Now that I was responding to spirit’s call to me and acting on my guides’ advice, things should have started to get better, I thought. Instead, the month started off very challenging. I felt angry and sometimes hopeless. And worst of all, I felt at odds with my husband. Although the month started with great emotional struggle, I was able to have some brighter days.

So much happened emotionally for me in this month that, as with June, I’ve broken the chapter up in two parts. This is part 1. You can watch the YouTube video of this first part of chapter 20 using the following link, or read it below.

 

20. July 2010

Saturday 3 July 2010

All the metaphors we have that involve sight and ignoring things—being shortsighted, can’t see the nose in front of your face, having tunnel vision, can’t see the forest for the trees. We use “see” a lot for “understand” and “comprehend” and “realize”: Don’t you see? We see the connections.

I wrote a bit [in my book] today, focusing on the [text about] Darkness, and then I ran out of things to say, blocked by my own subconscious. I couldn’t “see” where to go next. I cried in pain of remembering. And then I had to take a walk in the light of the sun—the light that I can now see as more than just a dimness barely brighter than the dark. I needed the warmth of the sun on my face, the breeze to dry my tears. But as I walked throughout our orchard, I was disheartened because trees … were “gone,” hidden by my damaged periphery. I was sad, freaked out, thinking my periphery had started getting worse. I cried. Angry at my lot in life. Sad. Wanting to plead for healing. I wandered in the direction … where we had planted the oak seed in remembrance of our miscarried child, and I cried harder. I wanted to fall to the ground and sob. I barely had the strength to hold myself up—or the interest. The only thing that kept me from it was knowing all the thistles that are [“hidden” in the grass]. So I crouched by the post [that we put next to the seed]. … And I cried. I nearly fell forward in my self-pity, my anger, my despair, my loneliness, but just in time, I saw the foot-tall thistle in front of me.

I stood and turned, walking, tears blurring the limited vision I already have. And then I heard a buzz and saw a short flash of black. I quickly blinked the tears from my eyes and crouched again, looking at the white clover flowers in front of me. There was a honeybee, going about its business, doing what had to be done. Bees don’t have time for self-pity.

I watched the bee flit from flower to flower for a few moments, feeling myself calm. Then I stood and began to take a step. And then I saw two small white butterflies [probably cabbage moths] chasing one another near some tall grass a few yards away. I remembered when I used to mow and hoped I wouldn’t run over any honeybees flitting around, laden with pollen. And I always smiled when I saw the butterflies. So simple, so small, yet so beautiful, symbols of growth and transformation.

And then it hit me as the third butterfly joined the other two—when we’re too busy crying about what we don’t have, feeling sorry for ourselves, we miss out on the important things—we can’t see the birds and the bees. They keep the whole world going. They pollinate flowers and food so we can eat, so we can thrive. They are incredibly important, and if I had kept on crying, I wouldn’t have been able to see them, these incredibly important things, for feeling sorry for myself, for mourning about a time that has passed, that has gone.

Yes, it hurts, but if I spend my time crying, I can’t see—literally or figuratively—the truly important things, the fact that I’m still here, that I’m still blessed, that life goes on. I could have trodden on a bee that was working so we can eat the bounty of our … garden this fall. I could have made it worse by feeling sorry for something that’s already dead and gone. It’s not really a comfort, no, but it’s a reminder to not get so caught up in the past that I forget about the important things today.

 

Sunday 4 July 2010

Big fight with Mike this morning. He [had] slept on the couch and woke up to me eating breakfast and trying to watch an episode of [a TV show] on the computer. It turned into a shouting match, with him essentially telling me to get to work instead of watching TV and me yelling at him that I had only just gotten up and was trying to eat my breakfast.

I should not have yelled. I overreacted. He made good points in that I don’t always use the best of my time. … [B]ut in trying to get him to see my point of view, I’m afraid I just ended up babbling on about my reasons rather than presenting clear arguments. … I feel like a shut-in. I get to interact with 5 people a week, tops. … I bear a huge burden of guilt because almost all [our] debt is my fault and I can’t make enough money for it. I always used to know that if things got tough, I could get in my car and drive somewhere to try to drum up business, but now I can’t do that; instead, I simply have to rely on him to do more work. I get tired and sore [from] sitting in front of this computer hour after hour, with only the four walls to look at; at least in an office [outside the home], I could see other people, talk with other people, walk further to go to the restroom, to get lunch. He gets to enjoy the company of other people each day. The house gets messy, and I feel guilty. He gets to come home and relax after working all day, yet when he sees me not working, he assumes I’ve been doing that all day, slacking, rather than cooking his food and [cooking] my lunch and working. [I told him] he thinks that I shouldn’t have been out “having fun” and not working when I was with [friends] … but that’s the first interaction I’d had with people in months, whereas he gets that every day. I told him all I want is to have my vision back.

Even now, while he’s outside, gathering food from the garden, because he’s said he’ll come home and do housework if that’s what it takes to help me (it’ll last a week or two and then stop, just like every other time we’ve ever had this conversation), I’m jealous. He gets to go outside to gather food, and I’m stuck in front of the computer, editing. He’ll get to mow the lawn or weedeat, and I’ll be stuck in front of the computer, editing. He gets to drive to work, to see other people, and I’ll be stuck in front of the computer, editing. He’ll do laundry or dishes, and I’ll be stuck in front of the computer, editing.

This morning, we wasted more time arguing than I would have spent watching one damn episode of [the TV show] while I ate. I don’t know what to do. I’m tired of this. And I know if I mention it to him, he’ll say it’s just what we have to do. … I can’t find words to help him understand how I feel. …

How do I make him understand? I don’t. I have to let him figure it out for himself, and I have to bear the brunt of it. Sitting in front of my fucking computer while he moves about the world, pissed at me for not doing more.

***

Just had a more reasonable talk with Mike, in which we both discussed our concerns. He said he felt I was always sabotaging, and I explained that I realized how he felt and how it was unfair, because I worked more than 60 hours last week, in 6 calendar days, and still failed to meet my “quota” for the week, despite working my tail off. I explained to him that I know a lot of our financial worries are my fault but that it’s not fair that everything becomes my fault, that sometimes I take the work because it’s work, and better than nothing, but then when it pays crap, it’s not my fault, so I shouldn’t be blamed for that.

So, we still really have no idea how to fix the problem, other than trying to work together more. And I reminded him that if he does try to take on more hours at work, it means I have to do more around here, which is fine, but that it takes away from me meeting my quota because I have to do more of the housework, because time is not something we can create. It’s all the same old stuff coming up, time after time, but maybe we make a little more progress each time the conversation turns up.

I told him I’m not going to try to protect him anymore by trying to figure out the best way to say something or present a problem to him, because he has often taken that as me trying to get my own way, rather than me having looked at the problem from all angles to save him the trouble and [then] presenting him with what I think is the best one. … I told him he’s capable of a lot more than when we got married, so I think it’s time for me to stop trying to make this aspect of life easier on him and myself, because I think he’s ready to handle it and deal with solving these problems now.

Anyway, I [did a Facebook tarot[1]] reading … and asked, “Tell me about this money situation.” Here’s the three-card spread I got:

Recent Past: Six of Pentacles
Dualities. … In money, to have and not to have. One is taking care of others, but also receiving care. Balance is absolutely required. Could mean a mentorship in order to teach others how to maintain balance, or how to do one thing and not another. The give and take of cash flow.

Current Situation: Five of Pentacles Reversed
Financial trouble. You have lost financial as well as emotional assets. Feelings of isolation. Being ostracized. You have lost face with someone or in your community. Could be ill health. Exhaustion from pushing too hard to reach your goals. Loss of income or job. … End of a cycle, but a new one may now begin.

Future Influences: The Fool
The fool, the wide-eyed innocent of the Major Arcana, begins his journey on a new path with the willingness to step off a cliff into the unknown. He brings little provisions with him, ready to create or find what he needs along the way. The sun at his back, his dog to accompany him, the fool’s carefree pose stands testament to his search for the new adventure, to the faith he has in himself to forge a new path.[2]

 

Monday 5 July 2010

After yesterday’s events—the argument with Mike, then the apparently closer emotional ties (we somehow got back to more of an emotional connection than we’ve had in a while) and the visit to [the neighbors] for the cookout and fireworks—things seem easier between us, and though I’m not working every minute, he seems (but maybe he’s hiding it) less stressed. I’m still working, though, and determined to get work done—but housework, editing, etc.—all of it.

So I looked at Facebook today for my single card of the day and got the Fool. Yup, that was in the three-card reading I requested yesterday. But their write-up of the Fool isn’t great, so I decided to request the three-card reading for today and ask about my day, and life in general. It’s a mixed bag, I suppose, but overall fairly good:

Recent Past: Judgement
Incredible pressure to tell truth lest you be judged. … Have you done anything for which your judgment or actions would be called into account? Time to examine life, friends, family, career and relationships with a discerning eye. Time to deal with something major in your life. Transformative energies are surrounding you now. A choice is at the ready and must be made now.

Current Situation: The Hanged Man Reversed
Movement. Becoming unstuck and moving forward. Consideration of viewpoints and attitudes of others. Period of suffering ending. Ready to get on with things and back in the game. An opening of mind and heart. The end of a difficult time or cycle. Illumination. The way out has been discovered and is ready to be acted upon. Conformity. Allowing other’s opinions to overrun your own. Things are turned upside down, but may appear right-side up. Look closely to discern how things really stand.

Future Influences: The Devil Reversed
Liberation from oppressive forces. You have escaped treachery and deceit. It’s easier to walk away from something now, go before you are turned around. Deeper emotional connection on equal footing is possible in a relationship. Two against one for the greater good. Dark forces have lost their influence. Strong positive emotions are ruling force. Someone needs strength of your character to assist them out of a bad time. A reversal of bad fortune.[3]

 

Interesting because the Devil Reversed has come up a couple of times in the past week or two, and I keep thinking of the Hanged Man recently…

***

Just had a discussion with Mike about what to do if we can’t have kids. Through a sort of looping-around discussion, I learned that he has avoided discussions of the possibility and of adoption because it makes him feel like a failure, a genetic failure. Part of the meaning he thinks his life has is to carry on his genetic line. He tries to avoid even considering the possibility of us not being able to have kids because of that—it induces in him the same kind of panic and fear that thought of a car accident does. When I asked where that leaves us if I can’t bear him children, I never really got an answer except that he just gets through it like he gets through driving—without thinking about the possibility of getting into an accident.

So even considering adoption to him is to admit failure. I asked when we decide it’s too late, how late we keep trying, and he said “fifties, sixties.” Far later than I want to keep trying, and far later than practical. I mentioned the possibility of risk, danger to me and the child, the older I get, and he was quiet. I asked several probing questions (what if we had a child who was of below-average intelligence, a gay child, [a child with severe health issues], etc.), to really get a very good understanding of his mindset, and then I took it all in for a while.

Finally, just before he had to leave for work, I had the chance to tell him a little bit about how I feel—that I’ve always wanted to be a mom but decided long ago that if I couldn’t have my own kids, adoption would be good, because the ultimate point is to make the world a better place by spreading my love, my knowledge, my wisdom to someone who could then make the world a better place by doing the same. Sure, I’d prefer it be my own kid, but really, the important thing is the passing on of information. And I truly want to continue my parents’ line, their heritage. But, I explained, it took us so long to conceive the first time. And then once we did, it went wrong, so wrong. And when it takes so long, you can start trying to make the pregnancy happen, by tracking your fertility and having sex when the calendars and thermometers say it’s time. And then, if that doesn’t happen, you spend money to do tests and find out why you’re not getting pregnant, and maybe even to do in vitro fertilization. But with my health problems, it’s not that I’m a healthy woman any longer. It’s not like I can just have a few miscarriages and not worry about the consequences. Hell, even if I do manage to get pregnant, I’ll be terrified of the consequences.

That’s all I managed to tell him before he had to go to work. I really want to be able to talk to someone about all of this, but I wouldn’t know where to start, and I don’t think anyone could help me anyway. But at least I was finally able to get Mike to open up a bit about this, and I was able to express my views to him. I don’t know if he was able to take it in or if he had to block it out emotionally, but at least we finally had a conversation about it. At least it’s a start.

I feel that I have to find some other meaning in my life. It’s not that being a mother was my only goal or the only thing in my life that would give it any meaning, but so many decisions we’ve made in life have been on the assumption that we will have kids—buying my car, buying this house, starting a garden and an orchard. They were all for us, but also on the assumption that we will be sharing them with kids. I’m not sure what my long-term goals are for life, [what] my long-term life meaning is, if not having or raising kids, especially since I now have to rely on others just to go somewhere…

No, it’s something Mike didn’t even want to consider, to think about, the possibility of not having kids. It’s not something I want to consider, either, but it’s something we do have to consider. Ignoring it won’t just make the problem go away, and it certainly won’t make our feelings of disappointment or hurt about it go away. …

Sure, I could just try living day by day, just surviving, but I’m miserable when I do that. I long for more. I’m always longing for more. Maybe I’ll just never be satisfied. Why can’t the longing be satisfied? What will do it? What will satisfy me?

[For a] tarot card I [drew] today, an explanation told me that I need to be using this time to be away from the world to develop my communication with the higher self, to find my purpose, to reconnect, to rejuvenate, to step away from the world. I should be away from the world to strengthen myself and find peace. But right now, I feel I’m always away from the world, I’m always disconnected from others, so what’s the point of being away from others to find peace and my higher purpose? I’m ALWAYS away from others, I’m always isolated, and it’s not a self-isolation. I’m not finding peace, because it’s not self-imposed isolation. … Every time I think I’ve made peace with them, with my situation, I find all over again that I’m unhappy. Is it a never-ending cycle? Or was I fooling myself into believing I’d found the peace?

Always the fucking questions, and never any fucking answers. … [N]ever any fucking answers! [4]

Always seeking, never finding. Never content, never happy. Not really, truly content. Always wanting what I can’t have. Always.

Once I’ve found my purpose in life, shouldn’t I be content? How can I make the world a better place if I can’t figure out how to do that? How can I make the world a better place if I keep losing myself? Did I ever really have myself? Was I ever really in touch with myself, or was I lying to myself all along? Where’s my comfort? Why can’t I find happiness with my husband anymore? Why can’t I find happiness ANYWHERE anymore? All I do is long for things that no longer are and things that I apparently just can’t have. I’ve never felt so angry or discontented before in my life. Never. I hate this feeling. I hate it, and I can’t seem to fix it. I can’t stop it. I can’t ignore it. I’m always so full of fucking self-pity anymore. I’m always crying for myself, for things that can never be. I’m so sad. Where did my peace go? What about my self-assurance? … My self-respect, my self-worth? Gone with my vision? Gone with my ability to drive? Gone with my health? Gone with my baby? Gone with my husband’s heart? Does he really still love me? Can he still love me if I can’t give him a child? Even if he will still love me, will he resent me for not being able to give him a child?

Why do I just assume that my marriage is doomed? Is it because of the changes in me? The changes in us both? Or the parts of him that may never be able to change and adapt? He really is the only reason I’ve made it through most of this shit since October. … I love him for who he is and everything he does. I just think sometimes he’d be so much better off without me.

I’m just following my own thoughts in circles now. That’s all I ever seem to do anymore. I’m tired of it.

 

Tuesday 6 July 2010

[W]oke from a [dream] a few minutes ago. Can’t remember most of it, but what just came back to me was of a man, … running a business … and I needed to get my truck out of the garage … and then make it to an appointment. … [T]he guy was having a really hard time getting all his … workers to concentrate, to help [me], so I called out to him that I was stuck, that I needed help getting out.

Rather harried, he asked, almost shouted, what I wanted him to do about it. I said that nothing had to be done right away because my appointment could be [moved], so there wasn’t a big rush, as long as my truck got freed up eventually. Then I asked him if there was anything I could do to help, because he looked very haggard, tired, and weak. He broke down and said, “You just did.” … He said that I could help by just being with him, by walking beside him for a while. He was skinny, looked frail, and shook a lot, but he was stronger and quicker than I was and although sometimes [walked] a few feet ahead of me, always came back for me if I was struggling, but often simply let me make it in my own time because I was doing just fine, I was just slower … than I wanted to be going. …

I remember the look of him standing away from me, crying after I’d asked if there was anything I could do. It has the feel of a message, this dream. At one point in the dream … I thought … he was a man I’d been wanting to meet for years and this was finally my chance. And rather than being scared by the fact that I’d wanted to meet him and letting that make me feel awkward, I embraced him because he seemed to need it.

Intuitively, I believe this dream was a metaphor for God and my journey for God, where I want to drive again, but I can’t because I’m blocked by a bunch of things I can’t control, and God really wants to help but I just have to have a little bit of patience because there’s a lot of stuff that has to be done first before my “truck” can be unblocked. And then, of course, the rest of the dream doesn’t need so much interpretation—I need to walk beside God, give up my fear and anxiety over meeting the divine and simply embrace the divine, because so much more can be accomplished when we support one another. The relationship needs to be just that—a relationship, not a functioning of parasite on host.

This isn’t an easy lesson, of course. It says to give back, to be patient, to wait because God can get to everything, but not all at once. And it says that God also needs something from us. And that goes against much of what we’ve learned and been taught.

 

Wednesday 7 July 2010

The earlier in the day I reaffirm myself as an instrument of Divine will, the better I feel emotionally that day. Today, I prayed right after I got up and brushed my teeth instead of waiting for showering and eating and being completely clean “out of respect for God.” I prayed, reaffirming my desire to be an instrument of Divine will, to spread love and understanding, to act the way the Divine wants me to work, to say the things the Divine wants me to say. And even though my heart has been heavy for several days and I have been full of fear and worry, today things don’t look so bad. It took a while after praying … but then suddenly, the feeling of calm hit me, and the words came to my lips: “May my life be a light to others in the darkness. May it give hope to people who have none. May my life serve to spread hope, and faith, and praise of the great works of the Divine.” I cried a bit, out of joy, and out of a little fear, fear of the responsibility, and of the implications of my “little” life doing so much. But if this is the good that can come from my life, if nothing else—if the pain and fear I have endured can help others, then so be it.

 

Notes

[1] App and text supported/provided by Astrolis.com.

[2] I didn’t comment on this in my journal entry because the truth, the accuracy of the cards, was so evident.

[3] It seemed a mixed bag at the time, because I couldn’t “see” far enough ahead to understand that this was a turning point. I had many turning points in this year. Viewed from 2016 and 2017, I understand, especially the judgment, really examining my life and my motivations, and then finding “movement” and “becoming unstuck.” That’s what 2009–2010 did for me—made me examine my life, everything I had been doing “wrong,” so I could free myself from old patterns and conditions, then move forward into a brighter time.

[4] Now, I know that once we think we have learned a lesson, the Universe brings the lesson back to us several times, in a slightly different way each time, to really help us cement that lesson, so the overall lesson is the same but the circumstances are just a little different. This is the process of growing, of really driving home the lesson. And from a distance, you have probably already recognized that I was getting answers—I just wasn’t listening to all of them: what I needed to be doing during the isolation, the reason for the isolation. Instead, I was focusing on the form (not self-imposed), rather than focusing on how I could benefit from the isolation.

***

Thank you for allowing me to share this part of my journey with you. Please let me know what you think so far and if you want to hear/read more of my story.

If this is the first chapter of my story that you’ve read or listened to, you can catch up by listening to all of the episodes on my YouTube playlist, starting here.

 

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