Saturday, May 1, 2010

Sleep would be wonderful

It's the one month anniversary of Hubby's funeral.
Today, we'll be putting his ashes to rest.
I thought I'd be okay with this, but no, my heart and my brain are both battling against my soul. I know it's going to take a LONG time to get through this. And it really has helped to have this month in between such major steps. I just hate feeling so fragile. Everybody keeps telling me that I'm such a strong woman. Well, yes, I am. But this has just been such a hard journey from the get go.

What many of you may not be aware of, is that this is also the anniversary of the day it all started to go down hill. May 1, 2009 is when Jim got a phone call telling him that his lab results were back and his red blood cell count was ridiculously low again, and that he'd best get in for a transfusion pronto. From there, it was the crazy journey of dealing with being way under-insured, knowing that no matter what, we had to dive in and do this. But at least a year ago there was still hope.

I remember being so upset with him. Not because of the financial crisis we were heading for, but because Hubby always had a habit of pulling back from me when he was sick because he didn't want to be a burden to me. And for me, this really hurt and frustrated me. It took forever to get it through his head that no matter what, we were in this together and I would gladly care for him no matter what it took.

And in caring for him through this journey, it gave the love I had for him a lot of texture. It actually helped me to find so many new ways to love him even more than I already did.
Jim was such a good man. I never realized just how much he did to take care of me. I always thought it was the other way around. And my main concern was that we were both giving The Child the care that HE needed. And Jim was the ultimate loving father. He never talked to Andy or Jerry like they were kids. He talked to them like they were highly intelligent adults. It was a beautiful thing to witness.

I don't get much restful sleep these days. The meds no longer do the trick, and I'll be damned if I want to be on something "more permanent" to get through this. I know it's my brain working through all of the "What If's". And my brain really does need to do that. I've always been a puzzle solver. That's how I approach life, and every problem within it. And my brain just can't accept the fact that it couldn't solve this puzzle called cancer. This puzzle called losing the love of your life in a slow, painful way. When this all started, I remember saying "We're too young for this! Maybe if it happened 10 years from now we'd be more ready to deal with it, but we're not in that mindset yet." But that's life. We're never really ready for anything it throws at us.

But maybe it's good that I woke up crying today. I was too stunned and overwhelmed at his funeral to cry. I've never really been one for public crying. I much prefer to stand by my dryer and purge. I'm surprised there's any finish left on that dryer these days.

So... I've spent enough time feeling sorry for myself today. Time to put on my battle uniform and face the world.

2 comments:

Shayla said...

That is one bad-ass battle uniform!

Aunt Evolity said...

Hubby made this drawing of me about 2 years ago. So he musta thought that I am one Bad Ass Warrior! Can't let him down, now, can I?