Motivation

Now into the tenth month of grief, some seem to think I should be over the grief now and to be honest, if I didn't know what I know now, I would probably think the same of some one who had lost their wife or husband nearly ten months ago. So I don't expect everyone to understand, how can they, I wouldn't understand, had it not happened to me. A few weeks ago two of Alison's young friends popped in for coffee, they are in their early twenties, they have a young open mindedness about loss. We sat chatting and one said in so many words, that I should let go of Alison now and move on, life is for living, look upon your time with Alison as something you have had, as part of life and just take positive things from your time together. Then my face book page was mentioned, in that having it as a shrine to Alison is not doing me any good !

This upset me, more so the mention of my FB page, the thing is, these are young friends who have never had a relationship and certainly never fell in love with anyone yet, how can they possibly know what losing Alison has meant to me. I know they meant well and were only thinking of me in saying those things.

I promised Alison to keep her memory alive, that's what she wanted and I want her to be remembered, at least I have done that.

I have to live with the fact that Alison is now not a physical part of my life any more and I am really still struggling with that fact. In the early months I had to look at photos or video to remind me of her doing certain things, in those early months my memory shut down, probably to protect and help me get through the first stages of grief.

Now I have clarity of mind, I can picture her clearly doing all the things she used to do, as if she was here only yesterday. I still cannot comprehend she is not a physical person any more, my mind tells me she still is, I think of her in afterlife, that she is the same physical person, but she isn't, she only exists as energy, as spirit, my mind at some point has to fully accept she is not physical any more, she has vanished from this earth and there is nothing I can do about it.

She is never out of my thoughts, each day is still a challenge to get through without tears at some point, I miss her so dam much, just thinking back on memories triggers the tears and it's not just the memories and the missing her, knowing that she is not here or ever going to be again, is a bad dream I'm never going to wake up from, it is physical separation at it's worst.

I don't want to feel like this! And as I have said many times before, Alison would hate me being like this, I would like to feel at peace and have acceptance of what has happened, it is just going to take a long time to reach that place. After all this time I still haven't got used to being alone, doubt I ever will, ten months, just seems like one month really, doing things alone, not able to share sucks big time. Having no one to bounce ideas off , no one to share opinions with, no one to ask my opinion, no one to chat nonsense too, basically no one to share my life with! I love our house, all the memories are here, but there is no life in the house any more, it was always buzzing with activity, Alison coming and going, friends coming and going, now nothing, just me.

Then there's the 'moments' when suddenly the reality that she is no longer here is magnified and it hits you deep inside. How can she not be here, I can still see her vividly going out the garden gate for the last time in her life, I watched her go not knowing that it would be the last time I ever saw her alive and she went not knowing that she would be lying dead shortly after. As I have said before, we both died that day, only I am left to go on with my life, while feeling dead inside. Grief has consumed me, no one sees it though, on the outside and in company I smile, I laugh, I'm normal, but inside is where the pain is and no one can see it or detect it, they never see me collapsed on my knees sobbing. The hard truth is that I know I have to get over the grief, sooner rather than later. I have to rebuild my life out of what is left, I cant change what has happened, the grief will not get smaller, I have to rebuild my life around it.

Which means I have to throw myself into work, to start producing paintings like I did before she was taken. Two weeks before she died I had confirmed a solo exhibition in Edinburgh, it would have been my fifth solo exhibition there. Obviously I had to cancel and since then my motivation to paint has been very low. I have had commissions and have slowly worked on these over the months, but the motivation and drive to produce paintings for various galleries, which have been asking for work, has not been there.

By nature, painting is a solitary profession, but not so solitary when you have a partner, Alison would often come in the studio and look over my shoulder at what I was working on, just a little thing like that I miss so much, then of course Alison was the first to see any finished painting.

So I have to now to do it alone, just like everything else! I'm hoping that once I get into painting again productively, it will give me focus and a sense of achievement again, I have to find that motivation! for Alison and myself.