realizations from church

I have been trying to find a church I like and today we tried a new one.  I almost feel like God is sending me to these different churches because I need the message at that church that week.  The message this week really resonated with me.  Not the whole message, but a specific part of it.  Well, 2 actually.

The lesser of the two is Proverbs 18:24 

A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

That just made me think of H because he didn't have a ton of friends, but the friends he had were family.

The most impactful part that stuck with me was about having a person or people who know everything about you.  Someone who is honest with you all the time.  Someone you can trust.  H was my someone.  We had no secrets.  He knew everything about me.  I told him everything.  He was always honest with me.  He would tell me when I was acting crazy and pull me back when I was going overboard.  I can remember clothes shopping with him when we were first dating and he would tell me when the clothes didn't look good (he said it nicely, but I knew what he was saying).  I knew even back then that we were supposed to be together.  He was the only person I had in my life with that type of honesty and trust.

So when he died, I didn't just lose my husband.  I didn't just lose my best friend.  I didn't just lose my housemate.  I didn't just lose my provider.  I didn't just lose my confidant.  I lost me. A part of me died the day he died.  He knew everything about me and I about him.  We were one.  And he took part of me with him.

So that leaves me to redefine who I am.  Not just in the sense that I am now a widow, now a single mom, but also that I am not his.  I am finding that to be really hard to do.  I don't know how to be a single person.  I have been half of a couple for so long that I think I have forgotten how to be a single.  And I don't want to remember.

I made dinner tonight and I didn't think to halve the recipe.  The kids and I will be eating fritatta for days.  I bought lettuce the other day and I didn't think that I don't need as much anymore.  I have all of these big important decisions to make like where I am going to live and where the kids are going to go to school and I don't know how to make them on my own.

Now, that is not to say that I can't do it or that I didn't have a part in those decisions when he was alive.  I did, but I had someone to bounce things off of and I had his opinion and feelings to take into consideration and he mine.  Now, I have to think about what he would want and hope that I am doing what he would want and honoring him.

I made a big decision already.  I had my sister come and take the dog to live with her.  He was his dog.  I mean we got him together, but he wasn't mine.  They were buds and I had to admit to myself that I can't give him a good life.  He is too big and I just don't have the time or the energy to care for him.  I had been feeding him and making sure he had water, but that was it.  I know my sister can give him a better life.  It just hurts to have him gone.  Not having the dog here means H isn't coming home.

And admitting that hurts.  It hurts more than I could ever imagine hurting.  It is an all encompassing hurt.  It hurts on all levels.  I get physically nauseous when I think about the fact that I won't get to feel his arms around me.  Hear him say he loves me.  Feel his lips on mine.  It physically hurts me.  And the emotional hurt in just indescribable.  Being dead just lasts so long.