If He Were Still Here

Everything I am reading, in order to help myself, talks of our bodies being so injured by our trauma that we have to be so very careful in everything we do, who we see, who we listen to, what we eat, how we work out.  

Because we look the same on the outside...sans a light in our eyes...because we endured no obvious break of bones or of skin we tend to not know that inside our bodies are working at less than, one false move and we are rendered sick or hurt.  Funny, really, to think of...more hurt than we already are? How is that possible?  

Everything I have and am reading talks of turning away from those that do you no good, draw life from you rather than give it, cause pain and anguish rather than calm and strength.  Turn away from the toxic people in your life, it is a must, it is essential to our health...to our journey...to our recovery.  I am reading that now is the time to find a strength that is not clearly felt, and to stand up and cut the ties that are slowly pulling us under.  We can and must do this in order to save ourselves, as there will be no one else to do it for us.  That one person who would have been our strength and guide to do such a thing is forever gone...it is up to us alone to help ourselves.

Well, who doesn't already know this, really?  Right?  Right!  The difference now, the glaring difference is that before, we were whole; before, we were well; before, we could cope; before, we could be indifferent.  Now...we can do, and are, none of that.   Our immune system has been jeopardized by shock and extreme stress, we are susceptible to illness and injury by the mere instance of losing our loved one.  I have known and am reading that undue stress at this time in our lives can be very detrimental, can appear in real physical pain, real physical injury.  I said I have known this, however, I don't believe I have ever actually sustained an injury due to stress. A headache maybe...a rise in blood pressure for sure, but an actual injury I have not had.  Until now!

I have known and felt since the accident that changed my life forever that my coping skills which I had honed to near perfection were nowhere to be found.  I have lost, or nearly so, my coping skills.  Now with but a few words I can feel undue stress immediately take hold in a very physical way.  I find that it torments me for many days and leaves me with physical injury.  Just as though I had worked through a strenuous routine at the gym...I have flushed cheeks, elevated blood pressure, instant headache and strained muscles.  I have had it for 4 days now and so far no amount of pain reliever is helping...well at least no reasonable amount has worked.  

I find that a chord which runs from my left shoulder up the back of my neck to my head is so twisted and in such excruciating misalignment  that I can hardly stand it.  The screams of my body to remove the toxic person from my life is received loud and clear.  But, is this not yet one more instance of stress, is this not an inward attack on me which I so evidently cannot cope with?  Clearly if this act of turning from the toxic was something I was capable of doing then the whole matter would be mute and I would not be in such turmoil, yet again.

Now is the time for self help, however now is the time I am least capable.  Now is the time I reach out for my one person that could ease my pain and calm my soul, that with a look or a touch would quell my anxieties...if he were still here.

If he were still here, ALL of this would be mute.