Been thinking about this for some time. A place to call my own here....
I can paint it whatever color I want...take down the ugly curtains that Cadet hung....
Building a large table for friends to gather around…
I'm not looking for pity, I'm sorry either. Just some real stuff, maybe some playing....
I was reading some in the archives recently, and with one of the BIG 6x6's that Ian used to swing around here. And he told me that this place was for laying out whatever my thoughts were, being vulnerable, and trusting others to help, advise, or provide empathy towards my thoughts, feelings, or whatever comes out.
That certainly encompasses me lately. …
As many of you know, I have had a huge loss recently in my life. Essentially ripped it apart, down the middle , and shredded all of the hopes, dreams, comforts, and companionship that I have had for the past almost 13 years.
I've deeply loved two Women in my life. I lost one of them through a Divorce, and one of them to Cancer....
Losing a partner to cancer is different than the loss of a partner through Divorce. Similarly the same, yet totally the opposite. From my perspective, the difference being that one, (divorce), was a conscious decision that had been made, whereas losing a partner to death is NOT a decision. It is the total opposite of a decision. If anything can lesson the pain, it is that.
Dealing with the aftermath is something that is different too. Going through what I went through with a divorce gave me lessons in how to navigate loss again. When I got here way too many years ago, I was broken, so it was a rebuilding process internally. Lately I have found that I am not broken, I am just heartbroken....BIG difference there....
If this isn't something that is allowed here, then please remove this thread. I kinda figured that loss was loss. And dealing with loss and rebuilding is the essence of this forum. ???
I have been laying myself at the foot of the Cross lately, trying to find what is real , what is imagined, and what I need to learn from this, and carry forward with me. It's left me feeling pretty empty at times, and has knocked me on my a$$ quite a bit. I am more than okay being alone, yet the emptiness is what haunts me most. I still watch the window to see her turning into the driveway, or waiting to hear her special text tone, only to realize that it's not her, and it will never be her again.
To be holding each other and planning a vacation in March, to planning a memorial service in June is pretty sobering...
Maybe that's something different from the Divorce process, that we can do the work, and better ourselves, and HOPE that one day we can be reconciled....there is no chance of that with this. Hope is laying at the bottom of a ravine, crumpled and decaying, along with the prayers, and dreams of our future that we were building together.
I had a birthday last week, not my first, yet the first that I have had since I had met her and lost her. I would say that the anxiety beforehand was numbing. It shut me down pretty good. Working through it, I realized that the expectation of it was worse than the actual day was. The day after was equally as hard, as it marked time.
Each day is another day that I feel further from her, another day, then week, than month, then year. I'm pretty sure that isn't productive in any way, other than process what I am feeling and thinking.
I've had thoughts additionally about my mortality, and what that might look like down the road. And I'm not stupid, and I have a lot to live for, so NO, I would never be foolish as to throw life away, yet there has been a certain calm about it for me, and that if the call would come, then I would gladly answer it.
I've decided that I am not making any BIG decisions for at least a year, about my life, about where I might live, or what I might do. Possibly even who I will be when I get further into this process. Nothing in life is for certain, this has shown me that.
All I can assure myself, is that failure isn't an option. I made K a promise, that whatever I did, and what my future looked like. That I would get through this whole and healthy, and that I would not only survive this, but thrive afterward. So that I could carry her with me to all of the future happiness she wants for me.... That this will not define me, and that I will honor her by letting her go and living a life of happiness.
Way easier said than done baby….
While at the Cross, I have been dealing with a lot of differing thoughts and emotions. Mostly, guilt has been eating at me. I've asked myself a million times, If I was 'enough' for her. Then again, I asked her that during better times and she always said yes. The last two years had been very difficult for us, and HER last 2 months made those look easy.
The difficulties that we faced, the lines between Love and Obligation could easily be blurred. So defining what each of those was, had become important to us both. Being her primary caretaker happened really quickly. Neither of us was ready for how freakin fast she spiraled down.
She would look at me and say..."I’m sorry, this isn't what you signed up for" and I would tell her that " I signed up for you, and whatever that entails" ...
And the guilt is what is different for me between the two things. Guilt allows it to be an obligation, whereas the lack of guilt allows me to see that all of this, was a choice that I made. A choice to Love without fear.
Sure, I feel guilty about some things, just not on the grand level that it could be, I feel guilty because after not sleeping for three nights and going to work, I would snap at her when she would expect the fourth night to be a mirror of the previous ones. On some level I can accept that it is human nature, on others I refuse to accept that from myself...and I should have been "better" for her. Peace lives in the balance between the two.
I feel guilt because I was unaware of how far into the end of life process she really was before I recognized it for what it was. It wasn't until we did our hospice intake that it really hit me, how much pain she was really in. How that I was in 'survival' mode, and maybe not seeing things as clearly as I could have, or should have.
I want to be able to see things clearly, without rose coloring on my glasses.
Sometimes a memory sees only what it wants to believe......Chris Robinson
I suppose that is what and where I differ from the divorce too. I ACTED out of guilt, even "stood" out of guilt for quite sometime, until I could get out of my own way, and accept that I was just as much to blame as she was for the demise of our marriage.
Anywoo....
i'm an open book.
Welcome to my place here....
It smells funny, I really need to wash the walls and change the curtains that Cadet hung up....
Clean the musty smell out of the basement from LH running his statistical database...and developing his phycological dating app. Clean out the Capri Sun pouches, pick up the Chuck-E-Cheese boxes....
