Revisiting November 2012

[Guest TooSoon]

So there is this huge blow-up going on at work that would bore you and is too involved to explain but last night someone asked me to dig through my old emails to see if I could document an incident that took place in November 2012.  I found them and was at first elated that I'd be able to contribute something to the case a colleague is trying to make but then I read them.

 

My husband's decline started in October 2012 when we learned his cancer had metastasized from his brain to his spine and we knew the gig was up.  From that point things started happening very fast and the things that started happening were truly beyond the pale traumatizing.  I was still working, if not full time, then close through it all, right up until his death - in an unrelenting series of "WTF?!" scenarios while putting on a good face throughout, until he died on February 3, 2013.. 

 

Anyway, when I read the email that I wrote to this person in November 2012, I couldn't believe what I'd written, completely over the top and truly a reflection of the emotional state I was in.  I can't believe I was working then.  How did I do that?  From the email, not very well apparently.  WHY was I working, more importantly?  I also realized the degree to which I have shuttered so much of that time and those events away, forgotten things and the chronology of things and the role I played in things going on at work during those months (I called a colleague who recounted the order of things for me because I no longer remembered - I had put a contentious meeting in September 2013 when it actually happened in March 2013). 

 

I'm not sure I have a point here.  None of this upset me but I was just surprised by the trickiness of memory and how little of it I remembered.  Must be some sort of survival mode mechanism.  Either that or I just had no idea the degree to which I was completely on autopilot for so very long. 

 

The good news, I suppose, is it all seemed like ancient history.  Like I'm many degrees removed from it all now.  Odd.

[marjoe]

Oh, I totally get this. It was a similar experience for me. My husband and i were in business and I had to take over everything..with no preparation, nothing. And had to put on the "face" every day, as well. It was agonizing. I think autopilot explains it pretty succinctly. I had a conversation with my best friend, who lives 400 miles away, about this very thing. She recounted conversations we had just before he died, and I swear to G-d, I have no memory of them. I also was writing a weekly food story for a local newspaper - when I read them, now, I think - who in hell wrote this? My doppelganger?

 

You don't have to have a point, TooSoon, you're just remembering and writing, as I am.

[ieh21]

Yes emotions play tricks on us. When I went back to work, five months after the death, I'd be at business-related events and business acquaintances would come up to chat and offer their condolences. Instead of politely nodding and talking about something else, I would go on about grieving, my DH's experience with cancer etc. i dont know why I thought this was all appropriate and I dont know how I got through life at work. People around me must have been really feeling awkward!

[canadiangirl]

I hear you, TooSoon.  I remember no details, just being in absolute misery, getting the baby dropped off and leaving DH home alone and going to my job in a fog of hell.  I was able to stop months before he died-I couldn't take it any more, even if I were let go--and went back 6 weeks after, which was way too soon.  Like ieh21, definitely had inappropriate "too much information" (TMI) conversations with my poor colleagues, but they are a compassionate bunch.  Even the last two years (today) since his death have been such a fog I cannot figure out if I took a few days off in September 2015 or September 2014.  Then there is just the hit chronic stress takes on cognitive function and memory in general.  So glad we're still standing and that you feel distance from that past.  I am sorry you are having to re-examine this and there's a stressful situation at work.

[Guest TooSoon]

I know, right?  I went back one week after his death (!?) and taught, I believe, 4 (!?) courses that semester.  I have no clue how I managed that and no recollection of any of it, only a vague sense of a few major events that happened at work, though now I am aware there is an email legacy if ever I want to be reminded....  Frankly, I don't remember much of what went on at home either those first few months.  This has to be a blessing.  Based on the email I read the other night, it is definitely a blessing....I can only imagine what people were thinking and now very much understand why so many people fled.  But most of my colleagues stood by - still stand by - that speaks volumes about them.  I'm so fortunate in that regard. 

[kjs1989]

Oh my gosh. Can I relate to this. I am sure this "fog" is why the advice given to those in early grief is to not make any major decisions. I still shudder, too, at old emails I have come across, things I have no memory of writing.

 

I am so thankful that D surrounded himself with smart and trustworthy people, as these advisors carried me through  and protected me from business and personal decisons I was being encouraged to make by D's brother of all people, which in hindsight definitely were not in my or my kids' best interests, but his own. I was such a "yes" girl to him the first six months or so. When the fog started to lift a bit and the advice of my attorney, accountant, and financial advisor began to click,  I was able to assert myself and make decisions best for me and the kids, not the inlaws. I am so thankful.

 

 

 

[Gabzmom]

I totally get this.  DH passed unexpectedly and I returned to my business within two weeks.  In my mind, I had no choice. 

 

I am the type that has to work through things.  I remember people; I remember places; I don't remember the conversations.  I was on autopilot and I had a 13 year old to focus on.

[MauiMermaid]

You are such a great writer, (((TooSoon))). I still feel like I'm in survival mode. Auto-pilot getting me through.

 

Seeing "2012" is a terribly painful reminder for me. It was the last year of his life as he passed away just after New Year's. I can't articulate how it pierces my heart exactly. I guess I should be grateful for those last 365 days of memories but it instead makes me conjure up sand quickly moving through the hour glass. The last Christmas, the last birthday, the last anniversary trip... when I see 2012 "anything", he was still HERE. Soon to be gone. It's all so surreal.

 

Thank you for sharing and sorry I rambled a bit! Hugs to all xoxoxo