15. Coming Home - Revisited

Featured on "Facing Grief - The Podcast" August 19, 2020.

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Written Sunday, November 3, 2019 / Day 83 / Morning

In Volume 1, Essay #9, I wrote about coming home. Home was a toxic place at that point. A place to be endured since the very act of entering was a profound reminder of the emptiness and despair of my life.

Now at day 83 I can report that there has been a change.

When I come home now - there is no longer that breathtaking wave of awfulness that seemed to be waiting for me.

Coming home has now become - neutral. In grief, neutral is almost joyful.

Neutral because the lack of the overwhelming waves of emotions I do not want to experience is refreshingly absent. And that is quite welcome.

The heaviness has been lifted.

My wife and I always had this little thing we did when we came home. We opened the door and declared, “We’re home!!!”.

So most of this time - that has been one of those taunting memories. One of those memories that sees you coming and just can’t wait to work you over for a while.

Now, when I open the door I say, “I’m home!!!” - and it doesn’t sting a bit.

So in that sense - coming home has improved.

As I wrote in the original essay, coming home is the epicenter of my progress. And using the original measurement - I no longer cry when I enter the house. Not right away or even after I am home for a while. Things seem matter of fact in a general way.

Now don’t start celebrating. There is a perceptible sense of potential sadness everywhere. It’s just that now it is an element I can invoke if I’m not careful - so I try not to encourage anything that would activate it.

But those waves of sadness and despair are no longer there when I come home. I go through whatever routines of coming home there are sort of matter-of-factly. So that is an actual good thing.

Coming home is also the yardstick of my grief. So if grief can be measured - I no longer receive any attention from the “welcoming committee” of grief and it’s friends.

In that sense this is an amazing moment. Coming home has become - sort of “normal”.

The hope I hear in the background - the hope that I have heard through its tiny, tiny voice over these past months has just become slightly louder.

I can’t wait for the day I come home and find that hope has moved in with me.