Anxiety Thursdays

Babe,

For some reason, there’s this pattern where on Thursdays, I wake up with anxiety.  Not sure why Thursday is a significant day for always waking up riddled with anxiety and a stark realization that you are not here anymore.  But, for the last few weeks, I can’t seem to shake Anxiety Thursday.  I also had a hard time sleeping last night (maybe because it was officially your one month deathversary; yes, it’s a word these widows online have been using to call the anniversary of their husband’s death.  Online widows?! WTH am I talking about?! is probably what you are thinking, but that topic warrants another letter in itself! stay tuned...)  But on Thursdays, for some reason it strikes really hard that you are not here when I wake up, and I just lay in bed frozen, paralyzed, unable to move.  The thought of it just makes me sick to my stomach and I just get immobilized; scared to move or take a step without you.  It takes me about ½ a day before I can finally get out of bed.  (Yes babe, don’t worry,  I ended up working from home today since an hour commute one way with anxiety and lack of sleep probably wouldn’t have been a good idea - I’m grieving, not crazy - at least not anymore - I think!)  

Well, the start of Anxiety Thursday was the week of your memorial service.  I was so anxious and lost that I finally decided that I had to keep writing you letters to help ease my pain and anxiety.  On that day, I also purchased a journal to chronicle by new journey (yes, very SY of me).  The journal has a quote by Vivian Green on the cover that's going to be my new mantra for young widowhood...    

“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass.  It’s about learning how to dance in the rain…”

It’s it great? I love it as my new mantra in this next phase of my life.  It reminds me of what you always say to me when my crazy planning and / or kon-mari mode gets to be too much for you, “SY - RELAX!!  Sometimes you just can’t plan or control everything.  You  just have to ‘roll with it.’  Now come watch TV with me.”  So babe, that’s what I will try to do - just roll with it and not try to go to far ahead of where I need to be - I will continue to just dance in the rain until it stops raining.  

Second Anxiety Thursday was last week.  I just woke up with anxiety and just kept thinking of how I would manage the rest of my life  without you.  How could I go on with this life that was built for two on my own.  It was also the day after I decided to start my blog, so in the back of my mind, I also thought maybe you were giving me anxiety since I could hear you saying, “Com’on SY, why you telling people my business like that?!”  I know if you were here you wouldn’t like the blog idea.  You like to internalize your pain and struggles whereas I like to wear my emotions on my sleeves.  We definitely have different ways of dealing with our pain and struggles in life.  Well, hopefully, you can forgive me for putting our business out there - but then again, maybe this can be your retribution for making me a young widow and now we’re even. :)  

Third Anxiety Thursday is today.  I just woke up feeling anxious and paralyzed that you are not here with me anymore and I’m still trapped on Earth 2 without a “breech” in the universe or a way of getting back to Earth 1.  I remember all those Flash episodes we watched where he tries to go back in time to save his mom.  Everytime he goes back in time, he ends up causing some sort of rift or catastrophic event in the current timeline, but he never learns and he just keeps going back in time to try and save his mom every season.  Each season he does it, I turn to you and say, “Hasn’t he learned anything?  Why does he keep going back in time to try and save his mom when he knows it will always be worse when he comes back to the current timeline?”  And I started to lose interest in the show this season.  I guess I never understood, until now, the pain he felt when he loss his mother at such a young age.  If I had his abilities, I would always go back in time to try and save you; even if it meant that something catastrophic happens in this timeline.  I would be like the Flash, I would never learn and just continue going back in time to try and save you; just so I wouldn’t have to go through this pain and emptiness anymore.  

Well babe, in the course of writing this letter to you and trying to figure out why Thursday was significant in always signaling this stark reality of a life without you, I realized that Thursday, Jan 11th, was the day I met with the funeral home to plan your funeral.  I guess, Thursday is significant afterall.