I’m learning so much about grief – the forms it takes in me, how it shows up in people around me, the effect it has on people I barely know. When little man first had to be admitted into the hospital, I didn’t let grief in at all. I pushed it out of my mind and just tried to focus on what needed to be done. Part of this was because I was staying there, in the hospital. I was in the room with him almost at all times that week and a half, so I didn’t want to feel anything but strong in front of him. Not that he didn’t know something was wrong. We were at the hospital for goodness sake. It wasn’t rational. 

My husband was driving back and forth from the hospital each day. We wanted to be there for our older son even though he had grandparents staying with him, so dear husband drove an hour (at least) each way every day. I can’t imagine the road rage he probably experienced with Chicago traffic. Maybe it’s best I don’t linger on that. But this provided a natural buffer between hospital and home, and it gave him some processing time each day. Both of our roles were difficult in their own ways. We each chose the role that was probably more natural to us, and it worked out as well as it could. The only thing I lacked was time and space to process as it was happening. 

I’m not sure I really even understand what “processing grief” means or entails. I associate grief with loss, and little man didn’t and very likely isn’t going to die, something I’m thankful for every single second of each day that goes by. But he is losing a normal kid experience for the next couple of years. Maybe I feel grief for the loss of carefree normalcy. I feel some grief for the loss of how much easier life was before this all started, before cancer took over his 2-year-old bones. 

When I think about grief, I think about the “why,” and I get angry. This isn’t fair and doesn’t make any sense. Evil people live lavish lives using other people’s money, and they don’t get cancer. Why don’t they get cancer so my family can be left alone? (I’m thinking pointedly about some politicians here, but I won’t get into specifics.) If the cancer quota must be fulfilled, why not them instead of my boy? But there are no answers to these questions, and there’s no guarantee of fairness, of course.

The interesting thing about grief is that, though it’s going to come out one way or another, we have some choice in how we feel it if we’re paying attention. My natural state of negative emotion is anger. It’s active. Anger gets shit done. Sadness is passive. Sadness is me crumbled in the corner because I couldn’t even get on the bed or didn’t want to feel the 3 feet of lift the bed would provide. That’s where sadness makes me go. Alone in the corner. But in small doses, I have to let myself feel the sadness. I can’t funnel it all into anger because the sadness is still underneath it. Once the anger burns off and I’ve hurt the feelings of everyone who cares about me or wants to help, sadness will still be there waiting. So I have to choose to feel the sadness sometimes, when it’s safe, when there’s space, when I know I’ll be able to come back up after I let myself go down for a while.

Maybe that’s all processing grief is – feeling the feelings inside until we feel something else, something a little lighter, something a little more hopeful. I’m moving that way, a little at a time.