Married, Divorced, Widowed & Might Just Try Again!

I had a painful dream last night. I dreamt I was pregnant with twins.

The first one died while in the womb, a few months before full term. Therefore, it was removed and disposed of in the medical manner. Although I was saddened by this, I remained grateful because of the surviving twin in my womb.

At full term I gave birth to the second twin. The baby was kept in hospital because of ill health.

Then one morning a few days after I had given birth to the second twin, I  received  a call from the hospital to inform me that the second twin has also passed away.

I was torn. More hurt than I was about losing the first twin. The second twin's death derailed me mentally and psychologically.

Waking up, I prayed about the dream & then got this revelation:

The first twin that died in the womb was my first husband, our marriage ended in divorce & although I was sad about it, I was somehow expecting it because we weren't compatible.

The second twin was my second husband Mbu and of course as you would know, our marriage ended in his passing.

Indeed the end of my first marriage hurt but I was ok with it; but my second marriage ended expectedly. I couldn't have predicted it, nor prepared for it. Just like in the dream, I was left so empty and confused about not only history navigate life but also redefining it after the death of my second husband.

So I'm depressed.

Yes, I pray, I love God and I know how much He loves me, but this is the life I've been dealt with. Who am I to say I don't want this as my portion? Who am I to question God for all these ordeals? Has God not promised me that His grace is sufficient for me?

My biggest fear is loving again. I am praying over this area of my life because experience has taught me nothing is guaranteed, the only way to prepare for it is to pray for it.

Back Here Again.

My late beloved husband and I spent every second weekend together during our dating years. The last day of each visit would become a bittersweet date, as we would try to cherish the hours we had left before we parted.

I would travel for an hour or more to get home, but not before being met with long taxi queues at the taxi rank, as most people made their way home from their weekend visits.

This seemed torturous then, but now it has become such a treasurable memory.

I travel a lot and mostly by taxi since I lost my car. There are days I find myself standing in the very spot I stood on years ago with my then boyfriend and now late husband. Everything around seems the same. There’s still shouting queue marshals and cheerful hawkers – but it isn’t the same for me. No matter how much I try to close my eyes and pretend Mbu is still standing next to me; truth is, he isn’t.

Instantly I’d feel the echoing void in my heart and if I have enough courage on that day, I simply let it rip by allowing my heart to be a fountain of a love never to exist again, until it overflows through my eyes as a flood of tears.

I have learned to appreciate each moment for what it is. Back then I wished my beloved had a car so I wouldn’t have to go through these long taxi queues. Today the value of the torturous time I spent standing with him in these long queues far surpasses the discomfort caused by his absence.

So in essence, every moment I spent with him, no matter how unpleasant or insignificant still had great value attached to it.

Dead Brain.

One of the hardest things a person can ever have to do, is to comfort a grieving person. It’s also humbling because at that moment you are left to accept that no matter how much you sympathise with the bereaved, there is nothing you can ever do to take their pain and sorrow away.

For me, death is one thing that reminds us all how human we are – that there’s a limit to life.

I have lost three people I loved dearly in my life. My brother who passed on at 10 months, my grandfather who passed on in January 2015 and then my second husband who succumbed to cancer at the age of 32 years in January 2017. Of all these deaths, my husband’s passing hit me the hardest. I remember feeling part of my brain being dead. I battled to process even a simple thought. Maybe it was frozen. I told my mom this and she looked at me as though I were crazy. Maybe I seemed crazy to her and many others, but I knew I wasn’t.

I explained to her that my brain was in recovery. Only a small portion of it was strong enough to stand the trauma, while the rest was basically in ICU but inside my head. This fraction of my brain was being protected from ‘fatal destruction’ that would have been caused by carrying the mental tasks on a damaged or compromised mental capacity.

The other challenge in offering support to the grieving is the misinformation on what grief is and how it impacts on the bereaved. I am hosting my first mental health seminar for this very reason. To educate our society. We are better effective when we’re armed with knowledge.

Grief alone is a huge life obstacle that one might have to face. I say obstacle because that’s what it is. It stands in the way of life and while most would prefer sweeping it under the carpet, I prefer facing it head on – with the right tools of course. One of these tools is ‘time out’. The effect of the trauma is massive, so you need to learn how to gradually recover your mental capacity, so time out to rest your brain is ideal. I love detox massages, they are like manna to the wandering Israelites.

I have to thank God because each time I suffered a certain trauma in my life, he’d just inspire me with ideas that have become my survival strategies. The importance of a detox wrap and massage was one strategy I got after losing Mbu. I had my first session in February 2017 shortly after Mbu passed on, I felt as though a thousand bricks have been lifted off me. For the first time in months, I could breathe easily.