I am melting..

I feel as though I am being hollowed out..as if a force far outside myself is walking me through a dance. This is a dance that was choreographed long ago...I am familiar and yet it's pain feels like it must be new for whom would ever consent to such pain...that is all I can say right now. I am short of breath even in print.


God Bless us all for we fight the battle together, it is our shared responsibility...there is no room for conflict between us.  The worldly pain shall not have their flames fanned...


Peace and Love and Light,


Nakupenda ,
 Malaika

Africa...

Amazingly I succeeded at one of the most important things I have ever done. I supported, loved and comforted my husband as he left this earth for his heavenly home...yet I feel so insignificant, like I barely exist...like a failure. I have been deserted by many and am lost in a no mans land...


It IS time to totally re-evaluate...there is a lesson, a life lesson here for me.  If money is consistantly the issue that dictates such misery, I need to take money out of the picture. My one dream, the one place my soul is most comfortable imagining as home is Africa.


Work real work, work that matters is awaiting me...Doc please bring me good news.

dear God..REALLY

 Wow..I am certainly in a place of heavy duty contemplation and prayer.

My friend, Doc  ;) has relit the pilot on my Africa state of mind. 

"WHY NOT?" and then ever so gently.."I'm sorry to say but it

may be now that your husband is gone it is time to reclaim your dream, Africa"

I will be going within..I pray I can keep our home stable during this important time.

Happy Chanuka and a Rich Kwanza...and soon a Merry CHRISTmas...love to all, peace for the world over is held as a dream deep in my heart...

IF this is your first time reading, you owe it to yourself to go back and read at least the BIO: or the first few posts ;)

Our Vows

It fell into my hands today...from the heavens it fell. The only Anniversary card he would ever be able to hand me, our eyes connecting as they did.  Knowing, I believe he would only do it once...me knowing as well...


My tears are searing and yet they cause my heart to swell In my chest....as I write I am listening to our music...misguided angel streams like honey out of our Bose. 


We burned strong and steady, our love palpable to those around us...I hold my card, I want him so...just want to lie there in his strong and so loving arms. Bobby I miss you...our vows said "and on into eternity" and I carry that vow within me.


Your face is framed over my head as I write, those Military issue Aviators and a young face already touched by such pain...I am with you, you with me...

The cold season of my soul...

Having survived many a year with only a small handful of people know I have PTSD...people recoil from what makes them uncomfortable. It's quite true...people don't like what they can't fix or don't know how to react to.

I don't blame them I just don't think that way. When someone tells me personal things, painful things I see that as an opportunity to help, to let God guide my heart and deliver some truth, some how, some measure of comfort as he would provide.

I reread much of what was written today on my FB page, this new social virtual world we have all opened our selves up to in varied degrees...

I went back and re-read a handful of beautiful, loving and deeply supportive statement's of support for me today. They come to me amidst my  actual horror since losing my husband. This wretched PTSD I have lived with since 18 and managed to hold at bay for SUCH long period's of time...I thank these beautiful souls, these worker's of light, I love them. This life is about the sharing of our souls...or so it is my true belief.

My Bobby understood and loved even the broken parts of me...he recognized them and nourished me as I nourished him. I completed him in all his splendor and he had finished his battle here, he was a warrior...as we all are.
Let us have courage in facing our own imperfection's and scars as well as each others...God forgives us our humanity after all, he forgives us all things.


Love, Peace and Happiness...


Nakupenda'

Malaika

Are your eyes upon us...?

Never in my wildest dreams would I have believed this could happen...
I move here to this island to marry my soul mate, this man that makes me the very best version of me and now he is gone...my heart is in tatters and every day I have to throw all of me behind myself to get through the day. I have had a tumultuous few weeks where I thought we had found a new home, a refuge from this surreal environment where we do not belong and are being pushed from. This place that was warm and meant love and a new beginning. I had embraced this new place we were invited to move into, it was going to be a warm home where everyone supported one another and provided a safe cushion against the harshness of this world. I think my heart actually sang and my soul rested easy for the first time since I lost Bobby...


Tonight I received the heart breaking call that this was not to be, minds were changed for reasons I will never know.   I now have an eight year old that wants to know WHY God hates us...I held her shoulders and begged her eyes to meet mine...they did eventually and I told her we are the blessed ones, there is nothing that can hurt us as long as we cling to him, PRAY to him and KNOW he will not allow anything bad to happen to us.
She cried as I held her and told her she had every right to be sad but that it was all going to be okay. I told her that I am 100% sure all will be well and not to worry.


So now, hours later I ask myself...is it? Is it Lord? Is it going to be okay? Is this what you want for us...


I shall pray, I shall cling,I shall talk with my Lord tonight




Psalm 52;8
But I am like an olive tree,thriving in the house of God. I trust in Gods unfailing love forever and ever

My husband, my heart...

The wind rips across the island today and yet still it can't come near the way the tears FEEL as they rip at my face, in reality they drip a slow steady drip...I realize we are in synq, the weather and I. Time for the anti-nausea med...


On these days I simply tread the quick-sand whilst praying my head isn't pulled under


The sea is calling me today, quite loudly...these are the days Bobby would surrender me in my warm long raincoat knowing he couldn't hold me back. He hated that but knew I had to go feel her fury...in the end, these days would conceal and allow my wailing and my full fury tears. I want to get in my kayak and take her on today...I need to scream myself hoarse and cry until I vomit or I am going to splinter into little pieces


I feel as if I died when Bobby died and  my body was left behind...this is the only thing that makes sense in my heart...  


It is not lost on me that as i have written, the storm has died down...still very wet and gray yet nearly windless


The mad rant of a lost soul today...typos and all

My purpose has never changed...

I realized today my purpose has remained the same through these past few years, this has been an amazing chapter in a less than ordinary life.  Saying this out loud has at once empowered and yet saddened me. It uplifts me yet causes me a sense of shame.


Would my husband want this? 
I ask myself this but the answer is already in my heart...my husband would want me to reach my dreams, live them out and be fulfilled.
His path was in so many deep and intensely meaningful ways, astounding, his path...his life,his dream. It was fulfilling and healing, he had healed and was basking in being truly and unconditionally loved. He was free from all of the demons of the past and I helped him learn to receive love. I took my place as his wife, healer and comforter seriously, I gave him all I had...he was so deserving and had nearly given up on true love.


For all of the people over all of the years the countless lives Bobby touched with his compassion and committment to a suffering addict was indeed commendable. Those touched live on, they carry the massage he carried to them.


I am still getting emails in my husbands account, which I can't bring myself to close yet....some of them don't know as they write, that he is gone...he has moved on to a place most can't really fathom. The ultimate place of places...I take great comfort in knowing the truest part of my husband is at total peace now, his soul is totally free. He has let me know many times over now, he is free. He now helps me to move forward, to assure me it is the right thing.


Getting past the longing for his physical presence is an excruciating part of this hideous grieving process, it is not for the faint of heart, I promise you that. Gathering up all my Irish doesn't do it some days. There are good days though, simple usually...days of loving or sharing with those I love. God has blessed me with many people to love. He has also blessed me beyond my comprehension with people that love back! 


I am grateful for this and I try to live in that state of being.


So now I go back, back to my realization...everything I do is to ready me for more...more life, more love, more learning and importantly for me, more doing...doing his work...I have started again if I ever fully left. I feel a sense of strength, compassion and adventure again, in some ways I feel these things stronger because he has made me a better version of myself. The light I brought to him when he needed it most has stayed with me as has a sense for him. We will see where this all leads as life extends it's path to me and I follow...


You inspire me...




In Love & Light,
Nakupenda,


Malaika~  Ah yes, feeling Malaika today




Psalm 146:1 "Shout praises to the Lord! With all that I am, I will shout his praises." 

Dear Lord...it's me his wife

I wonder every day will this be the day it crumbles, my shattered heart...? I want my Beloved back Lord...we were dreaming dreams, making plans...what about Memphis?  Remember I told him I would sleep on the beach with him or live in a cardboard box as long as we were together and he cried...? Remember Lord??? Remember the day I was crying silently about bills and someone had hurt my feelings and he pulled the car over and said as he took my hand in his "Listen Baby, from this moment on you defer to me" as I wept and looked back in disbelief he said "Be my wife"...we erupted in laughter and said "everyone will think we're crazy...it's been three days!" and he said "Fck em!" Remember that time Lord?
What about how I held his head in my lap and touched his face for hours and he would sometimes weep or fall off into a distant dream...WHAT ABOUT THAT LORD??????????


I feeel so betrayed and I want him back!

Falling into the rabbit hole

Feels as though my footing grows secure and then my ankle is pulled into a place where the ground grows astonishingly slippery so quickly....
Tonight as I lay in a tub of water as hot as I could stand it... I realized I am so touch deprived and warm knowing smile lonely that I felt as though I were melting as I brought my entire head under the water.
Then I began to cry like the primal animal that I feel myself to be.


I have started to move forward with my life, deciphering the sea of paperwork realizing.. this might be as sane as i will get...

The magnet that used to be known as my bed calls to me at all hours... except the hours that allow society to keep it's status quo with me somewhere along the fringes. I come alive at midnight and I pray, think and choke through growth...often alone, many times on the phone with Paula... sometimes I am blessed to swim through it, slowly allowing myself the freedom to keep reality away to a point. 
My husband is really not coming back...


I must take this better me and walk, breathe and yes begin to believe I can place my foot back on that path that I was happily skipping when I met and fell in love with this soulmate of mine...we will meet again but until our appointed time, all the grief I subconsciously avoid must be gone through even if I must cry...my way through at times.


My path has begun to call to me strongly, it calls to me louder than the comparative whisper the prospect of quitting on myself or my Beloved utters.


As usual God pushed hard this time, he allowed my body to start to break down. Your body will point things out to you that you are ignoring...


Always.


I have been having serious spasms in my face and even my jaw...not pain, twitching...


I don't know if this will stop after my massive emotional spillage, one can hope and one can certainly pray.


As always, you have my heart for I've left it here as humble as it is...for you.


Nakupenda,
Namaste',
God bless you.
Love,


Sharon...Malaika

Four weeks into hell...

Today marked the third Sunday to follow the one on which my beloved left me for his journey home. How is it that given that much time I am still flailing about aching for his hand, his touch, the sound of his voice...especially his voice.  How will I live? How will I accept that I will never sit on his lap or coo in the hollow of his neck...my world, my very being is feeling hollow and raw.

I feel as though life has taken on an absurd quality, having surpassed surreal...leaving it behind at some point, I know not when. There is an edge I feel now that I never felt before, the edge is most likely anger...I've never been big on anger. I have never seen the point in holding on to anger especially...where is the sense in it.

I am angry that my husband that I adore is gone, I am angry that he didn't get more time, I am angry that WE didn't get more time too, damn it!  I feel we were cheated...I have this past week cried out to God..."WHY, WHY WHY WHY"???? Did I not promise my life to you totally, I told you I will do your work always, I will devote myself selflessly to doing as you have asked...this didn't feel like a deal, a sacrifice, it felt pure, genuine and right.  Could you not have been kinder to us?

For tonight, for right now...I am angry, I am hurt...part of me feels betrayed. I want my husband back, I want him in his chair near me, smiling that beautiful knowing, tender smile that he only smiled to me..the one that said, you are my beloved and I am yours.

I will allow myself this...I can not deny my hearts it's intense need to bleed for a bit.

You made me imperfect and I am sure feeling imperfect right now...

Bogey's officially a "lapcat"

Okay, it's happened...he wouldn't like it but it has happened. His studmuffin cat has learned to crawl into my lap and purr and nudge me until I pet him. I look down at him and his hulky frame that makes him an unlikely candidate for lapcat of the month and sigh...
our kitty just looks right at me and we connect as if to say "yup, he's gone now" I drip tears on him, he gets irritated and leaves...seems the noise in the kitchen aka Alice Trouble Herne aka Alice made that choice an easy one.

"Honey come look at the kitties" I'd say to B. he'd walk in shake his head and smile that smile of his and time would freeze for a second...one of those moments when you say "if this as happy as I ever get, that's great"... wow, did we have lots and lots of those. I loved that man, there is a major fault in my heart that will shift on me when I least expect it. When I saw something I saw it for both of us, always...how can I change that? I won't change that.

Is this real...?

For every lucid moment I am gifted with there is a moment of sorrow so deep I watch my skin to see if it will pierce me somewhere...how can it not, I ponder...how can it not. 


Some of you know some of you don't, my Beloved husband succumbed to a hateful liver affliction two weeks ago today. Part of me died that day...




I am at once trying to suspend time and throw myself into the future, I am at a place to write in...the chill is nearly enough to validate the ache in my bones that is stoked by the eery liquid sadness in my heart, a dark pocket in me wants it to simply stop beating...to catch up to the soul in me. 


Surely our souls can not ever be separated, this is incomprehensible to me, I refuse to believe it. 


I want his company, I want him to whisper to me. I know one day it will happen and I will have that little bit back again. There was the day...the day was as sad as it was perfect. 


The angels came for my husband and we said our goodbyes as soft, private and forever as one could ever possibly dream of...


I will revisit this tender place it is within me at all times, tonight I am drained. 


Let me just close by saying I have very big plans for the future...my path lays before me and I will step back on it.  


Maji and a few close friends that we believe God has brought together and I have begun the  creation of a healthy Faith, Love and healing based retreat, { full yoga program as included well by a certified Yogini }  all set in the mountains of New Hampshire. 


He is working through me as he is strengthening my Faith and for all of it I acknowledge his blessings...Lord do with me as you wish, I am here...




Nakupenda




Malaika~ 

Love and Light always...

Soulshine

Stopped dead in my tracks...denial doesn't suit anyone. Fuzzy...I am feeling that awful blur that follows a "sleep seizure", which I had last night and perhaps last week too, as this horrifying bullshit was unleashed. Or perhaps it is intense shock...too fuzzy, not sure. Get better Bobby, fight, remember you have a beautiful life to come back to...please come back.

This resounds in my sore and fuzzy head as the mother of all headaches...
Wait on me Baby, wait...I will be there tomorrow. Today I will care for my soul and my heart and my bones. Today I will attempt to be kind to myself...my head, my belly, I may even take a bath then I will hug my little Mads and be sure her heart and her soul are okay today. She misses her Dad and is trying to process  this with her little eight year old heart...she needs comfort and God will be there with us.

100% Faith?

We live life as it comes once we have learned that life is about the love, the love is ALL...

For months now I have done my best to celebrate every moment of life, celebrate to the point of outragousness at times. I do my best to stay up and positive and even to inspire when I can. My husband Bobby and I know how to laugh and we do it all day and into the night, we share ice cream sundaes at midnight, we giggle and tease...we play with Madison at the level of an 8 year old at times when she needs it. We go to and from the V.A Hospital a great deal as tests are run and decline is as common as progress...one does envision a hellish roller coaster that doesn't have a power switch on a tough day.

So now I ask how many times have I mentioned my strength and conviction in regards to my Faith?  My own rhetorical question really...those of you that have followed my journey know it has been a recurring theme, the claim to 100% faith.
Those of you that have never read any of my writing now know it has been a recurring them as I just told you so...

I have sailed many a storm with the Lord at the helm, I thought we had this down. The conclusion I have come to is that 100% faith does not exist, it is an illusion, it is not meant for mortal beings. It is reserved for the Saints and the hereafter...

This profound conclusion has shaken my Spiritual ground...for the better. It has been a Spiritual milestone for me really.

Where is there room for growth in 100% faith? Where is the wiggle room, the room for the work?  My personal relationship with Christ is ever changing, ever evolving...sometimes backsliding and often a struggle. It is however my reason for being and my truest of Loves. I Love the Lord, I will sing it from the rooftops if need be...there is no shame there for me. However, I entertain no longer such hard lined "rules", conditions under which I must lay feeling the bitter cold pressed upon the dirt along with the pain I already suffer...that is not want God wants for any of us.

 I have come to realize in some of my darkest hours that it is acceptance I have been lacking... not faith. A-C-C-E-P-T-A-N-C-E!

I must do my best to accept what the Lord brings my way, I will strive to have faith that he will provide what I need to handle the unknown as it reveals itself. He will not forsake me, he never has, he never will.

We pray, each of us in our own way...How can I pray to do his work and receive his guidance if I refuse to walk across what appears to be an unsafe bridge he has laid before me? It is never a trap, it will never steer you wrong...if you stray on your own... the door remains open, you can turn around never forget that...

Faith and acceptance, this is my prayer


With an impending storm approaching my Beloved and I stand united in our devotion to each other and to life...In accepting each other as husband and wife, we shared with so many of you the Love and the Joy that God had brought us.

After our paths had gone in other directions for 28 years we discovered each other on Facebook on a cold January afternoon much like the one we had today.

Music, the great heart stirring magic that it is, became part of our language that entire January day...back and forth we went, sending  everything from classics to the more obscure but powerful song. between chatter we shared the sounds of Willie Nelson, Norah Jones, Johnny Cash and The Beatles... a bit of Aerosmith thrown in to move my heart in a way I had never stopped believing in but didn't count on anymore.

Bobby had pretty much stopped believing in Love...he had settled by the ocean to "ride out his years"

We met that night and the die was cast...

We knew our life would be spent as one.

We married surrounded by our big family of blood and friendship in August at a hillside home of dear friends. The backdrop of ocean and rose pink and white tulle blowing in the wind amidst the mingling sounds of laughter and eerily beautiful song, assured us our lives were rich and full in all the way that count. A beautiful Fairy Tale had begun...

Seven weeks into our idyllic and peace filled existence a Doctor confirmed what I had long suspected.  I even extracted a promise from my beloved that he WOULD see a Doctor immediately after the wedding...Bobby's body is diseased and sick. Many years ago my husband abused his body with alcohol and drugs like so many of the young men and women that came home from Vietnam that were spat on by a confused, angry and ignorant society. Yes, that really did happen...it is not a rumor for anyone that turned away from the stories that spoke of it or for those of you that simply didn't know.

After some years of trying his best to hide from the atrocities that became everyday life in a blur of surrealism...Bobby found recovery, the hardcore addict with the stay the fuck away attitude and the heart once touched by God got sober.

This man that I am clearly quite proud of then took control of his ship...remember we know our ships are never sailed alone so this junkie went on to become a College graduate so that he would be able to dedicate his life to helping fellow addicts turn their lives around guided by his tough love and the grace of God. My husband is greatly respected and loved amongst his peers, he did it the old fashioned way, he earned it.

A new reality...
There are moments in life when things are heard from Doctors that time freezes...our minds struggle to rein in an emotion as pure as feelings get. Our minds go into "Trauma" mode, those of us with PTSD especially...we do trauma

This week we face a very serious test that will tell us if anything positive has come from the pain of our raging war against disease.

This is a battle that deserves to be won. If you know my husband, you know that, if you don't I hope you will...

I ask you humbly for prayer, I thank you for your love and support...

In Love and Light,

Sharon

Mimi Nakupenda, Namaste'