Session on - The voice

Telling Diann about Saturday and Sunday and the amount of thoughts that arose because I got stuck in the cycle I seem to create, without even realizing it. The cycle of constantly reliving my own grief with the same thoughts, feelings and fears over and over again. The thinking made me reflect and the reflecting made more things come up, that I maybe only needed to say to be able to give a place in the puzzle.

Diann asked me weeks ago, to listen to the voice in my head, to recognize what it's saying and what is happening around me to cause the voice start speaking. I was in the car, driving from the airport up to Orla's house, nearly 2 weeks ago now. I remember how much I was thinking about Tom. Seans father who passed away nearly 3 years ago, after being diagnosed with cancer. Over the past years, I would think about him, of course, sometimes more regularly than others. But the past week, he's been playing on my mind.

I sat on the backseat of the car and felt so guilty. I was thinking about Tom and about the weeks of him being so ill. He traveled from Holland to Ireland where Ma was going to take care of him. I'll never forget seeing how ill he was. Life seemed so unfair, on that Thursday night as I sat there, because I knew that I had just made the journey that he had made. I wasn't in full health but I knew that I'd be doing the journey again and I'd be stronger and healthier. It seemed so unfair that I was allowed to be making this journey and that my health would only get better. For him it was so different.

As I sat there, for the first time, since the start of Anna, I felt like I had been given a second chance, in life. The 2 illnesses are so different from each other and I don't know if it's right for me to say that I got a second chance, because I don't know how ill I got. I don't know how close I could have gotten to the point of no return because I don't know where that point it. I do know however, that somewhere along the line, somewhere between me getting ill and getting better again and Tom getting ill, that our lines or our state of being ill, would have crossed. However, our "lines" were going in opposite directions. I couldn't see why I was getting a second chance, and he wasn't and when the voice got really bad.. I would hear it telling me that it should have been the other way around. He should have gotten better, not me.

I know this was the guilt talking to me. It was Anna getting me down. I had survived getting on the plane in Dublin and I had gotten off the other end and was still living and breathing. So much improvement in such a short period of time, was bound to wreck my head. And that's where the thoughts suddenly came from.

Whenever I was feeling bad over the past weeks, that's would pop into my head. I told Diann yesterday. We then talked about how he was and how it was when I was growing up. It's hard to put it into words how it made me feel, bringing this into the conversation. It was so emotional and I could literally feel it spilling from my insides, it was actually coming out of my heart and hurt like hell..

A combination of grief for loosing Tom and for the "bond" that we had, or the bond that I longed to have with him. There was no other man like Tom. I wasn't going to make everything better or worse. Things used to be exactly that..just as they were. When Ma and Tom first got together, I tried my best for him to like me and for him to maybe even love me. I would strike up conversations but I couldn't get through. He was tough and I was a young girl. There was only so much I could do, before I gave up on seeking approval from him. So we never got close. He was so proud and so strong. I remember that if he were ever to think anything good about me, in any way, shape or form, then my world would be made. I know he did care for us all in his own way. Ma told us many many times.

It wasn't until years later, when all us kids were all grown-up and we had matured, that there was some closeness to be spoken of. I respected him, even after everything that had happened over the years. I remember Ma said that if there was any of us 4 girls he could see being a success in college or to go far in life, it would be me. That, to me, made all the years of us not talking, worthwhile. I had finally gotten approval. He never said it to my face, but knowing that's how he felt, meant the world to me. Someone so strong and so proud, could see something special in me. That was all I needed.

When I was traveling, I would often think..I wish Tom could see me now. And sometimes, since July, I would think..what would Tom say if he could see me now? Diann asked me yesterday, what do I think it would be.. I answered honestly: "Get a grip and get on your life".. That's what I thought he might say. But the answer to what he would say, we'll never know.

Diann asked this, because the way he presented himself or the way he made himself appear to be, to the rest of world, was similar to the opinions I had towards myself. I didn't approve of myself. I wanted him to approve of me. But he never showed it. And to get a glimmer of his approval would make me feel special. It would make me feel just a little bit worthy. I could feel so insignificant, when I was young. But for him to see me as someone special, would mean that I was no longer unimportant, I would then be everything but insignificant. But then Anna made me feel special and she approved of me, in a way nobody ever had.

Diann said that, me being the person I am, it's only natural for me to have picked up on Tom's personality, at such an influential age, without realizing it. The determination he saw in me, he admired. He knew I would go places and do exactly what it is in life, that I wanted. He believed in me.

It's a hard issue, to all of us. And I know that none of us sometimes realize just how big an impact he had on our lives. Diann said to me yesterday, that he admired my determination and that that's the thing I have to hang on to. We don't know what he would have said, if he saw what I was going through. People change and the events people go through change people's opinions and beliefs. But the thing he admired in me, I never should to let go. Letting go of Anna is good, however it's my determination that made her apart of me. He would want me to let her go, but not the source..which is me.. Determined Fay. Something I have to treasure.. I'm grateful for his belief in me, and wouldn't have wanted any of it to have been any different. I'm grateful for it all. And I know by now that gratitude is the key that turns the expected into gifts which is exactly what all of this is.

It was hard talking about this yesterday and it hurt so much. But, as Ma said afterwards, it was playing on my mind for a reason. It needed to be put out there, no matter how hard it was for both Ma and me and even Diann.