Wednesday, April 13, 2011

No More Doom & Gloom!

Ok, I know I'm still in a grieving phase, and we have had probably one of the worst first two years of marriage EVER, but let's have a little happiness, shall we?
We can start with my attitude...attitude adjustment?
I started with cleaning the house yesterday...vacuuming the hardwood floors including corners and baseboards and under furniture, laundry, wiping down counters, cleaning sinks, washing out the kitchen trash can, dusting the tables and chairs with pledge, etc.
I have never been much of a house-keeper...arguably my biggest flaw as a human being is that I am a lazy slob. True story.
Anyway, my husband and I had one of those *real* marital "discussions" the other day and he finally let loose a few things he had been holding back for months. (Its like pulling teeth to get that man to admit he is unhappy with something.) Bottom line is that he had a good point....I may be grieving still, but being home all day while he works and pays the bills and him coming home to a messy house is really not fair to him.
That really hit home with me...I love my husband, despite our predicaments, and for him to feel unloved and unappreciated and ashamed of my lack of taking care of our home makes me feel bad. I need to get out of my feeling sorry for myself mode, press on through the anxiety and depression and anything else that gets in my way, and start small...so I blared the music yesterday and cleaned the house.
I remember a quote I heard on a commercial for that show on TLC "Buried Alive" about hoarders with ungodly cluttered and nasty homes, and the quote was something about the state of your home being indicative of your mental state.
You know, that is really true! If I look back on all the times that I decided to turn on the radio or pop in a good CD and clean my home top to bottom and organize drawers and throw away clutter and rearrange furniture...they were times in my life when I felt destressed, happy, and had a positive outlook on life.
So, if I only clean when I'm already happy and feeling good and when I'm depressed I live like a pig and keep everything filthy, and if your housing state is your mental state....wouldn't it seem logical that I could perhaps help myself get out of a mental funk by keeping my house clean? Even when I REALLY REALLY REALLY don't want to?
Let's see how that goes. I have very good motivation right now because my husband needs me with all the stuff going on with his ex-wife and kids right now. My season of being selfish and grieving is over...its not my turn anymore. My husband has given me ample time and leeway to grieve and he has done very little complaining. Now it's time to focus on the family situation at hand and start picking myself back up...I know I can't just become the person that I used to be overnight...but I need to step up this healing process because my family needs me right now.

Let's see if I can make a commitment to keeping my home clean and free of clutter and pray that it has the same effect on my mental and emotional state.

I feel lighter since the other day when I completely broke down and grieved for Becca so harshly...I put all the rest of the baby stuff in the attic that I had out in my room...the stuffed animal I had with her in the hospital, her memory box from the NICU, her photos and the ultrasounds and everything else. All in the attic. I miss my babies so much, but its been almost 6 months now since Becca died and it's been a year and a half since Jimmy died.
It's ok for me to be sad every now and then, but it's not ok to be a wreck anymore. I was allowed my time to wallow in my grief, and now it is time to get back up and get to work.
I'm so glad I am needed...I really don't think I'd have been able to motivate myself to climb out of this hole on my own.

2 comments:

  1. ((((HUGS)))) I am SO GLAD you have such a great positive out look shining through Katie!! =D
    I am wuite opposite, i clean when i am streesed out, all in a nervous panicked look, its very bizzare looking id imagine! lol! Do you and DH go to counseling at all? Matt and I start this Friday & I am just wondering how it all works if you know or have tried. Ill continue to keep you in my prayers and hope the sun keeps a shining in your soul!!! ((((HUGS))))

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  2. Its nice to have a bit of positivity come through this cloud of doom and gloom! Very refreshing, I must say.
    I wish I was like you in that I cleaned when I was stressed...I'm just not much of a cleaner, really, it's something I really have to work hard on.
    I have been going to counseling off and on. DH and I went to counseling together once and oddly enough we had actually worked through quite a bit on our own the night before so we didn't have much to talk about at our appointment...amazing what happens when you make your marital counseling appt 2 weeks in advance, hahaha! We have not been back since, but that does not mean we have not been problem free...I have spoken to our family counselor at church a handful of times since then.
    It's really, really, tough....I wish there was a guidebook for marriage in our situation. My husband and I have been married for less than 2 years and have been through huge amounts of stress and bereavement from everything from losing children, moving, losing jobs, blending families with step-relationships, and now custody battles....it's amazing that we're still together really.
    All the stress and grief has made marriage SO HARD, but in the end, if we can just tough it out...I think it will make us stronger than most (if we don't break first!!!) because we will have been through so much together. What is that quote I read somewhere? Something about matching scars...my husband and I definitely have many matching scars. Also something that grips my heart is the aching sorrow I feel for couples who have divorced over the problems that have arisen in their marriage when a child dies. That just hurts me in such a deep way....I don't want my husband and I to lose each other or suffer any more hurt than we already have. It's heartbreaking enough that we've lost 2 babies....we shouldn't have to lose each other too. There are too many memories that belong to just me and him, together, about our children...if we lose each other, we lose the only thing we have left of our babies and that is our memories together.
    I'm glad you and your husband are going to counseling and I hope that you two find a special tenderness for each other's hearts and feelings...its so easy to get caught up in the selfishness and callousness of grief that we forget how to love our partners and sometimes we alienate them or attack them in our pain.
    Ready to get my marriage back!! How 'bout you? Time for some healing and some forgiving and some sweetness and maybe even a little romance and tenderness!! Good luck, girl!! :)

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