Grief and Gratitude

What I've been up to (feeling) the last two months.

I have been having a hard time writing this newsletter. My last newsletter was about a deeply personal experience, making anything I write post-that-one feel trivial. I can't jump into a new post about my career, or something else, like that last one didn't happen. I want the newsletters to be strung together (like paper dolls or something). So in honor of trying to honor my feelings, paper dolls it is.

After my last newsletter, the only thing that feels okay to write about is my grief. Feeling happy, excited, and hopeful feels disrespectful to what I went through. I want to respect my loss and wallow in it a bit longer.

At first, the sadness was unbearable, I could barely avoid it, and I wanted to feel anything but the sadness. I went on a serious self-care mission involving getting so much sleep, seeing my therapist every week, drinking tea all day, and letting myself have and do whatever I wanted. That expensive haircut, you got it. New clothes, shoes, and that bag, yup. Go for it: if you want to lay in bed and read a book. You want to walk with a friend in the middle of the day when you should be working – whatever. Drink another cocktail – why not! And it worked. I started to feel better.

Laughing in a sauna with a friend, drinking a margarita with Nick, riding my bike in the woods, and working on projects I was excited about, I worked hard to feel the good things, as much as I felt sad. Nick and I went to Palm Springs, laid by a pool, drank slushie palomas, and marveled at our status of 'dinks.' We went to Joshua Tree after and took in the quiet. I spent hours and hours working in the yard. Nicks's parents came to town, and we did Portland Dining right. We got too many cocktails and extra slices of pie like tomorrow wasn't coming, and it was fun.

(I also want to point out, I am so privileged to be able to do this, take my time healing, and prioritize my mental health. The combination of working for myself and being financially set up in a way that I didn’t need to jump back into work immediately is a huge privilege. Having good health care, a supportive network of family, and compassionate clients is also (unfortunately) a privilege in this country. I’m dealing with this grief, but with it has been so much gratitude that I’ve had the space to process it).

I made it through April and May, focusing on the good and not overthinking the grief. There were challenging moments. Mother's Day, for example, turned out to be tough. Was I a mom if I just had a miscarriage? Do I qualify for it? Should people wish you a happy Mothers Day? Are you a baby-less-mother, or just a non-mom? It was a Mother's Day identity crisis, if you will. I didn't know how to feel most of the day; at one point, I drank two beers and took a nap; at another, I cried in the car.

I don't know anyone who has had a miscarriage and isn't a mom, so I didn't know who to text to commiserate with; so isolating. There's probably a Reddit thread for that. I had this intimate relationship with this hypothetical being, and it feels heartbreaking that no one will ever get to know them, not even me. Grieving the potential of a person is a strange feeling. 

May turned to June, and now it's halfway through this month, and I'm unsure how to feel. It feels like, as it becomes a thing of the past, I forget about it sometimes. I go whole days not thinking about it, it doesn't dominate conversations as it used to, and when asked if we have kids, I say "no" in a final sorta way so that I don't have to go into it, and if asked if we want them, we say "we don't know," and let our ambivalence be the topic of conversation. Now that the sadness is a minor part of the pie, I find myself holding on to it, not wanting to let it go. 

I fear if I do, I'll let go of something significant that happened to me, and I don't want to. I'm not ready yet. I'm in a new self-care phase, less 'yolo' and more 'you've got this.' I feel the grief when I know I have the space to. I like to read stories of other women who have gone through something similar; it feels cathartic in a less alone way. I also like grieving on dog walks, Piper doesn't even notice, and I get fresh air while doing it. 

We are still determining when we'll be ready to try again. Maybe never? We keep suggesting to each other that we skip it. Like it's a class, we don't want to go to. It feels like a coping strategy (if we decide we don't want it, it hurts less to have lost it, right?) and, one part, a potential truth (we went through a lot, it's reasonable to reconsider). We're giving ourselves some more time. It's unsettling not to know what the future holds, but that's life. A never-ending stream of uncertainty. (Great!)

With all this, I've been holding onto my career with less weight. I'm not trying to 'hustle' or 'figure it out'; I've just been letting things come to me, and so far, it's worked out just fine, and it feels better that way. Who knew? Holding things lightly might be the key. 

I finished a dream illustration project that I'm excited about; I am working on another branding project with Play&Co and got a contract design role helping a local business with emails and fun marketing collateral. I'm so grateful for all three projects, each with unique challenges and fun deliverables. I've been able to dabble in Commercial Illustration, Brand Design, and Graphic Design all at once. I'm still deciding if there's one of these things I want to focus on more or if continuing to do them all is fine. A topic for my following newsletter so I won't just write a diary of my feelings? Maybe.

I also want to paint a mural and sell some original art. Here's to making both of those things happen in the second half of this year. Can you believe we're halfway through the year? Happy Solstice – see you next time.