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Enveloped in small wonders
I nose-kissed my son, rubbing my nose against his after reading him one of my childhood favorites, The Rainbow Goblins. He grinned and giggled, so I followed up with a forehead kiss.
His eyes were closed and his breathing had slowed by the time I pulled my forehead away from his. A toothy grin alit his face, inspiring me to smile, too. I stroked his hair and savored the sound of his slowing breath as he fell deeper into slumber.
It’s been months since I last watched him step into dreamland. He usually wants to keep playing if anyone else is around, so our bedtime routine ends with a couple of stories and him humming himself to sleep, by himself, afterward.
I’d forgotten how magical it is to watch him transform from my little whirling dervish to my little sleeping angel. Something awakened in me last night watching this transition: a yearning to be enveloped in small wonders.
So busy looking for big bloggable events, I’ve lost sight of precious many small moments.
I’m seeing now. With a great big smile, I am seeing now.
To the lady who asked:
When I pictured NYE at Disneyland, I did not picture dealing with my most horrible diaper-gone-awry mess to date with bad wipes and a handful of damp paper towels. In a public changing stall.
I did not imagine how embarrassing it would be to spend ten minutes trying to clean up a mess only a bathtub was adequate for.
On the bright side, I also didn’t imagine you, the mom who would stop and ask, “Are you OK? Do you need anything? I have spare clothes.”
By the time you saw me and asked, I was almost done. But your question made me feel not alone, and turned my frown right upside down.
Like I told you then, I thank you so much just for asking. Your questions alone, and the care behind them, were all the help I needed.
Happy new year to you, all of you who stop and ask! May your new year be full of many sweet tidings.
“You don’t have families, Mommy?”
En route to Christmas dinner with my fiancee’s family, we pulled over at a convenience store. When Ba.D. left the car, our son asked me a few questions.
“Mommy, are we going to see your family?”
“No, sweetheart. We’re going to visit Daddy’s family.”
“You don’t have families, Mommy?”
“I do. They’re just far away.”
“Hey, I’m your family, Mommy!”
The other flaw in my explanation struck me only when I read the exchange to Ba.D. a couple of minutes later: We were going to visit family. Our family, not just Ba.D.’s.
It should have been clear to me earlier, thanks to text messages still fresh in my mind from the beginning of our drive.
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We had just begun driving when my phone alerted me of a text message. I unlocked my phone and read a text message from my sister, Silver Star, before seeing the picture attached to the message. Read more…
FTIAT: A Love Without Strings
Anna is a longtime friend of mine. Although she is not a blogger, her words in handwritten letters and emails alike have moved me for more than a decade.
I knew she would do well by the series with anything she submitted, but did not know just how deeply what she eventually sent would rock me. The moment I read her post’s concluding words, I knew hers would be the post to close out the FTIAT series. I have reread the post at least a dozen time since, and my conclusion is always the same.
I want the words Anna has written here to be the ones indelibly etched in people’s hearts when they recall this series. I want them to send long-lasting ripples of love and grace through those hearts the way they have done with mine.
And I want to thank Anna for not only writing but living by example, and for always, always loving without strings.
Recommended post: This one
A Love Without Strings
(Note: Out of respect for the recovering, some names have been changed)
I met Gabriel in my living room, where I was sunk into a fat flowery couch with my right foot propped up, recovering from ankle surgery. I was four months sober at the time and had been scared to death of general anesthesia– not because I thought I might not wake up, but because I was terrified I’d like the drugs so much they’d pull me back into the hell I’d just climbed out of.
Gabriel was a 28-year-old French-speaking guitar-playing wisecracking heroin addict. He was tall and cool, slouching down in the chair in my living room while his recovery teacher Mark chatted with me about God and friends and the world outside my living room. Read more…
FTIAT: For this I am thankful…
Christine (Know My Worth) has an aptitude for verse that both confounds and delights my much more verbose self. While I typically read prose, I not only enjoy reading her verse but mulling it over and savoring it long after my eyes have stopped reading any one of her poems.
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For this I am thankful…
Hunger
a raw, primal siren
informing of desire
signaling a most basic need
The desire to eat
a fierce roar
in the pit of my stomach
the cravings
sweet, sour, salty
crunchy, cheesy, creamy
Choked
by self-denial
“It’s not time to eat”
“I don’t need that”
Why do I deny my desire?
Why do I ignore my primal needs?
A hunger for love
builds inside
vulnerability awakens
pulse rushes
skin tightens
breathing quickens
Thwarted
by self-denial
“I can’t risk it”
“It’s too much work”
Why do I deny my desire?
Why do I ignore my primal needs?
A hunger for faith
to believe in something
bigger than myself
to give myself over
to something I cannot see
Cut off
by self-denial
“I can’t see it”
“It doesn’t make sense”
Why do I deny my desire?
Why do I ignore my primal needs?
Honest reflection?
hunger scares me
Like a lion roaring deep within
hunger could become insatiable
hunger could become the ruler of me
my brain could disengage
primal nature take over
and hunger would consume
my every moment
But
life without hunger
is a weak and empty existence
emotionally anorexic
crouching in fear
surrounded by darkness
So I listen to my hunger
and I am fed
and I am not alone
and I find light
I will not starve myself
or live in fear
but
I embrace hunger
I embrace life
and for this
I am thankful
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FTIAT: Ode to Jay
Sheila (Mary Tyler Mom) has changed my life with her words. You have heard about some of these changes in my many reflections on Donna’s Cancer Story, her blog series about her daughter’s battle with cancer. You will hear about the other changes in time.
While I first knew Sheila thanks to her daughter, I have come to see her as much more than “Donna’s mom.” She is a mom, an advocate for social change and for hope, and an exceedingly rare writer whose powerful words unify intellect and heart. She makes me laugh when I least expect it. In the face of her words, I have no room left for my compulsive overthinking; as long as I am reading them, I am immersed in the world as seen through her eyes. This is a gift for which I am exceedingly thankful.
Thinking back to when I first read Sheila’s words, I am floored to think how little I then understood how much knowing her would change me. It is an honor to know Sheila, to have hugged her, and now, to feature her here today.
Ode to Jay
I remember it clearly. It was a cloudy November day. I was playing with my eleven month old baby boy. I turned my head and he was smiling at me, so full of joy and love. I loved him, too, but in that moment, it was like meeting him for the first time, as if, almost, I had just birthed him.
My son was born into a complicated family. His older sister, Donna, three and a half years older, was in treatment for an aggressive brain tumor. She was prevented from visiting the hospital to see him and for his first week of life had to be in a different room, as she had RSV, a cold strain that can be fatal to infants. She died when Jay was just shy of ten months. He was a brother without a sister, just as I was a mother without a daughter. None of that was right.
Much of Jay’s first year is fuzzy to me, a swirl of relapses, surgeries, chemotherapies, fear, dread, and sadness, none of it much related to him. His infancy squeezed in between hospice visits and hospitalizations. I nursed him, thank God, because I honestly believe that if I hadn’t, our bond would have been tenuous, another casualty of cancer.
For Jay I am thankful. Every day I thank my lucky stars that I have him to care for, to call me Mom, to fuss over. My grief after Donna’s death might very possibly have consumed me, had I not had Jay to feed and bathe and diaper. And love. Read more…
FTIAT: Gratitude for Small Things
Elizabeth (Mirth & Motivation) was one of the first bloggers I followed when I began blogging in early 2011. Even before I’d gotten the hang of reading blogs, I was readily absorbed into her entries for a few minutes at a time. Her life has been so full and varied, I frequently still read her posts and think, “What hasn’t she done, or experienced?!”
A year after first finding her, her aptly titled blog remains my go-to when I find myself in need of inspiration. It’s thus with great gratitude that I share her words here today.
Recommended post: Inspiration: Embracing the F Word
Gratitude For Small Things
“As we become curators of our own contentment on the Simple Abundance path… we learn to savor the small with a grateful heart.”
Sarah Ban Breathnach
When I received Deborah’s first email about participating in this wonderful exercise – writing an FTIAT entry – on one thing we are grateful for, quite a number of possible topics with positive outcomes crossed my mind. Should I write about my life altering moments? How about the travails and triumphs of an immigrant woman? Or maybe Deb’s readers would love to hear about the challenges of raising multiples? Perhaps I should focus on my complicated childhood? You see, all of those events had elements that led me to a place of gratitude but none seemed quite right for the task. As 1001 ideas flashed through my mind, a little voice, still and quiet, kept prodding me to step back from the broad brush strokes I wanted to paint, to step back from the big picture, and focus on the gratitude that comes from small things; help from unexpected sources, parking spots that materialize last minute, missing items that resurface on a prayer and the seemingly simple act of taking a breath.
To appreciate the grace in small details, I’ll share a story from one of those life altering events. In my mid 30s, I had open heart surgery to correct a congenital defect. The surgery was successful but the road to that event was complex. I had no idea that the condition existed. As an active, fit person, my heart had never given me problems. But one day, I started feeling tired, dizzy and short of breath. It took multiple tests, several medical opinions and inconclusive results before my cardiologist sent me to a pediatric heart specialist. Yes, it took a simple test and the keen eyes of a children’s doctor to detect the small defect… The doctor assured me that even though my condition could have killed me by age 13, over the years, I had been guided to take small steps, make small lifestyle shifts, perform simple tasks that helped extend my life. Breathwork, jogging, low impact exercise, dance, yoga and meditation, a vegetarian diet, regular checkup and treatments for ordinary colds all contributed something to help my heart hold on. I also believe that the simple act of prayer and a positive spirit had an impact too.
“Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” Robert Brault
From as early as I can remember, I’ve always loved prayer; both loud invocations and quiet contemplative prayers. As a little girl, I found that saying a prayer had a calming effect and gave me the clarity I needed to tackle all sorts of situations; often with startling results. In my adult
life, I still turn to the calming power of a simple prayer again and again. For instance, recently I was getting ready to take one of my kids back to college and, as we gathered up bags and headed for the car, I realized I didn’t have my glasses. I wear them to drive and needed to find them right away. In a hurry, I looked in all the usual places but they were not there. I searched the living, dining, and kitchen areas and came up empty. The clock ticked away and frustration was starting to set in. Then I stopped. I stood in front of the dining table, held my hands up in prayer and said quietly: Dear God, please help me find my glasses. As I uttered the last word, my gaze shifted, and I caught a glimpse of a gold, metal piece. I stepped towards it to retrieve it, and sure enough, it was my glasses. They had fallen behind a cushion on the sofa and even though I had looked there earlier in my search and didn’t see anything, there they were and my gratitude for such a small thing was … huge. I am grateful for the gratitude that comes from small things.
Elizabeth Obih-Frank believes in positive kismet/fate and writes two blogs; Mirth and Motivation and Positive Kismet where she shares motivational, goodwill pieces and more. She is a mom to twins, a master trainer/educator, writer, healer, and social media fan. She loves people, a good laugh, good food and an occasional jaunt around the world.
PHOTO CREDITS/ATTRIBUTIONS: All photos Gratitude by Evelyn Lim, and Prayer hands
by Aronki via Flickr
Until Next Time…
Ask. Believe. Receive. ©
Elizabeth Obih-Frank
Mirth and Motivation
Positive Kismet
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FTIAT: The Pogues and Parcheesi and afternoon strolls through IKEA
Mackenzie (Brights Strange Things) means many things to me: late nights listening to Gary Jules and Common Rotation at the Hotel Cafe. Long drives up and down the Pacific Coast Highway in which we talked about everything under the sun. Improvised text message verses to the Common Rotation song “Fortunate.” Awesome book covers for my novels. The goodness of knowing–through having been there and done that, countless times over–I can safely tell her anything without her thinking less or more of me because she already sees and loves me exactly as I am.
It’s been eight years since we lived in the same town and a year since our last visit, but Mack is an ever-present feeling of love in my heart. I think you’ll see why as you read her words below.
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The Pogues and Parcheesi and afternoon strolls through IKEA
There are many things which have come easily to me, in the course of my life. I took pretty effortlessly to drawing things, and writing, and getting through school with an absolute bare minimum of effort, and I am also, for the record, pretty good at knitting potholders. Things that I am not so much good at include talking, telephones, arguments, coping with ghastly color schemes, and anything to do with relationships of any kind.
It’s not like I was a feral child raised by particularly unsociable dingoes, but it is fair to say that my family could’ve formed our own local chapter of Hermits United. During my formative years, when my classmates were learning how to strengthen or destroy friendships, fomenting drama amongst themselves, and taking every opportunity to practice their fornicating (I’m rather sad I missed out on that part), I was lost in my own mental worlds, for the most part content to completely avoid any sort of human interaction. I had a few friends, certainly, and was on good terms with pretty much my entire graduating class, but I had made a strong and early habit of keeping everyone at arm’s length. I also had what I then would’ve called “quirks” and my mom called “moodiness” which I now would probably classify as an amount of anxiety verging on clinical disorder. These and other factors are why, when I decided to move away from home and across the country after high school, things did not always go well.
It wasn’t that I was stupid. It was just that I was about as well-equipped for independent adult life as a penguin is equipped to survive in Death Valley.
Luckily, I had T. T was my first roommate, and probably my first truly close friend. T is older than I am, and to say that her experience of the world is somewhat broader is a vast understatement. She was well traveled and had gone to college and for some reason random strangers really liked to just walk up and talk to her, whereas I’d never even eaten at a real Mexican restaurant. T invited me to parties, towed me along to dinners, got me out of the apartment and generally did her best to socialize me. It was a fairly thankless job. I was walking social strychnine and I wasn’t always easy to live with, either. I was largely oblivious to everything from basic social cues to table manners to flatsharing etiquette. And yet, somehow, even at her most exasperated, T managed to gently cajole me toward adulthood without making me feel like I couldn’t also be myself.
When Deborah started this guest post series on thankfulness and gratitude, and asked me if I’d be interested in writing something, I thought of T first. Although we’d lost touch over the years, I still thought of her often, and by crazy random happenstance, right around the time I started writing this post, T tracked me down and got in touch again. I was delighted to hear from her, though everything I’ve had to say seems inadequate while “you’re my hero” kind of sounds like an invitation for a restraining order. Hopefully she still knows me well enough to know that if this blog is the best I can do for love letter and apology, that it’s only because I’m still a little emotionally stunted.
In those years of relative silence I’d often contemplated writing T to tell her how much she changed my life, and that I couldn’t think of a single thing I was more intensely grateful for than the friendship that she — and her own very gracious friends — had extended to me at a time when I needed it most, when things could’ve gone either way, when my choices really were to join the human race or to shut myself away from it. The changes she began laid the foundations for the person I became and am in the process of becoming. Because of T, I began to learn the tentative skills that helped me build all of the friendships that came after. And each of those people has also helped to shape me as a person in large and small ways. I carry some little piece of each of them with me, in the form of a memory, a song, a moment, a lesson, a turn of phrase, a regret, an old pain, a fresh joy.
So when you ask what I’m thankful for, I’ll tell you that I’m thankful for friendship and the way it grows, taking root in each part of a person and holding the center together. I’m thankful for The Pogues and Parcheesi and afternoon strolls through IKEA. I’m thankful for sweet potato fries, Hard Core Logo and impromptu cooking lessons. I’m thankful for cold drinks on the deck and a quiet conversation in the hay loft and messages from people who are half a world away but still so close by. I’m thankful for crashing on couches and laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe and knowing what it feels like to miss somebody when they aren’t there. I’m thankful for long meandering conversations from the driver’s seat and the crush of a crowded club and feeling that I can say anything, anything at all, and still be loved, always be loved, because there is no end to a thing that becomes a part of you.
I’m thankful for every minute of every day that another human being, motivated by nothing but kindness and love and camaraderie, reminds me that the only way to fail at life is choosing not to live it.
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FTIAT: Thanks for the Pain
Christine (The Dash Between) is a daily inspiration to me over at her Facebook page, but our paths first crossed in the blogosphere. Our conversations now flow between Facebook, our blogs and email, covering everything under the sun, but it was our first conversation about family that really helped me see Christine’s brilliance.
Her words expressed heartache, but even more deeply, a fierce, loving determination not to let her future be defined by the past or “The Family.” Every day I know her, I’m more inspired by her, and I’m delighted that you’ll soon see for yourself exactly why that is.
Recommended post: A letter to my Daughter: I know what it’s like
Thanks for the Pain
When Deb asked me if I would write a FTIAT entry, I was honored and thrilled! I have so much to be thankful for, I figured it would be a piece of cake to write. Was I ever wrong about that. The doubts started coming, and hard. I wasn’t good enough to be included with the many amazing writers The Monster In Your Closet has featured. I don’t write well enough. What I had to say was boring by comparison to other stories. Then I realized that I don’t have to be a fantastic writer. That comparing myself to others was ridiculous, given that we all have our own history. So, I have sucked in a deep breath and started to write.
A little over two and a half years ago, my life started to drastically change. I had been told by my then-husband that a relationship with me was too much work, and too hard for him to try. I realized that I had been a “mother” type figure in a one-sided relationship for far too long. I was home-schooling, and the kids and I were in a small town and stuck in the house 24/7. I was severely depressed, and often thought of driving into the nearest highway overpass support. Or downing an entire bottle (or two) of alcohol.
My parents had come for a visit, and I remember pouring out my heart to my mother about my marriage. I confided many humiliating things, and let her know that there was a very good chance my marriage would be ending soon. As she was getting ready to leave for home, I asked her if she was mad at me and if she still loved me. I’ll never forget the feel of her cool hands stroking the sides of my face, while she told me that she was not mad, and that of course she loved me. I felt such relief. And I felt that my foundation was rock solid.
When my husband and I finally separated, there was an uproar within The Family. These things do NOT happen in this family. The pressure was incredibly intense. I also told The Family I was no longer going to go to their type of church. The Family and Church are so tightly interwoven, that this decision was completely unacceptable to them. And the pressure increased exponentially. I couldn’t breath, I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep. I remembered trying to reach out, to have someone HEAR me… But no one seemed capable of that.
My mother seemed to have forgotten our discussion. My sister was constantly on me to do “the right thing.” Every discussion was such a struggle. I discovered my sister had been having private discussions with my husband on how to get me to stop “this behavior.” I was asked if I had started taking medication. I was told that I wasn’t explaining myself well enough for The Family to approve of my actions.
I decided to spend a weekend away, planning on locking myself in a hotel room with several bottles of booze and never to leaving the room again. I’ve never had such an internal fight as I did that weekend. I felt the simplest solution for everyone would be for me to no longer exist. This struggle to live my life, just wasn’t worth it anymore. If I couldn’t live it their way, I shouldn’t live it at all. As I wandered that weekend, lost, feeling hopeless, yet trying to search my soul for another solution, I happened to walk into a gift store and see a plaque that changed my world.
“Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly…”
When I saw that, I felt all the despair lift away. I realized this was MY life. My family wouldn’t approve of my decisions, and that was okay. I was 34 years old, I didn’t need permission from them to do what I knew was right for me. I left that store filled with hope, and determination.
During that same weekend, my husband had gone to my mother and reiterated all of the things that had happened in our marriage. The things I had told her when she had come to visit. I received an email from her shortly thereafter in an attempt for us to start honest communication. The one thing that I remember most from that email was her telling me that she just hadn’t believed me when she and I had our discussion, but she realized what I said was true when my husband confirmed it. While that hurt me more deeply than I can say, I decided to overlook it since I wanted to focus on the fact that we were having communication during this very difficult time.
I moved to another state and started life over. I started to fall in love with someone who had been a very good friend to me. However, the tension in my family was high. I knew they weren’t happy with my decision to move. Strike that. They weren’t happy with the way I was living my life, period. That was made clear when I visited them for a weekend nearly a month after my move. I remember my Mom hardly looking at me. Whenever people would ask about the area I lived, or job interviews, she just scowled. The day I was to return home was on a Sunday. The depth of her anger at me became apparent to me that morning. Mom was harrumphing her way around the house, hardly looking at me, hardly saying a word before leaving for church. When it was time for her to go, I got up from the couch to say my goodbyes. She walked right past me. I grabbed her, gave her a hug, and told her I loved her. I got a quick hug as she mumbled “I love you” back. That was the last time I saw my mother before our estrangement began.
Two days later I told my parents that I was starting a new relationship. That phone call reminds me of the saying, “Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.” My entire body was shaking. During this call my mother told me that she would not approve of my relationship. For the first time in my life I stood up for myself, and told her that I was not asking for her approval. I was simply informing her of what was happening in my life. She went to hang up, and I remembered rushing to tell her that I loved her before she ended the call. I got a terse “love you” in return, and those were our last spoken words.
I have been estranged from my family for two years and three months. My mother did not like my decisions, and encouraged my ex to take custody of the kids, since I had been “taken over by satan.” Finding her emails to him, and being served papers by him to take the kids away were so stunning that I literally couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think, I couldn’t move, I hurt all over… inside and out. The pain was unlike any I had ever felt before, and that’s when I realized that my foundation I had been so assured of months before had vanished. I felt utterly alone, completely rejected, and betrayed by the one person I should have been able to trust.
I wrote a blog not long ago to my daughter about some of my darkest times. This was
one of those times I referred to. I got myself up, and put one foot in front of the other. I didn’t know what would happen, but I knew that I just had to breathe to get to the next minute, the next hour, the next day, the next week. And I did. I truly started life over that day, and I survived.
I started blogging to focus on living life. I blogged to remind myself to appreciate
everything, and everyone, in my life. I needed to focus on being grateful and thankful. But, I refused to write about this stuff. I didn’t want to go back through it, and remember the hurts, or feel the pain again. However, once Deb asked me to write about being thankful, I think I knew deep down that I was going to have to delve into this painful time in my life. I needed to remember that these are the things that have made me who I am today. And I like that person.
So, what am I thankful for? I am thankful for being hurt, rejected, and betrayed. I am
thankful for pain that cut me so deeply I thought I’d never recover. These things have
changed who I am. They have shown me that I am capable, I am strong, I am brave, and I can survive. And I wouldn’t trade it for the world.
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FTIAT: My Blog Saved Our Family
Shannon (Mynewfavoriteday) spoke with such candor about the simultaneous grace and hardship in her life since becoming a mother, I was immediately drawn to not only her prose but to her.
When she asked some months later if she could interview me for her blog, I was delighted. Could she ever! I was excited to complete the interview, but even more excited when the interview unearthed a few similarities between us. It turned out Shannon and I were both (a) Oregon Ducks (b) living in SoCal after (c) each spending some time teaching in Japan. While I couldn’t really tell you if there’s such a thing as fate or if it led to our connecting, my heart frequently weights in with a hearty (get it? comic genius right here!), “You betcha!”
Shannon’s voice of gratitude, love and compassion brings light to the gloomiest of days, and yet she is also a vocal advocate for her children—and her readers. As you’ll see if you meander over to her page, which I sincerely hope you’ll do, her “About me” is in part about her well wishes for you.
Recommended post: Lost and Found on Hallowed Ground
My Blog Saved Our Family
‘Whenever someone sorrows, I do not say, “forget it,” or “it will pass,” or “it could be worse” — all of which deny the integrity of the painful experience. But I say, to the contrary, “It is worse than you may allow yourself to think. Delve into the depth. Stay with the feeling. Think of it as a precious source of knowledge and guidance. Then and only then will you be ready to face it and be transformed in the process.’
–Peter Koestenbaum
To say I had sorrows could not begin to describe the emotional place I was in in March of 2011.
As I sat on the couch with my legs crossed and my computer in my lap, my babies were on the floor. E in her baby chair with the oxygen tube delivering her the air she needed to survive with each breath while her monitor quietly registered her heart rate and oxygen levels with each beat of her pulse. Q happily rolling around on the floor knocking into seemingly every hard and potentially dangerous surface with his overly large head. My precious babies were now 18 months old from the day they were born, but because they had been born 3 terrifying months early, they were supposed to be developmentally around 15 months. Supposed to be.
It became clear after E came home after her 4 months in the NICU (Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit) that something was wrong. She wasn’t engaging, or looking at our faces. She wasn’t cooing or doing any of the things her brother was doing, or anything that any baby her age would be doing at any age over 20 days old. She was now 18 months old and virtually the same developmentally as a 2 month old.
I was crumbling into tiny little bits and pieces: one moment, one breath, one conversation at a time.
The resolve and strength I had been mustering and presenting to the world was only seconds from falling down around me. Everything was at stake. Our lives were at stake. I was no longer able to construct a future for us.
Like so many families, I, as mom, am the hub. And with 2 babies with medical and developmental challenges, I had been thrust into a world I had not imagined or planned for.
As a business professional, I am good in a crisis. Methodical. Rational. Practical. Resourceful. I can navigate systems and present my case to get my desired outcome.
I had been doing this in our personal life for 18 months and now it was all at risk.
I no longer really wanted to get out of bed. I wanted to stay there, with the babies. Just be with them. Shut the world out. Pretend. Pretend that for 5 minutes everything was “normal.” Not our “normal,” but “The What to Expect When You’re Expecting” normal. I wanted to pretend there were no wires or monitors. I didn’t want to talk about how they were doing, or what E’s prognosis would be, or have to make anyone feel better about our situation so that they wouldn’t worry.
I was consumed by worry but couldn’t show it and rarely spoke about it for fear of making it so.
At work I would cry, in the car I would cry, alone with the babies I would cry. I would never cry in front of anyone else; only when I was alone.
All around me people had regular babies. Happy, healthy babies. As those babies grew, they surpassed E in her own development. More cracks and tears into my façade.
I just wanted to hide.
So there I sat on the couch, hiding in our house with our precious babies but knowing I had to do something. I knew I needed therapy of some kind, but I couldn’t fathom sitting across from a therapist who had never sat in a hospital day after day as their children nearly died and came back to life on a semi-regular basis. So, a therapist was out but therapy of another kind quietly lurked at my fingertips.
From the time the babies were conceived through IVF, we had kept a journal for them. Thoughts, sentiments, pictures to show them just how happy we were they were coming to be and had come to our family. In the writing I had found some catharsis. Relief. As if air could fill my lungs can come out through the pen as it rolled across the paper.
Almost hauntingly my fingers started typing “blogging platforms.” And so it was. I would start a blog. It would be my therapy.
As I am optimistic by nature; my idea was to get back there. To pull myself out of the darkness that was enveloping me. The darkness would not beat me. My precious babies we here and alive and we would make it through. The simple gift of being here, in this world, fighting to survive, was enough to incent me to remember that each day can be and will be “mynewfavoriteday.”
And so 8 months later, “mynewfavoriteday” has become something greater than me.
It has set me free. Free to grieve, free to feel, free to speak, free to share, free to be supported, free to be me. To say my blog saved my life is not an exaggeration. It saved my life, as I know it. The positive, mostly happy, optimistic, compassionate, empathetic, hopeful, loving, and resilient, life as I know it. So today, in this great honor to guest post on TMiYC, I am grateful for my blog as it saved my life and the life of our family as we know it.
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