I had my ‘Bruce Almighty’ moment fairly early on After Arlo’s death- Screaming at sky till I was hoarse, punching my steering wheel and sobbing; projectile anger- exorcist like.
Lily died. Arlo’s little friend Lily lost her battle. And I was furious.
I had been in contact with Lorraine since we left Liverpool. I knew she moved into the family flat we were in so her Charlie could come and stay with her. I was so happy for her, Charlie had come to see her and his little sister, but he hadn’t been able to stay over with his mum. I was over the moon that they could now stay together. I left everything to Lorraine; another mum in the same situation. I gave her Arlo’s nappies and cotton wool balls for Lily. I emptied our freezer and fridge into hers; wanting to do anything I could just to make life a little easier for her and Charlie. Having lived the life of a neonatal mum, if someone handed me a bag of food, nappies and wipes, I would have been over the moon- anything to take the pressure off, just a little something to help.
Lily had been causing the right amount of havoc, just to keep the nursing team on their toes, but overall she had been doing well. She had had a settled few days, which is all you can hope for in neonatal. Don’t expect to move mountains, baby steps all the way- they are babies after all. There had been conversations about starting steroids to give Lily the little boost she may need with her lungs to move her along; everything was looking good (just like it was with Arlo) I truly believed she was going to make it all the way home to her mum and brother. George had gone, Arlo had gone, Lily HAD to make it.
Lily’s brother George died the day Arlo was born. Lorraine messaged me one day, telling they had made the decision at 13.30 to let George grow his wings. He’d battled so hard, but was just too little and too poorly, so he passed away peacefully in his mummy’s arms. Arlo was already showing he wasn’t too happy, but he decided at that time he was going to up the game and show he was in distress and was born 26 minutes later. She believed that her boy had made way for mine, and I found comfort in that too. Now, both our boys had wings, and Lily had those boys in her corner, we believed they would do all they could (and don’t doubt they did) to look after her; double strength and support from the sky.
I sent Lorraine Arlo’s poem, because I knew she’d understand, and with it I asked her how Lily was. I’ll never forget the reply.
‘Lily is now with Arlo and George.
She, like our boys, was too perfect for this world.’
To say I had been doing okay would have been a massive stretch, but I was riding the waves; plodding and sobbing my way through the days trying to find things to busy my aching arms, but all in all I was just making about scraping through. This news pulled the rug out from underneath my feet, more than that, I was suddenly drowning. I sent Lorraine a few messages with tears streaming down my face, sobbing uncontrollably. I’d been there, I’d been that mum clinging to my precious baby. Lorraine had been there too and now she was going through it all again, just shy of 8 weeks since the last time.
So heartbreakingly unfair! It was just so incredibly unfair, this isn’t how it should have been. Lily should have made it. Lorraine should have been able to bring Lily home. I just cried and cried and cried. I cried for Arlo, I cried for Lily and George, I cried for Lorraine, I cried for myself. I just cried. Eventually, I calmed down enough to drive myself home, I wanted to get home to Day. I began my drive over the mountain, climbing and climbing, higher and higher. It seemed my anger climbed along with it.
At first I simply asked why- why Lily too?! And I felt it bubble…
Why!?
It was building, boiling, burning.
WHY!!!
The third why was the one, the red faced volcano blew; lava bubbles shot from the top and with them spewed all sorts of things that I’m not proud of. I screamed as loud as I could hoping that would carry my words to whoever I was angry at.
God?
The world?
The universe?
I pulled over, unable to see, unsafe to drive, and needing to calm down. Instead of calming down it only fueled the fire, without having to concentrate on driving I let lose. I screamed, I sobbed, I swore, I punched the steering wheel- I was Bruce Almighty having a tantrum. I couldn’t string to words together, I just screeched incoherently, fists clenched, hammering my steering wheel. If I had some prayer beads I’d have lobbed them with all my might, just like Bruce.
George, then Arlo, now Lily.
I was SO angry, so venomous; spitefully furious. And just when I thought I calmed down another wave came from nowhere and I was back to the start again; a vicious cycle. The incredible strength and adrenaline that powers through you is scary, the unrelenting strength of something possessed. I was possessed- by anger! It overruled my brain, it overran every limb of my body, it overtook the upset and the heartbreak, momentarily.
After an unknown amount of time, my breathing slowed, I pushed my saltwater encrusted hair from my face, wiped the tears and snot away with a side-swipe from my sleeve, took a deep breath and carried on driving.
I repeated this whole sequence, from start to finish, twice more on my way home.
Opening the door, I saw Day’s worried face. I’d been a long time, a lot longer than I said I was going to be. He looked at my face, searching it for an explanation as to why I looked like a snot-covered scarecrow who’d taken a trip to the seaside. ‘Lily died.’ That was all I could manage before I completely splintered. The anger now dissipated; the burst dam of salty tears had melted the sharp ice-block of fury.
I messaged Lorraine lots with agonising empathy. I knew there was nothing I could do to lessen the pain, but I wanted her to know she was constantly on my mind as she laid her Lily to rest. My heart broke all over again. I never wanted anyone else to go through the pain and heartbreak we had experienced. We spoke of Arlo, George and Lily all playing together in the sky, we felt Lily thought she was missing her boys and needed to be with them. We were so comforted that they were all together.
This was the trigger of the first explosion, but anger reared it’s ugly head quite a lot in the early days, weeks and months. I was so angry that my boy had been snatched away from me and he would never grow up to live and love and laugh. The anger would normally come off the back of something else, something I was too ‘full-up’ to deal with. I was full of the empty abyss and it consumed me. It didn’t make me a nice person, or particularly pleasant to live with, but I had to accept that this was part of grieving and I had to learn to deal with it, and in a clean way. A way that wasn’t trying to hurt anyone else or react to the anger they were feeling, abs when emotions are running high, that’s agonisingly difficult. The ‘safe place’ of a grieving person can be a volatile place to be (whether that be the actual place they feel safe or the person they feel safest with) I found when I was out, or in the company of others that I ‘held it together’ with what turned out to be all my might, when I got home, I couldn’t keep it together any longer. To be honest, it was rare that the day to day alone made me angry. It was more the ‘added extras’ – any added stress or unable to tolerate anyone else’s high emotions that broke me. And that is so unbelievably difficult with two parents grieving simultaneously under the same roof.
Day and I had an argument one night and I left. I walked out, I found myself in my car, with the dog and I was driving. I had no destination in mind. I just knew I needed to escape from the pressure-cooker. After aimlessly driving around, I found myself at the a rocky beach just over two miles away from our house. Thankfully the car park was empty, I didn’t want to see another person.
It was winter. It was dark and chilly. The sea clattered against the stones, jiggling and rearranging them, continuously shuffling them, trying to make them fit. I strode our against the freezing night, hot with anger I was unable to feel anything, let alone the cold that tried to penetrate my thickening skin.
Sam, my faithful companion, trotted by my side, unsure whether to be excited or not. We didn’t walk in the dark. This was different. This was new. But that night, just like walking back to the flat on my own in Liverpool, I wasn’t scared of anything or anyone. I wanted someone to argue with.
The furrowed dark clouds and rolling inky waves matched the black heart that thundered inside my chest and the swirling anger that festered. I was drawn to them like a magnet. Initially I sat on a rock and just stared out to sea, my anger had abated during my stomp. I sat and sobbed. They racked my whole body, yet instead of shaking those black clouds away, the storm swirled around me. It gathered in speed and intensity until I thrust myself to my feet and let out a roar. I picked a large stone from the multitude to choose from and I launched it into the sea. It made an unsatisfying ‘ploop!’
I picked up another and this time I threw it at the lava-like rocks that frame the rocky beach. It shattered upon impact. The money shot. I needed to break things, like my heart was broken, I needed to watch things shatter, like the pieces of my life lay shattered in front of me. I let lose as I screamed and shouted, ranted and raved and smashed stone after stone after stone onto the bigger rocks. I hauled the largest stones I could off the ground and threw them into the sea. They made a more satisfying noise, plunging deeper and deeper; drowning- just like me. I hollered at the sky, I jumped up and down with my fists clenched. I was a bonafide madwoman, the genuine article. To an observed I was just that. I never even thought of the state I looked. Thank goodness the car park was empty or I could have been locked up. To be honest I didn’t care! I needed this and I wasn’t hurting anyone. I wasn’t damaging anything, the stones didn’t care, the sea didn’t mind. Mother Nature so often takes her moods out on the coast, I was just fighting back. I wasn’t hurting anyone with my venomous words, I wasn’t picking arguments for sport, I’d found a vent for that molten lava that scalded my insides and the stones were my only victims.
Sam just plodded around, sniffing, searching. (Probably searching for the ducks he thinks me may sprout wings and catch one day.) He checked me occasionally with one beady eye, staying clear of the ‘smash zone.’
Eventually I plonked myself down again, exhausted. Salty tears flowed freely and I hugged my knees, chin on my arms and listened to the waves. I wasn’t ready to go home yet, but I was calming down to the sounds of the swishing waves. They made me focus, and think of the real reason I was there, I missed Arlo. I was missing my baby and I didn’t know how to cope. Everything had been stolen from me and I couldn’t get it back and I was angry. Oh boy, was I angry! Arlo was mine and he had been so unfairly snatched from me. Life was moving on and I didn’t want it to, life was dragging me kicking and screaming further away from my boy and I HATED it. Each day that passed was a step away from Arlo and I couldn’t bear it.
Unable to locate a duck, or maybe because he sensed I needed him, Sam sat next to me, my companion, my best friend.
The crackle of car tyres entering the car park rudely ripped me from my thoughts. I jumped up and made for the car with Sam. Anger rippled again! How dare someone interrupt! I couldn’t feign happiness or even normality right now. I know I had a face like a bulldog chewing a wasp as thundered past the invaders. I was aware enough to recognise I got strange sideways glares and double-takes as I passed them. I couldn’t muster the energy to care. There was no polite smiles from me, and didn’t care about that either.
The anger of grief was like nothing I’ve ever felt before. I’m not proud of my actions, but I’m so glad I managed to vent, or I feel it would have permanently bubbled underneath. Everyone tells you that anger is part of the grieving process, but no one tells you how to deal with it. You’re expected to feel angry, yet plaster a smile on your face and carry on. Nobody understands how that anger eats away inside you. They tell you it’s okay to be angry, but no one gives you any healthy coping mechanisms for it. When I’ve spoken to people who have recently experienced loss, I tell them it’s okay to be angry, I tell them my experience and how much it helped me. I tell them to punch a pillow, to lob stones and smash them, I tell them it’s okay to sit and scream at the universe till you’re hoarse, because it is. You’re not hurting anyone, that anger has to come out, it can come out constantly in short snaps at loved ones, pushing them further and further away. It can leap out in jealousy of others, those carrying on their own lives. It can sound spiteful and nasty.
Don’t get me wrong, I snapped and I was jealous, but I think by having those outbursts it kept those feelings at a manageable level. I tell people to message me, to use every swear word under the sun, any way to vent their anger, because I don’t mind and I know it helps.
It took a while for me to calm down once I got back to the car, and I sat a while longer, but eventually, tear-stained and bedraggled, I returned home. This time the snot-covered scarecrow really had taken a trip to the seaside.
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