It’s the question I’m trying hard to answer. Though I don’t wish to make a shortcut in answering this, I guess the most honest reason would be that I’m circling back to who I left behind in 2020. That girl had been through some shit.

This woman has been trying to recover from it.

Where We Left Off

So…let’s see: where did we leave off? My last post was published two days after my dog died. My Tyke. My ex picked out her name. We had bought her with a companion, my Bella. I wanted to name them Lucy or Ethel. Or Laverne and Shirley. But no — Bella…and Tyke. Looking back, though, she was the spitting image of her name. She was a tyke. She held a playful, exuberant spirit much like a six-year-old learning to ride a bike for the first time without training wheels. She was pure excitement. She was pure love. And I miss her.

Final blog post aside, you may also know this space as somewhere safe. At least that’s how I treated it. This was the place I had come to complain about grief. It was the place where I could bash those who didn’t understand. It was the place where I could find people just as sullen, just as depressed, just as angry, maybe, as me that life had taken a rotten bite of their plans. I’ve yet to thoroughly comb through them but I have 48 unread comments — many of which, from first glance, found solace here, because they, too, lost their mothers. For those of you who I’ve yet to respond to, I hope that time has been kind to you. Well, as kind as it can be when we’re dealing with this.

Just like for many of us, the beginning of 2020 had an unusual start. While there were many parts of the pandemic (like all of us), I didn’t like, I loved the distance it created. Not a physical distance (although that was nice for my somewhat anti-social personality), but a mental distance. From whom? None other than my dad.

I cherished my dad but at this point in his diagnosis, I had already started to wear thin. I’m sure I’ve broached this topic before, but there’s only so much cancer talk one can hear during the week. At this time, he was driving me to and from work every day, and in the 30-minute rides each way I heard a cacophony of words — I’m dying (he wasn’t), chemotherapy is a waste of time (it wasn’t), I can’t lose myself in his death like I did my mother’s (I did), and that I didn’t know what to do with the house when he died (I hired a lawyer and a realtor and figured it out). That may not sound like a lot, but his constant push for me to stop being sad about my mom and to accept that he was dying despite all his CT scans proving otherwise got to be a little grating.

To finally have a lull in the conversation with him so we could focus on other topics was a breath of fresh air. But like all things, that air was soon covered in smog. Life polluted it and by the end of 2021, I had hit my breaking point. There’s a lot that I could say about my caretaking experience – and it will become a blog one day – but for the purpose of today’s piece, I had lost what little I was holding onto after my mom died. When he passed in the early months of 2022, I was devastated, of course. But I also reveled in the first night I didn’t have to have my ringer all the way up. There was a deep relief that came with death. I was both sad and honored to meet it. It was like finally being able to clock out of my shift.

Not the Beginning, Not the End, But Somewhere in the Middle

What followed was nothing short of absolute misery. Executor duties. Clearing out my childhood home. Putting it up for sale. Getting into a fight with my best friend. Getting demoted. Failing to find therapy. Getting on Buspar.

All of it led me to the lowest point in my life. A period of my life that I just considered hopeless.

And I felt hopeless for a lot of reasons, but mainly that the plan of moving to Florida and starting a family was dashed by the reality that creditors in my dad’s home state had nine months to contact me. In other words, his estate – and my tether to that God-awful place – was immovable regardless of how much pressure I put against it. I felt dizzy after I hung up with the lawyer and when my friend texted me, I told her my life was pointless. I would never have wings, just cages. That was when the fight happened. She had her own problems – a baby on the way that she was, truthfully (and she’ll agree), scared to have (though she’s a beautiful mother, and now I’m sure she would also agree). All I wanted – and had been putting off due to illness, caretaking, and executor duties – was a child of my own, and here was my best friend trying to put us on the same level. It was the visit that started the worst year of our friendship. A year we’ve thankfully, put to bed.

I guess you can tell I had a lot of anger.

The culmination of it all finally led to some good fortune and by that, I mean finding a therapist who genuinely cared for my well-being. She was everything I wanted in a therapist – kind, compassionate, understanding. But she was also firm. She called me out on my excuses, to which I had many. My breakthrough was when she diagnosed me with OCD. Excuse me, severe OCD. There are tiers. I rank right below extremely severe. It was brought on by my experience with my dad. I told you that his incessant chatter about death and putting a countdown on it affected me. I don’t want to say that OCD ruined my life, but it certainly ruined parts of it. Parts that I know I won’t ever be able to get back.

Getting Here – And Why Right Now

Since I was last active on this platform, I moved to Florida. I live in a beautiful area with a local Starbucks nearby, and boat rentals and water features. I now work for myself ghostwriting – I have clients in all sorts of industries ranging from healthcare to automotive. Have questions about mold remediation? Or the type of engine options available in the Ford F-150? I’ve got you covered.

It’s through ghostwriting, though, that writing stopped being a hobby. Don’t get me wrong, that’s something I’m absolutely honored to do. All I’ve ever wanted was to be introduced at a dinner party as a writer. Granted, I’m not invited to many dinner parties but just knowing it’s an option is good enough for me. I’m proud of where I am because I know how much work I had to put in to get here.

But I’m still broken. I struggle to work consistently. The idea of an 8-hour workday is the equivalent of going to the gym or listening to hardcore death metal for the same amount of time. I struggle with maintaining my house, though I’ve gotten better at decluttering. Worst of all, though, I worry. I worry constantly. I’m always waiting for that other shoe to drop, even if everyone in my life is walking barefoot.

In reconciling this, I’ve decided to revert.
Revert back to this.

For some reason, that blog post about my dog has been getting a lot of traction recently. When I received an email with the stats, I re-read it and you know what happened? I realized that I’m a writer.

I know that sounds silly, but I read it and felt moved by it. I felt moved by the picture of pet loss and grief I painted and it made me sad that I don’t write that way anymore. I barely write at all anymore.

I don’t know if this blog will persist. But I’ve let too much time pass without spending it doing what I love — and I love writing. I love the sound my fingertips make when they press down on the plastic keys. I love the way words develop rhyme and rhythm and that they somehow blend the perfect melody. I love the way some words and turns of phrase make me smile and cry. I love the art of this. It’s who I am. It’s what moves me. It’s what fuels me.

I was so focused (and naturally so) on death years ago and now, the death of the life I wanted to have at this point in my life. I will always be processing that.

But maybe I can process it here. In this safe space that we’ve created…together.