Journal entry by Melanie Edwards —
Almost five months since Mark's passing. I have been going over my posts and rereading the comments now that I am better able to absorb them. Thank-you again for your encouraging words. I particularly was looking for the posts on our honeymoon. I was so sure that I had finished that story but I find that I am left standing in the store while Mark goes to get his wallet. Yet it is so clear in my mind writing the ending. Did I just dream it? I find this inability to remember so challenging and frustrating. Did I post it on FaceBook? I doubt it but nothing is sure.
How am I doing? I have been posting some on Face Book with the events of the last few months and a few deeper thoughts but mostly it is about the surface things. It is easy to write about gardening, and cats, and friends. It is harder to write about the ebb and flow of grief that colors my days. And it is not just grief. It is a roller coaster of a ride of discovery as to who I am as an individual, no longer part of a couple. It is the process of becoming complete in myself again but what does that mean? The underlying emotion of the last couple of months is one of lostness, trying to rediscover me. My life no longer revolves around the presence of another person, their needs and desires or their occupation. To say the least, it is very strange as I got married at twenty before I really understood myself. It has been a long time since I was an individual. When I introduced myself, it was usually as Mark's wife, or pastor's wife, rarely as just me. And now???
Tomorrow school starts and I will be helping Becky three afternoons a week to home school Caleb and Maddie. One day a week I am hoping to go to Chris' to help out there a bit as well. I am looking forward to that. It is exciting to be teaching again. It will give some structure and purpose to my days. I have a keen sense that my days are numbered and I want to do something of value. What that is I don't yet know. Hopefully these coming months of teaching, fall chores, bit by bit reorganizing my house for new endeavors will peel back the layers of habit and dead wood revealing the reawakened me for my third and final act.
The brain fog of the early days is mostly gone although I still do struggle with decision fatigue. The shock has definitely worn off making these days more challenging in some ways than the earlier ones. The permanence of the loss is beginning to settle in. I see our lives together with a clarity that was missing before. I wonder how we drifted so far with neither of us urging us back into less stagnant waters.
The stress of Mark's health crises over the last three years is just being realized and acknowledged. My body and mind are slowly returning to a calmer more healthy place. If you had asked me, "Are you stressed, or upset?" I would have said. "No," and firmly believed it. However I now know that to be inaccurate. I am not sure stress is the right word but I can't think of a better one. My blood pressure that was steadily climbing has returned to normal. With a few exceptions, my erratic sleep patterns are back to normal. My comfort eating is slowly declining although slowly is the operative word.
Honestly I also know that some of what I am feeling and experiencing has nothing to do with Mark's death but instead is connected to the drastic changes in society because of COVID-19, racism, and the distressing riots and poisonous political rhetoric and their vindictive actions. However it is often impossible to separate where one ends and the other begins.
How do you measure, "How are you doing?" How do I answer that question?
Materially I have a lovely house, a fruitful vegetable garden with gorgeous flower beds and three meals a day. I am not cold, or wet, or hungry therefore I am rich.
Emotionally many days the tears come and go. I feel lost. Many days are challenging. I ache on my insides in a way that is new for me and hard to describe therefore I am struggling.
Family has been loving and supportive. Not only my children but my siblings and sister-in-law have sympathetically listened to me whine and whale over the phone whatever the hour therefore I am blessed to have intimate family relationships.
Friends have struggled to know how to help but a few have conquered their fears of saying or doing the wrong thing and waded into my turbulent waters and walked beside me during these uncertain days. Many have prayed for me. Others have stopped by for a visit, brightening my days therefore I am not alone.
Physically my health is improving therefore I am well.
The antics of my cats amuse me therefore I am happy.
How am I doing? I am a little bit of everything and not a lot of anything but I am okay.
How am I doing? I have been posting some on Face Book with the events of the last few months and a few deeper thoughts but mostly it is about the surface things. It is easy to write about gardening, and cats, and friends. It is harder to write about the ebb and flow of grief that colors my days. And it is not just grief. It is a roller coaster of a ride of discovery as to who I am as an individual, no longer part of a couple. It is the process of becoming complete in myself again but what does that mean? The underlying emotion of the last couple of months is one of lostness, trying to rediscover me. My life no longer revolves around the presence of another person, their needs and desires or their occupation. To say the least, it is very strange as I got married at twenty before I really understood myself. It has been a long time since I was an individual. When I introduced myself, it was usually as Mark's wife, or pastor's wife, rarely as just me. And now???
Tomorrow school starts and I will be helping Becky three afternoons a week to home school Caleb and Maddie. One day a week I am hoping to go to Chris' to help out there a bit as well. I am looking forward to that. It is exciting to be teaching again. It will give some structure and purpose to my days. I have a keen sense that my days are numbered and I want to do something of value. What that is I don't yet know. Hopefully these coming months of teaching, fall chores, bit by bit reorganizing my house for new endeavors will peel back the layers of habit and dead wood revealing the reawakened me for my third and final act.
The brain fog of the early days is mostly gone although I still do struggle with decision fatigue. The shock has definitely worn off making these days more challenging in some ways than the earlier ones. The permanence of the loss is beginning to settle in. I see our lives together with a clarity that was missing before. I wonder how we drifted so far with neither of us urging us back into less stagnant waters.
The stress of Mark's health crises over the last three years is just being realized and acknowledged. My body and mind are slowly returning to a calmer more healthy place. If you had asked me, "Are you stressed, or upset?" I would have said. "No," and firmly believed it. However I now know that to be inaccurate. I am not sure stress is the right word but I can't think of a better one. My blood pressure that was steadily climbing has returned to normal. With a few exceptions, my erratic sleep patterns are back to normal. My comfort eating is slowly declining although slowly is the operative word.
Honestly I also know that some of what I am feeling and experiencing has nothing to do with Mark's death but instead is connected to the drastic changes in society because of COVID-19, racism, and the distressing riots and poisonous political rhetoric and their vindictive actions. However it is often impossible to separate where one ends and the other begins.
How do you measure, "How are you doing?" How do I answer that question?
Materially I have a lovely house, a fruitful vegetable garden with gorgeous flower beds and three meals a day. I am not cold, or wet, or hungry therefore I am rich.
Emotionally many days the tears come and go. I feel lost. Many days are challenging. I ache on my insides in a way that is new for me and hard to describe therefore I am struggling.
Family has been loving and supportive. Not only my children but my siblings and sister-in-law have sympathetically listened to me whine and whale over the phone whatever the hour therefore I am blessed to have intimate family relationships.
Friends have struggled to know how to help but a few have conquered their fears of saying or doing the wrong thing and waded into my turbulent waters and walked beside me during these uncertain days. Many have prayed for me. Others have stopped by for a visit, brightening my days therefore I am not alone.
Physically my health is improving therefore I am well.
The antics of my cats amuse me therefore I am happy.
How am I doing? I am a little bit of everything and not a lot of anything but I am okay.
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