Today my little birthday project took a huge step towards being a reality. I have backing and support, I have ideas and tools to use to move ahead. It’s happening! I’m pretty excited.
The thought of being able to share happiness with a child who needs it is really exciting – not only for me but for my kids too.
By next month Celebrate Every Child should be throwing our first party!! That is huge happiness!
The boy and I have this cold that just won’t let go. Today as I was mixing up different concoctions for us to try I realized once again how much I have learned these past couple of years about how to regain balance. It’s a work in progress but it’s so much better than it was. That is happiness.
Being able to slow down and rest so we can get better – that is also happiness.
To celebrate her 12th birthday the girl is having a friend sleep over. It’s toned down a lot from what she had planned because of the concussion, but in many ways this is a nicer way to celebrate a new year. This is such a good friend, and they get along so well, sometimes it’s good to just celebrate with someone who really gets you. The importance of having a best friend.
I feel both happy and content tonight. She’s having fun, the boy is in town at a basketball tournament, there is a sense of peace and gratitude in knowing my kids feel safe and settled at home. In knowing they have a home, with people who love them all around.
This place where we live is pretty amazing.
I had an interesting body/mind/soul connection talk with my massage therapist today. He was doing a CST treatment – which is so trauma healing, I am so excited about all the good it’s doing for me – and he asked if my physical body often manifested my emotional issues. I laughed and said hell yes.
Honestly it’s been something that even though I’ve tried to honor and respect has led me to the end of my patience on many occasions. I know we shouldn’t compare ourselves to others, but sometimes I can’t help but look at people who I know are way more screwed up than I am and their bodies still seem to be strong.
He reminded me that my body is enough in tune with my spirit that when I am out of balance my body shows symptoms of it right away. In many senses that is a blessing. I know and have to focus right away on what my body is telling me, and that’s how I heal.
Sometimes though I just wish the healing would be faster. Then I look back at where I came from. It’s pretty amazing.
My moment of happiness was remembering that my mind, body, and soul are all working as hard as they can to return to balance and health. I’m so grateful for all the love and support that I have around me as I walk this path. I’m happy to be healing.
For the first time since her concussion over a month ago, my girl managed to do a full day of school. She’s not totally healed yet, and thank goodness we had 2 weeks of break so she could relax and let her body get better, but it’s a start.
I’ve been so worried about her, she’s been brave and strong, but it’s caused her a lot of pain and angst. We have this amazing healing team who have been working so lovingly with her to help return her back to her old self.
Picking her up after school today and seeing her smile because she was back with her friends was my happiness moment.
My other one was on the way home this morning. It was super cold, but so beautiful. I am grateful every day that God brought us back home where we are loved and safe.
A couple of months ago I mentioned I’d had this divine inspiration and was working on a project. In order to see my dream come to life I needed some support and backing and now I have it – it’s becoming a reality.
At the end of September I was in a sad heart place and took myself to church. When I walked in the church I was grabbed onto by a lady who told me about a spiritual gifts session that was starting and she said I should join it. I was feeling kind of lost spiritually and wasn’t sure of my gifts or value I headed to the group, knowing that God had sent this lady my way.
I loved it. I’m still part of the group and it’s one of my highlights of the week
At the end of the session I had this idea come to me. Actually it came from God via my friend Maggie in Boston. She helps at a local homeless shelter where they provide birthday parties for the children who are staying there. I realized that there are likely kids in Cochrane who for various reasons aren’t having birthday parties. And I strongly feel that every child deserves to be celebrated.
So, the church has agreed to support me in my quest to make Celebrate Every Child come to life. We are going to have one party a month for a local child, and celebrate them!!
I’m so excited and so happy that this is all coming together so easily. It really was an answer to my prayer – I talked to the right person at the right church and they see the value in my vision.
Happiness is best when shared. This is a very deeply felt happiness moment for me.
We had a family showing tonight of Mr. Bean. I have laughed with him for 25+ years as has my sister and mom (not sure about my brother in law), and my kids have enjoyed him since they were little.
We all overdosed on him a few years ago so it’s been a while since he has played on our tv. I had forgotten how hard he can make me laugh, and with such simple and honest humour. It was a pretty fantastic way to spend the evening – laughing and reminiscing about our favourite episodes. Happiness. Thanks Mr. Bean.
We said goodbye to my godmother today at her funeral in Cochrane. It was a small gathering of loved ones but there were so many memories and so much love brought into that church.
When I was a kid and Cochrane was still a small town, there were three families who joined together because of their businesses being side by side. There was Mackay’s Ice Cream, my parent’s law firm, and the Doctor’s office. As a result, the Mackays the Ramsays and the Mcquittys have been family friends for as long as I can remember.
In the last two years all of us “kids” (in our 40s and 50s now) have lost a parent and have all held each other up in love and support. It’s been a rough couple of years for a lot of people.
I didn’t really get a lot out of the funeral service in the church. I’m not sure why, it could have just been the emotional place I was in. I just found it didn’t give me what I was looking for in terms of supporting my faith and having some closure.
I decided to go to the graveyard for the internment ceremony and I’m really glad I did. She was buried in the old graveyard in town where all the other old Cochrane family members are. My grandparents and the Mackay parents among them – as well as uncle George (auntie Mary’s husband, who ironically also died on Christmas Day years ago).
There was a lot of comfort in knowing she was being laid to rest among family and friends. Normally I’m not a fan of graveyards, but I’ve always found a lot of comfort at that one. When I was a kid my grandma used to walk me through it and tell me about family members and neighbours who were buried there.
The priest in the church service kept talking about how death was painful. I prefer to think of it another way, in these words from Robyn Mackay after losing her mom just a few months before I lost my dad:
Love, is one of the forces in life that leads all of us directly into suffering, because we will ultimately lose every person and everything that we love.
After dad died, MOM is the one who taught me to be fearless enough to love anyway, without conditions, and take the great risk that loving HER, would break my heart.
I have blogged this passage before and I return to it often to find comfort during times of loss. They’re wise words. Loving someone will hurt, but we need to be fearless enough to do it anyway. Otherwise you end up living a life without love, and that’s a pretty empty existence.
My happiness moment was standing in the graveyard feeling the love and comfort of those beloved members of my tribe who have gone on before me. And as a secondary, more badass moment, Jenna and I found some kind of joy in being able to run red lights through town as part of the funeral procession.
I had another CST (Cranial Sacral Treatment) today in Cochrane with my amazing, healing therapist. I’m so blessed that I have this community of healers around me. The last time I had the treatment done I had a head explosion of word vomit flow out of my brain. All that mental anxiety that was running around in my head just burst out (quietly thank goodness) and left me. Knowing that this time would most likely bring different results I was excited to discover what shifts would occur today.
This time was all about memory flowing. One thing I learned a few weeks ago when I had my transformational acupuncture treatment was that I tried to leave my body during times of pain and stress. It was a coping mechanism I developed in the years I lived with Mr. X when he was raging, and it was done very consciously. I was aware that I couldn’t leave physically – I had no money, no family around, was in a different country, and I absolutely could not leave the kids. He would rage and then leave, but I could not go anywhere. There was no way I was leaving the house without my children. So, I learned to leave my body. I did it to avoid pain and hurt and anxiety. But if you think that leaving your body does not cause anxiety then you don’t know what you are talking about! However, it was the best coping mechanism I had at the time.
Since that acupuncture treatment I have been working very hard to stay inside my body, to stay grounded, to stay present, even when things are not comfortable. Today when the memories started flowing my first impulse was to book on out of there. But, I breathed, relaxed, and let it flow.
The memories that came were of our years spent in Rhode Island. Things started to fall apart in Quebec, but in Rhode Island everything really went to hell. It was hard to have those times that I have worked so hard to block come flooding back into my consciousness. The interesting thing about CST though is they come, they’re there, and they flow by without me getting really freaked out about them. There was a certain amount of comfort and calming in acknowledging some of those events and ugly times. It’s like my body has been yelling at me pay attention this shit really happened, it’s stuck inside you and my brain has been all no, just stuff it down, it’s not really there, we don’t want to feel that.
I also had some good times both with the kids and with my friends in those years. By blocking out the bad memories I also blocked out all the good ones as well. It was a significant part of the kids’ childhood and I want them to have memories that make them smile. I want to be able to talk about playdates, trips to the beach, day visits to Boston and remember that there were good times along with the scary ones. It’s good to have those come back.
On a personal healing level, my CST today was a huge happiness moment. It healed a lot, let out a lot, let flow some good and some bad. On a family happiness moment, I returned home this afternoon to see my daughter and my niece cross country skiing through the yard. They had been over to the neighbours along the ridge (where my dad used to love to walk), had tried downhill skiing on the buffalo jumps (I’m glad I wasn’t there to see that, but I sure remember doing it as a kid), and were laughing their way home. What a great childhood this ranch provides. What a great, safe, loving home we have here with our tribe.
I was kind of funky feeling this morning. I had some rather unpleasant interactions with Mr. X, somehow having forgotten that bullying and intimidation seem to be the name of the game. It’s a game I’ll never get used to no matter how many years I have endured it.
Determined to shake it off, I had a short nap which immediately had me in better spirits. I have been so run down over the past few years, all the emotional stress and turmoil of things that have been going on. I feel like I could go away and sleep for weeks just to get caught up. It helped though, rest and a clear head make things so much better.
I took the boy into town and we did some birthday shopping for the girl. That kid is so funny and he brightens my soul and my day in ways I can’t even express. By the end of our time I felt lighter, happier, and filled with love and gratitude.
We came home and played the Stinky Pig Game which is guaranteed for laughs. He said this better be your happiness moment, and it is. I also love that he looks for happiness moments in every day because of my blog.
I feel like we have been able to really stop and focus on our little family this holiday season. The three of us are really tight anyway and we spend a lot of time together, but there has been a lot of bonding, laughter, and really good memories made over the past few weeks. I’m really grateful for that and it brings me much joy and happiness.
