I've felt such guilt each time I'd go to read a blog and realize that I hadn't posted an entry here. And then this morning, as I was trying to view another blog, I had to research my password, not an uncommon occurrence with a periomenopausal mind, believe you me. And suddenly this blog was up on the screen and I saw that it had been almost a year, a full whole year, since I last wrote.
So where have I been?
A year ago a friend of ours, age 45, died unexpectedly of a massive stroke. It was a horrible shock to us all. We'd seen him just a few days earlier in church. He was asked to give the closing prayer and he ended not with the traditional "Amen" but a sincerely stated sentence, "Talk to you later, Lord." His ending generated a warm chuckle from all the congregation, but it spoke volumes about Dutch and his relationship with the Lord and we all knew it. He missed church that Sunday due to a spring cold, and again the following Wednesday night, and Thursday morning they found him in his apartment. By Sunday, he had suffered two more major cerebral strokes and finally, he died.
We loved Dutch and while you might think my absence was a prolonged grieving for him, it wasn't. His funeral was the most remarkable funeral I've attended to date. His mother sobbed uncontrollably. BUT his family and his friends laughed and laughed and laughed as one story after another was told of this man who lived his life fully and well.
However, I was not feeling well the day of the funeral. We'd planned to head to Lakeland, Florida to attend the Revival that was ongoing at that time. On the day of the funeral, I took my husband back to work and got lost on my way home. I felt so ill. I so desperately wanted to not disappoint my husband about the trip to Florida. I was in pain and nearly disoriented with it and missed a road I knew well. I finally found my way back to a familiar road, went home and packed.
As we headed to Florida I knew that I was well and truly ill but I couldn't for the life of me figure out why or how. I had shooting pains all over the right side of my face and head. I could feel a cold sore coming up on my lip, something I've never had in my life. My teeth hurt on that side of my face, so badly that I couldn't bear to bite down. My ear ached. I felt awful and that is the truth.
We arrived in Florida and went to our hotel to check in and while I waited in the car, a woman walked up to me and laid hands on me and prayed for me. I guess I looked sick even to her. We did attend the Revival meeting that night and I am here to tell you it was totally awesome, so wonderfully marvelously awesome! But I was so ill, all the same. Odd, here I was at a healing Revival and I was sick.
The next day I was worse. We had a long drive home, and stopped off at Ignited church. Another woman laid hands on me and prayed and the swelling in my lymph nodes on the right side of my throat considerably reduced. I felt better, still ill, but better and we were almost home before I began to feel badly again.
It wasn't a life threatening illness that had me in its grips I discovered the next day, but shingles, a remnant of my old chicken pox virus from childhood. But because I'd been ill for three days at that point, the virus was deep seated and it took nearly two months for the blisters on my face to disappear. And really it took the remainder of the year to once again begin to feel like myself.
Have things changed in that long year just past? Oh yes.
I met my new DIL for the first time. It was a difficult visit in many ways. Not her fault. Not my fault. Just two people forced into a relationship where they don't know one another. A lot of insecurities to deal with on both sides. What held it all together was her obvious love for my son, and her awareness that though I am step mom, I am Mom in his eyes.
I grieved for my grandchildren who live so very far away and went through yet another rough patch with my daughter being noncommunicative due to another imagined slight.
My grandmother experienced some TIA's which made her uncharecteristically angry and upset. Mama and I went to search for Granny's missing purse and found paperwork and junk mail stuffed in boxes dating back to 1967. As we sorted thru things, Granny became increasingly upset and confused. In the end, we decided she'd lived with the mess for all these years, she could live with it a bit longer. The house is essentially clean, just stacked to the ceiling on all walls with boxes of stuff she feels it's necessary to keep.
I faced a 15 yr old 'in love' with a troubled young man with a very difficult mother who felt she should be involved every step of the way.
In October, we returned to South Florida, and wandered the streets where my husband grew up. It was cathartic and healing and wonderful. But it was upon this 'vacation' that I realized my physical strength was seriously compromised. My 'brick wall' days as I describe them, were coming with increasing frequency. My pain levels were very high. I didn't visit a doctor for a variety of reasons. Number one, no insurance. Number two, I couldn't very well describe any of my symptoms as something tangible. I hurt. I was tired. I slept a lot. A lot. The whole vacation I did nothing but doze: in bed, in the car, on the balcony of the condo overlooking the ocean. And when we left I was just as tired as I'd been all along.
My mom broke her ankle, just about the time I realized that as far as she and I have progressed, I still had some rather deep seated unforgiveness towards her. As I spent December and January and February and some of March caring for her I've learned to stand up for myself, to forgive, to state my boundaries (both physical and personal) and stick to them even when mother guilt threatened to push the limits. I had to insist that she find someone to help care for her. That she learn to manage as much as she could on her own. That I had only limited time and I would not give up my entire life to her needs. It was hard, so hard.
Because of Mama's disability, Granny's needs were also heaped upon my shoulders, so suddenly I found myself running three households.
I passed the half century mark and celebrated my 50th birthday. And yes, there was a bit of fuss this year. My husband, though he was working, came home armed with all the necessary things to make my most favorite cake in the world: strawberry shortcake. It was such a lovely thing and I was so thrilled with his remembering that it was my favorite cake, that the cake itself hardly mattered.
This year, my husband said he wanted to sow a seed into my ministry and my dream. So he bought me a laptop and encouraged me to go into my room, shut the door and write. It isn't far along, but I've a few thousand words of my first fiction novel on that computer. And a couple of submissions for print venues.
And two weeks ago, inexplicably, I felt as though I'd turned a corner. My energy levels are so high that I can't believe it is me, the same brick wall person. I've been doing physically demanding things like lifting bags of mulch and digging up deep rooted plants and moving furniture and I've not had a twinge of pain. And finally I feel like I can be the strong person I claimed in my resolutions for this year.
So that's where I've been. And this is where I'm at. And it's so good to be back!
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