I Need You

I can't decide what is worse, being left to spend the rest of your life loving someone who is gone or the loneliness of knowing what true happiness means and not being able to communicate to someone they have reserved seating in your heart. 

I guess in the end it really is just one thing - loneliness. Crying myself to sleep seems to be the norm but there are times when I go to sleep with a smile on my face that covers a brilliant day. Most of the time it's just about me and my memories. 

I'm not sure how to change that. How do you let someone else in or trust that what you feel is true? How do you trust that maybe a really good friend is all that you are ever meant to have? How do you trust that there could be more to life? How do I live without? 

It's one of those motions days for me. I live but sometimes I feel invisible. Do you see me or do you just see this sad person with no joy or spark? I'm living but do I enjoy living like this? No not really. I smile, I laugh, but my heart aches for a life I will never be given a chance to have. I just want someone to look at me beyond the grief monster, to see my heart and help me feel again. To take my hand and love me. To see me across the room and smile with joy because you were waiting for me to appear. To accept that love is more than a physical experience but a mental connection that takes all the pain and loneliness and transforms into just knowing that all is right side up in the world. 

To know that someone is there for it all good and bad. Not knowing that anymore is the loneliest feeling ever. Not having a hand reach out to hold yours for no reason at all or all the reasons makes life seem a little less full. 

Celebration of Life 2015

It's time to make a large step. As if selling the house and looking for properties wasn't enough I'm taking this Celebration of Life trip alone. Well kind of alone. You all get to join me through the magic of FB. 

This all started about three weeks ago. I was supposed to go to St Louis again this year to see and support my Aunt as my Uncle passed away in February. Some things changed and I was left with a sense of loss. Easter and Scott's Angel day are once again together. Now why Easter moves every year and Christmas stays the same I don't understand. But in my world I get two weekends of grief and every so often just one! 

I'm glad Easter falls with Scott's Angel day this year but it makes my compensatory strategy difficult. Everyone I know has a family to celebrate life with this weekend. I do too but I'm not a great spirit. I do get a bit morose over this weekend and I know the only way around is distraction. Betsy was always great at helping me. She just knew what to do. I miss her so much too!  

So there I was with a plane ticket to switch. Thank goodness for Sputhwest! In three hours I'd contacted my personal travel agent booked a room at WDW, changed my flights, made fast pass reservations and a few dining reservations. I told the people closest to me and a few others like my patientss so people knew where I was going to be. 

I've counted my days down, got a surprise of a ressie at Be Our Guest for breakfast and a few days ago I was able to get a dinner reservation there also. So here we go I'm going to do something just for me and my ability to cope with the requirement of living forward. Here we are five years later and I couldn't have done this without all of you!! Please enjoy this trip with me!!

Control

Changes in my life happen most of the time when I don't want them to! This is something I can control. I can work and pay my bills. I can choose the clothes I wear each day. I can decide what to eat. I can control how I pack up a life that will never be. I can control how I live forward in the pieces that matter to me. I can't change the event that caused the grief in my life. But I do control how I handle my reactions.

So here I go making and keeping an appointment with a realtor. It is exactly how I imagined and I need to do the things I exactly thought. Now I need to do them and sign the contracts to put the house on the market. I also need to go to the other end and do the preapproval process for a new home. But what do I want? Where do I want to be in my life? What am I looking for in a new step in life?

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop" - Confucius

Hmm! Sounds like excellent advice. Great words of wisdom. Five days equals five years and I can still tell you all of our last moments together. I can still see the joy of happiness over the mail he brought me with our last WDW trip together photos enclosed. I can still taste the great meal we had at the Japanese place after the friends we were supposed to meet couldn't be bothered to see us for dinner. I love how those moments turned into amazing couple time. Our last weekend together was made just for us. I can tell you about the last Easter egg hunt I arranged for the girls. It wasn't until this last fall did I finally throw out Scott's candy from his basket. I still have my plastic bunnies full of ferro Roche. I'm sure it's not any good but well it's on my list of slow things to get throw away. I'm further than I ever imagined.

It is time to celebrate Scott's life and his Angel day. No matter where I go or what I do this day will always belong to him. It is a day I will always need to celebrate a love that I will always have. The smells, touches and sights of him fade but my heart knows the feeling of love for him. No matter where the next steps in life take me it is because of him I know how to accept love. It is because of his love I'm willing to be loved again. I may be taking that step as slow as a turtle but if it's meant to be it will be there when the time is right.

So here I go with the next step. Lord help me I may pack myself in a box and ship myself to the looney bin for deciding to move. And there go the to do lists in my brain.... Where will I live if the house sells!!!!

Shell Game

We used to have this argument about being alone and living alone. This was a very true discussion after the only thing we fought about. I finally told him very honestly that I was capable of taking care of myself and I didn't have to deal with the issue at hand. The only thing we fought about. I was not passive aggressive about it just frank. The only difference was as I told him I choose to be with him. I wasn't going anywhere. Little did I know he would show me just how right I was about being able to take care of myself. 

I'm doing it but it's not what I really want. I've been doing a bunch of reading as always. It doesn't matter what I read, a book on God, being thankful for what you have, a self help book, a mystery or just a plain ok romance novel, I find messages everywhere. The latest I read was an article in psychology today about widows and love. It was spot on. I'm going to have to find the article and share. It's not that I don't know what I want moving into my future but goodness I never want someone to think they would ever have to compete with my dead man's pefect love. That would be a big part of my non interest in dating. I do miss things but that doesn't mean I truly ever could handle someone else in my life. I laugh when I think about our 'perfect love'. That's such a joke. 

We fought. I slammed doors, yelled and screamed. He walked off and Lord knows we made up and he left me to fend for myself. I don't trust myself to keep someone around except in the friend box and side hugs category. I talk about wanting more but it's been so long I think I would pass out. 

I just miss someone caring about me enough to want more than that. I just happen to know I good with being stuck in this kind of purgatory, living in my Miss Haveshim world of Great Expectations. At least I don't sit around staring at a dehydrated wedding cake in my faded dusting wedding gown. It's all bundled in the closet just as it was the day I picked it up - never worn. 

As five years approaches in seven days I know I'm alive but am I really living. Am I good as a stuck in the mud. The term crazy old widow keeps coming to mind. Maybe that's why H is pushing so hard to get me out of this house. She knows I need to keep living forward but I think the anxiety will be the death of the rest of my shell. 

Water Falls

What a day in my little world. Lots of tragedy in Central TX today. Lots of people effected and lives gone. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about how short our lives really are. We can decide but most people don't and sometimes if you try things go wrong. I try to make a difference in little ways for people one by one. I'm not sure if there is anything else I can do. Life is over to fast. Take all the moments and enjoy each one.

I had a long discussion with a teacher of one of my austistic patients. He has aged out of the system but still needs help. His teacher is an older Chinese woman. We talked about life, dreams and our purposes. She explained that in China water is significant for change. Amazing to me as that is truly how my life changed, water.

Is there more water in my future? The ebbs and tides of life day it will be as always fluid. I know lives were changed today irrevocably. I would never wish the pain and heartache on another person losing a love in a way you wonder what they felt or even knew. There's not a day that goes by that I don't wonder about Scott's last moments. Did he know? Was I given the gift of  "it's okay! I love you!" as last words.

I spend so much time by myself during the day I could compose the greatest novel if I could type and drive. Somehow my minds only goes back to one thought, love! As if it always seems to be the answer. My greatest love will always be my greatest blessing from God. There will never be anyone more important to be than my baby girl. One day my time will be over and I know the greatest gift I can give her is love.

My mind has been running faster today than I can drive my car. If I could lose calories thinking I'd be so skinny I'd eat all day long. I realized today somewhere in the last five years I'm okay. I'm really okay. I'm living each day and making a difference in lives each day. I have a new patient with ALS. They offered him Hospice but he chose to stay with me because I am making a difference in his life. At least someone needs me. I know that seems like a crazy thought but given what I do but there are still days I do feel unwanted. Crazy I know that in this amazing life I don't get to be kissed again. I want to have that part of my life back. I have to stop rushing myself when there isn't anyone who is even remotely close to that. The thing that sucks the most is knowing I can't go back. I just get to keep living forward into whatever that means. For a person who hates surprises this is the hardest life ever. Be patient and don't push. Get negative Nelly out of your head. There must be someone else who will love me like that again...

Getting Home

The hardest thing about being alone is the lack of someone to share your life with. Not just a body in the house but really talking to someone. The lack of communication about important day to day things. The how was your days and sharing a meal. I had a taste of that twice last week when I had dinner with friends on two different days. I thought I'd fallen off the nightmare wagon into the best dreams ever spending hours talking about real things not patient small talk.

The next big thing is not having someone ask you where you are and your guesstimated arrival time and miss you if you don't show up on time. It's really funny but I'm crazy punctual and one of those running late call and let you know people. My patients can tell time by me. One of them teasingly gives me grief when I'm four minutes late. Do you know what it means to have someone let you know they are on their way? Yup both friends did!!

I miss the other parts of a relationship but not as much as the giggling,  laughing, story telling, serious mind blowing conversations and hugs. Who doesn't love someone in their life who trusts you with their day? Dinner alone also sucks. I guess I don't really eat alone when I have a stealth kitty trying to steal bites but super special to sit at the table with a glass of wine and take out nachos or pizza! Who says cooking at home is required.

I also miss complaining about stuff left all over the house. I like things in order but I find myself leaving my clothes or shoes somewhere just so I can gripe at myself. There is also no one to gripe about not doing chores. Which is good because I hate being cranky. I guess what I'm truly saying is living alone has it's perks but the negatives are greater. I do manage to entertain myself but spend more time working than I really should. I also find myself using FB as a way to say hey if anyone cares I'm headed home and it was a really long beautiful amazing day.

So if you have someone like me take the time to share an evening with them!! It will make their day feel less lonely. You too may save a life and not even know!!!

Socks

Why yes of course I can!! So strange things happening in my house again!! I walked into my room and there were socks everywhere!! The door was closed so no cats were in there and the socks were in the basket by my dresser. A sock was on my nightstand by my picture of Scott!! Really!! What is the meaning of socks all over my room? Is there a message because it's much easier to decipher the radio and the dimes all over the house?

I didn't hear back from the real estate agent so I'm back to second guessing myself. Do I really have enough reason to leave my comfort zone. Lord knows I've dealt with enough change. I'm a very old person in a middle aged body!! Maybe that's why I prefer the company of my cat, my patients, my family and a very select group of friends. Not sure why people go overboard impressing other people when if you treat everyone with kindness life is amazing.

Well so let's see how I can keep myself motivated this next week. What should I do with myself? What part do socks play in my crazy Angel messages? I need to focus on something besides my heart. Anyone have any suggestions? I don't have enough energy to do anything besides work and sleep. It's time to stop dreaming of something that I can never have and just go with what I have!! So maybe moving isn't the answer today! Maybe I'm better of as the crazy old widow lady who scares the neighbor children with the evil eye!!

Everyone should be scared of me I really am crazy, socks move on there own in my house and it's March Madness so you do know the TV changes channels on its own! I really don't like basketball!! I don't need an anxiety attack!!

Ok I'm going to go put the socks in the drawer!! Maybe my message is the socks should be put away!! I'm not the laundry fanatic in this house. I'm good if it's clean and I get dressed out if the dryer!!

My Place in the Sun

It's one thirty in the morning and somehow this seems like a place to be. I can't believe in a little over a week five years will have passed. Today I made a huge leap to contact a real estate agent to schedule an appointment to put the house on the market. There are plenty of things to do before that happens but it just seems like it's time to take another step into the world of living forward.

I'm lost in my life but I have this amazing life I should care more about. I struggle each day to come to grips with the fact that is really is okay to always love Scott and the possibility of loving another. Scott has his box in my heart and that will never change but when you have feelings that you can't express for someone else - that just knocks me to my knees. I can only tell you how many prayers I've said. Then I look in the mirror and I don't even see the person Scott loved.

One of my patients the other day remarked how she felt stupid and unable to get herself back after her brain injury. I looked at her and said, "that is like me telling you I'm unlovable because I'm fat." She laughed and told me I'm the most beautiful person she knows and my heart is filled with love, kindness and compassion and anyone who doesn't see that doesn't deserve me. I told her it works that way for her too. She is smart, funny and has more artistic talent in her little finger than I could ever imagine. What would I do without my wonderful patients? They keep me going each day.

I was just playing with the computer and my google account when I found lists on my google drive that Scott and I had shared. Guests lists, to do lists, trip planning, honeymoon planning and tears filled my eyes. How is it possible to have so much love for someone who had his faults but is now only an Angel in my life? I can hear him telling me I'm on the right path. I can hear him telling me it's okay to have feelings, that he would expect nothing less and will never let anyone less than what I need be in my life. Those gut instincts must always be trusted. I still remember when decisions were made and conversations were had about where Scott and I needed to be for happiness. One day I looked at him and said, "do you want to live the rest of your life without me or do we take what moments God has given us and live life to the fullest?"

We all know how that worked out we just didn't happen to get very many moments but darn it if we didn't make the best of those moments. I wish the person I see in the mirror could say that again. I'm not as fragile as I was five years ago but life has given me panic about being brave enough to say things like that again. So here I am at 1:45am on a Monday night talking to a cat with my brain going 1000 miles an hour. I just keep hearing my own negative Nellie saying your not good enough to be anymore than what you currently have. I keep reminding myself I've walked so many steps forward, why can't I have more? Why can't someone see me for who I am on the inside not the sad, fat girl with a stupid disease on the outside?

So maybe this wasn't the best idea for me tonight but it allowed me to get the crap out of my head and walk forward again tomorrow. I've forgotten how much easier it is for me to write down where I am when I'm stuck in my own thoughts. How the words just flow from my fingers without a thought. Just like I do everyday with my patients, I focus on their needs without a second thought. I am where I'm supposed to be but Moose isn't always the best listener.

Working on finding my place in the sun....