Fuck Mondays.
Today and tomorrow aren’t lookin’ much better.
Onward thru the fog.
Monday ‘s mindfulness
This week, instead of seeing the obstacles ahead, I need to look for opportunity.
Instead of focusing on what I have lost, I will appreciate all those that I still have.
The highs need to be balanced with humility.
The lows need to be filled with hope.
New friendships need to be nurtured,
Those friends that are no longer around, I will forgive and remind myself that it is not all about “me’.
I have a chance for a time that is bigger, brighter, clear and crisp.
I am still healing, but I have had glimpses of what my Parents would want for me.
It’s looking pretty badass…
…even for a Monday.
Cloudy, on a sunshiney day
When friends ask me what my plans are, until just recently, I had not one little clue of where I would land, or what I would do.
I was too busy closing up my Parents lives to even begin to think about where mine might go.
I left a life I was just starting to enjoy.
I’m not complaining; in fact, I am grateful that I could just hop on a plane and come back to take care of my Parents.
Hardest and most incredible time of my life.
Now, I’ve opened the shades just a bit to see what is out there for me next.
I am actually looking forward to skiing again, something I put away after being hit by a guy in a van, talking on his cell phone.
I have loads of ideas about what my life can look like, now that I have decided to land here for a bit.
I have a friend, who has been a mentor to me with my career choices. He has helped guide my daughter thru her nursing school and now career. Perfect guy to bounce ideas off while enjoying good wine by the river.
We met for lunch yesterday, chatting away about people, sharing bad jokes.
He then told me that he has cancer. Fucking Stage 4 Cancer.
I didn’t cry; in fact. I don’t think I even could take a breath.
I just touched his leg and let him talk.
We managed to make each other laugh, and he did throw me some great ideas.
I’m still in shock, but; having been through the shit storm of loving those with Cancer, I know that the people who helped me the most just listened.
They called.
The did errands, even when they weren’t asked.
They prayed.
This blog has become a “Debbie Downer” of sorts…
I may change it to just “Fuck Illness”
But I do believe it is helping me and others. Sickness and death are a part of life we all must go through, and my wish is that we get better at it.
Oh…and two more things…
Fuck cancer and keep praying.
Tsunami waves on an otherwise calm sea
Fall is my favorite time of year…
sorta.
Air is crisp, leaves are changing, Winter and Holidays are coming.
It is also that time of year when my Seasonal Depression decides to rear it’s ugly head and hits me when I least expect it.
Lets add that to the already situational shit I have been fighting with since my Parents died.
I am grateful for all the friends and family that stand on the side, cheering me on.
My support group and the work that goes along with it.
Beautiful days to walk outside.
Off Season,
for a choice of parking spaces.
I have gotten closer to many, and stepped away from many more, in my constant attempt to take care of myself.
But, there is no checklist for grieving.
There will be good days. There will be days I can’t leave the house. Days when anxiety takes my breath and stomps on it. Wonderful memories and fleeting pictures in my head of how things were near the end.
Not always smooth sailing.
A tsunami can come at me from nowhere. I feel like I may drown.
But, I don’t.
I am a strong swimmer with a boat full (butt load) of people around to throw me a line.
I can catch my breath and wait for the storm to pass.
Yesterday, my heart and felt empty.
Today I am hopeful and so grateful to have had the Parents I chose.
Beginnings and endings
I will try to begin at the beginning, although the edges are still a bit blurred. My grief is not yet 8 months old…
not even an awkward toddler.
I have periods of time and conversation that I have had that are still so hidden in the dark spaces, they are better off left alone.
This is the beginning of my journey to the end of my parents’ journey, in messy bits and pieces.
Today’s Special-
Heartbreak Hotcakes
Make mine a double stack,(One for Mom, another for Dad) with a side of sarcasm…hold the breath, please. And I could use some extra napkins…
and a Xanax.
Please and thank you.
My Sunday routine usually started with a strong cup of coffee and a call to my Parents after “Sunday Morning’ had aired; but, right before “Meet The Press” had started, as this would usually cause some sort of disagreement with my Dad about what was wrong in the world of politics.
This early November Sunday was different. The phone rang on our end. It was my mom. She sounded “off’, a little hesitant.
“Well…
I went to the Doctor…just the dermotologist, and he took a small biopsy of a spot on my scalp. No Biggie! I should get the results in a week. Not a big deal….Here, talk to your Father.”
My heart went into my throat.
My Mother’s history has never been kind.She has lost large pieces of real estate to Cancer. First her thyroid, then her breast. Next her spleen was removed when she was diagnosed with Hodgkins. The cherry on top was then removing 90% of her lung…so a little spot on the scalp sent me into a full on panic attack.
I called every day for 2 weeks. “No news yet.”
November 12th, 2014 around 10:00 in the morning, Mom called.
She calmly told me that the little spot they had taken off her scalp
had FUCKING metastasized from a spot they found on her lung.
I dropped the phone and screamed for my boyfriend.
“I’ve gotta go. Book me a flight. I gotta quit my job. We need to close the business and the house….on and on, no breaths.
“Mom, I’m coming out”
Just tears, on both ends of the line.
Day one of very few left, that would change me forever.
Calgon..take me away
Two of my Mother’s favorite things were great books and long baths. Preferably done at the same time.
I have inherited those same passions.
These are two of the most important things that she could no longer enjoy, once her body and soul had begun climbing that ladder to her next destination.
Yesterday, as I was soaking in the tub, with a wonderful book, I felt that awful emptiness…
Until
I realized how lucky I am to be doing what she loved. She would want that for me.
Goals
I set them…
usually way to high
I rarely reach them.
Today I reached a “goal” I had set for myself when I had my bloodwork results read to me, like a death sentence, by my Doctor.
There is a number,
EVERY woman has it…
what we think is the “perfect weight”…
Probably something close to where we were in high school.
It’s a number that fucks us up every day, whether we get on the scale or not.
I have not earned it in the way I thought I would.
Granted, I did give up gluten, dairy…joy.
I reached my goal by losing much more than pounds.
I lost both of my Parents, within days of each other
So, yes…I met that number, but it wasn’t earned.
It was taken from me.
Bonus, I am skinny.
The loss…
is the LOSS.
Just for today
Broken
Beautiful glass vials…
To fill with ashes…
of the most important woman I have ever loved…
Who is no longer.Period.
End of sentence
End of thought…
Just an ache.
Just
THE END
Take a gander at the geese
Grief took a sharp right hand turn today.
Having lost both of my Parents just days apart, my sadness couldn’t be contained.
It had yet to find a place to land.
Today I drove the same little direction one of us would have taken with my Daddy, either to Dialysis or St. Mary’s…
A straight shot from their house…at the very least, 3 days a week.
I reached over to check his seat belt…only to find an empty place where he used to take up so much space.
We would have the same conversation every day.
“Hey Brennie…look at all the geese. Sure are a lot of them. I love those geese”
I mentioned to a friend that I hadn’t seen a single goddamn goose since the night he passed.
“It’s Spring, and they are pairing off.”
Tears were leaking all over my face…
My “Oprah ugly cry”
Lovely thought…
They are pairing off.
Thank you Jane…got thru another day.
Alaska
I opened my eyes this morning, in hopes of a Spring Thaw…not of our woods, but; a thaw of my heart and brain, that I had buried so deeply in the frozen tundra…
to protect me…
Freeze me until I was ready…
I thought I was ready.
The thick ice that had been solid for weeks.
I was dormant.
I was still.
My breaths have not been warm enough to thin the coldness.
I was getting deep into my own fucked up thinking process, all melancholy and shit….when I had a moment of
a warm breeze.
I remembered that day.
The day we laughed,
looking for Bradford…then finding it in Alaska.
Upside down.
All was well that warm Winter day.
b2msnow 
Recent Comments