part 41

Imagine walking to your car. Just as you reach for the handle to open the door, someone jumps out and beats the shit out of you. After that, they leave you alone and you go on home. The next day, you are pretty jumpy when you go to your car, but nothing bad happens.

The third day, you are still kind of jumpy, but not as much as the day before. You reach for your door handle and someone jumps out and beats the shit out of you. The same thing happens the next day.

Circumstances have mandated your actions, and you have no choice and no alternative but to approach your car in the same way every day after work. No matter how beaten up you already are, or how hard you try to make yourself prepared, that person keeps jumping out and beating the shit out of you.

Then the weekend comes – a reprieve from walking to your car after work. So are the beatings of the previous week gone from your mind? Probably not. Also, someone has beaten the shit out of you three times in the past week – you have some healing to do.

By Monday, you are feeling a bit stronger, but the idea of going to work is very stressful because of the idea of getting the shit beaten out of you again when you go to your car that afternoon. There is a chance it could happen again, and there is a chance it will never happen again. You are still in a lot of pain from the previous week's beatings and the idea of those injuries recurring, or of getting newer injuries in other places, is very close to unbearable.

You try to rationalize  - you don’t know for sure that someone is going to beat the shit out of you, so you decide to go to work. But there is a possibility that someone might beat the shit out of you, and so you un-decide to go to work. Back and forth and back and forth and back and forth.

This goes on for weeks, and then months. The beatings and the fear of the beatings and the uncertainty of when a beating might or might not happen have probably gotten you pretty frazzled.

Now imagine that state of fear and uncertainty and anxiety and terrible injuries not yet healed, and multiply how you feel by 50. That is what it was like for me 24/7 pretty much my entire life.

After the memories of my dad’s abuse and other things he did began to make their way to my conscious awareness, you could take that same feeling and multiply it by 250. That is how I have felt 24/7 for the last three and a half years.

I’ve learned to function, to go about daily tasks, and even to laugh and experience joy in the company of that constant terror. But it’s still there.

Ok, now imagine that the person who has been jumping out and beating the shit out of you has been arrested and won’t be leaving prison for years. How do you feel? Now multiply that feeling by about 1,000, and that is what I feel like now that my dad is dead.

As I’ve said over and over, there definitely could be another shoe waiting to drop and I will not feel so positive and relieved about my dad being dead. But there have been shoes dropping all over the place for my entire life, and an entire shit-storm of shoes has dropped just in the past few years.

Now that my dad is dead, even if more shoes drop, I know they will be like ballet slippers, and not big clunky steel-toed work boots.

I keep wondering why it is so important to me that other people are okay with how I have reacted to my dad’s death. I mean, I know what I’ve been through, I know what he has done to me and to other people, and I know relief at his death is a very appropriate response for me to have. But I still wish more people could understand that, and could share those good feelings with me.

When someone is grieving for a person who has died, especially a family member or close friend, the other people around them surround the griever with understanding and empathy. They celebrate the deceased’s life and mourn their passing.

I want to celebrate my dad’s passing, because I’ve been mourning my own life and the dad he never was for years. I want other people to understand what I feel like knowing he is dead. I want to be able to have people surrounding me, showering me with joy and good tidings. I want to see people I haven’t seen in at least a week and say, “hey! My dad’s dead!” and not have it be terribly awkward.

I want a thoughtful neighbor to bring me lasagna or homemade macaroni and cheese that I can put in the fridge until I’m ready to eat it and then all I have to do is put it in the oven on 350 for half an hour. I want flowers. I want cards. I want sweet and thoughtful posts on my Facebook page.

Actually, I don’t like lasagna or homemade macaroni and cheese. And I know people do stuff like that because of how hard it is to go about life when you’re in so much pain. I also know how hard it is to go about life when I’m in so much pain, and I am really not in pain right now. I do like cards and flowers and sweet and thoughtful comments posted on my Facebook page, though.

My dad’s death is huge for me. It has changed my world forever. It is one of those before-this-happened-things-were-one-way and after-that-happened-things-are-another-way type of events.

Since I found out my dad died (nine or ten days ago), I have been falling asleep and then sleeping soundly all night and then waking up in the morning and then getting out of bed, all with little or no effort! Leaving my house has been exciting! Doing math homework just feels like doing math homework, and not like the survival of the human species is depending on me to interpret and explain Einstein’s theory of relativity to a Kindergarten class!

I FEEL GOOD! I FEEL SAFE!

Tears come to my eyes when I think of how scared I have always been, and how often I have wished he would just die already, and about how many other people he may be hurting at any given time.

But I’m not so scared now, and he did just die already, and no matter what he has done to me or anyone else, he will never be able to do it again, EVER.

So anyway. Maybe the other shoe will drop, blah, blah, blah. I honestly don’t anticipate it happening. Regardless, I think I will just do my best to enjoy this moment and quit harping over what I think other people might think I should think.

J