Here I am 12 months after my divorce–one month for every year we were married… In some ways, I feel like the groundhog who pops her head up from time to time to check the temperature, the circumstances, the shadows lurking around the corner to see if it’s time.  Sometimes it’s just a tiny ear listening up, sometimes a peek over my condo-burrow, sometimes it’s a full-fledged pop up followed by a NOPE and a slumber for six more weeks. 

My hibernation hasn’t been about ticking off the days until Spring, but rather of healing those places that I’ve neglected for ages. I needed time to take an emotional break instead of doing the usual Push Through the Pain modus operandi I am quite famous for.

How many times have we experienced tragic or traumatic circumstances and said to everyone around us, “Hey, I’m fine–I’m good.”  We may even tell ourselves that in the morning mirror and believe it. In reality, we are hiding in the busy-ness…in the flurry of emotion and tasks of daily life…only to look for an escape when it gets overwhelming in work, netflix, a glass (or 3) of wine, cleaning, snacking…whatever your escape jam is. Oh we can cover that flurry in glitter and quotes of hyper-productivity and justification to make us feel better….until we don’t. 

It’s an inner push-pull cyclone almost impossible to get out of as the gravity of life sucks you right back in. 

I felt so free in the last 12 months–it felt like I was healed, and then, I’d have a trigger moment, and all these emotions would bubble up.  Emotions I didn’t even know existed–hey man, didn’t you get the memo, I’m beyond that…. It’s like watching an emotional train wreck happening around me and I’m standing there in the midst of my feelings wondering what the heck just happened, here… my chest tightens, my eyes tear up, and all those old messages of my value and my worth start clanging in my head. Sometimes I keep it to myself and sometimes it just eeeks out in a tone or a voice quiver or a Pick Me Pick Me message to my friends….

Lillibet has suggested a few times that I need to grieve, but I just hadn’t felt it.  When my first marriage exploded with the discovery of the affair with my friend, and then three years later with our last separation, I cried buckets–no rivers–possibly oceans over the loss of that dream.  We were going to grow old together…I had plans, visions, dreams of what it was going to look like. 

These days, on Round Two, I find it hard to cry at all–about anything. It’s not that my hopes were any less real the second time than the first time…it’s not that I loved less or cared less…it just hits different, as the kids say.

When The Man and I got married, we said our vows in front of our friends in our backyard, summer wedding. While declaring his unwavering love to me, The Man produced a glitter ball out of his pocket as a prop for his vows. 

He gave me that sparkly bouncy ball on our second Valentine’s day as a dating couple. The ball had glitter inside and a heart in the middle. When I opened the box and pulled the ball out, The Man told me “when things get crazy, our life looks like this:” He bounces the ball really hard and the glitter creates a flurry inside like a snowglobe and the heart disappears.  Then he said, “if you’ll remember to wait a bit and let things settle, you’ll see my heart.”  He holds the ball steady in his hand stretched out towards me. The glitter starts to settle, and the heart shines through all pretty and shiny red. 

To me, in that moment of time, it was one of the most romantic things I had ever heard. (Yes, you red flag spotters, I hear you out there…I get it…I plead being a product of too many 80’s teen romantic movies)… It felt perceptive and wise and in tune with my own dysfunctional tendencies. It was a reminder to cultivate the skill of taking a beat and let things settle before I go all DefCon5/4/3…

Back to that summer afternoon, he presented that glitter ball to me and said the same thing in front of 100 of our closest friends.  He told me I could always see his heart if I’d just wait and let the glitter cyclone settle. 

Here’s the deal: what if I broke apart that entire paradigm. I mean, yes, it’s a great lesson to learn to let things settle a bit before you make any decisions….but what if I said no to the cyclone in the first place? What if: 

(a) I refused to cover my pain with the chaos of busy-ness–of being over-booked–of having an never ending task list and the corresponding shame accompanying never finding the end–the TaDa!! 

(b) I created boundaries where I’m responsible for me and my response, and not allowing my people-pleasing tendencies to get my emotions out of whack because I feel I’m letting people down. 

(c) I say no to joining in with someone else’s cyclone. What if I refused to believe that glitter tornado equates passion and love? Chaos is not sexy. Anger is not a thermometer measuring how much someone cares about you. That’s a made for tv movie in the same vein as forest animals who help with house chores…. 

(d) what if the defensive/protective skills I learned from previous relationships, which kept me emotionally safe, are no longer serving me. They did their job, but they were designed for a moment not a lifestyle. 

What if the Glitter Ball was the problem….

So back to hibernation… For 12 months I’ve burrowed inside watching too many episodes of Gilmore Girls. It was a nice, cozy cocoon. I was out and about, but the friend-cultivating store was closed for business. I’ve been reading books, going to therapy, and putting a microscope over my tendencies, reactions, and emotional translations of words, omissions, and actions. On one hand, it’s been exhausting, but on the other hand, it’s slowing down my emotional reaction–that flurry of glitter inside spinning and churning. 

Enter 2024, and I’m pondering my word for the year. And it came to me: Connection. It’s time to exit survival mode and make myself vulnerable again.  (The palpitations are already starting).

It’s time to volunteer, get involved, and meet new people–actually get beyond the Hi I’m Becky part of the conversation. I’m an extrovert, so this should be like riding a bike, right??? But it’s complicated–As a shy extrovert, I’m complicated… Romance is still not in the cards right now as I’m six months away from the end of my Gap Year extension. But this process isn’t about romance. It’s about practicing the things I’ve been learning these past 12 months. The time has come to exit survival mode and I’m shaking a bit in my boots…

See dear ones, survival mode has its purpose just as grief has its purpose.  But you cannot live there forever–it’s not meant to be that kind of place. It’s tempting to build an altar to my hurt and stay where I am all cozy and under my blanket binging Netflix as an escape.  But I don’t want to build a life where my mode operandi is escape. I want joy and connection and smiles and laughter. I want to give and serve and see and be seen. I don’t want to have to look past the glitter in a flurry to see the remnants of my own heart–I want my heart to be front and center for all to see.  It’s a vulnerable place I know. But what’s the alternative??? Having my heart never seen again like Willie Wonka hiding away in his chocolate factory? 

I don’t have to hibernate anymore… Healthy Boundaries are meant to keep my heart safe–not the flurry of emotion and the tornadoes of glitter distraction.  The glitter ball feels like safety as it’s somewhat predictable, but in the end, it’s a never ending cycle of chaos and rest…chaos and rest. My lesson is in the proactive intentionality of living where I get to choose my colors and be okay with everyone else’s choices. If we don’t align, it’s not mine to fix. If there is a tendency of the chaos cycle, I am not required to be the rock which tethers them so things can settle. That’s not my job. No more glitter ball for me for my own heart or anyone else’s.  

Today, as I was decluttering my utensil drawer, I came across the old glitter ball…exploded into pieces around the big red heart shining front and center on top of them. 

If that’s not confirmation of my message, I don’t know what is…

Becky: don’t hide in the glitter and the flurry. Break out of that bubble of a ball and live free where your heart shines. Be brave…connect with healthy people…give and be willing to receive. 

Next: Enough (as in I am enough!)