The comedian Patton Oswalt penned a lengthy and touching tribute to his late wife, Michelle McNamara, who died unexpectedly earlier this year, 102 days after her death. Chronicling the effects of grief over the past few months, Oswalt wrote on his Facebook page that he has now “reached a point where I’m crawling” after being “face-down and frozen for weeks.”
Oswalt likened depression to a fourth grade bully “dinging rubber bands off the back of your head.” But grief, he said, is much worse.
“Grief is Jason Statham holding that 4th grade bully’s head in a toilet and then f—ing the teacher you’ve got a crush on in front of the class,” Oswalt wrote.
McNamara, who died at the age of 46, was a true crime writer who founded the blog TrueCrimeDiary.com. She was 2 1/2 years into working on a book about The Golden State Killer when she died, Oswalt wrote in a tribute to her for TIME in May. In his Facebook post, Oswalt said he had worked to finish the book and that it will be published, though he did not indicate when.
“Any spare energy I’ve managed to summon since April 21st I’ve put toward finishing Michelle’s book,” he wrote. “With a lot of help from some very amazing people. It will come out. I will let you know. It’s all her. We’re just taking what’s there and letting it tell us how to shape it. It’s amazing.”
Oswalt also said he is ready to get back to work, saying “I’ll start being funny again soon.”
“I’m going to start telling jokes again soon. And writing. And acting in stuff and making things I like and working with friends on projects and do all the stuff I was always so privileged to get to do before the air caught fire around me and the sun died,” he wrote. “It’s all I knew how to do before I met Michelle. I don’t know what else I’m supposed to do now without her.”
Read the full tribute below.
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Write to Mahita Gajanan at mahita.gajanan@time.com