As you can well imagine, once Blaine was diagnosed, it was like he had been punched in the gut. That feeling never went away for him and he spoke of it often. He tried to be positive and he did his best to think of things that he would love to do once he was healed. I did my best to create an environment of positive influence as well. After all, you always hear that if you are positive that is half the battle right there. A positive mindset can heal you they say. He and I both practised meditating and I believe that helped us a great deal to get through the way we did. It helped with the fear and the pain. However, one thing we could not seem to get away from was the amount of emotion.
The emotion that comes with this kind of situation is intense. You get up in the morning with it and you go to bed at night with it. I was trying to be strong for my family, my friends and my husband. Blaine was never a fan of me crying. A lot of men I think are discouraged when it comes to showing that kind of emotion. He discouraged it for me I think because he simply could just not stand to see me cry. It hurt him too much. As a school principal I felt I needed to keep emotion in check. After all, nothing good came of acting out with strong emotion. In society we are told to stay strong in these situations of trauma. We are applauded for being strong, staying in control and not showing our "negative" emotions. All of this I learned and I did it so very well.
There were a couple of times though where I found myself in absolute despair. I hated to cry. To me it was a weakness. I found crying so awful because if I did let loose I would just sob uncontrollably and it was as if once the flood gates opened I might never stop them. It is what my daughter has referred to many times as ugly crying. I find that this is the perfect description because my face and my eyes would be red and I would just look awful. I just thought it was the way it was for me. Others could cry their quiet tears and somehow they could make it look and sound beautiful but when I did it I looked and sounded awful. It was embarrassing and so I avoided it at all costs and I got very, very good at it. Little did I know that ugly crying was the result of not crying. Saving it up was causing me to "explode" so to speak.
Fast forward to after Blaine passed. I started out well. I found the support around me was comforting and the celebration of life was so beautiful and I felt like we had celebrated his life like it should be. I was pleased and so grateful for all of the family, friends and community that came out and supported us in such a challenging time. It meant more than they will ever know. As time went on though and I ploughed through the things that needed to be taken care of I found myself carrying this heavy cloud of sadness with everything. I couldn't enjoy anything without thinking about the loss. Even what should have been utter excitement for a new grand baby on the way was clouded with heavy sadness. I did my best to show happiness and excitement but deep down I was a wreck. Christmas songs were hard to enjoy, Christmas itself was difficult and I wondered if I would ever enjoy anything ever, ever again. And I will say also that there was a general discouraging message out there that you never, ever get over it. That you just learn to live with it for the rest of your life. Wow, a recipe for depression if I ever heard one. So I just kept looking for something that proved that to be untrue until I began to find little nuggets of hope in stories from others who had not only survived this kind of loss but actually thrived because of it.
I had to find out more about this. I stopped listening to stories of despair and started to listen to stories of hope. One day when I was scrolling through my Facebook pages I found this quote from Julie Cluff that said, "People will tell you that you will grieve for a lifetime. I choose otherwise. I choose the path from hurt to hope to healing.... everyday." This is the path I have chosen also. As I am finding out from Julie, it takes work. You have to feel the emotion when it comes and you must lean into it each and every time it comes up. But when you do, something amazing happens. Not only do you feel the sadness but you also now feel the joy, the excitement and the passion again. You get to feel all the emotions and that my friends is living. I have days where I am sad. In fact, I had one this past weekend. It was a tough, tough day but I know on the other side of leaning into that pain that there will be joy again. That I don't have to keep all that heavy cloud around me forever. I can let it go and enjoy the sunshine until the clouds form again. I also learned that each time I lean into my pain that a part of me heals and I know that I am growing and healing as a person through all of it. If you are interested in healing and hope and what is referred to as post traumatic growth, let me know. I am just getting started on this journey but I am happy to share.
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