Lately, I’ve been really sleepy. I lack motivation sometimes and I’ve tried to keep positive by making content and giggling hard at 80s make up commercials and Tiktok videos. Almost anything nostalgia.
This morning, I had a massive break down.
Crying. Sobbing…like in the movies wailing. Snorting and hurtling snot throughout the room. I cried so hard that I was dizzy. I remember these feelings as a kid when I was throwing a fit, I would work myself up so much that it would take the life essence right out of me.
I just had one of those moments.
I hadn’t cried like that since my Dad died.
And before that, my Mom.
Grief.
This is grief.
The entire time during the shutdown/quarantine/avoidance of the-sickness-that-shall-not-be-named, I’ve been holding it in. Keeping my head above water. Stay positive. Be the light.
I hear a siren of an ambulance. It strikes me cold, but I bury it.
I read about a friend who’s sick, one who’s better and then another wail of a siren reminds me the worse is yet to come.
Yesterday, a gale storm came through NYC. It was the most real thing I’d seen all month. It felt like Mother Nature was reminding us again that she is here. I peered out the window as the stop-light hanging from the pole twitter back and forth, ready to snap off. I stared at the dramatic picture in front of me and I wanted it to snap off. I wanted the bridge to collapse behind it. I wanted the wind to destroy everything in my sight. I wanted a swarm of locusts to consume everything. I wanted the four horsemen to appear galloping down the BQE. I sipped my coffee and looked out the window while the wind battered the glass and I watched it all happen in my head. End of days.
I know, so emo, right?
These are the stages of grief.
For those who’ve not experienced the death of a loved one yet, this is what New York is going through right now. Slowly watching something we love die right in front of us.
DENIAL
For the first week, I was totally in denial. As my new business and the lights of Broadway shuttered around me, I acted as if it’s just a break. We’ll get right back to it. I denied it even, posting as if it’s just fine, and we should wear cute masks and enjoy our time to look inward. #StayHome
I even asked my friends to do readings of plays so I can have some glimmer of normalcy. Something of my real life was in tact. I even did a virtual 40th birthday party on Zoom. I had my first drink in almost 8 months! This is a celebration! Finally, a break…I’ve been going too hard anyway.
I was influencer woke about it.
ANGER & BARGAINING
We got the word that clients will understandably have to stop paying. The business I sunk my heart, sweat and savings into was falling apart. I had to let go of employees, offer pay cuts, desperately apply for loans and bargain with contractors and vendors to delay payments all while listening to the noises of the ambulances and watch the digital dumb-founded looks of little moving images of people in Zoom.
The government’s parade of misinformation came, and I was angry. I screamed at my friends via Houseparty when trivia about America came up. I used my smug plant-based lifestyle as a baseless attack on people who posted bacon pictures, saying “wet markets did this!”
I’ll just take my anger out and aggressively clean while I hate watch the press briefings.
I’ll apply for the SBA loan.
I’ll use this time to write a novel, that will make this okay. Something about King Lear and Shakespeare?
I’ll make a ton of great content for instagram. I don’t know what yet. Brooches! They bring me joy. I’ll do that. That will hide the sadness and buy me time to think about this.
I’ll bury myself in work. I’ll work-out every day and use this as an opportunity. I’ll read more, I really should read more…Warren Buffet reads every day. So does Oprah. I should be more like them.
I’ll rally the industry. I’ll be a leader and a hero. Who can I talk to? How can I help?
I yelled at the Facebook Lives of the White House press briefings. That’ll show ‘em!
Who am I? WHAT IS HAPPENING?
Then I turned it off.
DEPRESSION
I got sleepy.
Like, really tired.
For a few days I slept 12-18 hours a day. I built into my schedule a “nap time” in between the hours of menial work I was doing to try to save my business, or create content, or, even TRY to care.
Am I weak? I’m a fighter. I’m a climber. I can do this.
Where did my ambition go? I thought I was going to use it to fuel my success. Co-star says so!
But I am sad, and I can’t. I’d rather sleep.
Screw. It. All.
It’s not even that the sleep was that interesting. Mostly consisting of anxious dreams of messages that I can’t decipher. Am I being given a message? I remember my new found “wokeness” and said, look inward. But, I figuratively can’t even… I’m like, really tired you guys.
Am I sad? My heart hurts. Maybe it’s indigestion. I’ve been eating a lot. And drinking again.
I’ve consumed more pasta than I’ve ever had in my life. Consuming non-stop. Filling something. Anything.
ACCEPTANCE
In therapy, I’m told that as a “happy person” that it’s okay to be sad. Be angry and express all the emotions. But, I always throw them to the side. Like, aggressively order them to STAY OVER THERE. I always deny my right to be angry, sad and tired because of some deep need to keep others happy.
I’m not really sure why this breakdown occurred. But, I remembered all of these emotions after my divorce, after my parents passed, my Aunt, after my friends Brad and Jenna left us.
And, it’s good old-fashioned GRIEF.
Most of us haven’t had to experience much of it. We’re lucky in our modern-times. Maybe with a break-up or a loss of a job or even missing home after college. Grandma, Grandpa to some extent.
But, not like this.
I keep thinking about all the LGBTQ+ people that came before me. They survived a plague that came from no where and killed them from the very act of intimacy.
It’s happening again.
I’m devastated for the people who were touched by that plague and are here dealing with it again. I keep thinking about Terrence McNally. How he made it through one terrible plague and this one took him to his final resting place.
I know a lot of us are feeling this at different times, and I feel that the next and final stage of all of this is something I’m not sure if I can do yet: acceptance. Having been through grief previously, almost expertly, knowing that acceptance is coming is actually the best part. It allows for us to reflect, worship and press on.
But, when will it come? When will the final stage of grief hit me? When will it finally hit us all. I’m afraid that it won’t be for a while, spiraling back through the stages again.
I hear about the amazing health heroes that keep us going. The nurses and the doctors. The FDNY and the NYPD. People that are out there on the front lines to protect us. And, even the lot of us, who are not essential, who are smiling and laughing and building each other up INSIDE our homes. Supporting and clapping the front lines at 7pm every night. The ones who tip their delivery people more. The ones who have donated. The ones who simply be and are. Little acts of kindness all over this great city. Smiles and a ‘hello” from strangers.
I say hello back. I want to start a conversation. I want to hug them.
Maybe I’m coming closer to the final stage of grief.
I’m alive. I’m healthy. I have friends and family that love me. And I love them. And for that, I’ll continue to be kind and nice and share the light.
Maybe that is all that matters anymore.
I think I’ll go lie down.
