Tiny Nudges....

As Thursday approaches, and 1,462 days have passed, there are many things that I have learned along this widow journey.  I have often asked God to show me what my purpose is in this life...while I am still trying to figure that out, I felt a nudge from God to write...so I don't know if this is a blessing or a curse. 

Grief is different for everyone, I have lived it and witnessed this unfortunately in people close to me.  I have been blessed in so many ways and didn't realize how truly blessed until the death of Steve.  I have to admit, I was complacent...I didn't stop and smell the roses, didn't appreciate the small things in life, or recognize what truly mattered in this life.  I was more worried about how things appeared on the outside.....what others thought of me, of my marriage and my children.  I was trying to create a picture-perfect world for all to see.  Then on July 31, 2010, my world crumbled in an instant....the picture shattered.  I was blessed to be surrounded by so many friends and family members, it is they who carried me through the first year, and still carry me to this day.  The second-year the fog lifted and I continued on, mostly because of the precious souls God had entrusted Steve and me to.  They were looking to me for guidance on how to do this new life that we had been thrust into.  While I know I haven't done things perfectly, I do feel confident that we are closer than ever because of the honest and open relationship that we share.  While the raw openness is hard for "outsiders" to understand, I have learned that doesn't matter, what matters is how my children feel and cope with this journey.  I have been judged and questioned and at first, it threw me into a tailspin, made me question myself.  But at the end of the day, what matters is the peace I have in my heart and the peace my children have in theirs.  Through all this, I have grown so much as a person.  The little things used to get to me, now I probably dismiss the trivial things a little too easily.  But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter where you eat, what you do, if the trash got taken out, if someone was late, if a chore didn't get completed....what matters is the time you have invested in each other.  I truly enjoy just "being".  Being with the people I care about and love....I love just watching, observing and learning about the people I care about.  So if you think I'm just being quiet....truly I am just learning about the people that surround me.  A phrase that has always been apart of our family is "we're making memories"  It is because of that I feel my children are thriving.  I love it when they say "remember when....".  While it was a daunting task, to begin with, I have continued to make sure that we are "making memories"...we stop and smell the roses...sometimes the roses have thorns but that's ok, it makes for good memories. 

I was fortunate this summer to be an adult leader on our middle school mission trip.  It always seems that I walk away from these experiences feeling blessed.  I honestly believe that everyone has a story, everyone has something difficult they are going through or have been through.  While I may have lost my husband, became a widow at 39, have a child with special needs, I am SO, SO blessed.  While on the mission trip I saw so many things that made my heart ache... one that sticks with me is the woman with tears in her eyes as I offered her an extremely ripe cantaloupe.  She could not believe that I was giving her fresh fruit.  It humbled me...shook me to the core.  While I have had some major bumps along my life's journey, I am blessed and it's a conscious decision to stay focused on the blessings. 



So while my "picture perfect" family is missing someone, I am blessed to know that God will continue to hold us up and help us through this thing we call life.  For beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder....


Much love to you all.