Hi,
I am back and let me please start with an apology. I am really going to put more effort into being more active on here. The thing is, often times I start writing or have been writing the first paragraph of a blogpost and then life takes over and the blog gets pushed to the background. In this case I had like 60% of this post done, pushed it back and now I am at a point that I am not as angry as I was when I started writing.
Long story short: We flew back to the Netherlands a few weeks ago. As you might know we are still in the process of obtaining our US visa. Niels is still working on his Dutch contract and there are many puzzle pieces that aren't exactly in place yet. Which meant we had to go back to the NL and take care of some stuff there. Flying back we expected to come back to the home we left. Sadly enough there was no such thing. Coming home couldn't have felt worse.
I am going to spare everybody, reading this, the details (this is how you can tell I am less angry now, the first draft had it down to names and address :) but people we knew and trusted had gone through our stuff without our permission. Things were taken, thrown away without consulting us and our privacy had been violated in every possible way. Not only had people gone through our stuff, things were taken out of our house, literally tore down without our consent.
Coming home to this has proven to be another grand test for Niels and I and I cannot stress enough how proud I am of the decisions we made together. Since my father in law was in the midst of all this and to some level involved in everything that happened...... this could have been just another thing that tore Niels and I apart......
Let's face it we have been in similar (though not so drastic) situations before. What I had / have learned from those is to never make somebody else do something they are not ready to do. I could never tell Niels to behave a certain way towards his dad because it's not my place. Even though I have been through a lot with that family, it is still HIS dad. As his wife I feel I need to respect that, every family comes with its baggage and being married means helping your loved one carry that baggage... to some extent of course.
Well eventually we emptied the rest of our house in 2 days time, threw away stuff that otherwise would have been kept and searched for stuff that apparently other people had seen fit to throw away. There is still stuff of ours there but most of it is securely put away. We closed the "we live here" chapter and will now be merely visiting our old house when we fly back. Writing this it still hurts, having to close a chapter that you were not ready to close.
However I am a firm believer that some things happen for a reason. This all made us realise even more what a wonderful life we are building here in the USA. Our life is here now and, as if we weren't already, we are focused on our future here. Since we returned there have been many conversations, many feelings and emotions coming to the surface AND above all a lot of appreciation for the new start we are getting by being here. We are going to write our own story, do it our own way. This last chapter is closed and even though that still hurts, knowing what's ahead of us will make that pain eventually fade away.
So as far as new years resolutions go. We'll just keep doing what we have been doing. Trying to be better each day. Growing, loving, connecting and appreciating where we are in life.
Wow that last part reads heavier than I meant it to be but you know what, it's exactly what I mean. So for a lack of a better phrase.
Happy 2023 thank you for reading along!
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