Reflections and musings

[kayc]

We tend to measure progress by how we feel, if we feel better, we think that's progress.  But consider that when we experience the pain of grief, that also is progression, because we have to allow ourselves that in order to make our way through this.  Most of us experience plenty of grief, whether it be shock, numbness, anger, pain, tears, fear, anxiety.  And somehow we do progress through it with each other's help and Marty's guidance.

[Guest]

Just got back from the park (11 miles!) where I ran into a couple Deedo and I both knew - school and scouts.  We chatted for a while and then they left.  Since I walk much faster I soon caught back up with them and was watching them interact with each other.  They were both so into each other and watching the joy as they conversed reminded me so much of what Deedo and I had.  I've commented before how music wasn't that important to us as we were always talking.  We could drive for hours on end and never have a moments of silence.  When I got home I was reflecting on how jealous of this couple I would have been just a few weeks ago but today, at least, I was so happy for them.  It really is incredibly rare seeing people of that age that passionate about being with each other.  At least for now I can celebrate others who have what I once did.  That is a huge step for me.  Keep in mind I still look at the 350 pound chain smokers and wonder why not them instead of my 95 pound 3 mile a day running Deedo so I still have a ways to go.

[kayc]

I feel that way too, Brad.  I don't recall feeling jealous of others that still have each other, just wish I was one of them!

[Gwenivere]

I was jealous for a very long time, even annoyed seeing couples and even close friends laughing and doing whatever.  It still zings me now and then, but not as much as before.  But I am very aware of couples.  My assignment from my counselor is to be less resistant to what I cannot change.  So I guess with the horrid jealousy I had gone, I've made a little progress.  

I did notice a couple when I was at the store this morning with thier list and him saying, I'll get the basket, you go start looking for this.  If only..........

[Margm]

I think I must still be morbid.  I see couples mine and Billy's age holding hands and I think it is sweet, but I am afraid for them.  I wish we could all just stay happy forever.  I think about Doug Flutie's parents dying so close to each other.  My friend, her brother-in-law passed away and at the funeral his wife had a heart attack.  To me those things did not seem tragic.  But, you know it had to be to their grown children and grandchildren.  Myself, I wanted to go with Billy.  But, you know what he told me, so dammit, here I am, I'm staying.  

[Guest]

Lately I've been reflecting on what an amazingly lucky life I have led.  As I talk with people and read about the trials life has thrown at so many I cannot believe my good fortune.  Now I know that some people are sensitive to positive comments and they had better stop reading and skip this post.

Granted through the past forty-six years, since I moved out on my own, there have been some tribulations, mostly related to my Crohn's disease, but life smiled on me for the most part.  I found a career that brought me so much fulfillment and joy and I had forty years of loving going to work.  Even prior to that I found amazing opportunities working with a host of disabled/disadvantaged people in a myriad of situations and they were amongst the most memorable of my life.  

Then I met Deedo and what a fortuitous occasion that was.  I knew within days that she was the girl I would marry.  She, on the other hand, was leaving an extremely abusive husband and was NEVER going to become involve in another relationship no matter what.  I took lots of patience and soul-searching but over time she discovered she had self-worth and someone who loved her unconditionally for the first time in her life.  The result was thirty-seven amazingly wonderful years (and two months).  I used to say that our relationship was as easy as sliding on ice.  We never once went to bed angry and the number of times we had words could be counted on one hand; I personally can only remember three times we argued.

Then there were the kids.  Deedo and I both strongly believed in the Zero Population Growth concept and opted to adopt believing we could offer something to children.  Again life was good to us as we adopted three wonderful kids, the youngest: three days, and the oldest four months, between October of 1982 and July of 1987 never having to wait more than three months from initiating the process to receiving the baby.  

And what wonderful children we have.  Our oldest was eight-years-old when he was recognized on both floors of Congress and received the Nation's highest service award; the Jefferson Award, along with both General Colin Powell and General Norman Schwarzkopf.  While they all made their mistakes as young adults, all three have grown into incredible adults and I am so lucky to have them as children, plus the grand babies are remarkable distractors when I'm feeling down.  Day before yesterday my two-year-old grandson in Texas woke me up at five a.m. with a call.  Dad was in the shower and he decided he wanted to talk to his Opa.  

This is why, I believe, I have struggled so with Deedo's death.  For the first time in my life I've been faced with true adversity.  Over time I've amassed an arsenal of techniques for dealing with life's tribulations: basically it's Identify the problem, Identify possible solutions, Prioritize those solutions, Attack and solve the problem.  This time it isn't working.  Actually it is, it just isn't working as quickly as I would like.  I am much better today than I was six months ago.  I don't cry as much, I don't focus on what I've lost as much, I can look down the road at times.  I still get that emptiness in my gut that C.S. Lewis described as being very similar to fear, but I don't have it as much.  I still avoid group situations, two to three people are the maximum I am comfortable with.  I still walk when I can (it is snowing right now so probably won't be walking today).  I still lack motivation when it comes to yard work, I have lots of pine needles to get up.  Maybe later this week when it is supposed to be in the 60's.  I am no longer on mirtazipine, nor am I seeing my psychiatrist, grief counselor nor face to face support group.  I do feel they have taken me as far as they can at this point, the work now is mine.  So to all of you wonderful people, you are my support now.  Well you and my family.

Thank you all for helping me through this quagmire, this miasma, this abyss called grief.  You are loved and appreciated so much more than you can ever know.

So as Christopher Robbins said to Winnie the Pooh:

 

 

[Margm]

That was beautifully said Brad.  But, around the end of it I felt a rush, like maybe you were leaving too.  I think maybe I have become too dependent on the people on this forum.  I look at each of you in different phases of your grief and sometimes it gives me hope.  I had 54 long years with Billy, but it seems like only yesterday it was a July 3rd warm night in 1961.  We had changed our wedding date from the 7th to the 3rd because I wanted my "home" church pastor to marry us.  We had announced the 7th in the paper.  Word of mouth travels fast in a small town.  We arrived at about 7:30 p.m. and the church was full of relatives and friends.  That was just yesterday.  We did not make pictures.  Fortunately, that part of my memory is totally intact.  We had no money but Billy had a full-time job that he was already making plans to retire from.  He was to be 21 on the 20th of that month.  That was yesterday, it had to be yesterday.  Now his ashes rest in a beautiful wooden urn.  I put my hands around it.  I cannot feel Billy.  But I remember that whole first week that we got married, the apartment was full of friends playing Rook and eating bacon and tomato sandwiches.  That was all I bought for two weeks of groceries, bacon, tomatoes, bread and Miracle Whip.  We visited his mom and dad every evening for pinto beans, cornbread and tea.  Was that only yesterday?  It was.  

[kayc]

Margaret,

I've seen many people come and many people go on this forum over the years, but most of them drop in from time to time...I think this place remains forever a sacred place in our hearts as it took us through the hardest and yet most profound journey of our life. 

Brad, 

I love how you look on the bright side even with your Crohn's.  My life, too, has been rich, even with adversity in it.

[KarenK]

Marg,

That describes so much how I feel. It seems only yesterday that I watched that little baby roll herself around the patio in that clumsy 4 wheeled contraption they called a "walker" way back then. Got too close to the edge and tipped over on the grass once. Now she has gone over the edge forever. And wasn't it just last night that I met the handsome guy in the "hot" car that went home with me after a couple of dates and stayed for 40 years. I stole his car and he stole my heart. He took it with him when he left. Just makes me so sad.

Brad,

I am glad for you that there is a semblance of light in your life. I have not been as blessed as you, but still have some good memories. I do not begrudge anyone for being able to climb another step up from the darkness.

[Patty65]

Dear Brad,

I relate to what you said about how you have always been able to solve life's tribulations.  I am nothing if not a problem solver.  I used to teach Critical Thinking. And the quagmire is I cannot solve this.  I was the third adopted child of my parents.  They got me when I was 20 days old, on my grandfather's (and Ron's) birthday.  I was the happy child, and learned that was my role, despite bad things happening to me.  When my grandmother died when I was in 7th grade, my role as the "happy" child was compromised, but still trying to fill my role, the little sad me tried to wear a button on my child-purse that said "I am happy all over".  My mother took it off my purse. I was a successful architect, what my degrees are in, when I got out of school because I learned computer drafting.  I figured out quickly that my first marriage was not healthy, and raised my daughter for 10 years just the two of us. I taught myself web design and created a business, sold it, and was paid well enough to run it to raise her on my own.  I sent her to Montessori, and she is well adjusted and creative young woman. When she was 10, after 8 years of therapy to resolve childhood traumas, I reached out and found my Ron as my daughter was becoming less autonomous with mom.  I could be fully whole, and I could have the true happiness I always was able to exude in the world around me. My inside and outside matched.

I learned to be a creative problem solver. And now, I can't "solve" this pain.  And I couldn't "solve" it for Ron, although I pulled out every stop in my arsenal. And I can't be happy. I was always optimistic. I'd drive people crazy with my optimism. I can't solve this, and I can't be happy or optimistic, no end in sight.  Life strategies no longer work, it's scary.  I see here this is a "problem" that has no short term solution, I'm afraid I do not have the stamina.  It contraindicates how I've made it through life. I am in the pitch black cold desert flailing for a light switch that doesn't exist, in the middle of a sunny Maui morning.  Well how's that for the opposite of optimistic. Uggh.

I hope to one day have some perspective, some light. 

Patty

 

[brat#2]

Brad, that was so beautiful.  We are at about the same time frame on this journey and I'm so glad that you are finding light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm not sure I am yet, but it is getting a tiny bit brighter than it was, so maybe there is hope someday.  I was usually the problem solver also, but like Patty said, I just can't seem to solve this problem and pain.  I know that it will never be really solved, I will always miss Dale terribly, but am looking forward to it not being so heavy as it is right now.  This forum as been my savior and hope that the caring and support will continue for a long time.

Joyce

 

[Guest]

Patty my dear -

You are still so new into this process.  Not wanting to be a bearer of bad tidings but the one thing I've learned is that there is no rushing the process along.  If you look at my early posts the frustration was I am doing all of these things, why do I still feel so bad?  I wanted it (and still do) to be over with NOW!  I am closing in on nine months and while things are better, I still cry daily.  I still miss Deedo all of the time.  I am learning distractors and I am learning to cope better but not all of the time.  

You have overcome some amazing obstacles and have emerged stronger, more capable and wiser.  You will emerge from this as well.  Sadly, for you as well as for me, it will not be as quickly nor as painlessly as we would like.  

Some day you will have perspective, light and a stronger sense of self worth.

Brad

[Guest]

Marg -

Not to worry, my plans are to stay here.  You all give me exactly what I need right now: a sense of my past, my present and my future.  I welcome the smiles and the tears and the fears and the victories.  I know that occasionally some may feel frustrations because they sense they are not moving forward and yet every morning one gets out of bed one is moving forward.  Again it will take time, years and years and years just to understand that the life that was will not be the life that is, ever.

Hugs for you for tomorrow.  Six months is a big one.

Brad

[Margm]

@Karen:  Billy and I suffered through so many years with our son on drugs.  I was always afraid we would find him somewhere, unresponsive.  He had many friends.  He was a DJ at a strip club for many years.  He had many dopey friends.  He was at someone else's house every night.  One time I decided to just let the worry subside and go ahead and RV.  The rangers found us.  He had been shot and he coded twice.  That did not make him quit.  Another ER visit and he was ready to quit.  Getting off the road RVing to help save his life was done very willingly, of course..The results of the  mainline drugs and sharing needles nearly took his liver and life again a few years ago.  Hep-C treatment worked, but his liver will never be 100% again.  I can only imagine your pain for a husband and child.  My heart is with you.  .  

@Brad:  I never stay in bed.  As soon as my eyes open I jump out of bed.  But, this is true, even getting out of bed is a victory.  I needed that today.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, brat#2 said:

I'm not sure I am yet, but it is getting a tiny bit brighter than it was, so maybe there is hope someday.  I was usually the problem solver also, but like Patty said, I just can't seem to solve this problem and pain. 

Joyce-

Being a problem solver you really are solving this problem right now, unfortunately this problem is so gargantuan and the pain is so all consuming that it really is very difficult to assess the progress we are making.  Today is not as bright as you wish it would be but my guess is that it is not as dark as it was six or seven months ago.  I know for me even bright sunny days had a blackish filter over them last fall.  At least now I can see colors again.

[Gwenivere]

2 hours ago, Patty65 said:

I am in the pitch black cold desert flailing for a light switch that doesn't exist, in the middle of a sunny Maui morning.  Well how's that for the opposite of optimistic. Uggh.

Well, Patty, I can certainly relate.  It seems like no matter how many lights I turn on, it is still dark.  No matter how high I turn up the heat, it is cold.  No matter how much sound I turn on, it is too quiet.  

We're not required to be optimistic.  We want to feel that way, but we often forget (with the help of a society that wants to rush or deny the depth of grief) this is the biggest change we will ever face AND cannot fix.  

I don't speak of it much out there anymore.  I've learned that you have to live it to get it.  Plus I want to avoid platitudes and questions why Im not 'further along' (whatever the heck that means).  It like I've exhausted some allotted sympathy points.  If only they knew.  Especially as they head home to thier families and intact lives.  They are fortunate but can't really see it.  

I search for answers that cannot be found.  That is my weakness and a hard one to stop.  But it is a part of my personality because it worked so well before about things in this world.   Just can't help trying to find reason in this emptiness.  I've stopped fighting a little.  But it's still there.  Suspect it will be for a very long time.

[Patty65]

Yes, Gwen, all those things.  And I miss who I used to be. 

[brat#2]

Brad, Gwen and Patty - I agree with all of you.  Being the problem solver that I was, I want answers too and there aren't any.  I'm seeing some colors, but still more blackish tones than colors.  Little by little, day by day, minute by minute is all we can do to get through this and with the help from all of you, I believe I will continue to get through each day.  Thank you

Joyce

[Guest]

Winnie the Pooh said: "The best part of the day is when you and me become we."  

I so miss that.  It was always my happy time when Deedo and me became we again.  I miss being a we.

[Margm]

Billy and I were loners.  We had family and used to have get together's but we all grew apart and just family'd for all these years.  I wanted an apartment to get away from this small town, Widow Drive, that Billy left me stranded.  I have had my head filled so much with worrying about my mom and sister that it never dawned on me that now I am alone, alone.  I have not socialized for at least 54 years.  I cannot say that, I worked for 43 of those years, I have been around people.  We were just loners and now I really am.  Reality has a way of hitting you in the head pretty often these days.  I guess I can be that weird old woman in apartment 110 that won't speak to people.  

[Patty65]

Brad and Marg,

We were loners too.  And together 24/7 with the business.  We were always we, at least since 2010 when Ron was laid off and we started doing businesses together.   I couldn't have ever imagined the "danger" in that -- no "my friends", "his friends", "our friends"... mainly, just us with a very occasional get together.  I'm around people all day, but I sure understand the "alone, alone."  It's deafening.

[KarenK]

Marg,

The unfairness of it all is what gets to me as it does to so many of us. Debbie moved from here when she was 15. She fell "in love" with a boy in Kentucky while visiting her dad one summer, plus he had a new home, boat, etc. I'm sure it was more inviting as we had none of that. A few years later, she married the boy's cousin. A month after her second child was born, he left her out of the blue for another woman who was married and older. After 14 years of marriage she was blindsided. Unbeknownst to me, she started drinking. She raised her kids and worked hard. She never told us she was struggling financially. She was like that, fiercely independent. Had we known,we could have helped.. A few years later, she married her second husband. He was a drunk, liar, and cheat. She stayed with him for 7 years until he threw her down the basement stairs. My ex decked him for that one. Ron would have killed him on the spot. She wanted out, but again refused to ask for help. Ron sent her the funds for a divorce anyway. When her kids were in their teens, she finally met "Mr. Right". They married and 2 years later bought a beautiful log home on 28 acres with farmland with proceeds from my mother's estate. She got horses, her first love. I'll never forget her call in July 2008 saying she finally had everything she wanted. Believe me, she had earned it. Then that 2nd call in Sept. telling me she had colon cancer. Her husband was wonderful, stayed right by her side, and cared for her until the last breath. But damn, where is the fairness in all that. I know, I know, "fair is where you go to see pigs" as Brad says, but still it hurts.

She was a true believer. The day before she died, in a coherent moment, she looked up at me and said "I just love life". No fairness in that either. She wasn't saved, another factor in my beef with the Almighty, but I won't go there.

I will think of you as you struggle through tomorrow. Wish I was moving into apartment 112.

[scba]

Dear Karen, my heart goes out to you. There is no fairness.i send you a hug.

 

[kayc]

Karen,

It is so unfair.  I can't imagine losing your husband and daughter both, it must feel...beyond comprehension.  I'm glad she got the husband she did that stayed by her.

[KarenK]

Thank you Kay,scba, and all my other friends,

On another thread there was a discussion about why each of us come to this place of healing. One of my reasons for being here is that I  always know someone is listening. Debbie was my best friend and she listened. Over the years, the majority of my CSN friends have lost their battle with cancer. That forum is no longer my home. I have no local friends, I have lost touch with the few from work. After all, I have been retired for 10 years. Ron did not approve of my joining them for lunch or "Girls Night Out". They simply stopped asking.

This is my home. This is where I feel love and appreciation. I may post something off topic, give TMI or not reply to a post because I simply have no words. I care for each and every one of you and hope that our paths will become easier over time.