Finding Balance Along the Path of Grief
Is it just me?
Or does widowhood feel like school sometimes? Autodidactic daily learning?
Today my self-led course is about balancing care for others with care for myself. Not a new course, but one of many lessons that keeps returning until I (quote) get it right?
Not sure.
Case in point. I did a yard sale this weekend (Yes…I hear the groans from those of you who know of this strange custom that some of us participate in).
Oddly (as I view it in the rear view mirror) I thought I would do this myself. I asked to borrow a few things, but did not create a team of helpers.
Why?
I think it is because I am reluctant to bother other people’s lives as willingly as I bother my own. This is a form of “not being able to ask for help.”
It snuck up on me this time. When my son arrived to help me put up the EZ-up he loaned me, I blurted out: “I can’t believe I thought I could do this sale alone!”
Perhaps I could have.
Done it alone, that is.
At the end of the two-day sale, I can say without any doubt: I could NOT have done this alone.
Which brings the next question . . .
. . . how did that fact evade me?
. . . how did I plan and prepare for 15 days and not realize that I was in over my head?
. . . what is this wishful thinking, or inflated belief, or blindness to the facts on the ground?
. . . and how did my consciousness only wake to the facts on the morning of the yard sale?
I don’t know.
In the fashion of a blessed miracle, my son got on the Sibling Bat Phone and reported to his siblings that help was needed. Three more adult-children arrived with cheerfulness and generosity and the sale began at 7am, right on time.
As the day unfolded, it shocked me again and again that I missed recognizing the most important ingredient: a team.
The number one suspect is the part of me (especially with my children) that doesn’t want to bother anyone with the wild ideas that come to me now and again.
It feels shocking to write that when this is something I have been consciously working on! For some months! How in the world could it have snuck up on me?
Yet it did.
Self care in this moment appears as I give myself space to be human (again!) and not diss myself repeatedly. I did confess to my kiddos —You saved my life!
They were gracious.
I felt embarrassed.
Everything worked out fine.
I landed smack-dab on a happy place feeling grateful to remember I am a human – perfectly imperfect. A human who is making her way each day the best she can.
I’m a perfectly imperfect human, learning from life, learning from grief, and so, so grateful.
