Navigating a New Normal

These days I feel I have a better understanding of those who have experienced the loss of a close loved one. My parents are both still living; the closest family members who have passed away are my grandmother (the only living grandparent for all of my growing-up years) and my father-in-law, who passed away 3 years after my wedding. As deeply as I loved these two people, I know my sadness pales in comparison to what my dad felt when his mother died and what my husband still feels after 16 years of doing life without his own father.

Our current situation is incredibly different, yet the sense of loss is all too real. Verity is still very much alive. I feel her movements more and more each day. I have marveled over the years at how wondrous it is to feel a human being growing and taking shape within my own body--I have never gotten over those fluttery kicks that later become stronger jabs and sharp pokes. Whether it is the first or the ninth baby, it is an indescribable feeling.

And feeling a live, wiggly baby...while not knowing just how long she might be alive...is such a strange, strange place emotionally and mentally.

There is life...and death...all in one thought.

It is exhausting.

I sleep, but not really: I am in a seemingly endless state of weariness that numbs the senses even as it sharpens emotion.

I forget, but not really: I immerse myself in necessary activities (homeschooling and home management after a fashion), and when that time of focus ends, I remember reality once again.

And it hurts.

This is life in our new normal. We continue with our routine as much as possible, for there is comfort and security in the familiar, especially where the children are concerned. Yet we give ourselves and each other grace upon grace, for who can function in a fog?

Life in this fog has strange yet beautiful paradoxes.
Joy in sadness.
Peace with uncertainty.
Physical fatigue, spiritual rest.

I'm not sure how to end this post...this is where we are at.