Confrontation, I get it

Remember when I said February was beating me down? Well, I didn't quite tell you all about my March, but between the epic long bike ride and massive amounts of ambiguity in a relationship, it wasn't my cup of tea either.

But then came April.

This week was showdown time. Three major things all came to an end, were resolved, and confronted. By me. On my own. With the support of all my friends. And thoroughly. I have no regrets about this week. But damn was it hard.

So now I am left with the emotional fallout. With the results of risks taken and failed- and by that I mean my research, which I took 4 days off to work on it mercilessly, 4 days off without pay, 4 days off and one weekend in which I missed my nephew's 1st birthday, only to have it postponed until summer semester anyway. I took a risk when I took those days off. I knew it. And unfortunately, it didn't work out.

That was a failure.

But the other two major things, they weren't failures. I have no regrets in how I behaved in either one. It's going to take some time to heal and be willing to trust again, but damn, I did well.

I feel a peeling off of the old me, and this new skin is soft and tender yet, but it is stronger than the old skin, and eventually will toughen up and I will be even more of who I am meant to be, even better prepared to do God's will. And these lessons I learned this week, from these encounters, they will be passed on to my offspring, so that maybe they won't have to learn the way I did, so that maybe they will be bolder on the outset than I was. It wasn't in vain.

This molting of the old me has me consumed right now, devouring my time and energy and emotions as I recoil a bit to heal. I dreamt of a moth last night- I didn't really understand it in my dream- it was trapped and trying to escape something, but now I get it. I molted. Today I walked a little bit straighter, looked strangers on the street in the eye, and embraced life with my tender skinned self. To realize such growth in such a short time is gratifying, but painful in many ways- it is not easy to grow so much, so fast. I don't know how moths go from a worm to a winged creature in such a short time. Maybe I need a cocoon.

Because it is so very hard.