Last weekend, I drove to Flagler Beach, Florida to run away from my emotions on the third anniversary weekend of my mother's death. I went alone and only told my husband and a few people from work in case they needed to reach me on the day I drove back. I didn't really have many more people to tell.
Flagler Beach was not the original plan - I wanted to see St. Augustine, initially. It had been in the running for my honeymoon, and I wanted to see it for myself. When I got there, a seafood festival was in town, and the narrow streets were overrun with traffic. Exhausted from my 7-hour drive that had somehow turned into nine due to my search for gluten-free fare, I decided to drive thirty miles further south. There was one motel close to the ocean. It was easy to gauge its proximity by its price. The property was called The Topaz Motel/Hotel, and it was equal parts run down and haunted, either by actual ghosts or by memories of the family who had lived there before, or the tourists who had come and gone. I slept with HGTV on. Ghosts don't mess with folks who sleep with that on. They're too depressed by the beautiful homes they can't go haunt. I feel you, ghosts.
The beachfront was lined with construction barrels, as the city was repairing the dunes. I woke up at sunrise anyway and swung my leg over the barrier, taking the stairs down to the sand. I didn't see what I was looking for - dolphins. The whole reason I drove down in the first place. My mother had loved dolphins. I didn't cry like I thought I would, either. I sat on the stairs. I walked along the beach for awhile. I watched a glorious pit bull dig in the sand with its barefoot owner, waves rushing in as the sun climbed higher in the sky. The sand in Flagler Beach is mostly crushed coral and seashells, and it was rough in my sandals to the point that it hurt my feet. I texted my husband a bit. Still no tears. But then, she wasn't dead yet. It was still only Sunday, and the anniversary was Monday.
I spent the rest of the day getting breakfast, where I listened to a Florida State graduate bemoan the queer state of the Boy Scouts and laud our Cheeto in Chief for his guidance of the country. I spent two hours at the beach, forgetting to wear sunscreen and burning my shoulders and back to a crisp. I missed out on the dolphin tour I meant to book in Saint Augustine and ended up booking a cheap imitation, and ripped my favorite dress rushing out the door on the way to drive there. There was no parking and I barely made my dock. A couple in front of me on the tour talked incessantly the whole time. I finally saw my dolphins. Though I'm crying now at the recollection, I didn't cry then. I was hardly moved. I felt like I couldn't feel anything. I found more gluten-free sustenance at a nearby bar afterward, and hung out with a now-nameless bartender for an hour, drinking specialty cocktails and discussing the slower pace in the South compared to our native Northern climes. Closing time came as I was drinking my Swamp Pony, and he graciously let me stay awhile.
By the time I made it to Flagler Beach, I had four miles left in my gas tank. I risked it all to drive six miles to the nearest gas station for boxed Chardonnay and a bottle of water. I filled my tank. I swung open the hotel door, making sure to say hello to the HGTV and the ghosts lurking in the corner. By the time I popped the chardonnay in the freezer to be chilled a moment, it was Monday, March 25th, 2019.
This year, I cried a little less. The entire point of the trip to Florida was that I would deal with this death. For the last two years, two friends have thrown a "Deathiversary" party for me, to distract me and help heal my wounds. Those two friends were in my wedding. This year, I didn't hear from either of them on the anniversary of my mother's death. In fact, I'm not sure I've seen one of them, at least, since I got married. People grow apart. It's a part of life. It's the lonely part of life.
I did cry, though. I felt it. In the third year since my mother has been gone, I've started a new job, decided to finally take graduate applications seriously, married the man of my dreams, came out as bisexual, became an aunt, went to New York City, the list goes on and on. I've been diagnosed with endometriosis, PTSD, and PCOS. I've isolated myself, tucked myself away in my house with my husband and my dogs, barely interacting with any of my friends outside of the internet and completely unsure how to start. I'm slowly inching toward mental stability, and that means facing up to what a shit person I was while my mother was alive and when I first moved to Chattanooga. That means acknowledging the reality that I hardly remember a lot of nights, especially when I was out doing comedy, either because I was drunk or manic - or both.
Navigating chronic illness alone, without friends nearby...friends that you can text or call with a moment's notice and say "hey, I am struggling and I need to just not think about it for a minute" without having to pretend everything is okay...is impossible. I had surgery to excise endometriosis. I had ovarian drilling. I have scars on my abdomen that are barely two centimeters long each. Somehow, all of my gastrointestinal issues and abdominal pain are persistent. My pelvic pain is persistent. I'm still in pelvic floor physical therapy. My current treatment plan is having injections in my abdominal wall to numb trigger points, or clusters of nerves, that I developed while guarding myself from my intense abdominal pain from endometriosis. This might not work. I still need more vaginal wall injections. Just so I can function. The only person I discuss this with is my husband. Poor guy. In sickness and in health. I bet he's wondering when the "and in health" part comes along.
I'm so sick of being in the type of pain that no one sees. I'm sick of explaining that my pain isn't gone. I'm sick of not eating red meat, gluten, dairy, or soy, and somehow still not losing weight even at 1,300 calories per day. I feel insane all the time.
While dealing with all of this, I've been dealing with the very real paranoia that no one actually likes me. I haven't given people much reason to over the past three years. I've been paranoid, entitled, rude, dramatic, overly talkative, needy, the list goes on. Every time I try to go out or put myself out there, my crippling social anxiety takes over, and I stay home. Or I have a debilitatingly bad pain day, and I stay home. Even though I "seem healthy." I seem healthy because my world can't just stop when I feel bad, or my world would always be stopped. I'm not kidding when I say the only friendships I can keep are the ones I form online. Which is first, pathetic, and second, lonely.
Part of me misses when I wasn't medicated. Like all it would take is one good manic episode to really kick my shit into high gear. I wonder if I'd be better off if I never tried to get better. If I never had tried to fix myself. I'd lose this PCOS weight and feel like the talk of the town. I'd go out and drink and have fun, and maybe write a funny joke or two and have the energy to go work them out at an open mic. Maybe I'd do more than binge-watch Netflix and sit and wonder why no one reaches out to see if I'm okay. I see a lot of my friends post all of the time, hell, I do, about how if you're struggling, you should reach out. I do reach out. But what really helps is real relationships, not people paying you lip service because they don't want your pain on their conscience.
I drove 9 hours to Flagler Beach last weekend so I could mourn my mother. I wanted to mourn her actively and stop ignoring and deflecting. So I walked the beach. I looked for dolphins. I ripped my favorite dress and bought a $12 dollar swimsuit at Wal-Mart that barely fit my bloated, chronic illness stomach. I laid on the beach. I waded in the ocean and couldn't swim in the waves. I cried for my mother. I cried for myself. I lost myself in HGTV and ghost stories and wondering why I couldn't keep a friendship longer than two years, and if everyone was right about me all along.
I skipped two days of medication and waited to see if I felt better.
I'm still waiting. I think I'll always be waiting.
