Good Grief

As I’m writing and editing this, it’s approaching the one-year anniversary of Dawn’s death. I lost my life partner, travel companion, adviser, and cheerleader for the second time in the almost thirty years we were together. I initially started to lose her ten years ago when we received a diagnosis that reshaped and controlled our lives until her death on Christmas Eve, 2022. Alzheimer’s.

As I try to think about where I am in the grieving process, it has to start back then-ten years ago. After hearing the doctor deliver that devastating diagnosis, I tried to learn as much as I could about the disease, how it progresses and the impact it may have on us as we lived our daily lives. I think that I hoped learning about it, going to seminars and classes would somehow makes things easier or at least insulate me a little from its effects. It didn’t.

The last couple of years were the worst. The joy she found in the things we did together had disappeared and her dimpled smiles were rare. The terrible disease was robbing me of her, and the subtle shadows of grief were becoming sharp and distinct. The pretending that today would be better than yesterday didn’t work anymore. Today was often noticeably worse than yesterday. My life and the grief I had accompanying my terrible loss was often overshadowed by the physical need to care for her and the resentment that it had come to this. I soldiered on but was a mess of conflicting emotions.

Dawn was placed in a hospice facility after falling hard and hitting her head a year ago. Her two sons and I tag teamed it so she was never alone in the facility for the eight days until she died. I was sitting next to her bed holding her hand when she took her last labored breath late on Christmas Eve. Even though I knew this was what would happen, I was stunned. Almost numb. I didn’t break into sobbing tears like in the movies. I remember kissing her and telling her she had a “great run”. I may have prayed; I probably did but I don’t remember.

I stayed with her for about another hour before I left for the drive back to my apartment over deserted and snow-covered roads. It was about 1 AM Christmas morning and I was glad I was totally alone and no one could see me.

The days before her funeral, which was delayed due to weather, the holidays, and travel considerations, weren’t rushed. Arrangements were made and her sons and I moved her things out of the care facility she had lived in for the last four months. I remember wondering if I was grieving “correctly”. I felt guilty that I had a sense of relief. Dawn’s torture and anguish were over as well as my ordeal of being a 24/7 caregiver. What did those feelings mean? Was I a bad person? Shouldn’t I be crying all the time? I was conflicted and just waited.

The funeral was a typical January winter day in Michigan: grey and cold. The mass was a fitting celebration. And then the casket was placed in the hearse, and she was gone. Really gone.

I don’t remember too much about the next few months. Close friends invited me up north for a few days and I flew to Tucson to see one of my daughter’s. My children were attentive and tried to make sure I was ok. I visited Dawn’s grave several times in the cold and mud, but I was never sure why. I felt physically weak, maybe from an ailment I fight made worse by my emotional drifting.

I began receiving mailings on dealing with grief from my parish, the hospice organization that cared for Dawn, and even the funeral home that handled the arrangements. I signed up for a weekend grief workshop. And all of the time I’m wondering: what am I supposed to be doing? Should I be crying more, praying more, avoiding people, making more trips to the cemetery or maybe just trying to be more pitiful?

But none of that fit. I’d been grieving losing her day by day for over nine years. I mourned her loss, but I was kind of tapped out. I wasn’t feeling as bad as I thought I should. I could tear up thinking of her and even sob over silly things like when I donated her home office chair she sat in while working all those years on her degrees. I had started missing her a little bit at a time years ago, but now all that incremental missing was over. Now I just missed her.

Good old Charlie Brown from the Peanuts comic strip used to say “Good Grief” often when he felt exasperated, or things were beyond his control. Things were seemingly way out of control but then, probably aided by the passing of time, I stumbled into “Good Grief”; not the Charlie Brown kind but the restorative, resolute kind. I resolved to always miss her but to always be thankful for our life together. I resolved not to dismiss the sad feelings, but to always remember the happiness she brought into my life. I resolved to not dwell on loss, but to remember how my life became much better after I met her.

When we were both still working, we would always kiss goodbye in the morning and if one of us was anticipating a difficult situation or decision that day, we would remind each other to face the day and its challenges with “courage, confidence and joy”. That often proved easier to say than implement but it was a regular affirmation we gave each other to remind us we were in this life together. I now don’t often remember those three words, but when I do, it brings a smile to my face. They remind me to cherish the memory but to always accept the new day and life with “courage, confidence and joy”.

So where does this rambling essay that is in need of a good editor leave me? Well, I still feel the need to visit Dawn for a good talk a couple of times a month and have even thrown a folding lawn chair in the back of the car to make the visits more comfortable. I look forward to visiting places that were special to us, not in a macabre way, but to have fun and relive pleasant times. I’ve rekindled old friendships and relationships which help me appreciate the present and look forward to tomorrow. I try not to canonize Dawn in my mind, but to remember her as always trying to do the best she could with what she had been given-sometimes successfully and sometimes, as with all of us, regretting that she hadn’t done better. I think I’ve progressed to “Good Grief”; the kind that smiles more often than cries, remembers and appreciates things as they were and looks forward to tomorrow.