Grief, like a hole in the heart.

The thing with losing someone is that you expect that you will get over it, in time. People tell you that you will and it’s just what you think will happen.

In my experience, however, you do not. You get around it, you get through the freshest waves of your grief. But you are never free of it. Instead, you get used to it. You learn to live with it. Your version of normal has changed forever because someone who was a significant part of your life isn’t there any more. There is now a time and a date to when you last created a memory with them in it.

The best way I can think of to describe it is to compare it to an injury. Imagine you got shot. Imagine a bullet went through your chest in such a way that it missed all major parts. Imagine, also, that the bullet was so hot that it seared the skin as it passed through you. Imagine that, somehow, this bullet has created a neat hole that goes right through you. The skin around it is sealed, you are in no danger from it. However, the pain is excruciating. A bullet has literally ripped through your body and burned it’s way through your flesh. It will take some time to heal and to stop hurting. You might fight off infections, debilitating pain and shock for weeks or months.

You might spend months in a world that seems to have no colour or solidity. You feel tethered here by routine. You go through the motions.

Nothing seems quite as real as it should but you get on with it because, eventually, your flesh will heal. You will be left with a neat hole that goes right through your body. You will need to adapt to it, to get used to it. Do you dress to hide it? Keep it covered in shirts and one piece swim suits and never mention it? Maybe you will do that for a time. Then one day, you might not. You might let it show, you might talk about it. You might have finally learned to accept that hole that runs through you. It’s now just another part of your body. People seeing it doesn’t make you feel bad, anymore. It’s now just a part of who you are. You can’t ever really look at it without remembering how much it hurt, but you accept that of course it was going to hurt- how could it not? You have learned to live with the memory of the pain and you have learned to live with the way it changed you.

Grief is like that. Only the changes you adapt to might not be as obvious as a hole through your body. It’s more of a proverbial hole in the heart. Once you get through that first part, the shock and the searing pain, then healing can start. But don’t expect to be the way you were before. You won’t get over it- no matter what anyone says. You will, however, get around it. You’ll be okay. You will. It might take you 6 months. It might take you 6 years. There’s no rules, no fixed timeline, no right or wrong way to grieve. Colour returns. Laughter and love continue. You put your life back together around the hole that is left and you keep on living it.

I know this is true, because this week marks 7 years and you know what? I still really, really miss my Mum.