Goodbye Joy, Hello Truth

It's New Year's Eve, and I could not be more ready for this year to end.  To be honest, I feel like I have been dealing with ever bigger struggles since we first started having trouble conceiving in 2008 and I am terrified about the year ahead.  Meds and surgeries in 2009; IVF and rough pregnancy in 2010; CHD diagnosis, hospitalizations, heart caths, and open-heart surgery in 2011; miscarriage and failed IVF in 2012; IVF, rough pregnancy, CHD, rough delivery, surgeries, deaths, and hospitalizations in 2013; surgeries, hospitalizations, depression, and Patrick's death in 2014.  Six years of increasingly difficult experiences.  I am tapped out.  I don't know if I can handle any more.  I know that I said that last year, and that this year was much worse and I'm still standing.  It has become obvious that each time I have said enough, the universe has tested me and pushed me and showed me that, in fact, it could give me more and I would survive.  I'm also well aware that there are many worse things that could be sent my way.  I don't want them.  I am trying desperately not to challenge the universe.  I don't want to know how strong I can be.

At the same time, I don't want to focus on the negatives.  I want to focus on something positive, under the theory that we manifest those things on which we focus our energy.  As 2015 has approached, I began the task of figuring out my word for the year.  Let me back up--in my family, instead of make New Year's resolutions, we pick a word or attribute that we want to focus on, work on, or manifest in the year ahead.  I have previously picked words like discernment and abundance.  One year, I picked patience, before I knew better.  Last year, having had such a crummy 2013, I picked joy.  I wanted to manifest joy in my life.  Hahahahaha!  What I got was lots of opportunities to find joy in the rough and tumble world of hospitals and death.  As a result of the experiences this year, I've been (I think reasonably) scared of picking my word for 2015.  I felt like it needed to be "perfect"; that, somehow, if I could just pick the right word, I will have an easier year in 2015.

I thought I had finally managed to narrow it to three:  miracles, release, and connection.  Then, this afternoon, I read an article by someone else who was picking a word for next year.  The article included a list of questions to ask in formulating said word.  In asking myself those questions, I came up with a few other thoughts, including success, family, truth, comfort, and insight.  As I tried to decide which of these words would be the best one to select, it occurred to me that I was picking my word out of fear.  Fear that it would be hard.  Fear that it would bring more struggles and grief.  I was, once again, trying to outsmart God--as though that were actually possible.  So, I tried my best to get my head out of it.  I wrote the words on paper, folded them, put them in a hat, and picked one.  The result was unexpected.  Of all the ones I thought might come up, this wasn't it.  Maybe that's why it came up.  Who knows.  For good or ill, my word for 2015 is:

Truth

And as I thought about the word, I was reminded of a line of a covenant from a church I attended in my youth:  to seek the truth in love.  So, I wrote my own covenant for the year, to help keep me on track with my word:

Love is the spirit of my life,

And truth shall be its law.

I will seek the truth in love.

I will speak my truth with love.

And I will help others find their truth.

This is my covenant.

So, goodbye #Joy2014 and hello #Truth2015.  See you next year.

Children and Grace

Confession time:  I cut church on Sunday.  I didn't feel like going, but Mira really wanted to, so I got up and got us ready, and off we went.  When her godmother and friend showed up, she ran off to be with them, so I slipped out and went to go visit Patrick.  Turns out, it was probably better that way.  Not sure I could've handled what came next.  The details aren't exact, since I got the story second-hand, but you'll get the idea.

So, at Storytime, Phil called all the kids up.  Once they arrived, he said something innocuous like, is everyone here?  One little boy, whose little sister was in the nursery, said, "No.  My baby is in the nursery."  Mira then says, "My baby's dead."  *oof*  Just hearing that as a story kicked me in the stomach; it's probably good I wasn't there.  Anyway, whispers ran through the congregation and people tried to find out or confirm what she said.  Phil said something like, "Yes.  And that makes us sad," and then managed to get thing back on track.

But then, a beautiful thing happened.  The kids were dismissed to Sunday School, and Mira and her friends went/ran to the toddler room as usual.  One of her good friends, who just turned three, ran into the room, grabbed a doll, ran back to Mira and gave it out to her, saying, "Here's your baby, Mira.  His name is Patrick."  Mira hugged the baby and apparently it was just what she needed at the time.

How is it that a four-year-old's truth can cut us to the quick and a three-year-old can know just how to bring comfort.  It was a moment of Grace.  I'm just glad I only heard about it--I would have been unable to function if I had witnessed it.

I Am Not Wonder Woman

Truly, I'm not.  And it's hard to admit.  I wish I was Wonder Woman.  I *want* to own that mantle.  It took me forever to accept the label when people first started using it.  And, I think, maybe I was for a while.  But, not anymore.  Now?  Now, I'm just broken.  I don't care that I haven't showered in days.  My alarm goes off, but I can't bring myself to get up.  My mind tells me I need to get up and go to work, but I can't manage to convince my body.  My poor husband, who is also overwhelmed with his own grief, and who doesn't get a pass on the holidays what with being a pastor, is now shouldering the burden of caring for a wife who is succumbing to her grief, and a 4-year-old who is struggling with things much too old for her, as well as the normal 4-year-old stuff.  He's Superman--at least to me (I dunno--maybe he doesn't want a mantle either?).  Still, somehow, he can drag himself out of bed to take care of church things--big church things like funerals, and small church things like a weekly bulletin.  Me?  I am forcing myself to type this in the hopes it will help me get my stuff together and get my butt back to work where I can earn money.  

It doesn't help that I feel guilty because I gave in to the need to fill the hole inside me by buying "stuff," thinking I was eligible for disability pay while I recovered from my surgery.  Nope.  GUILT!!  Phil takes Mira to daycare in the morning while I stay curled up under Patrick's frog blanket--my ever present friend since he died.  GUILT!!  To my credit, I made it to my mental health evaluation this week. They will have some counselor recommendations as well as any other services they think might help me next week, but in the meantime, I seem to just be sinking further down the grief hole.  When the counselor asked me if I could *briefly* describe why I was there, I told her the short answer was the death of my 10-month-old son in September, but the truth is, I have been swimming upstream since 2008 and just can't seem to catch a break.  Have there been moments of joy and fun?  Absolutely.  But, if I were to take one of those stress inventories, I imagine I would create a whole new high score.  I watched as the counselor maintained her outer professional facade, while her mind tried to figure out how I was still standing.  Even as we spoke, and I kept remembering other things to mention as we talked, even to me, it sounded like a joke.  Like, truly, no one could possibly have to deal with all that crap in a 6-year period.  Up until now, I had managed to avoid most of the addictions to which people succumb when they are finally overwhemeled (except food, of course, but that one is socially acceptable).  But, the spending thing scares me.  

I grew up without, so when I finally got access to a credit card, I went whole hog.  By the time Phil and I married, I was 24 and $60,000 in debt, only $25,000 of which was student loans.  We worked hard to get ourselves to a comfortable place--more than comfortable, really.  Even though we financed it, we were able to do four rounds of IVF.  Four!  But two medically-needy kids and lots of time away from work to care for them blew through what we had.  Friends, family, even people we don't know, have been extremely generous to us.  And we were making it.  We had enough to get by until my scheduled return to work.  Then, I let myself "comfort buy."  Please know--we're not currently in danger of losing our house.  We put things on a credit card with a high interest rate that we had intended to pay off without interest, and now have to pay the interest.  We're ok.  For now.  But if I can't reign this shopping thing back in--if I can't get my grief under control to the point where I can get back to work, we could get there.  And it scares me.

So, no, I am not Wonder Woman.  I am not *coping*.  I am broken and falling apart.  And you, my friends, my readers, my support people, you deserve to know that.  Or rather, I deserve to let you know that.  So, when you ask how I am, and I say "fine," know that I'm lying to you.  I am not fine.  In time, I may get there--I sure hope so.  But, I'm not wonder woman.  Not right now anyway.  Hopefully, with time, meds, and counseling, I will be again.  But, if I'm really lucky, life will get easier, and I won't have to be.