I have been doing alot of thinking lately. My thoughts go all over the place and about all different kinds of subjects, but all subjects lead back to or start from losing my boy and the way that my life has changed since November 10th.
I've been working on my compassion. See, here is the deal. You all know that I lost my son and he is never coming home. Never. I miss him like crazy. My family misses him like crazy. We will never get him back, and that hurts in a way that I can't even begin to explain. Last Christmas I listened as my single friends lamented over not having their children home for Christmas or having to share their children with their ex-spouses. I was bitter. How could they say this to me a month after losing my son. At least their children were going to be coming home in a week or 2 weeks. It hurt so bad to listen to them. I tried hard to put myself in their shoes.....but I had just lost Nick.
Then as the school year came to a close, I listened to friends talk about their children going away for the summer or preparing to leave for college. Again, their children are going away. I listened as they talked about how much they would miss their children. And of course they should. I would miss my children. I do my best to be a good friend. I do my best to listen to them and remember how I felt when Nick went away to college. I was sad and I would do anything to help him settle in and become successful. When he went away to college, I just KNEW he would come home. I KNEW he would graduate and visit. I knew he was always going to be there. Then he left ISU and moved to Florida and I cried. Now he was a country away, but I KNEW I would do anything and everything in my power to keep my family together. I knew there would be family visits and vacations and when he graduated he would continue to travel and go where work goes. But I KNEW he would always be here. Then he died.
So here I sit as my friends feel all sorts of emotions as their children are spending the week with the other parent or as their child gets ready to go off to college. I tell them, don't worry, they will be back. I pull all the compassion I can muster and remember how I felt when Nick left. Sadness. Hope. Excitement. All of it. But then I also feel the deep sadness as I listen to them cause I know that what happened to my son was a tragedy and an accident and that the majority of kids who go off to college come home safe and sound and they are truly blessed because their child will come home when mine never will...and if they would just remember that and count their blessings, they wouldn't feel sad. But, alas. I know better. I know what it is like drop a child off at college. And my heart goes out to my friends.
Like I said, I am working on my compassion and letting go of my self-centered anger.
Something else that has been on my mind... the way that my body has changed and or been affected by the grief of losing my son. This weekend as I got ready for our most recent belly dance performance, I took a long hard look at my body. Yes, I know that women are their worst critics. But this is more than that. I put on my costume and look at my body. I am still lighter than I was when I joined Weight Watchers, but I have lost muscle tone. I look deep in the mirror as I do my hair. My hair was due for a dye job, but more than that, the amount of gray hair coming out of my head has grown exponentially since November... a sign of stress and grief. I start to put my make up on. My face has aged years in the span of a few short months. The wrinkles that I had before have become more pronounced; they are deeper. And I have more and more wrinkles that were not there before November. The skin around my eyes has gotten so baggy it has gotten hard to put eye make up on smoothly. I look into my eyes, and its still there. I may smile, and at times I may even feel happiness, but deep in my eyes, I still see it. I still see grief. I see the change of my life in my eyes.
I have been going to WW and my weight is not really going down. But to be honest I am not eating the way that I should. I was, at first, but I kinda lost my gumption. And then there was injury. But honestly, at this point, I really think I joined WW just to keep me in check and to keep me from spiraling out of control the way that I was when Nick died. And that is what I have to keep remembering when I weigh in. *shrug*
But on the good news side of things....
Last weekend, we danced at Goddess Fest. Omi and I danced 5 dances (including our duet). We danced beautifully. The mess ups were graceful and not really too noticeable and I felt the joy back in my dance. There is something so magical about dancing barefooted in the grass under the open sky. I love to belly dance. I love the way it makes me feel. I love performing. And I'm so happy that this feeling is back. There were some huge doubts there for a while, but I'm so glad its back. It is what is keeping me hanging on when I feel like everything else is slipping away.
I'm doing my best to try to find my groove in this new world of mine.
Then there is this feeling I get when I think about all of the money people donated to us when Nick died. Everyone was so generous. I'm talking hug sums of money from some people. My family and I have had some pretty "big" expenses lately including a couple of vacations and sometimes I feel a bit "guilty" that we are not struggling for money now, but the money we have now is because of Tracy's work, not because of money that was donated to us in a time when we really needed that money. I am so grateful for that money. So now, I do what I can for those who need it. (I did it before.. I have always done it before, but now it just feels different. It feels like a way to help pay it forward and show gratitude to all of those people who helped us when we needed it most.)
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