Lately I have been thinking a lot about sacrifice, selfishness, self care and sanity and how they apply in my life. Part of the grieving process is figuring all that out. I am still visiting a therapist bi-weekly who gives me a good sounding board and often directs my thoughts to areas I had not previously considered.
It seems strange that I am a widow. Most of my life has been spent as a wife and mother. I was blessed to marry Steve who was a good man. He loved me and we had many adventures together. Not the least of which was parenthood. And I am very grateful to be a mother, a grandmother, and a great grandmother. It is amazing to think that my 10 children have turned out to be pretty awesome humans. It is amazing to realize that from Steve and me have come almost 80 descendants to our family. I love my family and am grateful for this time in my life to interact with them all. I love that I see the 5 of my children who live near and some of the grandchildren who live near on a pretty regular basis and am always grateful when those farther away come to visit or text or call.
But it is still strange to be a widow. I am still not sure just what that looks like. I know I am alone, of course, but I am still trying to figure things out.
I have learned that I can go to bed when I want. I can get up when I want - even though I seem unable to sleep more than 5-6 hours at a time. I can get dressed, if and, when I want. I can choose what I want to eat. I can be social, or not, if I want. I can read or watch TV or do other "stuff" if I want. I have also learned that I miss the structure of life that comes in a family. So, I have to figure out what kind of structure I want now that I am alone.
I know I need more exercise to stay healthy and in shape but that has been frustrated as I am still recovering from back surgery. I am recovering but still have pains in my legs. I think I need a chiropractic adjustment but I cannot do that until after I visit the doctor on March 22 and get an X-ray and hopefully a green light for normal activities. It was good to be on the cruise and be forced to walk as much as I was. Crazy to think we walked 1-2 miles per day just on the ship going back and forth from our room ,to dining, to entertainment. But I came home feeling like my body could move better. I have been trying to walk regularly but the cold snowy weather has made that difficult and the reality is that I am kind of lazy.
I have been reading my scriptures regularly and have scheduled weekly temple attendance so that is a start at creating a structure.
But I really do want to do "more". My therapist told me to be aware of what I actually do each day; but feeling like I have to always be doing "more" is just ingrained in my personality that I must be doing. She introduced the term "self care" when I told her that I had chosen not to attend social event I had been planning to attend. I had to think a lot about that term to finally figure out that I do not need to do something just because other people might expect me to do it.
Then I have been thinking about how much of my life has been governed by my perception of what others expect. I have been trying to figure out what it is that I want. So, as I have been reading books and watching TV the back of my mind has been busy trying to figure that out.
Anyone who is a parent knows full well that parenthood is synonymous with sacrifice. We just cannot raise children without sacrificing sleep, time, energy, hobbies, etc. That is just the way it is and I have no regrets for sacrificing so much for my 10 children. And if I had a chance to do it all over again I would jump at it hoping only that I could be a better parent. And we make these sacrifices because we love our children. And it was our desire to 'raise up our family to the Lord'.
Trying to be obedient to the Lord's commandments also involves sacrifice as we spend our time and means to serve the Lord. I would never change our efforts that way either. I was grateful for the opportunity to speak in Stake Conference a week ago because it gave me a chance to serve and to share my testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
There are times when it is right to sacrifice. And there are times when I/we need to pull into ourselves and allow some self care. That is not being selfish. That is filling our wells so we can move forward. There have been many times when I have over extended myself and come close to damaging my sanity. In fact I know that I have damaged my sanity at times.
Sometimes in my life I have had to just stop and pull in and try to reset myself. Sometimes I have to learn to say "no" when I really can't go or do what others may expect from me. And that is OK. But it is a process to learn the balance.
My daughter-in-law found a poster years ago which featured a large elephant balancing on a small ball which I think was actually representing the world. I suspect we all feel like we have to balance "everything". But we don't.
There was a conference talk by Elder Dallin H Oaks a few years back about making good choices. He talked about "good, better and best " choices. I just reread it and appreciate the good counsel he gave.
I am attaching a link to his talk in case you are interested.
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2007/10/good-better-best?lang=eng
As I move forward with my life I am trying to figure out which choices are 'best' for me and my family. Sadly I still waste a lot of time being unproductive. I need to learn to forgive myself for not being perfect. I need to somehow step back and see the full picture and figure out what I want and why I want it and then move forward.
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