Have you ever enjoyed silence? It's nothing like the absence of sound. Real silence, silence that is so quiet you can almost feel the buzzing of sound waves around your body and in your ears. So quiet you can hear your breath and feel each body part as if they are floating separately in space. You feel your little hairs moving in front of your face when they graze against your skin by the movement of your breath. You are present.
How many times have you experienced this with someone you love sitting directly next to you? For me, it was every time I was with my Grandma Lou. I have only had one person in my life that I could share this with, one person that enjoyed the value of silence more than I did—that person was her. She would sit twiddling her thumbs together, as she always did, with her hands intertwined on her lap. We sat next to each other on my living room couch while facing the glass doors that opened up to my backyard. We would look outside in silence, occasionally laughing at the squirrels that found their way onto the porch. I have never felt so close to someone more than when I was with her in these moments; we sat and listened to each other’s breath. We sat and listened to how alive we were in silence, together. Those were the best moments I had with her. Sharing something we loved, being with each other, and feeling each other’s presence without having to say one word. That is the thing I miss the most.
The missing comes in stages, though, that is what you have to know. You think you are okay until you are reminded of the things you shared with them and, even more so, when you think of the things you can no longer share. I think about this every time I hear silence, real silence. What I would give to hear the sound of her breathing next to me again. The hard part is not the missing, the hard part are the stages you go through all while you are missing this person who has passed.
First, you are mad. You are mad at the things you couldn’t do to stop them from dying. You are mad you didn’t try harder to get them help, to push them to take care of themselves. You are mad at yourself, God, for taking them away, and most of all you’re mad that you didn’t realize you were too angry at the world to spend time with them while they were still here. You have to stop this anger. We are angry because we wish things didn’t happen and because we think there was something in our power to stop it—there isn’t. We cannot be selfish and wish them back when things are already as they are. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be angry. Hell, I cursed and screamed. Just don't let it consume you.
In hopes of clouding our anger, we cry. A stage of "zombification", no eating, no sleeping, it almost seems logical to deprive yourself of all the things your loved one couldn’t have in the hours of their death. We strip our lives away from ourselves to prove how much we love the person who passed. Sacrificing ourselves, when in reality, they would never want that for us. When you feel like this, remember to love yourself the way that loved one loved you. You are in pain but use your family to lean on. They are in tears too; they are the only ones to understand your pain.
By confiding in your family, you will realize two things: one, your family is irreplaceable and so is the love your loved one gave you in order to have this amazing family in your life and, two, you will learn to accept their death. You acknowledge all of the things that once triggered your tears—the sound of a song you used to listen to together, the smell of a sweater you never washed from the last time they wore it, the silence you picture their voice in. You will be able to enjoy these things without being angry and drowning in sadness. Soon, instead of them feeling like weights that drag you down and can only be lifted by that person's presence, they will become things that lift you in your remembrance of them.
And even through your acknowledgment, you will have moments of sadness and anger, I can promise you that. But, I can also promise you, you will mostly feel love in the end. Love for the times you shared with that person and the things they taught you. Know that it is okay to still miss them and to never be over their loss. Loss is not something we “get over,” it is something we carry on with us. Losing something shows us how to deal with the next loss in our lives. It is not how quickly we get over our pain that proves our resilience, but it is how we morph our pain into something that we can learn to love. We don’t forget about the losses of our loved ones, we just learn to accept them as things that make us realize where we came from, what we care about, and what we should care about. No matter how far away the day of their passing was, they are someone that isn’t there in our lives anymore, and that is not something to force away. It is something to realize that we had the blessed opportunity to have had. And, even though they are not here, know that it’s okay to still talk to them as if they are.
Lastly, it is important to realize the things that are everlasting. There are things that we cannot change and there are things that we must accept about this unchanging certainty that everything is never permanent and that this person will not be in the world we live in today. But, what we can nourish ourselves with, is that there are things in every relationship that are everlasting. Take these things with you as you go on, day-by-day in your new life without this person. For me, this is silence.
Now, months after her passing, I find myself closing my eyes and breathing. My little baby hairs are grazing my forehead lightly. I hear the same subtle buzz of the air around me and I picture her there, next to me. Holding her hands together on her lap with her eyes closed. I swear I can almost feel her right next to me. And we are there, and we are everlasting.
