It takes What It Takes

I am so grateful for today, in the coming days, months, I will know the effects more from all this- right now I feel  like a limp noodle.  It's all about letting go. Surrender.

When it hurts, it is so easy to bolt. It would be much easier to go out to dinner right now with Ray and Matt. Just move on, but my heart knows what to do, go on automatic pilot.  Everyone has their moment to take, when bolting is the much easier solution, when that familiar pain creeps in. I am out of here,  this is uncomfortable. I  feel the tell tale knot in my throat, tightening in my stomach. I am bracing myself. The big,  uncontrollable cry is going to burst out- perfectly orchestrated. I am going to be out in public with an audience. And so it goes....

It started today talking about family, love, telling the truth, in a restaurant bar. Packed to the rafters no less.
Truth couldn't help pouring out, as did the tears between myself and the two gals I was with.
It was a very  profound moment in time. We all understood each other on such deep levels. Loss   wanting- needing family. Simply stating that loss and embracing what we wanted and needed.

It opened me up to express myself in a way I have shut down in the past, didn't  know I had closed so tight.
Through our conversation, what opened up.... loss I have tried to bury over and over again so deep.
I thought I had healed.... but realized until today I only had put a bandage on the wound.
It needed air. I let these two in... to a place so private, so deep in my heart- I have kept people at a far distance. I  asked them both if they would come to Forest Lawn with me.

We went in search of a particular tombstone,  no matter how hard we tried to find....  couldn't.
I have been there countless times through the years- have found it in ten minutes or so. Today even after forty minutes or more.... I realized that was not why we were there. It was not to visit the  tombstone. It was to let go.

We sat down and began to talk. First I didn't want to, then I felt that old friend panic. I wanted to run- I couldn't breathe. Then the tears came. My baby was buried here. I have done so much work through the years on healing this wound.  What I realized when I finally had the courage to speak.... my guilt kept me so connected to loss. It was the first time in sixteen years I had ever spoken aloud about my guilt. The tears poured out and would not stop. I felt like something was wrong in my pregnancy.... I had been pregnant with twins, and was terrified there was something wrong with them. I never spoke to anyone about it, I never took any tests, and I never had an autopsy. For sixteen years, I was convinced my body, my mind created  what went wrong. On the other hand, I was terrified at what it had created. I  never felt that way with the other pregnancies.

I felt these feelings reflected the kind of mother I was.... and it wasn't a good one. It ate at me everyday. I never went for grief counseling, I just shut down afterwards, for many years. I had gone later to therapy for years but never discussed this. Having loving hands to hold as I told my deepest fears...it just melted away.  I came home, Ray got home not too much after that. I told him what happened,  he just listened. I was frightened to tell him the part about it being my fault for some reason.This is the man who has loved me through everything- especially this.

Tears rolled down his face, as he said-" It was me, I was the defective one." I was dumbstruck. What is he talking about? All of these years we had mourned together, held each other, but never really talked about this.  Both carrying so much pain and guilt, staying in our own little worlds.  We could mourn it, but we could not get past it.  It was time for forgiveness.

Today we finally forgave ourselves. We both carried so much pain about something that was never in our control. It just happened. I never in a million years would have thought Ray saw himself as the defective one. I thought he saw me as that. Today I let it go. Sixteen years later, out of my body,  mind, spirit,  soul.  Ray got the same rebirth. I never thought when I woke up this morning- by surrendering, true surrender I would feel these feelings. It takes what it takes.