I wrote and shared another version of this post one year ago today.
At some point since then, I found my notes from a session with an old therapist (who moved out of state a few years ago). I discovered that processing “missed potential,” and not “missed opportunity,” were the actual words she used to suggest a common thread between much of what I struggle with in life.
So I decided to update my original post, swapping out the word “opportunity” for “potential,” when I determined the two words are not as synonymous as I initially thought/misremembered. Potential seems to fit better, though they both work and make sense in this context.
I also added my perspective from a year later, that fleshes out more what my grief has been about, mourning 21 year old me/my hopes and dreams at that age and stage of my life versus only processing the death of my old friend.
Last Thursday, one year to the day that I found out about my old friend’s death, I had the honor of reading my updated post/essay on stage at The Frunchroom (a South Side reading series) here in Chicago at the Beverly Arts Center.
Below is a video that Bob took during my performance, followed by the text that I read. It will also be available eventually on The Frunchroom: Stories from Chicago’s South Side podcast.
I ad-libbed a bit at the beginning, talking about how it felt for me to be on stage, after having been in the audience, as a big fan of The Frunchroom, so many times over the years.
I also shared a short anecdote about how I learned what a “frunchroom” (front room or living room) is, on one of my first visits with Bob to the South Side of Chicago, where he grew up.
I was nervous, but got more comfortable on stage, as time went on.
I did get a bit choked up towards the end, which never happened when I practiced. But I know that it was okay, to show my emotions.
Also, I don’t know what I was doing with my left foot at times, Bob and I were cracking up later on, watching the video and noticing the random things I was doing with it while speaking.
Many thanks to all who were there in person and those who were with us in spirit.
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I returned to therapy, after a few years off, in 2011.
I was struggling with some difficult relationships in my life, as well as trying to make peace with the deaths of two loved ones, while also weighing the pros and cons of a big decision for our family.
Those were the objectives I laid out at our first session.
I wanted my therapist to help me address those three issues.
And she did.
After many meetings, discussing my feelings and working through how to cope with all of the things that were weighing me down, my therapist suggested a common thread,
Missed Potential
My difficult relationships had missed potential for deeper and more genuine connections.
The deaths of both my childhood friend, who was 29, and my cousin, who was 35, included missed potential for them to do more with their lives and for our relationships to grow.
And I feared that the decision we were considering, for our family, whether to try to have more children, after all we’d been through with secondary infertility and loss, could also lead to missed potential.
Over time, my therapist showed me how many of my emotional roadblocks come when I am processing missed potential.
When we experienced our first three early pregnancy losses.
When our first three IVF cycles were not successful.
When our second child, our daughter Molly, was born and died in April 2008.
When relationships in my life didn’t develop as I hoped they would.
When those I love and care about left this world too soon because of illness, accident, or death by suicide.
Over the past year, I have been processing more missed potential, as I grieve the death of an old friend and the time in my life that our relationship represents to me.
My old friend’s death was compounded by the fact that he died, of brain cancer, almost five years ago, but I didn’t learn about that until one year ago today, when our 10th Friendaversary came up in my Facebook Memories and I went to his timeline to see how he was doing.
To say I was shocked is an understatement.
Were it not for social media, we likely would have never reconnected, after losing touch over 20 years ago.
That said, how did I manage not to visit his timeline or notice he wasn’t showing up in my news feed for over 4 years?
It happens, especially when we reconnect with a lot old friends and extended family, as well as develop new relationships and connections, online.
Over the years, I have developed a process for working through my grief, when I find out about the death of someone who was important to me.
My ritual includes gathering everything I have connected to that person, including correspondence, pictures, and mementos. And then I go through it all, remembering the times we spent together and what made that person, as well as our relationship, special.
In this case, because my old friend and my relationship spanned a time when I journaled regularly, I was able to read what I wrote about how our connection grew, especially during the spring semester of my junior year in college, in 1996, when I studied abroad in London.
We met and became friends the previous summer working together at a residential summer camp in Algonquin, Illinois.
And it was after that magical summer, that I was inspired to study abroad, through meeting awesome people, including this old friend, who had traveled from across the pond to work at Camp Algonquin.
I met up with my old friend a number of times during my semester abroad. I spent Easter that year with his family at their home in Southampton, England (where the Titanic, which I’ve always had a fascination with, sailed from), and I visited them again my last weekend overseas, before returning home.
What began as a friendship grew into more, and when I left England in May I imagined a future that included us being together.
I understood it wasn’t practical, that one of us would leave our home country to start a new life with the other. But we entertained the fantasy, towards the end of my time abroad, and I continued to dream about that for a while, after I was home.
We exchanged some letters that summer. However, my old friend wasn’t great with correspondence.
Being that it was 1996, with the Internet in its infancy, we didn’t have a lot of affordable options to keep in touch.
I wrote to my old friend more often than he did me, which was disappointing.
I thought about him a lot that summer and did my best to make peace with the fact that our connection was fading.
And, eventually, we both moved on…
I met my husband Bob that September at the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana, we started dating in October, got engaged in March 1999 and married in September 2000.
No marriage is perfect and we’ve had our share of challenges.
That said, from early on in our relationship, Bob and I learned to be open with each other when we are struggling.
Over the past year Bob has been incredibly supportive, allowing me to share how learning of my old friend’s death has affected me.
I am grateful that I have not had to hide my grief and how it has felt to process this loss.
Another blessing has been connecting with my old friend’s younger sister, who was 16 during the semester I lived in England.
His sister has appreciated getting to chat with someone who cared about and remembers her brother and I have gotten to learn more about his journey since the last time we had contact.
Getting those blanks filled in has been painful at times, especially hearing what he went through during the 18 months that followed his diagnosis with inoperable brain cancer in 2013.
However, there have also been wonderful things shared, including how my old friend’s illness brought their family closer and the legacy he left through his four children.
I have enjoyed getting to know my old friend’s sister as an adult and to see how his memory lives on through their family, as well others, who will continue to tell his story.
A year later, I am still digesting the news of my old friend’s death and what that stirred up in me.
I know grief is not linear and we never get over losing loved ones.
This experience has given Bob and me opportunities to reflect on our life together, how we got to where we are today, as well as what we want for us in the future.
I was surprised how hard my old friend’s death hit me, as, though I did think about him now and then over the years, I was not pining for him.
My therapist helped me to realize that though some of my sadness is about the death of my old friend, it is also about reflecting on who I was at 21, before I met my husband, and became a mom; from the perspective I have now, at age 44.
I have be able to work through how revisiting my journals, from that semester abroad in England, gave me a window into the hopes and dreams I had back then, before I made some big life decisions, such as leaving my career in recreation program management to become a stay at home mom, when our son Sean was born in October 2003, and it has remained my primary vocation ever since.
Our third child, our daughter, Abby, was born in September 2009, after a five-year journey through secondary infertility and loss.
Building our family was not easy and parenting sure isn’t either, but getting to be Sean and Abby’s mom, has been so very worth it.
My life, since becoming a mom, has been fulfilling in many ways. Being at home with Sean and Abby allows me the flexibility to volunteer often in their schools, Scout troops, neighborhood social justice organizations and our parish, St. Barnabas, here in Beverly.
Over the years, I’ve taken on some part time work, including becoming a group fitness instructor, writing, blogging, and running two home-based businesses: one focused on easy to prepare food and the other health and fitness coaching.
I have also been able to be more involved in my parents’ lives, as they get older, manage health conditions and, most recently, when they sold their home of 40 years in Evanston, where I was born and raised, to move to an awesome retirement community, not far from their old house.
For the most part, I’ve felt confident in my major life decisions over the years, especially building a life and family with Bob. However, reflecting on where I was at 21 led me to wonder more about how things might’ve turned out, if I’d made different choices.
Just as I wasn’t yearning for my old friend all these years, I haven’t spent a lot of time imagining my life if I’d taken other paths.
So all of a sudden finding myself struggling to reconcile mixed feelings about both my old friend and my choice to be a stay at home mom has been confusing for me.
Awhile back, I learned to embrace the idea that “we make the best decisions we can, with the information we have at the time.”
I think about that when I find myself questioning various choices I’ve made along the way.
There is so much missed potential in life, but perseverating on that can keep us from making the most of what is right in front of us.
At some point this year, while working through my grief for my old friend, which also brought back sadness related to others who left this world too soon, I heard the expression, “be the things you loved about the people who died.”
That sentiment really speaks to me.
I realized that I can also take some of the things I’ve remembered about 21 year old Kathy and find ways to incorporate what I loved most about myself back then, that may not be as much a part of who I am now, into this mid-life version of me.
My old friend who died used to say when we would part, when wrapping up a phone call, or in signing off his letters to me, “Look after yourself.”
Part of looking after myself is not getting stuck in the past, while also recognizing how my loved ones, including those who died, have had a positive impact on my life and helped to shape the person I am today.
One year later, since learning of my old friend’s death, I recognize looking after myself can also be giving myself grace, as I make peace with some of the hopes and dreams young adult me had, that didn’t come to fruition, while celebrating how wonderful so much of my life is now.
Its sucks that my old friend got cancer and died.
I don’t believe everything happens for a reason or that we have to find silver linings in tragedies.
That said, I do appreciate how processing my old friend’s death, along with how my life has evolved since age 21, has helped remind me of all that I have to be grateful for now, as well as that it’s never too late to take new paths, as we pursue our hopes and dreams.
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