That’s how I feel today. Everything feels far away and like it is too much effort to even try. I am not used to feeling like this.

It’s George’s birthday today. The first one without him. What I realized early this morning when I couldn’t sleep was that this year all of our birthdays, our first birthdays without each other, were on Saturdays. That struck me as unfair. If Saturdays are the ultimate day to have your birthday on, why in the year that it would be so for all of us, would we not be able to celebrate them together??

I know, of course, that dogs can tell time but don’t care about days of the week. They don’t care when their birthday actually takes place, they just care about being around the people that that they loved. The hamburgers and presents for them to unwrap were just a bonus. The singing of “Happy Birthday” offtune probably damaging to their sensitive hearing.

Since last Saturday, Henry’s birthday, I’ve felt this whole week like I just wanted to give up, to retreat from everything and hide. I didn’t let myself do that. If anything, I pushed myself even harder, to be present, to be overscheduled and to be overstimulated. Like if you are already feeling uncomfortable, can you push through to a maximum of discomfort so you just stop feeling that way? Like spiking a fever.

That’s not working anymore today. I feel like giving up. Maybe that is why I am drinking tea instead of coffee. To do this in the middle of the day, as I believe tea has it’s place but not during the day, is a sign that I am in deep trouble with myself.

I wonder to myself if I felt this way when the boys were still alive? Or did they keep me firmly anchored? Was it because of them that I always managed to get up and power through? When I felt at my most frustrated, did I come out of those dark moments because I had them nearby and they were happy with me exactly as I was? How much of my ability to emotionally regulate was based on my relationship with two loving small dogs?

I feel so empty. I feel like I want to disppear and stop giving a shit about all of the things I am trying to change in the world. I feel like I don’t care anymore. I feel like there is no point in caring anymore. I feel without hope. This is hard for me to acknowledge and even say out loud. Yet there it is. I have lost my indestructible sense of optimism. Or at the very least, misplaced it somewhere that I am not able to find it.

This year of firsts. You know the year I mean. The one that starts the day you lose a loved one. The first day, then week, then month without them. The first birthday, yours or their’s, that you face. All the first times you go somewhere without them.

I have been doing that. I can’t say that I have been doing it very gracefully or with a high level of documentation. Primarily, it’s been trying to give myself the room to be sad, to miss my boys and to be okay with the fact that there are still tears.

Yesterday was Henry’s birthday. I woke up early yesterday morning, hours before the alarm to talk to him and to cry. The best time for me to cry is when the whole household is asleep. I knew that if I didn’t do that, it would be hanging over me like a cloud for the rest of the day and yesterday, I needed to be high functioning as I was speaking at an event.

I try to keep them close to me. I still hold George’s last blanket up to my face every night before I go to bed and first thing in the morning, to breathe in his smell. It’s fading and I know it. Henry’s little t-shirts are ducked into my drawer and they still smell like him. Last weekend, I cut open my arm from the work we were doing to build horse stalls. I reached for the Vetramil and smeared it on the cut, knowing that if had been good enough for Henry’s skin, it would be for mine as well. And mostly because I wanted to be reminded of the smell.

I skipped my birthday this year because there was nothing I wanted to celebrate. I chose instead to make the promise to myself that when I feel like celebrating it, I’ll just choose the day. For so many years, my birthday meant going away with the dogs to somewhere where they could be free and I could pretend to relax.

In some ways, I am getting better. I don’t cross the streets anymore to avoid walking past someone and their dog. Last week, I held a small dog in my arms until he fell asleep. I can spend time around dogs. I give the cats the attention they ask for, instead of trying to keep them at a distance. This is hard because they have all needed to adjust as well and now they are much more people oriented. Sometimes I wake up in the night thinking it is the boys that are sleeping next to me. Instead it’s Pickle or Olive if it’s really chilly. In that moment of half awareness, I think that the boys are still here and it’s just been a horrible dream.

I know that this will just take time and I cannot problem solve for it. While I haven’t slowed down, I also know that I can’t come through this by simply keeping myself so busy I don’t have time to think or feel. So I am not. While I typed that last sentence, Pickle just climbed up into my lap and is now hanging diagonally across my chest with his head over my shoulder. Glad he is comfortable!