This is what Acceptance looks like

 The more and more time that passes the more I am accepting of my reality that this is my new normal. Does that mean I’m happy about it?  Heck No!  But with acceptance that I cannot change my reality comes peace.  Perhaps I’m over the grieving phase of my loss moving directly into the acceptance phase.  The five stages of grief if I need to remind you (I had to remind myself): The five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. I went through the first four kicking and screaming.  Now I’m rounding into acceptance and I was tested on it today.  I had a great week.  Even a fabulous week.  Did I win the lottery, reconcile? Or get a promotion?  No, what made it a fabulous week was simply my attitude.  Something that was entirely in my control.  Event wise it was a fairly non-chalant week.  I did have my daughters to look forward to this weekend so that always helps.  But the weekend did not quite go as expected.  I still had a nice time with them, but there was some disappointment.  Still we tried to make the best of it.  I wrote about the Funniest Person contest yesterday.  I have so much pride and joy that it is finally starting to take off.  But today was tough.  I was trying to fix my phone as I couldn’t order my youngest an ice cream cone from the McD’s app last night.  I know I could have purchased one, but since I had one in my app for free cone from the Monopoly game that expires soon, I was too stubborn.  So what I thought was a simple reset didn’t work.  After a call with Apple they suggested I reset my network settings….Bad idea. 

I’m more attached to my phone than others because I use it for Diabetes management.  I have an app that tells me my blood sugar level and another app that reads that app that coordinates insulin delivery.  So it’s like having an artificial pancreas.  So when I reset the network settings suddenly both diabetes apps were no longer functioning.  Thus I couldn’t get my insulin.  This obviously jumped to the top of my priority list.  I wanted to take my girls and dog on a long walk through the park.  This is something new we are really embracing lately.  Yet after talking to several people on tech support both with Apple and the Diabetes folks no one could figure it out.  I was getting extremely frustrated because I still had to make the girls lunch and go on our walk. I only have the girls for 15% of the month (every other weekend) so I value and prioritize every minute I have with them.   After 3+ hours of dealing with this, I was starting to lose my cool. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my dwindling weekend talking with kind but struggling tech support people that couldn’t figure it out.    I tried to stay calm.  Eventually we figured it out and we got it fixed but was my day with my girls ruined? It was so late now, and I had to return the girls to their mom soon.    

I made Chicken Stir Fry for the girls (their request).  And we talked about how we would handle the rest of our day.  I decided that a short walk after lunch would be better than no walk at all.  I live right next to Umstead State Park.  We had not explored that park yet for walks so we gave it a try.  I am so glad we did.  The girls and I had such a great time.  Just wandering around in nature around dusk.  There were no screens, devices, or monitors, just a couple of girls enjoying time with their dad completely content with life.  They loved picking up rocks, trying to throw them in the lake.  It was just bliss.  We didn’t do anything except enjoy each other’s company and that was enough.  It was really quite beautiful.  Here’s a pic.  So a day of struggle turned into another fabulous day just because I had to willfully reframe it.  I could have thrown my arms up in defeat and taken the “L” but I didn’t want to upset the girls who were being so patient.  I’m so lucky to have three little ones that love me so much.  It reminds me of the great quote from Dr. Seuss “Don’t cry because it’s over.  Smile because it happened.”  Yes I no longer have the close in proximity relationship with my girls like I used to have.  Yes I get very lonely.  Yes I miss them terribly.  But I have moments like these where I can focus on that lifting my spirit.  This is what gives me the hope I need for the future.  That is what leads me to believing that ALL things will certainly work together for good (I think soon).  This is what “acceptance” looks like.  I’m OK with that.