Total Eclipse of the Heart

Listening to music has always been my solace, my energizer, my safe place to express deep feelings and truly feed my soul.  I may have mentioned in previous blogs that I was struggling lately with listening to many of the love songs that had always blessed me with a deep joy as I sang along and basked in the love that my husband and I shared.  During these past few years as I was losing him to Alzheimer’s and struggling with the emotional fallout from losing that love I had been basking in for so long, those same songs ignited the battle in my soul between that love and the loss of that love.  The songs didn’t feel the same anymore.  They started asking questions.  What the fuck are you singing about?  They seem so idealistic, unrealistic, and sometimes downright, schoolgirl fantasy baloney.  What kind of love is that?  Does that kind of love really exist?  Did I ever believe in that love?  It just seemed so far removed from the losses in that love and my life partner that I had been experiencing as I walked beside him on his end of life journey.  I just wasn’t feeling the vibe.

I still don’t really have any answers yet for those questions.  I’m still sorting through that and probably will for a while. Another thought just occurred to me tonight after meeting up with my brother, catching up and sharing what been going on.  My thought was: I wonder how long it’s going to take me to heal enough to be able to feel what it used to feel like and lessen the impact of the last three years.  I guess we’ll see.  I will continue to walk through my version of hell, but I think I can get out before the devil knows I’m there.

Another interesting thing about music that I’ve experienced lately.  Some songs that I’ve always known and enjoyed have attached themselves to my souls and a certain portion of those songs keep running over and over again in my head for days.  The biggest one is from Total Eclipse of the Heart by Bonnie Tyler.  “Once upon a time I was falling in love, now I’m only falling apart.  Nothing I can do, a total eclipse of the heart.”  The music in this portion has always touched my soul but right now the words themselves are seared on my heart.  They just keep repeating over and over again.  Guess I’ll just keep listening until my heart finds its way back to its path.

I have really been struggling with finishing this particular post and missed my due date on submitting it.  I just couldn’t finish it last night.  As I was driving home today, it has been weighing heavy on my mind, first because it wasn’t done, second because I didn’t know where to go with it or how to finish it.  I’m so deep in the mess of my life, I don’t know how to move forward.  So, I called a friend of mine from my Alzheimer’s caregivers support group who lost her husband to Alzheimer’s a few years ago.  I was pretty sure she could help me process what I was feeling and how it’s impacting my life.  Then, maybe I could continue this post and actually make sense.  Because it wasn’t making sense inside of me and I couldn’t figure out how to write about it.  And, as usual her words made sense to me and helped put some things in perspective.  I told her about the abyss I had fallen into and how I was struggling to figure out how to move forward.  I’m anxious to move on to my next life, but I can’t quite seem to do it.  One of the things we talked about is the fact that caregiving for a partner with dementia changes who you are.  When your partner has dementia, you are going through the loss of your partner while you’re both very much alive as you lose the emotional connection because they can no longer process their daily lives and interactions.  Their behavior changes and so does yours.  You are dealing with so many losses while you are giving your all to take care of the one you love, who is unable to provide the emotional return because of the state they are in.  Your partner isn’t always there when you need them.  In my case, I also had two surgeries and a fractured foot and losing my son during the same timeframe.  Although my husband tried to be there for me during that time, he didn’t have the capacity to do so.  Sometimes he didn’t even remember that my son was dead or why and I would have to lay it all out for him.  This sometimes happened on an hourly basis.  It was very difficult to deal with the most painful thing that could ever happen when having to figure out how to help him process what he was unable to comprehend.  She told me it changes who you are.  Aha!  Light bulb goes on.  Damn, she’s right.  I’m not the same person I was three and a half years ago.  Oh shit.  Then who the fuck am I?  Here I am thinking I’m just a better version of me because of all the attention paid to my growing and healing as these events are unfolding.  Well, hopefully I’m still a better person even though I’m not sure yet who that is.  I think I will have to spend some time on that. Here I was thinking I was the same and wondered why I just couldn’t seem to do it.  No, I’m not the same.  This was well-defined trauma.  So, not only am I grieving his loss, I’m recovering from the trauma of the last three years.  That just means I have more healing and growing to do.  I look forward to that, because I sure don’t like where I’m at now and don’t want to continue in this mode.  Just like when I got sober; I wasn’t afraid of dying and I wasn’t interested in suicide.  I just didn’t want to keep living the misery for the rest of my life.  That was my bottom that forced me to seek healing and growth.  And, I found my way out of that misery and chose a good life for myself.  So, I’ve enjoyed the benefits of healing and growth many times since then.  For me, living proof of what great things can happen when you open yourself up to it.  I’m impatient though.  I think it needs to happen now because I’m ready to give it up.  I forgot that it takes time and work to find my self again.  I think I should be done now.  But, I do know from experience (after being reminded) that it’s not a “say and do.”  It’s “say and do one day at a time.”  It’s not about the words, it’s about the action that follows.  Growth isn’t going to come without action on my part. I figured that out a long time ago.

We have come down to crunch time.  If I’m going on this 50-state motorcycle ride in just over a year, there is one hell of a lot of care I am going to have to apply to myself if I’m going to physically even be able to do it.  With my lack of appetite, weight loss, lack of nutrition, not drinking water, not having worked out for a while due to recent events, my body is just generally in a sad state.  It’s going to take some serious work to build me up again physically.  I no longer have the luxury of neglecting my health because of the trauma in my life, which is kinda how I’ve been operating.  I believe my mode of operation has to change.  “Act as If” comes to mind from AA and something my husband and I often talked about.  The thought being that if you take the action, the mind will follow.  It’s worked pretty good for me over the years.  Something my sister-in-law said to me this morning now makes a lot more sense in this whole ShitShow.  I was talking about the people I’ve been losing, not just to death, but because they can’t get past their own bullshit.  I guess there was still a lot of emotion in my words, as her response was “yeah a lot of losses, but maybe it’s time to focus on what who you have that is still there for you.” I’m like “yeah, yeah, blah blah blah.”  Typical psychology.

Eight hours later after continuing this blog, I realized that I had reached the same point in my writing.  Focus on the positive, Act as If…and change the trajectory.

Once again it amazes me that the people in my life bring exactly what I need when I need it.  I hope I can do the same for them.  Several different conversations with my brother and sister-in-law and Alice and other friends in the last eight hours has brought me to a whole different perspective than I had when I started this blog last night and woke up with it in my head this morning.  I feel like the load is just a bit less heavy right now.   I love it when that happens.  I can move forward a bit today now that they have provided me their combined words of wisdom. Tomorrow I’ll work on remembering this so I can do one more day at a time.  I guess I can always re-read my blog, if I forget.

Love and Peace,

Chick