Before and Now

Quite a few months ago when I mentioned to a friend that I had gone out on a week night to a political lecture she commented on how she wished she could do that. But her husband wanted/needed her home each night. When I replied that this was not not something I probably would have done when Michael was alive either, her response was "well isn't that a good thing about him dying?" I have to admit there are many things I might be doing now that I didn't do before June 23, 2007, but putting the words good and Michael dying in one sentence is just too much for me. But as I go back or rather as I look forward on the coming months and years I do indeed look at the list of things I am doing that I would not have done had Michael been still here.

I just returned from a 2 day golf tournament in North San Diego, I spent two nights away in the middle of the week. My life is kind of divided into those things I do now because I can choose to do them,

overnight golf trips
political lectures
remodeling the upstairs
traveling
remodeling Oregon Beach House
volunteering on Hadassah Committees
letting the dog on the bed and in the pool

and things I do now because I am alone

fall asleep with the TV on
skip meals
avoid romantic movies/books/plays
sleep in the middle of the bed
talk to myself
worry about my decisions
sign up for focus groups
get out of bed at the crack of dawn



not that women who aren't widows don't do these things or that I didn't do some of them before...I just do them all more now. There seems to be this line that divides everything. A sort of before and now. Even more difficult is that creeping sensation that there is enjoyment is one of those things. There is still the guilt of enjoying. I imagine it will be quite some time before it goes.

Well Here Goes

Someone asked me this past weekend what I did for a living and I was stumped. I hesitated for a second and then said, "I think I am retired." You see today was my last day at work, at my job. It was a part time job at that but I had been there seven years, creating the position of oncology nurse educator at weSPARK. I worked 15 years caring for cancer patients as an RN and with Micheal's death from brain cancer last June and all the deaths at work..well it was time to not be needed.
Marissa my 17 year old daughter leaves for college at the University of Colorado Boulder August 19. (Go Buffs) We could go deep into the empty nest stuff if indeed my nest was empty, but it is not. Nick, my oldest is living at home. But things are changing and way to fast for me and not at all as I planned. Back to the decision; the choice to leave now. I mean people asking me most of last year "why are you still working around cancer patients".

After losing Michael, my partner,my husband and suddenly becoming something I had not chosen; a widow, a single woman. I was not ready to give up my identity as a nurse. Something I loved, something I was good at and felt good doing. Now I am at least prepared to try, try and explore and discover who this new person is just as Marissa heads out to discover herself so too will I begin discover.

Maybe I made it out to sound a little too spiritual. The truth is I am going to get Marissa settled at school, travel and play golf and travel some more. The clinical term could be self care but I am learning about this widow thing day by day and ugly month by ugly month and yes I confess I am looking forward to not being needed so much.