Just Ramblings

Later today we drive to my uncle and aunts house for the big Pauls' family Christmas. This year there will only be three family members missing. Which is a first in many years, so that means there will be 37 of us hanging out for the afternoon. It should be a lot of fun. I'll update on that later, and hopefully by then I will have down loaded the Christmas photos.

This is a time of year to celebrate and to be joyful and happy and if I am being honest I would have to say that I have spent the past 2 days numb. It was a year ago December 27th that my dad died. Three days before my wedding, he did not know that I was getting married. The reason being is I did not want him there. When he was a part of my life he was not a very nice man, and he did a lot of things that I am still in counselling trying to sort out and deal with for my self. And after a while he was no longer a part of my life or a part of my life that I would want celebrating the best day of my life to date. The day I married Jeral. When I heard he had died I was torn and conflicted because there was a part of me that was relieved, and then there was a part of me that was sad, and then I just didn't know how to feel. So this was the first Christmas without the obligatory phone call to dad to say "Merry Christmas", and as I reflect about last year at this time and then thought about where I am a year later, I realized one thing, he is dead however my fear of him is not, and it is time to bury that fear. I am so tired of waking up from nightmares crying and trembling in fear. It's time to lay it all to rest and to live in freedom.

I don't necessarily understand why all the thing happened the way they did, and in dad dying there went the last chance to get the answers to the question why? However, one day I think I will all of a sudden understand when I least expect to find the answers I am looking for. I do know this God's timing of my fathers death was perfect. Yes it through a bit of a kink into my wedding, however in the days prior to the wedding I was able to grieve not having a dad to walk me down the isle. And on our wedding night I was able to give myself to my husband, the man I love with all my heart knowing my dad was dead and could never hurt me again.

Grief I was told is a cycle, and there are many layers to it. I know I still have much to grieve in regards to the lose of a father. I now know though that whether my dad was physically alive or not I would still be going through the grieving process, because he wasn't really a dad. I also have to grieve the things that I had hoped for if he would have changed. Now those will never be realized and truthfully I don't think that they ever would have been realized, and so God is his mercy took my dad off of the earth in a very merciful way (trust me heart failure was merciful considering that liver failure and cirrhosis would have been the way he would have gone otherwise).

So I am hoping and praying that in the weeks to come, before I next see Joy that I will have been able to put to rest the fear that still remains alive. I am determined to live the life that I have to its fullest without the fear of him anymore!