Separation Anxiety

Some of you that read this blog may remember what I'm talking about here.

When I was younger, like oh, maybe 7 or8, (Not 16 like Troy would have you believe) I had some serious anxiety issues. There were so many times that I actually made myself sick because of the worry that came along with being separated from my mom. Church, school, when they would leave for the evenings. It was bad. Waaayyy bad.

I distinctly remember one occasion when Mom and Dad left to go water skiing with another couple, who it was exactly I don't remember, but I don't think it was Fred and Stevie. I remember them pulling out of the Shop driveway, towing the boat with the yellow Blazer. I remember standing in the doorway (of the big double wooden doors!) at the front of the house and just screaming and crying. I honestly thought I would never see her again. I know I had worked myself up into a frenzy because there were dark clouds, and it was "windy", which mean breezy, but I was a freak, remember? I can feel that some one was pulling me back inside, though I don't remember who it was. I'm sure it was Troy, but for some reason I sense that Nikki was there, too. Anyway, I'm sure those around me thought I was being a big baby. And I was. But there was real fear there. I DID NOT want my mom to leave me. I wanted to go with her. Or better yet, I wanted her to stay with me.

And here it is, some 25 years later, and I still get that feeling of screaming as she leaves me. I feel the pull of people around me, keeping me grounded, and keeping me sane. I see the same dark clouds approaching, but I also see that I will be safe here in the cocoon of the Gospel and the knowledge that I absolutely will see her again. Comforting, yes. But it certainly doesn't make this whole "enduring to the end" thing any easier.

I admit, and maybe I shouldn't, that I've often thought about what it would be like to just get it all over with and see her again. Don't worry, it's just thought proccesses, nothing more than that. But honestly, I know she's happy seeing us here going about our lives, and doing our best. She taught us how to do it, after all. But still, the leaving. It's horrible. It hurts. It physically hurts, just like when I was 7. I guess I'll always have that feeling. Only this time, I don't think people will accuse me of just being a baby.

On The Eve of 7 Weeks

Thank you, Katrina, for this lovely quote. It's been nearly 7 weeks. She's been gone longer than we even knew about the cancer. What a strange new world it is without her. Empty, sad, and raw. We all miss her, every second. Times flood in when you realize she's really gone, and the sickness in the pit of your stomach hits. It's a familiar comfort of nausea. The tears are farther between, though certainly not fewer. I think we've all done something when we think of her up there laughing at us for what we've done, or crying with us in our pain, or reveling in that perfect moment of peace with us. I often think of those she's now in contact with, and I know she's so happy. Her good friend Audrey Drury just met up with her a week or so ago. I know they are having a good catching up moment. But now on to the quote. Such perfect phrasing for what we have been through. I'm sure many of you can relate this to some point in your life. For that, I'm sorry, but I know I personally wouldn't change a thing.


"We don't have life experiences so that we can simply endure them. We must endure them well so that those experiences do change us. That is the purpose of those experiences. If we don't change through them, then they are simply tragic. But if they do change us then they are what I like to call "difficult blessings." They are blessings that we would never wish for, that we would never wish upon anyone else. But if we are honest with ourselves we realize that the best attributes we have, our love, our compassion, our desire to serve, to do better, to be better couldn't have come about to the same degree without those experiences. And so, while we would gladly do away with the experience we would never trade what the experience has done to us. Unfortunately, we cannot have one without the other."