Is healing possible?

 

Do you have any idea how beginning a month with a funeral is excruciatingly painful? 

I sat there. Looking straight at my friend as he gave his farewell speech,"He was a good man, a man of his word. A man with a vision,one he tried to impart on all of us. He loved wholeheartedly, gave willingly, lost with honour and stood up with his head held high.You know, we had plans, we were to build a house, expand the....."

At that moment, we could all hear his voice breaking and face tearing. Let me tell you maina, grief is contagious. The tribute of the person before him made us giggle but his tribute send the entire congregation to the land of emotions crippled with trees of tears and grass of running noses. It is not the norm to have a moment of silence before the widow speaks, but we did. All because through him we realised  the wrath the cold and unforgiving grasp of death. It's sting cutting through the fabric of existence like a sharp blade, leaving hearts shattered and spirits broken in its wake.

One day, he was here and the next he was gone! Death, that merciless thief of life, prowls like a relentless predator in the shadows of existence, striking without warning, without remorse. It lurks in the depths of despair, lurking like a  voracious serpent ready to strike its unsuspecting victims with a deadly bite, leaving behind a trail of devastation and heartache as vast as the darkest ocean that takes years upon years to deal with.

"Dust to dust. Dust you are and to dust you will return.” The preacher said while throwing a pinch of dust on the casket. My friend crying and those words triggered  something in me. Something I never thought I would be feeling again. Something I didn't think I will need to process again. Pain. A pain that started with me having hiccups and then feeling like their was no air on my chest. Then came the incessant headache and twirling of my stomach. Before I knew it, tears were rolling down my face and I was weak on my knees. It took everything in me to move from where I was standing to the nearest wall. I needed a pillar to lean on. 

It has been two years and six months. Two years and six months since I lost the love I loved the most. The love that taught me how to talk, walk , eat ,pray ,go to the farm and sing while digging the land ( we'll try to sing is more of it.) Two years and six months; the time I have taken to learn to live half alive yet one minute in a similar environment and I am triggered. 

The sound of muffled sobs and whispered condolences echoed around me, but it's as if I was in a bubble, isolated with your pain and a ricochet of memories. My gaze driftted to the grave and for a moment, it's not my friends dad lying there, but the her. My throat tightened again and my chest felt constricted as tears threaten to spill over.Every word spoken by the mourners standing next to me felt like a stab to my heart, reopening wounds I thought had begun to heal. Memories, both joyfful and painful, washed over me, leaving me gasping for air amidst the suffocating weight of my grief. Suddenly, the wall wasn't enough to hold me. The world was going in circles and I felt like I was almost falling down.

"Hey, you alright?" My friend's girlfriend asked.

"Yes I am." I said while  struggling to maintain composure, but the facade cracked as a solitary tear escaped, tracing a path down my cheek. I wiped it before she could see it and before he could reach us. Today was about him, about his grief not mine despite how much it was trying to creep upon me like a shadow.

"Thank you guys for coming."he said

"Thank you for letting us be here, we know how much you like keeping it by the chest." I said 

"Just say he is a snob. It's the truth ." His girlfriend said

"Heeeyy, I just buried my dad. You can't say mean stuff to me ?"

"Huuhh lost my dad card? Really??"

"It's the best move I got right now."

"I can't argue with facts."

"Seriously, does it ever get easy?"

"I don't know. But when I find the answer, you will be the first person I call."

"I better be. Coz fahm, sometimes I am just chilling watching a movie and boom! I remember and then I feel paralysed."

"You know, letting him go is gonna take work. You'll have days when it's easy peasy and days your mind and heart are so fucking messy. But that's okay. This is supposed to be heavy. This is meant to be felt. This is expected to be difficult. It is designed to knock you down and you ought not to get up immediately. There is no timeline for healing or manual for dealing with the loss of a loved one. Even if there was, it would not have helped. It is your loss; your grief. How you work on it and move on is one of the few things that is in your jurisdiction."

"When did you become so wise?"

"Been sitting with old men today you know, it rubs off on you."

"Nowadays we call it sitting huuhhh."

"Sharaaappp"

"You know some people call it.."

"I am out of here."

"That's no way to leave your grieving friend kiddo."

"He's in good hands." I said while pointing at his girl who was busy giggling while eating.

I was among the last people to leave the compound. Dogs had started barking and chickens were well locked in. When I reached the gate, I turned one more time. I remembered the emptiness and pain that came after the funeral, after everyone left and it was time to start dealing with the loss. The pain and emptiness I haven't felt in a minute but came crashing down on me today. It got me wondering, is healing real? Does one ever heal? Completely?

By

Khaoya Favor