28-Day Pit Stop (August)

This is a repost from August 2010, but it just fits this time of year too well not to repeat.

On the 28th day of each month (in honor of PMS and that whole menstrual cycle thing), we make a Pit-Stop to rally support for each other during a particular moment of PSM.

Submit a comment with your experience. Yours may be just the inspiration or the support or the laugh a PSM sister needs!!

This month's little adventure is entitled "Empty House", because that's what so many of us are left with as our Spawns leave for school. If it's for the first time, their freshman year, the sight of their near-empty room and the silence of the house can be unnerving. There are signs that they will be back - furniture, maybe their car - but you won't hear their key in the door each night or the perpetual slamming door as they come in and out of the house all day come Saturday.

And you suddenly have hours and hours and days and days to fill. You should call a friend. You should join a group. You should sign up for a class. You should, you should, you should. But first, you'll grieve. You may not even recognize it (mine came in an inexplicable hankerin' to watch the first season of the Brady Bunch over and over and over), but, if you can, just give into whatever your mind and heart and body want. If it's the Brady Bunch and Chunky Monkey ice cream, so be it. The world can wait for you and it will.

And, on the bright side, the next year's Fall semester break-up will be much easier. In fact, you may be surprised when you don't cry as they drive away!

Read next to the not so BE-YOU-tiful visual for suggestions to distract you while we check the lug nuts and put air in your tires for the next 28 days. And don’t forget to send in a comment if you have any suggestions for fellow PSMers!!

August's Pit Stop Suggestions:

Get a pillow and blanket and stay on the couch as much as you want to. You deserve a little downtime anyway!! I recommend watching mindless TV Shows about busy houses full of love and humor and little kids like Roseanne, Full House, Brady Bunch, Andy Griffith, Father Knows Best or Leave it to Beaver. They will make the house less quiet.

And Its Name Is Loneliness

I don't feel it nearly as much as I used to. My son is in his third year of college, so I've had two years to adjust after that first paralyzing one. Things are different now. Looking back, the Universe was fairly kind to me about this transition into post-single mom life, and I am grateful. Oh, don't get me wrong. It hasn't been easy, and I still have hard days - both to be expected in any grieving process - but I’m okay, and being alone in the house feels normal. Now.

But at first. I didn’t even recognize it. Then, I couldn’t quite pinpoint it. I knew I had felt it before, but it must have been a long time ago, because I couldn't remember the details. When it finally did shake hands and introduce itself, rather matter-of-factly, it gave no indication of how long it would stay or that I had any choice in the matter. It moved its stuff in, made itself at home, and materialized in a numbing fear and sadness.

It had an endless supply of excuses not to get out of bed each day. It understood the necessity of work, but it loved naps. It loved television, especially things it had already seen dozens of times. It hated quiet, but it hated noise. It hated solitude, but it hated people. It hated having nothing to do, but it hated plans. It hated not getting anything done, but it hated doing anything. It hated time passing, but it wished the days would go by faster. It loved a reliable Tylenol PM, because it forced sleep. It craved sleep - time to not be angry, sad, lost, unnecessary, or alone.

It loved the phone ringing, but it hated to answer because it didn't know what to say, and it was scared that if it did start talking, it would say too much and explode. It loved to see others living and playing and having fun, but it hated the idea of interacting. It seemed to want to dream, to escape, to live, but only in the future, not in the present. Sometimes, it acted like it might want help, but it was helpless in knowing how to ask.

Then, it felt guilty. It wasn't cancer, for God’s sake. This was no tragedy. It was being too dramatic and giving itself too much credit. It was just the result of too much time. It just needed to find something to do, to shut up and get on with life. Read a book or go to the bookstore or window shop at the mall or go for a walk or rake the leaves or get a chai tea or take a vitamin or pray. Or volunteer, contribute, give back, or think of others.

If only there had been five spare minutes from feeling sorry for myself, maybe I could have distracted it. I told it every night that I would leave the house tomorrow. For over a year, it didn't let me, but I kept hoping. Hope. Consciously putting one foot in front of the other for just a little while, hoping that everything would be fine soon. It was just loneliness, after all. I didn't know it at the time, but it never stood a chance in the ring with hope.