Bittersweet Blessings

Yes I know I am blessed. I thank God every day for my life. I would thank God everyday for my life even if I were living in a van down by the river (you get bonus points if you know what that is from).  I feel so lucky to be here with the man I love and my two amazing girls. Wanting to work through the negative emotions associated with a big life change is a completely normal and valid thing to do.  Our society seems to frown upon allowing people to work through their yucky stuff.  Oh you are having a bad day, week, month? Can't show that.  You have to give the illusion that you have your whole life together.  Or you can't process the negative because you need to be only looking at the positive.  I am all for being a positive person in life.  In fact I have always said I find joy in the small things because chances are I am never going to win a big lottery or anything like that so finding a lost toy or my favorite song coming on the radio are huge celebrations for me.  But I think we need to be okay with working through our stuff.  And better yet we need to be okay with showing OTHER people that we are working through our stuff.  

Just because I want to acknowledge the difficulties I have faced does not mean I am not grateful for the opportunities.  I called my blog Joyful Contradictions for a reason.  When we were getting ready to move over here and I would talk about it with people, the main reaction I got was "I am so jealous!" or "You are going to have so much fun! What an adventure!" or something along those lines.  And yes, all those things are true.  We have had fun and will continue to make the most of this amazing opportunity.  But when I would start to discuss the stress of moving to another country, people would come back with "but you are so lucky!" or "it will all be worth it".  And, again, all that is true.  But you know what ELSE is true?  That parts of moving to another country, or even just being a GROWN UP, can suck sometimes.  Right?  I totally miss snow days where I could sleep in and wake up to a yummy breakfast my parents had prepared for me.  Filling out so many forms over and over and over is not my idea of fun.  Trying to explain to your child that her friends can't just pop over for a play date is NOT fun.  Watching your child cry because they can't talk to (insert far away friend or family member here) because there is an 8 hour time difference is NOT enjoyable.  Trying not to fall apart in front of your kids while you comfort them is not easy.  I am a firm believer in allowing your kids to see you cry but you also have to be there for them, to help them through whatever they are going through and I found that extremely difficult at times to balance both.  Especially when my children and I were sharing the goodbyes, whether goodbyes of family members or goodbyes of friends.  Many of Gabby's friends were children of my friends. Trying to guide her through the goodbye process while also confronting my own emotional anguish was difficult.  I hope I did an okay job.  I hope I am still doing an okay job.  The crazy thing about parenting is a lot of the time we will have no idea how badly we screwed up until decades later.  Yay for that guys!

So I have a bit of advice for anyone who knows someone going through a big life change, or a tough spot in the road.  It is okay to remind them that it will get better.  But I am sure they have already heard it.  Something I doubt they have experienced?  Someone that says "I can't imagine how tough this must be" or "that sucks" or "If you ever need to vent about the tough stuff, I am here".  "I. AM. HERE."