O Baby!

I started to wonder, not because it was actually possible but because you can only be so late before your mind goes there, am I right ladies? The plausible reason for being two weeks late, stress as my body tries to re-calibrate through grief. But the weird stories that my mind makes up... Immaculate conception. Maybe I was the chosen one. I have never been in any rush to have kids. I don’t gush over other people's babies, and have never been sure if they are even for me. Yet, surprisingly at this moment when nothing about having a child would be ‘right’, single, grieving, moving out of town, really the list is endless,  I still felt like I'd graciously accept.

As it turns out I'm not the modern day Mary, and this isn't a Christmas miracle. Not that you would have believed that anyway. 

However, my imaginary baby showed me something. To come back to life I need to be shocked just as sharply as I was when my beloved was suddenly killed. In the same blink of an eye, can't see it coming, no choice in the matter,  all encompassing way. Be it an unexpected baby, job that steals my heart, passion project that takes up every free second of my time, or man that sweeps me off my feet.

I have been so aware of the fact that I didn't want to skip over grieving by trying to replace him with substances, stuff, or the flavor of the week, that I might  have gone too far.  Been closed off to the fun of life,  and have forgotten how to let myself be happy.  I have all this energy that I used to share with him, that now has nowhere to go. Our puppy was spoiled before but now…

Last night as she was making herself cozy on the other half (3/4 let's be serious) of my bed, I thought about how she's not going to be happy when there is someone else making himself comfortable there, but maybe I could be.

They say you can't solve a problem in the same space it was created. It takes a shift in the way of thinking, the way of feeling, or in the energy around it if we want to find a solution.

This is an exception.

In this case the cause and the cure are the same. Love.

It's love that got me into this and I am starting to think it's love that will get me out. For those of us who have been devoured by love, those of us who have seen its harshest side, its severity, its ability to nearly strangle our ability to breathe,  the risk of the game seems unworthy. But here is what I am learning. We have no choice. Maybe there is no real way to move through the hurt of lost love without new love. Not as a replacement, but somewhere else to direct the energy that was once theirs. We can only survive in deprivation for so long.

It is so scary. This is an enormous thing to trust again, to open up again. It will challenge and demand of us, but the glimmer of hope I had for the baby I knew wasn't real showed me a spark for life I haven't felt in a long time. It brought back the good side of the unknown, of surprises, of mystery. The cause of our hurt may also be the cure for our hurt. The poison is the medicine, and our work is this; stay open to the good shake ups, to the possibilities. Stay open to love.