I was driving back from Morrisons today, with essential food items for my children's return from their Easter trip (and the ingredients for chocolate brownies for celebratory baking) when I had a lightbulb moment.
It was about acceptance. I have been thinking of acceptance as the holy grail of the grief process, the point at which one might reach a kind of zen calm (I typed zen clam first of all, and then wondered how a zen clam might view this situation).
I have, until this moment, thought that acceptance would be like a giant eraser, rubbing out all the unpleasantness of the past nine months and moving me to a place where I smile, nod sagely and agree that everything's for the best.
I realised today that acceptance, that is, coming to terms with the reality of a situation, does not mean you have to like it (the situation).
This is a huge relief. I am dealing with it, I am still living, I am doing my best to embrace my "new life". But I don't like that it happened, I wouldn't have chosen it. I am increasingly convinced that I will be ok. But it won't ever be gone completely, in time it will hurt less but it won't ever not be a regret.
This makes me breathe an internal sigh of relief. I don't have to like it, or think it's a good thing. I think I have been attempting some twisty mental gymnastics over the past few months, putting a brave face on, trying to persuade myself that in some strange way it's all good.
Do we do this too much now? Do we try so hard to be together people, having all our assorted crap thoroughly sorted, so that we can't say, you know what, it sucks, but in spite of that I'm not going to give up, or stop brushing my hair, or forget to wash the school uniforms. Life can be really pants, and that's ok.
The sudden rush of relaxation is brilliant, I can go back to watching Jam and Jerusalem (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006ncn0) and eating Easter eggs.
