Birthdays & Beginnings

Today was my fiance's birthday. The third year without him here. You always think it's going to get easier. And you never really have any clue how it's going to hit you. That's no mystery to me. I've been dealing with the milestone of my mom's birthday for over 20 years now since she died... and some years are just harder than others, for no real reason at all. I gave up long ago trying to understand the "why" of all this.

I feel like this 3rd birthday has been even harder than the 2nd without him. Maybe this is because it is the same amount of birthdays I shared WITH him... we only had 3 short years together. As I'm writing this, I'm thinking it has a lot to do with it. This officially kicks off the first of many milestones this year that are going to be even harder than last year, for that one reason. By June, I will officially be entering into having lived more time after his death than I actually had with him. It's heartbreaking, even now just thinking of it. And it's weighed so heavily on my heart today that I've scarcely even had words.

There were some highlights to the day. My mother-in-law and I went to get pedicures in the morning. Cute toes always make a day better. We did a little shopping and then had a blast out on the ranch ridiculously exploding a pink pony piñata - because sometimes you just need to blow some shit up. I will admit, that felt crazy good. And afterwards, my in-laws and I went out for a really nice dinner. There was a lot of good in the day actually, I have to admit that.

But still... under the surface has been that feeling of the lurking 3 year mark. And that's not the only new thing that's entering into my life right now either. Simultaneous to this whole 3 year milestone, I have also met someone.... new.

There has been wonder and joy and excitement again with this new person. And warmth and support and understanding. It has been so beautiful. He cracked a beer at midnight with me last night - just to celebrate Drew's birthday. He gets me. And I have laughed more in a few short months than I think I had in the entire past 2 1/2 years.

But there also days when I've just had to run off, and create distance from this new person, because being vulnerable feels too hard. And moments when I've been paralyzed by the fear that I will let this person matter so much, and then he will die too. There have been times when I've wanted nothing more than to fall into this new man's arms... And times when I have wanted nothing more than to fall into the arms of my fiancé again - not this new person - because that is truly where I feel the most safe. All of this, the great stuff and the hard stuff, its a lot to take in. To put it plainly, goddamn, this shit is just terrifying.

One of the worst aspects: I hate knowing that - for the rest of my life - I am going to have this fear of the person I am with dying on me. I really, really hate this. I miss the innocence of believing blindly that the odds were in my favor. Now, I know different... and I wish I didn't. I wish none of us did.

This post is really sort of a rambling mess, I didn't plan what to talk about or think through this at all. It's just whatever is going on in my head right now. I am confused, and a bit scared right now. About life. About death. About what lies ahead.

In a few months, I will be exactly as far away from his death as I was the day I met him... and I think this realization has been bubbling up under the surface for a while now. Well, I know it has, I've feared it since he first died. I still cannot even fathom hitting this landline of a mark in June. I cannot even fathom how difficult a time it is going to be... and how much I may regress back into my grief - which makes me want to distance and turn off from the world and be alone. And then I think of this new person, and how much I'd like him to keep being here, but also how scary it is to bring someone else into my world at a time when I may really need a lot of space. I'm confused, and sad tonight. And all I really want is to talk to my best friend, to tell him Happy Birthday, to talk about this new man with him, and to express how scary this year's milestones are going to be. God, why can't we just pick up the phone and call each other?

Where We Began

A big hello to everyone here at Soaring Spirits and Widow's Voice on my debut post. I'm incredibly honored and humbled to have been asked to join this team. I hope that we can help each other to feel heard, honored, and loved for exactly where we are in these years of tears. I've been a writer all my life in some form, but this is the first time I've ever written anywhere but my own pages. It means a great deal to me. So I thank you for reading! With that said, I will begin...

Last year, I was supposed to be standing at the altar – marrying my best friend. Instead, I was standing at that altar trying to tell a church full of loved ones who this man was in my life and what he had meant to me. Striving to articulate the sheer magnitude of this person was like trying to hold the all the world's oceans in my hands – an impossible task to ever fully contain him... and not something a twenty-nine year old woman should ever be faced with, or anyone for that matter. But there we were.

Drew and I met in Dallas in the fall of 2008. He was in flight school working toward his dream to be a commercial helicopter pilot. I was a web designer at the headquarters for a global fashion company. He was analytical, I was creative. He liked guns, flying, beer and war movies. I liked art, beauty, nature, writing… I was terrified of guns and hated war movies. On the surface, it sure seemed like we couldn't be more different, but underneath all that we shared deep passion and curiosity for life and a seriously goofy sense of humor. We both loved to learn, laugh and explore almost anything. I'd say that's a pretty good basis for the start of something awesome.

We became best friends over the course of the next year and in June of 2009, we started dating. As it turns out, all those differences are incredibly fun when you have two really curious people who love to explore anything new. He taught me how to shoot guns, build fires, and fly planes on the simulator. I taught him about design and how to look for beauty and art in everything around you. He introduced me to delicious dark beers and aerodynamics, to camping and Texas country music, and I took him to art museums and festivals and exposed him to incredible art he'd have never otherwise seen. There was skydiving, parasailing, hot air ballooning, race car driving and so much more. I was his first flight student – letting him practice his lesson plans each night with me while he worked toward his flight instructor certification. And of course.. he took me up for a few helicopter rides. These are by far some of the most special memories – watching him in his element – living his passion and sharing it with me. The war movies though… I never got on board there!

It wasn't always clear skies of course, but for 3 years, we built something strong and good together. There was always, above all else, an unspoken agreement from the beginning that we would be kind with each other's hearts. Neither of us had had a particularly sugar-coated life thus far, so we had our insecurities and issues. But somehow together, we never clashed. Instead we learned how to help each other to become more aware, heal some of the past, and choose new and better ways to cope with life's challenges. I have often said that it was as if I could see the little boy in him, the one that was good and pure and hadn't been hurt or made insecure by the world yet... and he could see that little girl in me, too. It was as though we grabbed the very core of each other and pulled it right to the surface where it could breathe. Together, we were more who we were always supposed to have been.  

It's amazing to look back and see how much impact just one person could have on my life in just three short years together. On any given day, I can look at myself and see a whole list of things about me that feel as though they've always been there... but they haven't. They were the things he brought out, the things he exposed me to and shared with me and taught me, the parts of myself that he saw and encouraged that no one ever had before. I cannot hardly imagine who I was before I met him. Before beer and western boots. Before a passion for flight, which he passed on to me. Before the camera he got me on my 27th birthday – and my love affair with photography that is still going strong today. Who was I then? Surely me, but so much more myself because of him. 

And then of course, it all ended. And everything… as you well know, changed. I changed. And that part, my newfound friends, is a story for next week. 

When words are not enough

source

This Saturday marks 3 years since Jeremy took his last breath.
How can that possibly be?

Every year, I am in awe of how crazy it seems that so much time has passed, and yet how far away it seems when so much life has been lived in between. I have truly experienced more in the past 3 years than most people do in a lifetime. Since Jer died, I've bought 2 houses, purchased a new vehicle, traveled all over the country, lost and gained friends, dated and remarried, blended a large family, moved out of state, had a baby without his daddy, and am preparing to have another child with another man. Surely these things couldn't possibly describe MY life...

And yet, no matter how much life has been lived since I've seen Jeremy, the weight of the hole he has left in my life is still so evident, and still a very painful reality I face daily. The last several weeks have been especially hard for me. Part of it is because I now grieve so far away from his family and friends, far away from the life I shared with him, and far away from where I can feel his presence. I feel so far removed. I ache to hold on to pieces of him during this season. Part of it also is from the fact that the closer I get to delivering, the more terrified I feel. Pregnancy hormones alone could do me in, but the sleepless nights remembering a piece of my grief that I never thought I'd have to face again is sometimes too much. My anxiety level is high, to say the least.

I was texting with a friend this weekend just about how crazy it is that it's already been 3 years. And I realized how much I ached just to talk to someone about it. To let it out. To have someone actually ask me. I confessed that it's been hard to feel like I have no outlet lately. She asked me if writing was no longer an outlet. I had to think about that for a minute....

Writing has always been my way of expressing emotion. Words are my ally and my weapon of choice. They help me sort through my own head when things don't make sense. And being able to write about my grief journey has brought me more healing than I could have ever imagined. But I found myself at a crossroads of guilt. Guilt for feeling like I couldn't talk about the depths of my pain without somehow sounding ungrateful for the life I have now and the blessings that come with it. And guilt for being too grateful for the life I have now and feeling like people think it means I'm just ok and don't need to talk about Jeremy anymore. I also just don't like feeling like I'm seeking out attention. Writing makes people think they know me and therefore the personal connections are lacking because they think they know where I'm at. They can watch from a distance.

The truth is that words sometimes are not enough. Most of the time, I really don't have much NEW to say. I've run out of ways to express how much I miss Jeremy, how much my heart longs for him, how hard it is to watch my kids grow up without knowing him.......it really never changes, just evolves. I want to scream from the top of my lungs just how much grief sucks still sometimes. I want the world to know what an incredible husband I have now, and that how deeply I cherish him has no impact on the amount of grief I have and will continue to carry through the rest of this life. I wish I could find the right words....words that connect with everyone. But like Janelle said, we can't reach everyone. All we can do is write what we know, what we are living.

I keep going back to an analogy I heard shortly after Jeremy died, I think in a book I read somewhere. It painted a picture of train tracks, one track representing grief and one representing joy: both running side by side on the same path. They both exist together.

This week, I don't have the right words. Just a jumbled mess of emotions that seem to represent my heart these days. My words are not enough. But just remembering to put one foot in front of the other is sometimes all I need to do.