What It Is

Since my SIL asked me for my blog address and I had to come here and get it, I took it as a sign that I must need to write. Life seems to be passing at lightening speed! As usual I have too many things going on and not enough hours in the day to complete all the tasks. It may be time to try the dreaded "to-do" list again. First on it...BLOG daily :)

Changing.

It's different now. My dad being gone. It's harder is some ways, easier in others. I don't think about him every second of everyday anymore, although I still think about him a lot. Now I mostly think of how he is missing the things we are doing and how he would have enjoyed them, or the stories he would have had to go along with wherever we were. I miss being able to call him up and tell him about a bad call I saw in the ballgame or an amazing play. I know he has a great defense for the President in the recent scandals which I would love to hear even if just to tell him he was CRAZY! But it is different. The pain isn't there every second of everyday. I can finally take a deep breath again without my chest feeling like it is going to explode. What it is not is easier, it is just different.

Grief.

Grief: deep and poignant distress caused by or as if by bereavement That is what people keep calling the feelings I am experiencing right now, grief. Today, I am calling it anger. Today I have incredible anger for what I believe to be the injustice of having my father taken from me at only sixty years and two months old! The social security administration website tells me that I still have 19 years and 10 months left with him before he dies, 80 is the life expectancy of a male born in February of 1953. So the way I see it, the SSA lied to me! They have cheated me out of nearly 20 years with my father and I am angry about it! I'm angry at Phillip Morris for continuing to sell cigarettes long after knowing the harm it can cause people. How a company can knowingly sell a product that causes a disease like lung cancer is amazing. It makes me angry. I'm angry at the medical professionals who have not found a cure yet for lung cancer. I'm angry at the people who have fought and won the battle because it is just NOT fair! Yep, I know this feeling of anger is unhealthy, misguided and unproductive but that's how I feel today.

Letter To Me.

There is a Brad Paisley song entitled "Letter To Me", for those of you that are not familiar with the song you can listen here/. It is a song that when it plays on the radio I always stop and listen. When the song is over I always think about writing a "letter to me" but as of now I have not done it:) In the song Paisley writes to his seventeen year old self, I think I'll write to my teenage self.

Dear Emily, This is my letter to me. Life is the late 80's & early 90's moves too fast and everyone is in a rush to get somewhere bigger and better. The problem is that there is never big enough and you never get the best by rush through life. STOP, smell the roses. Be a kid. It's okay not to have a boyfriend in middle school, that will come. And when it does, be picky and I promise the nerd in math IS worth dating over the running back! Tell yourself and believe that you are as worthy as smart as capable as everyone else, but you have to belive it before other people will. Understand that people are going to treat and see you the way you treat and see yourself! Your heart is going to get broken when your first love ends and no matter what anyone tells you, You Did Love, you aren't too young! School. School is important. Learn how to write NOW because it is going to be the death of you later! You do need to give it your all. Right now school is your job. This is where you set the tone for your work ethic and drive that will carry you throughout your life. Don't be LAZY. Take the opportunities you are given, even if you're scared, you may never get the chance again. Tomorrow is never guaranteed, so Live knowing that today could be your last but hoping there will be a tomorrow. Love, Emily

That is my letter. I could add more and may in a private letter, one that my children will never see :) I wonder if I would have lived differently receiving this letter. I have no regrets in my life, but I do have a few "what if's". And when I take the time to remember them, my life seems fuller, I feel happier and more content. The small things do matter because they are building blocks to the big and your foundation needs to be strong so the blocks don't fall, but sometimes you can just lay the blocks down and move on without forcing them into place.

2 Weeks or 14 Days?

Perspective. There was a period of time in my life, between being a little kid and having little kids, that 2 weeks didn't seem too long. What I've found out over the past 2 Weeks or 14 Days is that when your father dies, 2 weeks or 14 days again feels like forever but at the same time your life seems as if it is constantly changing. Maybe the feeling is caused by not sleeping or maybe it is just because you're constantly moving & searching for a new normal. It has been 2 weeks or 14 days. I wonder constantly if I'm mourning correctly. Should I be further along in the process? Should I not cry so much anymore? Should I delete his number from my phone? I do not know the correct etiquette on these things but I know there must be some and I am sure my dad would know it(and could reference Emily Post on it :) But without him I do not know. Two weeks or 14 days. My father was catholic; I'm not. I think my lack of faith concerned him. I'm not sure he cared that I didn't believe what he believed, I think it concerned him that I had nothing to turn to. I think my dad saw his faith as a comfort, as an answer to those few things science did not seem to explain for him. Whatever the his reasons, he was a believer :) This afternoon I was driving in my car to get a haircut and the next thing I knew I was pulling into the parking lot of a local Catholic Church. I sat there for a moment but then decided to go in. It was quiet and peaceful. For sometime I sat there and just kept hoping, wishing for a "sign" but one was not forthcoming. I then started reading the Bible and this was the first (and last) verse I read: But the souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction and their going forth from us, utter destruction. But they are in peace. -Wisdom 3:1-6 I am not sure if it was the sign I was looking for or a sign at all, but they were the right words at the right time. I read the verse over several times, I am not sure exactly how many but a lot and I cried harder and harder each time. Then my tears stopped and I walked out of the church, my head-up and feeling lighter. 2 weeks or 14 days. That is how long it has been since you left. It is not getting easier, just different.

Time to Write

It is hard to think that I used to blog EVERYDAY! Now I am lucky to make time to do it once every 3-6 months. We the monsters were younger I blogged about my day, their milestones and anything else I couldn't find an adult to talk about :) It helped keep me sane through my early years of being a SHM. I even found a group of virtual friends that have become part of my "real life":) I now find myself in a place in my life where I think writing might once again bring me some comfort. I am hoping that writing will bring all that is floating in my mind out and move it along. Before I really start whining... *** I have never been shy about sharing my battle with depression or anxiety or whatever other "stuff" I have going on, some say I share too much, but I share this on the off-chance that someone out there might be reading this and be going through their own stuff and feel scared or alone. I want them to know that they are NOT alone. Sharing or not sharing there are plenty of folks in the boat with you:) Now, I have had a hell of a few months! The New Year did not start off good. My dad, who you may remember was battling stage IV lung cancer since 2009, was not doing well AT ALL. He was in tons of pain all the time and the doctors were not finding anything that could help. Nevertheless, we went ahead with the Surprise 60th Birthday Party that my sister had been planning for about a year. A few weeks before the party he fell and broke his arm! Talk about adding insult to injury! As I am sure you can imagine a broken arm did NOTHING to help his physical or mental battle with cancer. We all headed to FL for the party and it was wonderful. The party was fantastic. There were friends from near & far that came to join us. My dad had a great time and really was surprised. Once everyone left and went about their lives he became a frequent visitor at the local hospital. There were daily phone calls with updates and few of them were good. He had some good days but they were becoming fewer & fewer. With all that was going on I knew I was in for a rough road ahead and made an appointment with my young & handsome doctor of 6 years so that I could refill all my "meds" and see if he had anything to add :) After 6 yrs together he knew my CRAZY & I loved him for it! The night before my Monday morning appointment I received a call that my appointment needed to be canceled because my 44 yr old, fit, healthy doctor had died. WTF!!! I needed meds, I needed him! He wasn't just my PCP, he was my friend, therapist, doctor all in one. As you can imagine, I did not (still not) handling this well. Nor have I found another doctor and I need refills! A week goes by and I think about finding a doctor to fill my meds but I never do. Instead I run around trying to get Easter together for the kids before I need to be in the car to NJ to celebrate Easter. Oh, during this week, my dad isn't doing well, the husband's aunt is super sick, my SIL is scheduled to have a c-section & Marg and I celebrate our bdays. Yes, it is okay to laugh as you think of what living with me that week must have been like:) Finally we make it to NJ the Saturday before Easter. The day was uneventful, thankfully. My MIL did the Easter stuff with the monsters and I went to bed early. Easter morning came, the monsters ate lots of candy & hunted for hidden eggs. All seemed to be moving in the right direction until my sister called ME on her bday before I could call her. Her message...Dad is back in the hospital and you need to come here NOW. What do we do? Hop in the car of course and drive back to VA after 24 hrs in NJ, unpack & repack for our second driving trip to FL in a month. 16 hours in the car with three kids, a crazy wife & a husband that does nothing but drive is AWESOME! We did it, we got to FL on Monday night and intended to spend our week of Spring Break there. Ten days passed and we were still in FL and the kids were off one random day the following week so it became a two week stay in FL. I spent my time trying to help my mom & sister by running my dad to and from the doctor and get the care he needed and the husband and monsters visited park after park in the area. With my husband, I decided that we needed to get the kiddos back home and back into school and then I would come back to FL. When we left FL on Friday night, I left my mom with my dad back in the hospital knowing that we were seeing the end of his fight. The doctor had told us the week earlier that our time with him was running out. That we were now talking about weeks to months left. Nearly 4 yrs after finding a small tumor in his lung my father's body could no longer win the battle. That was two weeks and 2 days ago. My father has been dead for 11 days. It has been one week since we were in NJ to hold a "Celebration of his Life".

The Perfect Family

In my mind the "perfect family" would be a mix of early colonial American Housing(everyone stuffed into a one room log cabin), the 1950ʻs "Leave It To Beaver" (Dadʻs commute was 10mins and mom had fresh cookies every afternoon) & all the technologies American family can enjoy today. I wish my extended family all lived in the same town and that we had family dinners every Sunday after church. Holidays would last days and include aunts, uncles, cousins, in-laws and anyone else that needed a place to go. Thatʻs NOT my family. To start, I live 30 miles from my nearest relative & he is a second cousin that I see more often when I travel 5 hours back to NJ than I do here. The remaining majority of my family is spread across the Eastern Seaboard. Five hours one way and fifteen the other but there are those few that "broke away" and flowed West. Most of my family I go years without seeing, you know the wedding & funeral crowd, that is our relationship now. This is not what I imagined my family to look like; me, my husband and children living hundreds of miles from our parents and siblings. With little to no relationship with the cousins I grew up with as best-friends and hardly knowing my nieces & nephews, but that is what I have. As I move from Thanksgiving that was spent at home, just the five of us, I hope that Christmas and the coming year will find me closer to this "Perfect Family" I think I want:)