Ten years ago, I was a different person. I was just dating my now-husband, I had no kids and I had no major tragedy in my life. I was a young woman in grad school, seeing a guy who I was in love with but wasn't yet sure of where it would go. I had friends and I saw them often. We did things together, we texted, we emailed. We were great about staying in touch.
When I got married, things maintained the same way for a while. I still saw my friends, maybe not as often, but I still felt close with them. We still talked and gossiped. We still made an effort to see each other. When I was expecting my first baby, we tried to maintain. But things would come up. I wouldn't be able to go to something because I wasn't feeling well--pregnancy hormones really mess with you. Every now and then I'd notice I wouldn't be invited to something. When I was, I'd feel somehow like I had missed something. I began to feel like I was the outsider to the Single, Kidless Friends Club.
When I was expecting my second child, it was a lot of the same. It did become harder for me to go out with friends, but it wasn't because I didn't want to. It was because I couldn't get a sitter, my husband couldn't get home early enough, we were all battling our twentieth cold of the season. Or I was just plain tired. A toddler and a pregnancy--a sweet combination, but a very exhausting one.
Then we lost him. My world crashed around me. My friends--nearly all of them--were reaching out to me. Many offered to visit or send meals. Only some did. That's understandable. Friends who had been close friends for many years, dating back to junior high, suddenly were checking on me every day and sending their love, or calling and spending two hours on the phone while I sobbed. Some friends who had been close friends for a good ten years offered their condolences, but slowly disappeared. I didn't mean to be so self-consumed, but the inevitable fact was that my grief was all-consuming. Losing a child is. It couldn't be any other way. Ask any parent.
Mom friends gathered around me to lift me up and help me find laughter and joy again. Other friends simply disappeared from the radar. An occasional email here and there, but basically not a lot of effort on their part, and unfortunately not mine either. I didn't have energy for any kind of effort. The energy required to take care of my first-born was more than enough to suck my depressed and still healing body dry.
I tried not to resent any of this, but I did. I tried to be above that and recognize that I wasn't giving very much either and that perhaps they just didn't know what to say or how to act around me anymore, but I wasn't. It's only truly now that I am beginning to feel like a normal person again. Just shy of two years after losing my son, I feel myself finally feeling joy again. My heart still hurts on a daily basis, but now it is balanced by laughter--genuine laughter--and that helps me survive much better than it did when the laughter was always still overcome with the the idea that I would never be happy again.
To those friends who have drifted from my life: I still love you and I still value our relationship. I'm sorry that I was not the friend you wanted me to be over the past couple of years. I hope you can understand that I simply had nothing to give. Even if I had tried my hardest, I wasn't going to be fun to spend time around. There would always be that dark cloud. Always. To the friends--long time and new--who came to my rescue: I hope you always know that you saved me. You kept me afloat. You made me laugh and you cried with me. You saw me at my worst and still loved me. I will always remember that and I realize what special people you are.
At the end of the day, I feel my life beginning to be full again. I am sad for what is essentially the loss of my old friends. I guess that's an inevitable part of life. People drift. People change. I've changed, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I can't change what happened to Christopher, but I am eternally grateful for the lessons he left with me. I may not be the person I used to be, but my sons--both of them--have made me a better person than I ever imagined possible.
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