Trevor Update August 13, 2023

 I was having a full-on panic attack through the entire funeral, including while i was up front speaking. I sat through everyone's speeches, stone cold, feeling almost nothing, unable to cry, trying to perform appropriate facial expressions. I didn't recognize the physiological signs of the attack until after the ceremony was over, locked in the single-occupant bathroom, hyperventilating and taking a status report of my body, organ by organ.

The last couple days, i've realized the panic attack never ended. I've been in a hyperactive, manic state the last few weeks, overcorrecting for whatever was happening inside of me and performing someone else on the outside. Let's just say Manic Panic and get the Hot Topic jokes out of the way right now. In the beginning, grief felt like a performance. I wasn't sad, i was numb. A variation of that meme, "I am going to get a good grade in [grieving], a thing that is possible to achieve and normal to want" flashed through my mind constantly. So i just. Stopped doing that. I told people that i was okay, that i had gotten out in front of the grief through all the pain and suffering of the last few years, so now that it's over i can just feel relief. I told people that because i wanted to believe it myself. I don't want to do this anymore. I desperately want the pain to be over. But it's not. I haven't been honest with anyone, least of all myself. I was trying to speed run grief and get it over with so i could move on. And finally i ran so fast i tripped and face planted into the pavement.

I wasn't left alone for weeks after Amanda passed. And i love and appreciate and value all of you, everyone who took the time to stay with me and make sure i was safe and eating and hydrated. But i've just wanted to party with you. I'm defining partying extremely loosely here, sometimes that meant sitting on the couch and chatting, sometimes that meant GenCon, but it frequently involved drugs and alcohol.

As soon as i had an afternoon to myself, this past Friday, the overwhelming emptiness of the house started crushing me. It's so big and i'm so alone. I didn't get ahead of the grief, i just time shifted it and cut out the commercial breaks. Like a DVR.

I canceled plans yesterday, and today, and spoiler alert, i'm probably gonna do it again tomorrow. I hate this. I hate that she's gone. I hate that i'm keeping a running list of all the things i keep seeing that she would want to know about (I'm Board is opening a third location! There's a Naf Naf Grill on State Street now! There was a new version of Hex Hex at GenCon! I got interviewed for a podcast and told the story of how i proposed to you!) which i will never be able to share with her. I hate being alone. I'm not whole. There's a giant crater in my chest.

But i'm gonna have to deal with feelings sooner or later, it's inevitable, it can't just be partying forever. I said to a few of you at the wake that there would come a time when i got peopled out and i would need to push everyone away for a bit and be alone. I think i hit that point a long time ago, but i didn't acknowledge it, and i just kept pressing on. Partying. Performing a version of an okay person to make people believe i was. I just didn't want people to worry about me. I still don't. How fucking midwestern. California already taught me not to be that way anymore but then i lapsed straight back into it.

I'm not okay. I'm sorry for presenting myself like i was. I don't know what i'm doing. I'm sure a lot of you already knew this but i guess i'm just figuring out for myself what it looks like. I haven't been eating as well as i've told you and i haven't been getting out of bed when i don't have to. I am drinking water though, that's the one streak i haven't broken through all of this. I've been cherry-picking episodes of Star Trek that i know make me sad and playing Portal and rereading Jon Bois's work, which is already more emotional than it has any right to be, but now that Amanda can never read the third part of the trilogy, punches that much harder. She loved those football satellites.

I love and appreciate every one of you. But i think i need some alone time.