Moments of Normal

Brien just wrote about the Road to Recovery. I think I am on that road with him, just maybe not very far down the path yet. First, I can't bring myself to use the word "recovery." When I think of that word I think of recovering from an illness, and that implies "back to normal." Recently, I spent some time in a recovery room at the hospital and I will, without a doubt, recover from cancer. I have yet to accept use of the word "recovery" though when it comes to Grace's passing. I will never recover from that, she has forever changed my life, and because of that my life will never be totally normal again. Instead, I must move forward in this new and much different life as a very different person.

Last week, when attending the bereavement group, the leader was describing the grief process and emotions from initial shock to denial, anger, acceptance, anxiety, guilt, etc....the list is endless. He spoke about how the process is fluid and not usually sequentially completed in "stages" so to speak. A few things he said really struck home with me. Several weeks ago I really felt like things were getting worse for me. Time was not helping heal any wounds at all but only making me miss my baby more and more each and every day. The sadness that encompassed me was often overwhelming. I learned that is totally normal and my feelings were not just spiraling out of control, however it was, I believe, my own "rock bottom" so to speak. The leader then spoke about how slowly, these "moments of normal" would sneak into your life and they would be ever so fleeting at first and then, eventually, these moments would happen more often every day. When he said this, I couldn't help but think back to the night before we came to group.

As a bit of history, I have been an off and on "gym goer" for about twenty years now...as I'm sure many of you can relate! For the past ten years I was a member of 24-hour Fitness Club and use to frequent the downtown Sac location. I loved the aerobic classes, my favorites were step and turbo kick. After becoming pregnant with Grace, I didn't often go to the gym, figured it was as good of an excuse as any of the others I had in the past. Lately, I've had other excuses, going through the grief process has been exhausting enough, let alone now going through the process of cancer treatment, which means going off of my medication in which a side effect is lethargy. Getting to the gym just seemed like too monumental of a task. Then, we moved our office and low and behold, my work was next door to Gold's Gym. After much debating, I finally took the plunge last week, cancelled my old gym membership of 10 years and joined Gold's. The night before our bereavement group, I decided to try out the step class there. I was nervous, I hadn't been to a class in over three years. Granted, it was challenging to keep up with the cardio but, thankfully, most of the names of the moves hadn't changed so when the instructor called them out, it was like riding an old familiar bike. It took awhile, but towards the end of class I had a fleeting feeling of happiness, that this was normal. But then, like a butterfly, it flitted away. I had no idea what I was feeling at the time so when I heard the support group leader discuss these types of "normal moments" the next evening, it gave me hope that maybe, just maybe, it would happen again.

Joining a new gym has been a different experience, I no longer see the old familiar equipment or the friendly familiar faces of instructors and members that I once knew. I now see a bright sparkling environment filled with change such as unfamiliar faces, new equipment to learn, and a whole community of strangers that I have yet to meet. Even though everything there is new and different, it's also oddly familiar. I feel like this new gym gave me some new hope and promise for the future. I plan on going back to class this week in hopes of feeling normal again. Maybe I will, maybe I won't....but, perhaps, I will at least become somewhat healthier in the process.