Grief

Today I had a little breakthrough.

It's obvious to anyone who has followed this blournal (and even more obvious if you follow my private family blog) that in April of this year I kind of shut down.  I stopped writing, I stopped reaching out to people, and I stopped a lot of other things.  I knew this, I could feel this, and yet, I was perplexed as to why it had and was continuing to happen.  It hasn't made me happy or even made my life less stressful; quite the opposite really.

Side Confession: I see a counselor once a week.  She's a really cool woman whose prior career was teaching a masters program for special education teachers, so that makes her perspective really unique for someone like me...a working mom turned SAHM with a traveling husband, special needs child, and boatload of shoulds.   Weekly I go to her office and we talk about whatever is on my mind.  Sometimes, oftentimes it's housework.  Sometimes it's about marriage or friendship.  Sometimes it's about special needs.

Today our conversation veered from dishes to blogging.  That turned into her asking the question I've never answered before.

What happened in April that made you stop allowing yourself all the things you love?

Oh, the answers that poured forth.  The truth is, there was a trigger in April, but I honestly don't remember what it was now.  All I recall is that in the middle of celebrating Little Bro's Family Day, Appa and I realized that we could not help our son anymore on our own.  It wasn't going to work.  He needed help.

We started medication.  This post pretty much sums up my state of mind.  Only what I realized today as I started telling my counselor about that month is that it was the time where for the first time ever, I truly realized that Little Bug might never live the life exactly like I had always envisioned for him, and by extension, our whole family.  I started looking ahead 5 years, 10 years, 20 years and accepting scenarios that we had previously refused to give thought to.  We weren't just medicating ADHD, but finally admitting that whatever Little Bug's needs are, they are bigger than us....and I finally started to feel the weight of our unknowns and complete and utter helplessness in controlling his ultimate future.

Grief.  That's what she called it when I took in a sob.  Grief.  And now, finally months later as things seem steady in this ebb of ours, I am starting to cycle out of it.  I sought help for myself.  I started making changes in our routine and home life.  I started drawing from faith again. It's slow going, but she told me....it's happening.  Acknowledge it.

"Go home and write about it," she said.  Give yourself the gift of writing the words out that you are sad and scared for your son and your family.  Holding it in only keeps the grief constricted.

Let.it.go.

So there it is.  No wonder I am paying her good money.  Just getting it out in words does make it feel lighter.  I'm sad my son has to struggle and hurt.  I'm sad my other son has to live in a home that is structured for the needs of someone else.  I'm sad I can't have a "normal" parenting life.  I'm scared for what the future could hold for Little Bug, for kindergarten and high school and college and love and success.  I'm scared for what that could mean for Appa and I, and later, for Little Bro and Little Moon. I have spent the summer grieving these things.  And slowly, but surely, I am accepting it and moving on.