I'd like to return this item, please. A couple of months ago, I was given this device. It works by randomly shaking up my emotions and super-intensifying the one it lands on. I have always been fairly happy and even-tempered with the occasional flare-up of anger or sadness. It's a smooth path in life, and quite enjoyable. I did not give it up willingly. This device, this "grief magnometer", has taken over my thoughts, feelings, opinions, and actions. It's a dictator with one agenda; to keep me feeling the opposite of how I used to.
Let's talk about sadness. I have always cried at commercials, animal stories, my own and my family's hurt feelings, and especially when tragedy happened in other families. It rarely cut me inside with knives like the sadness from the grief magnometer. This device knows how to read when I am performing a simple task, like putting on makeup, washing dishes, starting the car....and then it attacks. It uses triggers that I didn't even know existed to bring on the memories, followed by the trembling lip and tears rolling from the eyes. If I could change the setting, I would have it schedule an appropriate time for sadness and a good cry, then I could carry on with the day. (Holly Hunter did that brilliantly in a scene from "Broadcast News", by the way. Check it out.)
The magnometer also knows how to scare me. I am sensible and smart. I have made plans to live without my husband's salary. He loved us so much, and left us in good shape for the future. But this crazy grief-device unleashes feelings of being afraid if we happen to spend thirty-five dollars on something, or if one of the cars makes a funny noise, or I see a bit of peeling paint out on the porch. I usually take charge and fix things - fix them myself if I can. But this new feelings device forces me to sit, stare, shake, cry a bit, (whine a bit) and even talk of giving up. Thank goodness for family and friends that talk me through these situations and encourage me to be my old self and handle them. This device is just plain old mean!
Speaking of mean.....that is one word that has never really described me. I'm sure I had my moments as a young person, but as an adult, I think that I've only been considered to be a 'nice' person. I like to joke when a new student comes in at the middle of the school year by introducing myself and saying loudly "......and I'm the meanest teacher here!" Of course, all the other little ones start saying "No, you're the nicest!" "You're not mean!" (If you're insecure, or an attention-hog, I highly recommend being a good elementary music teacher.) I try to ALWAYS be nice to people. So, mean feelings surprise me. Feeling mean is different from feeling angry. Feeling mean is strange. The grief magnometer sometimes likes to shake things up and make me feel mean when people are trying to help me. Not good friends, but people that I might have to call, or have an appointment with - people that have my best interests in mind! I sit on the phone with them, or drive to my appointment, thinking mean thoughts about them, and concocting mean things I can do to them. Feeling this way is so unlike me. This is the main emotion shake-up that makes me so angry.
Oh, anger!! When I was in college, my roommate took a class called "Death and Dying". She would share portions of what they learned - it was such a foreign concept to college kids! They memorized the stages of grief as set forth by Elizabeth Kubler Ross. I remember Maria telling me the stages, they were novel and interesting at the time. I understood all of them except anger. I mean, yes, "you can be angry that someone is gone, but aren't you more sad?" I thought. My twenty-year-old self thought that. My present self knows that the anger is the quickest emotion to flare in my state of grief. Everything triggers anger, because it doesn't matter if the feeling is good or bad to start with, the anger comes around in the form of "Why aren't you here to share this beautiful thing/help me with this difficult thing?" I'm angry at fate, I'm angry at him, I'm angry at the life insurance company, I'm angry at my financial advisor, I'm angry at anyone that expresses a different opinion, I'm angry at the companies that keep sending bills, I'm angry at my fingernails for continuing to grow, I'm angry at the grocery store for not hiding that chili and those hot wings from my eyes, I'm..........angry. Very recently, I went into a yelling, screaming, cursing rage fit. Ninety minutes later, I was so embarrassed by my own self, I was in tears. Thank goodness family understands. I am controlled by this grief device. I just never know which button it's going to push on which day.
It's too bad that this grief magnometer is a final sale item. I cannot return it. The thing it came in to replace is permanently gone, and it is permanently here. I think I can change some habits and surroundings and learn to live with it, but I wouldn't if I didn't have to.
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