We Are Strong

In a telephone conversation with my beautiful mother last night the subject of my blog came up. She said that she was proud of me and she said that I was strong. When people say this to me I usually say thank you, and leave it at that. While anyone is saying this I think to myself " I'm really not".  I thought about this a lot today.

When we are faced with a tragedy, what other choices are there? Why is it that people think I am strong? For me, the aftermath of loss and suicide leaves a lot of anxiety. Anxiety is fear; fear of what might happen in the future. It is disempowering to constantly worry about what may happen. This is part of what I am currently working on for myself.

Mindfulness and living for each moment negates those feelings because we can learn to say "Right now I am OK" and not worry about what will happen next year, next month, next week, tomorrow, or even a few hours from now. It is surrendering to the fact that we cannot control anything except how we react or respond to a situation. This is tough! I am unsuccessful at it more than not, it's just how my brain is trained to think. We tend to have a million things running through our minds at once, from the most insignificant things (Did I pay the water bill? Did I turn the flat iron off?) to my biggest fears having to do with loss or death, that I really do not have any control over. I try to notice and stop it when it happens and with time, hopefully, I will be able to totally be in "right now". So, as far as being strong goes, anxiety  makes me feel weak and powerless.

To me, I just see it as dealing with my situation as it is. I watched a television program about Jaycee Dugard, the woman who was kidnapped and held captive for almost 20 years, she told her story and had a positive outlook and now appreciates every day that she has. I thought "wow, she is strong!".  Single parents are strong, children who were kidnapped for sex trafficking and spread awareness are strong, as are people who grow up being abused and spread awareness about it. It is all surviving horrible events but not letting those things break you. In that case, yes, I suppose I am strong but I am only doing what I feel will be creating a life worth living.

As far as this blog goes, I am just just as surprised as anyone else, to be honest. I have yet to write anything that didn't just flow through me. There is a powerful need in me to do something that may, one day, reach someone who needs this information. Maybe not even needs this exact information but finds this and contacts me to help them with what they do need.

I am going to do a whole post on what I am about to say, falling under the category of my experience with different things I have tried to help with dealing the pain of suicide, but I will share a small piece of it now.

A dear friend of mine sent a text message to me saying that she added me to a Facebook group. She said it contained psychics and mediums that do short readings live for free. I thanked her but didn't give much thought to it. I never considered talking to a medium but I've always found it interesting. One day while looking through my page I noticed someone was streaming a video so I clicked on it to see what she was saying. People were asking for a reading and she was going through the list in order. She would make some observations about their life and they all seemed pleased and agreeable with what she was saying.

I thought why not? I'll give it a shot. I posted a simple question "May I have a reading?" and waited for my turn, which never came. I got tired of waiting and moved along. As I was scrolling down I realized that it was not live, it was just recorded from when it was. Let me mention that I am, in no way, good at Facebook. I never post anything on my page and I maybe have ten friends.
A bit later as I was doing something else and had already forgotten about my flub, I received a message from the medium saying she saw my comment and told me about the services she offers. I embarrassingly apologized and told her that I was not working at the moment and I couldn't afford it but I would check into it when I was able. She told me that she was drawn to me and said there was a young man with her who said he had to tell me some things that I needed to hear, and offered her services at no charge if I was willing to wait for her work day to end because she felt compelled.
Now! I was skeptical to say the least but I thought it was kind of her and my interest was piqued, so I graciously accepted. One more message came from her that asked me to be open to it. I said I would be and I waited.
This has a point, I promise. The time came and she contacted me. I was really afraid of what she may say to me because I was in such a fragile state. I'm going to save most of it for a different post but she said "They need you to tell your story to help other moms, I'm not sure what they mean do you?" I said yes.  I started this blog shortly after that.

Before Nicholas died, my therapist told me I should look into being a speaker and spreading the word about surviving and child loss but I kind of dismissed it. Right after Joseph died I bought a domain name and started a blog but didn't write one post. I just didn't know what to write and I was scared of sharing such personal things in my life. Now I feel pushed to, I feel a passion about it. I want to share, provide information, and just let everyone who is faced with child loss and suicide know that they are not alone. I never feel like I have to be perfect, only that I have to be real.

Call it strength, call it a newfound compassion for other people, or call it my children guiding me. I don't know what is, but I have no intention of stopping.

I am strong. We are strong.