Kindness confetti

Grief really really really screws with you.

Probably not you, maybe not even most of the bereaved, but me it really really really screws with me. I've known that I'm confused. That I'm lost. That there is no gravity. I've known that I've lost most of the people I thought were friends, my culture, and my faith. Until yesterday I didn't realize that I have also lost my identity. Not really. Not in that "oh god, I don't know who I am. I really don't know who I am." way.

This is fresh.

I realized yesterday that I have no confidence in me. I have no confidence in my decisions, my abilities, my opinions... none. I look for confirmation from someone for everything and I almost never make a choice that is counter to the opinions of others. I need my husband to tell me if I should buy the expensive detergent or the cheap detergent because he's so frugal and what if he gets mad that I bought the expensive stuff (which he would never do) even though I know both of my boys have sensitive skin and really the only choice is the expensive stuff. If you read that whole sentence as fast as possible in a frantic tone you've spent a few seconds in my mind. Criticism of any sort can send me to the black where I crawl into anger and hide from the fear and the pain.

I've read that depression in anger repressed. While I think this is another example of misunderstanding the depth and breadth of depression I think it is partially true. And I think anger is often pain's prison guard. Anger feels protective, but every time I crawl into that cocoon that allows me to run from the agony it's acid eats away at my raw, exposed, wounded body.

I hear a great deal of criticism about those who "destroy their lives" after a child dies. They drink, they sleep around, they lose them selves in this high or that, they become "so jaded," or unapproachably angry...

Sometimes it is so much easier to lock yourself in a prison of your own making than to face the loss, to walk through a cruel world with no protective layer, to endure the missing, to nearly drown in your own self doubt, to be so lonely and so afraid of people. It is easier to run and run and run and never stop than to face the agony that lives inside.

I think the fight, really the fight for everyone, is to stay. To stay in the moment. To stay in the conversation. To hear. To believe. To feel. To not justify the suffering of others, no matter what the circumstances. To not comfort ourselves with platitudes and judgements. To remain present.

My next step is figuring out how to trust myself again. To believe and claim that I am capable of, well, anything. To remember that 99% of other people's behavior is about them, not me, an to figure out who me is so I can be her.

We are all together too dismissive, too unkind, to busy, and way too damn judgmental.

I need kindness like I need air. I am a wounded, floundering, fearful woman. I need kindness.

There's a foundation for bereaved parents called MISSfoundation. Every year they have an international kindness day (or maybe it's a week I'm not sure). They put out a challenge for all of their members to do something kind. To go out of their way to be kind. To be kind to everyone in their path. To just throw kindness around like confetti. I've been so narcissistic lately I've thoroughly and unbelievably sucked at this. I've been much less than kind. Everything hurts!

I'm challenging myself. I'm reinventing Jodie. I don't know who I am so I need to figure out who I want to be. I want to be kind. I know this one thing so this one thing I will focus on until I figure out the next one thing.

Today, or tomorrow, or this week when you read this do something stupidly kind then tell me about it in the comments. I need this. I need your kindness. Let's throw kindness around like confetti.

Until next time...