Not Alone Anymore

Somehow the title I thought up in my mind, "not alone anymore" resonates throughout my entire body. For the last year, and who knows of the other times in my life, I have felt that I was the only person in the world that felt so alone. Somehow, I pushed on and believed that there was a 'light at the end of the tunnel' only to continue to lock down in my body those 'tragic', 'go-through- them-by-myself times', my father's death, the moves I made when the military 'told' us sometimes at a days notice that we would be moving to another province or out of the country, my husband going away to sea for weeks and months on short notice, and somehow everyone saying to me that it was a choice I made, ...those comments only help me to silence myself i believed at the time, no where else to go but inward, lock down and oh...wow... my sister's death. A sister that was more like a mother to me... I am from a family of twelve - she was the oldest in the family and I am the fifth child. Kathleen was always there for me, with chats (the one sibling that consistenly called me long distance whereever I was), always lots of encouragement and fun to be with. Is it no surprize to me now of what I have learned in the past year that she died of cancer, at the time she was an assistant bank manager and told one of her friends from the bank that "the big boys don't want to play".

Today, I stand at a very different place. I am grateful that I have allowed myself persmission to open up and receive. Maybe this past year, is all I did, received, and that is okay because I knew that I was willing to die when my husband and i moved to Ottawa last Sept 2006. We have moved from the Maritimes to Ottawa, my husband 'retireed' from the navy, our son moved away to university (i will talk about that in my blogs to come), truly valued myself only as a 'mother' and I was diagnosed 'diabetic' two years ago. I have suffered from 'PMS' all my life, and I remember the many jokes especially from my mother and younger sister when I was a teenager and up to just recently that silenced me. I wonder now, if my monthly cycle was the only window of opportunity I allowed myself time to express 'anger', the stuff that I now know that propelles you forward. Funny how culturally conditioned I was because I had the belief that good little girls were always to be good and pleasing...and the next thought that flows from my mind is subservant. hmm...

'PMS' has left me...i no longer even have the thought run across my mind... the 'problems' I was experiencing with my periods over the course of many months this year - most people would head to the doctor because I was anemic when I arrived last fall, and this spring I had so much blood lost during my periods that I even had one person say to me, "just go and get a 'hysterictomy' and get that plumbing out, you don't need it anymore anyways". I live in gratitude because I knew in my body i was experiencing something different then to run to an 'expert' - how for me, it was more important to listen to my own internal self. I am here not to say that 'experts' are good or bad and I am grateful for their knowledge and experience - I am here to say that i knew in my own body that it was meaningful to me to pay attention to what was happening to me. I am no longer experiencing those 'heavy' periods - as I look up at the title, I am not alone anymore - sweetness is coming back into my life....this has called up a lot in me...and this is an invitation for you, to give yourself persmission to notice what is rumbling around in you right now, breathe into that impulse and who knows where the next breathe will take you ...talk soon...