Linsey I hope that yesterday passed with love, so much love for you all, and that today, you feel that you have honoured your little girl in the most wonderful way possible.
heavenly yes, people's expectations are so, so hard. They feel helpless in the face of your pain, and they just desperately want you to stop hurting. People want to help, but they really don't know how. Like you, I wanted to isolate myself, but knew that it wasn't always going to be the solution. Yet I had no idea how to do it. So I ended up asking a small group of friends to keep contacting me, asking me to do things with them, and even if I didn't reply or said no, to keep on asking me by text or by email. And they were wonderful. They asked me to go on walks, to lunch, to visit them, to babysit, to go horse-riding, to attend make-up lessons… all kinds of random things opportunities, some of which afforded the time to talk, some simple to have company, some simply to get out of the house. Some invitations I accepted, some I didn't, but they all just kept on texting or emailing me to let me know that they were thinking of me. For that, I am extremely grateful. So I found email, MN (especially here), FB and texts to be very useful. They provided a level of contact I could control, in a timeframe which suited me, and a distance which I needed.
Yes, phonecalls and face-to-face contact were infinitely harder, but if I had to cry in front of someone, there was absolutely nothing I could do to stop it. I did find that I actively avoided socialising in large groups, or with people I didn't know well (but two years down the track, I am now almost back to saying yes to those sorts of invitations) - as I didn't want to be asked any difficult questions by those I didn't know, and who perhaps might brush off Mia and my love with awkwardness or a trite comment. I wanted, and needed to stay in a 'nest' of friends who understood and who didn't judge.