it’s coming

I made myself keep moving today. I cleaned my entire house. Dusted everything. Kitchen. Bathrooms. Floors. Laundry. I felt the need to change my Christmas lights to solid purple. I was going to wait for Monday but I needed to do it now.

I hate cleaning. And I hate dusting. And I hate dusting even more now. I cried the first time I dusted Bryce’s shelves. Because it hit me that he’d been gone for long enough for dust to accumulate on his urn. 

I almost cried again dusting today but I was too numb. 

I can feel it. 

The anxiety. Just like when it first happened. 

Restless but yet no energy. Exhausted. Mentally drained. Brain fog. My body hurts. I feel it flaring my chronic pain. 

I have to work the two days surrounding “the day” and I am dreading it. I know I will have to pull out my old mask. The one I wore two years ago to hide how I was really feeling. To hide the overwhelming anxiety I was feeling. The feeling like I was crawling out of my skin. 

I would go to work and break down on my way there. Wear the mask at work. Take multiple bathroom breaks just to catch my breath. Feel so overstimulated all day at the noise and talking and acting and coworkers with too much energy and happiness. After work, I’d climb in my car and cry and feel like I’d need to just tear my skin off because it was crawling. 

The anxiety was just too much. 

In less than 48 hours, 2 years ago, it will be when I last saw him. I was leaving for work early in the morning as he was sitting in his car after a night shift. He was decompressing and the music was loud. I texted to tell him to turn it down so he wouldn’t piss off the neighbors because it was only 4:30am. I asked why he wasn’t going inside to sleep because it was cold outside. He said he was comfortable and just relaxing and he’d go inside in a few. Our cars were side by side. I still wish I’d have gotten out of my car to give him a hug. I told him I loved him and I left. 

I didn’t see him again. 

Not for a week until I saw him in an open coffin. Looking like my baby…but also not. 

During that day, there was a text here and there. 

Excitement when he texted about getting a free sweatshirt and a ham from work. 

Then another later telling me that he was going to go on a ride with friends before Rory came over later that night. 

That was the last time we spoke. 

2 years. 

For 2 years, I have continued to live. 

I have worked. Slept. Bought a home. Taken care of his dog. Loved his friends. Continued to love his then girlfriend as my daughter, as she always will be. Gone to work. Continued with my masters program. Dated on and off and then now found my boyfriend. Make friends. Lost friends. Lost family. I have laughed. I have cried. I have lost weight. I have gained weight. I have disassociated. I have helped Carter through losing both his big brother and his dad in less than a year. 

But I don’t know how. 

How do I live without my baby boy? 

Sometimes I feel like I can live despite the pain. Sometimes I just feel like collapsing. Sometimes I just cry. Sometimes I feel like I need to cry but the tears just don’t come. I’m just numb. I feel lost. I want to hear that goofy laugh. I need to hear him. I need him near me. 

How am I supposed to outlive my child? How do I do this? I’ve been taking it one day at a time for almost two years and I still don’t know how to do it. It is literal pain in my chest that just doesn’t stop.