The climb

Uphill all the way?

Healing isn't linear is it?

If it was a meal, it would be super sticky, gooey noodles, drowning in a stock of confusion and jarring flavours! Sometimes delicious, memories of a meal that left a smile in your tummy but at other times, so overwhelming and unpalatable, sticking to our insides like rancid glue. That pit of despair and heavy feeling in our hearts.

Loss is physical, mental and emotional and plays out entirely differently for everyone on this planet, but it's a known process, no surprises there my loves. The stages of grieving are many, anger, denial, regret, pain, blah blah blah. Never the twain shall meet, never in the same order. We kids all carry a different version of our parents in our minds, so much so, it's like siblings weren't given the same experience theme park ticket!

That pointless phrase we use 'I wish I'd........'.

If only!

We walk beside our grief. It enters the room when it wants to, consuming us for a while.

A right messy life plate!

That said, we can unravel our messes any time we like!

I really did take on too much in the way of stress lately, didn't I?

Also, sometimes thats life, we can't always avoid the tough stuff, it's coming ready or not and often in batches! Nicely grouped together to make us wonder what it's all about! Why me? Why us? WTF now ?

Of course it was all gonna show up somewhere and the last few years of turmoil came knocking for me, in the form of extremely high blood pressure. I was just another possible stroke victim in the making! I got the ultimate wake up call and a health warning to boot!

Time for change.

I heard Mother Nature loud and clear, shape up or ship out! Brutal but very much needed. It's when we ignore the warning signs that things tend to go tits up and our families are fighting over who's getting what.

The last few years haven't been all dreamy, no, but we did have our good times and that's what I'm focusing on. I'm also working harder to set boundaries with those that love to take advantage and I won't be living under the weight of their judgement again any time soon. Life is not always a box of chocolates and you really do never know what you’re gonna get. However, unless we live under that umberella of delusion nothing is perfect, not you and certainly not me.

This morning, I'm staring down the barrel of Watsons fury black nose, he's plonked himself between my bent, laptop adorned knees and is dead to the world. That kinda of peace is gold eh? Find a space that fits and settle in for a good ole snooze, let the world keep spinning, regardless. Perfect. He's also warming my cold feet. Even though the weight of him is warming and calming, he's 20 odd kilos and making my dodgy knee a tad uncomfortable..... 'ying and yang'! No gain without pain. Still It's lovely to be an animals safe space. How fortunate am I ?

Everyone!

Hear me!

The world will keep spinning whether you want it to or not, you know? When someone dies, we can hardly believe that the planet doesn't miss a beat but it doesn't. Life is for the living and we'd better darn well live it well eh! Please don't feel guilty for enjoying life whilst grieving or at least keep trying.

Enjoy the ride. No one ever died wishing they'd not lived every bloody second as if they were dying! It's such a short trip, make it about the things you love.

I think what frightens us most when a loved one gains their wings it is that rude reminder that we are merely mortal.

It stinks!

It's Friday and there's plenty to do but no rush to get it done. So far, I've drank my weight in tea and then eaten a doorstep bacon sandwich and now I'm tapping away chatting to you lot. Life is good enough. Mum's inquest is done. I will be sent the outcome. I do hope they got the answers they were looking for. Sometimes in life there are no clear reasons why? We just have to deal with that disappointment and hope that the lessons learnt are enough.

My Dad is also home from hospital I believe and I hope that now the worst is over, he can try and start living again a day at a time.

Gentle as you go Pa.

I truly wish him well. It's not lost on me that loosing mother, his life partner, the anchor in his whole life is a first class tragedy, which comes for us all in the end. The best thing we can do is live well together and apart, so that that bottom doesn't disappear from our world, when it's time for one of us to go.

I do feel it's time for us all to inch forward after Mum's passing and start the healing process. I think she'd be rather put out at all the infighting and rhetoric. She couldn't stand fuss and wasn't one for an out pouring of emotion. She very much belonged to the generation of stiff upper lips, never explain, never complain and a good clip round the ear when needed! Measured emotions are often very damaging I fear. Don't hold back, say your piece but don't expect anyone to care. Each generation learns what not to do from the last, but we all still have a long way to go until we get it right eh!

The mothership has been missing from this motely crew for 10 months now and our family did nothing good except implode, as families tend to do in times of loss and crisis. We all need to learn to handle the difficult times in life without the need to pass the blame eh? Pointing the finger is just deflection in the end. No one was to blame for Mum's poor health except Mum and even then there are genetics at play!

I've chosen very much to do my healing by myself and leave the toxicity behind. We can only fix ourselves and I have zero wish to be involved with people that don't have my back or prefer war over peace. Folk without empathy or emotional intelligence are very dangerous people indeed.

Not my bag.

We can only control ourselves not the other characters in our story. I've shut the book on those many fractious chapters and started afresh as is my prerogative. The call of duty rankles still. Why should I give up my life for people that have lived theirs, made their choices and never offered me a kindness in the process. Remember folks, you can love your family but not like them very much. Thats okay, I'm sure it's totally a tale as old as time.

I'm in my 'black sheep' era and totally owning it.

Don't let others ride your wave or write your chapters unless you want them too eh! The future is a blank page, write it only for you.

I was talking to a friend recently and she felt she had become 'selfish' but I think what she meant was that she had learnt to protect herself better, her peace, her time and her energy. Thats not a bad thiing at all and it comes with age and experience. Another friend, felt I might be being cruel to my family but again, I explained my right to not engage and protect my life and family from something that adds nothing other than pain and stress to. my already overburdened lot. People only get away with bad behaviour if we let them eh? We are also under no obligation to put up with being called mental, selfish or anything like but we have to own our choices, be at peace with them. I am.

My other friend has recently said that she doesn't want an all encompassing relationship after two horrific marriages and I get it. We must choose us then them.

We have to look after ourselves first and we women are generally so busy looking after everyone, we forget to take care of no.1, us! When we realise we've mistakenly left ourselves behind, we catch up pretty quick! We literally change everything about us to try and fit in, society demands it! We are masking all the time, until we look in the mirror and don't recognise ourselves.

Selfish is good, it's the key to happiness if you ask me. Get to know you and live with you before treading into muddier waters, bringing your own brand of BS to the world. I truly think therapy should start at 11 years of age and run for life, then we wouldn't go around trying to destroy others peace!

Start asking those vital questions 'what is this interaction going to add to my day?'........and use all possible versions of that question, to start filtering out the shit! Learn to say NO without further explanation! Don't feel obliged to add to your pain because someone hasn't done the work on themselves. We don't need extra shit, only the good stuff please. We can be good friends, lovers and parents without loosing ourselves in the process right? I can't heal your pain but I can sit with you whilst you work it all out.

Be your own best friend and advocate for yourself loud and clear, yes you'll be called 'difficult', 'a bitch', 'mad as a box of frogs' and so much more, all because they fear you have a handle on the stuff they don't!

No one is gonna deliver us happiness in an Amazon box today, are they petals? No, that is the shit we own individually folks. It starts and ends with you and me. We are a work in progress our entire lives. Happiness is something we find within ourselves first, we create the magic, then we reflect it back out into the world.

I do believe we all have a purpose in life and it's not to make others bend to our ideals, pass our misery on or genrally fail at being a good human. A good human I say, not a stupid, roll over and die one!

I'm here for you and for me.

Make of that what you will.

D x