Positively Adrift

As I sit in my backyard I can feel the little hairs on my pale legs flutter in the wind.

Most people aren’t impressed with the wind that blows continously throughout the year in our small city. I’ve lived here for twenty years, you just get used to it. Then I realize that the wind is gusting from the Pacific Ocean, maybe ten miles away, and I feel pretty lucky.

I contemplate why I haven’t written much in the past few weeks. Why I’ve pulled out some of my hair.

I don’t have complete thoughts, or even answers. Just repressed feelings.

Furthermore, its incredibly exhausting trying to figure out why and how I’m feeling on a daily basis. Just don’t want to do it anymore.

I suppose subconsciously I’ve decided to just be.

Be in the moment with my family, in conversations. Whatever task needs to be done, I either tackle or not. If its imperative then it gets done sooner.

I’m done feeling overwhelmed with the days bleeding into the next, mirroring the movie Ground Hogs Day.

I didn’t ask to stay at home and not work. Shit I’ve had five jobs in the past two years, if that doesn’t show my passion for working outside the home then I don’t know what does. There are reasons for so many jobs and I won’t get into it; a difficult pregnancy, one job going out of business, and me going back to school are just to name a few.

But I think not working is exactly what I needed.

I’m not the best judge of my own needs, so the universe gives me a swift kick in the ass every once in awhile to get me back on track.

So I’ve been focusing on my girl and my husband, and keeping my twins in my heart.

Really and truly practicing patience, to where it is second nature.

Sure I could get mad and pissed off all day long. But that’s the easy road, the one I’ve traveled most of my life. I don’t like who that person is on that path.

I get more out of living life on this earth by sowing seeds of compassion and empathy, and humbling myself. Without sarcasm or patronizing.

At this time, I’m going to just be~

Join me, shall you?

The ever present rattling in my brain has subsided, only to be replaced by displaced anxiety.

But it does mean that sleep hasn’t evaded me entirely so I’ll take it.

My over-the-phone therapy session really made an impact this week.

She made me realize that the new habit I reluctantly told her I created over the past few weeks is deeply woven with threads of anxiety.

As far back as my mind let’s me remember I have always played with my hair.

I grasp long strands from the top of my head and run them between my thumbnail and underneath my index finger, until I reach the ends of the hair.

Sometimes it ends there. Other times I twirl long strands with my thumb and index finger until knots are created loosely or tightly. Always with my left hand; occasionally the right hand gets in on the action.

To me it’s normal to play with your own hair; I’ve seen many women do it out of boredom or meditation. My sister also plays with her hair.

What took a drastic turn is pulling it out. I can’t explain why I’ve been doing it, so I haven’t really told anyone.

I’ll start from the beginning.

I’ve decided recently to stop coloring my hair. I took advantage of not being around people because of the pandemic to just let my hair be free, and see what it looks like without being shamed.

I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time. My natural is an ashy brown, and since my late teens I’ve had gray hair in the front of my scalp. The gray hairs have peaked in growth over the past several years, to where there’s significant clusters in my bangs and the side of my head.

I love my gray hair. Its unique, and confusing for people to see someone so young with it, even though I’m 33.

Since growing it out, I didn’t realize the texture had changed. Not only is there more gray, but also curly and heavily textured dark brown hairs. So playing with them doesn’t create the same satisfaction.

Its an odd combination of feeling something foreign and wanting to rip it off, but also loving what the body is capable of.

I seek out the textured hair, then pull it out. Feels like the root is ready to let go of my scalp, so I just help it along right?

Wrong. I don’t need to do this.

Unkempt anxious feelings channeled themselves through my hand and into the atmosphere.

I don’t claim to be without faults. I just don’t want to air out my dirty laundry for all to see.

But I committed to being honest with myself so I can heal, and writing honestly in this blog is part of that path.

I don’t believe in seeing the world in black or white; the universe is a myriad of gray tones and beautiful hues not seen by the human eye.

This situation, however, is black or white. There’s no benefit to this habit. I’ll just end up with bald spots.

All I can do for now is do better and be better.

And be realistic, giving myself time and grace to get there.

Join me on my path back to hope~

My head doesn’t feel like its screwed on just right.

I can’t focus more than half the time. Easily distracted. I’m doing my best, and when that’s all I can do but there’s more to be done, is when it gets frustrating.

The forefront of my brain is cheerleading me into positivity, keeping me moving forward.

But damn its been a rough year.

Fluctuating between who I was before my girls died and who I am now is exhausting.

Like a glitch in a video game. The terrain is comforting and familiar, but a new foreign thing is entering my brain wanting to take over.

That foreign thing, that glitch, is my grief.

But the familiarity of my terrain isn’t comforting anymore. Its vile.

That old terrain couldn’t even fathom the implications of death.

How losing someone affects every atom in my body down to the soul that inhabits.

The vessel that houses emotion, that once was empty, is overflowing and shows no signs of stopping.

I feel like I’m relearning how to breath.

Relearning how to walk. Putting one step in front of the other. Going somewhere with purpose and intention and not because that’s what my bipedal body is designed to do.

Learning for the first time how to speak my truth.

And when I sleep, there is no rest. No time for my brain to process what’s been downloaded.

What’s always been constant are my lucid intense dreams. My mother and I have that in common.

I dreamt of someone close to me dying, and for the first time I really felt the weight of grief pushed down upon me in the dream realm.

The challenge is not being able to relieve my emotions and thoughts, when I can’t physically go anywhere and distract myself for a few hours.

Since February last year, its been rough. I’m trying everyday, tooth and nail, to focus on positivity.

To focus on the light and not succumb to the darkness.

And, most importantly, embracing my glitch and learning how to live with it~

I just want to run, until my feet don’t touch the ground.

Push myself over the edge of exhaustion to get away from the heartache.

I’m afraid of where my sadness will take me, that’s why I never let it in before.

Even now I’m still pushing it away. I just want to run.

……………………………………………………………………………….

I started writing those thoughts the day after the girls birthday. The darkness that entered my heart was all consuming.

So I took a break from journaling. The last entry I made was on my birthday funny enough.

I didn’t plan anything for my birthday, nor did I care that it was coming up. The only thoughts in my brain were about my girls.

Considering everything going on, I let myself feel a little joy that day. I received a few fun gifts, cards, messages, and a happy birthday video that reminded me how much people care.

I’m still amazed how insensitive people can be though. No I’m not going anywhere to celebrate because I’m still grieving my girls, and there’s also a global pandemic going on where we are supposed to stay home.

Where would I go if everything is closed? Even so, my daughter would have to pee five minutes into the trip, and where would she go to the bathroom? Its just absurd.

People who haven’t lost their children cannot understand, and I don’t expect them to. But know I’m not going out of my way for anyone. Its hard enough to focus each day with grief, lack of sleep, no sense of time because of the pandemic, and an energetic toddler streaming through my brain.

So I’m letting go of everyone else’s bullshit and focusing on myself, my girl, my husband, close family and friends, and my home.

That’s all I can do right now. I’ve been getting a lot done around my home, and not just half-assing but really doing a good job and being proud of my work.

So let’s cheers to running.

Not running away from grief, but towards it.

Embracing it some days. And punching it in the face on others.

Join me on my path back to hope~

Happy birthday my darlings.

Just as quickly as you two came to this Earth, you had to leave.

I believe you girls were always, and still are, with me. Just in a different form.

My grief has taken me to places I’ve never wandered, while at the same time opened up old wounds.

I can’t begin to describe the heaviness pressing down on the entirety of my being.

The girls first birthday in heaven was something that I highly anticipated and dreaded. I knew the heaviness of sadness was upon me, there was no escaping. No jokes or silliness that could distract me.

I still wanted to celebrate because if I didn’t I knew I would instantly regret it.

I succumbed to the heavy.

Pulled in and out of it throughout the day and the days leading up to it. Almost losing my shit when less than kind words were spoken to me.

I let the hurt just hurt. I honestly don’t think anyone would react any different.

This is the first time I have ever felt this way.

Even when the nurses and techs started taking all the intubation tubes and IVs out of my girls precious bodies, and they faded out of this world and into the next in my arms. The gravity of the situation didn’t sink in.

I was too overwhelmed by, well, everything.

Too distracted by everyone else’s pain.

Not equipped with any coping skills whatsoever to deal with childhood trauma let alone the death of my girls.

There will always be a few regrets and should-a, would-a, could-as.

But the girls choosing me to be their mom is the greatest gift I could ever receive. That thought alone is hope.

So I’ll fade in and out of the heaviness, and at the end of the day I’ll dust myself off and remember the moments that gave me joy.

The image in my mind of them swimming freely in my womb, like astronauts floating in space. Knowing no pain, and never alone because they had each other, and me.

And if they are anything like their big sister, they would be touching everything they could. Embracing one another, and yet fighting like all siblings do.

The isolation this pandemic has thrust upon everyone couldn’t have come at a worse time for me emotionally.

It feels really lonely carrying this sadness around. Realistically I’d feel this way whether the stay at home orders were in place or not.

One day at a time again.

Join me on my path back to hope~