From My Heart to Yours

 October 10, 2023

It's been over a year since I posted. Shortly after the last post you texted me that you were going to go no contact for a year. August 24, 2022.  I knew it would be more.....I knew it could be forever. We have a total of almost seven years apart.

 I continue to grow in ways I never dreamed. I have you to thank for that. Peeling back the layers of the onion and dealing with them one by one. I used to pray for a day I didn't cry. Now I string months together and don't let the grief consume me. Then there are the days, like this one, that I let the tears flow. I don't give myself permission to cry for the whole day anymore...now I give myself a couple of hours to just cry.  We are moving on with our life.We are learing to live without you.  

Sometimes my mind gets off its leash and I dream about the the things we could do together to heal. Books I would love for us both to go through. I just finished, What Happened to You? Conversations on Trauma Resilence and Healing by Perry and Winfrey. It drove home so much of what I have already learned. 

You know, sometimes when I write I think....hmmm I am making it all about me. But then I realize....thats all I have is me. In order to make it about you, you would have be brave and share.  Ironically Brene Brown calls it Braving.  It takes emotional regulation and a lot of strength to be vulnderable. To dare to put yourself out there. I find it so ironic, I begged my Mom to go to counseling...so peel back the layers...to be brave. I so hoped I was worth fighting for. I wasn't valuable enough to her....I wasn't worth fighting for. 

Now, as I work to let go of you a little every day, I tell myself that I did everything I could...I stepped up to the plate and was willing to be vulnerable...to do hard things. I was excited to when you requested counseling...I was willing to be vulnerable to work hard to heal wounds that I may have caused without meaning to.  I know I have so much more understanding and compassion for my mother learning what our brains do to protect ourselves. I am so grateful that I had the strength to continue to learn and heal, to be vulnerable. I wonder....will I be worth fighting for someday for you? Or, will I have worked so hard to let go that I will be fearful to even let you in....to want to try. 

You know I sit here and try to write the perfect words....when the reality is you probably never even look at this blog. The story I tell myself is that you don't even think about the Mom and Dad who grieve so deeply over the loss of their child. So often I tell my heart to be like my Mom....to be hard and cold and not care. But I am not her..... I grieve very deeply. I want so badly to reach out. To say I love you, to say I miss you....but then I also know that I will have to deal with the silence that tells me you couldn't care less that I love you or miss you. So my brain and my heart war with each other. I also wonder if you think I am not fighting for you. So the war is, do I honor your request of no contact and leave it up to you or do I send you a text knowing my number is most likely blocked. Do I set myself up for more heart ache or do I continue to build the walls around my heart and pray for the day I no longer think of you...as if that could happen.  I also wonder if you also know you have work to do? You have emotional resilence to build. I so so so wish I knew then what I know now. I would teach you that emotioanl resilence. To be a fuckin' Cheetah (as Glennon Doyle would say) and do hard things! I truly hope someday you are brave enough to explore the darkness ....somewhere in there I hope you find yourself and the Mom who loves you. 

I need to stop writing now.....I can't see through the tears. I wish you love, I wish you strength I wish you happiness. When you see a butterfly think of me. Living under the same moon and stars ....your Mom.