M.I.A. - Missing in Action

I was too young to understand MIA's when I was growing up. I am a child of the 70's and back then you could send away and get a metal bracelet that was engraved with the name of a missing in action soldier, it had his (probably very few her's) birth date and identification number on it. You were to promise to wear the bracelet until that solider "came home"!

I wanted a bracelet but I didn't get - to get one... my dad told me, "You could end up wearing it for the rest of your life." End of discussion. Period. I didn't agree with dad,  but I think I have been "MIA" missing in action - long enough.

I struggle and deal with depression - full blown blubbering sobbing, crying the blues, to the pit and depth of the soul depression! This fall - I hit the 'brick' wall.

A variety of things probably helped me crash - 12 deaths since April, one being my best friend last May. If you have been by this blog before, I have written about her. Time hasn't healed this wound or made it any easier, her birthday was just a couple of weeks ago - and it brought all kinds of memories back and emotion up!
It is the weirdest thing to be going on along, living life, doing normal daily activities and WHAM you just start crying your eyes out. Or the worst is being somewhere in public and having to hold back the major emotions that come up....

I miss laughing with my best friend the most. The gut wrenching till it hurts laughing. I have wondered many times since May, if I will ever have a best friend again... Just that thought makes me sad. At this age, I am beyond lonely. I had a best friend for 36 years - older than most of the students that I attend school with. I probably sound selfish. But I can not even measure the depth of the loss she has been in my life.

My aunt died in September. She was my mom's older sister. When we were kids growing up, every summer my parents loaded up the car and we drove from Arizona to Iowa; then followed the grandparents up to Minnesota for a week at the lake. We then would head over to Ohio, to visit my mother's side of the family - grandparents, aunts & uncles and the cousins! We had good times exploring forests, nature walks, fishing, cards, picking strawberries, big family meals & bbq's , riding bikes,  camp fires, rolls in the fluffy green grass of the mid west. Great memories.

My grandmother died 7 years ago - during the past 7 years, my mother and her twin sister had not talked with their older sister. Oh we can play the blame game and point fingers at who ever we want; yes the twins were cheated out of inheritances, but when it all comes down to what is important in life - you only have your family!  And money is just a tool - sometimes we have a think times with money and sometimes we have thin lean times.  I kept telling my mom and her twin, 'You have survived this long without it, be thankful for what you do have.'  But they are 'MIA' - so there has been a lot of unresolved issues through out this grieving process.

I reached out to my cousins and my uncle in hopes of being supportive during the loss of their mother. Some of my favorite memories are of the great times we had during those summer visits, Christmas celebrations and multiple weeks with the cousins and grandparents growing up. A part of myself grieves for the loss of childhood times. 

But my mother and her twin sister, my aunt hadn't reconciled with their sister and they still didn't reach out to their brother in law, my uncle. They just wrote her off. Tried to forget about her and the injustice that she had brought on by mismanaging their parents estate. So they went MIA - missing in action.

My best friend and I had quarreled a few years ago - over my son and his biological mother being involved in his life. His biological mother was MIA - missing in action from his life and I attempted to provide visitations, but these were never consistent due to her lifestyle. I did my best each time that she had time, that my son visited. (And by the way, his biological mother and I have been on good speaking terms especially the past ten years - she has thanked me numerous times for being there for OUR son!)
 I do not know where it is written, but you do not put down other people and their children. Yes tempers flared between my friend and I. But I never thought that we would go almost three years, without speaking. She became MIA to me and even to her grown adult children. I tried to call her, email her, wrote her countless cards but nothing could pull her back. In the end, we were all called to say our goodbye's - her parents, her brother, her cousins and her children. Everyone had been cut out of her life. The final time that I saw my dear friend, she had been in a coma for a little over two weeks. She was nothing more than an empty shell of herself. She was MIA.

I realized as I reflected on her death that their had been signs all along of her depression; her addiction to prescription medication and alcohol were more hidden. Carla lived her life MIA in her final years. I would give anything to have been there her through her darkest hours; I have replayed the past three years over and over of what I could have done different. And of course, there is nothing to be done. And so a piece of me goes on MIA.

This being Thanksgiving week - I wish to encourage everyone to reconcile with a family member or a dear friend. Do not put it off! Do not wait! Take the first step, if that doesn't work, take two or three. But do NOT allow the sun to set, another day go by without saying I love you. You are better to bring peace into your life and go on - then sulk and stew over misgivings.

I have been MIA - I have not been well- emotionally and mentally - I dropped my classes this semester, I could not complete them. I have been frozen. And due to my MIA, my creativity for writing has been next to nothing. I am disappointed in myself for not completing a novel that is down to chapters and a few more classes to complete more educational goals.

This blog may not be read. It is not a happy feel good message. But if you stumbled upon it and took the time to read all this - please consider it a 'divine' appointment. A divine appointment that God wishes to invite you - to invite HIM into your life. To remember when you get so low that you can not get out of bed, that God is bigger than that and can bring restoration to your life. That slowly and surely God will bring you back. I am clinging to this and it is the only thing I have going at this time.
Faith! Faith that things in time will get better and I will be healed. Faith in myself restored so that I may finish a new chapter of education in my life. Faith that God will direct where I am to go. And faith that when I am MIA - He doesn't give up on me but keeps after me - until He finds me.

May any stumbler upon this blog - be blessed! And know that I am praying for healing for all that are seeking it! Let's find a way out of being MIA- Missing in Action!

Blessings,
Joan