I used to be quite a tearful person I think. Hopefully not overly so, but I mean, I would well up at a touching story or have a little weep at a moving documentary. I had emotions, I felt sadness, compassion, anger, hurt, empathy in what I considered to be healthy proportions.
I guess I'm just trying to say I'm kind of sensitive. Or at least I was.
I used to like just having a good cry. Or even just a little cry. A let-it-all-out-and-you'll-feel-better kind of cry.
This fascet of my personality appears to have upped sticks as it were. I can count on one hand the number of times I've cried since Skittle came home. After sobbing for about a month, when he was transfered from high dependancy to low dependancy that was it, click. Emotions switched off.
Maybe not all emotions. I'm not now the tin woman. I hope I still have the capacity to be moved, at least for the sake of others. But in terms of appropriate reactions, I'm annoying myself.
Why can't I just cry? Be sad, let-it-all-out? Instead I often feel numb, blank, distant. Anger no longer takes the form of a good, strong minded discussion/letter/complaint but a fairly strong urge to self harm because I am so stuck I don't know how to express what I want to feel.
Blumin NICU, it has so much to answer for. At least I think it was NICU. Maybe I'm just talking rubbish and these ramblings make no sense. Leanna talks about mummy-bot...I think she understands all this better than I do. I'm so thankful for other premmy mummy blogs, to help me unravel and get clarity.
Your definitely not talking rubbish. It affects everyone differently, and in my opinion (not that I am an expert) the first birthday often marks a bit of milestone in how you see yourself dealing with grief. I think too many of us think that by a year, we must be "better" or because the length of time elapsed seems long, it must be more than long enough to have said goodbye to at least a sizeable chunk of our demons. But really, it is SUCH a short length of time to process everything as well as get on with life. I still find there is rarely a day when I don't think of what we went through, but it still feels quite numb and distant; like I can't really reach it. The feeling of being desperate to feel something, anything isn't nearly as bad as it used to be but I do often find that nothing sums it up enough to the point of being even half of what it feels like. Time is definitely a healer; 2.5 years on things are much clearer/less raw/more emotionally defined than at 1 year for me. So be nice to yourself xx
ReplyDeleteAw bless you. It does seen you at have a mummy bot scenario going on there but I think it's a natural thing and nothing to be worried about. I think we switch off so we can be switched on. It's our minds way of looking after us. I mean we'd be no use at all looking after a small baby if we were blabbing all the time. I did find for me that I literally woke up one day and realised I was sad. I cried a million tears for weeks and it was finally a relief. We premmy mums can know so much stuff without feeling it and equally we can feel do much with out knowing it too! Xx
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