Dreams of Dylan

I've had some trouble sleeping lately, and there are a few reasons for that (staying up to chat to people about things like their theses, talks they have to give, and having jumbled up my sleep cycle last week with a night shift.)  However the main reason that I'm still having trouble sleeping is that I dreamt of Dylan again on Monday.

Another night so late it turns into morning again.

This isn't new, I've dreamt about him many times before.  The dreams would always be the same.  Dylan would turn up somewhere and I'd usually be one of the first people to realise he wasn't dead after all.  Then I'd get a terrible feeling that something was deeply wrong.  Dylan's dead.  I saw the coffin.  We cremated his body.  If he's still alive then that means that we burned someone else.  There was nothing in me, even in my dreams, that thought it would be a good idea to bring Dylan back to life.

I'd heard that it's natural to dream of the dead, and that it's asign that your brain is adjusting to the idea and accepting it.  So I don't really think anything of these dreams, I just make a note of them and move on.  I used to keep track of the dreams of him, but stopped after a while.  (From what I remember there was only one dream that I didn't write down, so let's write it down here.  For some reason I was at the Brunel campus and Dylan showed up.  I told him he shouldn't be there and then we went outside where there were some washing machines and inside one of them was an award for something.)

Monday's dream was different though.  For the first time, Dylan appeared in my dream, alive and well, and it took me a few seconds to realise that quite a few years had passed since he "died".  This time I was happy to see him.  He told me that he had faked his death and that he was ready to come back to us.  This was the first time I'd dreamt about him and felt good about it.  I'd love to have him back.  All the pain and anger associated with the grief would be forgiven and he'd be welcomed back.  This time, even though it no different to what happened before, it was a relief to see him.

Of course I woke and realised that reality is different, and that I'll never see Dylan again.  This didn't make me sad, and in a way it amused to have this dream.  It's as if I've moved on into complete acceptance of the situation, but somewhere, in the deep recesses of my mind, part of my brain hasn't quite realised this yet.  If that was the end of the story it would have been fine, but unfortunately it's not.  Every night since then I've had problems getting to sleep, waking up about an hour after drifting off with what feels like an adrenaline rush, and then struggling to get back to sleep.  I wake up later than usual feeling more tired than normal and the cycle repeats.  It's made me "late" for work all week (not that this matters too much in this job) so as it's starting to impact on the rest of my life it's time to get it off my chest.

The problems with sleep patterns are not new to me, and for a long time when I lived in California I felt much the same way.  Today has been a bad day so far.  My whole body feels sad in a way that's hard to explain.  I feel like I want to take a nap, but I'm not tired (and in the past I've tried taking a nap like this, it doesn't help.)  I feel this tension within me like I want to cry, but that's not quite what I need either.  It's as if my body is caught mid-sigh all day and if I can just find what I need to do to release that tension I'll be okay.  Today is an unusually sunny day, which doesn't help.  It feels like I'm in California again, isolated, with enough time on my hands to ponder my feelings in a lot of depth.  It turns out the only thing that will make this better is time.  I won't let it grind me down, I'll smile through it all and in a couple of days time it'll pass.

I still miss Dylan from time to time, and that's okay.  The bad days are getting rarer, but they do come back every now and then.  I've had enough practice to know how to get through this, so I'll be fine today, I'll be fine tomorrow and I'll be fine until whenever this passes.  In fact, I probably won't even notice when it does.

Sunset? Sunrise

There are many bereavement support groups out there and for some reason many of them like to include a setting sun in their logos. For me the setting of the sun is not the difficult part. The rising of the sun the next day is where things get difficult. Finding the strength to get through the day is draining. I tried to put on a brave face all week, and managed to make it to the weekend. But today I was around friends, and I was mopey, and I don't think they minded. I don't know if any of them know about Dylan's death, let alone when it was. Perhaps I should have told them. Tomorrow is another day. I hope I'm ready for it by then.

Another story

One of my close friends recently lost his father. I sent him a short message which I wish I had received when I heard about Dylan's death. What helped most was that people said they were thinking about me, even if they had nothing else to say and felt helpless. I felt helpless too. But at least I didn't feel alone. Here is what I sent:

You're in my thoughts and if you ever want to talk about it, now or in the future, you know where I am. Send my love and thoughts on to the rest of your family. It'll take time, and things will get worse before they get better, but they will get better. Until then you know what to do- give yourself time, give yourself space, talk it over with people, and one day you won't need to talk about it anymore.

For me, the part that was at the same time the most reassuring and the most terrifying was that I knew what to do, keep talking. Knowing that eventually it would change, but at the same time feeling that it would never get better, and knowing that things would never ever be the same as they were was what kept me awake at night. It still does sometimes.

I still take time to be alone and appreciate the solitude.

One day I woke up and it was suddenly easy to be optimistic again. I wasn't happy, it still hurt to get through the day, but at least I had hope again. Every day since then has been better. From time to time I still think about Dylan and the loss (today is one of those days) but they're getting rarer.

Music to grieve to

I've listened to a lot of music in the grieving process, and Kathleen Ferrier has been by far the most moving. It's warm, comforting, heart breaking and most of all it's dignified. All grief should be this beautiful. It may be painful, but with Kathleen it feels like it has purpose.



I think it helps that my mum used to listen to this when I was young (she probably still listens to it0 so it gives me a connection not only to my childhood and Dylan, but also to my mum.

Everybody Hurts

It's been a rough few weeks and finding alone time has been difficult. I took some comfort in physics, immersing myself in my job. Since Dylan died, my physics career has given me a wonderful way to fill the time, explore the world and enjoy my own company again. But then I heard Everybody Hurts by REM, and it brought back a lot of painful memories. It's a song I've known for about as long as I can remember, and I loved it long before Dylan's death (everyone loves it, of course.) We played it at his funeral, and that made it doubly painful and doubly healing to listen to. He must have felt so alone and so helpless if he couldn't see a reason to go on living. And after he killed himself, we were all left alone together.

We all lost Dylan, but we had to deal with that loss alone, because we can't grieve for each other. Hearing this song brought back the memories of when Dylan was still alive, shortly after he died, and the years since. It's not a coincidence that I've become more insular, more guarded and more transient since losing Dylan. I don't think anyone can fill the void that Dylan's absence has left. Nothing can undo the years of hurt and the slow process of putting my life back together. I had a lot of help from a lot of people and I found many of my best friendships while I was grieving, often keep hold of them because of the grief. (When you find someone who's willing to hear you talk about bereavement one day and go for a picnic with you the next, or even from one hour to the next, you don't let go of them easily.) But even so, there has been nobody who has been at my side the whole time. I've had to find my own path, and I picked a particularly tough one. It gave me strength, hope and confidence to keep going. Having lived through all that I doubt I'll be able to ever fully commit to a relationship or be fully open with another person. I'll always find it easier to withdraw into myself, and find it harder to think that anything else has any permanence. It's as if all the things that have shaped me have already come and gone, and I was the only one to see them happen. It's almost pointless to get an impression of someone's grief and its aftermath. It's not enough to be able to fully understand what someone has been through and why they are who they are.

Anyway, here's the song, for all its power and its many interpretations. It's been there for me many times and this won't be the last time it's helped me sum up the sense of loss and then find strength.

Some good advice

I think the best advice I ever got was from Dylan. We were both teenagers and I was frustrated with how boring I found my hometown. (The feeling didn't go away until I started university.) It was simple and to the point and since long before his death it's changed my life for the better:

If you're bored then don't sit around feeling sorry for yourself.

In the months and years that followed Dylan's death it was easy to get bored and to slip into depression. So on the anniversary of his death I've tried to do something different, to get away from work and spend a weekend with friends. Most of the people I spent time with didn't know it was a special day, since Dylan died on July 4th.

Here are some photos from previous years:

A weekend in London with family and friends (2011)

A road trip to Yosemite with Eugy and Manuel (2009)

A trip to see family in friends in Crewe and Birmingham (2007)

Journal

I kept a journal about my life and when Dylan died I used it to record what had happened. Here is the first entry after his death:

My brother committed suicide on Friday. It hasn't sunk in yet, and all family and friends are being really good about it. I've never lost anyone close before and I don't know how bad things will get or how long it will take to get through it, but the next couple of months are going to be difficult. It seems very odd that a week ago there were four or us and now there are only three of us.