Earlier today all I kept thinking was, I really wish Dustin was here. I need him in the worlds worst way. I need his help. I need his comforting words. I need him to be here for our kids. I need him for me. You see, I am facing a new round of grief. One I'm becoming familiar with as the days turn into months and the months turn into years. One I'm learning to live with.
One thing a lot of people feel and think is that there is a time limit on grief. Well, apparently these people have never lost someone so close and significant to them because they are full of shit. When you loose someone so close to you, like I wrote in my previous post, there is this void that can never be filled. You have to learn how to live with this void and that is no easy task.
Lately I have been greatly struggling to stay afloat. At least that's how I feel. When you don't have another adult in the home, who knows how your household runs and knows your kids, knows you, you get lost in your own thoughts very quickly and easily. And these thoughts can be a wide array of things. So not having another voice of reason with you is hard. Flat out hard. So as today progressed, my thoughts also progressed.
I can't do this. I'm always 10 steps behind. Why can't I finish laundry? What new way can I display the routine chart so everyone can see it and complete the items in a timely manner? How am I going to teach them to do this? How am I going to accomplish that? Etc, etc. All of these thoughts and more run rabid in my brain and I don't have "my person" here with me anymore that can help calm them. So they run and run and run until I have a panic attack and crash. Which is what happened today.
I got to bath time and thought to myself, How great would it be to have my relief pitcher come home right now? I'd feel so much more secure, calm and at peace and my crashing panic attack would disappear in a moments notice. But, then that haunting thought came into my mind again, he won't ever come back home. He won't ever be my relief pitcher again. And that my friends, is a rough thing to continue to realize.
When you finally don't have the widow fog anymore and are able to really start thinking again, you realize that life must go on. Life needs to start where you are. Not where you left off. If you start where you left off, you'll be stuck forever. Trying to wrap your brain around the whole situation. So, like I've written before, you start a whole new routine. A whole new life learning to live without them.
For me, I've had to figure out how to live without daily relief. Dustin was so good at being my teammate. We worked in our home as a team so we could spend more time together. I've had to set boundaries for myself so that I can stay positive. Like putting positive and uplifting quotes next to old pictures of us so I can feel as if he's telling me those things, so I keep going. I've had to make myself do other things so that I'm not sitting here on the couch watching mindless TV to numb everything that happened throughout my day. Recently I've taken to reading books. Lots of books. I've had to do so much soul searching that I feel so mentally exhausted and I don't know how I'm going to make it through the rest of a day. It's been hard learning to be accountable for myself when I was so used to being accountable with him.
I know I say it all the time, but this, learning to live without him, has been the hardest trial I've had to face yet. Loosing him was the easy part. Well, sort of. But learning to go on in this life without him has felt almost impossible lately. It is a momentary battle I face all day, every day. And most days, I really don't like it. But I keep persevering because I know the more faithful I am, the more diligent I am and the more I show that I accept God's plan for me, the better my reunion with him will be. I will continue to learn to live without him so that when the time has come, I can be with him for all of eternity :)
I have been having a really hard time lately and today was one of the worst. My husband works out of state now and it seems like we have hit every deployment curse possible. As I was sitting today in my driveway (in my now very expensive paperweight) and crying, wishing my husband was here to help me figure this out, frustrated beyond belief over the last months events & especially today's -you popped into my head. This is your reality every day for the last too many days...and will continue to be for sometime. I have the privilege of picking up the phone and calling him, something that you would trade nearly anything for. Everything I felt today, the lack of support, the panic attack, the frustrated tears, the worry...I understand your situation more than I ever did before but I know it will still never come close to what you feel and go through. And I told myself to stand up, wipe off the tears and do something about the problem because dang it, that's what Bri would do. The issues won't be resolved for awhile but at least in the meantime I haven't planted myself on the pity pot. Darling, on your worst of days you are so much stronger than the rest of us. I wish there was so much more we could do to help you, no one deserves a break more! But know that you are an inspiration to so many- your children, family and your friends from all over. And especially today, me. I pray for strength for you and continued peace. You are loved momma!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Amber!! I anyone knows what a glimpse of this life is like it is my fellow military wives and those of the like. I have had many, too many to count anymore, days like yours was. Where it's just the icing on the cake but you don't want to eat it. And you're right, I do just get up and do it. Take care of it as best as I can. I'm honored to know you thought of me and that I was the one who helped give you that push to keep going :) We can do hard things!!
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