Super Sonic   +  this is fucked

The Catalogue of Loss

A whole year in, and things shift and change and slide into perspective.

I begin to catalogue my losses, all the things I am grieving for. I tally up what this has cost me. Because now, twelve months on, and I can let go of any lingering hope that things will change, that things will revert to normal, that the people who no longer love me will forgive me.

It takes a long time for shock like that to dissipate. A year, it seems, before you start to see things clearly.

It hurts to think of what I've lost, and it's natural to shy away from it. But there comes a point where you have to look it in the face... letting go, so you can move on.

I am not the person I used to be, and some people seem to love me less for it... but it's not something that can be helped. I miss the Purple Lori as much as they do. Occasionally, people mention that they'd like me 'how I used to be'. And that hurts too... because the Purple Lori is gone, for good now, and if I could I'd bring her back. But that's the equivalent of raising the dead, and that's impossible.

I miss the friends I used to have. All my friendships are different now, and few of them feel genuine. Two of my closest girlfriends, my bridesmaids, friends of mine for over ten years... I've lost them both. One hasn't spoken to me for eight months. No reason, no argument, no fall out... she just stopped calling, and I was still too far in a fog of grief of pain to make the effort. Charlie the shrink tells me it's easier for people to avoid me. Dealing with me, seeing me, talking to me... it hurts because they can see my pain. Having no contact with me at all, they still deal with their guilt... but that's much easier to ignore, much easier to turn away from completely if I'm not there, reminding them all the time.

And that other girlfriend I spoke of...? It happens with all friendships, most friendships, eventually, and it may have happened anyway. But she has drifted away from me, not nearly as enamored in this new Lori as she was in the Lori Before- I'm different, I've changed, she is busy... these things happen. Again, I understand that... I don't like me much either.

Two friendships, that maybe I didn't really need, that maybe I'm better off without... I know all the platitudes; I know that it's them, not me with the problem.... so save the niceties for some other blogger, please.

Two of my own friendships, added to all those other things... the extended network of Tony's friends; my Purple house and Purple life; my vision of the future, my five year plan; my sense of stability, safety and trust.

It just keeps adding up. The cost of it, the toll of that one moment of madness... the longer things linger, the more that choking dust of confusion settles... that first loss just keeps compounding. And the catalogue of loss, it just grows and grows and grows.