Trilogy Or A Library?

A Trilogy Or A Library?

There are many and varied ways one gets to the point in their lives that we call today. I woke this morning looking over my life, not the whole of the 63 years but the last 20. I can honestly say that what I am feeling is not anxiety at the things I know we are facing this month and the months to come. But I can honestly say that I am emotionally concerned and that concern has effected by sense of calm.

As is my habit and source of seeing things in a more real and collected place. I write. 

This morning I lay in my bed going over the reams of stored memories that has brought us to this place in our lives. I am sure this thought and review process was triggered by the upcoming knee surgery that Dennis is looking at.

Sometime in all of our lives we have to stop and assess where we are and how we came to be here. Looking through the eye of our memories that represent real time situations, we look at the pieces that have made up the puzzle of our lives to this point.

My puzzle is 63 years constructed, not yet completed. Only God knows the exact time the last piece will be snapped into place and I will leave this location for a better one. Until then the pieces will continue to be laid. 

Hopefully today I can step back and look at the last 20 years of construction and more clearly see the progress in the intended picture on the box lid in the Master’s hands.

My mind this morning began to take me to various places, scattered thoughts and memories, some here in the present and others that happened at various times in the last 20 years. 

So much of my now life is so intertwined in the last 16 years of my life that to unravel it would leave me not only a broken stringy mess, but lying in scattered pieces that may never be recovered. Those same events and memories also hold a wealth of joy, accomplishment, progress, success and various bits of wisdom learned along the way. 

My intended goal is to unravel the things that have disconnected me from the whole of who I am. The whole of me, spirit, soul and body connected and intertwined in a way that no matter the events of today or the days to come. My strand in life is strong and secure. 

This mornings main topic of emotional stress started with the upcoming surgery my husband is scheduled for in two weeks. As minds and memories are wired to do, mine began to download and propel me to many and various places that seemingly had no connection to the present. 

Or, did they? 

Looking at the age of my husband and the possibilities that any surgery forces you to look at, swinging from the totally worst to the length of his recovery, any complications etc. I was caught on a ride that has taken my mind at warp speed into the unknown possibilities of our future. The mind is a very dangerous place! It is sometimes hardwired in a manner that at the speed of lightning, takes you to many and various terror filled outcomes.

Sometimes it takes me a few minutes to realize that I and only I am in the drivers seat of this warp speed, emotionally fueled vehicle that is propelling me through life. 

Casting down thoughts and imaginations can sometimes be like driving through a corn field on a bicycle. There are no roads or trails that protect you from the reach of the corn stalks slapping you in the face and grabbing at your body as you propel this bicycle through a location that was not intended to accommodate a leisurely ride. The bicycle was not designed to be ridden through a corn field. There is nothing to encase you and protect you as you maneuver toward your choose distention. The narrowness of the design allows for riding in more narrow spaces. But gives no surrounded protection if you bump into the hard things lining those narrow spaces. By design a one man machine. Leaving no place to take the companionship, support or comfort of another along to share the experience. 

Just as a bicycle was not mainly intended to be ridden through a cornfield. My thoughts and emotions were not intended to be placed on a two wheeled, self propelled vehicle and driven through rows and rows of growing anxious emotions. 

Casting down thoughts and imaginations is hard work. Much like the hard work of riding a bike in a corn field.

The overwhelming emotions and thoughts that had flooded my waking moments, had taken me under the waters of emotional dread. Fighting to reach the surface and take a deep breath of the air of His Presence, inside my head I kicked off the bottom of the deep pool trying to weigh me to the depths of despair. I look upwards and began to glide through the waters toward the light. Each time I kicked my feet and used my arms to pull on the waters of thoughts and imaginations, I moved upwards toward the surface where the light was shining. Waiting to fill my weighty truth starved lungs, with a fresh breath of the reality that the air I need to breath is just above the waters of doubt that are pulling to hold me here.

As I emerged from this deluge of flooding emotions. Just above the surface was my precious son. Sitting in the kitchen, eating breakfast, preparing for his day of college classes, filled with expectation of the knowledge exchanged by others to propel him towards his goal of becoming a police officer. Little did he know that he was about to get a preview of one of his many and varied opportunities as a servant of the people to serve his mother. 

I drenched in the flood waters of my emotional plunge, ask him to hold me. Just hold me. I have never ask him to comfort me. Never in his almost 18 years have I gone to him for comfort. I as his mom have always been the arms that were available to comforted him. He looked at me in puzzlement and confusion. This was a whole new place he had not been exposed to in his short life.

I am not one who ask others for comfort or support. I am not too proud to ask, I have mostly always flew into the arms of The Father, gone to the place of prayer and scriptures to reassure myself that this present flood was temporary and He could be used to float upon until the waters receded. 

Today I was at a new place. Yes, I knew that this threat of a deluge of possibilities of a not so good outcome with the upcoming surgery for Dennis. Were just that a threat. But today I needed arms, human arms to hold me and allow me to expel the water in my emotional lungs. Water of emotions that I had inhaled when I was thrown into the deep end of the emotional pool. 

Gage was the side of the pool I could hold on to and allow for the release of the fear and dread that had tried to drown me. Allowing me to release the fear of an almost drowning. My precious 17 year old son held me. Just held me. Asking what was wrong, but not panicked. Patiently allowing me to recover from the sobs that I could finally release. Sobs that were necessary to the progress of a healthy recovery. I allowed myself to expel the choking inhaled flood of lies and emotions that had tried to take my breath away. Although there were many truths and facts involved in the flood of thoughts and emotions that had over taken me. The physical arms of my son. Gave me a place to find comfort and the courage to share a bit of what had tried to drown me. 

As parents we have to navigate the parent child relationship. Some of us may do it with smooth sailing and move fluidly from one stage of your children lives to another. Some of us feel we are in a row boat without paddles. Today i realized that my son was not just the child I have raised, but the young adult that loves me and wants to share my journey. Even the real hard, ugly parts.

Gage is the last of the second batch of children we have been so blessed to raise. He along with his brother Ryan and sister Erin have grown up in our home. I did not birth them from my womb, I birthed them from my heart. They are my adopted, on purpose, chosen children. 

We have raised them through lives being steeped in the details of a drug addicted mother, the death of one father, our son. The denial of parentage of another, and the abandonment and loss of parental rights of the third. We have fought for them to stay together and be raised as siblings in the same household, by the same parents, us! 

Erin and Ryan have already left the nest but Gage is my fledgling, gaining new feathers and strength to fly off the edge of the nest and soar into his own destiny. I didn’t experience empty nest syndrome with my two biological children leaving home. I was at a much different place in my life and rejoiced and participated in the transfer of belongings to a new address but never felt that I was being left behind. 

We had a vision and prospective plan for the next stage of our lives and marriage. That vision was totally placed in a deleted file when we became surprise parents again.

My waking up with their father's upcoming surgery on my mind. Added to the many and varied emotions of the possibility of Gage moving out soon and yes, fears of what Gage is heading toward, with his career choices. Plunged me into the deep end of the emotional pool. And as those who know me are aware of I don’t get in water that I can’t reach the bottom. Never learning to swim until I was an adult, and being self taught. I have never developed my swimming abilities to the place of feeling safe and secure in any depth of waters.

I can reason out that all the many, varied and vast collection of possibilities of the out come of my husbands knee surgery, and my sons career choice are not things that I am right now presently having to contend with. But I also can admit that thinking and reasoning out the many varied and vast collection of possibilities is a normal part of the life we live in this flesh suit. Looking to the future and making decision that will make the future event less stressful for us all.

My journey to be whole spirit, soul, and body is ongoing, daily bringing new things to light. Things that I have stacked or hidden away in the closet of my memories. I have been too busy to sort them. With the daily task of raising children and trying to give them the best and safest life we could possibly give them. We have placed things into closets and rooms of our emotional self and closed the door. I no longer want to have those rooms and closets cluttered with the cast offs of times and seasons gone by. It is time to clean house, spiritually, emotionally, and physically. 

Today I was overwhelmed with the massive amount of work and clutter I have accumulated in the closet of my mind. Little things deposited away out of sight. Collecting and filling the space needed to function peacefully on a daily basis with the discarded thoughts, feelings, and emotions of seeing my last child preparing to leave the nest. I have worked diligently in the past 5 years to clean the emotional hoarded house that was a result of the death of our son and the acquiring of his children to raise. I did not realize that I have returned to the habit of putting things down with the promise of returning to put them away, only to discover that they had accumulated and now resembled the hoard that had occupied most of my emotional house previously. 

In this emotional closet I am having to take out and examine each tossed thought and decide if it still fits or is useful in the new stage of my life. I have always felt that being a wife and mother was the highest call I could answer. This was in fact my career choice. Being an ordained minister, x-ray technician, chiropractic assistant, a welder, cashier, drapery seamstress, telemarketer, and babysitter are all jobs that I have done. But being a wife and mother has been who I am!

For the last 16 years I have lost my position and identity as wife. Because of the lack of skill in being able to focus on raising a new batch of babies and maintaining the intense needs of being a wife and companion to my husband. Our marriage suffered. For a season we lost the closeness and communication that is the life blood of any relationship. 

Dennis and I both have been working to regain that communication that will result in a greater experience of closeness. Bringing back a level of security in our relationship that has suffered while we focused on the daily task of raising children.

Our individual relationships with The Father have grown and through that growth we are discovering a new place that is marriage for seniors. LOL The expectations we have placed on what this Senior Marriage should look like have been focusing on the past picture and experience that our Youth Marriage was. It is much like keeping an old favorite shirt, rediscovering it and being shocked that it is now several sizes too small. 

The past relationship we had, has grown up. It has changed. We have changed. Individually we have moved through these past years more separate from one another. We divided our time and effort on tasks and duties that took us in different directions to be able to meet the many and varied needs of the children we were raising. We lost us, and became, Sharon doing what she needed to do, and Dennis doing what he needed to do. We were too exhausted and wounded from the losses we had endured to stop and take the much needed time to communicate to one another the sorrow, fear and dread we were experiencing. We thought we were protecting the other one, by not adding to their grief the insecurities of our present state of being. 

When in fact we were adrift in two little life boats. The storm of life was taking us in different directions and all we could see were the things in our own little life boats. Occasionally, I would look up and see that Dennis was at a distance moving in a direction that was taking him further from where I was. I would call out for him to wait or to paddle toward me. Or I would paddle furiously to try to get to where he was only to find that he was paddling away as I was trying to reach him. He wasn’t running from me he actually thought I was right their close behind. His focus was fixed on the daunting task of providing for three new human beings. Trying to make us happy and above all keep them safe in his little life boat. He couldn’t stop his son from dying, so he would be more diligent to keep these precious babies close and safe.  

I don’t think we even realized that we had landed in separate life boats. We both wanted the same thing. To make sure these children had a safe and happy life. We needed to protect them at all costs. We just didn’t know at the time it would cost us everything. It has been well worth the price but littered with many choices that would cause us to grow apart. 

I felt that he had placed me in another boat, because there wasn’t room for me in his. He thought I was tied securely behind him. All I wanted was to be in the same boat, together, crowded if necessary, but all together as one family. We were having to find out what this second family thing would look like. He thought using the same things we had in raising the first would be just fine for the here and now. I knew that this was a totally separate assignment and that we would need detailed instructions to navigate this journey so as to reach our destination together, alive and well. 

Dennis is an amazing provider and implementor. His focus and driving force is his need and ability to make the money and acquire the things that I and his family need. He will make it happen no matter what. I am more focused on the spiritual, emotional and psychological effects life events are having or may have on us as individuals and as a collective family. 

I am not right and he is wrong. Together we make up most of what is needed to be a sound and productive individual in this life. The problem is communication. We assume that the other one understands and agrees on where we are coming from, when actually we are floating in two different directions. 

We are working vey hard on taking what we have recently discovered and reworking it to build a vessel that will allow for our individualities while not leaving the other behind in our quest to get to the land of our promise. 

It’s ok to be different. I am finding that it is even ok to be in separate boats. The key is to alter the two designs in a manner that they join one another and can be detached when and if the other one needs to separate and sail out to acquire what is needed to sustain us as a family. His difference is not leaving me forever. His difference is going out to provide and bring back much needed provision to enhance and sustain the quality of life we both desire. 

The fuel that allows us to function as one, but separate in marriage is communication. If he leaves (not necessarily physically but emotionally) for a period of time to go and get provisions or seek our intervention and doesn’t communicate that he is just going for a short time. I can panic that something has happened to him. That he no longer wants me and has abandoned me and his responsibilities to the family. My emotions and feelings will escalate and anxiety will send me into a panic attack. When he returns and dismisses my emotional responses. It deepens my retreat into the self protective place where I become numb to him and shut him out of my life. He thinking I am too emotional and needy will go to his self proactive place and shut me out of his life. 

When what we really need is to just share through the very important tool of communication what we individually are feeling. We need to learn to listen and not be defensive.

If I don’t listen and really hear where he is coming from and acknowledge his position then I am paddling away from him. If I don’t share the truth of my own feelings and reasons for feeling that way then I am paddling away from him. Even if he refuses to share his truth and feelings with me. I need to try to see him through his eyes and to try to adjust to this man from his perspective. I am not saying that I just have to suck it up and be the one who always changes or lets go of my truth perspective. I am saying that we are having to navigate this new water, in new vessels, with our eyes not only on my own boat but on his as well. Stay intentionally close and attached to one another and collectively deciding which direction we are going in. If one needs to go in another direction for a time. We are having to stop and relearn how to not just take off because I am in my own life boat and can. But have a conversation with one another so the other one is secure in the knowledge that we are not leaving them or the marriage.

I don’t know, maybe a better analogy of marriage is conjoined twins. We are not taught how to be married. We enter marriage in separate individual boats. Expecting the other one to get in our boat at the altar when we say I do. The scripture tells us to leave father and mother and to become one flesh. 

Functioning as one, seems to require being joined in a manner that we share vital parts. Much like conjoined twins share vital parts. Some conjoined twins can be separated and function as individuals. Others loose a limb they shared. Some conjoined twins are so joined that they cannot survive without the other. One set of conjoined twins, Abby and Brittany Hensel, would not survive if separated or even if one dies. They had a reality TV show years ago. They were lovely. It was so uplifting to watch as they navigated life. Learning to drive a car, ride a bicycle, study for tests. They share one body with two heads and fully functioning brains, but they think and reason as separate individuals.

Dennis and I are working on how to be joined, attached to one another and function through compromise, and communication. Always attached going in the same direction even if one of us is not so sure they want to go there. Agreeing and compromising for the greater ability to function and move ahead with life.

Sadly it has taken a lot of years for me to realize that the reality of the first 20 years of marriage and the success we had was, just that... past success. Raising our two biological children and seeing them leave home, have relationships, marry, and have children was all a part of a series of books on our life and not just one large volume that was our story. 

Heath’s death and getting his children to raise was the first chapter of the second volume. Gage growing up and attending college and being the last one to leave the nest has forced me to write the ending to this volume. 

Oh, the story has not ended. The next book that I will be writing will come from my daily experiences with my family. A family that has now grown up and is causing me to experience a different life view. They are not my babies anymore they are wonderful young adults, healthy, happy, capable and successful.They will always be my children and I their mother. They aren’t big names that everyone would know but they are stars in mine and their Papa’s eyes. 

I am not sure if this will be a trilogy or a whole library. What I am sure of is that it is real and I have experienced every moment of everyday and year. My only desire has been to make it the best life for my husband and children that was humanly possible. 

If you know us, depending on which stage of life you have known us in. You have read or are reading the volumes that are written of who we are and how we got here. I am not speaking of actually published books. But the books of our lives. Written and read by those who encounter and know us. Many of whom are written of in these books of our life.

I am reluctantly bringing to a stopping point the second book of child raising and moving on even as I finish this one. To the collecting of material that will make up the next volume. Expecting at some point to write about their husbands, wives and children! On the day they give birth to a child I will become not only grandmother, but a great grand mother! Double portion in manifestation.  

I have to say that the first book of 20 years was a more joyous and upbeat story. The second 20 years was more of a tragedy. As in most tragedies the foundation is love. The structure built on love experiences many storms, trials, and tribulations. Sprinkled with many and varied levels of hope, peace and trust. The ending most always is filled with the many lessons learned and the gold mined from the blasting process to get to the bedrock of truth.

I lived the first 20 years with the veil of illusion firmly over my eyes. Desiring only to produce the imagined image of a good marriage and a happy healthy family. My faith in that illusion manifest and we succeeded in having the marriage and family we had dreamed of.

I lived the second 20 years with the veil of grief over my eyes. Desiring still only to produce a good marriage and a happy healthy family. My faith through that veil of grief has also produced a manifestation. The difference is the emotions have been more driven by loss. By the grace of God and the deep seated desire to find and live in truth. We have succeeded in having a family that is happy and healthy. 

The marriage relationship has been wounded inflicted with a chronic lack of communication. 

I am happy to report that a diagnosis has been found, a plan of treatment agreed upon, and we are taking the prescribed medicine of the Word of God, regularly visiting with Holy Spirit the great councilor, exercising our will to choose, and seeing the Great Physician on a regular bases. 

I have put aside my sack cloth and have washed in the water of His Words, put on the garment of praise and I am clothed with the knowledge that He is with me to lead and guide me into all truth. Even the truth I don’t want to hear. 

There are many others out there that their stories are much like ours. Sharing my perspective of the truth of my journey is not the end all or the solution for everyone. It is only intended to be a real, naked narrative of what reality can look like. It is one example of the hundreds and thousands of times my God has come through for me. 

Dennis and I are determined to find the place we truly belong in each other lives. The place that we cannot live happily without the attachment of the other one. We are not conjoined by birth, or marriage as conjoined twins are joined. We are separate individuals, with separate bodies, minds, emotions, dreams, desires and wills. We are choosing to renew our Youth Marriage and take new covenant with each other in this Senior Marriage stage. Hopefully we have gained some hindsight and wisdom along the way. 

Maybe through our willingness to be open and naked someone who is ready to give up on their life, marriage, or children will find hope. We have not arrived but we are on the right road. We are learning to stop looking for the familiar on a road we have never been on before. 

I have gotten out of the corn field on my bicycle, found the road, driven to the dealership and purchased a more suitable vehicle for the journey. I am still discovering all the bells and whistles on this one, it comes with a Holy Spirt navigation system, a manufactures handbook, if I will take the time to read it, trust and follow the directions! We will arrive safely, full of joyful stories and experiences along with way.

At this point in my day I have to pause my writing to allow for a service tech to update our Dish services. Kiss my son as he goes out the door for another day of gaining knowledge that will get him one step closer to his dream of being a police detective. 

My heart is full of peace and joy. My near drowning forgotten and my future securely in focus. Today two sets of arms held me My Heavenly Father and my earthly son! I among women am most blessed!