1 Year Off The Streets

Hi again,
Feels nice to back here again so I'm just going to jump straight into it. To sum up some of the reason why I haven't followed up on last my series on no longer being homeless...my sweet grandma died and not in the most peaceful way. Then I lost my lovely little firecracker and best friend of 8 years "Penny" my dog, soon after. 2018 was a year of loss and grieving for me more than it was a year of celebration. How is one supposed to feel happy you have a home when the very souls you want to have in your home aren't here? What is a house if its empty of the company you want? I imagined when we got a home I would create a get together so everyone I know could come celebrate with us but instead all I felt was aching and in no mood for having a party or to even think of a celebration.

Moving on felt dirty. It felt feels wrong.

My heart was broken by the loss of 2 souls. They were stripped from this world in painful ways and I felt feel robbed not just for me but for them. I guess thats how the loss of loved ones goes for anyone though. You stand back aghast with the breath taken out of you, suffocated. Then no one lets you know about that terrible feeling you get every time you remember that time forgets everything as soon as it happens and so you feel like you have to scurry and huddle and gather every memory and any sense of proof that they were once here in order to keep the pain from crippling you over because you have to be alive still even though they aren't.

Did that make any sense? Did you get any of that?

I guess I knew I should try writing again when I would look towards my desk and the computer everyday briefly for a couple seconds. Its felt like something you forgot but knew you needed to remember.

When you begin to realize you are suffocating yourself in order to stay in the same mental/emotional state thats when you know you are no longer meant to be there. Thats when you realize its not the pain holding you back anymore...its you. I guess what it means is feel what you need to feel until you don't anymore, right? I couldn't not (the biggest lump in my throat formed as I typed this) allow myself to celebrate the place that we are in our lives rightnow. The growth. The stability. The handling and navigation of new terrain. I couldn't deny myself that forever. I am now able to side with the belief I've held onto forever that you can grieve and celebrate, you can be sad and happy disturbingly and magically all at once. I scorned at celebration or anything similar to it when it was fresh and wasn't able to see anything other than that until magically one day I could again.

I would like to point out that telling someone who has recently suffered a loss to celebrate is NOT helpful. We must allow anyone going through a loss to progress there naturally. No one wants to hear positive, cliché things when you are fresh in the midst of feeling shitty. It can make the person in pain feel distant towards you and alone.

August 1st will be a year since we've moved in and I feel like that absolutely must be wrong. How can this be? WHAT?? And not because I don't remember paying rent Oh I remember THAT part its the everything else part thats a little fuzzy. Having to make a house a home while grieving can blurr out a lot of memory. I haven't invited anyone over that I would have liked but maybe that's to come. I plan to upload a video of tidbits put together of the moving in process to help me better enunciate all of the feelings that came with this experience.

I feel really vulnerable uploading this. For a second, I actually was trying to figure out a way to make this post without it but then I thought about how I recorded all these things in hopes that I could see them, remember and really appreciate how far we'd come. This time I'm just sharing it with you too.

Home is still being put together day by day. I am still shocked when I sit back to think of it all or when I make a purchase specifically for it. Like buying house plants and patio furniture. I have my own place to put them in?? Crazy. I get to create my home. Control my environment and the ambiance it has. I get to burn sage and I get to shower when I want. I can read books in bed. 

I am still navigating what it means to be the boss of my home and setting boundaries with family in regards to it. I am trying to learn in which areas the boundary lines should be just lightly outlined and which ones should be bolded. I'm learning and healing and its tough work but good tough work. I always said that getting my own home was the next step and now that we're here I'm terribly anxious but grateful. 

I've felt quite lost to be honest with you and I thought I was even done with writing but I am actually feeling a little bit more centered since writing this. 

Next week, for sure.

Okay I'm going to try really hard.

I am.

I will.

Okay, Bye.