Breathe, Just Breathe

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/breath/

Yoga is to me what breath is to the body. It fulfills me and gives me peace. I was quite discouraged with life in general when I returned from the United States last month. I wrote about being misplaced, and apparently I find it hard to be one with the Universe when I visit South Florida. I write this with regret and want to make sure everyone understands that I have changed from what I was before I moved to Colombia, it is not really about the United States but more about who I have become. Yoga is part of my life force now, it keeps me sustained with energy and calmness. I thank God every day for my friend who came to visit me at Villa Migelita for opening my eyes to the wonders of Yoga. Yoga was very hard for me to do while in the United States, and that was my first clue that the peace I am used to here in the mountains of Colombia is not easily available to me while there. My mind couldn’t calm enough to let go during my Yoga time. Anyone who does Yoga knows this is the whole point of Yoga, besides the beneficial exercise. One must quiet their mind. When I was visiting Rhode Island, I had no problem doing my Yoga, it was when I came back to South Florida,  that the drama began and I couldn’t let go of the thoughts that were whirling inside of my head.

So when I wrote my recent blog I was in a different place, a place where I was truly disgusted with people’s actions. I was sad, disturbed and really alarmed about certain things that happened in the world around me while visiting the USA. It seems people feel I have rights to change things with my granddaughter, but I don’t have a lot of rights. I DO have an agreement until my granddaughter is 18 and it is ironclad. I will fight ANYONE who tries to deny me my rights to visitation, and I can actually have them held in contempt. However, when I hear things or see things that are unacceptable to me all I can do is speak up. Which I do quite readily now, much to the dismay of others. That is where I have changed another area in my life. I have no problem saying what I mean to others anymore.

When you marry someone who used to be a good person but slowly shows they are bitter and very much verbally abusive it can make you a person that is meek, without the courage you once had in another period of your life. That is what happened to me during my marriage. I became quiet about things I should have spoken up about, and I should have left much sooner than I did. I am constantly asked by many how I ended up in Colombia. I think that I knew deep down that if I didn’t leave I would lose any semblance of respect for myself, as my ex was stalking me and watching my every move. My son would not adhere to the visitation schedule and had been alienated by my ex-husband to a very extreme extent. Friends who once really thought well of me looked and acted differently to me. I know it was because of gossip, and maybe my paranoid behavior to a certain extent. After all, I had tried to get divorced two times and the second time took almost 3 years and it was a nasty affair even though it could have been done and settled rapidly. It wore me down. I gave custody to my ex because I couldn’t put my son through anymore fighting and ugliness. Also my son would not stay with me like he was supposed to. I had therapists coming to the house to help him deal with the loss of his sister, but when he was with my ex husband they wouldn’t let them inside the house. I know that I was the better parent but my son was 15 and there was nothing I could do to make him stay with me during my visitation. He was allowed to do what he wanted and it hasn’t turned out so well for him, as I know if he had been with me his life would be so much different now. He would be in a much better place and have a much better life plan. That time of my life was so bad, I still have dreams of trying to escape all the time. Strange dreams with people in them that are chasing me, people who were really mean to me then. Disturbing, realistic dreams of the trauma I went through showing up in my psych like a horror fiction novel. I open my eyes in the morning and look out to the mountains and hear the birds singing and breathe a deep sigh of relief, and this is 5 years later. So you can imagine how going to the United States affected me this last time. It made me remember things I am trying to move on from.

I will never not go back, because of the love of my granddaughter. She is my angel that is the good in all of the bad that has happened in the past years. She is a sweet, loving child caught in the middle of a bunch of very horrible situations. Myself, and her other grandparents, along with her loving aunts look out for her well-being, but her father does not which is very upsetting as he is her only parent because my daughter is dead. He is back in jail and that happened while I was visiting this time. He violated probation and his chances of getting out again are not good. I am angry at him. I did so much to help him when he was in jail this last time. I wanted my granddaughter to have her only parent in her life, and when he served his prison sentence recently she changed. She was sad of course, and she understandably wants to have parents like other children do. So when he was arrested while I was there I was furious. He told me he made a mistake, but to me it is not a mistake when his child is left parent-less once again. He then was calling her on the phone and saying he would see her soon, which I knew wasn’t true so I told her the truth, much to others dismay. She needs to know that all adults don’t lie to her. I do hope by some miracle he gets another chance and the judge at his hearing will let him out of jail, but the odds are against that.

I wonder sometimes why my life is the way it is. I would love to be growing old with my children around me, and my grandchildren visiting. But that is not my life plan. I am never going to have that. My own son recently contacted me, but he did so to find out whom I am leaving my Villa to. It was not because he missed me as his mother, but because he wanted something from me. The only thing I want to give my son right now is good advice, love and encouragement to become a strong and independent young man. If I see that change then I will consider what I will leave to him based on responsibility and life choices. He doesn’t want me to be a mother, he wants me to be his friend and not even mention he is now 21 and should be in school or working…which he is doing neither. I love him but I will not accept his choices. I will see him always, but I won’t allow him to berate me or use very bad words to me when I say something he doesn’t agree with. So he told me I had two dead children as far as he is concerned. It hurt, but not as bad as you would think it would. I just realize that what I am made of did not pass on to him. It is sad, but I have no control over his decisions. So I just do what I always do and go on with my life and what makes me strong and healthy. That is why I chose to move to Colombia, another country, to get away from all the bad that engulfs me while in the United States. I realize that only I can bring happiness to myself and cannot count on others to do that for me. I am still sad to be without the family I dreamed of having once upon a time many years ago, but it is just not meant to be. So I accept what I do have, a lovely life filled with my animals and nature in a beautiful place of peace. A peace that is so wonderful and of much comfort to me. When I breath while I do my Yoga I take in that peace and it fills me up with gratitude for what I do have, even if it is not what I envisioned so many years ago.