What you thought important as a child seems laughable as an adult.
What you found painful never leaves you.
What you lose can shackle you to what is no more, never to be resolved, by definition moments in the past which no longer exist and are forever out of reach.
A decade ago, I said that I felt the weight of all the
years she would never have, and that they might crush me.
Over time, I have come to realize all the things she never
saw or did adds to that weight. Even though it seems like
it should be the same weight. Somehow, it isn’t.
I was talking about all of this with a therapist a few days
ago, about the time and the losses and their accumulated
weight. I said, “I don’t know how to be okay when I failed
my child in the most fundamental way possible.”
“You didn’t fail her,” they said gently.
“I know that,” I replied. “But I don’t feel it.”
A decade, it turns out, does not change that. I’m not sure
now that any stretch of time ever could.
As @imchillyb in this thread notes:
Time is distance. How many miles the train will travel from
the station. Distance grants perspective and removes
immediacy.
Here, this can only be true if we give ourself permission to "board the train", to free oneself from the shackles of loss, of guilt, of blame, to accept that time does not destroy the memory of where we were or who we were with.
What you thought important as a child seems laughable as an adult.
What you found painful never leaves you.
What you lose can shackle you to what is no more, never to be resolved, by definition moments in the past which no longer exist and are forever out of reach.
As @imchillyb in this thread notes: Here, this can only be true if we give ourself permission to "board the train", to free oneself from the shackles of loss, of guilt, of blame, to accept that time does not destroy the memory of where we were or who we were with.