When the fog lifts

I've been meeting a therapist via Zoom for the past few weeks who has been helping me talk about my father's death and to put it all into perspective.  Her calming approach and genuine desire to help (not all therapists are born equal!), really caught me off guard.  I've seen therapists before who didn't probe enough into the real underlying issue and left me no better off than where I was at the start.  

I have begun to make time to focus purely on myself, trying to understand and put into words what it is that I am actually feeling and look back to when this cloud wasn't hovering over me.  I've also started to allow myself to feel and allow emotions to flood back in, which I've been absolutely terrified of doing.  So much so that my body freezes at the thought and I would catch myself holding my breath.

Isolating this has been a very big worry as it's been such a muddle in my head for so many years that when I finally pinned it down, I heard an audible sigh come from my body, feeling my shoulders drop the tension that they had been carrying.  I know that this isn't in any way connected to my dad passing away, but it has an immense effect on how I approach situations, grieving being one of them.

I'm finally able to rise above and make sense of tiresome journey that was left me mentally and emotionally drained.  I'm feeling my strength and emotional and mental ability return to where it once was. 

This in itself would make my Dad proud.  He was my biggest supporter and I miss the conversations that we would have when it was just the two of us in the room or with no one around to hear the phone call.  He got me and for a very long time, I thought that he was the only one that truly understood and saw me for who I was.  He would listen to me and help me rationalise situations, calling me out if I needed it but in such a subtle way that I hardly realised it at the time.  To have that degree of support taken from you is heart wrenching to say the least, but I know now that I've had it in me all of this time.  I just lost my way a bit and he was slowly but surely guiding me back to the person who know I could be.

I'm looking at a photo of my Dad as I type this, my eyes burning as happy tears are flowing.  Showing emotion is not a sign of weakness, it is a sign of strength.  Thank you for teaching me this, Dad.  Wish I'd realised this when you were around but as you always said, "no regrets".