Always ours, Molly.

This post is well overdue, but there’s a very good reason. To say I’ve had a bad few days would be a huge understatement. I’ve deliberated writing this since Wednesday, but didn’t have the strength or the mental capacity to deal with what I felt I must say. This post isn’t for anyone else. It’s for me. It’s for my own mind. My own satisfaction. My own way of coping. I don’t care what anyone else thinks. Very recently, we lost our family dog, Molly. I won’t go into the details, but we had to make the decision to end her suffering, the hardest thing we’ve ever had to do. She was more than a dog, by far, she was part of our family. Loved, cherished, and deeply missed.

I’m writing this because I don’t know what else to do. For anyone who may come across this and dare to utter/think “she was just a dog” then fuck you, because frankly, your opinion doesn’t matter to me. Whether this is articulate or not, I won’t comment on. If no one else reads this, that’s fine by me, because it’s my own.

Anyway, I got to thinking, amidst the crying and harsh silences, about grief. It’s a funny thing. Everyone reacts differently, but there’s always a similar feeling. The loss is unbearable. You don’t know how to react. Are you supposed to cry, or do you keep yourself busy? Do you talk about it? Do you forget and move on? There’s no right answer when it comes to losing someone you love. The excruciating numbness, as if you want to pinch yourself and wake up from a horrendous nightmare. That empty, painful feeling in the pit of your stomach, that makes you not want to eat or sleep or even think. You’ve got nothing to say but you can’t stop thinking.

Over the last few days, I’ve felt so down, so lost. Hours afterwards, I never spoke to anyone. Never uttered a single word, looked on Facebook or Twitter and turned off my phone. It suddenly didn’t matter what kind of support system I had (an amazing group of friends, all ready to console me) because when something like that happens, there is no consolation. There is absolutely nothing that anyone can say to make you feel better. I got to the point where I didn’t want to feel better, I wanted to cry, and scream and lock myself in my room in the dark and be able to turn off my brain and my emotions and just sit there, staring into nothingness. I wanted to be out of myself, I wanted to be someone else, or anyone other than me, someone who wasn’t feeling these feelings, or going through these things.

In a word, these last three days have been horrific. No matter what people say to you, to try and help, it doesn’t. I’d never wish this on even my worst enemy. Deafening silence seems to haunt every step you take. Your family are all in some sort of bubble, this is the only topic of conversation (not that anyone really speaks.) Everyone feels the same yet so different at the same time. The house feels emptier without you. I catch myself forgetting for a split second, then silently cursing myself for doing so. I walk through the door expecting you to greet me, and when you don’t, my heart plummets. It seemed so sudden, so soon. I’m still getting to grips with it all, even if it is reluctantly. I never want to forget you, and I don’t think there’s any chance you ever will be forgotten.

For anyone suffering right now, loss, grief, loneliness. I know how you feel. The agonising feeling of wanting everything to be how it was before. The sacrifices you’d make for their return. The sheer enormity of the hole left behind, that will never be filled. You wish for one more chance, one more day, one more smile, but not for now at least.