When I Sleep
It’s 2 am and I can’t sleep. I’ve been up since 7 am yesterday when the baby came in. I know he’ll be up and in my room again at the same time in just a few hours. Why can’t I sleep? Tonight anyway, it’s because I don’t want to get in my bed.
That’s a strange thing because I love my bed so much. It’s soft. It’s cozy, my favorite blanket calls me into its embrace, but the reason I don’t want to get in bed tonight is because it’s empty. I only hear the silent call of my blanket and that’s all that’s waiting for me in my bed tonight.
As much love as I have for my soft cozy warm blanket, the blanket that’s the only thing that’s brought me comfort since you left my bed empty Grant. The problem is, it's just a thing. It’s not you. You’re gone and so I don’t want to go to sleep and wake up to a bed still empty. It’s too painful.
It’s been 16 months and I thought this was past, but it came back to me tonight. The reminder of this emptiness tapped me on the shoulder tonight. As I turned my head to see who was there, it was the ghost of the pain from that first night you were gone. It was back. Which made me realize that for a time it had been gone.
That was peace in my life and now I know I don’t have it in this moment. When I went to bed that night you left for good, I just lay there in the dark, not knowing where you had gone and knowing for sure that you’d never lay down next to me again.
That was the tap on my shoulder that asked, “Do you remember?” Oh yes I do. It’s a reminder I’d prefer not to have, but is here nonetheless. So as much as I’ve done to start a new life, move to a new neighborhood and a new house; there are things I know I can’t escape even if I change everything around me.
What is in me won’t change unless I do that work to change me. So here I am awake, staring at my bed, still not wanting to climb in, yet knowing if I don’t tomorrow will be hard. It’s harder and harder the longer I resist the sweet rest of sleep that renews me to take care of the kids you left.
I need the sleep to take care of the house you left, the life you left, the business you left and all the things you left behind that are now my responsibility, fully. None of it is shared anymore. And these things don’t wait. They don’t wait for me to feel good enough to wake up rested after a late night.
They don’t wait for me to finish grieving your death. They don’t wait for me to shower, get dressed or have a moment to myself. They start the moment the first little person wakes up and from there on out, it’s a scramble to keep up with all you left behind. But for now, my heart is hurting enough to keep me from what’s best for me.
I know it. I don’t want it, but I’m indulging it tonight, because I’m feeling it. And feeling means I’m alive. It means that I’m still here and wishing I was with you, but knowing being here with our boys is where I need to be. So I’m indulging in the feeling, cause when I feel, the hardest thing thing to do is feel it.
Only after I feel it, then I can let the feeling pass through me and I know it won’t stay forever and that’s the part that brings the relief. If it starts and if I stop it, it doesn’t leave. I’ve done it many times. I thought I’d gotten past this one, but that little tap on the shoulder reminded me this is far from over.
So I sit here with red eyes and a tired body, looking at my bed, quite, still and empty, knowing that when I get in it, I’ll rest. When I wake up, it’ll be just as it looked when I got into it. Only changing when I change it. The only movement will be mine. I’m the only one here. I thought I’d gotten over that.