I foolishly thought that once the legal issues were resolved, life would get easier. While in some (major) respects it has, in many other respects it's gotten a lot harder.
Mike said to me today (in the midst of one of my many recent breakdowns) something along the lines of, "I, along with so many others, saw you get through the past year and stay so strong. Once everything was over, I figured you would be okay but I'm realizing now that it's only gotten harder." He said some other brilliant words following that, which I of course, cannot remember.
It's the truth. The floodgate of emotions has been opened. I've been so hurt by everything that happened last year and I had to get through it before I was able to finally turn around and look at it.
The problem is, because I was "strong" last year, people in my life are now surprised by my "weakness". They don't know how to handle it. They don't know how to handle me and all this emotional "baggage" I come along with.
And I know I'm not the only one in my family to feel this way. My mom is really struggling too as people expect her to move on with life and she has days where that's just not an easy task to do.
How do you "move on" with life when you're stuck in the thick, black mud that's called grief?
Feeling so hurt, disappointed, and disposable to my own father has made me all the more aware of the other "hurts" in my life. Right now, it feels like I'm full of gaping wounds and I have been for weeks. If you've been in close proximity to me recently, you've either seen the pain seeping out of me or I've pushed you away so that you don't. Black or white, right or wrong, that's the way it's been. The people I've pushed away are the ones that have hurt me the most. It's not that I don't love them... in fact, it's probably the opposite. I'm just tired of putting myself out there and my heart on the line to people, who like my dad, see me as "disposable".
It's a snowball effect. Mike even said it today, "All these feelings about your dad have brought up feelings about me. All your feelings about me have brought up feelings about _____."
Simply put, this place I'm in right now is not a good one. If I'm to be honest, it's sad, dark, full of tears and anger. One minute I'm okay, the next I'm far from it. I'm grieving for the totality of this experience.... what happened, what I lost, and what I continue to lose.
The one thing that's reassuring though is this... I can see the sun shining and every day, I wake up wanting to be happy. I wake up wanting to focus on the relationships that have run the gauntlet with me and allowed me to feel loved, respected and appreciated. I still look forward to things, like Spring which is hopefully just around the corner and Liana's upcoming 5th birthday (!!!). I know that some relationships will become stronger as a result of this while others might fade and I know I'll be okay regardless of which way they fall (though I do hope that they all remain intact as I don't want to lose anyone else from my life). My heart may be hurting deeply but my head is strong as I've never been so aware of how I'm feeling and why.
I still have hope and I'm desperately clinging to it. If I didn't have hope at this point, I'd be far worse off. I find myself talking to God... something I haven't done often in my life or in a long while. This is always a good thing but also signifies to me just how much I'm hurting.
So, I have one request.... if you pray, will you pray for me? I don't ask that easily but I know that right now, my heart needs it in the worst way. I need to find a way through this pain. And pray for my mom and Mike too? That my mom finds her way through her own pain and that Mike and I can find a way to reconnect emotionally.
Before I go, I want/need to say that I debated about writing this post for weeks but after my conversation with Mike today I realized that it might be better if people understood why I've been feeling sad lately. I also wanted people to understand for my whole family's sake that just because the events of last year are over, the emotions left in the wake of everything are far from gone.We're still full of hurt... maybe more so now than ever before. ♥
And again.... I'm sorry for another sad post.
And again.... I'm sorry for another sad post.
