The grief is loud, so I am quiet

The entire year of 2024 has honestly been some bullshit. There has been just…unimaginable loss. Over and over and over.

But this past month probably takes the cake.

Putting my dog down after spending the last 17 years of my life with her was absolutely awful. It was heartbreaking in ways that you just can’t even put into words. And I didn’t have the words to try.

So I shut down.

I didn’t talk about it with either of the 2 new therapists I met for the first time last week because it wouldn’t have mattered. It wasn’t real therapy, the first time you meet a new therapist it’s more like an interview. There aren’t feelings or emotions or depth.

Now here we are again, finding ourselves on a Monday.

And I’m struggling. Mondays used to feel like hope. Now they just feel like loneliness.

I’m struggling with the loss of everything that felt safe and hopeful. I don’t feel like I have that place anymore. That known, safe thing where I can go and be me. Be real. Have feelings and talk about the stuff that just fucking hurts.

I’ve definitely felt myself shutting down and pulling back lately. From everyone.

There’s so much going on that I just don’t even know how to talk about.

On top of it all, my husband is having some really scary and possibly serious health concerns related to the fracture in his face he suffered back in April from the first of 2 car accidents. Yeah. That paragraph in it of itself is too much to handle. Now just add it on top of everything else.

Right now life is scary and unpredictable. I feel really alone in dealing with it because of the fact that my biggest support system (my therapist for the past 10 years) decided to be done.

A new therapist doesn’t feel hopeful right now. It feels foreign, and not in a good way. It just feels wrong.

And the fear of now losing my husband in any number of possible scenarios (physically, mentally/memory or otherwise due to these new absolutely crazy health concerns) feels just insane to go through and process without her.

So, yeah. The grief is loud right now. There’s been a lot of loss. And I’m just struggling to find my voice again through it all.

But I know I need to keep showing up. And keep writing. Because the one thing I can’t do is lose my voice altogether.

But I feel like I’m already starting to.