The twins slept until 7:30 a.m. this morning. Before daycare, I had to take them to get their flu shots, and they were total troopers. I stopped to get a coffee after I dropped them off. There was a little bit of light snow falling, and the parking lot bustling, but not overwhelming. The Salvation Army bells were ringing. I could still practically taste the holiday toffee that a friend and I made last night in preparation for Thanksgiving. Everything felt just right.
As I walked across the parking lot to my car, I felt happy.
I've felt many positive emotions in the past months, in varying amounts: contentment, joy, and pride among them. But a simple sense of happy has been elusive. You can't miss what you don't have, or so "they" say, and it wasn't until I felt that bit of happy this morning that I realized how long it had been gone.
I got in the car and headed to work. A good song came on the radio, and there was no traffic. I thought about John, and I cried a little as I drove. I know John would want me to be happy. But there's a part of me that doesn't feel ready to be happy without him. Part of me believes that in the Venn diagram of "happy" and "no John," there is no overlap. Or is there?
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24 comments:
I hope the happy becomes more commonplace. John would want you to be happy and the twins deserve a happy mom. Most of all, YOU deserve to be happy.
I am so glad that you are feeling happy. You, like everyone else in the world deserve to be happy.
I'm so glad happiness passed through! Hopefully it will be there to stay. I know it's hard but think of your current Venn diagram of you, Maddy & Riley.
There will be overlap, eventually.
You begin to see who you are and who you will become because you had him in your life, and that will make you happy.
Right now you see through the lens of who you are "without him." Time will lift that when you are ready.
It is okay not to be ready.
There is no way to be ready as your first holidays without him approach...
I'm thinking of you...
You will have happy moments and said moments. It is a very long healing process. Yes there will be times when both happy and sad overlap.
If he wanted you to be happy in life, he would also want you to be happy without him. You surely can miss him, and be sad about him being gone. However, you can also be happy that you have the twins, that you have great friends and family, that you had to opportunity to have such a great man in your life. You are not happy that he is gone, but you can be happy for yourself.
Not only do you deserve to be happy and John would want it that way, I believe considering all the good in your life (minus the obvious and very big bad of missing John) that happiness will become your natural state in time.
Happy Thanksgiving, Snick, and wishing you more moments of peace, happiness and contentment.
ditto to all everyone else said. you deserve to be happy and time will make it so. Happy Thanksgiving!
Hugs Peach
Yes, there is an overlap. Allow yourself the happy. You deserve it.
I say good for you, girl. Little things can make us feel so wonderful. Happy Thanksgiving!
I am so very happy to read that you had at least a "bit of happy", I really hope that it keeps growing. I know you will find the place where "no John" and "happy" overlap and it will happen when you are ready for it, I truly hope that time comes very soon, you deserve it. Please take care.
Just want to echo these comments; I'm so glad you had a moment of happy and hope that the overlap continues to appear and to grow.
MMmmm..happy...that sounds really good. Blessings on your head.
I am so glad happy snuck up on you when you weren't looking. I hope it stayed around long enough to get reacquainted. I am guessing you will be seeing more of each other from time to time.
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Hope you and the babies have a wonderful Thanksgiving.
I hope happiness becomes an every day thing. You certainly deserve it. The way you have held up and supported your kids and your family during this last six months has been just incredible. I admire you so much. Take all the happy you can get - you have earned it, and then some. :-)
So glad to read you had a jolt of happiness today. It will take time. Although I have never lost anyone as close to me as you and John were I have lost my share of beloveds.
It takes time, keeping busy and growing and more time...
Hoping the happiness continues to show up and feel less surprising as time goes on...
You are such a brave woman. I love reading your blog because you are very "real" and that's how it should be. I am glad to see that you are happy - keep smiling!
You will never be happy about what life dealt to you and John but you have many happy moments ahead. I think your effort to block the irritability you have been feeling (e.g. "yelling" at the twins) is related to why you recently felt the first twinge of happiness. Your path is strewn with many obstacles and, because of the grief, is not straightforward, but you are on the right path and you have much happiness ahead.
Rebecca
You are so deserving!
I think I understand what you mean -- feeling happy, and yet without John, seems impossible and in some ways almost a betrayal. And feeling happy means that the distance between the period of your life when John was alive and this new phase is getting longer -- and that realization hurts too.
You are really, really strong, and impress the hell out of me.
Shelley
Hoping, in time, the happy times overshadow the sad. If John loved you as I think he did, he would want that for you and the kids. To move on and be happy. Who doesn't want that for the ones you love most?
That said, I can understand how difficult being happy and content with the great loss you have endured. Give it time.
In the meantime so happy to hear you are having glimpses of happiness :))
I am glad you had the happy. The overlap is going to show up once in a while. It doesn't hold, necessarily, but it is nice to let it be when it comes.
Funny, for me coffee helps a great deal. I don't think it's the caffeine, I think it's doing this thing entirely for me, for the pure pleasure of how it tastes to me. And paying otherwise decadent money for it, I think. :)
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