Tag: grieving

How can it be?

Jen3 Comments

Can someone please explain how it’s possible to experience both, or even all sides of a spectrum at the same time?

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On one hand… I’m doing better than ever.  My kids are happier than ever.  Work is starting to take shape and I’m finding that I might even have made myself a role in the company that I can be excited about.  My side business is growing and the more I dive into it, the happier and more content I seem to get.  The holidays are coming up and I’m looking forward to them.  I have so much hope for the near future and what it holds for me personally.  And yet…

On the other hand… I have moments when I feel scared and lost and alone.  Wow – I won’t lie – that took a lot for me to type.  I think I’ve been trying to ignore it.  It’s this thing that’s been sitting on my shoulder for a few weeks and I’ve been doing my best to pretend it’s just not there – but like an elephant in a room that is too small, it can’t be completely ignored.  I give myself these silly pep talks occasionally.  Trying to give myself the courage to keep getting out of bed, to keep doing what I have to do, when sometimes… all I really want to do is sit down and hide, or find a friend and just cry and let it out.  Tho – truthfully – even THAT doesn’t seem to do much for me these days.  I’ve just never been much of a crier.  It doesn’t actually solve anything, and a lot of the times, only makes me feel worse in the long run because I tend to get headaches afterwards.

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I’m grateful that I got this job, as the bills were piling up.   As it is, it’s going to take me until mid December to fully be caught up and not be living paycheck to paycheck.  It’s kind of a foreign feeling.  To be working but not make enough to cover what needs to be covered.  It’s been a long time since I’ve been in those shoes.  Helped remind me of how good I have it.

Maybe that’s part of my problem.  I know – compared to many – I have it good.  I live comfortably, my life isn’t full of drama or crazy levels of stress.  If anything – I’ve been leading a pretty boring life these days – as I’ve been busy working on my business when I have any spare time, so I feel guilty when I start to feel down.  What do I have to feel down about?!  And that’s the crux of the issue – I DO have things to feel down about.  People often think of me as this chipper and enthusiastic girl, “Ra! Ra! Be happy!  Stay positive! Go Team!”, what they don’t realize is that often, I do that more for myself.  To keep myself from feeling down.  That or I joke around – make people laugh. It’s only in the last 3 years that i’ve learned to allow myself to have moments where feeling down is ok.  Often, by feeling it – sitting with it for a little while – I move forward from it easier.  That is my hope tonight… I had a good day.  Not entirely sure I even understand how this mood crept up on me, but there it is.

My son is already tucked into bed, and my daughter is busy watching a show on netflix… and yet all I seem to want to do is swoop them both up and cuddle with them.  Instead, I’m sitting on my bed with my laptop writing here baffled at why I’m suddenly feeling so sad? Is it possible that I feel like I’ve just been lacking in hugs?  Is it wrong that a hug from my children… lately… isn’t quite satisfying enough?  Don’t misunderstand – I love hugging my kids… but it’s just not enough.

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Goodnight Neverland.  Much love to you tonight.  Stay safe, wherever you are… and know that even tho we haven’t met, and we don’t know each other – you have my love.  🙂

Hope is a beautiful thing…

JenLeave a comment

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Yup.  I saw this in my pinterest feed today and it really struck a nerve.  In a good way.  At some point, you have to get on with living.  Whether a person is recovering and grieving the loss of a friend, a relative, a broken relationship, a failed test, or even a disappointment at work.  There comes a point where you have to let go of the dreams and expectations of what was…and embrace what IS that is right in front of you.

It’s been a whirlwind of a few weeks, between dealing with my daughter and her ever changing needs, my son – who turns 5 tomorrow! I can’t believe it!!, work and my ever challenging but still amazing boss, or a whole host of other things… to say it has been busy is simply an understatement.  But what I’m finding to be quite interesting, is that I’m not feeling beat down by it.  Sure, I’ve had a few days here and there where I’ve questioned myself or felt a bit unsure, but I still plowed forward.  And today, was a good day.  🙂

At work, I had the opportunity to sit down and do some design and innovating.  It’s funny, it’s what people hire me to do for them, and yet I rarely actually get to sit and DO it.  It seems most of my days are filled with meetings and coaching and overseeing.  Rarely do I get the luxury to sit and just dream and let my imagination flow.  So because I got to do that today, I’m riding a bit of an inspiration high this evening.  I came up with something very interesting today.  Something incredibly unique, and it might not be THAT hard to pull off from an engineering perspective.  I’m very excited about it and can’t wait to take another couple of days to really bring the idea to life with more comps and drawings.  Then next week, I’ll pitch it… the company I work for would have to be bonkers not to do it.  🙂  It’s very exciting.  🙂

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One of my closest female friends challenged me almost a year ago to do an experiment on myself, in regards to my self esteem.  She told me to take 1 selfie per day.  Doesn’t matter if I hate it, I have to keep at least one from each day.  Now, truthfully, I didn’t remember EVERY single day… but I have put in an effort and have managed roughly one a week.    I HATE pictures of myself.  In fact, there are very few photos of me that I like.  I prefer to be on the other end of the camera. 🙂  So when J challenged me to do this, it wasn’t something I was enthusiastic about doing.  Tonight I flipped through them.  She was right.  As a collection… viewing them changed something for me.  I laughed at the ones that looked HORRIBLE.. I smiled at others that reflected how happy I was or how sleepy I was.  And as I finished up… the overall opinion I had on them, and me, and how I look….

I’m pretty!  And cute.  🙂  My god, it only took me 34 years to really understand and be able to say that and mean it.  I love my dimples, and freckles, my frizzy curls, my eyes that oddly change color when I’m wearing different things or near certain colors.  I love my nerdy glasses and the fact that most days I’m in a hoodie, yoga pants and flip flops.  I even love my squishy tummy.  It is me.  This body has been through so much, and it’s so damn strong!  I have curves, and a waist – something that I didn’t have years ago.  Here’s a few from the last few weeks.

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I’m enjoying life right now.  I’m enjoying finding myself, learning to be a home owner, spending quality time with my children and my family.  Is it strange that I can say that life is good right now?  Even with all the turmoil we’ve gone through in the last few weeks?  And that’s not me burying my head in the sand.

For the first time… maybe in my entire life, I truly have a sense of comfort.  I’m content.  And I have so much hope bursting in me for the future.  For my kids… but more than that.  For me.  Hope.  It’s a beautiful thing.  It’s not something I’ve felt in a very long time when it comes to me personally.  I think, as much as I don’t like to admit it, I’d been a bit burnt out.  Perhaps taking some time off was a good thing.  🙂

Well neverland, it’s time for me to get some sleep.  But if you’re still awake.. here’s a goodnight kiss to you.

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Learning life lessons

JenLeave a comment

It has been an interesting few days.  I’ve had 4 days off from work, and I won’t lie, they were most welcome.  Stress has been building up for me lately, and the few days off to sleep in, play games, eat good food, and hibernate were much appreciated.

Thursday, the plan was to do nothing.  Boring, I know.  But I have been boycotting Thanksgiving for 6 years now.  Ben died 2 days after thanksgiving and it just left a bad taste in my mouth. So I plan nothing.  Sometimes, I’ll get a hotel room, other times I’ll just binge watch movies.  The kids go to enjoy thanksgiving with the ex in-laws.  So it’s usually just me.  Around 10 am, my phone rang.  It was my brother and my father asking if maybe I’d like to come join them for turkey.

And this year – oddly enough – I said thank you and that yes – I’d love to.  You see, I’ve never had a thanksgiving with my real father.  They were always spent with my mom and step dad.  And they were lovely growing up.  But I always had wondered what it would be like to spend that day with my dad.  I got ready, grabbed a bottle of wine from my collection as an offering for the table and drove up to his house.  I was nervous.  I don’t know my father very well, he is still someone I am getting to know.

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It was lovely.  Relaxed and casual, lots of chatter and play, dad would sing whatever song was in his head… I have always loved my dad’s voice.  Smooth, deep, country… I swear – he could have made a career with that voice.  He laughs when I say that.  To him, he’s just playing around with it.

It dawned on me while I was heading over there.  I’m not angry any more.  The past 6 years.  I’ve been so angry and didn’t even know it.  I was angry with thanksgiving.  Angry at my family.  Angry at my ex.  Angry with the doctors.  Angry with fate.  Angry with God.  I was just… Angry.  And yet – no one knew.  Not even myself.   This year was different.  I didn’t want to boycott.  Suddenly, more than ever before, I just wanted my family.  I wanted to surround myself with the people I feel comfortable with.  The people who I know have my back – always.  Dad wanted me to spend the night… oh how I wanted to.  He and I chatted about all sorts of things.  Life, love, politics, human nature, psychology … some of our topics were light, while others were deep and full of emotions.

Friday, I decided I wanted to cook.  So I cooked a full feast, from scratch.  No canned goods, no canned soups, no pre-packaged stuff.  It was incredible.  T, R and I cooked and feasted and made merry.

Yesterday, I had a song stuck in my head.  It was still early and I found myself humming outside.  I’m not typically much of a hummer.  This song was playing insistently in my head to the point where I had to go look it up and just play it.  I found it on youTube.  A song I hadn’t heard in at least 8 years.  The lyrics had me instantly in tears.

I ugly cried.  I bawled and bawled and bawled.  Apparently, once the flood gates opened, there was no stopping it, because I literally spent the entire day in bed.  I still can’t get over what that felt like yesterday.  I’m sure to others I must sound strange.  It was just overwhelming sadness.  And to anyone else, they’d probably say “So?  Haven’t you been sad this whole time?”  My answer to that would be both – yes and no.

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I’ve appeared sad.  I’ve acted sad.  And on some levels, I’ve felt sad.  But really – I don’t think I understood what the sad part of grief looked like until now.

I wish there was an answer book for life.  Is this normal?  No way is it normal.  I realize grief is different for everyone, but shit.  To spend 6 years and not really get to this part of the cycle seems a bit – drawn out.

I don’t want to be angry any more.  And I have been – for a very long time.  Stubborn, Angry, Strong… and maybe I was scared to allow myself to feel sadness to it’s full extent because I was scared that it would somehow make me weak.  And if I was weak – that perhaps it would break me.  So I shoved it aside.  I forced myself to keep my head held high and square my shoulders and just keep moving.  Never allowing myself to really feel.  This weekend – I felt.  I allowed myself to swim in it.  Every time someone would try and cheer me up – I’d go with whatever my heart wanted.  If that meant I’d giggle or laugh for an hour – cool – and if it meant that suddenly a wave of sadness would take over and I’d snuggle under the comforters and just cry and cry – that was ok too.

Oddly – allowing myself to do that has been the most freeing thing I think I’ve ever done.  I don’t think that even I fully realize how often I don’t allow myself to really feel an emotion in the moment.  Perhaps, it is time to allow myself the freedom to practice that.

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I went and visited my Mom today.  We haven’t been as close lately and I’ll fully admit to and take the blame on that one.  I’ve needed some space.  But I was feeling a bit guilty over my silence and decided to drop in.  I’m glad I did.  My mom and I may butt heads, but really, it’s only because we are so alike.  She knows that I will always love her and be there for her anytime she needs it.  And I know I have the same from her.  We’re a family.  Perhaps a bit dysfunctional at times – but we love each other all the same.

Tomorrow, I will return to work.  I’m not ready – my game face isn’t on yet and my energy levels aren’t quite where I’d hoped they would be by now – but oh well.  It is what it is.  I’m about to go into “hell month”.  A month long crazy ride of long hours, short deadlines and lots of work.  🙂  But then January will come, and things will settle down a bit.  I may even get to take a vacation.  Lord knows, I’ll need it.

Much love to you all tonight.  Goodnight.

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