It was Patrick's 69th birthday on March 10th. I've always been fascinated with numbers.... a childhood obsession..... 3s have always, for some reason held a special meaning for me. My grandmother died on 9/30/89. I was 6. My grandfather died on 1/1/92, I was 9. My mother died on 8/12/2003 in my 21st year... and this is my 33rd year.
How fitting I thought.
Everything is working out. Everything is coming full circle and I am just beside myself at the experience.
The thing I am becoming most aware of through all this is how deep the sadness in my heart had to get for me to be able to appreciate this.
My oldest friend, Ki, is in Thailand right now. Today. She is stepping her footprints into sand that I stood in after my surgery in Thailand, where I stepped forward into this part of my life. That was the place I came to see that the Universe was conspiring for me.
How funny the universe works.
How strange it was that I had been to 3 other countries that year and never bothered worrying about travel insurance..... but I had a feeling... a whisper... that said.. just make sure... write down all the info just so you have it....
And 10 hours later I was in the emerg department in Bangkok, Thailand.
We were supposed to get on a bus to Laos the next morning at 9am. We already had our tickets.
But I keeled over 2 hours after getting to Bangkok... and somehow... by some miracle.... ended up at one of the best hospitals in the world...... the scariest thing I have ever been through.... another language.... in mortifying pain.... without a mother to discuss the course of action with.... I had to make a decision that would alter my life.... I had my insurance info with me.... it was going to be paid for. All I had to decide was whether I needed surgery. On my ovaries. A cyst had been found that contorted around the ovary and was on the verge of rupturing.
I had like an hour to decide.
I wanted to live. That's all I knew. I wanted to live.
I had never even broken a bone. I had never been put under. and I had never really taken any prescription drugs... I had no idea if I had any allergies.... I knew that I could react to anything they gave me... I knew that something could go wrong... and I knew I could die.
I gave myself to the universe that day. I said..... I am OK if I die today. I am proud of myself. I have no regrets. But... please.... let me live.... I have so much more I want to do. please.
I woke up. The tube down my throat.... gasping for air..... choking.... waiting for breath to enter my lungs..... terrified that I would never feel the gasp of air again..... and then slowly. slowly..... I started breathing again....... my shoulders feeling like they were going to pop off my body. (from the CO2 pumped into my body.) I was in pain.... a pain I had never experienced before. But I was alive.
There was a thunder storm out my window that night. I lay in bed breathing in the sound of the rain, the thunder and the lighting. I cried.
The next day I found out that they had removed an ovary. A shock that ran so deeply into my soul I never really talk about it. No mother... and an even better chance of not being able to have children. Even writing right now, I realize it's a feeling I haven't felt in a long time. An experience I rarely share.
All my friends told me that that;s why they make 2 :) and I believed that... ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN and you have to just live.
That experience catapulted me into a totally new space where for 2 weeks I heard in my head..... "you have to go home to the love. "
I would tell myself..... "you are lying to yourself that you are unloved... you HAVE to go back and find it... you have to prove to yourself that you are loved....whatever it takes... you have to."
I left Phuket and sailed down the coast of Thailand. Learned how to scuba dive at Phi Phi island and thought I was going to die when I saw a shark swimming near me.
I could have gone anywhere... but I wanted to come home..... I came home to the deepest love from my friends Thao and Lynda who just took care of me while I tried to figure out what was next.
They reminded me that I was loved.... and I started to see that it was the loss of my mother that had convinced me I wasn't loved anymore... and the feeling any kind of love would trigger the loss of her so badly that I couldn't stand the feeling.... it was comfortable to stay away.... to date men who were just as detached to themselves... our hurt and pain brought us together and I learned that I still needed to learn to love myself again.
I went to nursing school... because I knew that medicine saves people sometimes and even though I fully support my mother;s belief that emotions contribute to illness.... I also believe that staying alive right now is the most important decision... I'm alive because of it.
These past 3 years have been about me walking into unknown spaces, terrified of the outcome.... walking away from an abusive relationship, letting my family love me enough to help me find a car..... letting my friends and family support me from afar and love me even though I have been distant...... trying to let love in. .. letting go of everything when I couldn't support myself any more and trusting the universe..... and finding James moments after believing I would survive.. no matter what.... and that something just needed to shift and I had to go along for the ride.
I feel like a free fall right now.... I have never felt so loved in my entire life... and I know that it's because for the first time since my mother died.... I am accepting that I was fully loved by her.... and the feeling no longer triggers the sadness.... now... it triggers the deep gratitude I have for her and her letting me go..... I wouldn't be here without her death..... it is only in through losing her that I have been able to fall and climb back up. Knowing.... love comes from within.
Meeting my father is the result of me giving up all expectations. To get to a point where I just wanted to love and didn't need any in return. I forgave him for the pain that I had experienced in feeling unloved by him... abandoned.... and thankful that he played some spectacularly interesting role in my life..... I couldn't have been able to write such an exciting tale....... to wait 32 years..... for it to finally be happening and for me to be able to share the journey with all the people I just adore is such a spectacular gift.
So thank you for wanting to be part... thank you for being part, for the love you have all shown me... teaching me to come back to my heart, teaching me to love myself despite the circumstances..... and letting me learn how to love again.
Finding James, and being able to come home to James is the coziest feeling I have felt in years. I feel safe in this relationship, I feel authentic and real. I feel that we are completely open to each other and honour our pasts. We love each other, trying to still remain separate. I wished he was going to come on this trip with me, but alas he is not. At first it made me sad, and I couldn't understand what I was feeling... I became critical of him... annoyed..... then I realized that I was trying to make it easier to break up..... In my sadness of him not coming, I was scared of breaking up... so I was making it happen.
The second I realized that maybe I was creating the very thing I was scared of... and decided to shift the way I thought about it.. I remembered... sometimes the things you want are not what you need.... I am imagining sending him postcards and being old school love. Still connected, yet far apart.
There is something really special about giving yourself permission to trust and love that deeply still... and I am so thankful that we are letting ourselves love despite our disappointment of not being together and the distance.
Going on this journey, truly feels like a full circle moment. Patrick and I have built the foundation of a lovely, safe relationship.... I am In love with my life here and I get to see some of my favorite people in the process :) I honestly feel like the luckiest girl in the world... and it all started that day in Bangkok, April 7, 2009.
I will be with Ki for the last two days before meeting Patrick. Her mother was my mother's best friend. There were three of them, and 3 of us. I leave from Kristen's house and end up with Ki.
:) luckiest girl in the whole wide world here :)
angels on your pillow.
thanks for being part of my life... and being part of my story.
Amanda
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