Grieffy Goodness

My husband feels, sometimes, like I give him a lot of grief. I don't think I do; I keep asking him questions until I understand, even when his voice goes up and he starts saying "back off, you're badgering me" sorts of things.

Well, here's a revelation. I do give him grief. I was born into a world that had a boy in it already who didn't want to share attention with me (his little sister, less than a year younger), and got hard-wired, somehow, to compete with men. Sometimes I get mad at the huz for competing with me, but guess what, it's my own default setting.

I'm one of those weird people who cry when they are moved, whether by a beautiful story, piece of music, sappy movie (even if I KNOW I'm being manipulated), or a cute baby at the grocery store. I just have leaky eyes. But yesterday my energy guru pushed me on it. I was weepy for having figured out I compete with men. I felt relieved and happy and elated. And moved. "What are you sad about?" she asked, when the tears jumped into my eyes. "I'm not sad. I'm happy. I guess I'm just wired wierd."

"Tears are for sadness. You're carrying grief. Let's see if we can fix that wiring," she said, and started tapping on my meridians. Then the session was over. I felt relieved. Last night I dreamed about moving to new places, finding new rooms, figuring out where all my stuff would go now.

But that was just the beginning. Today, no matter how hard I pushed my eyebrows together in a cranky frown, the grief started leaking out my eyes unprovoked, threatening to flood my emotions. The countless large and small failures to do my best, failures to prevent conflict or loss. The unforgiving self-loathing. Each tiny memory connected, by a thread, to another, and another, so pulling one string had the effect of knocking loose another loss, causing me to feel more and more bad bad bad. Money lost. Dreams in drawers. Falling into fight after pathetic fight in a marriage that feels quite sturdy most of the time. And now, a long fight in a parked car on date night.

"What are you so sad about?" he asks, finally. I tell him about the tapping. I tell him about the grief. Suddenly the arguing was over. He nods. He understands. "It's like you don't want to feel it a little," he says, "because you don't know where it will end." The dam breaks. My tears begin spurting in full force out onto the steering wheel. He fishes around behind the seat and hands me tissues. Yes. That's exactly what it feels like.

Behind the flood of tears, I hear my familiar, judgmental voices, trying to put the cork back in. "What have you got to feel so sad about? You've had a great life. Lots of opportunities. You're white. Blonde. High IQ. You have good teeth. You got to go to private colleges. You traveled the world. You're you own boss. You're so lucky. You have so many people in your life who love you, admire you, adore you. Those people in Iraq deserve to grieve. Those people in Darfur. Those people who live in the apartment next door to you and have to look at your beautiful yard, they've got a right to grieve. It's selfish of you to give over to such blubbering and self-sorrow. Cheer up; the world would much rather see you smile than cry."

But the voices don't stop the tears, not this time. This time I can't help but follow these rivers all the way to the biggest hole, somewhere below my solar plexus: my parents' divorce. Something I never really grieved.

I did cry, I'm sure. I sure felt sad. It was the end of the world as I knew it. But I had to buck up. I had to keep going. I had to keep smiling. I had to stay brave, for my parents. For my brothers. I didn't want to be sad, so I wasn't. I diligently search ed out the silver linings, of which there were many: My early emotional and intellectual independence. My strength--after all, I had survived the worst thing I could imagine. My fierce cheerfulness and optimism. But I also taught those voices in my head what to say. (They're very loud, tonight. "That was thirty years ago," they shrill. "You should be over it now! Suck it up!" But I did suck it up. That's the problem. I shut the door on my sorrow. And so many of my other feelings.)

I did process the divorce, over the years. I talked about it with my brothers and friends. I told my stories to a therapist or two. I listened to my mom and learned the details and forgave her. I listened to my dad and learned the details and felt sorry for him. But I never let myself feel it. It was too big. Am I big enough to feel it now? The grief feels overwhelming. I blubber out loud: "I don't know how to grieve."

"Is this why you keep expecting our marriage to fail?" asks the huz, handing me another wad of tissues. I smile. Just before our wedding, I tried to negotiate a contract with him, to consciously renew our vows every five years or dissolve the relationship. "We're getting married in two weeks, and you're planning our divorce already," he'd said. Today he says, "You keep testing me on this unconditional love thing, but you're the one with your finger on the eject seat button...." I laugh, through the waterfall of tears. Yes, it's true. We fought a lot last year as we approached our 14th anniversary. I worried a lot. That's as far as my parents made it.

Instead of dinner at a restaurant, we get drive-through so I don't have to show my puffy red face. I want to eat somewhere where we had a view of the sunset. I pull into the cemetery, and start sobbing again, from grief and joy. "Look!" I say as we pass the somber gates. "They built a place where people can go to grieve!" I drive up the hill, the gorgeous marble tombs and pyramids blurry beyond my tears. Fifteen years ago we posed here in black tie for our engagement photos. We are still together.

I don't know what will happen tomorrow. This could be the end of the mid-life crisis I've been having since I was twenty. I so want to change. To die, to be reborn, to be who I want to be, to stop being trapped by these voices that tell me what I should or should not feel. I have to stop running away from the grief. I'm too tired to keep holding it inside. I'm old enough now, I'm safe enough, to let myself feel my thirty-year-old feelings.

The huz rolls his window down so I can hear the silence, see the setting sun. Graveyards are beautiful places. I realize it feels good to feel so sad. Grief is different from sadness or sorrow. Grief is a room in your soul where sorrow can spend some time. I may be here for a while.