Intersecting spheres

Way back in March I was trying to understand the strongest feelings of grieving. You might think that losing a spouse feels like losing half of yourself. Well, to me it felt like losing most of myself.

I drew a picture to try to understand better. It consisted of two intersecting circles - like two joined bubbles. One represented me and one Robin. Where the circles intersected I wrote descriptions about all the things that Robin and I shared - activities, interests, memories. In the other areas of the circles I made notes about things we did independently - like Robin doing massage, or me providing flight instruction. Some things appeared in both parts of the bubbles - for instance we did bike rides together, but we also did bike rides solo, or with other folks.

The picture actually helped me to see how much we did share and how intertwined our lives had become. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing. In fact it's another area in which I have no regrets. We really spent a lot of time together and we were better off for it. In hindsight it seems like the last few years we'd been sprinting to the finish line, cramming in "life" before things would change.

The drawing also helped reinforce that there was still a "Greg" in here. Though Robin's bubble and the intersection we shared was gone, there was still an independent "me". I'd like to think that like a soap bubble my sphere would right itself and become rounded again. I guess that's what's happening, I'm just not as elastic as a soap bubble so it takes some time! ;)