On Grief, Metamorphosis, and Self-Excavation

What with my own personal grief; seeing friends in pain with various losses and grief of their own; feeling like things in the world are getting worse rather than better; not to mention the whole snow/winter/cold yuckiness that is January in Michigan, I am overwhelmed with sadness and despair.  I am done.  Empty.  Spent.  Broken.  I have nothing left.  It's not that I don't care.  Rather, I care so much that I have no energy left to care at all.  I am tired of being a responsible adult.  I want permission to be weak, but then rage against any perceived weakness as a failure of the strength label I pridefully own.  I want to run away for a while.  Explore the world.  Excavate me.  But I can't.  Not yet, anyway.  I have made too many commitments.  Obligations.  Maybe later.

I am tired of worrying all the time.  Tired of being afraid.  What is this weird new bump on my finger?  Is my extra weight killing me?  Are Mira's pressures getting worse?  Am I a failure for having a messy home?  Have I failed my family?  My spouse?  My children?  Do I worry too much?  Is it depression, or grief, or both, or neither?  All this worry sucks was what little energy I manage to acquire.  Ain't nobody got time for this.  Where is my joy?  What happened to the woman who could do anything she set her mind to?  Who achieved so much educationally, professionally, personally?  I miss her.  I need more smiles.  More hugs.  More laughter.  More beauty.  More stillness.  More free time.

As an introvert, I need time away.  But I am already so isolated; so alone.  Being out in busy places with people I don't know just makes it worse.  I need one-on-one time in quiet, familiar places with just a few people who can help fill my energetic bucket.  Who won't judge me.  Who don't care how I look.  Who don't have a vision of me that will shatter if I name my truth.  Who can take me away for a while.  Who can bring me back to to myself.

I need help.  I don't know what kind.  I just know I don't want to hurt.  I don't want to cry when I see babies.  I don't want to envy someone else's life.  I don't want to be alone.  I don't want to feel overwhelmed.  I don't want to feel different, or unworthy.  I want to feel connected.  Loved.  Valued.  Valuable.  Worth the space I take up.  But not because other people tell me so--that can be taken away.  No.  I want to know it to be true, deep in my bones.  Know it with every breath.  Feel it.  Remember it.  I want to be so caught up in the joy and love of my life that I am not threatened by what others have; what I don't have.  I want what I am and what I already have to be enough.

How do I get there?  What must I do?  Excavate me?  By making time?  By making me a priority?  By making me an obligation?  Oh.  I guess that makes sense.  How can I feel worthy and valuable if I refuse to value myself enough to make time for what I need?

This is where I am going.  Do you want to come with me?  It's okay if you don't.  I just can't stay stuck in this hole anymore, trying to find happiness in food, stuff, and other people's validation.  I can't stay the same, even though I don't know what I will be when I come out the other side.  Change is scary and difficult.  It hurts.  But, quite honestly, it hurts to stay where I am, too.

I can't promise that you'll still like me.  In fact, ultimately, that's up to you.  I can promise that I intend to like myself--to enjoy my own company--and that I will work to embody kindness, joy, patience, acceptance, strength, and love.  I have no idea where I'll end up, but I will share my journey with you.  You can find me here.

#Truth2015

Learning to Be Flexible With the Rules

I'm pretty much a rule person.  They keep the world tidy and orderly.  I believe in consequences for breaking rules, and I believe that we need to teach our children that there are consequences to their actions when the costs are small, rather than continuously bail them out and make their first experience of consequences come at a large cost.  I am also a pragmatist who also understands that pretty much every rule needs an exception because there will be circumstances that require it.

Parenting requires a fluidity and a balance between rules and exceptions.  Indeed, one of the reasons I said I wanted to be a parent was to learn flexibility and how to go with the flow.  Yes, the rule is generally "x," but because of "y," you can do/have "z" this one time.  There are times to hold fast to the rules, and times to bend (for some reason, I have Kenny Rogers' The Gambler running through my head), and parenting styles tend to dictate which rules we are more flexible with and under what circumstances.

Phil and I have been very lucky that we are pretty much on the same page about things.  We've been even luckier that the few times we have disagreed, it wasn't over anything big, and we still backed each other up in front of the child, and waited until later to discuss and reach consensus on whatever it was.  One thing which we agreed on before Mira was born was that she would sleep in her own room from the start.  And, except for when we were on vacation and there was only one room, we held pretty fast to that.  Even when she was in our room, we had her sleep in a separate pack-n-play.  We both held the line on this rule, with few exceptions.  Even so, there were some.  When she was scared on the cruise to Alaska, we let her sleep with us, and we all shared a bed for nap times during GenCon one year.

When I was pregnant with Patrick, we decided that it had been a pretty successful rule and planned to implement it with him as well.  In many ways, it was easier with him--no sleep training was necessary, as he was used to sleeping in his own bed away from us after a month in the hospital.  Moreover, he had too many tubes and wires to allow us to sleep with him even if we wanted to.  However, once we started being gone to Detroit for long periods of time, it was clear Mira needed reassurance, and we began to let her sleep with whichever parent was at home.  It was a rough time and making her feel safe was more important than holding the line.

When we brought Patrick home, we tried having her sleep in her own room, but she is scared of shadows and noises.  More than anything, though, she is scared she will wake up and we won't be there.  Scared of being taken away to live somewhere else.  Knowing the number of times she went to bed and I ended up taking Patrick to Detroit so she woke up to no mom or brother, and the multiple times she was taken by her grandparents for extended periods of time to Tennessee, these are not really irrational fears on her part.  So, we have allowed her to continue sleeping with us.

It's been difficult, to be sure, but there are some lovely moments--when she rolls over, drapes her arm over my shoulder, and says, "I love you, mommy," or when she scratches my back or smooths my hair with her hands in a soothing motion.  There are heartbreaking moments, too--when she wakes up crying because I am not there (I have been sleeping in the guest room so I don't get kicked in the stomach by her while I am recovering).  Each night, we let her choose where she wants to sleep--her room, our room with daddy, or the guest room with mommy.  Last night, she picked sleeping in the guest room with me.  I could tell she really missed me because she ended up putting a blanket over her face so she could not see the shadows made by the headlights of passing cars; she was willing to brave shadows to stay with me!

And then, there are the moments when I know I can't force her back to her room.  When she reaches out, multiple times, every night, to make sure I am still there.  If I have gotten up to go to the restroom, she wakes up to figure out where I am.  Once, she went walking through the house in the dark to find me and, when she did, she climbed up in bed and snuggled in next to me.  When Phil woke up and she wasn't there, he went on a search and found her snuggled up with me.  I love that she loves me, and wants me near, but it breaks my heart that she feels so scared, and her world feels so unstable to her.

In October, we had talked with her about having her start sleeping in her room every other night in November, and she was really excited about the plan--until it was time for the first night away.  Then it wasn't fun; it was scary.  Phil and I talked and we agreed that we would rather her feel safe and secure than rush her back to her room and potentially make things worse.  After all, it's only been since April that we've been allowing this.  Even if it lasts six more months, one year--even two--isn't long in the scheme of things.  We would much rather figure out how to make her feel secure enough to go back to her room willingly than force her to go back there now.  The world is scary enough when you are three--it's even scarier when your parents disappear at what seems like random, and your brother comes and goes and then is gone forever.  I can't even imagine.

So we bent.  Our firm "no co-sleeping" rule had to adapt, because, when we made it, we never anticipated the current circumstances.  None of this is to say that there are no more rules.  There are still rules, expectations, and consequences.  She figured out pretty quickly that people would treat her differently and let her get away with things if she said, "I'm sad because my brother died."  She discovered the words were a magical incantation that, once uttered, changed how the world worked.  We reigned that in pretty quickly (we think), and she is doing amazingly well for all she has been through, particularly given her age.  But things like this remind me that good parenting is a moving target.  There is no one single set of rules; no one perfect way that everyone should do it.  We learn; things change; we adapt.  It drives my type-A, OCD brain crazy, but I am learning when to be flexible, in hopes that it will keep me from breaking.

On the Oddities of Grieving

Grief is strange.  There is simply no other word to describe it.  It hits at odd times, in ways you do not expect.  Sometimes, the things that set you off make sense, but other times, there is simply no rational explanation for how you are feeling.  Every day is different and you really can't prepare because you don't know what is going to happen.  Sure, you expect sadness and difficulties on the "big" days--birthdays, anniversaries, etc.--but there's no way to know what will set you off, no way to know what things will make you feel as though, without them, you cannot function.

I have been going through Patrick's things and have had no trouble deciding which clothes to keep and give away--except for a few things.  Oddly, the things I can't deal with right now are things that were 24-month clothes he was given but never had a chance to wear, so they still have the tags on.  In theory, there is no sentimental reason to keep them--they aren't family pieces Mira wore, and he never wore them.  So, why can't I part with them?  Also, his bedding set--comforter, sheet, bumpers, bed skirt, diaper holder, curtain, clothes hamper--I have no attachment to any of it, except for the comforter.  Why just the comforter, when Patrick never even slept under it?  Whatever the reason, my current dilemma is whether to give all of the rest of it away without the comforter, or hang on to it until I am ready to part with the comforter so I can donate it as a complete set.

At the same time, Phil and I easily decided that we will turn the nursery into a playroom/family library.  We have had no trouble giving away car seats and strollers and bouncy seats and various other bits of baby paraphernalia.  I cannot fathom what the difference is, but I am trying to honor my feelings and just putting aside those things with which I am not yet ready to part and, hopefully, in time I will either understand why I need to keep them, or be ready to let them go.

Then there are the grief triggers--things that set you off that you weren't anticipating.  Things like the crinkly paper at the doctor's office that Patrick used to love to roll on and tear up to hear the sound.  The smell of a different deodorant than I usually use, which I bought in Detroit because I ended up there without my kit bag.  The party supply catalog that comes in the mail advertising all the necessities for Patrick's first birthday party.  The Amazon.com recommendations to purchase baby items because I have purchased them in the past.  I have no doubt that Mira's trip to the cardiologist in two weeks will back tons of memories and feelings because we were last there only days before Patrick went back to Detroit for the last time.  When you are grieving, life is like a Michigan road after a rough winter--full of potholes you don't see coming, can't avoid, and might put you out of commission for a few days.  And it's not going to get easier.  Next April, and indeed at least once a year for the rest of her life, we will have to take Mira to Detroit for a cardiology visit and will have to experience the hospital and see all of the doctors and nurses again.

Even so, there are things that bring me comfort--like sleeping curled up under Patrick's fleece froggy blanket, listening to "Happy," reading through the notes people left at the visitation and funeral, watching the videos of him on my phone, and looking at the amazing picture of him and his sister above the fireplace.

I don't understand and certainly can't describe or explain how my heart can feel so full and so empty at the same time,  All I know is that I love my baby boy.  My life is both brighter for having him in it, and duller for his having left it.  I will forever be caught in the duality of gratefulness for our time together and frustration and anger at how short that time was.

I am also caught between wanting to shy away from all things CHD and knowing that I have to keep fighting because I still have a child with CHD.  I find myself crying myself to sleep at night, fearful that her next trip to the cardiologist will reveal that her pulmonary pressures are increasing, meaning that the medications aren't working, which means a long, slow trip toward right heart failure and the eventual need for a heart/lung transplant.  I reach over and stroke her hair, snuggle her close, give thanks for our time together, and try not to borrow trouble.  But, with the wounds from Patrick so fresh, the trips to the doctor so frequent, and the medication reminders every day, it's a struggle.  Like everything else, all I can do is take it one day at a time, one hour at a time, one breath at a time.  In that way, grief seems a lot more like everyday life and feels more manageable.  Here's hoping.