I Still Care For You

When I can wade through all this shit, all the heavy stormy waves of the seas of love/betrayal/lies...when I come up for air, of course I am gasping, my lungs full of flooding waters...

I feel shame and embarrassment that I find, even now after the years of hard times, and growing apart that...I STILL care for you. In your best moments, even now, even after all the hurt you have compounded upon this little beating heart of mine. I STILL care for you?

How? Why? What's the point?

I am full aware that I am not innocent in this. Yes, I am guilty too.

I pushed, I pushed, I pushed and you walked away. Though not a clean, clear and steady walk. No, it was more like a plunderous plank walk right into another shit storm, with waves full of hot frothy foam, and tangy sweetness between an others' labial lips.

Oh how aware I am of the complexities that sum up this human that I seem to be.

Complex, stubborn, HOT HEADED, bitchy, crabby, BUT also SO FULL of LOVE, devotion, compassion, empathy and understanding. Never ever has my heart lead me off a plank to betrayal of a loved one's heart. Never have I wished upon anyone in my loving care the hurt that follows in that wake. 

I am not a cheater, nor a liar. No, even in the darkest hours of what was, I held steadfast to my devotion, to promises made. No matter the intimacy status, as nil as it had leveled to be, I held true to the words spoken years before.

I have always been on the receiving end of that fools tale. Still, I come back to the thoughts, the knowing...that I indeed pushed, and as I did I pulled away, to protect myself?

Here I am, the fool, the loser, the lost.

It's a doleful tale, been spoken before, and here it is again.
It won't be the last time.

I walked away, you walked away.
I thought I went away...I was wrong.
You really went away...
And that is the hardest truth.

Wild Wolf Woman

I think it's a cultural disease.

We have all lost our way out there in the big wide world.
We have lost touch with our animal selves, leaving our instincts behind losing them to the fleeting winds and highest heights of the tallest elevations that we forget to climb.

I know that I have lost my way, lost my path as a wild wolf woman...(this reference is coming from a very delicious book that I have just begun reading - Women Who Run With The Wolves by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés).

I can feel the deep ancient connection to that wolf woman within, I feel her writhing within this modern body everyday, but today she isn't just writhing and stirring she is beginning to HOWL and SCREAM. 

Finding this path seemingly alone now, she is awakened, guiding me to learn to trust what my bones already know. The cliff that I have fallen from did not break me, I have seen darker caves than this. My heart is strong, it just has to be re-tuned.

A New Independent Life...

I cannot even begin to comprehend what this means for me. Where does one even find the time or the energy to put one foot in front of the other to pull such a thing to fruition? And with children?

It's so confusing, navigating the path when everyday one's emotions are turning this way and that. I cannot even keep up with the sudden fluctuations of my san(insan)ity. One moment I am in the presence of my ex(?), and he is showing such kindness that it pulls me right into those feelings again...the lost love, the longing...the missing of the smell that resides right there in the space between his neck and his shoulder blade. Some days, when he is here with our children I catch little fragrances of him and it melts me, just a little.

Falling away from what was once such a strong, solid foundation is leaving me with not much more than jaded memories.

Lately, I find myself wanting to warn people of what could befall their marriage if they make the same mistakes, not tending to the relationship that they know NOW.

We are both such strong people, perhaps a bit too strong for "our" own good together. So strong, that we forgot to really pay attention to what we both needed as individuals in the relationship together. I admit, wholly admit that I began retracting myself after my needs were not being tended too. I became distracted and un-attracted to the one person whom I love(d) the most.

Then, when help came to us, help to sort things out, to look at things from a different perspective we became too strong again, and together made a most terrible decision, one that was supposed to help us to have both of our needs met. As it turned out, one of us got their needs met while the other tended to the children and the house. Tragic, devastating consequences ensued and the ramifications of the shock wave are still being felt.

This is not what I wanted to feel, and I don't think that I much care for this "New Independent Life". Besides, it's not fully realized, and I cannot wrap my head around how it could ever be possible for me at this point.

Today my truth is this. I miss my parter, my husband. Even with his betrayal, I miss him and today I am feeling love for him (and this has been creeping up on me more and more often). Even though he has told me his feelings have changed, my heart still cares, still holds a place for his.

Telling Stories

A few days ago while my eldest was in the bath he began telling me about the books that he would someday write. Not just one, not just two books. I believe that he gave me a list of four or more...(which I promptly jotted down on a piece of paper for him to refer to when the time comes)

How can I, as his Mama not feel utterly inspired to create my own stories to tell.

Everyday, I am inspired by these children before me. Sometimes just looking into their eyes sends me spiralling into an abyss of silent creative splendor. I begin reeling with ideas that I cannot in the moment capture on paper, I have to try to stow it away for when I have time alone...Ha!

My truth be told, I am never alone, not truly, not yet.

I'm 100% dedicated to raising my children, which entails the smallest to be with me (if not awake and crawling or working on walking skills), then he's on my asleep and/or nursing. There is no other choice for me, this is how it must be. SO, since I have a not yet 1 year old, he is always here...and I love it!

Now, in the moon glow of this beautiful and bone chilling night, I can sit here, on this birth ball (sleeping baby upon my chest via baby carrier) and write until my eyelids start to close. Though, I won't, I will soon realize that even though it's not late for most people (only 9:30pm!), that I will be awakened around 7am and to avoid turning into a grumpasaurus, I better go to bed.

One last thought though. As the next month is right around the corner, the month of this sleeping babes birth, my heart feels full. It's terribly hard for me to get into a memory space of what my body felt like at this time last year, a few weeks from his birth. Though, I can recall what I looked like! I was heavy-set, as I do become in pregnancy, and the last pregnancy was the "lightest" of the three I have been blessed to have.

Still, February is coming and this wee one will become a 1 year old! Oh my, little guy, OH MY!

The month following, March. On March 3rd, will be a day to remember Birdie who would be 6. My recollections of the time spent with her body after her death grow less and less clear with each year. There have been plenty of times in the last few years when I have stepped off and away from writing about her, about her death and the experience of such tremendous loss. This, has left me feeling a kind of empty space, confused, helpless and guilty.

I cannot be hard on myself about this, obviously I am full aware that I have two living children who keep me full and high on them everyday. There are definitely whispers of her that fill the house, and sometimes tears...when my oldest son (who is 4) asks me about her, and asks to look through her memory box. Or, he will surprise me with his thinking about her, and talk about her being in the stars and how he loves her so much and misses her...and how he really wants to see her.

In these moments shared with this amazing living child, I feel full of him and her all at once.