Strength

The amount of people who have called me “strong” since Charles has passed is baffling to me. I would never consider myself strong by any means. I have hidden my hurt and my tears from so many for so long. It seemed easier for me to smile and not show my pain so that people would start treating me like a human again instead of the broken shattered void that I had started to feel I had become. It seemed as if everyone was walking on eggshells around me for the longest time and all I wanted was for a sense of normalcy to be restored. It felt as though I lost my identity with Charles, so I tried to make myself look like I was happy again and hid my sadness from the world. I just wanted to be treated like I was before my life was crushed.

I never thought this would be my life. I always wanted the fairy tale. I wanted to be a wife, a mother, a part of a home that I built with another. When that dream was pulled out from under me I tried to force it to happen once again. I tried frantically to find someone to be my partner, but it only left me with a bigger hole in my heart. I can not find someone to make me feel whole. I need to be whole in order to find someone to compliment me. After all, that’s exactly what Charles was. He was the man that was unapologetically himself and allowed me to be the same. He was my strength. Physical and mental strength were a few of the things Charles embodied more so than I ever could, so I didn’t have to work hard on my own strength because I thought I would always have him to balance me.

I am not strong. I have just embraced my circumstance. I have had to learn to not be weak. I have learned that showing weakness only makes people think that you are incapable of taking care of both yourself and any other part of your life. Its not fair, but its reality. I have seen it happen again and again with those around me and it frustrates me to no end. All I have wanted since Charles has passed is to be looked at again as if my scars don't define me. They have helped shape who I am, but my scars have only brought out characteristics of myself that I had no idea were inside of me. My tragedy isn't my whole story. I am broken, but I have slowly been bonding myself back together to hopefully become strong one day. I am not strong. I am resilient. I can only continue living my life in a way that pushes me forward and hopefully gets me to some of the dreams that I had for my life before Charles passed.

I hope one day to not be called strong, but to just be seen as human. You don't know how you are going to react to life, you just instinctively react. I don't want to be seen as strong for something that I did without thought. Strength is much more than that. Lets reserve that title for those who really embody it every day.