I haven't spent much of my life just sitting around. It's not in my nature, or in my ADD/OCD tendencies that have been with me since birth. As an infant if I wasn't doing something, I was crying. If i was being ignored, I was reading. If someone wouldn't play with me, I'd go find a new group of friends. If my sisters were too busy with me, I'd go out and bang nails into a piece of plywood with my dad. You see, I've always been doing SOMETHING.
And so this is my latest struggle. Learning how to just 'be'. It is second nature to me, and feels incredibly foreign and well, wrong. I've never had much of a problem making decisions. I weigh the pros and the cons and I jump into my decision without looking back. I thought it was one of my strengths, something that showed my attachment issues really weren't true. But now, I come to see, it has been a way of keeping myself busy, to pass the time and to make sure I can never say I did nothing.
I'm only 31 years old and have lived a pretty full life. I have helped raise children that were not my own, I have been away to college in a state across the country. I have fallen in love, fallen out, and fallen back in love again and again. I have bought my first car, my first sports car, my first family car. I have had children, I have worked as a stay at home mom, I have worked outside the home with small children. I have been in so many weddings I cannot count them on my fingers, I have learned to look outside of my comfort zone and try new things on for size. I have birthed in the typical american setting of a hospital, and I have had three natural births in the setting of my own home. I have moved a dozen times, I have owned more vehicles than i have fingers, I have married, I have aged, I have supported a husband through joining the Army and been a military wife and raised my children on my own while he served our country for 9 months. I have started my own businesses, I have dabbled in art, I have blogged for years, I have played in competitive sports, I have tried out for college softball and been offered scholarships. I have hurt some, loved many, and lived a lot. I have been a gestational surrogate, I have cycled as a traditional surrogate. I have given birth, I have miscarried. I have been in the NICU and PICU with my own children, scared to death for their lives, I have been through health scares for both my spouse and my children with issues that many have never even heard of. I have been faced with the death of a few loved ones, been surrounded with an amazing family with 5 sisters and a brother all full of dysfunction but more importantly filled with great love. I have done a lot in my 31 years.
And yet, here I sit. Finding myself chomping at the bit, because I am at a point in my life where I am seeing that someone or something is forcing me to just sit and breath. I don't do well with just sitting and breathing. And so I've started baking and cooking these amazing 3-5 course meals.I have contemplated doing another surrogacy, I have signed up for a marathon. I am doing something, anything to not be forced to just sit and do nothing. Why? At times I'm not sure, at others I am sure it is because of one simple fact. I suck at taking care of myself and following my own dreams. You tell me a need or dream and I'm your gal. I will work until the dream/need is filled and your heart is full. But if someone asks me what they can do for me, I change the subject or talk about something else. I don't do good with me. And I think the current lesson of my life, is to learn how to just be me and to nurture me and to care for me. I'm being taught how to listen to my heart and it kind of sucks as the dreams and desires I have in my heart (have one more baby, do another surrogacy, have a happy and fulfilling marriage) are not within my scope anytime in the near future. And I hate the answer 'no'.
Life is at a standstill, almost literally for me. The fighting has stopped in my home. STBX has realized the war is lost and neither of us has won. He's also realized that i'm no longer fighting for it, any of it. It doesn't mean that I gave up. It just means I'm not longer fighting something that is detrimental to me. I'm a doer, but I cannot undo the things that have transpired with in our marriage over the last 10 years. As badly as i want a whole family for my children, I want a healthy marriage for myself. I want my children to see what love is, how you treat your spouse when you love them and how a healthy couple works through their issues.
And I know myself, I will never, ever get to that space with STBX as the wounds are simply too deep, I just cannot fix him or demand of him something he was never able to give me. And realizing that is scary, breathtaking, and yet calming all at the same time. My hardheaded self, has finally realized that I cannot fight for something that didn't exist. I'm not longer ranging between anger or the soul sucking sadness. . . it just is what it is. I have moments of sadness, when I look at STBX who is like a completely different person now that he's medicated, but the sadness is that of mourning. One of realizing that we are at a standstill and to continue to fight for 'us' would only harm us further. I am thankful for the calm after the storm. It literally is like that. You look around after a tornado has blown through a community and there is destruction and debris everywhere, but there is also dead silence since the storm warnings are no longer alerting. And that is much of what my life looks like right now. We co-parent, we live under the same roof for about 50% of the time, we get along, and we genuinely have the children's best interest at heart. And I think, sadly, we've finally learned the cornerstone to what successful marriages have, respect for the other regardless of how you are feeling.
We have stopped trying to hurt each other, we have stopped bringing up the issues, we've stopped making snide comments or using sarcastic comments to mask our pain. We simply have started looking at each other, realizing the other was not perfect and we have come to a place that is so far away from where we ever hoped to be and said, "The past is the past, I will not forget it, but today I grace you and am trying to forgive you". And in those moments when forgiveness is the last thing from our hearts, we take a break. Which for me is the biggest gift he can give me right now, because i'm not always so full of grace and forgiveness and at times want to still rip his head off when i think of the horrible things he's done and the lies and the risks he put me through. But that's when i tell him I need space, and he stays at work or is off on business trips. And because of where we are finally at, I no longer feel the need to control him and my attachment issues don't scream abandonment or feel as if i have to keep tabs on him to catch him in yet another act of cheating on me. Sadly, we are learning how to be better friends than we ever were spouses.
I look around and see the debris, the destruction but there is no need to piece it all together or to fix everything. The casualties have been taken to the morgue, the hurt have been taken to the hospital and treated, and now we walk around what was once our life with our crutches and bandages taking in what our new life is like. It's sad, it's a deep impact, but it's no longer terrifying or something that makes you think you cannot possibly survive it. It simply is, what it is. And so, I sit. And i do nothing. Because right now, I'm looking around taking stock. Seeing the damage that will need to be worked on, the gutters that need to be redone, the garage door that needs to be replace. I look at the debris and see the sidewalk that will need to be cleared and the street that will need to be emptied. I see that big huge tree that's fallen across our favorite part of the backyard and i realize, this is a pretty dang huge job of cleanup that I'm about to undertake. And when I'm ready, i'll be able to call in the reinforcements for help. For the first time in my life I realize, I'm not alone and wont have to go through the clean up aspect of this next part of my life alone. Yes, I'll be doing the majority of the work, but that doesn't scare me as I love to take on tasks. But for now, I'm learning how to sit in it. Not out of denial, but out of realizing I am more than just a doer. I am me. I am perfectly and wonderfully made and was given everything I ever need to get through this. I wont always be surrounded by debris and destruction, I'll get the clean up crew, I'll work on the faulty foundation that I placed my marriage on and I'll be better for it. And I'll have been given the opportunity to learn that I don't always have to be 'doing'. That there are times in ones life where simply sitting and doing nothing are perfectly acceptable and needed. That 'doing' was a way of me avoiding the deeper work that has been sitting within my heart all these years. Instead of ignoring that work, I am looking at it in the eyes and saying, "Hi, I see you. I'm not ignoring you or filling my time up with other things so that I can never get to you. I'm taking stock, I'm taking my time and i will be ready and able to get through this when the time comes".
And until I get to the place of action, I'm content to just sit here and breath and take in the peace and quiet that has surrounded my life after the storm has gone. It's amazing how much easier it all has become since I simply stopped fighting and doing. Another lesson learned.
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