Friday, March 9, 2012

Feeling off-balance.

I just want to say that I miss this place, and I miss reading blogs regularly and commenting and all of the above. I am really struggling right now to achieve some sort of balance. I have stepped away for awhile, mostly because I feel I was here perhaps too often, and that's not good either. Life is not meant to be spent tied to a computer screen. The positives have been that I'm taking a workout class and am also learning to cook and enjoy other things. However, something is missing, and I know that I still need to come here; I need to write and to read and to connect. I just don't know how to get things balanced. Slowly I am "unsubscribing" from people on Facebook and will be doing a cleanup. I feel I have overdosed on social media to some extent, and I want to emerge from the shadows and focus more on "real life" and all that is tangible. Then, I realize, I don't even know what that means or what that is. Between my career, my marriage, my home, my family, my friends, it's just so difficult to balance it all. New hobbies and interests have taken shape in my life, but where do they fit in, and how do I incorporate all of this new stuff and still come here? It blows my mind when people say they are bored. How the hell are people ever bored? Life is so painfully short, and there's so much I want to do, become, achieve, and explore. So many people to connect with. So many people who can change and enhance my life. I can't disconnect from the loss community, either - not that I would ever want to. No way, no how. I am judged by people (and it is very obvious) for still reading the loss blogs when I do (which isn't often enough), for connecting with other loss moms on FB, and for wanting to acknowledge and honor my son. Maybe to some extent at certain points in my life, things were lopsided in that direction, sure. But now, I am realizing that, and the problem is that I don't know how to fix it so that it all has its proper place. I've found myself becoming much more social lately, which also has its pitfalls. Anyone in the loss community will tell you that figuring your social life out post-loss is a very confusing and difficult task. Just when I open my heart to be vulnerable again to friends, I end up getting screwed over again. I am at a point in my life where I am done with games and passive aggressive relationships. You're either my friend or you're not. I realize friendships are on a spectrum, and they shift and morph, but there's also a limit. And when I feel completely disrespected and devalued? Time to move on. I don't know how to achieve balance in my life yet, and I realize that's the goal so many of us have. I don't know how to reach "integration" as some call it. I don't know how to just be at work and focus on work, or be at home and focus on home. Everything gets blurred, the colors bleed, the lines shift. Just as I don't know who to trust anymore or how I will ever be okay again, really okay again, without my son here. Everything is lacking clarity, and I feel aimless, confused, hurt, abandoned, and scared. My grief has new layers to it that I never knew before, and I have horrible flashbacks and nightmares that can be triggered by many different things. I don't want to say I have PTSD, because I don't really know, but it really wouldn't surprise me. Work used to be my safe haven, my place to go and get away from my grief, and it was easy to compartmentalize to some extent. Why fifteen months out (today!) is it becoming more difficult to do that? Why do I find myself crying at work during my lunch hour? Why can't I focus and be efficient? Why do I still not know what choices are best for me, and why do I feel like depression is lurking around the corner threatening to snatch away any joy and motivation I feel?

7 comments:

  1. Just wanted you to know I was here, I read this, and I care.
    xo

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  2. I agree that sometimes its good to step back and focus on real life, but what I'm figuring out in my quest for balance is that these connections with other BLMs is part of my real life now. I think it's great you are feeling more motivated and social - you deserve that. It's hard at first, that's for sure, but I feel that I'm slowly emerging back into my old life with pieces of my new life filling in the gaps.

    Wishing you continued peace along the way . . .

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  3. Like Hope's Mama, I am here. It is a difficult balancing act. I can completely understand the need to 'disconnect' from life on the internet, blogging etc. It is something that I find difficult to do myself but I still need this space, I also need to be a good, competent employee and a happy, caring parent. Oh and a loving, supportive wife. And a concerned and loving friend. And a sister. And a daughter. The list goes on. And yes, not enough hours in the day, certainly never time to be bored!

    I'm sorry that you feel judged. It must be very difficult. I've tried to imagine how I would have felt about the baby loss community, had Georgina never died. I hope I would have had a little compassion and let others grieve as they see fit. But the person that I was is long gone and I can hardly remember her or what she might have thought.

    I don't know why but I've always kept my blogging semi-private. I suppose it is because I am afraid of being judged. But it's facebook that undoes any attempt to compartmentalise and that is tricky to negotiate.

    I haven't any advice to offer as I'm still struggling with the same issues nearly four years on (but don't let that worry you as I think I am particularly slow and ponderous person!) but I think that you need to do what is right for you. And I know that it is not always easy to figure that out.

    I think it's great that you are out there doing workout classes and cooking. That sounds really fun and I've been trying to do more of that type of thing myself. And as for being ok again? Well, sometimes I am. Really ok. I can't say when it happened or what caused it to happen or anything about it at all really. But hang on in there. I know it's hard and that it feels so frustrating when nothing is clear and you can't see how to make everything fit in its proper place.

    Ach, what a long and useless comment.

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  4. It is hard to find a good balance. At one point in time I was spending way too much time on the computer but at the time it was what I needed. Now, I don't spend nearly as much time doing things online and I actually like it. I don't get to keep up like I used to but I can't help that.

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  5. Sometimes I step away too. The loss community is one of the only places that really understands where I am in my life and so I must stay. Even when I don't write all the time I try to comment. I am still here. I read and care. I used to FB all the time. Now I go on every once in a while...once a week or longer...but it does not hold what it used to for me. it feels too fake. I like pinterest and etsy but that too has subsided some. Right now I really like playing words with friends. I am trying to get more sleep. I need to clean house in my accounts too. Your either in or you are out! Sending love.

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  6. I think that's the thing about balance--it's always hard to do. Sometimes we swing one way, sometimes another. I think the important thing to recognize is that it's OK. It's OK if things feel a bit weighted towards the grief end sometimes, and a big weighted toward the "step away" place at other times. Our needs will differ from day to day, and that's OK. You're in my thoughts, and you know where to find me when you need to cry!

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  7. I'm late commenting because I've been doing something very similar to you - stepping away from blogs, re-engaging with other parts of my life, having hobbies. I've come to realise there is a rhythm to my grief, an ebb and a flow which doesn't really account for the length of time I have been grieving. Sometimes 3.5 years can feel like 3.5 months and sometimes it feels like 35 years and I've realised that my feelings do not follow a linear timeline and sometimes I need to nestle down in this virtual community and sometimes I need to step right away.

    And those why's? Such hard ones to answer aren't they. Because grief is like that - greedy and snatching and it doesn't take heed of where you want to be in your life or your mourning at that moment.

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