Break down

I need to cry. I need to be able to break down. I don't want to keep this in anymore. I've opened this page so many times, willing myself to write something...anything. But I couldn't. Maybe I was scared. I think I was scared that if I did get my feelings down, I wouldn't be able to take it.

My one release was always writing. The one thing I knew I could do to keep from falling apart. And I stopped. When Jamie died, I couldn't write. I'd open my diary and just look at the empty page, wondering why the words wouldn't come out. I'd write a few words and then just...stop. No tears, no heartache... just plain denial.

I remember locking the door and just staring at the ceiling. I knew I needed to let it out. A few forced tears would slip out and that was it... I think the fact that I didn't see it happen... that I just heard about made it easier to believe that it was just a bad dream. That if I didn't cry, I wouldn't believe it. And it wouldn't be real.

Avoiding the issue should have helped. So I cooked, I read, I watched mindless TV... And I didn't think about her. I didn't think about my little baby. I didn't think about her never flying down those steps again. I didn't think about her never making that strange noise she made outside the house. I didn't think about her never looking down at us from the first floor. About her making a fuss over her breakfast.

I didn't think about her except in those unguarded moments when I didn't have anything to distract myself. And then, dry-eyed, I'd remember her. Because to my mind, distance had allowed me to live in my make-believe world.

I'm home now. And I can't be in denial forever. She's really gone. She's never going to be terrified of plastic bags again. Never going to be the only one brave enough to face a crazed Santa. I'm never going to carry her again. I'm never going to hear her be called a rabbit.

I wish I'd had the chance to hold her one last time...to pet her tiny little head and tell her she was a wonderful dog. It didn't matter how much of a mess she made, how much she terrified us when she fell ill, how she could be so stubborn. What mattered was the way she would jump up in joy when she saw us. How she would try to scare cows. How she would lie on her back demanding we rub her tummy. How she made me so happy. And how I'll miss her.

I'm finally in tears...