Breathing in February

Yesterday the anxiety returned.  By bedtime, I could barely catch my breath. 

I struggle with seasonal depression.  But I'm from ND and that's not rare for our northern climate.  Our winters can be long, and harsh, and suffocating.  I can usually feel the heaviness settle in about mid-November -- right before Thanksgiving.  I sludge through the holidays (so thankful I truly LOVE Christmas).  January is usually a blur. And I hold my breath through February.  Especially the last week.  The last week of February is always the hardest, as I find myself slowly sinking even farther under an ocean of heaviness that I just want to give in to.  Because it is easier  - and more comfortable - to rest in the depths than it is to fight my way through it.

And then comes my birthday.  I hate my birthday.  I never look forward to it.  I try to ignore it.  And I can't wait to get past it because then, oddly enough, I can breathe again.  I have never understood this.  I just knew it was the way it was.

Until today. When the proverbial light bulb came on.  And a quick Google search brought up the photograph below.

5 days before my 14th birthday, my baby sister died.  At age 2 1/2.  I can't remember the exact date of the funeral but it had to have been only a day or two before my birthday.  She died at home under the care of Hospice, in the arms of my mom, and surrounded by the few friends and family that had stuck with us through a very long and isolating 2 1/2 years.  We knew it was coming.  An odd lot of humanity gathered in an uneven circle and breathing quiet shallow breaths, as we waited and listened for my sister to breathe her last.

What I do remember:

1.  As soon as they said my sister was gone, I gave her one last kiss, I got up, walked out of the room, and went to bed.  I just wanted to sleep but people kept coming into my room to see how I was doing.  I said fine.  I felt the urge to lie and pretend I was a hot mess because that seemed more appropriate but I didn't.  Even though it seemed kinder than admitting that you are relieved and that your only thought is that hopefully now, somehow, your life can return to some kind of 'normal'.

2.  I remember getting up the next morning to find all of my sister's stuff gone.  I walked up the stairs to our living room and the silence and emptiness took my breath away.  Her bed, medical equipment, blankets... everything that had taken over the main floor of our house for so long... was just gone - as if the last 2 1/2 years had never happened.  I just stood there... hanging on to a breath that I would still be holding on to 32 years later.

3.  My mom took me shopping for a dress for the funeral. At K-Mart.  And we bought the ugliest frilly, pink, polyester dress I had ever seen.  And I was angry.  I remember thinking that my sister wouldn't even recognize me in the dress (I was a bit of a tomboy).  And she wouldn't care if I wore a dress or not.  I didn't wear them when she was alive.  Why should I have to wear one because she was dead.

4.  Almost all of my 45 classmates came to the funeral.  They took up 3 pews of the large Catholic church.  I don't think I could ever express how much that meant to me.  And it was a bit of a revolt because our school principal originally said he would not excuse the absences of the students who left school that day to attend.  (This was the same principal who gave my mom a hard time about letting out of school to go to grief counseling.)  Thank you for sticking up for me (even though some of you probably did come just to get out of school. But if you think a funeral is more fun than going to class... well, whatever.)  It is probably one of the only times in high school that I ever felt like I mattered to anyone.

5.  The funeral was completely awkward.  I was 13 (14).  That age is already awkward enough.  But as I sat at the after service reception with my friends, I had no clue what to do.  I felt guilty for not crying.  I felt guilty  for laughing.  I felt guilty for wanting to eat more Jello - and for refusing to eat the funeral hotdish.  I wanted to throw off the ugly pink dress and go back to school with my friends and just pretend that none of this was happening.

6.  I remember that life never did get back to normal.  Our family was a shell. What was left of us  - me, my mom & dad - would retreat to our individual corners of the house each day.  No one really talking.  No one really living.  My dad and I slowly emerged - my mom never recovered.

7.  I remember that I never cried.  Oh, I cried about boys, and school, and classes ... and life.  But I never cried about my sister.   In part because for almost 3 years, I was told by well-meaning folk that I needed to be tough.  Don't complain.  This isn't about you.  Don't bother your mom with your feelings or problems - she's got enough to worry about.  I did that for so long and, like the perfectionist that I am, I did it perfectly.  If fact, I did it so well that at times I still know how to do nothing else.  I am a tough nut - for better or worse.  32 years later... I still have not cried.

But I also never cried because I was relieved for my sister.  She was born 3 months prematurely - and survived - in a day and age that when babies with much smaller obstacles died because there just was not the medical technology that we have now.  She was a miracle.  She came home after 3 months.  And a month later contracted spinal meningitis.  She recovered but her heart was severely damaged and she was now blind, mostly deaf, and would fight epilepsy and encephalitis the rest of her short life.  She had beautiful blonde hair that would never be allowed to grow out more than a few inches before a doctor would have to shave it to do another surgery to replace the shunt in her head because she had either grown out of it or it was not working properly.  We  had to suction out her lungs several times an hour to remove the phlegm and fluid build-up. And even with heavy meds, grand mal seizures would shake and seize up her innocent and frail body - sometimes several times a day.  And so when my sister left us, I knew she was free.   Free from it all.  

I  have a visual of my sister in my mind of her running through a field of daisies - free to run and laugh and soak in the sights around her with her long blonde locks lifting in the breeze around her.  And in later years, I know that she was joined by her nieces and nephews  - the 4 children that my husband I lost through miscarriage.  They keep her company, playing and rejoicing and waiting to be reunited with those of us still left behind. 

What is the point of all this?  I am not sure.  Except for the epiphany that life is not random.  That for every shadow that seems to hover over us there is a reason that that shadow is there - whether we recognize it or not.  And shadows only exist when light is only allowed to glance off of something from one angle.  But when we put a spotlight on something and expose it fully to the light - the shadows disappear.  And hopefully, when the shadows flee so will all the heaviness that comes with them.

And then finally, maybe finally, I'll be able to breathe in February.