Dancing as fast as I can

Well it's March, alright. It's been nearly a month since I've written here. Sometimes I think I avoid it at all costs. Other times I think I just run out of time or don't have enough time. I especially don't know why I haven't written because I've been struggling for quite a while now and that's the time when I used to write daily for hours sometimes, but since Mandy died I really rarely write at all.

I'm much more likely to craft or sleep or sometimes play computer games, especially face book games. Writing things down make them more real, too real sometimes...

At any rate on top of my obsession with crafting and my usual struggles with this time of year as it pertains to Mandy's death I'm suddenly feeling noticeable low self esteem. I suppose it's possible that I always suffer from a certain amount of it, but I don't usually notice it. I don't feel it, but lately I do feel it.

I feel like I can't do anything right, like I'm not right about anything, like I don't count and I don't matter....

It's odd and it's bothersome. The more I feel like I'm failing the less I want to try. I'm pretty tired of not being able to cook a pork roast no matter what directions I follow.

I'm tired of disappointing people and saying things the wrong way so they get upset and can't seem to give me any slack. I feel like I just need to crawl in a hole somewhere and sleep for a generation or two.

Have I discussed how much I miss Mandy loving me? It's selfish I guess, but then grief feels selfish, like since it's my daughter who died I'm entitled to the grief and no one can take that away from me. It's real and it's mine and no one can really know or understand it the same as I do. In this way I am alone. I stand apart and alone no matter how many other parents share this kind of loss it is just that... sharing a type of loss, the death of a child... however:

I believe that for all the ways grieving a child is similar each is also very unique. Our relationships with our children, with our parenthood is vastly different. The circumstances of our becoming mothers and our feelings about that are also unique. The way we view/ed our place in the world of motherhood - how we say our child and how our child saw us - it's all unique to our individual stories.

All I really know for right now, for tonight is that I'm dancing as fast as I can. I'm spinning and hooking and crafting as if there is a fire chasing me. I feel as if I'm trying to stay ahead of it, trying not to look back but afraid that it's making ground and that it will not only catch me but overwhelm me and I will be rendered useless even to myself...