It's not unusual after a traumatic event to have flashbacks to it. I still have flashback to the last week that my Mom was fighting to stay alive. It was brutal. They used to completely paralyze me, an unwavering parade of scenes and imagines which I would rather forget. I still get those but when they happen I redirect my thoughts to happier times with my Mom, the memories I do not want to forget. Even the sound of her laugh. It's helped. Remembering that her life was far more than the last few months.
The last time I posted here I was just starting to come out of a very dark place. The crawl out of that pit was a slow one, it didn't happen all at once. Sort of like one day I felt like me again. Somewhere along the line I started living again, not just surviving.
Maybe it happened as we have fixed up my childhood home, my home for most of my life. Painting the walls, fixing the floors, raising the ceilings, updating the appliances and the electric along with a million other tiny things we have found along the way. Clearing out and fixing up the house seemed to do the same for me, for my mind. I was never much of a do-it-yourselfer. I always wanted to be and my pintrist will show that I found tons of things to do. But when you suddenly have an entire house to fix up you are forced to be put on your crafty gloves and just go at it. I'm not particularly good at most of these things. People have asked me about how I feel about the house being that's where my Mom died. Don't I feel weird having chosen her room for my own? The answer is simple and always has been. That house has been my home my entire life. I love every inch of that house/yard and I have a lifetime of wonderful memories filled with love. Not just the last two weeks of her life there. As for it being where my Mom died, it's also the same place where all of my pets died and while their loss wasn't the same, each of them was like family to me. I was there when almost all of them died so no it's not weird. Maybe if my Mom had been violently murdered and I had to clean blood off the walls it would be different. But I love my home and the memories that are there. It's a part of me. As far as choosing my Mom's old room for my own, it would have been weird for me to take my old room. I'm not entirely sure why, perhaps because that would seem a little too much like making the other room some sort of shrine. I grew up therefore, I left my childhood bedroom. My mom's room was also the place I always went when I was sick or upset. Being there now is still comforting, especially since my new bed is super comfortable. Mostly I look forward to creating new memories there and filling the house with love of a different sort.
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