Until I no longer can.  This part was never really covered in the life handbook until I lost Kevin.

After caring for Kevin for months during his illness, I took a lot of time doing the things I really wanted to do.  But then I begun getting involved in giving back to the communities that had helped me – widows and cancer families.  2 summers ago, after breaking my back, I realized I was pushing myself a little too hard, so I gave myself a break and for a year decided to take off from volunteering with these groups to pursue things that I love.

But instead of taking down time, I quickly filled the time that I would have spent doing those things, with other things.  Some of it included fun things, but most of it has been obligatory things for friends and family to celebrate their lives.  I like being active in my friends and families’ lives, but there also comes a point, like now, when I begin to realize, hey, I have a whole new family now – Dave and I.  Somehow making him a priority has become a back seat item for me, and I’m exhausted trying to find time to do it all.

I keep thinking about all these things I want in life:
-Explore more national parks
-Get a cool camper/pop up to get out to these national parks
-Do more camping, fishing, hiking and biking
-Restore the swinging 50s outdoor loveseat in our garage and work on our yard
-Give items to Goodwill or Hold a Garage Sale

These are some REAL goals.  While my brain can float around all these other things I can do to fill our time, ultimately these are the places where my brain can seek solace. 

It’s time to cancel some items off my list that are more out of obligation than out of my own life passion and pursuits.  It’s time to put in some time to get these things done, and if you want to join me, please do.  I’m not leaving you behind, I’m asking you to come on this journey of self care with me.

As many widow friends reminded me during my grieving, be gentle with yourself.

With 401 parks to choose from across the United States, there are an amazing amount of protected spaces that we should be exploring.  With having just told the boy, while watching a documentary about drifting down the Yellowstone River, that I want to figure out a way to not work and just explore special places like that, I realize that we need to figure out a way to enjoy these protected places everyday.  Not just on special occasions, not just once in a lifetime, but in each day.

National Park Week brings awareness to all of the unique parks across the States – including desert, wetlands, mountains, volcanoes, historic sites, rivers, frozen tundra, and ocean.  If you wish to experience a different type of landscape, you can be sure that somewhere in the U.S. you will be able to find it in a National Park.

Where do you want to explore?

Here’s some of the places I’ve been….

Saguaro National Park – AZ

Gettysburg National Military Park – PA

Hopewell Furnace NHS – PA

Great Smoky Mountains – TN

Delaware Water Gap – NJ/PA (also encompasses Appalachian Trail)

Harpers Ferry National Historic Park – WV

Assateague Island National Seashore – MD

Badlands – SD

Mount Rushmore – SD

Yellowstone – WY

Grand Canyon – AZ

Glacier National Park – MT

Yosemite – CA

The month prior to the wedding, I also finalized my book proposal to send off for a non fiction writing contest (didn’t win).  Finishing the proposal helped me to feel some closure in my life before the boy, but it also raised a lot of thoughts about what it would mean to no longer be a Boitson, to enter a new life with someone else, a new forever.

I’ll admit, it was scary.  Some days, it still is.  But mostly, it’s wonderful. 

I think a lot about Kevin, and what our life was supposed to be.  Let me rephrase that: what I thought it was to be.  The reality of life is that it doesn’t happen as I expect it to.  Life happens as was planned out for me.  That’s still a tough adjustment some days.

I haven’t given much thought to long term, to future.  That sounds weird coming from a woman who just married someone, doesn’t it?  But we are happy, and we compliment each other well, and I love him so very much.  I think my love with the boy is practical, is adult.  Wow, this doesn’t sound very romantic at all does it?  But it is.  I’ve been able to move forward, to see a future.  Even if I haven’t been able to fill a dream book with all the things I want us to do together, I have those hopes and expectations of our life together.  I think that part of me is just still a bit afraid to think too far ahead.  I know what can happen, and that part still scares me.

Remarrying after widowhood isn’t just planning a wedding, writing some vows, and marrying the man that you love.  It involves a much more complicated thought process than I ever expected.  I’m not quite ready to delve into all of that yet, publicly, but it’s been scary and wonderful, and comforting, and satisfying, and joyful and tearful, and lovely, and exciting, and thrilling.  It’s been all that.  Here’s to forever, however long that will be.

About 8 months ago I decided to take a break from volunteering actively with Team Sarcoma and the Soaring Spirits Loss Foundation to go a more lighthearted direction and volunteer at the visitors center at Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site in Elverson, PA, about an hour from my home.  This weekend was the first weekend that I struggled with that decision.  As my close widow friends gathered for Camp Widow East, I missed them, I missed the interaction with the organization, I wanted to buy a plane ticket and head straight to Myrtle Beach, but I couldn’t.  There were no reasonably priced plane tickets (yes, I checked), and I was committed to attend the volunteer appreciation picnic at the historic site at the start of National Park week.

It was a good decision.

Today I was given 2 certificates – one with my maiden name, and one with my married name, along with a good harassment from Frank, the volunteer coordinator at the site.  I’m really happy I am volunteering there.  My dream of one day becoming a park ranger has not gone away, and I wonder if it may just start there.  Tweets from gals attending Camp Widow made me miss them and wish I was there, but dinner with local friends last night ebbed away some of those disappointment thoughts.

Cancer and grief organizations are of great importance to me.  Without these organizations and people having entered my life, I can’t imagine what kind of mental state I would be in today.  But, taking a break from being actively involved in them has given me a chance to regain focus on the living, the thriving, the good in the world.  Being consumed with sorrow all the time is not healthy.

Volunteering for the NPS helps me feel alive, active in a community, and a part of the preservation of the country and land that I love.  So yes, that’s pretty important.  It’s life or death, but in a whole different realm – environmentally.

And tonight, I was blessed by attending. 

I met an amazing woman – she lives locally, but spent much of her life in Iran, her home country, Brazil and the UK.  She holds masters in English, Music, Psychology, and speaks many different languages.  She was a true spirit – she shared her writing with me, and we both teared up as she described her longing for her home country.  We talked about my loss, her loss, and how lives lead us down these strange paths.  She told me she has bone cancer, and I wanted to put up that wall.  I wanted to shield myself from getting to know her any better, but at the end of the night, she hugged me and wished me well on my honeymoon.

This woman didn’t know much about me, but she shared some great spiritual insight on God gifting our loved ones too us for a short amount of time.  She said she had explained this to her granddaughter, who was wondering how she would cope, if her Grandma were to die.  She didn’t realize that she was also giving me great comfort with this insight.

I never know who I am going to meet and how they will touch my life.  I meet new people every day in my job, and nearly every day I come home in awe at the amazing, powerful, joyous, and empowered people that walk on this earth.  I am truly blessed to be able to meet them and to discover bits and pieces of what makes them so interesting.

I’m going to continue working to have an open mind when I head into new experiences; I never know who I am going to meet.

But he’s getting better every day and things seems to be smoothing out.

All these doubts run through my head about myself; what can I handle again?  If something happens to him, how will I handle it?

But I don’t want to live that way.  I fight those thoughts nearly every day; not to live in the past.

It’s difficult not taking my brain back there.  It’s difficult allowing yourself to love again while knowing it could all end at any second.  This was something I dared not believe could happen the first time.  Now, I know at some point it could very well happen.

But that’s not  healthy, it’s not vibrant, and it does neither of us any good.

This is what I have to tell myself.

I’m not the woman Kevin married.  I look for pieces of her, but ultimately, the person I am today only contains bits and pieces of that woman.  Some good, some bad, some just there.

I brought strength along to this new woman that I never thought I was capable of.  I brought along a talent to take charge while still being a bit sound-minded (although that escapes me some of the time).  I brought along a depth that I had not known in my soul.  I brought along some pain and heartbreak that causes me to leave a guard up.

Ultimately, I am a morphed version of myself.  I think all people morph and change, and yes, I do believe your core structure, moral, and beliefs can change over time.  I also believe that if you don’t allow those things to change, or allow your partner to change, you can both suffocate one another and yourself.

It’s hard for me to admit that I’m not the same woman that I was.  I no longer care about some things, yet am deeply concerned about others.  But I do believe that it is healthy, but sometimes painful, to let yourself be changed by your experiences.  I hope that these changes are mostly for the good, but sometimes I don’t know.

I am 2 weeks away from marrying the Boy.  What a journey it has been as we approach 3 years together and I approach 5 since Kevin’s death.  My life is so different, yet so wonderful and blessed.

I don’t want to lose sight of that, overall, when frustrating and scary things come my way.  In everything I know that the purpose of my life is greater than all of my combined fears.  My fears are not meant to eclipse what I need to experience and grow.

But damn, it’s tough.

I’m looking forward to returning to blogging soon. I hope you’ll join me as a reader, encourager, and promoter

I only recently realized that I hold my breath…a lot.  My coworker heard me sigh and asked what was wrong.  Dave also mentioned that I sigh a lot.  I knew that I did, but I never realized it was because I hold my breath when I’m feeling stressed or anxious.  I wonder when this started?

From what I’ve read online, it seems this is directly correlated with anxiety.  I know I’ve been stressed and over-committed (this sound familiar to anyone) but I figured it was just my typical reaction.  That may be so, but I am finding that my unhealthy habit of anxiety instead of healthy stress, might be back.  That terrifies me.

I never realized I had anxiety until Kevin became very ill and I had a panic attack in the surgical waiting room in front of my entire family.  I went on meds to control the problem on an as needed basis. I have been proud to say that I’ve been off my anxiety and anti-depressants for a couple of years now, however, I can’t say that the problem is “solved”.  Will it ever be?

With another new chapter of my life just around the corner, I want to find healthy ways of dealing with stress and anxiety.  One seems to be completely correlated with the other.  I don’t want to hold my breath; it’s not healthy.  In fact, now that I’m putting this down, I wonder if the caffeine I cut out (coffee) was not the trigger, but moreso the holding of my breath would trigger my heart palpitations.  Or maybe, it was the combination of both things making my heartbeat go nuts.

Whenever something goes a little bit wrong, I tense my shoulders and hold my breath.  I would love your suggestions for releasing this and just rolling with the punches, something I’ve never been good with.

Anxiety has such a control in my life, and with a dominant personality, I crave control far too much.  How do you let go?

We chose an unlikely place to find couples: a local dive bar with great food. We invited our boisterous, and entertaining, single male friends of whom there was no romantic interest. We drank. We ate. We laughed. We celebrated singlehood, as much as it pained me that first year.

For anyone being single over an in-your-face holiday like Valentine’s day, t is not an easy holiday to embrace. Choosing an anti-holiday setting may just give you the release you need, and a celebration you need more.

Friends are important to have around over painful times such as these. Pick a few close friends who can relate and understand your journey, and most important, are also single. It may be hard to do, but you can guarantee that they need a night out as well.

Pick a place where you will not be surrounding by lovey dovey couples, or cupid arrows being thrown all over. Dive bars work great, and some local places may even be throwing an anti-Valentine’s Day Party. Here in Lancaster, Pa, Brendee’s Pub on W. Lemon Street has thrown them in the past. If you do not have a good location that will be couple-less, opt to stay in or do something unique.

Be comfortable-part of the Valentine’s Day hubbub is to get dressed up for a fine occasion. This is a single’s time to shine in all your sweatpants glory.  Baseball hats, sans makeup, don’t shave, be comfortable, embrace your beer gut. Let it all out: it’s part of the ‘anti-Valentine’ philosophy.

Love yourself for the night. It’s hard to let go of the past, whether it be a broken relationship, the loss of a loved one, or just being stuck in singledom-either scenario considered, it is time to celebrate you for a night that is not your birthday. Order the wine, and the dessert, or the beer, and the bratwurst. Garlic loaded? Why not?

Nearly a year after his death, after I had gone back to school and hit the 1-year loss mark, I was having difficulty studying and staying on top of school.  I sought out my doctor and together we made the decision to start on a low dose of anti-depressants to help me focus.

This morning, when I read Caleb Wilde’s recent blog, Should We Medicate Grief? I was appalled and saddened that the new Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders  from the American Psychiatric Association had decided to lump together grieving with depression.

I’m not disagreeing that grief feels depressing, but is it depression?  Isn’t it completely normal and sane for someone to not want to get out of bed, to put themselves in remote situations, to sob uncontrollably, to have suicidal tendencies, to feel at their lowest of low, because they lost someone they loved?

When chatting with a widow friend this evening we both agreed that we felt something is lost when a grieving person chooses to immediately medicate themselves.  That’s not to say that if you have depressive tendencies you shouldn’t be concerned and stay in close contact with a mental health professional, but if you’re just plain grieving, trying to suffocate that grief with medication can be destructive in the healing process.

I’m curious to know what your thoughts are.  Did you medicate immediately following the loss of a loved one?  Do you believe that grief should be lumped in with Psychiatrists’ diagnosis of depression?