Grief Journal: Crying in the Shower

Shower time is crying time. 

I still cry every day. Often, multiple times a day. I cry with my family. My friends. In front of strangers, even. 

Mostly, I leak. The tears spring to my eyes and start rolling down my cheeks. I’m not sobbing or wailing, but I am just…crying.

There’s a running loop going on in the back of mind, constantly asking “What if? Why? What did I do? What didn’t I do? How did I fail him so badly?” Sometimes that loop pushes its way to the front, triggered by a conversation, picture, or place. And I cry tears of guilt.

There’s another loop running in my head, memories of my boy. His smile, his laugh, his energy—boundless enthusiasm and talent and curiosity, wrapped in one skinny, lovely package. And I cry tears of rage because that is gone from this world. 

Then there are the tears of grief and sorrow, for the hole ripped in our family and our hearts. I see his sister cry and afraid to be by herself, and I cry for her tender heart, because she loved her brother so. I see my oldest be strong and stoic because he wants so desperately to help, and I cry for his lost innocence. I see my husband buckling under the weight of his own grief, and I cry for his tears, which I can only share, but not stop.

So while I’m liable to start leaking tears any time, the shower is where I now have my breakdowns. Sort of like Holly Hunter in BROADCAST NEWS, I have a scheduled time to utterly lose it and ugly cry—sobbing, snotting, gulping for air. The water washes away all my tears and grief until I am spent, ready to face another day without my boy.

Yet the grief remains. I am being reshaped, from water without and empty ice within.