Looking back over the last two years, I am able to see the progression in my family’s grief processing. It’s not always clear while you are in it, but looking back you can see distinct shifts.
The first year was us trying to breathe. Trying to work through not only the grief of losing Jeremy, but also the trauma that we experienced. During that year, I learned how to recognize and differentiate between the two. There were times that my brain, randomly would release a trauma based memory and I would be side swiped by it. It would undo me. I realized how much my brain had taken in and had stuffed in order to keep going. Unfortunately, after his death and the immediate chaos that seemed to follow due to the pandemic, resources that would have been available, especially to my kids, were not. So we limped along, doing the best we could.
Going into our second year, I realized how beat up we all were, our minds, bodies and spirits. Honestly, my adrenals left me no choice. They threw up there hands and said no more! I was forced to see it and to take action, with what little hutzpah I had left. Thankfully, some things that were unavailable before, became available, and the kids and I have gone after them. I’ve seen my kids working hard and to say I am so incredibly proud of them, is an understatement. They are doing the hard work. It isn’t always pretty, but they are doing it. They are doing work that even some adults refuse to do. I am in awe of them.
And here we are approaching the beginning of our third year without Jeremy.
When Jeremy was first diagnosed and I realized how bleak his prognosis was, I remember coming home and looking at the farm and thinking do I even want to do this without him? Can I do this without him? It was a path we had chosen together. It was a dream that we had dreamed together. It was a life we had lived together.
Together.
And I then I found myself in a place of no more together.
Death.
And without our together, my “why” seemed to be missing too. Not dead. Just missing. I felt like it shouldn’t be missing because the same beliefs that influenced our decisions for our lifestyle still held true.
I have questioned over the last two years what I want to do with our farm. I have questioned do I still want to do this? Can I still do this? WHY am I doing this? But that’s where I have left it. Questions. I chose not to search for the answers. I just couldn’t. Because grief and trauma…you can’t ignore them. You have to walk through them to be healthy.
However, I did choose to put in front of my eyes others who are homesteading. Others, I knew, understood all the reasons for choosing to homestead I became a passive observer in their journeys, all the while focusing on the things I shared above with you, knowing I had to come back to finding my “why” in homesteading… later.
I haven’t been ready to pursue my “why” until recently. And honestly, my “how”. As an active reach to finding what all this looks like now, I attended a homesteading business conference in Tennessee. It was a smaller conference with some incredible speakers in the homesteading world. I went with an open mind. Praying that God would give me some understanding on how to move forward, but really just attending with an open mind and heart.
The weekend was full of information. Some didn’t pertain to me and others did, but honestly it wasn’t until one of the speakers, Jill Winger of The Prairie Homestead, made one simple statement that everything stopped. “Homesteading makes us feel alive.” It was like her statement was translated and written on a billboard, and all I could read, hear and see was right there. This. This.
Life.
There is life in homesteading.
And THAT was the reason I had lost my why. Because was there life and living if there was no more together because of death?
Ironically though, it was also the reason I couldn’t let go of one day finding my “why” again.
Because despite death, there is still life.
Homesteading is not “cheap thrill feeling alive” type of feeling. It goes deeper. Much deeper. And homesteading, despite all the hard, does make you feel alive. Connected. Connected to a deeper unknown place in you. A place in you that you didn’t know had life.
Here’s the thing. I miss Jeremy. A lot. I miss my person. I miss living this life with him in it. I miss living our “together”.
But my kids and I can’t stop living while we are here. I want to live. I want my children to live. Not chasing thrills but truly living. Connecting to the deeper parts of us that were created to experience life.
And homesteading is a part of that for me. I find myself in a place of developing and growing what that looks like for my little family. To knowing and understanding my “why” as we move forward
I do know that my why is going to look different from my previous “why”.
But one thing will remain with my new “why”…
Homesteading, despite the presence and reality of death, gives life.
