The Tornado of Grief and Loss

Sometimes words escape me and I can't really describe how I feel and yet I have this need to get it out of me.  At times like that, I turn to drawing, albeit terrible drawings, to try to sort out how I feel.

The day before my husband was diagnosed with leukemia was a perfect day.  (Okay, maybe not perfect.)  But the months leading up to his diagnosis were perfect.  He had just come home from his second twelve month deployment to Afghanistan.  We were moving to a new duty station from which he would not deploy for at least three years.

We watched an episode of Monk most nights together.

We were finally enjoying time together without the angst of another deployment hanging over our heads.

In short, life was good.

And then he was diagnosed with leukemia and it seemed as though a tornado had begun to rip through our lives.

I was shocked and the tornado only seemed to grow larger.

And once the tornado was done ripping apart the fabric of our very lives, I was left alone still wondering what had just happened.

And I still wonder.

And then people asked me how I am doing, and I still could not believe what I had just seen and what remained of my life, this awful terrible mess.

And I can see the mess, but I don't think anyone else can see it because they say things like, "You're over this now, right?" and "You should be okay by now."

And then they leave and I see this life that was once so beautiful and now just a terrible mess, and I wonder, "How could you even say that to me?"

How can you not see this mess?!

How could you think that everything would be okay by now, just a few months afterward?

Why can't you see that my life has been irrevocably changed?

Why can't you see that it takes more than a few months to rebuild a lifetime of dreams?

Why can't you see that I can't just sweep this under the rug?

Why can't you see what I see?