For most of 2009/2010 I have felt like something was missing. I didn't realize the depth of my emotion until a recent visit to my doctor in October. While talking about my exercise program and weight loss I started crying. My doctor immediately responded, wondering if these expressed emotions may have some relation to my weight loss, and suggesting we meet monthly to touch base. I began to dwell on the questions: Is my sadness affiliated with a physical loss of weight? Could exercise trigger hidden hormones that elicit "sadness?" Is loss a part of aging? Could I be sad because I did not pay as much attention to my body, and to living a more healthy life? Or was this sadness related to other kinds of "losses?"
I started adding up the events in my life and found a long string of "losses:"
• A very significant loss this year was the death of my very good friend and colleague Marcia McVay. It was sudden and not so sudden. She had been treated for cancer, recovered, and then the cancer was back with a fury, and she was gone. I still run across recent emails from her and just weep. I weep that she will not be around to lament about budget woes, to chuckle knowingly about the crazy things the students have done, or to laugh hilariously at my recent travels into Northeast Nebraska. Many of my colleagues in the College of Education attended Marcia's funeral on March 18th in Auburn, Nebraska. I weep as I write this - still deeply sad - but feel fortunate in knowing Marcia and her ever present laughter, for over ten years. She no longer has to deal with cancer craziness, and she is most certainly resting in peace. Good night Marcia.
• Within the last two years, significant friends and colleagues have left my community to start rich new lives and careers in other communities throughout the United States - Michelle in New York, Daniela in Florida, Tammy in Colorado and Charles in Pennsylvania. As a newcomer to my community just over 10 years ago, I had come to rely on the camaraderie of these special friends/colleagues - as we all had the status of "newcomer" in common! Each of their moves "out of my life" were traumatic. At the same time, I am grateful for their enduring friendships, cherished memories and good times, and that each were rewarded with great career moves!
• During this year, the outspoken and courageous Commissioner of Education, Doug Christensen (who had also become a personal friend) resigned his position because of a difference of opinion with other state leaders. I had come to respect and admire Doug as a personal hero. Indeed he was a personal hero to many across the United States. It has made me sad to realize that I no longer have someone with such great convictions and ideas - to consider a mentor - in a leadership role in this state. It is a huge loss for our state. I will find ways to continue to connect with Doug.
• My cousin Terri, with two young children at home, has been diagnosed with Lymphoma, and while all family members have been sending our thoughts and best wishes to her and her family, we have been scared about recent PET scans revealing a potential re-growth of the lymphoma. So far no news on the recurrence, so we are all in limbo.
• My mom, who founded The People Place, in Ames, Iowa, decided to retire. The People Place was founded in the basement of our home over 30 years ago. Every member of our family, down to the grandchildren, have had a role in supporting this local parent resource center, whether helping with the Call-A-Thon (the annual fundraiser), supporting the organization at City Council meetings, creating brochures, preparing mailings, helping out at the child-care center, giving annually, dropping food off at people's homes during the holidays, writing grants, and more! Mom's retirement from The People Place feels like the death of a family member; I will most certainly miss this one constant in our future family gatherings.
• Just as I was beginning my new exercise routine last summer, my husband was in a serious, life-threatening horse-back riding incident. He was life-flighted to a major university hospital, hospitalized in the ICU and general hospital for two weeks with a flailing lung, broken collarbone and all the ribs on his left side broken/crushed. When the priest met me in the emergency room, I flushed, in shock, and quickly realized that Dave's situation was worse than I originally thought. In mid-July he began a long recovery at home. I learned to juggle exercise with the need to care for my husband and his doctor's appointments, while also making sure my daughter was well cared for. I wasn't always successful. Fortunately we had very good friends who offered to take Catherine in while my husband was recovering and brought us food that lasted for nearly a month. And we were also fortunate that our work allowed us to take family medical leave during this trauma. We both breathe much easier these days, since he has made excellent progress!
• My work was very stressful in 2009, and I have a sense of "loss" related to it. I still haven't figured out "the sadness" part? Perhaps it was a sense that nobody cared to look out for me? Perhaps it has to do with unresolved conflict? Because these stressful events occurred at the same time as my heart attack, perhaps I blame my work stress for the two stints now lodged in my heart? I've decided to let this one go. Let it hang out there on a limb of its own, and eventually fall to the ground to decompose like fall leaves. This image helps me to get beyond the pain, and honestly, it isn't worth the extra energy.
• People have gone in and out of my exercise life. The trainer who originally encouraged me to make a stronger commitment to exercise left to pursue a graduate degree in another state. Not only did this leave me with less support at Lifepointe at a time when exercise was very "new" to me, but it also broke up a group of "exercising" adult women who I was just getting to know. As always, I adjusted, found a new trainer and forged new relationships, but not without initially feeling a sense of great "loss." These initial feelings led me to these weekly writing efforts. And my new training group grew out of the initial exercise class. We have become exercise colleagues - each member appreciating each others' strengths, and appreciating the strengths of our new trainer.
Are these losses, or is this life? Are these changes that one eventually recognizes as significant, yet also events to suffer or persevere through, make adjustments to, in order to "live?" In some ways, the feelings of sadness and loss are essential for change to occur. Garrison Keilor, NPR's Saturday evening radio talk-show host/humorist of Prairie Home Companion, tells the story of how Scandinavian men and women in his made-up home town of Lake Wobegon eat Lutefisk every Thanksgiving and Christmas Season in order to physically remind themselves of the suffering...it is what gets them through the dark nights and tough times of the Holidays. (If you never experienced Lutefisk, it is a pretty disgusting fish...soaked in lye for years!) Now granted, this is a humorist speaking and it's a made-up story, but this familiar theme is found in many similar tales - Suffering/Loss = Life, and it is definitely worth much more thought as the 2010 Holiday Season swiftly approaches!
Submitted on Sunday, November 21, 2010.
P.S. Back to the posting - this post counts as three! Happy Birthday Mitchell!
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