It's funny how things come around and go around. Patterns in our own lives - in everyone's lives. We all have our personal patterns, our karma that must either work out or rehash over and over again.
I've rehashed enough, and I'm ready to move forward, in all things. Our move is a month and a half away - our guess date is Sunday, Marth 15th - and we're ready. Things are coming together in a way that they haven't when we've tried to move before. Ducks are in rows, poop is in groups. People who I have helped are coming out of the woodwork to help me, and that moment is magical. I don't know why it's hard to accept that other people like me, care about me, and want to see me succeed, but it is. I'm trying to learn to accept help and kindness from others without feeling like I should have been able to do it myself. I am one person. I can do no great things, just small ones, joined with others.
Yesterday was my 30th birthday, and Dean had the most beautiful surprise party for me. No one has ever done anything like that before, and he really went all out. Not just him, either.
All the special people in my life too the time to make sure that I didn't know the surprise was coming. They spent their time and money having dinner with me at a spend-y restaurant, and sacrificed kid bedtimes to bestow their love on me. When I pulled off my blind fold, all I could do was cry with joy. No experience could have convinced me more that I am loved, that I am wanted, and that people want to care for me because they want to. No one was obligated to be there. They just came.
Things will be different with that knowledge. Things already are.
Two years ago I had a mental breakdown. I was trying to be a full-time mom to two kids under 4 - including one with a recent epilepsy diagnosis. I was trying to be a full time college student. I was trying to be a full time apprentice. And it was all too much. I was getting up at 4am to drive to class, sitting in class for 8 hours, and then driving home in the dark with no cell phone reception, often barely awake and arriving at 9pm or later, with my children already in bed. It was hellish. It was horrible. And it all came down around me like a cave collapsing. I was sick in body, and I was sick emotionally, physically. psychically. In every way that one can be sick, I was. I curled into a ball and cried, and then when I stopped crying, I turned away. I gave away all my books, my instruments, my tools-of-the-trade. I forgot that I knew anything about birth, forgot, even, that I loved it.
I didn't know until about a week ago, or I suppose I just didn't allow myself to see, that everyone around me saw what had happened. I had felt so helplessly alone. Those around me saw and understood, with no judgement what had happened. I'm sure they even wanted to help, but I couldn't see their hands reaching out in the dark. They watched me crumble, and they watched me push everyone away. Me. Watched me push everything away and retreat into that dark space you go when you have no energy left to even feed or care for yourself.
I crawled out of that cave, slowly but surely. I moved forward with my life, and now I'm ready. I'm at the very edge of the clearing, and if I look back I can see that cave. In front of me, though, is the main road. The forked detour I took that day two years ago. Finally I'm open to it again, and the way is open to me.
I've broken a pattern, so finally I can move forward. The pattern started when I left Florida. I left a lot behind. My hopes of every finishing my midwifery training, my sewing machine and guitar, and much more. And to be honest, I didn't leave with much grace. I couldn't. I was already walking the path to my cave.
For my 30th birthday, Dean got me a guitar. Not because I'm a musician, or because I play constantly, but because there was a completeness to the gift. After two years of purposely shutting out birthwork, all my books came back to me, all at once. The lightness and joy I felt in that moment was overwhelming. There was a completeness to the return. A friend had held onto them for me, fro two years. I didn't do it on my own. I had much help. I turned my car on the other morning and the radio was on. The first word? Midwife. A similar 'omen-ing' is happening with Oregon.
Finally I'm not battling through the path, running headlong down it, forcing my way straight when I see bends and turns. I am following, open to what comes. I am not alone, but rather surrounded with companions, on divergent, yet connected paths. And I am content. Content to explore the path at my own pace, in my own way, in my own time. It is my way to walk, and I am finally content to do just that.
