“Who Are You—Now?”

In my last post I noted that I seem to be on the other side of the grieving process and intent on creating a new life. But I was confronted by a question….

In that same post, I mentioned grief expert David Kessler who collaborated on two books in the 1990s with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross before she died. In 2020, Kessler added a sixth stage to her 5 Stages of Grief as described in his book entitled “Finding Meaning.” The very last line of this book poses an intriguing question:

“With the loss of your loved one, who are you?”

You can replace “loved one” with whatever your loss is. But for me, the question was “With the loss of Steve, who am I?”

Thinking about that, I realized that “I” have certainly had to be more resourceful now that I’ve had to assume full responsibility for everything: house and car repair/maintenance, finances and investments, our little pup Callie and, well, everything—much of which Steve took primary responsibility for, while I took responsibility for other things. Likewise, “I” am acclimating from thinking and saying we/ours to I/mine after 40 years of the former. May sound trivial but it has big emotional implications and is not easy to do.

What has also changed is the feeling that somebody always has my back. That someone is there to pick up the slack (or the pieces) when, for whatever reason, I can’t. Like a couple weeks ago when getting a large container of yogurt out of the fridge to top off a fruit snack, it slipped out of my hand and spilled all over the fridge bottom and door, the floor, and even under the fridge. Although I was on tilt emotionally and felt like I just couldn’t deal with it, there was no one else to ask to handle it. Nope, I had to clean the mess up myself, even as I muttered some pretty colorful words and phrases.

Again, this may sound trivial to some of you, especially if you’ve been living alone and are used to handling everything by yourself. But it has been really challenging for me after 40 years of having a partner who shared the work and could step in when I couldn’t handle something due to impatience, frustration, anger, fatigue, overwhelm, or lack of relevant knowledge and experience.

So the “what” and the “what I have to do” in my everyday life has changed for me. But the question remained, “Who am I now.”

I thought about it and realized that I’m … still me. Same values and characteristics, same skills and talents, same hobbies and interests, same personality and sense of humor, same stubbornness and impatience, same commitment to learning and growing spiritually and intellectually, same attitude of I’ll do whatever needs to be done. So even though now a part of me—my partner in all things—is missing, gone forever, “I” have not changed.

This is oddly comforting to me. It gives me a sense of confidence—“I” have been capable and doing my life generally successfully until now, figuring things out as I go along. Since I am still me, I can still do that. And I can continue to do it in the new life I’m creating.

In the past—in my old life—when confronted with a car issue, some house issues, and certainly tech issues, I used to just say, “Steve, can you fix this?” And he did. But without him here to fix whatever it is, at the first few such challenges I faced, I panicked. Now, I simply figure it out—I google it, watch a YouTube video, ask an AI app, call customer or tech support or even, yes, I actually read the relevant user manual.

For some reason, maybe knowing these new responsibilities would be a challenge for me, shortly after Steve died I started a “Kudos to Me” list in the Notes app on my phone and iPad. Every time I’m confronted with something I have absolutely no idea how to handle but I AM able to handle it, I add it to the list. As of this week, I have 91 such successfully resolved challenges, including tech stuff—astounding since Steve was my tech guru. So yes, kudos to me!

Of course, the “who am I” question can be asked in the wake of any loss: “Who am I without that job title?” “Who am I now that my lifelong dream won’t happen [or has finally happened]?” “Who am I without that friendship to lean on?” The answer is probably “still me” but it will probably take some time to acclimate to the loss and its subsequent changes to everyday life.

Just as the path through grieving a loss is unique, so also is the path to adjusting to that loss. Consider starting your own Kudos to Me list. Distractions work too—I’ve certainly done my share of binge watching Netflix or listening to audiobooks as I (somewhat obsessively) embroider or color. Whatever works.

And oh, BTW—another source of solutions to challenges I encounter are thoughts that just pop into my head. As I described in my blog post entitled “About ‘Guidance’” I described such a “popup” thought:

“… it definitely feels like it’s not “from me”—it’s not from my well of knowledge or experience, not something I would have thought of on my own, and not something that’s ‘just logical.’”

I noted in that post that such a popup thought—such Guidance—is ascribed to a variety of sources, including the Catholic concepts of the Holy Spirit or Guardian Angel, New Agers’ inner knowing or Higher Self, or simply a gut feeling, a sixth sense, or intuition. In exploring whether what really is the source and how to determine if that source is credible, I came to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter. If Oneness then all such Guidance comes from Source/God. And I posited that:

”Source/God in its love for us guarantees we’re not left to fumble around on our own on this plane without some extra help—if we listen for it. I find that to be miraculous, magical, and very, very comforting.”

So I’m creating my new life (just as you all are doing your everyday lives), facing all kinds of challenges—but “still me.” I’m figuring things out on my own, getting help from a variety of sources on this plane (noted above) and sometimes with Guidance from whoever/whatever on a different plane (including popup thoughts/suggestions from Steve).

I feel deep Gratitude for all of it: the challenges that support me learning and growing, the solutions—attained by whatever means—that help me, and the fact that “I” am still me and can, indeed, create a new life for myself.