Grief, Anger, Regret & Not Knowing How to Move On.

The last few days have been kind of difficult. I’ve had a lot of grief bubbling up.

A friend and I discuss a lot of things in depth. We go down rabbit holes about psychology, embodiment, trauma... all the things, really. There is some overlap between her and a therapist I used to work with, so sometimes just her presence can trigger the grief on its own.

But really, it’s our conversations that bring a lot of it up.

Today she sent me a video of an autistic therapist talking about ways autistic people can process emotions outside of having to feel them inside of their body. She asked for my thoughts.

One of the ways they talked about was metaphor. That resonated with me because I use metaphor a lot to describe my emotional experiences. Sometimes an image or a metaphor is much easier for me to access than whatever is supposedly happening inside of my body.

So I typed out all of my thoughts.

Essentially: yes, I resonate with this. And also, I’m not certain autism is the reason I struggle with my body.

Maybe it’s one of them.

I think for me, it’s more than one thing.

Because I’ve also noticed that through very slow work, I have become able to feel more than I used to.

And somewhere in explaining all of that, I mentioned Courtney.

I talked about how when I worked with her, she sometimes used the art on tarot cards to help me process emotions.

And now here I am. Sitting with the memory of being in her office. Crying.

I really value this friendship, and it’s complicated because of the grief it brings up. Sometimes I wonder if maybe these conversations are just making me face something I otherwise would have buried.

I don’t know.

I’m still not quite sure why this hurts so much.

Or if it will ever stop hurting.

Being reminded of Courtney so often makes it hard to figure out what “letting go” is even supposed to look like.

Yesterday, I wrote her an email. I almost pressed send. I was asking for a closing session. I went to her website because I wanted to make sure her email address was still the same. And then I saw her picture.

I felt angry.

Really angry.

And I realized there is too much there.

Too much hurt. Too much that happened between us and in the ending for one closing session to somehow repair it. And I think realizing that intensified the grief. Because what I want isn’t really just a closing session. I want relational repair.

And I don’t know what that would look like anymore. I don’t know if one conversation could hold everything that happened between us, or if there is any way to repair something after this much time and this much hurt.

I think writing the email made me realize how badly I still want something I don’t even know is possible.

And that hurts.

And then there is the part of me that turns all of that pain back onto myself.

I get angry with myself for not having better control over the way I behaved.

I think about what I could have done differently.

What I could have said differently.

How I could have been easier.

Less reactive. Less hurt or whatever it was that made an email feel like the right place to end things.

And sure, I could bring all of this into therapy now.

But sometimes I find myself thinking:

For what?

So I can say again that I’m sad? That I wish there could have been a closing session? That I’m hurt? That I wish I could have done better in those moments? I’ve said those things. I know those things. And the grief is still here.

It still finds me in all the things I encounter that remind me of her.

In the memory of sitting in a room with someone who once helped me find pictures for feelings I couldn't find inside myself. In the acupressure mat that hangs on my wall, that I still can't bring myself to touch. In the poems sitting on my dresser.

And underneath all of it I still wonder:

What was so bad about me that she couldn’t end things with me in a room?

I know there are probably other ways to understand what happened. But sometimes it just hurts and sometimes that hurt turns into anger. And sometimes the anger turns toward me.

And I hate myself sometimes. Right now is one of those times.