I've come undone

When a tragedy hits, the mind tries to protect the heart. There wasn't one moment during the time my beloved Warren was ill that we ever thought he wouldn't survive. And right up until the last minute I held on to that belief.

I recently bought a new computer and migrated all my information from the old to the new. So, I started to review everything on the new one and that included reading old, saved emails. I just about went into shock.

In the almost two years since he passed away, I have pictured him in my mind's eye as looking pretty healthy albeit getting thin, but able to move as he always did up until the last week. And in my mind I saw my thin, fairly healthy-looking, handsome and adorable husband as he'd always been.

In some of the emails, though, my belief faltered and the reality crept into them. I realize now that I was aware of that reality as I emailed various friends who lived in other parts of the country to bring them  up to date.  I don't remember writing them. I have no recollection of anything but the positive outlook we both had throughout the whole ordeal. There were just a few of them but I was frankly shocked to reread them. I was sure that my faith in his recovery was never-ending and so I must have blocked out what deep down I knew! I never gave it credence. Never.

And now I am left with the hole in my heart a little bit bigger than it was before. I've come undone. Now I have to work on not letting that guilt I feel overtake me....because even though I wrote about the reality, I think I truly never believed it. Hope was the emotion and the belief that we both hung onto through all those months and I know we never let that go, not once, not ever.

Copyright © 2019. Reisa Sterling Miller. All Rights Reserved.