Birthday Eve!

It's the eve of my birthday and I have been known to be dramatic so give me a bit of room here.

When Facebook tells me that I have 'memories to look back on today' it fills me with a dread now. It's the sort of dread that is compulsive.. it draws me towards it knowing that there's heartbreak on the other side.. especially when it says 'you have memories with Oliver Madge to look back on today'....

Our first weekend of moving our stuff to Portscatho (2024);

Holidays in the Outer Hebrides with friends and family (2019 and 2017);

Birthday weekend in Belfast (2018);

Celebrating our two breeding sows both giving birth within two days of my birthday (2014).

Each post is decorated with photos showing smiling faces, fancy cocktails, wonderful seascapes or cute piglets, denoting a life full of love, laughter and adventure. A life which seems so distant now and so out of reach. It breaks my heart.

I was absolutely fine, and when I say fine, I mean I knew that my birthday was going to be a bit of an emotional rollercoaster but was ready for it, felt ready for it.. It's only the day before and I was doing OK until the post arrived. I've been saving the occasional card that has come through the post since Monday to put to one side so that I can open them in bed tomorrow morning.. a tradition that we had.... but today flowers arrived that couldn't wait to be opened and so the process of acknowledging my birthday has begun early... and it hit like a freight train. More than Oli's birthday did... does that make me selfish?? Probably.. I'm prone to that.

Unfortunately, I only noticed the post right before I was due to be picked up to go rowing.. it's amazing that flowers get sent through the post these days.. anyway... It floored me, and I'm not too sure why. I couldn't open them. I didn't want to see who they were from. I think I was worried they would be from people who wouldn't normally make a fuss of my birthday and that would emphasis my loss more. It brought me to my knees and I felt levels of grief that I thought I'd left behind....everything that Oli gave me was taken away all over again and I felt destroyed and alone. I left the house in a bit of a state thinking I'd have a couple of minutes walk to my friends house to compose myself but I was busted.. my friend was ahead of herself and was waiting in her car outside already.

The silver lining of all of this shite is that I'm starting to build relationships here that I know are real and have longevity. I'm slowly opening up to friends and trying not to scare them with my grief.. my lift to rowing is a good hugger and it wasn't long before I was distracted enough to feel better. Rowing has the ability to lift me when I'm at my lowest and it certainly did that today. Everyone was lovely and kind and the sea was brisk but welcoming.. which was kind of everyone, and the sea, to make the last day of my 56th year as bearable as possible. Tomorrow I turn 56... an age my husband was never fortunate to get to and I feel guilty that I have. He should be here.. with me... and that breaks my heart.

P.S. Flowers were from people who would normally send stuff so that was fine... although have no idea who Scilly Flowers were from... answers on a postcard please (or just message me).

P.P.S. If you have sent me flowers on my birthday when you wouldn't have normally, that's lovely. Thank you. It's really nice to be thought of. You rock!!