Feeling the grief

I am allowing the grief over this cycle to wash over me in fits and starts. It seems to come in waves - sometimes it seems more than I can bear, and sometimes it is just a dull ache. Most of the time I have to squash it back down as I need to be at work and can't turn into a blubbering mess at any moment of the day. But when I am alone I am letting it come. I am letting myself heave and sob and gasp for breath with the very effort of it all. I am going to try not to completely numb myself with alcohol (at least, not every night) so that I can work through this grief properly.

Sometimes it just crushes me when I think of my family. About my parents' genes not going forward into future generations. About my maternal grandparents' genes not going forward. Hell, even my maternal grandmother's parents may stop here. Some of that is due to war, to early accidental deaths, and in the present day it is due to mental illness, to the failure to find a partner and to choosing not to have children. But I was trying for them. I was trying to make sure my sweet Granny and my dear Father and Mother carried on into the future. And I failed. I turned out to be infertile because I left it too late.

And I sob and weep and it feels like people are dying all over again.

And then I think about things, and realize that some of this is pure chance and none of us have any clue as to whether we are going to contribute to the future of humanity after all. And I look at my cousins who look nothing at all like my lovely Granny so I think how silly it is of me to grieve her genetics when really it is her sweet nature and loving kindness and history that needs to be carried forward. Who can say what my cousins have of Granny, except that they remember her ways and loved her for it. And that doesn't need a genetic connection at all. And on that I think I am slowly making progress. But it has taken a stopping, a getting off of the train that was propelling me forward to be able to really feel that. I knew it intellectually but I didn't know if I could make the leap to know it in my heart. It is still a feeling that is deeply painful right now but I know that the pain will dull over time and I will be able to move forward at some point. I don't yet know what I will be moving forward into but I know that life, and our family, can go on if I choose.