Life Right Now
As life continues, I am sitting in my kitchen/living room. You may be asking yourself what I mean. It is a small one bedroom efficiency apartment. This is perfect for me since I am a single divorced woman whose only child is grown. I live in a small town outside of Rochester, Minnesota. As i write this in the background, I am listening to inspiration youtube videos. Why, you might ask? I am processing some things I find I must deal with.
The last few days, I have been crying, something I don't hardly do anymore. My mother's birthday just passed. The woman who has been an adversary from the beginning. I often think of classic bedtime stories that told to warn children of monsters and evil. Yet someone along the way had to try and make them stories children wish life could be. It is unfortunate that the purpose was altered. My daughter asked me if I was going to go see my mother for her birthday. My heart felt heavy. Words escaped me entirely. Then that feeling of guilt swept over me like a cold, wet blanket. I couldn't answer. I decided about a month ago that I would remove her from my life. Mind you, I am an empath. The kind who enticipates how actors who play characters may feel when they are hurt physically in the role they are playing. I feel their pain. I broke into tears and had to excuse myself from the company to take some time to process what I was feeling.
I stepped outside to catch my heart. My mother is in a rest home. She has three different cancers now, and doctors have said that without treatment, her life expectancy is less than a year. Two years ago, she survived breast cancer. She also has had several strokes. The last was pretty severe. Every time her health issues come up, it triggers my trauma. It is overwhelming, so it's hard to be there for someone who wasn't there for you. Your mind takes you like a time machine to your past with no warning. No matter your present moment. It floods you with fear and emotional pain. This time machine is out of control. One moment you are in a past moment, then another and another within moments of present time. Your whole life flashing, you feel like you're dying inside. It is so much. You try to slow it down so you can process all those emotions and memories. Then you think that this woman who allowed so much acts like you have wronged her. Then your guilt takes you to this family responsibility that this is your mother. She gave you life. What I have learned is that when I am going through this, I need to reach out to others who care about me. That is what I did, I reached out to several people from my life. However many I need to, to ground me and remind me that self-love is of the utmost importance. All you are feeling still is how bad you feel because you feel you are neglecting that person who neglected you. You feel terrible, horrible, bringing in new pain.
I survived my mother's birthday, with many tears. The question I was left with at the end of the day was why I believe I need to care so much for someone who hasn't cared for me at the bare minimum? It is the hard truth. I want to share with you how unresolved trauma and lack of self love kept me from the life I deserved. How my lack of trust, my anger, and resentment blinded me in seeing myself.
My life, you better hold on. This isn't going to be the normal testimony. My life even in this moment, is not great. Currently not working, have no money to my name. I do have a roof over my head. My bills are not behind as of yet. Do I know how I an going to get by? I know I will. I always do. What happened? I needed a break, before I broke.
No matter what in life, it is my mind and my heart. I am far from perfec. Noo one is that would be a lie anyways. I don't like lying, I am not good at it either. Not to mention the unrelenting guilt it constantly brings. Which you pay tax for, it's costs me. I am one of those people who know life no matter how unfair we think it is. It does have this balance magnet. Just like any negative there is the positive counter part. It applies to our whole. When we allow something negative it will find a path to take from the positive. We might not even give a thought to it. It's there though. No matter the kind of person you are. We have the ability of choice in addressing it. That is when the kind of person you are matters. Being self aware is a must!
When I was young I wanted to be acknowledged and loved by my mom. I wanted her to be happy with me. I wanted her to know I loved her. Unfortunately I have wanted the same even in adulthood. This was a realization in writing this just now. Woe is all I gotta say. Not long ago I also came to a realization that all my relationships I have had, were unhealthy because I didn't ever see that my first relationship with my mother was the base of all others.
I know now that I can't allow anyone to cause me hurt because they give the bare minimum. Allowing pain that is avoidable, only impedes healing and change. The thing about deserving love, is that love comes with hurt. Hurt shouldn't outweigh the love you give.
Some days I ask myself how do I continue to have hope or keep going. With how my life started the first 20 years, feeling like I am I have not succeeded. I often forget all that I have experienced or came out the other side. Instead of seeing all the ugly and hurt. To see the strength, resilience and how I inspire others by just showing I am still standing. I still have love inside my heart. I am important to myself. Learning to trust in my strength. That I am worthy of respect. I am loved. Just because those mistreated or thought me to be undeserving of care. Does not mean that they were correct. That my value only comes from those early in life.
Life is so many things, and is determined by so many things. I am going to speak of my experiences and do my best to share in a way that might be of some help. Experiences and struggles of life give us wisdom. Wisdom is important and is the sum of facts, love, thoughts, others, self-awareness, trial and error. So so many aspects. That life is everything. That just like everything that exists. There is a positive and negative to all. It can be the worst imaginable to just totally miraculous. Nothing worth having comes without a price, as everything that costs you will have some reward. None of which do we get to directly set in stone. When we pay our dues or receive rewards are not in sync in time. All we truly have is our ability to try and pass down what we have learned.
What else do we have, that is truly priceless and timeless?
Chapter 2- Spiritual Life
We all have different beliefs about our world and if or how to see a greater purpose in the world with so much ugly. When I experienced little care, i did have my great-grandmother. She was the person who showed me kindness, care, and for the first example of positive anything. She also went to church. That is where I learned that there was a place to go to have hope that there is something more to life. It was a place my grandma believed in. This woman who I never heard her be mean or say anything bad to or about another. She was calm and kind. When I was with her, I felt that I was safe. She was good. I was too young to know what God was. I just knew this woman went to church. She was love to me, she gave me hope that life wasn't chaos or cruel. That something else existed. Grandma had hope and a belief in something. She must know something. I would go to church with her. This was important to her. So I wanted to be with her and learn about what this was about.
My mother spoke about him at times. Not a love for God. I knew she didn't dismiss the whole idea of what God and church were. It is my belief she was just angry. I don't remember specifically, I just got that she was angry at God. She may of said so. That he took my father. She was so angry that the love of her life was taken. My father, besides my grandmother, were the only people I ever heard my mother not talk bad about. She smiled when speaking about either one. She had love, you could see it. You could hear it. My mom would talk how my dad was a good man. That he was in heaven. That is the only positive sense that anything to do with God was like a great thing. That he was in place of peace and love. But so very angry that she wasn't with him here on earth or in heaven. Then when I was nine years old my grandmother died. I remember the last time I seen her. She has stopped by our house and I had been playing outside. Just like most kids, when you are having fun you don't want to stop. Well, I had been needing to use the bathroom. Waiting until I couldn't almost hold on a second longer. So I ran to use the bathroom. But grandma left before I came back out. I always hugged her. Her hugs were a comfort of love. That day I didn't get to. She passed a few days later. My mother crushed. All I could think of was she was gone. Never to hug again. Grandma Hoy, it is you who gave me something to believe in.
Where does my spirituality come into play? What is it? Spirituality is believing in something, anything, that guides us or gives us strength. It is something that is not concrete in front of us, yet we know something exists.
This journey has moments that always remind me I am not alone. I will share these as I go.
