Today, the sun is shining but I can't feel it: A Quiet Ordinary Grief

I told my massage therapist a few days ago, 'this week is going to be big. I feel like things are just snowballing into each other.' I preemptively knew, that my schedule was not allowing any time to be still. Grandma's funeral was on Monday, followed by three days at work and now time has suddenly stood still but it's a parenting day with G and I don't feel like I'm 'coping' very well.

I've felt the need to have a good cry all day and all I can leak out are a few miserable tears. G and I cuddled up on the couch this morning to look at pictures of Charlie after I realised I needed some time to mourn him. Maybe a sense of discomfort made her say some silly things like, 'he looks like poo, Mum' and then gloated about the fact that she got the teddy that was given to him in the hospital because he'd died and now it's hers. She doesn't mean these things in the way I've taken them but they hurt.

The sun is shining outside, the TV is on inside. It goes against my vision of motherhood and childhood but my energy feels sapped. I know it's either that, or feel my irritation continue to rise. I question whether it's hormonal and maybe, to an extent, it is because I notice when I'm ovulating, sometimes I miss Charlie even more. A little clip of a baby breastfeeding popped up on my Instagram and it made my heart lurch. I paused, staring at the baby suckling for a minute, then swiped out hurriedly. Just bearing it quietly feels like enough right now. I miss him and having a baby.

I don't have any insights today. I don't have a revelation, a passion, a noticeable unravelling. I'm simply tired. The unfairness of it, the drama, the intense grief, the terror of the memories are all still simmering but I can't bring them to the surface. And so I sit here, with a quiet sadness. There are days where I think, this new normal is bearable but I feel so tired of trying to bear it.

In terms of 'life,' there are so many 'goals' teetering on the precipice. A trip to Sydney this weekend, I booked flights to Nepal last night, the marathon is less than a month away, our forever home is nearing completion and again, I feel so robbed of the joy of all of these things. It feels flat.

I know, for me, contributing factors to this flatness are not having exercised since Sunday, not allowing myself time for creativity and rest, not spending time with Charlie. I knew this may not end well but I blinked and found myself in this pit. I'll sit here for a bit but I'm too aware that the sun is, annoyingly, still shining, time is still passing and it feels a waste to be sitting down here. So, there's that guilt too.

Anyway, this post feels representative of my state today. Scattered, tired, lacking lustre, creativity. It just sits alongside my quiet sadness. I miss him. I hate that I had to dust his photo frames, that I must wipe the cobwebs from his plaque in his garden, that his name on his painted rock is flaking off. I hate that today, the grief seems to want to simmer quietly because in some ways it felt easier when it screamed inside my body and there was no option but to let it out.

But that's it today. I miss you, Charlie. Life feels quiet, hollow, sapped without you in it. And yet, some may argue, I didn't know you before. But I did. I have always known you. I missed you before you were even conceived but having you for a little while was both a miracle and a cruel taste of what was to be taken. I love you, my bear.