Reprieve.
Defined as a temporary escape from an undesirable fate or unpleasant situation.
Sometimes a reprieve may arrive in the form of not thinking about the reality of my life, pushing this heartache aside for a few hours, distracting myself with something fun. My reprieve may be solitary, excepting the wildlife on or around a lake, or it may be an hour floating mindlessly in my pool. On these summer days, a reprieve may be giving in to my constant exhaustion and allowing myself a late-afternoon nap.
A true reprieve, though, isn’t me hiding from my reality; instead, it is a break from pretending to be strong. It’s a chunk of time when I’m free to be however I am that day without worrying that I’ll make someone uncomfortable with my emotion, with my frequent tears and my need — my absolute need — to talk about Cooper. A reprieve is the freedom to admit to my bewilderment that this is my life.
Because this is my life.
This month of my life is a roller coaster of memories, and very few are good. I spent a week of June 2020 wondering if Cooper was alive. We spent the night in an ER. He spent an entire week in a behavioral unit trying to shake the voices and hallucinations that followed him home from the Shawnee. This month, a reprieve is having implied permission to own those memories, to honor the trauma that eventually took Cooper. Logic says it does no good to rehash June 2020, but I can’t live June 2021 without the memories. Maybe next year will be easier. Maybe June 19, 2022, will pass without me thinking about Cooper finally coming home, but malnourished, dehydrated, covered in cuts and bruises and out of his mind. Who knows what a year can bring? What I know is these June memories nag me day and night. Reprieves are necessary.
My own brain is disinclined to offer reprieve, preferring to haunt and taunt me with the past. Fortunately, I have people in my life who are reprieve pros. One friend is a night owl like me; we often text late at night and the conversation goes where it goes. And wherever it goes, I know it’s safe. Another friend and I try to get together once a week, just to hang out. We color (yes, really), compare colored pencils (yup), and visit. Last week my picture pages were damp with tears and the room quiet after my pitiful admission that some of my worst nights follow my best days, that the transition from a good time back to my reality leaves me curled on the couch, broken. An email from across the country, an hours-long lunch seasoned with laughter and tears, a message at just the right time, that after-church hug, an afternoon of cards, my family, always — these are the reprieves that save my days.
Out on my own — floating, paddling, wandering — my brain may quiet for a few minutes. It doesn’t last. I can float in the pool, the pump underscoring my questions and recriminations. My body may relax, but my mind does not. I can work my muscles on a lake, paddling for miles, but my mind entertains itself. No, running away doesn’t fix anything.
Being able to exist as I am offers the greatest reprieve. My life is flush with people who can handle me, who understand or try to understand, who will continue to look me in the eye. In a year that feels bereft of blessings, these living, breathing, on-demand reprieves are my blessings.
Woods Writes 