Working on detachment, my anxiety, and the joys of limbo

[Phoebe]

Well, I'm back!

So yesterday I saw my grief counselor. It was hard to talk about my loss history, and, yes, I cried almost the whole time I was trying to talk through it. Big surprise, right? On the other hand, she was an incredible listener. The idea when someone is telling about their loss history or a relationship history is to be a heart with ears and no mouth, so the listener does just that and may react normally and even cry, but should not talk or question.

The idea is not to pretend we will arrive at a point where we no longer hurt. I don't think that is possible, particularly in the case of relationships that are ongoing. The idea is to understand our own history, identify any themes (like my lack of emotional safety in Rs) or any recurrent behavior in ourselves (I realized that I go back to those who have rejected me and pick up any crumbs they drop me, usually in the form of physical attention, hence the reason I allowed intimacy with my H the night before I found out about the PA).

I listened to her loss history last week and she listened to mine yesterday. Then we talked a little bit, and she shared the next step, which is to choose a specific relationship and record that history as another graph. She shared the history of one of her own Rs. It's hard work, emotionally, and my counselor's pain in her own relationship is as present as my own.

So now I need to examine a specific relationship. In this case, probably my marriage, but the same process can and should be done for most major relationships in my life. Again, it's to help me learn about myself as much as it is to learn about the other person.

So, it was hard, but perhaps more of a neutral experience than I expected because we didn't talk about the loss history, per se. I shared my history and then shared the observations I had learned about myself. Then we talked about those observations and themes more than the actually history.

After all that, I went thrift shopping, and it was a sale day at the two places I went. I got 2 pair of jeans and 3 shirts for $16. Good brands, too. Sweet. It's to have clothes that fit. I'm still choosing to embrace the weight loss. Well-fitting clothes make me look healthy, whereas the baggy stuff made me look ill. I tried to wear a pair of my hiking pants today to work in, and they literally fell down. So much for those!

The Audubon meeting last night was all about bluebirds, and it was great! I am definitely going to the one next week, too.

So this is for SadHub. My local report. After being unseasonably cool, today it hit 83 sunny degrees, which is too warm for this kid. Luckily it wasn't humid, so it was reasonable, plus the tractor has a/c.

I have solar panels and they generate all the electricity that I have used since the went in, so today they were cranking out the watt-hours and running the meter backwards. I'm grid-tied, so I pay for the privilege of being hooked up by paying a monthly line fee and basically use the grid as a giant long-term battery. I make extra power all summer and then in the winter I pull it back out. It's pretty cool.

I spent another 4 hours today brush-hogging and waging my continued fight against invasive species -multiflora roses and Japanese barberry. I once though that the roses were pretty. They still are, but now they are the enemy. I love it what a massive shrub becomes a pile of mulch. It sounds easy to drive a tractor around, but it is strangely hard work. Because it's all field edges, and the edges are hilly, all of it is done with the tractor in reverse. I spend those hours cranked around, looking behind me, running two levers with my arms and my feet run the brake and clutch. I get out and my limbs are just kind of trembling and my neck is sore.

Still, it feels like such a victory to reclaim land that was previously unusable. The roses firm impenetrable thickets, and I've probably reclaimed a couple acres or more. It's also cool to be putting the tractor to use. I don't know if I'll be able to keep it. It's just quite a big expense. I'm going to use it all I can in the meanwhile.

You'd think the birds would all fly away while I work, but they seem really interested. I must scare up insects as I go.

No contact with H continues, which is good. Every day leaves me feeling a little bit stronger and more resilient without him. Every day I check the mail, mentally prepared to find that H has started D proceedings, but nothing has come and no word from him about it. Total limbo, but I am out GALing! I know I need more pure social contact, but I spend time with people every day, and the work I do on my property makes me feel like I'm doing something meaningful.

I see my journaling has gone overlong again. Oops.