Last year I was just turning in my badge at work, cleaning off my desk, and preparing to leave my full time job to stay home with G after what had been a very hard year for him.
The past 12 months have been filled with journeys and travels I never planned on or prepared for, some I didn't even know I was taking until I'd come back, changed by the entire experience. G has traveled his own path as well, with tremendous growth. This past year has allowed both of us to leave behind the anxiety and insecurities we brought into it. We both are more settled, calmer at our core, and stronger. Sitting down to write this feels less like chalking up another month gone by, and more like having a whole new blog to write. There is excitement ahead for both of us and I fully intend for both of us to embrace all of it.
Today I registered the Gman for Kindergarten. It was a hard decision for me to make and I fretted over it for months. Having just turned 5, I could have held him back for a year to let him grow into himself a little more. He still struggles with good social skills among his peers but this boy is also reading, doing math, and his busy busy brain is bored. I can't really teach him the social skills he will learn in school, and the child wants desperately to go. So he'll go. Today we drove to his school, a place where he has gone to play in the playground and to ride his bike around the walkways and has some familiarity with. He was so excited, and yes, nervous too. It felt very anticlimactic to me, personally, after all the worrying I'd done. We walked in, met the principal, handed over our paperwork, and that was it. Done. G skipped back to the car, buckled up his own car seat straps, and chatted all the way home like he usually does. It felt so normal. That is the life we are excited to have - normal.
I had a hard adjustment coming back from Hawaii. It wasn't just the post-vacation blues, it was more. I was heartbroken, and missing my family. The time that I'd spent with my brothers, my nephew, and some old friends, had made me so acutely aware of what I was missing in my life. It also made me equally aware of what my future was looking like and how much I did not enjoy the view. I felt very unbalanced, very lonely, and shaken to the core with all the uncertainties I was facing in my life. It took some hard work with a great therapist, and I'm pretty sure I caused more than one of my friends to actually roll their eyes by the time I worked through a lot of old trauma as well as a whole new crop of fears, but I did it. I came through a really broken heart and fearful spirit to find a new path for myself. A journey that I am choosing deliberately.
There will always be sadness when I look back at my past, and letting go of hope leaves a discomfort that I'd rather not experience, but none of it has the power to stop me from making a future and being hopeful, unless I let it. I'm not willing to let it derail me though. I can have both: I can feel sad, and I can feel happy and hopeful. It is, as usual, about balance.
It was a long year. A year of battling demons and I wouldn't trade the demons we battled because the lessons we learned were worth it. Just the same? I'm glad to close the door on the past 12 months, and grateful to fling open the door and welcome in everything that the next 12 months will bring. I can't wait to write about it!
