Family
Repost from 3/24/2016
One Tuesday about 15 years ago the kids took off for school and I laid down for a while: I wasn’t feeling well. My husband came back to the house, which never happened, and proceeded to tell me about some bad choices he had made that affected our marriage and family. It was shocking. It stopped time. And my life was never the same. When the kids came home from school, their family had changed forever without their knowledge.
From that moment forward, I ended every phone conversation, every drop off, every walk out the door, every goodnight with “Love you.” I still say it to them every time and they say it back. I wanted to make sure that if time stopped again, those words were etched in their memories.
Now that trouble has struck me again, I have a new ritual. Every night when I go to bed I tell myself and God what I am grateful for. It may be just one thing and sometimes I have to stretch to find that one thing, but I find something. Usually I have lots of things for which to be grateful. Thank you for my phone conversation with Ryan. Thank you for keeping Kevyn safe when she was traveling. Thank you for my visit with Kyle. Thank you for the warm day. Thank you for the sun. Thank you for the one pound lost. Anything. It makes me feel better. It reminds me of all the blessings in my life.
In the morning, I give thanks for letting me wake up another day. It sounds corny, but it helps me appreciate my life.
And, when all that negative talk starts swirling around in my head; what I did right, what I did wrong, what he did to me, how bad he is, how stupid I was, I say this little prayer to myself: “God, please take this mind off of my mind and out of my heart.” That’s really the best I can do. I know there will come a day when I say that and hear in my head…done.
Read MoreRepost from 3/8/2016
It has been clear to me for a long time that I am not the same girl I used to be. I changed along the way, and I didn’t know if I was coming back.
I always felt that I was kind of fun to be around. And, I certainly thought my husband would agree. But, from the start of our marriage, I was, apparently, mistaken. I felt like “the old ball and chain,” and I knew that wasn’t me. But I must have been…right? Why else would he treat me that way?
So I would try harder and harder and harder. And, by the time I realized that I had built a fortress around myself to protect me from the heartache, the old Paula was long gone. I knew what would fix it, but I couldn’t do it.
I used to have a saying, “for a better marriage, just lower your expectations.” It worked for me but is so sad.
I can say without hesitation, I was enough. Our family was enough. Our family should have been the focus, not a distraction.
I can breathe now. While I am so sad that my marriage didn’t make it, it makes me happy to know that my children will get to know the real Mom all over again. I think they will be surprised at the me that they didn’t know existed. The happy, light-hearted, fun person who had been buried under the weight of an unhappy marriage and all the sadness that came along with that. They will get to know Paula, not just Mom. Can’t wait for that to happen.
Are you living the life you envisioned? I bet most of you are shaking your heads about now and saying to yourself, “No, I am not.” I have to say, I’ve been so focused on the fact that being single wasn’t part of the plan, that I didn’t realize that I am actually closer to my vision than I have ever been in my life.
I am single. I didn’t expect to be single, although that thought seems ridiculous now. But, I always saw myself as the married mother of three for the rest of my life. That didn’t happen, so my happiness was over. I had failed. I saw my divorce as the tent pole for everything, rather than one piece of the puzzle.
Recently, I’ve been evaluating my life and what’s missing and how I can make it better and the truth is this: the only thing missing in my life is that marriage. And, it was a terrible marriage. It wasn’t happy, it wasn’t healthy, it was not right for me. I have been so mad at myself for not picking the right guy, for not making it work with that guy, for not being able to hold on to that marriage no matter what, for failing at marriage. It is time to stop.
The only opinions that matter to me about all of that are my children’s and they don’t see a failure. They actually see a woman who was able to take all of that and reboot.
I am actually the closest I have ever been to living the life I envisioned. There is one piece missing, but that one piece isn’t everything. I am not married to the father of my children. That’s all. But I have a great life, I love my life. It actually looks like a life that I could have envisioned all those years ago, with a couple of exceptions. I am proud of it.
So again, I ask you, are you living the life you envisioned? What’s missing from it and are you letting one missing link takeover your wellbeing? Re-evaluate where you are, where you want to be and I feel certain that you will be closer than you think to your dream.
Read MoreHere we go: the holidays are here and those holidays offer a mixed bag of emotions for all of us, no matter what our marital status. But, if you are 50+ and single, you may not see a Norman Rockwell painting when you look ahead at what’s coming. So what can you do about that? How can you make the next six weeks happier and less ominous? One word, plan. Plan, plan, plan. That way you can prepare yourself for the potholes in the road ahead and try to avoid them. You have seen these ideas here before at Starting Over at Sixty, but they can’t be overstated: you must plan your holidays so you can stay out of the darkness that can take over when you get loneliness creeps in.
Are you going to be alone on Thanksgiving? First, remember that not all family affairs are perfect. When I was a kid, I thought everyone in the universe was at a dinner table having the time of their lives on Thanksgiving: family, food and fun. I was an only child and so it was just the three of us. That was not what I thought Thanksgiving should look like. It wasn’t until years later that I realized that not all big, family Thanksgivings are anywhere near perfect, but we do romanticize the day. That being said, many of us have that perfect vision, and when we are left out of it, our hearts are a little broken. So, what can you plan for on Thanksgiving? It’s a good day to take a long walk, to watch the parade and to watch the dog show. It is a great day to go to a movie, or even two. Make a plan to see someone, anyone, at some point during the day so you are not 100% isolated.
Christmas Eve and Christmas are big family days, of course, and I know that I used to dread waking up on Christmas morning alone. But, I also don’t like it when my adult children leave to move on to other family celebrations that don’t include me. So, when I can, I take the afternoon-evening shift so when they get there they are all mine for the rest of the day. I go to church if I am alone on Christmas Eve because it takes my mind off myself for a while and puts the joy back in the holiday. That’s just me. You can choose to do anything you want, but Christmas Eve always feels like a more sacred, joyous time, and you might want to enjoy that feeling, whether you are alone or not, whether you are Christian or not. It is my favorite night of the year. On Christmas, I can get through anything when I know I have something to look forward to.
Now, for New Year’s Eve; is there any more hated holiday? I hated it when I was young and single, I hated it when I was married and I hate it now that I am old and single. It feels to me like a time to celebrate how painfully aware I am of how fast time goes by! I am happy to see the dawn of January 1st so I can say goodbye to New Year’s Eve. So, I am always proactive for New Year’s Eve because it is not an evening that I want to leave to chance. I have invited friends for a dinner party. I have gone to a comedy club for some fun. And, this year I have planned to go to an Inn for a couple of days to do absolutely nothing! But, the key to getting through it is to do more than get through it: it is to create your own fun. Make it happen!
So, I want you to sit down right now and plan your next six weeks: plan for parties or the lack thereof. Plan for the actual holidays and your possible lonely times. And, plan for the fun, the moments that make the holidays happy and joyful and full of love. Make the most of this time by preparing for the worst and enjoying the best the holidays can offer.
Happy Holidays!
Read MoreAging isn’t for wimps, is it? And, there are times when it seems that as a single woman I am falling apart without a support system. It’s easy to have a pity party, isn’t it? But, if you need a pick-me-up just look around you to feel pride. Look at the people who you have helped, the people you have raised, the people you have lifted up in your world and I don’t care who you are, you will swell up and send that pity party packing.
I was at an event this week to honor my uncle. When we were assembled to take a family photo, I thought, “Who would have ever imagined the paths that our lives would take and the families that we built around us? Who would have thought all of this would be possible nearly forty years ago when our lives looked pretty bleak?”
My uncle and I both lost our parents in our twenties (my mother was his sister). He lost his wife to cancer in his early forties, just one month after cancer took my mother. I can remember being at my aunt’s funeral and feeling like the sky was falling. We were a couple of sad sacks, and we were the last ones standing in our little family. Mark was left with a six-year-old daughter to raise. We had both had a lot to deal with in each of our short lives.
My uncle remarried and has lived happily ever after. And, while my marriage wasn’t a happily ever after situation, I have three wonderful adult children who are proof that I did something good.
Now, here we were at a photo-op, my uncle and his wife, his daughter, their grandchildren, and me with one of my sons. This was our family that he and I could never have imagined all those years ago. This is the family that we both wish our mothers could have known. For me, it was a moment. I felt so much pride, even though nothing was about me that day. I just kept thinking about where we came from and where we are now.
So, again, I say that aging isn’t for wimps, and sometimes it feels like the Titanic. But once in a while, you get a glimpse of what your life has been all about and I can’t imagine even one of you not being able to look back at your lives and think about what you have accomplished and the people you have helped or nurtured along the way. And, again I say, just look around you to feel pride.
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