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Finding my new "normal"

What is “normal” anyway? My normal and yours is going to be completely different. Is it normal to lose your mother to ALS (Lou Gehrig’s) and then within a month lose your baby sister to incurable cancer? I don’t think many people can say that is their normal. Now, I have to figure out what my new normal is after the loss of my loved ones.

While watching my mother slowly die, I experienced what they call anticipatory grief. As her caregiver, with the assistance of my sister, it was a trying time for all of us. The last week of my baby’s sister’s life I spent a few days with her and seeing her suffer was so difficult. Life is not fair! It took both of them too soon. My sister was a positive force in this world of so much negativity. She was loved by so many people. My mom had just finished a school degree and was bettering her life. Both very cruel and fatal diseases.

I continue to tell myself positive affirmations. I make sure if a negative thought comes into my head to fight it off. I will get through this and find my new normal, I know. Right now I cannot focus. I get my best thoughts while taking a shower and it’s like the water washes them away, because after that I am lost again. However, as long as I am given a task, I will get it done.

My current focus and tasks include my fitness and health. Just in time a new 80 day program was released with a timed nutrition aspect to it. It’s a task… I’ve assigned it to myself, but it’s a task I am determined to complete, if not 100% to the best of my ability.

My day job is a litigation paralegal. I struggle here the most. I have asked the attorneys I work with to be sure and assign me tasks so I can be sure to work. It’s not like there isn’t plenty of work, it’s just I don’t have the initiative to look for what needs to be done. That’s not like me at all. I am slowly getting that initiative back. My employer has been extremely understanding of what I am going through and that is a blessing.

My second job as a lifestyle, health and fitness coach, can be difficult to focus as well. Right now I have tasks. The thing is I am my own boss… so, I make my tasks. But I am part of a training that is giving me tasks as well and is helping me stay focused, even when I would rather sleep.

I know I am grieving. I know that is a process. I know I will find my new normal.

Thank you for reading.


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