I had last night off, I decided that instead of going out and doing doing doing doing I was going to stay in and just physically reset myself for another long day and then hustle and bustle of getting ready for vacation. I made myself a nice dinner and sat down to watch a movie. I chose The Shack.

I know it is rather shocking that I would randomly chose this movie after vowing I wouldn't or couldn't sit through it but I figured worse case scenario I was home alone and I could turn it off and throw the remote through the TV if needed. It was not that bad.. I cried, probably more that most people would but the movie itself was very good. I can see why it received some nasty Christian comments as it doesn't really fit in the mold they have made God or Jesus into and that is ok. I am not here to judge anyone else's thoughts or beliefs only mine.

The main part of this movie is a family who lost a child, a daughter to be exact. While the situation was completely different than mine it was completely the same. This family, the father actually looked away, and when he turned around found his whole life upside down. I looked away, I thought everything was fine, I wasn't there to protect her, I didn't teach her the things she needed to know... while it was completely different it was all the same. A terrible man snatched this little girl... A terrible God snatched my little girl.

Through out my journey I have gone through periods of extreme anger at God, my closets of friends and family know this. They have witnessed it. I go through anger at myself due to parental failure. I deal with the shame of deserving my kids to be taken away as a punishment by God for my past. So over and over this movie continued to hit home in how I dealt with the deaths of these two beautiful children in my life. I blamed myself for not being there, I blamed God for not stopping it. I judged others around me who I felt how can this person still be here yet they took my beautiful girl! How am I still here.. I don't belong here. Maybe I do and this is just hell.

So I sat through this movie as I watched the father's agony over losing his beautiful child and the blame he placed on himself and God and I cried. Ok I cried a lot. My take away from the movie was simple. Forgiveness. The key to all is forgiveness and release. It is time to lay my beautiful girl to rest in my heart. To bury the tragedy and the pain before it completely consumes the remaining time I have. While her earthly body is in a grave far from me I have carried her with me in my mind and my heart and more times than I care to admit it is the horror of that day that comes forth. Not her beautiful smile or her infectious laughter... just the horror. It is time to wrap her battered and broken body and lay it peacefully to be buried with love in my heart so that her beauty can shine through. To do this I have to forgive myself for not being the mom she needed. I can not change the past, it is set in stone but I can move on and try my best to live in a way she would have wanted.

So while the movie was hard to sit through.. it left me better than I was. To me that is a win.

Love and Peace,
Re

PS I don't think God has a beard.

The journey to the impossible. I was sitting last night talking to friends after a long evening shift at work and one of them told me that they couldn't possibly go on if they lost a child. I immediately rebuffed this statement and told them they were wrong. That on that first day you believe that, you truly believe the world is going to swallow you whole and you will just be gone too. Oh who am I kidding you feel this way for a LONG time, but the entire time you feel this way you are putting one foot in front of the other carrying on day to day activities even if you feel empty inside, right up until one day you realize "Hey! Look at me! I am living again!" I do mean really living, not just going through the motions and saying you are doing it, you are REALLY doing it.

I am not sure when it happened, but it seems it did. I sat there last night in a bit of a shock going on in my head while I went on discussing things and as I drove home, I thought to myself. "Wow I really meant that" I am not faking the funk right this minute, I really am carrying on. I do realize that I am completely and totally broken and that will never be fixed but I can live life broken. I have dreams, I don't mean little silly dreams like buying a jeep (yes that is a silly little dream) I mean life long dreams and plans for a future. For the first time in 4 years and 2 months ... I am planning a future!

The plans I have will take a lot of hard work,  long hours, dedication, commitment, help from loved ones and friends, but I see this dream taking me to the end of my life, which I don't see as tomorrow anymore. Someone asked me one time, "Why don't you save any money?" My response to that was, "What for? I don't plan on being around long enough to spend saved money." I truly believed in my heart and soul that I was going to be swallowed by the universe, if that be by natural causes, an accident, my own hand.. I don't know but I did not feel like I was alive and I imagine some part of me was hoping to just physically be dead as well.

I am not in any way saying that things are perfect, I am not saying that the sadness is gone forever, or that I will never hit the low again. What I am saying is right this minute I have a dream and I feel alive!

I know there are a lot of contributing factors in all of this. A man who believes in me and cares enough not to give up. A trainer and a partner who are always a text a test and a kettlebell away, they are so much more to me than they understand. A bootcamp family that is always there to lift me up in times of sadness. A family who supports me no matter how many times I trip up and need some help standing. A best friend who shared her dream with me even when I forgot how alive it made me feel to be there and living it with her. Children who put up with all of the craziness and yet continue to love me. Parents, I am not sure what to say about my parents, I am sure that more than once in the last few years they wondered if they were going to lose their daughter too, yet they never shoved me away or tried to hold me too close, I guess I had parents who had faith I would see my way out of this. But the biggest contributing factor is myself, that regardless of how incredibly horrible things got I managed to keep on putting one foot in front of the other, refusing to give up, now allowing myself to quit. In all of this I have gained what I thought was the impossible because I have already gone through the unimaginable.

Here's to the rest of the impossible.
Love and Peace
Re