Let It Go

Blogging is hard. I know that there are many of you that have told me in the last couple weeks that you miss my blog posts. Well, I'm writing again today and I'm going to start off by whining a little bit apparently. Blogging is hard. Let me clarify that statement. For me, the act of writing the blog posts is not hard. I can do that in usually just a few minutes. I love to write and I always have. It is fairly easy for me to listen to my little daughters, come up with a plan for a blog post, type it out, and be done. That part is easy for me. It's all the preparation stuff around writing the actual post that is difficult for me. I'm not 100% sure, but I can almost bet that all of my readers have been through something. You've all experienced some sort of trauma...some sort of pain...some sort of rough patch in your lives. We all go through them. There is nothing special about me at all, other than the fact that I think I got my lifetime of trauma and pain and rough patch all in a tight span. But I'm not special or different in any way. We all have moments of loss. We all have moments of suffering. We've all lost loved ones. We've all had life plans abruptly interrupted. We've all had things that we were going through that weren't so easy. I imagine if you walked into a room filled with people, you would be able to find people who had been through something. Life is full of tough stuff! You all could be blogging too!! Like I said, I'm not special by any means. And even if I was, I'm not certain I would want to be special for these particular circumstances! Oops...it appears my undiagnosed ADHD has kicked in and I'm off topic a bit. Blogging is hard. HA! The hard part is knowing what to write. Knowing how much is too much. Wondering if I should bring that up in a public forum. Thinking about who I've told what to and what I might want to keep a secret. Weighing out who I wouldn't want reading certain things on here. Wondering where the line is for myself, and then factoring in the fact that I asked these same questions and think about the perspective of my children. Blogging is hard! On top of those questions, I also try and feel out for myself where I am in my process. I have been quite open with people, and with my blog, about the fact that I go to therapy. At one point I would have been highly ashamed of that whole process and would have been mortified to know that others knew about it. I had "weekly doctor appointments" forever. I'm sure people really knew what I was doing, but I was ashamed to admit that I couldn't handle it. That I couldn't hack it on my own. That I might be just a tad bit crazy :) I'm not crazy, I know that, but in my mind I was thinking that a diagnosis of depression or anxiety just as well might be a label of crazy. By the way, I feel strongly compelled to let you know that I have not been diagnosed as having depression or anxiety. I'm sure anyone would understand if I was, but I haven't been. I have done the best that I can, and there still is a stigma attached to those labels, even in my own head which is probably why I'm defending the fact that I'm not diagnosed. But the tie between therapy and blogging being hard? I'm still working through stuff in therapy. I know, it's been three years. Get over it! You should be done! Well, I've learned that this is a process and that everyone goes through it at their own pace. I'm happy with where I'm at right now for the most part. And maybe not happy with where I'm at so much as happy with where I'm not anymore...does that make sense? I have made so much progress and I'm really proud. So, working through stuff in therapy makes it hard also because then I'm not sure about therapy and blogging and what I should talk about here and what I need to think about more and...yeah...in case you didn't notice already I tend to overanalyze everything...always...so, this is why blogging is so hard! What probably goes from a super simple blog post about a conversation with my six-year-old or three-year-old becomes this huge thing where I over-process and overthink and then I get scared and decide it's just easier to not blog. And then let all three of my fans down!! :) So, blogging is hard! But, I have been working on this post for a while. The girls and I have been to see the movie Frozen three times and I am hooked! I grew up with Disney movies. I grew up wanting to be Belle and Aurora and Cinderella. I love Disney movies! And I love that my girls are starting to get into them as well. Every year for Halloween, they have picked a different Disney Princess for at least four years. It is so much fun having little girls! So, having little girls was also a great excuse to go and see the movie Frozen three times! It is a great movie! I've cried every single time I've gone to see it. I think it's because it's about sisters. And my sister and I have always been so close! Best friends! Inseparable. And then the stupid Navy happened and moved her away and it's been harder to keep in touch. Days get shorter and time flies by and I don't get to talk to her. We used to see each other every day. And then we'd at least Skype or Facetime every day. Pretty soon it was just phone calls sometimes. And then text messages at least at some point. Lately, through no fault of either one of us, it's fallen to texting a word or two here or there. So, when my sister was up here at Christmas, we took our kids and our parents to see the movie. It was great! I loved it! I cried! And I've wanted to go again since then, so my girls and I went for two weekends in a row. Everytime I watch it, I see my sister and me in the two sisters on the screen. We were so close! We did everything together. And I also see my two girls, who are also just as close. They are so loving, so caring, so much like my sister and me! And that makes me emotional also. And there's also this element to Elsa. I don't want to give away any of the movie in case you are going to get a chance to go see it, but Else has magic powers, and at one point in the movie she exiles herself from the kingdom. When she does, she begins singing this song called "Let It Go." If you haven't heard it, go to YouTube and look it up. It is a beautiful song. So, listen to it once just to take in what a beautiful song it is. And then listen to it again and listen to the words of the song. I am very connected to music. I always have been. I usually can't tell you very much in terms of my horrible memory of events, but I almost always can tell you what song was on the radio. I will always remember the songs that my grandpa would sing in the cornfield on those still summer days and will always remember his voice being carried on the breeze into my bedroom window and how I would smile and listen to him sing. I will always remember how when my first true love broke my heart I blasted Blink 182 all the way to work that morning and sobbed. I will never forget listening to Riddlin' Kids with my friends, heading to camping, and Tim almost breaking his head on my window from excessive head-banging. I'll never forget summers filled with Warped Tour or OzzFest. I'll always giggle when I think about that moment when Brian took my to our first concert together...seeing Kenny Rogers come out on that stage and knowing that my life as I knew it was over...haha! Music is so very important to me. So, Frozen is a great movie, but Let It Go is an amazing song and the lyrics, as cheesy as this is going to sound, speak to me. And they speak to Amelia as well. I have been thinking and singing and reading the lyrics to Let It Go since we watched the movie. Learning the words and singing the song and thinking about how it relates in my life. And I found out tonight that Amelia has been doing the same thing. "Mommy, just one more thing?" "What's up, honey?" "Well, I've been thinking a lot about Frozen and I think that I'm just like Elsa." "Oh really, honey? Why do you say that?" "Well, I don't have any special powers. I'm sure you've noticed, but I can't freeze anything with my hands..." "OH gee, really?" "Mommy! I'm being serious! But, I feel like there are things that I need to let go. You know that part in the song where she says, I couldn't keep it in, heaven knows I've tried?" "Yeah..." "Well, I think I'm a lot like you." "What do you mean, Amelia?" "Well, I see you start to cry all the time, but then you make yourself stop. And I know you do that for us. And I'm the same a little bit. I start to want to cry, but I make myself stop. For you and for Emerson." "We're all kind of silly, aren't we?" "Yeah...a little bit. We shouldn't keep it in, should we? We should cry and we should let people in and let people help us." "Yes, Amelia. We should! If there's something that you feel like you need from someone, or an emotion that you feel like you need to share, then please do that! You have to do that, or you will make yourself sick. Don't hold it back! We have to be willing to be sad and we have to be able to cry and grieve." "You're right mommy. So, do you think we can promise to help each other do that?" "I promise to cry when I need to cry! And to hold you when you need to cry..." "Then, I promise to do the same. We sure don't want Emerson to grow up to be like us, do we?" Laughing I said, "Well, in some ways, I hope she is exactly like you, but when it comes to crying and being free in her emotions, no...I don't want her to be like us. And I don't want us to be like us! We need to change too!" "I love you, mommy..." "I love you too, sweetheart!" And I walked down the hallway to the living room. We are tough. We are strong. And for some reason I have always had it in my head that we are tough and we are strong because we don't let people know that things are not ok. That there is a storm raging inside and that things are hard. I've gotten better. There are a few people that I cry to and vent to, but it is still so very hard for me to do, even with the people that I love and trust most. Crying and having emotion is so hard, but so necessary. I have written before about my seizures. There is a part of them that are stress-induced. My seizures get worse when I am stressed or worried or anxious. Stress can do awful things to a person! I have seen my hair go from dark brown to scattered strands of gray to a whole stripe of gray in no time at all. I have worried myself sick with stomach aches and pains. And then I developed seizures. Stress is awful and Amelia is right. I do get sad and weepy and I am very good at stopping it and shoving it down and moving on. There are times that it catches me at the worst times, for no apparent reason. And when it does, I usually pay for not dealing with it up to that point. So, Let It Go and the lyrics to this song are apparently just what Amelia and I have needed to help each other grieve. To help each other cry and process and move on. Search for the lyrics to this song. Wow, I'm bossy and giving you lots of homework tonight!! Sorry! :) There are two separate versions of the song. One which is sung by Idina Menzel for the movie. And another single version by Demi Lovato, which is almost the same, but contains a section that is just a little bit different. In the middle of the song is this part: It's funny how some distance makes everything seem small And the fears that once controlled me can't get to me at all Up here in the cold thin air I finally can breathe I know I left a life behind, but I'm too relieved to grieve This part! It is so true. 2010 was a horrible, awful year! And the time after that was rough also with healing and crying and fighting and therapy and all of the aftermath of everything that happened. And this is exactly how I feel now. In fact, I told my therapist this tonight in different words. I like where I am right now. I like my life. I like who I am and who I have become and who I am continuing to become. I can finally breathe! And I did leave a life behind. The image of my life that I once thought I would lead is shattered. I never in all of my dreaming of my future pictured that I would be a widowed, single mother. I didn't think that I would ever be a statistic. But, even though I know that that life is gone, that image is gone, the relief that I now feel is overwhelming and there are times that I'm too relieved to grieve! So, let it go! Grieve and feel and deal with the pain, but then let it go! Because life awaits! The future awaits! Let it go!