9

Today would've been 9 years that we had been married.  I try to imagine what our life would be like now together.  We would've weathered the storms of getting to the toddler years together.  No doubt it would've shifted us and changed us to learn to parent together.  And I wonder how we would have fared.  Things were in flux when he died.  Our twins were only 10 months old and we were still trying to grasp the idea of parenting, and who we were as parents, and who we were becoming to each other in those roles.  All of that seems like such a blur and I'm amazed I have made it this far alone.

People say I have changed.  Of course I have.  You can't go through something like this and not be transformed.  A friend commented to me recently that she could tell I was really happy and that I seemed like the "old" me again...the person I was before I even met Andie.  Normally this would upset me, but it didn't.  Because I feel it too and I feel at peace with it.  I am more authentically me than I have been for a very long time.  I am living for me now and not for who I think I should be.  I realize looking back that I was subtly shifting into who I thought Andie wanted me to be, though I never asked him if that was what he really wanted.  Ironically, the girl Andie fell in love with, the authentic me, is who I shifted away from over the years and only in an effort to please him.  Yet I wonder if this is where some of our marital struggles came from...was I trying to be someone I thought he wanted, yet all he ever really wanted was the true me, so he started to not understand me.

I find myself back in that place of hopeful happiness like I did in the early days of our marriage, and again have found someone who loves me for me.  I believe that God had a hand in bringing me this man, and that Andie has blessed it because he knows it is good for my soul.  Because he knows that this man allows me to feel comfortable returning to the girl I was...the girl I want to be.  To being the very girl that Andie fell in love with and vowed 9 years ago today, to love forever.

The hustle and bustle...

Wow! I can’t believe it’s been over 2 months since my last post. So much has been going on and I have been so busy I just haven’t gotten around to filling you all in.


School started again, which means I’m back to work. For the first time in a few years I’m back to work full- time. I used to have Fridays off which was a nice reprieve for me. Being an introvert (and a busy single mom), I’ve savored those Fridays by myself while the kids were at preschool to get my chores done and wall myself off from the world to have a little alone time. It gave me a chance to decompress from the hectic work week and recharge for the weekend with the kids. Now that I’m back at work I literally don’t have a moment to myself except when I’m in the shower or commuting to work. The rest of the time I’m pulled in what feels like a million directions being a full-time single mommy, daughter, friend, co-worker, and partner. It’s been disconcerting for me to not have my down time to recharge. My brain and emotions get overwhelmed being in the presence of others all the time and I have to actively practice patience with others, and with myself. I’ve been overwhelmed with trying to balance getting all the things done around the house that need to be done while still being an active and engaged mom on the weekends. I used to be able to devote my time and attention to the girls on weekends because I had Friday to focus on errands and chores. Making it even more difficult is the fact that my boyfriend started a new job and now he works long hours on the weekends, which doesn’t leave us time to have fun together. So I’m back to feeling like a single mommy all the time…

Another big change has been the “official” addition of my boyfriend to our household, and the adjustment of living with someone who’s not young enough for me to make all the rules for! My boyfriend’s children moved to a different city at the beginning of the school year. This was, and continues to be a very difficult adjustment for him as he no longer gets to see his children as often as he wants to. But since he doesn’t have them every other weekend anymore it has allowed us a chance to try living together on a trial basis. I’m happy to say it’s been a really smooth transition and when his lease on his apartment is up in about a month he will officially move in here. Though ironically, we actually spend less time together now even though he’s living here, because he’s always working on the weekends which is when we used to see each other the most. We’re happy to be taking the next step in starting a life together, but it feels bittersweet to not have his kids be a part of it with us. I felt like I had just started to get in a groove with them and develop a good friendship, and then they moved. It’s been a big adjustment for us both to realize they will not be as much a part of our lives as we want them to be.

To top it all off, I’ve added a huge project to my plate. I bought a vacation home in Costa Rica and every spare second lately has been devoted to getting the needed renovations done so that I can have it ready to rent out by the first of the year. Renovating a house from a different country has been quite an experience, and has taken a ton of my time and money! I will travel down there two more times before the end of the year to get everything done, and it all seems ridiculously exciting and overwhelming at the same time.

So my life has been crazy, and busy, and fun, and complex, and emotional lately…but it’s all been worth it!

Scars and salvation

I am stretched out by the pool reading a novel.  Ironically it is about grief and loss.  My mother catches me in just the right light and notices stretch marks on my belly from when I was pregnant with the twins.  I'm astonished she has never seen them before.  They are nothing more than scars really.  Points where the skin was stretched to within it's breaking point, yet miraculously held strong under the pressure.  I see them every morning when I get out of the shower.  Perhaps the lighting is just right there, or perhaps I know what to look for.  I see them daily, yet to most people  they are invisible.  They have faded.  They have tanned. To most people they are not even there, but are so very present in my mind. 

This is how grief manifests itself now too, fading away to others but a near constant presence in the back of my mind.  Not something I think about unless I'm reminded by someone that it is there.  Or unless I happen to catch a glimpse of it myself when the timing is just right.  But nevertheless, under the surface all the time...scars really.

After she notices the stretch marks I sit up to dip my feet in the pool.  There is a bug spinning in circles on the surface of the water.  One wing isn't working, yet the other flaps incessantly as though it might be able to work hard enough to save itself from drowning.  Instead it only goes in circles.  Over and over.  It doesn't realize it's getting nowhere.  It makes ripples on the glassy surface of the water effecting everything around it, though it does not know this.

How many times have I beat my own broken wings, going in circles with this grief, getting nowhere? Yet somehow believing I could save myself, only to eventually tire out and give up.  Until someone came along and scooped me up.  It is the same with grief...circles over and over until  someone steps in to save you.  Family.  Friends.  A wonderful man who understands loss in his own unique way.   I think of scooping up the bug to save it but I don't.  Then I feel guilty.  Is the bug not worthy?  Thank God for those who scooped me up and saw me worthy of saving.  Thank God for them and salvation.

Perhaps the grief is on my mind because the novel I'm reading is about a mother that loses her son.  Or because a family from church just lost their adolescent daughter.  Or maybe it's the life changing experience this trip has been in allowing me to finally settle down.  Feel the calm.  Understand that I can and should live life in a simpler fashion.  Perhaps this is what allows the thoughts and emotions to ebb and flow like the tides here instead of me being able to drown them out as usual.

Either way, I realize I'm grateful for the scars, those seen and unseen. They are proof of what I've survived when I need reminding.  And more importantly, I'm grateful for the salvation that comes when you finally let go and let someone else do the saving...