ANOTHER GOODBYE

today i experienced another goodbye.....i'm beginning to really hate that word. i had to tell a wonderful group of women that i have done Bible study with for the last 12 years that i just couldn't do it anymore.....and my heart broke just a little more. this group of women have encouraged me, laughed with me, cried with me, learned with me, mentored me....and i love them all dearly. i have been feeling lately that i'm just keeping my head above water. i have been forgetting things, misplacing things, losing things.....my mind is in overdrive every day. i think a part of me wanted it that way. i wanted to be so busy that i wouldn't have to feel the pain that is always a part of me, but has been pushed aside for so long. i think that i thought if i could just stay busy i wouldn't have to deal with that grief pain.....and now is coming in such huge amounts that i feel as if i'm drowning.

it's back.....that heaviness. not nearly as bad as last spring...but it's there. i can tell seth's 2nd Heaven birthday is coming up. i'm crying more. i see seth everywhere. just this morning i dropped luke off at school and watched him run in.....he ran EXACTLY the way i remember seth running. it surprises me that i'm feeling this all again. i don't know why it would surprise me. i expected it last year....it took me by surprise this year. my counselor said that it was a good thing that i gave up coffeebreak (my Bible study) and a few other commitments....it allows me more time to do my grief work. i don't want to do it.....i don't want that pain.....i don't want those memories. and yet they are constantly with me. lisa, my counselor, said that this pain IS always there and that i may have been 'damming' it all up and not allowing little bits of it through. she explained it that i may have been not letting just a little grief in at a time.....managable bits.....but have been 'storing' it all up and now it's come flooding out again. that made alot of sense to me. she encouraged me to allow just a little bit out each day and then i'd be able to handle a little at a time. her favorite question each session is 'what are you going to do for jolynn this time?'. i think that the next few weeks i'm going to start looking through the things that we've put in seth's trunk. i'm a little surprised that we haven't gone through it as a family more than we have....we really never go through it. it's just sitting there in the living room - great footstool - but that's about it. i think it may be time for me to allow those little bits of grief through and start going through his trunk......i think that's what i'm going to do for me this time.

goodbyes are so difficult....and yet they also mean a new chapter.....a new journey.......a new calling perhaps. goodbyes allow me to see where God wants me to go from here. that's my challenge now.....see what God wants me to do from here. i know that starlight is a major piece of this new journey....and i am so very excited to see what God does with it. lisa asks me what do i do for me....starlight 'does it' for me. i LOVE working towards this goal that God has led Greg and i. i feel purpose.....i feel excited......i feel scared......and yet i feel exactly where God wants me to be.....and that is the only place i want to be. so saying goodbye to my wonderful Bible study this morning was one of the harder things i've done recently.....and yet i believe that God has exciting plans in store for me......and i can't wait to truly dedicate my time and energy to where He leads.