Second year

Everybody told me if its second year was worse than the first year and I don't know if it's worse, but it's really different.

I think it's a first-year you're numb and you're going through so much stuff with the paperwork, the financial part, making decisions about what to do with clothes and body wash in the shower and how it's going to be.

And then the second year starts and you've made it through all of the holidays and the paperwork for the most part is over and a lot of their stuff is gone and you have to figure out who you are without them. I think that's what makes it hard is that your identity is questioned.

I've always been a wife and now that I'm not a wife in person, only in spirit, I have to figure out who I am as myself.

I know I will always be a mom but that's changing too has my kids grow up and start to do things on their own and not need me as much everyday.

Changing jobs was a really good thing for me over this past year but that is changed my identity also.

I know this is all part of God's plan and that he put me here to be a wife, to be a mom and I am still going to be those things, but I need to figure out what else I am. I need to know who I am as a person. Everything I've gone through for my entire life has formed me into who I am today. Being a daughter and a granddaughter, then being a girlfriend and eventually a wife and then becoming a mom and a teacher is all a part of me and that will never go away. I am still all of those things and that's not going to change. What is changing is how I see myself.

Steve was always the one that would talk to me about how I was beautiful and smart and a great mom. I can't hear him say those things anymore and I guess I just need to learn how to believe them for myself. I know I have support of my boys, my family, all of my friends, my co-workers and people in my parish, but it's not the same.

I am learning how to be who I am and finding how to do that without letting go of the past and worrying too much of the future. I am learning to think for myself and to believe in myself, but I didn't get here overnight and I don't think I'm going to find myself overnight.