1.2.3. freak out time

i was sitting on the couch next to ryan.
and he had been waiting to tell me something.
i am usually good about these things... about if someone is holding back on me.
i wait.

Ryan looks a bit concerned.

He then goes on to tell me that while he had been driving that day he had gotten light headed and thought he was going to pass out. he said he had pains in his chest. (insert dire panic here) He went on saying that he was currently feeling those chest pain again and he thought it would be a good idea to head to the doctor.

this is where my own inner panic started to take control.

What did I want to do???

run away.
cry.
scream. yell.

What did I have to do??

be a big girl.
take the lead.
control myself.
breathe.


My body was moving in a sort of slow motion inside my head even though I knew I was rushing around on the outside. We went in the car and i didn't want to talk. i didn't want the details. mainly because i was afraid of them. i was trying the best i could not to start having a panic attack or let my mind wander to a dark place. and i didn't want to have to take my medicine. i just wanted to be there for him. i wanted to be the normal girlfriend that he deserves to have that should handle these situations rationally and say "i am sure it is nothing, honey." i don't want to make his fears worse. just because the worst has happened to me before. and it's hard to believe in the "it's just nothing, my dear."

we went to a clinic.
and they sent us to the ER.
typical stuff.

i was doing ok.
i wasn't losing it.
i was very calm as we drove to the ER.
I started to plan out how it would pan out.
I already threw working the next day out the window.
I didn't want to text or call anyone and let them know we were going to the ER.
It was like I thought it I admitted it then something would happen. like i was jinxing everything. I didn't want to even believe this was happening. to take ryan to the ER because of chest pain.
As we were signing in to the ER I went to the restroom.
I started crying.
ya know... the ugly kind.

it lasted a minute.
i gave myself that much.

then i went back to ryan.

we made sure the nurses were aware of my past experience. you could tell i was taking it a little harder than most. i have this pasted face of fear. as much as i try and be the bigger person and take care of my boyfriend... i am a damaged and wounded grieving woman who cannot handle the loss of another person I am in love with. 

just walking through the hospital doors was like taking a knife and slowly pushing it through my chest.

it was absolute torture.

fast forward 4 hours......

....

after watching ryan get EKGs an bloodwork and Xrays.... we found out that he was in perfectly good health as far as his heart goes. he has some inflammation in his chest and will be on steroids for a week. It was an absolute relief to hear. although because of my past experiences i feel like ryan has been a little more paranoid about things and so we followed up with his doctor and have been taking every precaution possible to make sure he is 100%.

and poor ryan.... not feeling well and also upset for hurting me.
you could tell it was hard for him to tell me. you could tell it kills him to make me worry and hurt.
i hate that before his own health he puts my own feelings first.
he just wants me to feel good and be happy.
it's what we want for each other.

In my mind i started to run through what life would be like without this worry.
the only way that would be possible would be that if i didn't date ryan.
or anyone for that matter.
the only way to never be worried or hurt is to be single forever.
and i just don't think that is something i could ever do.

so, for now I am gonna take a risk at life. as i did before... and be with ryan.
he's worth it.
and he's healthy.
and we are in God's hands.

                                                   ryan being brave and taking it like a champ.

Return to Me

So, my cable is out and it will be out for about a week until they can get me a new box. awesome.
So, this is good for me... time to get stuff done and get creative, right? Well... yes...
I clean out the car... halfway.
I work out. Go me!
Then I remembered Netflix.
Oh yes, a perfect distraction.
In my mind I always tell myself I can play a movie and get stuff done at the same time. This somewhat fails. I decide I will watch a movie I have seen before so I won't get distracted as much. As I scan through my choices a movie pops out to me. "Return to Me"
If you have never seen this movie... WATCH IT. Yes, you will cry. But it's a beautiful story and touching.
I knew well ahead that this movie would make me cry.
So, I was prepared. I am always prepared. I have many boxes of Kleenex in the apartment.
I play the movie and I begin to weep.

(WARNING: I AM GOING TO GIVE AWAY THE MOVIE RIGHT NOW SO IF YOU WANT TO WATCH IT FOR YOURSELF STOP READING HERE:)

Basically a man has a wife. She dies in a car accident and her heart goes to another person. Ironically a year later he falls in love with the woman who has his wive's heart.
I have heard about this phenomenon happening before. It's not just a Hollywood thing. It's weird though. And I need to do more research on the matter because I find it fascinating.
Anyway, I cried for a few reasons during the movie.
1) I feel for David Dachuvney's (sp?) character. Losing the love of their life suddenly. Experiencing the trauma and having to walk through the grief.
2) The dog. OMG. Animals just break my heart.
3) I thought about how John's organs could have gone to others

Now, when John died I do not believe his organs were donated. Mainly because his death was unknown and they didn't know if the organs were good or not. This is what I believe. I don't think I truly ever found out for sure. Perhaps they went with him in the ash....
I am saddened that it was John's heart that failed him in the end. He was the strongest man I ever knew and he had the sweetest heart known to man. A simple virus took down my strong, loving man. A tiny thing. A thing undetected and unseen. And then, gone.

I know that when I die one day I want my body to help others if it can.
If it can save a life then it's worth it. After all, my body will be useless to me once I am gone. And then turned to ash as well.

It does not take death to give to others.
I know I can give my heart out now. To many. I can love my friends and family unconditionally and share with them not only love from my heart but from John's as well. Because I carry his love with me daily.
I have been caught in a wave of "me, me, me" since John died. And it was well deserved. But, I have realized that I have lost focus on others. I can't get past my own grief to love and help the ones around me. And I know that it shouldn't be like this. Not forever. I have to make a better effort at connecting with others and doing what I can to be a blessing to them. Because in the end... it will bless me and help me with my healing. And if John ever taught me anything it was to care for others. He was so selfless and I want to be like that.
Why wait until death when it can start now?

It's my birthday and I'll blog if I want to...

We are on a ship.

Why are we on a ship again????

Didn't I just have this dream? Except this ship is different. It's

smaller. It's going to an unknown place and as it glides p

ast the shore... takes a turn and is now plowing into the land. But it's not... it's gliding.

I am in my cabin. John is on the bed. He is sitting there. He starts to talk to me... "Autumn, I am trying this again... but it just isn't going to work. I can't do this. I can't be with you."

I begin to plead and beg. "Don't do this John!"

He leaves.

My body flies off the boat into the sky. I am looking at the ocean from the sky. The boat is now small and white. My heart is breaking in half. Again. John is leaving me yet again.

And then I wake up.

Happy Birthday, Autumn.

Today is my birthday. Today is my golden birthday.

I can't stand to be awake. I need to go back to sleep and see John. I need to convince him to come back to me. Why does he always try to leave me in my dreams?! It's a horrible feeling. It's like breaking my heart over and over again. My brain is trying to convince me this is what happened. It's trying to make things easier. No, Autumn... you didn't find him dead. He left you. My brain is trying to re-write history.

My brain is wrong.

Dreams are dreams... they aren't real.

The reality of it all is that John and I were in the happiest time of our lives. We were never so in love than at the point of his death. He would have never left me. And I would have never left him.

Fuck these dreams.

And on my birthday? Fucking really?

FUCK THIS SHIT.

I decide to lay in the bed and sleep again.

Dreams not remembered. worthless.

I stay in the bed until noon. I'll just go ahead and sleep this birthday away.

But I did get up. My nieces made me oatmeal. We played rock band. We stayed in and talked, laughed... my sister in law came home with a fever. :(

My nieces made pancakes for dinner.

We put a candle in one and I blew it out. I am sure you can guess what I wished for. Definitely not for another year like this one. And I almost feel bad saying that. Because really the beginning of my year was FANTASTIC. It's so shitty the best part of my life and the worst part of my life were in the same year... I mean really they were only 17 days apart. How unfair.

But 2011 brings hope.

This is me trying to convince myself.

And I guess I could be bitter about being 27 and starting my life all over again.

And I am actually.

A lot of my friends my age are married, pregnant, successful... perhaps some of them not as happy as they seem to be. But that's not always what they post on their facebook. So, what I see is everyone around me having a better life than me. As I inch towards 30 this is NOT where I ever imagined myself being at 27. This isn't where I should be. Apparently I can't plan my life. Apparently it is out of my control.

27 years. 6 of them spent with my love.

Who will be fortunate enough to spend the next years of my life with me?

A strong man for sure. That has to deal with my shit. My "baggage." John is not the baggage. Widowhood is the baggage. Being labled like I am wearing some God forsaken scarlet letter. Instead of an A lets just go ahead and paste a big red W on my chest.

And it amazes me. My progress.

I told myself I would NOT be celebrating my birthday this year. That I was going to skip it....

And yet this may be one of my biggest birthdays to date.

A dinner. 6:30pm.

Over 25 guests.

All there for me.

My loved ones. My friends. The people who have pulled me through... who are still pulling me out of the darkness. The ones that encourage me. The ones that stay in contact with me. The ones that call me and invite me out. The ones that wish that they could do for me.

I am actually looking forward to it.

Of course there will be an obvious absence of presence in the room.

It won't be mentioned I am guessing.

But everyone will feel it.

Where is John?

Where are my flowers? Where is my birthday kiss? Who will occupy his seat next to me at the dinner table?

Who will occupy that empty hole in my heart?

Who will one day take on the task of loving me. This broken girl. This shattered woman. This mess. This beautiful mess of a person. Who is going to save me... tell me it's ok... and show me the light again?

Strong man. Strong, patient man. I pray for you.

I read the Bible tonight with my nieces... I always find myself heading towards 1 Corinthians to read the passage about love. To torture myself? Maybe.

But then I read the line "Love never dies."

You're right. It doesn't. My love for John will always stay ignited inside my heart and soul. I can make space for another. For the Bible does say the most important thing is to love extravagantly.

The greatest of these is love.

I am a person full of love. Love that I want to share. Love that will go on and fill others... family, friends, and eventually.... a lover.

And so I am walking out to the water... and I am putting my toe towards the edge... and dipping it in slightly. Am I prepared to test the water? If I dive in I could drown. So, I will stay towards the shore.... until I am ready for a plunge.

Happy Birthday to me.

because I tend to worry....

I am sitting in the airport again.
And I am going to Vegas.
I should be more excited, right? Everyone wants to go to Vegas.... it's where all the cool kids go.
And it's not like I am not happy to see my sister. It's the highlight of the trip and all... but ... I still don't feel right. I have been sick for a few days now. My throat hurt, my head feels AWFUL... two migraines in a row.... stomach doesn't feel normal.... and I get lightheaded...
And I am super exhausted. I will be sleeping on the plane. Thats for sure.
I just wish I felt better. Then I would feel better about the trip.
But now I am about to get on a plane with more people. More germs. More sickness.

I feel like I have turned into a hypocondriac. I always feel like I am getting sick. But, it's not that. Because I AM getting sick more often.
I have been reading yet another one of my grief books and it says that people going through grief have a 25% less weakened immune system. Which scares the shit out of me. If John didn't die from a virus I wouldn't be like this. I would trust my body more. But, now I am always scared that I have something. I get nervous to go to sleep... I get nervous about taking naps... because I may never wake up. The nap John never woke up from. I can't imagine living the rest of my life like this. I hate sleeping alone in my house. What if something happens to me??? And there is no one to help me.
But then again there were 5 people in the house when John slipped away silently.
I feel so weak. I feel so frail. I am a fragile human being. I am a complicated organism.... yet I am so delicate. I sometimes think about my heart just beating on it's own. My blood knows where to go. My organs know their role. My brain saves information and gathers data. Although it's not doing it's best in the memory department right now.
John's death opened my eyes to just how fragile life is... and how it can be taken away even when we sleep silently. We don't have to be in vehicle accident, or do something risky... God can take us whenever he likes and however he chooses. You can't escape death.
And that scares me.
And so when I am sick I get nervous and super cautious.
A big part of me wants to run to the emergency room at every symptom I come across. I want reassurance that i am going to be ok. That I have nothing to worry about. That I am healthy and will live a long life. That I will be happy again and find love again. That I won't always feel like this. Like I am living in some sort of twilight zone movie. This is my real life. This is really happening to me...

I looked through pictures the other day... in a photo album that sits by the door. Some from just a couple years ago. They were such genuine pictures. My smile were bright and true. My skin looked good... I looked healthy and happy.
I see pictures of me now and cringe. I look different.
I look tired.
I look fat.
I look like I am faking through most of them.
I look worn.
I look different.

The shine has left my face. The light has left my skin.
I do take occassional pictures where I look better. When I find my times of happiness. Like with the beluga whales, or when I see friends, or travel to st. pete. I have the capability to go back to that light-hearted person again. Don't I? Is that allowed in the widow game? I sure hope it is. I sure hope I can manage to make that happen. It's going to take work... to bring back my spirit after the Hell it's been put through. It's worn down. I have to dig deep and find it. And find myself in the process. What will I find in this journey? What will be in the road... should I fear what I will find? Will I find anything that will come close to filling in that empty hole that sits in my chest?


I am going to go ahead and board the plane now... it's another part of the journey...
to go to a place where I shared memories with the love of my life... and make new memories with my sister. To find a scoop of happiness and live off of that for as long as I can.



ilymtli

hair.

Today I cut my hair.
My "wedding" hair.

Today is exactly 2 months since I hugged John for the last time and kissed his warm lips the morning of April 22.

And I thought today was a good day for a hair cut.
Something fresh.
Something easy.
Something different.

Why did I call my previous hair my wedding hair?
Some of my friends knew the story. When I decided that I was going to marry John... and when we discussed it and knew for a fact it was in our future... I at the time had cut my hair off very short.
So. I was like... if I am going to have pretty hair for my wedding and options with it I am going to grow it out.
And I did. And I grew it out for quite some time.
For years.
Last October I chopped it off 8 inches because it was getting a little bit too long. My school ID looks like I am wearing a sash. we call it "sash hair."
I knew that I had some to grow it out some because John hadn't even proposed yet. I knew I would have months to grow it out once he proposed.
But.
There is no more wedding.
And so today... I cut my hair. I chopped it off.
I wasn't sad.
I didn't regret it.
And yes, it has pink in it.
Because.
WHY THE HELL NOT?!

Last night I had a dream I got a tattoo with Annie. Now part of me is kind of wanting one.
But for a person with problems makin decisions in my life. how could i possibly pick out a tattoo that is going to stay on my body for the rest of my life??

I also had another dream.
a dream that made me hate waking up.
yes, a john dream.
he was alive. I was given a second chance!!! He came back.
but we knew he couldn't stay.
somehow we knew he would die again.
so, I told him... "john, lets go down to the courthouse and just get married."
he agreed.
i ran upstairs and got a dress together and created my own sort of "blusher" by cutting up some material. how we had this material? i don't know.
John's dad let John have his wedding band. which actually in my dream looks like my brother's wedding band.
but as I was getting everyone ready to go... john wanted to take a nap on the couch. I kept telling john "no! no, you can't nap! You won't wake up!" I knew that if John fell asleep he would be gone again. he would die again.
and for some reason I wanted to marry him first.
even in my dreams I am longing to be his wife.
so much I would sacrifice the dream ceremony.
just to be his wife.
just for him to be my husband.
just so i can say I am Autumn Seay.
for 5 years I practiced writing that last name over and over on scrap paper by the computer.

autumn seay.
autumn seay.
autumn seay.
Autumn Seay.
Autumn Grace Seay.

I got the S just right! It was beautiful. Sometimes I made the S look like a treble clef. Nerdy.
But neat that you can do that with that letter.

after john proposed... a week later i changed my bank account sign in name to Autumn Seay.
I can always change it back. but i dont want to. i'll keep it for now. because it's the only chance i will have to use it.



tomorrow i am sending john a note on a balloon. it's pink and a heart.
it represents my heart.
and it will fly up high.
and he will read it.
and eventually it will fall back to earth.
and get caught in a tree.
and the heart will deflate.
kind of like my heart now.

Myocarditis

After a month of sitting around waiting to find of what happened to the love of my life... we finally got an answer.
Let me tell you how frustrated I am with people's initial thoughts to the death of someone who is young. It has to be one of two things to them.
1) drug overdose
2) suicide.

and I guess at some point i might have had the same outlook? i mean if I watched the news and someone said they found a 25 year old dead in his home. i would assume that.
but when John's toxicology came back the day after he had NOTHING in his system. not even aspirin,
this was odd coming from the guy who would take 5 tylenol if he had a headache.
so, we just didn't know what to think.
what could it possibly be?
they had pointed to cardiac and left it at that.

after a month they found it to be a rare disease (actually viral infection) called myocarditis.
this is all i really know.
20% of sudden death in young adults is caused by myocaridits.
it's a virus that's attacks the inner part of the heart.
the symptoms are your normal "boy, i don't feel good..." symptoms. nothing fancy really. nothing shocking and out of the ordinary. you just dont feel good.
and that's how john was. he wasn't feeling good. but he was functioning fine. we went to bed. we watched tv the night before. we woke up and snuggled. it wasn't like he couldn't get out of bed or had any crazy fever. etc.
in fact, i read that myocarditis can only be actually detected through a heart biopsy.
some people get it and have no idea... and then they get better the next day... or, they have heart failure.
it is completely unfair. it's completely random.
it makes no sense. this whole thing doesn't. the virus doesn't either.
it's not hereditary.
it's not contagious.

it's just a freak of nature thing that someone tagged a fancy name on to.
it

and now that I know... do I really feel better?
absolutely not.
knowing doesn't bring john back.
i am glad i can explain it to people.
i am glad no one has to let their imagination run wild anymore
i am relieved it can't be passed on... to me or his family

but in the end i think about how through knowing all of this scientific research.. my soul still longs to understand the meaning of it all.
no fancy medical term can describe my own condition.
i am completely at a disarray. i am at a dead end here.
all i have is a fancy word.
but i am still clueless and empty.
this rare, undetected thing stole john. it snatched him away from me. and i am pissed.

there is no cause to join. no fundraiser for a myocarditis foundation. no myocarditis support group.

it's a term that so far... no one had heard of until this point. at least that I know of. i didn't know it existed... nor did I want to know. because before then i was living in my happy little bubble and NO ONE could burst it.
except for this.
except for the thing i dreaded the most.

when asked my worst fear i always replied "losing someone i love..."
what do you do when your worst fear becomes a reality?
that's like telling someone who is afraid of spiders that they will be surronded in a room with them for the rest of their life. no escape.
they have to deal with it.

i have no escape.
i have to deal with my worst fear daily.




so now that i know. now what?