Tag: CRC

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Traveling 🧳 Light 

I’ve been counseled by another widow through a mutual friend that I need to make this “The Year of Yes.” (Not to be confused with the Shonda Rhimes book, though I read it, & it is fabulous!) I was told this advice was essential because I wouldn’t feel like doing anything for quite a while, but if I gave into those feelings of no, I would find myself even sadder and even more alone. 😢

Her advice has been a real compass to me as I navigate the dark & uncertain terrain of widowhood. 

  • Want to go for a walk?  Yes! 
  • Want to meet for lunch? Yes! 
  • Want to see some music? Yes! 

And so, when 4 of my best girlfriends strongly suggested that I could now join them on ‘the girls trip to Napa,’ because, sadly, I was no longer a “care-partner,” I said “Yes!” I cashed in on frequent flyer miles, & packed 2 heavy carry-ons. Heavy with the layers you need in Northern California & heavy with my own grief & tears. Was I looking forward to a big raging girl’s weekend? No. Did I worry I might be the wet blanket to everyone’s good time? Yes. Did I go anyway? Yes!

Honestly, I was waffling on this particular yes, but I realized that if you don’t invest in your friendships, you’ll lose your friendships, and I have learned that I need these women in my life.

Case in point: When @ 6:50 AM on Tuesday, July 19, I texted these ladies in our everyday group chat, “He’s gone.” I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that two of these women were in my house BEFORE the hospice nurse arrived 45 minutes later, & another one was in route from Atlanta, before the nurse started dissolving all the remaining Oxy in the house. In fact, when the nurse did arrive, she came up to me, still standing @ the foot of Jamey’s hospital bed stupefied & in shock, and told me she needed to speak with my mother. Me, not really comprehending what was being said, was just like, “Um, why do you need to speak to my mother?” It was one of these fierce ladies who interrupted & said, “She IS the mother!”

So, like I said, I need these women, so off I went to Cali. And while I admit I wasn’t really all that jazzed about the trip, it was sooooo, soooo good for me, and I am so, so glad I went.

Did I cry? Absolutely.

Did my heart hurt 💔 when I realized that I had no one to call or text to tell that I landed safely? For sure. Was it bittersweet to dine in an Iron Chef restaurant, a show that Jamey and I watched together since I was pregnant with Halli, Morimoto’s, in Napa, without even being able to tell Jamey about it? Oh my goodness, yes.

And it was even more bittersweet when through a series of uncanny events an old college roommate, not mine, turned Stage Manager to Bonnie herself, and unexpectedly gifted us four tickets to her show that night where she covered two John Prine songs that Jamey loved. (We 4 were also fans of the INXS cover she did, but that’s not really a part of this story. 😂) So yes, there was a lot of bitter, but there was also a lot of sweet. 

Namely the laughter, the blessed, sweet laughter! The laughter slipped in between all the things, all the raindrops, all the chilly temps on Sunday, & most definitely through the sunshine on Monday. And though I know I’ll grieve the loss of Jamey every day for the rest of my life, I was reminded on this trip, that there is still joy to be had in this 🌎world. And so though I picked up a few souvenirs & squished them into my bags, not only did they divinely feel lighter, so too did my heart. 

“The Lord is close to the broken-hearted & saves those who are crushed in spirit.” Psalm 34:18

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Diagnosis Anniversary

A year ago today, my world 🌎 cracked and the sharp edge of cancer pierced me  straight to the core of my soul. A year ago today, the doctor called us back in for a consultation after having had an MRI @ 8:00 AM, a consultation we weren’t supposed to have for another five days. 

I remember driving down hwy 280 white knuckling the steering wheel, knowing the worst was about to come. I remember praying feverishly in my head for God to give me strength & perseverance to face what we feared the most, already knowing Jamey had a cancerous tumor, but not yet knowing the severity. I remember hearing the words “Stage 4,” “time to get your affairs in order, “a year to live.” (Side note: we only got another 10 months, not 12.)

I remember hearing someone wailing “No! This can’t be! I can’t live without Jamey.” I remember realizing the wailing was coming from me. Meanwhile Jamey, ever stoic, ever calm, literally even in the face of death, merely sat stupefied, & asked for some time to sit outside. Together we walked outside; we passed the fountains, the people, & he led us to a shady spot facing away from the hospital, away from the news. I sat behind Jamey & wrapped my arms and legs around him, head on his back, & just held him & weeped. He held my hands to his chest & said something to the effect that he just didn’t think it was his time yet. He didn’t feel ready. He couldn’t believe it was his time. Oh, but it wasn’t, yet still it was.  (Psalm 139:16b All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”)

     I’d like to say that was the worst day of my life but it wasn’t, but it definitely ranks up there with many of the  horrible minutes, hours, days, and weeks to come. Days spent coaxing Jamey into taking the pain meds and then hours managing the Oxy hallucinations. Minutes spent watching Jamey literally crawl from the kitchen to our bed holding a barf bag after a procedure he insisted on coming home from as opposed to spending the night in the hospital. Time disconnecting him from the chemo pump or emptying & changing his colostomy bag. And while just typing out all that awfulness fills my eyes with tears, walking alongside Jamey during those dark & horrible hours was an honor & a privilege I would not trade. I’m thankful it was me. “…in sickness and in health, to death do us part.”

Now I tell our girls that one day, when they consider marrying ⛪️ someone, they need to make sure that their someone is not just handsome and fun, but someone whose character & soul speaks to theirs. They need to make sure that they love them truly and deeply, deeply enough to walk them to the light, if God calls them home.
(And of course there will be no marriage consideration unless all parties involved have had their colonoscopies. Kidding, not kidding. 😂)

But now, truly, I pity our girls, because I’m a much less stoic patient, & so when my time comes, since my person is gone, I will fall on their shoulders. And it will be up to them to walk me to the light. Fortunately they will at least have each other, & they will be able conquer & divide time with Mom. 😂😂

Lesson to all the parents: Be kind to your children, or it might be a lonely light walk.

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Who Am I Now?

Well friends, here is my 2nd attempt at a blog post.  We’ll see how it goes…😂 because truthfully, I am still figuring out how this whole ‘setting up your own blog space’ thing works, but that is just par for the course these days, as I am also still shamelessly figuring out a lot of other things too.  Namely, who am I?  

Who Am I Now?

I don’t know why that thought seems so elementary and profound to me all at the same time, but there it is.  I mean, I named this Blog space “Family 2.0”, because I immediately realized that we, as a family unit, needed to figure out who we were.  I quickly made the comparison that as a family, we were like any newly reorganized business team.  I understood and even explained to my girls that we would be going through the stages of team development: Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing.  And that as such, we would have a few hiccups, and a few disagreements along the way, but that we would keep pressing on, and that we would, by the grace of God, emerge stronger and more resilient together. 💪🏼❤️

But for seem reason I didn’t expect to feel so lost myself.  Sad? 😢 Yes. But lost?  That was a surprise to me.  But I think it’s a valid place I find myself sitting.  Afterall, I have been Jamey’s girl for 22 years and his wife 💍 for almost as long.  (We had a fast and furious courtship & engagement. 💞 ) But who am I now???  I am not entirely sure.

Everyone tells me ‘Don’t make any major decisions for a year.’  But the last time I checked; the world hasn’t come to a sudden halt for anyone but me.  Life goes on, and decisions still need to be made.  For example, I contracted to have a tree 🌳 cut down recently, and I bemoaned to a girlfriend, that I felt like I was ignoring the good advice of waiting to make any major decisions for a year, but that I felt like the tree should come down, mainly because I just didn’t think I could manage having it FALL down.  I started justifying it to her, by telling her how Jamey and I had actually discussed whether we should invest in having the tree cut down in the past, because it was leaning over our house in a rather menacing way, blah, blah, blah.  She quickly shushed my justifications and reasoned that just because it FELT like a major decision to me, because it was the type of decision Jamey would have ultimately made, it was not actually all that major.  It was just part of my new role as CEO of our new Family 2.0, a role that I didn’t apply for, but was promoted to against my will, like Joshua was promoted after Moses passed on, a role, he too neither applied for nor wanted.  (At lease if he did, I missed that part in the scriptures.)  But decisions like that keep coming at me fast, just like a  Nationwide commercial. 

At this point you may be wondering, “Well in your limited amount of hindsight & reflection so far, do you think you are making the best decisions all the time?” And my response would be a hard no!  And to make matters worse, I so miss being able to talk to Jamey about my missteps and receive his wise counsel for future improvements.  For example, am I happy with the medical insurance I switched our family to after reviewing the 16 different possible plans I could have signed us up for?  H to the N!  But am I thankful that I get a do-over come Open Enrollment in October?  Yes 200%!  Have I learned something?  Yes!  Have I learned how to fix a disposal?  No!  Did I try?  Yes!  Do I love the new quilt I ordered to replace the comforter that had come to represent cancer and sickness to me?  Yes! Do my girls?  No!  LOL!  😂😂 

So, you see, I am most definitely a work in progress. I am having some successes, and I am finding many new opportunities for improvement.

So, I imagine it is going to take me a very long time to figure out who I am now.  And maybe the even bigger question is “Who do I want to be?”   I anticipate wrestling that one in the coming days, weeks, and months to come.  However, I am not totally lost at sea.  I do know who I still am at my core.  I am still a child of God.  I am still a mom to two beautiful girls and one precious fur baby (& maybe 2 fur babies come Spring.) I am still the woman who fulfilled her wedding vows to the best of her ability and loved Jamey to the bitter end & will forevermore.  And because of Jamey and Jamey’s love, I know I am stronger, more confident, (maybe sometimes with some misplaced confidence, lol) than I would be otherwise, but who Dany 2.0 is, is still undetermined.  🤷🏼‍♀️

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Hello friends,

Experiment

Welcome to my little experiment. Many have kindly shared with me that they really enjoyed following our story through the Caring Bridge site. Well, confession: Sharing our story on the Caring Bridge site was therapeutic for me as well. But now, six weeks post Jamey’s passing, we/I don’t really have a ‘fight against cancer’ story to share anymore. So, I thought my story was finished. Truthfully, in many ways, I kind of felt like I was finished. But a dear, dear friend suggested I write about grief, and share that with others.

Grief

But honestly, grief sucks. Grief is not sexy or fun, or anything that I would think that anyone would really care to read about it, so I am going to try to modify the subject just a bit. I am going to try to write about how we, as a newly revised and modified family of three, a family I have dubbed as “Family 2.0,” are moving through grief, and maybe growing through grief. And in my effort to get an A in Grief because that’s what motivates me: grades, accolades, and gold stars, I have been doing all the things. I’ve joined virtual grief groups, face-to-face grief groups. I have met with widows; I have listened to TedTalks about grief; I have read and listened to books on grief; I start my day with “griefy” biblical devotionals. I mean I have and am truly trying to do all the things, because I keep hearing that if you don’t do grief right, it only gets worse, and let me tell you, I can’t handle worse. This is about all the worse I can take.

Journaling

But one of the things that all those things keep echoing one another about is that they all suggest keeping a journal. Supposedly, keeping a journal might help you make your way to the other side of this hell hole. Well, the other side of awful is where I want to be so, ding, ding, ding: here I am, trying my hand at “blogging” my way through grief. I hope it helps; I hope I make it through, and I welcome anyone to follow along.