Just Keep Swimming....... x

Yesterday, my sister’s daughter Charlotte drove to my house.  Yes drove!  She’s old enough now and has her learner permit.  I’m so proud of her.  I couldn’t wait to watch her drive out of my driveway…and of course not back into my garage door!  And as Charlotte slowly edged back and forth with the car, giggling, my brother in law Tone rolling his eyes from the passenger seat, she finally got it. 

She straightened up the car and drove slowly out of my driveway.  And in one of those strange reflective moments, with her bright yellow L plate stuck to the back window, I couldn’t help but notice the other bright yellow sticker on the car bumper under her L plate.  

 It said “Touched Be The Road Toll.”

I stood on our front steps madly waving and blowing kisses to Charlotte who gave me a big thumbs up.  I know she couldn’t see the tears in my eyes.  But it was a poignant reminder of life.   

One, how it goes on, that people do survive tragedy and thrive and two, that these little moments after grief aren’t little moments.  They have the ability to trigger such instant responses.  At a subconscious level!  The sun was shining, I was filled with a sense of such pride and happiness but in a second of seeing that sticker and Charlotte’s L plate I was reminded just how fragile and unfair life can be sometimes.  Unfair that it wasn’t my sister standing with me, so proud.   

So how do we ready ourselves for those triggers after grief?  

How do we ignore them, shut them out, block them, avoid them?   

Well I’ve learned you can’t!  It’s all part of the process.  A process they call healing…or moving forward.  But sometimes it’s like one step forward, two steps back! 

But with every shot of pain and recognition comes more resilience.  More strength….to cope when these sparks of grief strike.  I’m not scared of them now….well not as much as I was.

And I wonder how other people cope with these little set backs or obstacles?  Whether they’re part and parcel of grief or whether I’m stuck, or I have too much time to contemplate?  Or all this means is that the love I had for those gone will always prompt sadness sometimes?  Is it odd or normal to still feel this way? 

I’m glad its August as it’s the later part of the year where it seems I get a breather from all the reminders of those I’ve lost.  May was Mother’s Day.  June was Savannah’s birthday and July my baby has her birthday.  Which seems always overshadowed by her sisters.  And I hate that!

And all these special days prompt tears and wondering and questioning why?  Year after year.  Its like you have to deal with the difficult stuff for three days.  The day before, the day of and the flatness of the day after….the recovery.   But we do recover.  We regroup.  We mend.  And thats the true miracle of the human condition.    Just keep swimming as Dory said!

You’d think I’d be better at this by now.  But it seems grief is like an eclipse.  When it’s around, everything else seems to be shadowed.  Even the good stuff!  The triggers are just that, like someone has a gun pointed.  The best way to deal with them is to let the pain sit with you, or pour out of you.  Whatever works!  But I do know that burying the pain can create addiction.  And with addiction, unless you deal with whatever is causing the pain, you will never fix the addiction if you have one.

And the other night I watched a TV show called ‘Offspring.’  A scene in it showed one of the main characters celebrating her birthday.  The table was full of family, laughing.  She got up to make a speech, how it was the first birthday without her dad.  And in the scene she melts into a mess of tears.  And out of the blue, lying on my couch under a fluffy throw rug, I started sobbing.  And I couldn’t stop.  It was like someone turned a tap on.

I miss my dad.

I m i s s  m y  d a d!

That one little scene in a silly show triggered grief tears and set me off! 

But I wiped my wet face with the fluffy throw rug, took a deep breath and let the pain sit with me.  And you know what….after a few minutes, the sadness passed. 

However I still got up, grabbed a crystal glass off the shelf, and poured myself a red.  i know I’m a work in progress….and that’s ok too! X

Tapping those red shoes.....................

Pain can be our teacher....

Yesterday, Dempsey found a small purple velvet box in my sideboard drawer.  She wandered up to me very sheepishly with it behind her back and asked me if she could have what’s inside. 

“What is it Precious?”  I asked, wracking my brain to remember what was inside that box?

Dempsey smiled and slowly opened it, not taking her eyes off mine.  Inside was Peter’s mother’s ruby ring.

“Who’s is it Mummy?”  she asked.

I told her it was Daddy’s mother’s…..her grandmother’s, who died when she was only two.  Who we weren’t close with.

“What is it with me and Grandmother’s!!!  Why don’t I even have one?”  she asked.

I pulled her into me, wrapped my arms around her and kissed her head.  I told her that not everyone has a grandma, and that I know it’s not fair she doesn’t have any but that’s just the way it is.

It made me think how the school of hard knocks can certainly teaches us resilience….and some days acceptance of our ‘lot in life.’  But it is also a breeding ground for wishing for things we cant have…..impossible things, and that’s when some days can be torture and you want the sun to sink quickly so it’ll be a new day. 

Wanting things that will never be only gets you down and as difficult as it may be sometimes, you have to dig deep and look at what you DO have instead.  It’s a hard habit to nurture, but it IS possible….. 

Facebook is a great example of misreading other people lives and wishing for what they have!  It’s a platform that can easily trigger feelings of wanting what we can’t have, or wishing we had a different life. 

But is all that stuff that people carefully post an illusion?   

When I see my friends on Facebook posting pictures of their healthy kids Savannah’s age, or photos of them with their healthy mothers out lunching in the sunshine, it creates that perspective that everyone’s life is perfect, that other people have what I don’t.  And its difficult to try to change your way of thinking….but you have to, otherwise you find yourself spiraling into that place of pining for things that will never be.  And that’s detrimental to the soul…..

Everyone has the power within to change their way of thinking, to dig deep when you need to….

YOU have the ability to focus on the positives or accept what’s not to be, it’s how we interpret ‘our lives’ that matters….it’s those shitty days and shitty feelings that become our building blocks, stacking one block after another, after another, fostering strength and shaping our armor.    

And as my dad used to say, “There’s always someone worse off than you Diana!”  and it’s this mantra I quietly say to myself when all else fails…because there is!  And that, saying is sometimes my life raft…..it brings perspective and jolts me back into my reality of how lucky I am!

Yes, Demps doesn’t have any grandma’s and I don’t have my mother, sister or daughter here.  But I did!  And I DO have girlfriends and close people in my life who have stepped up and are there everyday, that call me and make me laugh.  That hug me and hug Dempsey….they are like my loved ones, even though they aren’t!     

Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz when she realizes she had the power all along to take her home, just by tapping her red shoes....she just had to discover herself!

We also have the capacity to realize we can change our way of thinking….it’s there…it’s been there all along……

So today, I’ve been down in the dumps, wishing for things I can’t have but trying to remember my mantras and remembering the Glinda the Good Witch from Wizard of Oz reminding Dorothy;

“You’ve always had the power my Dear, you just had to learn it yourself!” X