You died last night.
Not really, it was a dream, obviously. But for those first few waking moments, before reality set in and I found out that the duvet was upside down and that I had forgotten to turn off the bathroom light, you were dead.
As I now write this late the following night, though I can't recall the exacting details, a part of my head is still trying to mourn something that it, itself, invented.
But I think the truth is that I have, without admission, been grieving you. The you in my head, the you that was, the you that is gone. The truth is I have done this for a long time.
Looking at the bigger picture, I am fairly certain what I am experiencing is "ambiguous loss". Apparently - and in hindsight fucking obviously - this does not have wonderful interactions with ADHD and the accompanying emotional dysregulation (Right, ADHD, I'll get into that Bucket of Fucking Hell™ at some point in the future. If I did, remind me to put a link here).
In hindsight I don't believe this is something that has grown and morphed and mutated with time, rather, that's how it always was and I have just learned to discern its shape more clearly.
Every little loss through life, every final message from an old friend drifted away, each favourite colleague meeting the end of a contract in the unique hell that is seasonal work out in the sticks. These are just things that happen in life, with which I am at peace as is any mostly-adjusted person.
There will be new, joyful, funny, fantastic faces to fill the gaps and I am glad for all of them, however lasting or fleeting they may be. Sure, any loss stings for a time, but each serves as a reminder of the absent, echoing ache that I'm sure at some point I was holding onto for you.
The stupider part is that it isn't all about what was. Some of it is for that which never happened: plans that never made it out of my head, things I never found the right moment to say, to share, to give, to love. Followed by a thousand half-mutterings to a ghost of "you'll love this-", "would you like to-", or "hey guess what-". A thousand reaches for an ethereal hand that will never know I tried to find it.
The worser part is I don't know where to put this sensation and sometimes its really rather awkward to hold. To make a dreadful analogy: it feels kinda like I'm grasping an overfull shopping bag, the plastic handle is stretching a little and my arm is getting tired. But I can't stop yet because there's frozen things in here and I parked much too far away. I just need to keep going and I'm pretty sure there's enough space in the fridge.
The salad bag will find a place in the crisper drawer, and I will find somewhere to set down this vague half-loss. I warned you that this analogy was bad.
I hope I can reach out to speak to you about all of this one day; but you died last night, and how can I speak to the dead?
I need to go to bed but the short version is that ambiguous loss sucks balls and it's really bad at doing it, too.