six weeks out

This is the 6th week since Sully was born. This is when most women normally go for the "six week check-up", go back to work, get back into normal life and activity. Sometimes it doesn't feel like I had a baby just six weeks ago. I'm pushing myself to get to where I can wear my normal clothes. I never would have even fathomed normal clothes at this point after my other pregnancies. What am I doing? I don't really know. I don't really know exactly what I should be doing with myself.

I am not as tired as I would be if we had a healthy six week old around here. But I am emotionally tired. I feel very little strength to pursue the things that I once would have tended to with gusto. I am feeble in my relationships, very much unable to be a good friend, to give what rightly should be expected in friendships. I heard someone say that loss such as this is like losing an arm. That arm will never grow back. So, I have to figue out how to rebuild my life, to function and exist in this life without that arm. I hate the thought that I have been made so weak. I hate that I will disappoint people because I am no longer the Heidi I once was. (And who I am I kidding, the Heidi I "once was" isn't so great, but in my head I believed I could give "equally" into relationships). But this is who I am now; this is where God would have me be.

I am eager for the play ground work to begin. I want to see it completed, and then I have a feeling I may retreat again. The work on the play ground has drawn me out, given me focus, something to care for, something to love and tend, something to nurture towards growth. It is an incredible gift to me. In some way the playground has helped to slightly anesthetize the wound for a short time. I worry that when it is complete I will feel a bit lost, that then I will have to embrace all over again and more fully the emptiness of my arms.