I Lost Him: A Dream

I made a big revelation yesterday: I need a new bed. I figured that out after many months of back pain, which crept in on me over the years, but only left me mostly incapacitated last week after a particularly heavy lifting session the week prior. I had just finally given in and upgraded the younger kids' beds, as the ones they had were extremely old and falling apart. I found myself napping on Ryan's bed this afternoon because I decided to get a foam topper for my own bed, and it was expanding on top of mine. If I nap, it's usually maybe an hour? However, today, was nearly 3, and I woke up feeling the most refreshed I've felt in MANY, many years...maybe ever. So that's it: It's time for me to get a new bed. I intend to go this week to pick one out. For now, though, the foam topper will have to help make do.

It caught me off guard, then, awaking just now after the first real dream I think I've had in a decade. It's 1:05am one week and one year after I lost him. I guess that's maybe when the dreams will start, no? Maybe that's what restorative sleep will do for me?

I was visiting family down at the farm in Iowa for an extended period of time, but it was as if no time had passed. Except I was married and I had all these kids and I had no idea where they all were. I wandered from building to building (many were buildings that don't exist at the farm, but were certainly dated from the time period I was as a child). There was a large school nearby (perhaps what is now the historical museum? Who knows.) In my dream, it was within walking distance of the farm, and upon walking inside, it was packed to the gills with people.

It was raining, that much I knew, and upon stumbling into the building, there was noise off to the left hand side through this door, past a large red brick fireplace. Upon turning to stand in the doorway of the room, I saw a man had fallen asleep, laying on the floor, and there was a doctor and two other men surrounding him. He was elderly, and it didn't appear he was breathing. The way they maneuvered about led me to believe he had passed away, and they were preparing the body for transfer. I kept wandering around, and finally came to a very large room with a large stage in front and a runway of sorts, and the room was crowded with so many people.

In through the door came running one of the kids' babysitters and her boyfriend's daughters dressed as if heading to a funeral, and she confided in me that her grandpa had passed and they were coming to see him for the last time before he was cremated. They rushed off, and I kept feeling drawn to follow them to tell them that it was a gruesome sight and they might need to prepare themselves, but I didn't. I didn't want them to know I had seen it at all. So I kept wandering, and some man came up to me who had been in that room and he repeatedly asked me where the fireplace key was, and I had no idea what he was talking about, but he insisted that I needed to find it or they could not cremate the elderly man properly, so I gave them some suggestions for places to look, although I had no idea what it even looked like, nor how I would have any idea what to look for.

I finally grew tired and sat down and ended up falling asleep on this poor man's shoulder for a short while. Upon awakening, a spring maternity fashion show as in full swing, and I vividly recall this gorgeous long sleeve peplum floral top walking down the runway. As I looked up toward stage, I spotted my friend's husband and his buddies drinking scotch and holding up rating signs for each outfit, and then my good friend from college, looking absolutely radiant, smiling, laughing, just not a care in the world. She brushed by me shortly thereafter, smiled at me, asked me who my new friend was (who, coincidentally, I had fallen asleep on, but had no idea who he was), I set her straight, and she went on her way.

I apologized profusely for sleeping on this poor man, and he smiled and said it was no trouble, and then his wife showed up and was strangely okay with it, saying she completely understood the need for a good shoulder nap, and that she knew it wasn't an easy thing to find a good shoulder to nap on. It was bizarre how okay with it they both were.

The fashion show ended, and I ran off in search of my kids. I found them inside watching movies with MY cousins who were coincidentally the same age as my kids are, while my aunts and uncles on my Dad's side of the family were inside with my Mom and Dad laughing and eating my Grandma's cookies and waiting for supper to be done to feed all us kids. It was then that it dawned on me that I hadn't seen Mark in days, weeks maybe, and I searched frantically to find my cellphone to give him a call.

Upon finding it, I called him repeatedly, but it kept going straight to voicemail. I began to inquire around me if anyone had seen him, completley ashamed that it had been so long since I had seen my husband. Strangers would say things like, "I can't fathom not knowing where my husband was. How irresponsible to lose your own husband!" I just couldn't believe it hadn't been phasing me for so long that he hadn't been there, and I went to find the kids to see if they had seen him, and the more frantic I got, the quieter people became. As everyone just stood there and stared, it finally hit me like a ton of bricks that I couldn't have seen him in recent days or weeks, because he was dead, and he had been for a really long time.

I'm hopeful that now that I've gotten this out of my head, I will be able to sleep again.

Our New Chapter and One Year Angelversary

It's late tonight, and I should be in bed, but I know if I do, I'll just sit there mulling over what to say and wishing I'd just sat down to write.  It's 4:58am and I've been up for two hours, and initially, that confused me.  What's going on tonight?  Why did I randomly wake up?  Insomnia hasn't been my norm in years!  And then I recall a year ago, and I know.  It isn't the sore back, although that doesn't help.  It's just been a year, and that makes a lot of sense.

It has been a year since I got that call.

A year since I said goodbye to the body that once held the man I loved more than life itself. While his mind had gone long before then, saying goodbye to his body, holding it, kissing it, caressing it one last time. Feeling his strong forearms, combing his hair with my fingertips, hugging him, touching his cold face...it all felt somehow therapeutic.

It felt more like I was saying goodbye to the insanity that had been our lives since bvFTD had entered the scene. It was saying goodbye to the limbo, the toxic PTSD that had taken me over. The constant fear that the fruit basket would upset and I'd be stuck making even MORE horrible decisions. I couldn't believe it was all over. I couldn't believe he was just gone. And truly, my first thought was that I was horribly sad I didn't get to hold his hand when he took his final breath. I felt like he deserved that, and so did I, but it was what it was.

A year ago, I was having a sleepless night as well, and at this particular time as well.  I truly believe that at year ago at this time, it was when he was taking his final breath, even if he wasn't discovered until many hours later when he didn't wake at his normal time.

In that past year, there has been so tremendously much change that I can't even begin to wrap my head around it. Truly, though, it was all exactly the way it needed to be. I know for some, embracing as much change as we did in that first post-loss year seems excessive; impulsive even. It wasn't that way for us, though. It felt very planned; meticulously so. And truth be told, finding a house wasn't something I envisioned happening so quickly, but when God tells you to move, you move!

Some days I wonder what might have happened if I had listened to the Holy Spirit ten years ago when I felt that first nudge to stay home with my babies. Would any of this had happened? Would we have had four kids? Would Mark had gotten sick and died? Would we still have been in Windom? Would everything be complteley different? The truth, however, is that it's all irrelevant, because God knew that this would happen in this manner, and I'd eventually end up a solo parent who, for the first time in 25 years, gave herself the opportunity to stay home while I let my deceased husband provide for us. To be the kind of Mom who is just...here.
For the first time ever, the kids don't go to daycare at all.  The boys all ride the bus together just a few blocks from our home.  I get to drop Kinsley off and pick her up from preschool,  and thus I actually get to make breakfast for her on the weekday mornings!!  Tuesdays and Thursdays,  I actually get to spend the whole day with her.

I get the privilege of running errands during the day instead of cramming it into the jam-packed evenings. This is a FAR cry from the "up and out the door, to day care and then work by 7am" mornings, and squeezing everything into that 3:30-5pm timeframe before picking up the kids, rushing home to hurriedly throw together supper and then yell at the kids all evening to get their stuff picked up and ready for bed, do their reading, and hear them whine about not getting enough downtime during the day.

I get to spend FIVE HOURS in the evenings with all 4 of my kids!!! 

The past five years of our lives have been ridiculously harsh.  The happy posts and funny ones celebrating my family aren't fabricated by any stretch of the imagination.   But the really hard ones aren't always readily shared, simply because I'm too tired.   But for real...the past six months of moving has hit us all extremely hard.  The transition was initially pretty dang ROUGH.  Bedtimes were a joke, leaving me on a rampage and the kids overtired, exhausted, crabby and just plain nuts! It is ever so slowly coming around, actually, and as we're settling in, I do occasionally get a night prior to 9pm that the kids go down and I get some time to actually respond to messages and catch up with friends.

But guys...God is so good!  I know we are where we are supposed to be in this season, and for that, I am so grateful!  His promises to love and protect us, he has fulfilled and will continue to fulfill. Overall, I just feel so joyous!

The kids have had overall a pretty wonderful transition at their new schools,  and they ALL made new friends and had really great days even off the get-go on day one - something I've been praying for for quite a while.  Praise Jesus!! I just had the second set of parent-teacher conferences last week, and all of the boys are adjusting SO well! Their teachers all raved about what a wonderful adjustment they had, how loveable they all are, and what a joy they are to have in class. They are all on track or better in almost all areas, making lots of friends, loved by all their classmates and they are just adjusting so, so very well in that regard. We've found a church that we really enjoy there as well, and the kids only fight me on having to actually put on something other than pajamas to attend lol They otherwise LOVE it!

We're course correcting, and we'll get there.

So...what's next?

Well, after about 3 solid months of intense work at our old house in Windom, I just finally closed on the sale of it a few weeks ago, and that chapter is over and done with now. It was horribly bittersweet, but it's such a huge weight and burden lifted, and for that I am so grateful! I have a small handful of projects to complete at our new house here as well, which I'm waiting to hear back from a couple contractors about shortly.

Change, while overwhelming, is good.  Our backyard is such an oasis, our home cozy and warm and inviting.  We're so happy here! 

I think probably THE most asked question I get is if I'm job hunting, and the answer currently is no. I am contracting back to my former employer for emergencies only for the time being, but those hours are very minimal, and for now, I'm content with that. I don't know the right timeframe for heading back into the workforce, but I do know that God does, and when I feel that ever-so-familiar nudge, I'll jump. For now, I am absolutely adoring this time with my kids.

That definitely doesn't mean we aren't having some rough days, but I'll just say that those 5 hours (as opposed to 3) each evening has been really great for all of us. I want to hopefully make it through at least this coming summer and get the kids solidly back into school this fall before I get back into the workforce full time. I am so thankful for this opportunity for sure! I guess you could look at it as a bit of a sabatical, which is truly exactly what you need coming out of the kind of chaos we've experienced.

I thought I'd have more downtime, honestly. Most days I'm just so swamped between house projects, housework, and trying to keep groceries and snacks on hand that I don't have time to sit down and watch a movie or play piano or go for a walk like I thought I might. I'm hopeful that as the winter melts into spring, I'll find more spurts of time (and energy!) to explore more outside and not be as concerned about the weather. I can honestly say that physically, I'm SIGNIFICANTLY busier now than I ever was while working full-time. It's just different busywork, as I'm not hiring the help I used to in order to keep up with housework or care for the kids while I was working.v

I am very much looking forward to the literal spring this year, even if our figurative spring has been here for a number of months now.  I am excited for the adventures to come. I am excited to hit the pool all the time with the kids this summer - something I've never been able to do in the past. I am excited for Cashel's 10th birthday trip to Alaska!

I am excited to see my kids finally be in a place where they realize that life is not entirely full of pain and suffering and hurt and sadness and anger and frustration.  I am excited to have a summer that isn't plagued with pandemic fear, and the fear of what will happen to Daddy, and what our future will look like.

I think I speak for all of us when I say that we're excited for the future, and so fully ready to embrace what comes next.

It gives me great peace to be on this end of this part of my story.  I am so thankful for the love and joy that my life has embraced while Mark was in it.  I thank the Lord that he gave Mark the comfort of his presence while he suffered and ultimately died, and that he used myself and the kids to care for him.  I am so thankful that he is now rejoicing with his Lord and Savior.  I am so thankful for a fresh start.  I am so thankful for the people God has placed in my life as a result of what we went through, namely the beautiful souls who cared for and advocated for Mark while I couldn't. The entire staff at The Pillars and Freedom Homecare who went above and beyond to make sure he was safe and loved and cared for - thank you! I still feel like I haven't done enough or said enough to express just the degree of gratitude I feel for you all, and I hope if I haven't seen you in recent months, it will be again soon under good circumstances.

God is so good, even when we don't see the good.  Trust Him to provide, especially in those moments where you are 10000% positive there is no way out.

There is never not a way out when God is involved.

Happy Angelversary, sweetheart! We miss you so, so very much, and think about you and talk about you all the time. Thank you for loving us so well!