Grieving

I am thirty years old and I am not living the life I dreamed for myself. I want to be in a healthy relationship. I’m not sure I know what one looks like. I want to love and be loved and to have my own family. I want to have a baby, Dr Sanaa, a baby girl, so I can show her what it is to be loved and honoured and cherished.

 

I don’t want to wonder what it would have been like if Nurse Florence had been my mum instead of the tired nurse who came home after long shifts with her beloved babies. And who, or what, I would be if Papa hadn’t sent bofrot and kele wele to 37 Military Hospital so my mum would marry his second-born son in London.

I don’t want to wonder why Efua Simpa sent lightning pain flashing through my dad’s body when he was only three years old or who he would have become if she hadn’t. I don’t want gravel to sit at the pit of my stomach every time I think about him in that wheelchair. I don’t want to feel guilty about it or him. I don’t want the idea of his vulnerability to invade my thoughts. Or to wonder if he needs my help while he dribbles on a different continent. I don’t want to will his right hand and mouth to do the things he used to do to me, just so I know he can. And I don’t want to think about his orthopaedic shoes. Jesus.

I don’t want to worry about what will happen to Sol, and his marriage if he doesn’t process his trauma. Or what kind of father he will be to his unborn child.

And I don’t want to spend my life grieving for my baby sister Coral and wishing I had only just seen her face.

 

I feel like someone or something inside me has died.

 

I am grieving.

 

For my dad. For his right eye that used to stare at mine and make me look at my shoes or the floor. For the right side of his mouth that used to call me ‘insolent,’ ‘defiant’ and ‘disrespectful’. The same mouth that made people laugh and laugh and laugh at Ghanaian functions. I am grieving. For his right hand, the hand that used to beat me. I am grieving for the old softness of his hands and the shade of brown that used to be his skin. I am grieving for the dad that Sol used to have. The dad he loved so much. The dad he still loves.

My mum. I am grieving for Nurse Florence. The fact that I only met her once. That she never came to my house or confronted my dad. That she never advocated for herself and didn’t know that she could walk away until she did. That it took her so long. I am grieving for the choices she had to make. That she couldn’t hold her head as high at home as she did at work. I am grieving for the time I spent resenting her for it and the example she didn’t show me. How much I wanted to not be like her. I am grieving for the idea that she never knew true love. I am scared that the same thing will happen to me. I am scared that my life will mirror hers.

Sol. I am grieving for the childhood he had and for the pain he has buried. I am grieving for the fact that he couldn’t fulfil his dream of playing the drums because the sound of the cymbals made his heart betray him. That he didn’t know what it was to be part of a family until he married Sienna. I am grieving for his battle with guilt and failure and inadequacy as a brother to me. I am grieving for the lost opportunities that he may never again enjoy with his dad. I am grieving for his feelings as well as my own. I grieve for the siblings we could never be and the family we never had. I am grieving for the journey he must now embark on.

For Christian. I am grieving for the love we had. Our relationship and lives together. I am grieving for the companionship I have known and lost. The meals we cooked and ate. The walks we used to take. I am grieving for the father that Mai has lost and the family we no longer have. I am grieving for the future I had hoped for and dreamed of with him. For our unborn child and what she would look like. For our children. I am grieving for the fact that he removed the choice from me. That he left me with no option but to walk away. And the fear that I will never love again.

 

Together, Dr Sanaa and I consider Christian’s weekly alcohol consumption against NHS guidelines. I calculate the units on my phone. Dr Sanaa helps me to understand that Christian consumed, in one day, in excess of the national weekly guidance. I could never have brought up the subject of his drinking. Not without enraging him. I tried once but he shut me down. Is that the sign of a healthy relationship?

Together, Dr Sanaa and I consider the role that Christian’s procrastination played in our daily lives. My inability to communicate with him. His looking for another job, abstractly mentioned, never seriously pursued. I wanted to encourage him from a place of love and support but I didn’t know how – without angering him. Is that the sign of a healthy relationship?

Together, Dr Sanaa and I talk about when I fell down the stairs – when he pushed me down the stairs – and how I felt as I cowered at the bottom with red wine in my hair. We talk about the way I felt when he shouted at me, when he stood over me and roared. We talk about the day he took the strawberry from my hand to stop me eating it and the day he threw the remote control at my head. We talk about physical and emotional domestic abuse and the different forms it can take.

We talk about how hard it is for me to say those words out loud – ‘he pushed me down the stairs’ – and what that meant about him and for our relationship.