Sharing of yourself

Today is another day for gratitude and appreciation for stories.

I, again, met someone who was widowed at a young age. I see this as something remarkable.  In some ways before I was widowed, I don’t really recalling meeting young people who were widowed on a somewhat regular basis.  Perhaps I just didn’t note the people’s circumstances, but truly, even of clients, as a social worker, I recall only meeting a small handful of people who describe their life story as having been widowed at a young age.  Yet, nonetheless, I’ve been meeting widowed people all over the place it seems.  Just in the past month I met two older women who were widowed young. I listened to what they revealed about themselves with great interest.  Both had a multitude of children (one had 9 when she was widowed, the other 6). One had had a number of partners since and the other I’m not quite sure, both now have grandchildren and even great grandchildren. One was met at a cancer related workshop.  What both have given me is perspective. At times I feel I struggle with one child to raise on my own, how about nine? Of course there are unique aspects to each.  With multiple children you have older kids who can help with the younger kids and the older children have much to share about their father with the younger kids. But that is also 10 mouths to feed and a home to keep large enough for ten. Anyway, the most important thing is perspective.

One thing I have become even more aware of, and it seems silly to write this as a therapist, is how all of us have a story.  What seems clear to me is that few of us share our stories. Even fewer share publicly, although, that may be changing with this world of internet.  Again and again I have been meeting people whom I have the greatest admiration for given the challenges of their story.  I think, perhaps, these stories of tragedy and triumph are actually quite common, but for some reason no one lets on this is the pain they carry with them and of the strengths that carried them through tough times.  I think if we are more able to share our lived experiences in various ways (in creative, not overbearing or in needy, ways) that perhaps, it is gift that we are sharing with others:  to inspire, to help them through tough times, to help each other understand that we are not alone. In a way, it is an act of love to take the opportunity to give the gift of sharing of yourself.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Telling Others

This has to be the toughest aspect of having difficult life situations, telling/sharing with others.  I keep feeling there is this look of horror in my friends, family and others' eyes when I share what is going on.  Generally I'm a fairly open person, and it's not me to lie about what is going on in my life. In turn, this sense of not being able to share without the reflection (in other's faces) of "how can this be happening" often prevents me from putting myself out there because it is hard to share, and more difficult to see the reaction of others.

What do I want?  To know that my friends, family, colleagues, and others whom I share with are going to be positively supportive.  To know that they will check in on me, since I don't always have the energy to reach out; to know they are thinking of me and sending out positive vibes; to treat me the same despite what has occurred in my life... I guess the sympathies of others kinda grate on me.  I'd rather laugh about how absurdly difficult the curve balls are that life swings at us.  I'm mean really, I lost the love of my life to cancer (thus far, though I can be optomistic that there could be a time in future that I could meet another fantastic man), now I have a bout with this disease (although totally different outcomes are anticipated as my husband had a rare cancer and I had a well researched, early detected cancer - "had" as it was removed with surgery months ago now); and my work is to help people emotionally to address trauma in their lives yet I have a whole big mess of my own emotions to sort through with all of this.

I'm writing this post now because there are now two opportunities to meet with friends from long ago - well people I haven't seen in 10 years or more.  One person I have agreed to meet - she doesn't know about what is going on, but I will share with her when she comes to town. The other is a group of friends from residence at university. There is a closer group within the larger group that knows of my diagnosis, the rest do not know.  I guess I've taken the route of the closest to me knew right away, then others whom I'm likely to see, everyone else is on a need to know basis. I actually would like to go and see this larger group of university friends and look forward to hear what they are doing, but I don't want to bring down the conversation in our few hours at a pub with what all has occurred in my life. Nor do I want my closer group of friends being put in the place of fielding questions of how I am if I’m not there. I am tinkering with letting the larger group know ahead of time and sharing this blog. So there's time to digest and "be normal" by the time we meet and I can look forward to seeing everyone with a little less anxiety and feeling weird. So when I stomach the edginess of sharing, I will type up something to the university group and hope it goes well.