The Bridge

[mfh]

It's a bridge, this forum.

When one loses a spouse the person they relied on for so much disappears in an instant, even if years of dis-ease preceded that death. Until the very moment of Bill's last breath, and even though he was not able to communicate except with his eyes and previous to that could not really track my words...he was there. He was there to attend to, to snuggle up with, to embrace. And I talked to him even if I did not know if he could even hear me...I could feel his heart beat and see his chest rise and fall with the spirit of life-his breath, the breath that breathed life into me. He was there when I left and there when I came home. Even if he could not respond, I knew he loved me and was receiving love from me. When I wrote a poem, I read it to him believing he could hear and comprehend. Sometimes he could. When I went to the store and bumped into so and so, I told him about it. When I was sad, I shared my sadness and when he could no longer tell me his sadness, I said it for him...for I knew so well what he was feeling. "I know you love me, Bill. I know it is hard for you to see me tired and taking care of you. I love taking care of you. I know you want to die and though I will miss you like I miss my own breath and soul or more, I hope your death comes soon so you can be peaceful again."

When that exhalation happened, that final exhalation, there was no Bill in that body. His spirit was lifted though it also stayed and still does surround me, his energy a part of mine. But there was no one to hear my poems, feelings, comings and goings...he was gone...in an instant....the longest instant in my life. Oh, I tell him all I want to share but though I believe he hears me, there is no response and so...I go to the bridge.

The bridge is here. I walk it over the river of emptiness and loss. I walk it to get to the other side of that raging river that carried Bill away. Stopping half way over, I share my pain and sorrow and someone on the bridge puts his or her arms about me and says, "I hear you. I am listening. Tell me fearlessly for I understand this loss of yours and I care about you." When I come home from a concert, I go to the bridge and see who is standing over their own raging river so I can reach out to them as they did for me just hours before. If I fall into those treacherous waters, someone drags me out, pumps water out of my lungs, and tells me they understand my pain...though they can't understand all of it. No one can.

This bridge helps remove a bit of the loneliness. Friends no longer want to hear every poem, every story, every detail of what I did today. And though I tell Bill so much of it, the silence that bounces back to me only serves to increase my emptiness. Until one loses a spouse they will never ever know how silent this silence. They will never know how empty the house becomes though he is every where I turn. I could never have imagined this if I tried a thousand years.

And so the bridge...I do not know yet what is on the other shore. I never get that far. I get glimpses of what I want to find there if I ever arrive but certainty alludes me. Each time I come to the bridge, I come with a bit more healing and am healed. I go to the bridge and walk part way and stand and look beneath me to the waters that have the power to carry me away were it not for the bridge solid beneath my feet, railed to prevent a fall into the treacherous waters of loss and pain and grief that I do know will never ever go away but which rarely totally devastate me now in part because of the bridge.

Sometimes the bridge is crowded. Sometimes new people find it and are welcomed by those who walk it. No one wanted to be on this bridge but all who come are healed and embraced and understood. No one who comes has to worry about whether their pain and stories and emptiness are being judged. Instead they are reassured by those who stand here or sit on it dangling feet over the raging waters beneath. Like an Irish wake, sometimes those of us on this bridge are laughing and sharing stories, poems, videos, photos of our lost one. Most times, it is pain and fear and grief that is shared and heard and received without judgment. No one on the bridge says, "it is time to move on. Pull yourself together. Get over it. Start a new life. Take a trip. He is better off." No one would ever say that on this bridge. For everyone here knows what "they" know not.

This bridge that takes us over the river of pain....what a gift it is, a place to share when the person who would have understood is no longer here to hear, to embrace, to respond. When friends show little interest or remembrance of my loss or when I wonder how they will respond...the bridge awaits and so I walk to it, interact with those who are there, and feel a sense of comfort and just a bit less alone.

I thank Marty for providing and building this bridge and standing guard at its entrance and wandering to its center to interact with and help to heal those who come. I thank those who come with stories, pain and healing words...the newcomers who allow us to reach out and feel meaning in our lives by helping them as we were helped; those who have been around for a while with their experience and gained wisdom and understanding what none of us ever forget...and those struggling to heal and survive. It is indeed, a tribe and at night we gather around the fire and tend it and welcome those lost in night's dark loneliness. And in the morning when we must rise again to pain and emptiness, we support each other for only we really know...no one else knows...this gut wrenching pain we hold in our hearts and souls (what is left of them) each day, all day and each night, all night.

How grateful I am for this bridge and those who walk it and those who tend it.

mfh2013

I am reminded as I re-read this of Munch's painting: The Scream

[enna]

After I have wiped the tears away and cleaned the snot from my nose I'd like to thank you for this beautiful expression of what this forum is to all of us, Mary. Those here longer know what comfort we get from having a 'sacred' place to come. I love the idea of your 'bridge' -

I shall leave in another hour to have the cardiac procedures done that are scheduled and I will go in a calming peace knowing that our bridge is sturdy and those walking or sitting on it have my back. Through the night I kept calling out to my Jim - screaming that I needed him today. It was not until I read this post that a calm settled over me. I am fine now and shall try to be courageous. The house was too quiet with Benji not here but I knew I wouldn't have time to bring him this morning because they opened later today.

And yes - I know I won't get to come home today - they reminded me again to pack my toiletries!!! Anne

[mfh]

Go in peace, my friend

Mary

[feralfae]

Dearest Anne,

You may be on your way by now. All my love and good thoughts and prayers go with you.

Blessings to you this day and always, and know that all of us are holding you in our hearts today and tomorrow.

Much Love,

fae

[feralfae]

Dear Mary,

What a beautiful and poignant metaphor of the bridge. And so very apt for us all.

I wondered how I would survive Doug's leaving, and now I know: I survive because there are caring people who lift me up when I fall, and who love me even when I question life, loss, and my pain.

Thank you for such a beautiful statement of our journey.

*<twinkles>*

fae

[MartyT]

It's beautiful, Mary ~ Your ability to describe (in so many different and beautiful ways) what this site means to you, and what it offers to our members, is amazing to me, and I am deeply grateful to you for that. From my heart to yours, thank you. ♥

I invite everyone to see Mary's other piece about our "tribe," published this morning on the Grief Healing Blog, here: The Fire Circle of Healing

[mfh]

Dear Dear Marty, Thank you. I am honored.

With love and peace,

Mary

[Wifflesnook]

Mary I am going to copy that out in my own hand writing into my journal, which I don't use much because I use the forum to pour out my heart. When I wake in the morning ( the hardest part of the day, when I have to remember what happened to me, or rather to us) I will reach out for that and read it. Mary, your heart is so great. In your pain you still comfort us. You have such a gift for expressing what we feel. Thank you. Love from Jan

[Wifflesnook]

Dearest Anne

We hold you in our hearts. X

[KATPILOT]

Mary, How you amaze us all. You can articulate our feelings with your words and we are deeply bonded by all of the truths you show.

This is what keeps us all family. Perhaps together we may find the strength to survive. To go on one more day crossing the bridge that I think may only end when we do.

Thank you.

[kayc]

Thank you, Mary. Yes, indeed, this sacred bridge which is comprised of all of us. And there is always room for one more, whoever needs to be here. This is the place that was my salvation as I began my grief journey...and so many times along the way. I know if I had left first, it would have been my George here writing to you all...he was a eloquent and gifted writer with a heart of gold. It was in writing our hearts out that we first found each other. Maybe he prepared me for this place...

[mfh]

Thank you, Mary. Yes, indeed, this sacred bridge which is comprised of all of us. And there is always room for one more, whoever needs to be here. This is the place that was my salvation as I began my grief journey...and so many times along the way. I know if I had left first, it would have been my George here writing to you all...he was a eloquent and gifted writer with a heart of gold. It was in writing our hearts out that we first found each other. Maybe he prepared me for this place...

You are welcome, Kay. Yesterday I got in touch with how I tend to post things I would share with Bill or Cathy or Heather...if I could...and how good it feels to have somewhere to share them. Hence came forth...The Bridge. Maybe George did prepare you for this place....maybe you were already prepared. However it worked...your input in invaluable.

[mfh]

Mary, How you amaze us all. You can articulate our feelings with your words and we are deeply bonded by all of the truths you show.

This is what keeps us all family. Perhaps together we may find the strength to survive. To go on one more day crossing the bridge that I think may only end when we do.

Thank you.

Thank you so much. I feel so good when what I write helps someone to identify their own feelings or pulls us together...though the latter is hardly needed...we are united already. Mary

[mfh]

Dear Mary,

What a beautiful and poignant metaphor of the bridge. And so very apt for us all.

I wondered how I would survive Doug's leaving, and now I know: I survive because there are caring people who lift me up when I fall, and who love me even when I question life, loss, and my pain.

Thank you for such a beautiful statement of our journey.

*<twinkles>*

fae

fae, I assume you are chugging south through Canada today...passing incredible scenery. Let us know when you land tonight...nothing about Anne yet at 4pm Central. Mary

[feralfae]

Hi Mary,

I have landed in Whitecourt (I think this is the proper spelling, but in old Jesuit records it was White Court, so I am a couple centuries behind on spelling, I guess) in a nice Holiday Inn room with A/C and wifi. Life is good.

I bought a bag of potato chips today -- my comfort/indulgence food. I ate some as I drove, then figured out that I was eating starch saturated with fat, and none of that was good for my body, so I tossed the rest and next stop, I bought an apple.

I should be home by tomorrow night if Calgary's flooding, which is very, very bad, is passable on the four-lane highway. Today a moose ran across all four lanes of traffic, and we all stopped for the moose. And we were all smiling at each other, so happy the moose made it safely. It was a very lovely moment. Tomorrow I will bypass Edmonton and head south around Calgary and into Montana north of Havre. Then it is a fairly straight shot home to Helena. And my own bed.

Mary, I sure hope you are saving all of your beautiful words for a book, for a series of articles, for something. I am glad Marty is saving and publishing some here on the internet, but you are such a gifted writer, and poet, that your work really does deserve a wider audience. You help all of us here so very much. If you feel up to it, or want to. I consider myself highly favored that you share here.

*<twinkles>*

fae

[Wifflesnook]

Yesterday I woke, let Kelbi out, made my coffee and returned to bed. Drank my coffee and then thought "before getting my porridge, maybe I should empty the moth trap earlier than usual" so I went outside into the garden and there, resting on the outside of the trap, vulnerable to being picked off by a bird, was a huge poplar hawk moth. Do you know what my first thought was? It was that Pete had somehow communicated with me that I must go out early to do it to save the hawk moth. Whenever I have a good thought I think Pete put it in my mind. I bet you all do this too.

[KATPILOT]

Jan,

I think Pete is communicating with you. I also awaken in the middle of the night, though not often, and I feel her trying to tell me something. Sitting on the sofa and having coffee, I often get what she is trying to say.

Someone once told me that they are with us when we sleep. That is when they can be the closest to our thoughts. I came to believe it. While I am sitting there, I have to work very hard at letting my mind be quiet and just let the message gel.

By the way, most of the time I sleep through the night. I never set an alarm. Owning my own business, I just get to work when I get to work. I love that schedule. Time for me is not the same as it used to be.

It never will be.

Stephen

[KATPILOT]

Fae,

Safe travels today. It will be good to know you are safe and at home.

[mfh]

fae, thank you. I have saved them but doubt I will ever do anything with them. Just part of my journal and glad people here benefit in any way.

I hope Calgary roads are open and you find yourself in your own bed tonight...what a gift that will be. Let us know and then sleep for a couple of days.

Mary

[kayc]

Jan, if Pete were to communicate with you, it'd undoubtedly be through a moth!

fae, so glad you got to see the moose safely across the road. I encounter God's creatures every day as I go up/down the mountain, I do love it.

[Wifflesnook]

Yes Kay, and every morning when I check the moth trap I talk to Pete. And this morning, which was a beautiful one, when I felt so sad that he wasn't there to enjoy it (you all know how often those feelings come) I tried to turn around d my thoughts to think how he enjoyed those wonderful mornings when he was here.