Is This Living?

 Weekends are always hard now. Mark and I were always on the go and doing things together. He was truly “my person” and I was his. There was no one we enjoyed being with more than each other. The house was always filled with noise. People, dogs and the background noise of any sporting event that happened to be on. Football, baseball, soccer or Formula One. It didn’t matter. My husband enjoyed all sports. The competition, the sportsmanship. He could talk about any sport, with anyone. He could discuss college basketball with his brother in law and an hour later be discussing racing with his nephew. 

Now, the house is silent. I rarely have the television on and the dog that made all the noise crossed the rainbow bridge to join Mark. The silence in the house echos the silence I feel internally. There is no joy. No laughter. No smiles. No hugs. I am merely existing. Doing the tasks that need to be done, but no more. I go through the motions of living. I get up, make my bed, get dressed and do whatever tasks need to be done. On automatic. 

I’ve gone through all of Marks things. His clothing no longer hang in the closet and his shoes are no longer next to mine. I’ve kept things that were special to Mark and things that instantly transport me to a memory of him. These items are in two boxes. Close at hand, but things that I can’t look at or touch without being utterly destroyed by waves of grief.  

I spend a lot of time sitting or lying in the dark. I wonder how I’m supposed to live the rest of my life without him. Tears still flow on a regular basis. I miss him terribly. He left a void in my life that can never be filled. I don’t wish this type of grief on anyone. It destroys you.