Yea, I’m ok

Someone asked me a few months ago how I was, I smiled, and made some smart comment about life then asked how they were. They never looked back. I sighed relief, because once again –I didn’t have to explain just how not ok I was. They ask me all the time “How are you?” and I keep saying my standard answer. I keep telling them that I am ok –how are you? And then eventually, they stop asking. Because they know my response will always be the same. I’m ok. I’m always ok. Because I always have chosen to believe that if I’m not –I will be. And that small glimmer of hope that someday, maybe, one day, somehow, I will be ok? Has gotten me through some dark moments.

I decided a while ago that when I was having a bad day –I was going to do something nice for someone else. I bought seven cups of coffee last week. I only drank one. I still don’t feel any closer to being ok.

For the most part, I ignore it. Whatever it is. I go out of my way to actively avoid it –because avoiding it is all I know how to do. I know that if I face it –head on like most assume I am doing, that there is no coming back. And quite frankly, back is the only direction I want to go. Back. To when life was somewhat ok.

Because the truth is that I am not ok.

I don’t say it because I want to draw all the attention to me, because I don’t. I would rather go see the dentist than have all eyes on me. I don’t say it because I think it will help –I know it won’t. If anything, it will only hurt worse. I don’t say it because I think I need to, or someone is making me. No, I say it because it’s true. And right now, I don’t know what is true and what isn’t. I need to start somewhere.

I miss them. I miss them all. I miss them all, so very much. I miss them all so much that sometimes I feel as if I just hold my breath, maybe just maybe the pain that is surging through my body will leave. I miss them so much that it feels as if I have a thousand volts of electricity racing through my body. I feel like I am holding an electric fence. Hugging a sting ray. I feel as though if my chest were to split apart –then maybe I would have some relief from the pain that is building inside.

…and I don’t understand.

I don’t understand how I am still able to wake up in the morning when all I want to do is just keep sleeping. I don’t understand how I am able to breathe when my breath has been taken away. I don’t understand how my heart can still go on beating, when my heart has been taken away. Multiple times. I don’t understand why I keep going, one foot in front of the other, when everything I ever worked so hard for, is gone. Just like that. No questions asked. No take backs. No do overs. Just gone. I don’t understand why people keep asking me if I am ok. I don’t know what they want me to say.

Because no. The truth is I am not ok.

I miss my wife. I miss my daughter. I miss my nephew.

But saying it doesn’t make it any better. It doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t change the facts. It doesn’t bring them back. Saying just how much it sucks and how badly it hurts to wake up every morning and face another day without the ones I love…does not change the facts. It isn’t anything new. It doesn’t help anyone.

So instead I keep waking up when all I really want to do is die. I keep smiling when all I want to do is cry, I keep saying I am ok, in hopes that one day it will be true…and I keep buying coffee for the person in line behind me in hopes of making maybe one person’s day a tiny bit better.

No, I am not ok. But I don’t know what else to do except fake it until one day –I can finally hold them all tight and never let them go.

Dave

We are goofy, smart, funny and wild. We get mad, are happy, and sometimes sad. We reminisce, love, and live. We are who we are, broken pieces being put into a new puzzle. But arent we all? Just pieces. Trying to fit in.