Hiatus

While I know I've never managed to post with the frequency with which I would have optimally preferred (as most bloggers fail to do), I will say that I have been deliberately avoiding posting for a while.

For the most part, it's due to the grief therapy I started in January with a new counselor.  While the first gentleman I saw was pleasant and has a good reputation, we simply didn't mesh well.  His technique apparently did not suit my personality well and I only went to see him twice, relatively soon after Mom died.  Luckily, the new counselor seems to be a much better fit.

And so.  I've had a lot to digest and process, both mentally and emotionally.  This has taken some precedence, of course, along with trying to get the more practical aspects of my life back on a regular keel. 

In addition, while I still feel like blogging as I was can have a lot of value, my counselor has pointed out something once or twice that has resonated with me.  First, I should say that her focus is not necessarily on exhaustively analyzing every feeling of grief, guilt, and loss that I've been having, but more on how to enable me to learn to live with it and to the extent possible, move past it.  And too, she's treating me as a whole person, and not just for the one event that triggered the need to see her. 

At any rate, she was, in my case, rather scornful of certain scenarios that can occur with blogging about something like my situation.  She pointed out that (these are roughly her words, by the way) if you take a bucket of shit, stir it up, analyze it, and organize it, it's still a bucket of shit.  Wallowing around in negative feelings isn't going to change them, nor will dwelling on them allow for much progress.  I originally saw my posting here as a way to vent the negative feelings and perhaps move past that way.  I don't regret having done it, and I do think it had some value.  Nonetheless, I can also see her perspective and it does feel correct for this point in time.

It's been over six months now since Mom died.  In some ways, that's unfathomable to me.  It also feels more like six years.  I still miss her, so very much, but I know I always will and I wouldn't want anything else.  Anguish and shock have softened to grief which is itself gentling some towards sorrow.  There are still things that hit me each day that make me wish she was still here as she had been (for she'll always be with me), but with each pang of missing her I can stop a little and remember all the good things we shared. 

I do plan to continue blogging soon, or perhaps it's more correct to say restart blogging soon, with more of a focus on remembering the incredible lady who was my mother as well as hopefully chronicling good changes as I move forward with my own life.  The latter is in line with the byline of the blog, anyway.  I do enjoy the writing process and having a positive focus should be beneficial.  Also, I'll get to think about Mom in ways that make me smile.  I'd like that.

Love you, Mom.

Moving On, Part 2.

For the first time I am tempted to completely remove something I have published here.  I won't though, since I do read over these for my own benefit.

This writing is a way for me to organize my thoughts and hopefully be able to work through some things.  As it turned out, the post I made earlier this morning was indeed sort of a grand house cleaning, if you will, before going to see the new counselor.  That went well, by the way. 

The earlier entry is a little more raw and chaotic than I'd prefer even for this, but I suppose that's how it goes sometime.

Moving On?

So ... the holidays were a lot more painful that I expected them to be.  (And yes, I will clean up the missing Christmas post and publish it, for my own sake if nothing else.)  I actually cannot tell you precisely how bad things were, because in thinking back, I was somehow managing to wear mental blinders for about five weeks.  Yes, I knew it was Christmastime, and I actually did some holiday type things, but I really just tried to skim by as quickly as humanly possible.  I just don't remember some days.  I don't mean that in some disturbing "I was blacking out some days" way, but more like I somehow figured, quite unconsciously, how not to let the days register too much, how to turn off the mental recording software that makes memories. Perhaps that should still be disturbing, but right now I choose to see it as grace coming in very unexpected ways.  It's been a rough enough trip as it is; it would only have been worse if I had to have been more cognizant of things.

The last portion of December and the first few days of January comprised the time period that I was most dreading.  Mom's birthday, Christmas, and my birthday come in a rapid succession.  My maternal grandmother's birthday was just over a week before my mom's as well - at one point, you had all three generations of us within three weeks of each other.  Now, I'm the only one left.  In the same vein, I can remember when we had five generations of the women in the family in one picture.  My great-grandmother and grandmother are gone for us all, but both my mother's siblings have grandchildren now.  In my weak and spindly little branch of the family, it's just me.  I feel somehow like I'm the failed end of something.

This brings up a segue that keeps occurring to me.  Basically it comes to this:  I don't have any grandparents, parents, or siblings.  Granted, marriage and children are not yet off the table for me as far as close family, should I ever be so lucky, but what in the world do I have to offer them?  There are no grandparents or aunts or uncles for my own children.  I feel like I would be robbing them.

And speaking of having children, I wish I had given my mother a grandchild.  It was always a future possibility, but now it's an impossibility.  I know that wish would not have been nearly sufficient enough of a reason to have a child, and I had never been in a position when it would have been a good choice.  There's also that whole pesky needing a father thing that was problematic.  Nonetheless, I still failed her.  I failed her, and in being too scared and too cautious after getting hurt a few times years ago, I am failing myself.  For a person who usually prides herself on her intelligence, I can be phenomenally and unbelievably stupid in some areas.

You know, I think from now on, I'll avoid segues.

So back to the holidays.  I spent Christmas with my aunt and uncle (Mom's brother).  I think that being there was certainly the best place I could have gone short of fleeing family contact as I did over Thanksgiving, and I don't believe that would have been so good in itself.  I'd find myself seeking a quiet corner to cry periodically during the day, but my aunt was supremely understanding and comforting.  There's more in the Christmas writing, so I'll leave that for now.

I had expected the minefields to be around Mom's birthday and Christmas, and while both had their perils, neither produced the meltdown I feared.  That turned up on my birthday, where I didn't expect it.  On that particular weekend, I knew I didn't want to be alone, so I traveled to my other aunt and uncle's house the day before my birthday in order to spend the night. There's a comforting sense of continuity there that I just realized I take for granted, since they have lived in the same house on my uncle's farm for my entire life, or at least certainly for as long as I can remember.  My uncle is very much the patriarch of that part of the family, and they can be a little insular, which used to upset my mom when she tried to reach out.to her sister.  But still, they are family, and my aunt was there when I needed her.  

They went to bed early by my standards, and I stayed up watching television for a couple of hours.  When I finally got to the point where I could try to go to sleep, my mind started racing the instant my head hit the pillow.  And for reasons that I cannot even begin to try and explain, the thought of having a birthday without sharing it with my mom upset me horribly.  For the very first time since she passed away, I quite literally cried myself to sleep that night.  I'd cry, then sob, all while trying to not wake up my aunt and uncle.  Once I got myself calmed down again, I'd lie down and it'd start all over again.  And again.  After a little more than two hours of this, I finally was too exhausted to keep it up. 

When I awoke the next morning, my aunt was in the kitchen having tea.  She later told me she knew it was a bad night when she saw the handful of crumpled tissues I had in my hand to throw away.  Seeing how swollen my eyes were was probably another clue (and until she mentioned it, I had no idea they looked that bad).  We ended up talking for a couple of hours, with me crying a lot again.  I think maybe some of it was useful, but it certainly wasn't fun. 

And so ... that was a couple of weeks ago.  I know from reading about the grieving process that there are certain stages most people pass through and they can reoccur, although it's different for everyone.  I seem to have gotten thrown back to some lovely stage of depression.  Before the holidays, I had gotten to where things were a little better.  I was making plans to do new things, and get out a little.  I had the house under better control, though certainly not perfect.  All of that was completely blown.  During the past two weeks, I've known that I was depressed again; I could see it, and I most definitely could feel it, but I couldn't stop it and I feared going through it again.  Now ... now I don't know where I am.  Somewhere in-between, I guess.  Or maybe I still have things to deal with I haven't acknowledged, but if so, it's not conscious.  That doesn't seem fair, but then again, nothing about this is, least of all for Mom.

At the risk of being self-indulgently whiny, again, I'm tired.  I know I don't have a choice but to slog on, but I'm tired.  I'm lost, I'm scared, and I'm alone.  I don't know how to move on, let alone what I want to move along to.  I'm tired of leaning on friends, especially without being able to ask for specific help, but I don't know what help I need.  They have told me it's okay to lean on them, but I'm still worried I'll do it too much and they'll get tired, or just decide I'm not worth it.  (And that is wholly a comment on my worthiness, not theirs, just to clarify.)

Now I'm trying very hard to appear "normal," perhaps in hope that it'd actually happen.  Short of simply losing it completely, it's the only safe option I have right now.   Some days are more successful than others.  And going back to the idea of being stuck here because I have unacknowledged issues, I have had the thought that moving on now that it's a new year might be harder because that's somehow put an edge on having to accept Mom is dead on more than a functional basis.

I wonder if this is how lab rats feel stuck in certain trap-mazes.

And so.  My sleep schedule is so completely blown it's not funny, though oddly, I'm keeping more "normal" hours than one would expect.  I sleep in chopped bits now.  I can't compress a day and go to sleep early in order to fix things, so at some point I'm just going to have to stay up.  Or something.  

And so, again.  I actually have an appointment in five and a half hours with a new counselor.  I think that is, in part, what has prompted such an unwonted excessive unloading of emotions in this entry.  It's either me trying to arrange my thoughts or trying to clear them, or both.  Sorry about that, too.

What a mess.

I'll sleep a bit before work, and we'll see how this goes, shall we?

And Mom ... I still miss you.  I love you.

Christmas Without You

(Yes, there really is text for this, from the holiday draft.  I will have it fixed soon.)

Musings in the dark

I'll start with the by now requisite lament of the time that has passed since the last entry.  If only somehow my thoughts had a more direct method of appearing here, there would be far more entries.  However, given that a lot seems to be bottling up inside lately, I suppose finding a release for it might not only be prudent, but would have the side effect of raising the post count.  Not that the blog itself is the point of things, of course.

Things were actually getting better in November.  I still missed Mom more deeply than I could adequately convey, but I was actually starting to feel like I was getting some balance back.  I was starting to reach out for new things to do, to find ways to actually live my life.  And best of all at the time, I was going to see the person whom I've considered a best friend since I was a teenager, and spend Thanksgiving with her and her husband.  Getting a break from home seemed like the perfect idea, with the huge bonus of seeing friends.  

To forestall anyone getting the wrong idea, I'll go ahead and say that the trip was lovely, aside from a few fog-delay inspired snafus on the flight there.  Seeing my friend was awesome.  Somehow, it seems that I've been blessed with one of those friendships where the time that passes doesn't truly matter.  I felt as at home and comfortable with her last month as I ever have.  I'm pretty damn sure I don't deserve that, mind you, but I'll take it with gratitude.

The only real problem with the trip was that time still passed, it ended, and I had to return home where the holiday season was starting to go into full swing.  Normally, I enjoy the holidays.  I typically see this season as a time to share with family and friends; to enjoy love, laughter, and the company of those special to you.  Needless to say, the death of the most important person in my life left a gaping void which the holiday season only serves to magnify to tormenting proportions.  

As a result, I've been able to feel myself sliding back into a depressed, directionless gloom.  I can see it reflected it the deterioration of the household routines I was painstakingly establishing.  I can tell it by the days that pass marked only by my apparent ability to continue surviving them.  The contacts that I was trying to establish with people are ever so slightly eroding again, and I don't know how many times I'll be able to apologize  for this and have it be accepted.  Of course, I usually question why people bother with me in the first place, though that's an issue for another time.  I can see all of this happening, and I can't figure how to make it stop again.  

I had a nightmare Thursday night, and what seemed to be the same thing tonight, though tonight by whatever grace, I managed to awaken before things got too bad.  In a very tightly compressed nutshell, as it still causes great pain, I'll just say that I dreamt that Mom was still alive, but we both knew she was dying.  I couldn't stop it, I couldn't save her, and it was like we were both somehow trapped.  All I could feel was an almost animal panic at the thought of losing her that only increased over time.  Waking up to remember that this had indeed happened was one of the lowest points I've hit in a while.  It took the course of a day turning back into night for the full panic of that to hit me.  I had kind of hoped I was done with it.

It only seems to make sense that the pressures and demands of the holiday season are causing this.  And it's really odd, because part of me still very much wants to enjoy the season as much as I possibly can.  I'll be with family for about a week, so it's not like I'll be alone.  And there are so many things to inspire delight this time of year.  One of the things I have always actually  liked about myself is that I have always happily retained a childlike joy in things like Christmas lights, decorations, making holidays cookies ... some of the simpler little joys life can offer.  Part of me deeply wants to still be able to take pleasure in all of  this. 

On the other hand, part of me also wants hide and pretend none of it is happening.  I can want to smash things when I hear Christmas carols.  And let me tell you, there are some of them that can cause pain in only a few notes.  Hearing "I'll Be Home For Christmas" is a fantastic spur to consider the benefits of playing in traffic.  "Blue Christmas" has a similar effect, but "traffic" is at that point is better defined as an eight-lane freeway one is trying to cross at night... during a sleet storm... while the roads ice over.  The description are purely and completely hyperbole, by the way (I promise!) but unfortunately for me, the anguish is real.  I dislike the idea of truly wishing away any part of my life, but I won't be sorry to see this holiday season end.  I'm torn between trying to find some joy in it, trying not to be hurt and ruin things for others, and just wanting my soul to quit bleeding.

There's an eleven-day stretch coming up, from a few days before Christmas to right after the first of the year, that encompasses not only Christmas and New Year's, but mine and my mother's birthdays.  For the first half of it, I won't be alone.  Right now, for the second half of it, I will be.  I am not looking forward to this time with any pleasure or peace of mind.

I want this all to pass so I can go back to where I was feeling that I was maybe beginning ever so slowly to find ways in which to live again.  For the very near future, though, I just want to stop another downward slide.  I know well how I hide from things now - I actually had a pretty good idea of what it would probably be before - but I still haven't figured out how to put a halt to it with any efficaciousness.

All this is why I find myself here at 4:30 in the morning, avoiding the miseries of sleep once again.  People will ask me how I'm doing.  And do you know, I honestly don't know what to tell them.  Is there a scale for these things?  If so, I'm not conversant with it.  Ask me twice five minutes apart, and you may well get two different, but equally correct answers.  In giving those answers, however, I am grateful that I've been given the grace of friends who care enough to hear when things aren't okay, even when I don't specifically say so, and who don't stop with accepting the polite answer.  When the dust settles, I hope to be able to adequately thank them one day, if such a thing is even possible.

And so ... the process of having to think through things enough to be able to express myself at least semi-coherently has once again worked to at least drain off some of the restless energy.  Now I just have to figure how best to get through today.  I may have to put some things off - again - but the deadlines are not set with any real purpose.  

Actually, today would have been my grandmother's eighty-eighth birthday had she still been living.  The day  would have caused Mom her own anguish as it did every year, actually, so I suppose I'm taking after her after all. One thing I do need to do today, if nothing else, is to make a silk flower arrangement suitable for Christmas and take it to my grandparents' grave.  I know this may sound like putting salt into a wound, but I truly have been giving myself a break when it comes to assuming Mom's duties such as this one.  But given the day, and how very important it was to Mom, I feel like this is something I want to do.  I actually have the idea of somehow incorporating a small picture of Mom in the arrangement, maybe even one of all three of them.  And somehow, this idea seems like something that might inexplicably be a comfort.

As always, I love you, Mom, and I miss you.

Time flies

And once again more time has passed that I had thought since I posted here. It seems to be a rule of blogging, at least for those of us who do it on a casual basis.  It's almost not even noteworthy to mention anymore, and yet I always feel constrained to do so.  The time has certainly not passed without me thinking of Mom.

All the time since she has died has been tough, so it seems foolish to point out that I'm having a very, very rough times of things now.  Perhaps that should be still?  On a mundane note, I was laid-off from my job. I actually do not find being laid off to be terribly upsetting.  I don't know if it is because I am numb to it, or because there are much more important things to be dealt with that it's a minor issue.  I am trying to take this as an opportunity to switch directions with regard to work, and since I am (luckily!) safe from financial worries for a while, I'm trying to be optimistic long term.  Of course, the only reason I have this financial security is thanks to Mom.  She's been gone almost three months and she's still saving my butt.  This begs the question of what I am going to do by myself?

The holidays are coming up.  Since we've just gotten past Halloween, we're about to plunge into the holiday frenzy.  I can always remember seeing the de rigueur holiday stories about people coping with loss during the holidays, and feeling both sorry for the people as well as uncomfortable.  It was the people who were alone that really struck me; now I'm one of them.  Not completely, no, and please don't think I'm taking my family or friends for granted.  I don't think I would have made it to this point without them.  But since my closest friend in-town is preparing to move to Arizona thanks to her husband's military reassignment, my day to day life is about to be really void of people who I can count on just to give me a hug.  I truly have no idea how I'm going to make it through the holidays. It's been hard enough so far - I'd much rather run away than have to face Christmas now.

I do have some ideas on how to get out more and maybe some of them will even work.   I'm just not the most outgoing person by far, and I make friends more than I make acquaintances, which takes time.   I worry about the meantime.

I feel like I owe my mother to be doing better than I am and not to squander the potential opportunities I now have.  I just hope she's not too disappointed in me.  Right now, I'm stuck somewhere between wanting to jump up and whip everything into shape so I can get ready for whatever my life will hold and actually being able to take enough first steps.  I haven't felt well, I'm not sleeping well, the list of things I need to do is overwhelming.  When I do rally, it's enough to take care of immediate needs but not much else.  And to top it all off, I seem to be whining now.  I know .. just keep trying.  Maybe that will even work one day.

Oh ... for the record, I got a copy of the original edition of Richard Scarry's Best Rainy Day Book Ever in the mail today.  Some pages are missing and a few are colored on, but by and large, it's a very good copy for its age.  It felt so familiar when I opened it, it was a little odd.  I'm glad to have it, though.

I miss Mom so very, very much and it hurts more than I can say.  But I'll keep going, however badly.

Sleepless thoughts

If I had an actual post published for every time I thought about something I could write about here, there would be significantly more content.  The fact that almost two weeks have passed  is in absolutely no way an indication that I have slowed in thinking about my mom or even this blog.  It's just that the process of rebuilding a "normal" life is apparently a never ending roller coaster just full of unexpected delights.  (If you didn't read that last sentence and infer a healthy dose of sarcasm, please do.)  I never know exactly how I'm going to react to things or what little reminder is hiding for me on any given day.

In my absence from this blog, I passed the two month mark since my mother's death.  Since there's never been any way to determine where I think I should be by different milestones, assuming the task of getting through each day would actually afford the luxury to do so, I can't say that I'm ahead or behind in anything.  The fact that so much time has passed, very relatively speaking, is a shock to me.  We're looking at Thanksgiving very soon, and Christmas beyond that.  (Along with  my mother's birthday as well as my own.  I would truly undergo cryogenic suspension from Mid-November until the second week or so of January in a heartbeat if at all possible.)  On the flip slide, just short of nine weeks is a blatantly insufficient amount of time to have been able to patch back together some semblance of a life.  At least it is from my point of view, since I certainly haven't managed it.  It's not been a lack of desire, either.

I had almost gotten my sleep schedule back to a normal rhythm, or so I hoped, but the last few days blew that out of the water again.  While I won't go into the reasons now, there was an event Sunday evening that I could have very definitely done without.  So now I'm backsliding in several ways, though I'm told that this is to be expected.  Okay, maybe so, but it still stinks.

The gods are showing some mercy to me.  There are several people, friends and family both, that continue to extend their caring and concern to me.  Words will never be able to convey how grateful I am and how much this has helped me.  Even at the times when they are caught not knowing what to say, or caught watching me when *I* don't know what to say, the simple fact that they are there is crucial.  

But "how are you doing" is such a loaded question these days.  I'm not going to insult anyone who cares at all about me and is asking by giving a false answer and cheapening their concern.  On the other hand, it's not easy to convey that mostly, I'm in pain, feeling lost and scared - still.  There's the additional irony that I can make it through the day okay, at least overtly, right up until I'm asked that question.  It makes for some awkward conversations when you spend half your time either crying or trying not to cry.

I'm trying to pull it all together, folks, I really am.  But being alone, dealing with all the financial matters and messes, figuring out what's going on with work, and trying to figure out what I want to do, let alone how, is quickly becoming overwhelming.  There's nothing to do but to get through it - somehow - but many times I can't see the how.  Tomorrow is another day, though.  Actually, since it's just past 3:00 a.m., I guess it's more apt to say today is another day.  

In the interests of not leaving this post completely negative and/or self indulgently pitying, there are some little fragments I've been thinking about.  I may well expand upon them later, but here are some scraps of memories about Mom.

• I had a period in childhood (around age 4-5) where I had many respiratory difficulties.  At one point, I had asthma, bronchitis, and pnuemonia, all of which resulted in a collapsed lung.  I couldn't go outside and play.  There was a Richard Scarry activity book - Richard Scarry's Best Rainy Day Book Ever - that I adored.  My mom sat with me for hours as we colored, cut-out, and made all sorts of things from that book.  She told me later we went through two copies of it.   (Mind you, this was a book that was originally around 500 pages.  Phone books were anemic in comparison.  I saw that it was released in an annotated version a few years ago, though it seems to be mostly out of print now.  I would dearly love to find a copy.)  At some point during this time, we were in my parents' bedroom doing something in the book and I got upset because I saw my dad and brother taking out their bikes.  I loved to go on those rides, but it was another thing I couldn't do.  I don't remember what Mom said or did exactly, but I've always remembered the feeling - she comforted me, let me know she'd be with me and I wouldn't be alone, and that we'd have our own fun. And we did.
• During this same period, I can remember going to Sears after yet another doctor's appointment.  My dad had been out of town, and I was upset in all sorts of ways.  Mom had taken me there to get a stuffed animal from Winnie the Pooh as a special treat.  She could always make things like that seem like an adventure.  It was a Piglet, by the way, and yes, I do still have it.  
• While speaking of Pooh Bear, whom I still love, I also have memories of one of the nights when a Pooh special was coming on television.  (CBS, to be precise.  I can still see the overlapping, multicolored 'CBS Special' logo spinning on screen.)  With the overwhelming media choices today, that would seem like no big deal at all, but it was huge then.  Mom made an event out of it by making caramel apples for us to have during the show.  She told me that she figured that caramel was enough like honey that Pooh would approve.
• Like most small children, sitting still was a difficult thing for me to do, even in church.  Mom would sit next to me and just fiddle with my ear - either gently tucking my hair behind it or just rubbing the earlobe.  As long as she didn't stop, I was blissfully quiet.  The conditioning never faded, either.  Last November when we were at the hospital awaiting the outcome of my uncle's open heart surgery, Mom and I were sitting next to each other on a couch.  My foot was jouncing up and down wildly, a nervous habit of mine, until she reached over and started smoothing my hair behind my ear.  
• A few years ago we extended our Labor Day vacation and went to Orlando after the usual visit to Jacksonville.  We picked Sea World as the park we wanted to go to while there and set aside our last full day for it.  It was raining that morning, and I was scared it would ruin everything.  I was worried not only for me, but for Mom's sake. I wanted a good vacation, but I really wanted her to have fun and relax, and didn't want anything to mar it for her. We were determined to go and make the best of it. It did rain on and off most of the day, but as it turned out, nothing was ruined.  The first show we saw that day was the dolphin show.  While I loved it myself, the absolute best memory of not only that show, but the entire day, was looking over at Mom and seeing the look of sheer delight on her face. I will remember that forever, and be thankful that we had that time together.

I think that's a good note to end on for now.

I love you, Mom.