Is exhausting.
i found the thread I started a few years ago. I didn’t add on to it because it’s too long, but it’s the one on “becoming authentic”
this year is a roller coaster.
Joy - my dd1 is going to have a baby in July.
and pain - can’t share much, but there have been two dead young people in my life this year, three youth suicide attempts, and a mental health crisis that has a family I love facing a murder trial.
and many small things on both sides.
i have learned that loving like you’ll never be hurt hurts pretty much constantly. And that I know no other way to love.
i have learned that I believe in redemption. And mercy and grace.
i have lost the energy or patience to judge, care, or argue about small things.
my definition of “small things” has expanded exponentially.
I am doing a lot of re-examining of what matters in my life from a clean slate perspective (if this were someone else’s life and was stepping into it with full power to edit, would I choose this?) and letting go if the weight of previous decisions (for example decoupling the garden from good years and bad years, successes, failures, and expectations and simply looking at it as a piece of yard and deciding what, if anything, I want to do with it this year. Just this year. - sometimes and some decisions, just today.)
i still love my job, and it still brings me small joys every day. I look for them harder now. I may cut back my hours next year however because I will have my grandchild one day a week. (The day I already don’t work) I have left my schedule in the hands of my boss - I gave her my class options list for next year and a request for a full day off if she can fit my core classes into three days. 2nd choice is four full days which would actually be a schedule increase. We had a conversation about why something in between is the worst option.
i am doing more with my pottery. I have made more connections through that in the local community and may add soap to my repertoire. I am not sure how I feel about my local community or being more visible in it
Dh is in charge of dinner. Full stop.
I have gained a significant amount of weight and dislike my body from a functional standpoint. But when I get to the end of the day I am wrung out, and dh brings me comfort on a plate and I eat too much. And I don’t exercise enough because I put too much of my energy in other places. And joint pain. I need to stop and look at this one because there is a lot more to unpack in it.
i am still fighting depression.
I have realized I have very few people I trust to help me carry the things in my life that are too heavy for me. And the idea of sharing that weight with most of them is unbearable.
Lately I get up every day open to the possibility of the best possible outcome but expecting that I will get the opposite. Someone recently called me an optimist, and I responded that it is less about believing that everything will work out and more about learning to be pleasantly surprised that I am not dead.
Reply With Quote
