Anyone who has experienced loss, knows that we often have to hold onto two opposite emotions at the same time. A dear friend expressed this situation so honestly recently on her Facebook page:
“This week my daughter’s volleyball team won their state championship.
It’s been a year and a month since my son took his life.
The heart has an incredible capacity to hold joy and sorrow simultaneously.”
When I adopted my daughter Alice, I remember reading that with the joys and blessings of adoption, many adoptees experience great loss and heartache related to their birth families. It is different for each adopted child, but often, they have to learn to hold these feelings of loss with the feelings of joy and love they now experience with their forever family.
I tried to equate that to my own life and I didn’t have to look far. I learned this lesson in my 20s. When I was growing up, Christmas Eve at our house was filled with hustle and bustle. There was last minute Christmas shopping with my brother Jim and last minute baking to be done. My mother’s extended family would arrive at our house after church to celebrate. Polish food abound – homemade pierogis, smelts, chrusciki (Angel Wings) for dessert and the tradition of greeting each other with oplatek.
According to the internet: The sharing of the oplatek (pronounced opwatek) is the most ancient and beloved of all Polish Christmas traditions. Oplatek is a thin wafer made of flour and water, similar in taste to the hosts that are used for communion during a Catholic Mass. The Christmas wafer is shared before Wigilia, the Christmas Eve supper.
We would go around sharing oplatek, wishing each other a Merry Christmas.
My mother became ill when I was 22 years old and died when I was 24. I learned the deep impact of grief then. I also learned that I could miss her terribly but feel blessed that my father and I had become closer.
Sadly, the Christmas Eve tradition died with her. I also had to learn to enjoy the holidays without her and our large, family tradition. We learn how to hold two emotions in our heart…. the ability to be happy for the moment but sad over a missed loved one or a past memory. I have been able to hold both emotions throughout the years. There is much gratitude for having had those wonderful past experiences, but pain that mom and now also my dad, is no longer with us.
These emotions can be magnified during the holiday season, so be kind to yourself. Feel all of those emotions and know it is ok!
I am finding the ability every day to enjoy the moment and cherish and honor the past. Find the blessing in the day!
Merry Christmas to those who celebrate!
Happy Holidays for others enjoying their time off.
Finding Abilities 