8 months between posts is SO NORMAL

Not that it matters because I'm the only one reading anyway.

I've been doing lots of writing, just not here. Journals? You wanna talk about JOURNALS? I've filled TONS of them. I've also been writing creatively- this is going much, much, slower. But it is loads more enjoyable and very satisfying. Thanks in part to writing (creatively) and journaling and meditating and yogaing and therapying, and living and lots of other INGS, my feelings are more good than bad. Still sad sometimes, still really fucking angry sometimes too. But happier than I've been since Ivan died. Still missing him, parts of my heart still raw from his loss.... but happy.

Sweet little Dash is gone now too. God, that was HARD. If Ivan was my dog soul mate, Dash was my best friend. Ugh. I chose to let him go in June. I could have waited. I could have let him get worse before I made the decision. But I didn't want that. Saying goodbye felt selfish at the time. I was tired, I was having a hard time keeping up with all his problems. And then the ointments I had to put in his eye started to make him pant and twitch with pain and I just couldn't do it anymore. I thought at the time, if I could just hold on and wait for a crisis it would be so much easier for me to make the decision. It wouldn't feel so hard.

I've since learned that isn't true. It always feels like you're making the wrong decision, that there might be something else to do, that with time it might get a little better, that you might have a little more time if you try one more thing and one more thing and one more thing. Then I met Tina. A tiny 3 pound chihuahua who's owner died and left her in need of a hospice home. She was 17, she had no teeth, she was probably deaf and mostly blind and eating food was potentially life threatening because she had a grade 5 out of 6 heart murmur. She was rickety and weird and her tongue stuck out and I fucking loved her. At first I think everyone (including me) thought it was a bad idea for me to take her because HELLO- she was a strong breeze away from death.

But something happened to me taking care of that dog.

Her very, very, very inevitable and unpreventable death made things oddly easy. If she was alive in the morning- great! If she died in her sleep- that was good too. She was warm and snuggled up and fed and clean and dry... oh yeah, she peed on me. A lot.

Anyway, my point in all of this is that about 6 weeks after I started hospice-fostering her.... she had a bad event. She vomited and turned blue and tried to die right in front of my face. And with oxygen and a little time she mostly recovered... but that became "the thing". The thing that made it too much. I could deal with the no teeth and the bad heart and the blindness and incontinence. But the risk of her suffocating to death alone or as I raced her to an emergency clinic became "the thing". The thing that made me say- ok quality of life is not a thing anymore. BUT IT WAS STILL HARD. Making the decision still sucked and hurt and felt wrong even though it was right. It felt selfish and too easy for me and THE END for her. If there was every going to be an easy euthanasia, this was it. But it wasn't. I said to my friend, "It's annoying that this decision is still so hard."

So what I learned is- the right thing can feel very, very bad. It can be emotionally and spiritually challenging. It can feel mean. It can break your heart. But it's still the right thing. In fact, I might argue that that's WHY it's the right thing. Because often there is an easy way out.... but easy, it seems, is very rarely the right thing to do.

Also? Easy/wrong can sometimes masquerade as the right/hard thing to do. And sometimes the context of someones actions must be considered before you weigh them as right or wrong. When it's kind of hard for you to do something, but you're doing it because it's easier than what you should have done... that's not really doing the right thing. Are you picking up what I'm throwing down?

But here's the thing, people- it's like, totally going to be OK. I mean, at first it sucks. You look at yourself as this awful monster, 100% to blame for everything that's happened. And you'll try to fix it too. You'll beg, you'll bargain. You'll promise to give up more of yourself to someone who has been lying to you for years. You plead with someone you will learn doesn't actually exists. You will try, until, with a little time and distance, you start to see what you have actually lost. And it is not what you thought. It is, in my experience, someone who doesn't care about you. You will suddenly remember that they have always (and I mean from the beginning) done things that you have asked (and sometimes begged them) not to. You will see that they make false claims against you, when they are the ones guilty of the crime. You will realize that the rock you thought you were clinging to, was really the rock weighing you down. That who this person claimed to be does not exist and the things they claimed to love were just pieces in a story they tried to sell to you, to everyone, to themselves.

And one day you will wake up and realize that you are more than ok. You are blooming and feeling better. You will realize that it's more than ok to be yourself. You learn that it's great. You do things you felt embarrassed to do before. You do things you didn't even know you liked doing. You laugh. You heal. You heal from the abandonment. And from things that you couldn't heal from because you were in a toxic relationship. Because lets be crystal clear: If someone can walk out on you.... if they can leave without warning, without bringing their concerns to the table and asking for change, if they can bring you presents one day and leave the next... you are not in a relationship with someone who is capable of carrying their 1/2 of a healthy relationship. And you learn that it wasn't them holding your head above the water. It was you all the time. You're stronger than you think and doing better than you think and you'll be so much more than OK in not that much time. You are not perfect. And you never, ever will be. But as long as you try, as long as you learn- that's ok. You don't ever have to change. You just have to grow. There is a difference, I think.

A year is nothing.
A blip.
Less than a blip.
It's literally nothing. But that's all it took.

Because in that blip I experienced loss that was harder than the abandonment. And that was surprising, but helpful. I experienced the truth of his heart. And that was surprising, but helpful. I brought new little fuzzies into my life. And that was really, REALLY surprising, but helpful. I went on vacation by myself and left the woods of Maine feeling like fucking Wonder Woman. I do things on my own. I do things with my pets, I do things with my family and friends. I do things without fear of judgment. My life is full. I don't need someone else to make me whole or happy. I find my happiness within myself, and in tiny little moments. When I stretch my leg a little higher in yoga. When I smell pine trees on a hike, when I listen to my dog snoring, when I watch Doctor Who, when I listen to Hamilton full blast while I clean my apartment. When I find a pretty, crystal, and old bottle or a cool plant. When I talk with old friends or help someone at work. When I get excited for an outing with my family. When I make the littles laugh, when the middles give me a kiss, when my biggest nephew asks to come for a sleepover. When I think about something precious that Dashy did, or silly that Ivan did. When I think about the time that Tina peed on my lap and it almost made me pee my pants. I have all I need.

Is this airing dirty laundry? I don't think so. I'm allowed to tell my story even if it includes someone doing something really, really shitty to me. It's one of the reasons why the #metoo movement is so powerful. Because so many people keep their stories hidden, and not just because it's hard for them, but because telling it might be hard for someone else.
Fuck.
That.
Shit.

This is part of my story and I will not hide. Feel free to look away if it doesn't suit you, but I'm not covering myself up for anyone anymore.

PLUS, like I said... no one is really reading this. :p