A New Home

We’ve decided to exchange our one-bedroom for a relatively nearby two-bedroom with a little more wiggle room. It’s something we’ve been considering for a long time but finally it’s time. More room and a change of scenery will be good for us. So we’ve given notice and plan to move around the Fourth of July. We’re still working out the exact timeline for cleaning the carpets and painting and actually moving the furniture and household goods. And then there’s transferring the utilities and forwarding the mail and saying goodbye to our first place together and finding a new route home.

I hate moving. I’ve done a lot of it as an adult and I’ve always hated it. This time, the actual packing up and moving is not what concerns me—I know our friends will be glad to help. It’s leaving our first home together and the place where we knew Toby—where he lived with us. It’s the memories these walls harbor, that are palpable to me when I look around and will be less so when I no longer come here. The memories and the emotions are both sweet and painful and the whole thing seems incredibly intense right now.

So I am being gentle with myself, planning and preparing on paper for now and leaving the surface of things intact until the week before. My heart is already in tatters—I can’t bear to live with everything torn up yet. The week before, yes, but not for a whole month.

Toby would be six months old now. It feels so unreal. Sometimes I wake up in the morning and feel the awful reality wash over me again as if for the first time. And I realize I’d had a few minutes or hours of oblivious respite from the awareness of loss that is my constant companion.

So I will continue to be brave, one moment at a time. I trust Him, even though I don’t understand. Thank you for continuing to pray for us.

Oh, and if you want to help us move, text me. (Praying counts too, but you don’t have to text! Although it’s always nice to know that you’re thinking about us!)

More good days and bad days

The past couple of months have been hard but good. HK is really enjoying his new job with the elevator company. I'm really, REALLY glad to see how happy and content he is in this new career path that he's patiently worked toward for so long. As for myself, emotional healing and vitality are my priorities in this season. 

The image I have is a wavy line with waves above and below a baseline. At first, the peaks and valleys are very high and very low and very close together. Over time, the highs and lows become less extreme and less frequent, with more time spent in the moderate zone. So I have some good days and some awful days and a lot of just ordinary days, or hours or moments. 

I never know when it will be a high day or a low day or how intense those experiences will be or how many ups and downs will occur each day. The unpredictability is hard to plan for so I just have to pay attention to how I'm feeling and what I need at any given moment and make room for myself to be and feel whatever I find when I look inside. I need to pace myself physically and emotionally so I don't get too overwhelmed. 

Reflection, journaling, professional therapy and connecting with good friends are tools I'm using in my recovery. In March I went to Idaho to visit Richard and Jeannette McGrath, old friends of mine who rode their horses across the country a few years ago. It was really good to see them again and to meet some of their friends, whom I am blessed to call my own friends now. I think the McGraths are wonderful and amazing people, but you can find your own reason to think so at their website: www.heartsupranch.com.  I've also been able to visit dear friends in Northern California and here at home. I've started back to work, just a few hours at a time. I don't want to go back to work full time right now but it's nice to be able to help out. I'm also really enjoying my time at home. I reorganized my freezer, my pantry, and my dresser. I got to help HK's mom plant the garden this year. We put in cucumbers, squash, beans, peas, and tomatoes.

As Mother's Day approaches, I am on a bit of a walkabout for two weeks. I spent three days at Rock-N-Water, at the Gold Rush living history program I used to do full time. It was fun being Elsie again, gold panning in the river and singing songs and telling stories around the campfire. Now I have a few days to visit dear friends and family and be Aunt Judy for a while. Later I am going to Yosemite, one of my favorite places on the planet. And I plan to see my mom and grandma on Mother's Day. But it's a tough time no matter how you slice it. HK and I both appreciate your prayers and your encouragement, through the next few weeks especially.

Good days, bad days, and a new job for HK!

HK has a new job! He started at the beginning of February with Liftech, repairing and modernizing elevators. This is something he's wanted and worked toward for 9 years and he is really enjoying it! I'm so proud of him and his hard work and patience and faithfulness.

A new job meant getting private insurance until he is eligible for health benefits in 6 months. That was icky, but we applied for new policies and now I am just waiting for the last few snags to get worked out.

Please pray that our claims get paid in this difficult season. There are some claims that need to be reprocessed, which can be quite a nightmare. Insurance headaches don't make grieving and recovery any easier and are especially stressful for me.

Please pray for HK to do well and find favor with his new company as he learns a new job. Praise God with us for His provision and blessing. And pray for both of us to adjust to his new schedule (up at 4 am and bed at 8 pm!) and still make time to connect and live life together.

As for me, good days and bad days and a lot of big ups and downs are to be expected right now. I've had 4 or 5 really good days in a row, which was a welcome relief. My therapist cautioned me not to analyze my good days, which is really hard because I want to know how it happened (how did I eat/sleep/what did I do differently?) so I can get more good days or at least predict the bad days so I can plan for them--but it doesn't work that way. He said just enjoy the good days when they happen.

It's really hard not knowing what to expect. Will I be able to walk into that room full of people or accomplish that task on any given day, or will I be crying too hard? I never know. And I'm a planner, so it's hard not knowing. And how long is all of this going to take? How long before I will feel better? How long until I don't cry every single day? There's no way to know that either. My therapist reminds me often that it won't always feel this way, and to be patient with myself. For now, I'm doing what I need to be doing. It just feels really, really horrible.

So I go to the gym, go for a walk, journal, rest, connect with the people on my support team, tend the flowers and herbs I got for my little container garden when my mom was here, try to remember to eat, try to remember to breathe, try to pace myself with the phone calls and bills and errands and chores so I don't get too overwhelmed. And I take my vitamins and play Plants vs. Zombies. And I think and reflect and remember and try not to get too overwhelmed and try not to ask myself how long it might take to feel brave enough for hopes and dreams again.

3 things that REALLY help!

1. Keep praying
2. Keep reading my blog posts
3. Keep telling me that you are doing the above

A sentence or two via text, email or message on the Encouragement Page on the blog here can make
SUCH A BIG DIFFERENCE!!!

This week 2/2/15

HK left for San Diego yesterday. He will be there for two weeks for work. My mom will be here this week for a visit. It's nice to have her company, especially while HK is away.  I will see HK this weekend and may stay with him for part of these two weeks, but please pray for me to stay centered without him home every night.

It's easy for me to get overwhelmed by my emotions right now--I am often unbearably afraid, lonely, sad, and despairing.  All of this is normal for a mother who has lost a child. So I inch along, one thing at a time. But I have good times, too. I just never know how I will be feeling one moment to the next.

I'm looking forward to doing some fun things with my mom while she is here. Please pray for us to have a good visit.

Also, please pray for safety and blessing for all of us during this time. And that God will continue to provide for our financial and medical needs and for wisdom and guidance as we research our insurance options.

Update and Prayer Requests

I wrote "What Just Happened?" early last week but before I could post it, I got hit with a massive tidal wave of depression, fear and despair. Depression is an old familiar nightmare so utterly terrible that I'm not even going to try to describe it here. I have posted some helpful websites under "Links" but that's all I can do right now.

I know people are praying for us and God is walking through this with me. After countless used tissues, some journaling and some therapy sessions, I am feeling slightly less miserable today.

Please pray for my emotional healing and recovery. I know that the hard work of recovery is just beginning and there are unknown months of painful healing ahead of me, which feels very daunting. Please pray for me to find new courage to face each day. Please pray also for my physical healing, as my emotional pain and tension are now manifesting physical symptoms. Please pray for our insurance to cover as much of our bills as possible, both for last year and this year. Please pray for blessings for HK in his work and that he would be encouraged in his own healing process--which is very different from mine. Please pray for us to find ways to connect and grow together in all this. Please pray for God to provide what we need.

What Just Happened?

The memorial service is over (and it was beautiful--thank you, everyone!) and the out-of-town family members have all gone home and HK has gone back to work and I am left sitting here wondering what just happened?

I'm not the same person I was before I had Toby. I was afraid for a while that nothing had changed--except that I was a year older and farther than ever from the life I want as a mom. It was as if 2014 hadn't happened--it didn't exist. But it did! And actually it was a wonderful year, up until the last three weeks.

Over the eight months that Toby grew in my womb, my love grew, too. I was constantly aware of his presence and his dependence on me to care for him and protect him. I was careful to tend my body and mind so that he would be well. I grew fond of him. I looked forward to watching him discover the world and I looked forward to sharing my favorite things with him as we explored together. I considered what I wanted for him as he grew to be a man. All of that loving changed me and I am forever changed.

I will never be the same person I was a year ago, before I had Toby. But I'm not the person I thought I would be, that I spent the year preparing to become. I don't have a baby to hold and care for. I am a mom--but I'm a mom without my baby here. This is uncharted territory--an unexpected bend in the road of self-identity. Who I am now as Toby's mom, I must now discover.