Stress Reaction

Jesus said it, and I choose to believe it. I have to believe it really. To think anything else is to go deeper into the blackness and the pain that already surrounds me. The one comfort, the one spark of light is knowing that my mother is indeed in the arms of her Savior. That she feels no more pain, or sadness, or loss. She is perfected in peace.

I carry her with me always. When I look in the mirror, it’s her body I see. I have her curly hair, her laugh, and her hands. It is through her that I learned to love the craft of those hands. She taught me to knit and to sew, to love reading and learning.

She took me to church and because she did, I have the assurance, in the midst of my pain, that I will spend eternity with her. This, above all else, is the greatest gift she has ever given me.

My heart is broken.

There is a stone on my chest. Or maybe it’s in my chest. Where my heart should be. It sits, heavy enough to make shallow the breath, until the moment comes when I realize that I haven’t breathed, and I must, though the effort is great.

If I were an artist, I would paint the world as I see it now. I walk, into the wind, and I talk and smile and even laugh at times. The trees are green and beautiful on my drive to work. It has rained almost every day since my mother died, but when the rain stops, the sky is a brilliant blue with snowy white clouds. But if I were an artist, I would have to wash the whole picture with the grey of the rain, even when the sun is shining.

There are more birds in my backyard than I ever noticed before. I sit, sometimes for an hour or more and watch them as they fly and sing and build their nests. There is so much life there.

Life all around me, but not touching me, until suddenly grief rears up and tears at my heart and my lungs and my thoughts until I feel as if I might drown. And then I breathe again.