22 weeks ... how can it be?

22 weeks without the love of my life.
22 weeks without the one to make me giggle.
22 weeks without the one who held me when I was afraid.
22 weeks.
seems like a lifetime. yet seems like only yesterday.
how can it be?
how is it that time seems to hold so little meaning for me anymore. a clock means nothing more than a tick tock - an awareness of moments alone.

I know that some people are thinking that I should "get over it" or "move on". but when you have lost so much of yourself in another person, it's not so easy to do as others think you should.

I breathe in and I breathe out. I get thru each day, each evening, and each night. one breath at time! God holds me and God stays right by my side.
there are times of laughter. times of tears. times to just remember.
there are even times when I cry so hard that I lose my breath, and for a few minutes, I lose my focus.
but even in the hardest moments of this life of grief - God is with me. He holds me.
and regardless of what anyone says or thinks - I am ok. God has given me the permission to grieve, to miss my Sweetheart, to love him still.

little by little I am learning to live again ... only this time, to live alone.
I thank God for my children and my grandchildren.
I thank God for family and friends who call, or text, or send me a love package from Missouri!
I thank God even for those who have pulled away since Rick's death - for you have made it easier for me to lean on Jesus.
I thank God for my "new" family - the grievers. they have accepted me - just as I am. they put no conditions on me, they give me no time limit for my grief. they understand on a level that most of those in my life do not. they cry with me, make me smile again. they pray for me, and give me opportunity to pray with them. we are a family - with a bond that none of us wanted, and yet we each have now.

I was at the just-a-buck store the other day, and a magnet caught my eye. anyone who knows me, knows that I am patriotic so much so that if you cut me I will bleed red, white, and blue.
well, this magnet has a picture of our Flag, and the word "FREEDOM" written under the flag. Then, these words --

"Freedom. It's refusing to recognize boundaries that others set.
It's feeling free to explore your options, all of them, without worrying about the outcome.
It's taking risks, saying yes.
Freedom is the ultimate potential.
Use it, enjoy it, savor it."

now those may be simple words, and I am sure they were not words written for a grieving widow. except - on that day, and every day since, those are extraordinary words. and written exactly for a grieving widow - me.
I never wanted to be "free" from my husband. with him I knew a freedom that I had never known before him.
but I want to know freedom now.
freedom from the constraints that other people try to put on me. freedom from the fears and worries that I am not up to the standards of those around me, who do not understand the depth of love and grief that I am experiencing.
freedom from the life that is not lived.
freedom to cry or to laugh ...
freedom to remember ...
freedom to stretch beyond what I have been ...
freedom to reach for what is still here for me.
freedom to love my husband, without others feeling a strange threatening.
freedom to miss my husband.

FREEDOM.

There are those around me who have a compassion that words cannot describe. their hugs say more to me than any word could ever say.

I had to go to the home office of the funeral home that handled Rick's funeral. (I could not bear to enter the funeral home where he had been.) I needed to make a payment on the funeral. the man who met me and talked with me was the same man who had come that fateful day and took my Rick away.
I told him on that day that I did not like him. I would never like him. he looked at me with sad eyes, and asked "Why?" ... my answer - "because you are here to take him away from me." His arms encircled me that day and just held me as I cried. a grieving widow.
and this week, on the day when I had to make a payment, he received the check in one hand, and put his arm around me with the other. held me a moment. let me go. I got to my car in the parking lot, sat down and had a meltdown. I cried. cried. cried. it was not like the cry of a 22 week old widow. it was like the cry of a this moment widow. when the tears had calmed down, I looked up and I saw him standing at the door - watching me. not in a gawking way, but with compassion - just to make sure I was ok. it was tender, and I appreciate his care.

there are others, too, who are free to me with their hugs. I so need that right now. rick was my HUG. and I miss him.