#NanoPoblano2018 Day 18

Sunday Suspension of my Poblano Theme of “Personal Mottos” to do more of a free-write kind of thing.

I came across this woman’s story as I was browsing my news feed and it really hit me.  It hit me because it is also my story, in more ways than almost anyone knows. 

When Having No Family Affects Your Mental Health During the Holidays

To clarify, I do have family. I just don’t have people that have been in my life since I was a newborn that see who I am, get joy from my joy, spend time sitting and listening to my thoughts and feelings and are present with my life. That’s what I want. That’s what Christmas cannot give me.

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I grieve at the holidays. As much as I want to be in the moment and I try and try and try, there is a reality that I cannot put aside because it comes from a place of a real lack of attachment to a loving, empathetic family. It is a burden I carry on Mother’s Day, birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter — the times when we should be wrapped in goodwill and love. I can’t help but think of all the people out there that might insist I need to just “let it go.” Then I think of all the people that are in the same boat as me. We are two different worlds that will never collide.

When Having No Family Affects Your Mental Health During the Holidays

It brings up so many thoughts – thoughts that swirl around me like smoke and are difficult to grasp and hold on to.  There are so many things I wish I could share with this woman, because I have been in that boat she speaks of.  I know it well.

When I read her story though, it strikes me that she feels stuck in that boat, and I wish there was some way I could encourage her that she doesn’t have to live there.  Is it easy?  Oh hell no.  But it is doable. 

For me, I likened it to being a type of amputee.  A part of you is missing: it’s just gone and you can’t ever get it back, and you can’t replace it.  You can only move forward and try to adapt to and embrace a new normal, a new way of doing things, a new way of being.  In my mind, I pictured a 3-legged dog catching Frisbees, still playing and finding joy and doing what he loved to do even though he was missing an important part of himself.  I kept that image in my head through my darkest days, and even still, when those days come up. 

I don’t t know that there is ever a state of “healed,” but “healing” becomes a state of being.  It’s a process.  Some days, it can feel like a more difficult choice than other days, but you keep on, keeping on, right?  Personally, I try to add in a dash of, “living well is the best revenge.”  It helps.

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