tonight i am lonely.

the loneliness feels as if my chest will implode. it’s a pulling sensation, like an invisible rope is tied to my sternum that’s trying to pull my chest inward and crush my own heart. it’s an aching, sucking feeling. i can only describe it as so intense that i feel like i can’t breathe, can’t cry, and can’t wail. can the center of your chest feel nauseated?

it snuck up on me today. the lonliness was a silent and cloaked beast that was stalking me in my own shadows as i went about my day. i had no awareness of it until it brought me to my knees in the shower. i gasped as water poured over me and struggled to catch my breath. usually sitting in the shower and feeling the warmth of the water cascade around me was soothing, but tonight it felt as if it was pushing me into the floor.

the lonliness i feel is altogether familiar and foreign. i am used to the lonliness of missing who was 6 feet under. this is not new, as i have been dancing with it for almost 8 years. the lonliness i feel in my own home, however, is a painful admittance of something i feel i am failing at. but again, it’s not new and not unfamiliar. i can deal with these two breeds of lonely, but the other, not so much.

this new feeling though, this absence of my very soul i feel, is something so unemcumbered by experience that it has me feeling like a naive child. of course i’ve felt lonely before, but not like this. its antidote is 6 states away and yet close enough in connection that a simple text will connect me. a simple, instant message, but it still leaves me feeling empty. this emptiness can only be filled when i’m in his arms, i have realized.

i have accepted that this lonliness will have to live in tandem with my joy and my success. it’ll have to be roommates with the plethora of emotions that ebb and flow in my psyche. i suppose i can live with that. when i really think about it, this lonliness simply means that i am loved and that i love beyond measure.

to love is to live. i just need to remind myself that my lonliness is a reminder that i am alive and living. i am not just watching my life pass me by; and for that, i am thankful.