Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Life Seems To Get In the Way...

Last year I posted that I was going to start to post more. Life just gets in the way sometimes. Over the past few months, a lot has happened in our lives. The biggest thing that has been the hardest to deal with is my dad's passing. Mom and I took care of him at home for a month. Dad passed away on December 12, 2011. Life just seems so empty without him here. I still have the urge to go ask him for advice about my car. Call him when there is something good happening. Wanting him to see me sing in church choir.

Christmas was hard without him here this year. It was his favorite holiday. He loved to listen to Christmas music and would often start to listen to it during the summer. I didn't even feel like doing anything for Christmas this year. We didn't put up a tree, we didn't exchange gifts...none of that seemed right this year. Darrin and I did go out to dinner with Mom, to the same restaurant that she and Dad would always go to on Christmas. Darrin and I went to Christmas Eve service and Christmas Day service at church. Other than that, we just stayed home and I finally picked up my knitting again. I had been working on a dishcloth the night that Dad passed and it stayed on the needles until Christmas Day, when I finally got up the courage to finish it. I know that seems silly, but it was just so hard to pick up those needles and start knitting again. I have finished about 40 dishcloths and have almost finished an afghan since then. I have also crocheted about 10 prayer squares for friends that I pray for and with.

Over the past year, I have kind of pushed my emotions aside. It was easier not to deal with them. Rather than deal with the passing of our 2 cats, I blocked those feelings so I could move on. It was horrible to do that, but I felt that I had to. Winters are always so horrible for us. Last year we lost 2 cats (Bandit and Sasha), and went to about 7 funerals. This year, our neighbor passed away about 2 weeks after my dad. All of the grief didn't hit me until about New Year's. It still hits me in waves. I will be fine one minute and crying the next. Sometimes a song triggers it. Sometimes it is a Bible passage. Sometimes it is a photo or a memory. These days, I just let those waves hit, and deal with it now rather than push it aside until later. Some days I am fine, then there are others where I am a sobbing mess and the slightest thing will make me cry. I will make it through this. It might take me a while, but I will make it through.

1 comment:

ann said...

I fully understand what your saying Alice. So cry when you feel the need to cry. It takes a long time to accept things like this . So hold on tight to those memories and let them live on in your life today....Ann