In the past week, the grief has been physically affecting me. I expected as much in the lead-up to the one-year anniversary of my mother's death. I'm struggling to move my body, to get out of bed, to go from one room to the other. My chest hurts. I even get short of breath.
The loneliness is one of the hardest parts. In my daily life, I am alone. All my friends are online. I'm not held. No one holds my hand. There is no one to talk to. I have endured this grief completely on my own.
Other than a few close friends, no one online has checked in on me. I've done the podcast for a decade and spoken about my mother's death on it in the last year. Barely anyone has reached out or asked how I'm holding up.
It's actually quite shocking, and it's why I left Instagram and other social media. It's why I have walled myself off, reduced my online presence, and stopped posting except on this blog. I have no community, no support. I learned the limits of online "connection."
A message would not have solved anything, but to know I was thought of during the worst time of my life would have made some kind of difference. What a soulless world this is now. So cold and uncaring. At least that's been my experience of it.
I'll keep surviving somehow. I will drag my body through each day. I will try to recover from the nightly crying sessions that leave me hollow. I can't believe this is my life—that I am this alone. It's terrifying. But I've lived it before.
After my father's death, no one helped me and my mom. We only had each other. So, I've known for a long time that I am worthless in this world, that I am not deemed worthy of care and support for whatever reason. It's why I go to art. Art never abandons me or lets me down.
I actually developed heart issues after my dad died. I haven't talked much about it, but I still suffer physically from the trauma of his death. I could never get a diagnosis from doctors, as they dismissed my symptoms. Maybe I've had a broken heart this whole time. Maybe it's slowly killing me.