Grief comes in waves, or layers

It is often said that grief comes in waves. 

An acquaintance once put it as, “Grief comes in layers became if it came all at once we wouldn’t be able to bear it”. 

Whether it’s layers or waves, it comes and goes and sometimes one level hits harder than the others, deeper than expected. That’s what’s happening to me today. 

Maybe it’s the suddenly increased time alone I’ve had over the past few days after being in almost constant company of loving, supportive friends and caregivers for ten days around my surgery. 

Maybe it’s the second round of sadness from the loss re. the relationship with my non-binary climber friend from California. 

Maybe it’s the almost sudden realization that the rupture with the cute, genderqueer lesbian who picked me up at the climbing gym in December is actually real and most probably irreversible. 

Maybe it’s the fact of finally allowing myself to seriously entertain the idea that I will likely never see my father alive again.

Maybe it’s also the dawning on me of the sudden change to which I exposed myself, my body — maybe even the loss of “my tiny tits”. 

And also, once again, the grief for that boy who wasn’t allowed to be for so very long, as a vivid memory of teenager me pops into my mind — me going to get my first real haircut at age fifteen, cutting off my long hair for the first time and getting a “boy’s cut”, and then coming home to a barrage of criticism and harsh comments which continued for years around my hair being ”too boyish”, “not feminine enough”, etc.

That boy was trying to be and all he got from his parents and many close relatives was criticism and limitations. He might not have survived if it hadn’t been for the support of my friends, my godmother, and some other mentor/surrogate-parent figures.