While people celebrated their day of independence, I marked 31 days since I lost my Clint. The weekend was a blur of agony. I drove the 90 minutes to visit with him as I usually do. I wrote out thank you cards for flowers. Never would I have imagined writing out thank you cards for a funeral.  I looked forward to sending out thank you cards from our wedding. My children stayed with their father this past weekend and the pain of being alone was just…overpowering. The crying has become more physical. It is louder and literally shakes my entire body. I guess this is the shock leaving my body and reality taking over. Sometimes I feel as though I need a “time out” in a rehabilitation facility because I just can’t do this alone right now. My appetite has left me yet again and forcing myself to eat makes me sick. Going to work for the past 3 weeks has been heartbreaking. Putting on a façade that I’m “okay” because it’s expected makes the breakdowns so much worse. I don’t want to hear people say “have a great day” or “happy this or that.” It’s not happy and it’s not a great day. If I didn’t have bills to pay, I wouldn’t have come back for a few months. I was back less than a week after burial. I was informed to “move on and get over it because I have a life to get back to.” I was also informed that it was my responsibility to say “hello” to every employee when I returned. Why? I wasn’t social before this and now I’m required to address employees that I did not associate with previously? I do my job and I go home. I don’t bother anyone.  I have been shown pictures of people in hospital beds hooked up to machines and monitors with no consideration for what I just went through. Outside people just don’t understand. I miss Clint so very much. You don’t just “get over it and move on” as if he didn’t exist. He was my life and my future.