Normal

Not quite sure how to become this again. I am trying. I think I am a pretty good actress I guess. Life keeps me busy with kids, running errands, baking cakes, serving at church. I even manage to get out with friends once in a while, but all the while, and in all honesty, it feels like one big and very long performance. I am going through the motions. I am realizing that I do it to protect others. Isn't that funny? Pretending to be ok, pretending to be strong, so that others don't have to peek inside that place? To save them from the pain. It's nice of me, right? right. Grief seems like it's awkward for people who aren't grieving. Does that make sense? They feel badly for you, but don't really want to touch it or go there with you. I have noticed it is easier for people to avoid me now, than to talk to me because I guess they don't really know what to say. I feel like some are breathing a sigh of relief because it has been a month now, and surely Callie has moved on, surely the worst is over...surely I won't have to talk about it with her now. Thankfully, it's not everyone. I have some pretty amazing friends I must say, friends I don't feel the need to act for. Also, a pretty amazing husband that I can cry to, and talk for hours with. I guess I just feel it is easier to act like everything is fine, than to dwell on the pain. It hurts too much to go there. No one wants to feel pain if they don't have to...but, it comes anyway. I guess it never really goes away, and I guess it's just a part of me now. It's a whole new me - like it or not.

Perspective is an interesting thing. I have gained some for sure. At first, I thought this experience would help me gain compassion for people. To some extent it surely has, in other respects I have become less tolerable of people and their choices, mainly their poor choices. Losing a child blesses you with a much deeper appreciation for family and life. I struggle with judging others now when they complain about small things, or make poor moral choices. I struggle, because it's wrong of me to judge. I don't want to be this way. I guess I still have a lot more to learn about this "new" normal. In a sense, I feel like a new person, a very broken person, but new. So, it has been a balancing act. How do you stand up for what you believe in, for what you know, for what you have been shown, and still embrace and love those around you, who by their choices mock what is most sacred to you? How do you have charity with new eyes that see, but with a heart that is broken? How do I feel normal again?