Sitting Uncomfortably

Been a weird week.  Emotionally, strange for me. I have been sitting with it, but not comfortably!

I guess I'm still adjusting to living back in my childhood hometown.  I'm about 5 miles out of a small town of 1300 or so people.  I haven't lived here since I was eighteen.  I moved away for college and only came back for a couple of months in the summers after my first two years of college.  It's a bit of an adjustment after being in the DFW area for 10+ years, followed by Los Angeles and then Philly.  It's a slower pace to be sure.  So there's that.

Then I'm also adjusting to being the full-time parent to just my youngest child.  The two big kids (my teenagers) chose to stay in Philly to be with their friends.  So the house is much quieter, and that is different. I"m still working through all those emotions.

And there is the physical fallout of multiple years of mounds of stress. My energy levels are not as good as they should be and my body aches just about all of the time. I need to be doing more yoga, but can't seem to generate enough drive to properly motivate myself into a consistent daily practice. And most recently the tendon in the crease of both of my elbows decided to start screaming at me if I decide to try to lift anything. I have a feeling it's the fact that my shoulders have been much too tight for far too long and the pain is just sliding down my arms into my elbows.  Next I'll be typing with my nose because I won't be able to move my fingers! I'm trying not to let the physical stuff worry me, but I don't always win that battle.

Plus I'm not at all used to dealing with any sort of physical limitation and it annoys the hell out of me!

And I'm also still learning how to be single. Or at least how to emotionally handle being single. I'm not sure that sentence even makes sense.  I was a kid, then a teenager, then a wife.  Yes, I was married at 19.  I was never a single adult. So now, as a 40+ year old gal, I'm learning all the things about single adulthood I should have learned years ago.

I was a wife for 21+ years.  All of my adult years were spent as a couple. I thought about life and planned for the future as a couple. I never imagined that I'd be single. Things in a marriage are not always perfect, but my philosophy was that you keep working on it and keep working on it.  Giving up was not an option.  So now that I find myself single in my forties I'm a bit at a loss.

It's weird and I don't even know if I can properly put into words the strangeness I feel. I don't really want to be in a relationship.  I cannot imagine trying to have the emotional energy to date and really get to know someone new right now.  It just sounds exhausting.

And I also enjoy my alone time.  I have never had trouble being by myself.  I can sincerely appreciate quiet down time with just me.

So I'm still working on putting my finger on just how I feel.  I guess there are things that pop into my head every now and then and I want to share them with someone and I don't have that certain someone.  Which doesn't really make sense because I have the most wonderful friends and family a person could ever want. I can reach out to many of them at any time and they respond.

Again, not sure I'm making sense.

I think I feel lonely in a new way that I've never really experienced. And I hate to even admit that feeling. I don't like to admit things that make me feel vulnerable. It's difficult for me not to see that as a weakness. I want to be strong and self-sufficient. But I guess I liked being somebody's "other half."  And even admitting that made my stomach turn a little bit. My brain says it sounds yucky and weak to admit that. And for some reason while I'm sitting here writing this I've started to cry.

So I sit with my single, emotional, physically tired, forty-something self. It's shit. It's real. It's me.

I'm trying really hard to like me right now. It's not easy.