“Recovery is a story that never ends”- Linsey, one of the greatest friends I have made in the past year through work but also in any work setting (and diving into some of my work “trauma” is a story for another day).

Sharing in the now is hard… but she did that and live… AND via our job! AND about something that is hard and forever- AND she did that.

Which is what inspired me to go full force with this series of uncensored writing and publishing it (unfiltered, not holding back, whatever word you throw in), and I thank her for that.

So I write this in its purest form. Without editing and formatting in its original state. Because that is the issue I have… (more details at the end and with a probable landing page). I’m not hiding the kitchen timer writing.

“You like the nicer nurses, you make the best of a bad deal
I just pretend it isn’t real

And I hate to make this all about me
But who am I supposed to talk to?
What am I supposed to do
If there’s no you?” – Taylor Swift, Soon You’ll Get Better

To get to the point-

Daddy, I miss you. You are the example for me with voting. When you escaped hospice to vote in the 2004 election, less than two weeks before you passed away.

Daddy. I really do miss you.

I know it’s technically been so long. But I also know after the summer heat and humidity became less extreme, it felt like my seasonal affective disorder in the summer wasn’t lessening. The people who heard from here heard things that might worry them.

But daddy, it feels like I’m back in middle and high school before therapy that was actually for me in college. and I know it took so long before I grieved. I know I blocked it all out. So maybe I would have realized it earlier?

That even though I love the fall, it can technically be the hardest time of year for me. That as a kid after coming back from camp in early August, my fears of not getting my usual camp letters came true- there was bad news.

You had cancer. and the news was already bad. But we chased specialists anyways. We didn’t know where it was. You had a few months to live.

I was supposed to deal with it during a certain timeline. I was supposed to embrace certain counseling- and a counselor my mom was already seeing right away. I was supposed to want a male mentor to obviously skip lunch in middle school because obviously I wasn’t normal. I was supposed to write about it as my life changing experience in that same school year for a class. I was supposed to go to a weekend camp for kids who had lost a parent that spring.

and the forcing of it made me hate these concepts. But when I started to really need it- it wasn’t there. I also had to be the adult in most situations- it was on me to be on top of things and bite my lip.

So the end of July through early December became a dark and hard time every year, I dreaded the fall.

Eventually, I had the chance the grieve. I got therapy for me and not for others. I got the medication I should have always had.

I enjoyed fall again- it really is my favorite time of the year.

But this year- with the pandemic- I didn’t catch- well remember the heaviness I used to feel. Of course it presents itself a little differently- but it became stronger- the heaviness of fall. I was supposed to hold the weight of figuring out my dad’s birthday and when he passed away- which is a little over a month away from that.

Plus there are so many other things with this pandemic. But I guess we feel things a bit more? and it’s not our fault- it’s not backtracking- it is this situation. I kept blaming myself for not being like I usually am- even with the pandemic view. But the pandemic adds a little extra to things.

I’m proud of myself for working through this now instead of running away- instead of waiting until after my birthday and when you passed away (5 days after).

But daddy, I miss you- and I am getting by- but it’s harder. But it’s a feeling and situation I have been through- I just didn’t want to remember it. I was feeling like I was almost on top of it with it the pandemic even when the heat arrived, and it felt harder. But then it didn’t fade- and the realization hit.

I miss you. I wish I didn’t have to be a shoulder for mom and lecture/educate her. I wish that my aunts and uncles- especially my godmother didn’t disown me- wait for me to come back when I decided to not be liberal or agnostic. But- it is where I am.

I didn’t have this blog or TRUE support system- I wonder what that would have done? But I press publish without obsessing or editing myself into fear- which is huge for me- I will eventually go in and edit the glaring issues but not until I post- so I won’t run away.

and this song from one of Taylor Swift’s recent albums gets me- EVERY TIME. I stop in my tracks and really listen to the lyrics.

these line gets me more than anything else-

“You like the nicer nurses, you make the best of a bad deal
I just pretend it isn’t real

And I hate to make this all about me
But who am I supposed to talk to?
What am I supposed to do
If there’s no you?

This won’t go back to normal, if it ever was
It’s been years of hoping, and I keep saying it because
‘Cause I have to”

This pandemic… it’s been hard to just write and let it out. I don’t want to start the domino effect I fear. But I am willing to write it out often, but then I go to perfect- to edit, to format, to add links and sources- but then I read my words and crawl back in my shell. Because I know- a big issue with expressing emotions is actually diving into and dissecting what is truly behind the anger. I’ll write and post with anger- won’t think twice. I can edit and not bat an eyelash if it’s something deeper. Happiness and anger- don’t bother me either. But how much of my anger has something more deep rooted.