Greif like Gremlins

I have decided that my grief is like a Gremlin, a lot of the time it is a reflection of the love I have for those that I have lost. I welcome that. I love them so don't want them to be forgotten, like a cuddly toy to a child, some days I may leave them on my bed or a shelf, other days I need to keep them physically close to me.  If you were a teen in the 80's as I was, then you will know what happens when a cute looking Gremlin turns bad.  If they get wet, are exposed to bright light or fed after midnight they turn into the most horrid evil little monsters.

Sometimes my grief turns bad, the Gremlins in my head start to tease and taunt me, I no longer have the people in my life that can tell me that the bad feelings I get are not real reflections of how they thought about me.  So today I have decided to write some of these things down.  I don't need comments or sympathy, I just need to put some of them on paper (so to speak) so that I can acknowledge their existence. So here goes:

"Your mum took her own life so she could be with your dad and youngest (favourite) daughter."

"You were never good enough"

"You took on your niece to try and please others not to do the best for her"

"When are you going to get over your past?"

"You obviously like to wallow in grief"

"Just stop feeling sorry for yourself"

"You should be grateful to not be juggling ageing parents as your children leave home"

"look what a crap parent you have been"

There are many more but that is quite enough for today.  Until now I would cope with all these things in my head by counting the hours til 6pm so that I could obliterate these gremlins with alcohol or sleep (or both).  That time has passed, I can acknowledge that this is a bad way to continue regularly coping with these thoughts. That is not to say there will be times when that will still happen.  Another coping mechanism I use is to keep busy, this has it's limits too, my poor broken body can't keep doing that.  So for today the only thing I can do is be, I know deep down that the things these Gremlins say to me are not true, but I also know they still feel real now and again.  So if I see you in real life then you might notice I'm a bit shut down, I cannot do everything without the crutches of alcohol or busyness.  Thank you in advance to those of you that know me well and will still be there when I reemerge, it could be later today or next week, who knows?

Much love xxxx