Taking October Back ❤️

Hello people ❤️

Today... I want to open up and talk about something. Another thought that caught my braincells... 

Something that has, in many ways, been a curse throughout my life.

Losing people has never been easy for me. Death is not just sadness. It is a force that crashes into your chest, removes the ground beneath your feet and takes your breath away. Your energy. Your strength.

It takes pieces of you with it.

It cuts deep into your heart.

When death comes and takes someone you love, it can make you feel dizzy... like the whole world is spinning around you while you're standing completely still. It hurts so much. It makes it hard to breathe. Hard to think. Hard to function.

And grief comes in waves.

Sometimes you feel like you're okay. You laugh. You live. You breathe.

And then suddenly... a memory, a song, a date, a smell... and the wave comes crashing back. And for a moment, you're right back there again.

My first real meeting with death was, as I wrote about earlier, when I lost my brother.

But death didn't stop visiting my life there.

Over the years, I have lost more people and animals that I loved. And maybe you would think that after meeting death so many times, you would become numb. Harder. That each loss would somehow prepare you for the next one.

Maybe it does, in some ways.

Or maybe... that is why it became harder for me to let people in.

Because they might leave.

And for me, October has always been a difficult month.

My birthday month.

A month that should have been filled with celebration, happiness and excitement... somehow became filled with grief instead.

It didn't end with my brother.

Many of the people, and animals, I loved took their last breaths during October. My grandpa. My dog. My sister's dog. My stepdad, who died just a few days before my birthday.

Heck... my grandpa and my stepdad even died the same month, in the same year.

So naturally, October became something else for me... 

In addition to being a month full of nightmares that somehow return to me every year because of my trauma... it also became a month I associated with bad luck.

A month where, somewhere deep inside me, I always expect someone to leave.

To die. Or for something bad to happen. 

And somewhere along the way, I think a thought started growing inside me...

A thought that maybe all of this was somehow my punishment.

For what happened... 

Maybe that sounds stupid when I write it out loud. And logically, I know that the losses of the people and animals I loved were not because of me. I know I didn't cause death. I know I didn't deserve to lose people.

But trauma doesn't always listen to logic.

Sometimes your mind starts connecting things that were never meant to be connected. Sometimes you start looking for a reason for why so much pain keeps finding its way into your life.

And when October already carried so many memories, so much grief and so many nightmares... maybe a part of me started believing that this month was somehow cursed for me.

That every loss was another reminder.

Another punishment.

Even though, deep down, I know it wasn't.

And yes... when I really think about it, maybe that is a fear I have carried with me for years.

But this year...

This year, I want to do something different ❤️

I want to fill my month with good memories instead.

I want to take back October.

I want to own my life and refuse to let the past decide what my future should feel like.

Because I am the one writing my own chapters.

And yeah... this October, I have plans.

Plans to chase away some of the nightmares.

Plans to bring light into the darkness.

Plans to do things that make me happy. To laugh. To travel. To listen to live music. To see places I have never seen before. To explore and experience what life has to offer.

And maybe...

Maybe on those especially difficult days, I can give my brain something else to hold on to.

Something beautiful.

Something new.

Something that reminds me that even though grief will always be a part of my story... it doesn't have to be the whole story.

This October, I want to make memories.

I want to live.

And I want to remind myself that it is okay to be happy, even in a month that once only reminded me of loss.

Maybe I can't erase the past.

But I can create something new alongside it.

And perhaps, little by little, October can become mine again ❤️

Because I am still here.

Still writing.

Still dreaming.

Still living.

And I am ready to fill the next chapter with a little more light ❤️

- Merry -