🎧 Mourning the Life I Thought I'd Have

I open up about grieving the dreams that didn't unfold the way I expected. The plans that fell apart. The relationships that ended. The version of life I was certain I'd be living by now.

Grief isn't always tied to death. Sometimes it's learning to let go of expectations so you can make room for a future you never saw coming.

If you've ever struggled with unmet expectations, disappointment, or starting over, I hope this conversation reminds you that it's okay to mourn what could have been while still embracing what's ahead.

Sometimes letting go isn't giving up—it's making room for a new beginning.

Check us out on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/@HealingHerSoulPodcast

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You know, I realized that I am in a state where I am mourning the life that I thought that I would have. There's so many different things that I thought that I would have accomplished by now, and just different places in my life I thought I would be. And so it's been very difficult for me to wrap my head around the fact that I am not where I want to be. I know that that is pretty cliche. A lot of people say that a lot of people have that same struggle, but for me, it's just been like a season where I'm going through a really difficult time in my life, but then also mourning the things that have not happened. So I'm sad about the things that are happening, and then mourning the things that are not happening, grieving the life that I for sure thought that I would have by now. And I don't know if it has to do with my age and being nearly 40 years old. I don't know. But what I do know is that it's frustrating and it's challenging, and I'm trying to find my footing, I'm trying to find my way, I'm trying to figure out what it is that I need to do to fulfill my purpose because in this moment I don't quite feel like I'm fulfilling my purpose, and it's causing me to feel an immense amount of sadness and discouragement and just feeling like I don't belong. I'll be transparent and kind of talk a little bit about my current situation. I recently found out that I'm pregnant. I'm about three months along, and it is something that we planned for the past couple of years, but it was a struggle because of some medical conditions that I have. And according to my doctor, it was going to be very, very difficult for me to conceive. Um he was definitely rooting for me to have you know IVF because of the difficulties. There was a lot that I had to do within a fertility evaluation, lots of you know, procedures, biopsies, bacteria infections that were found, medications I had to take over and over again. And it was very, very discouraging, and I honestly just pretty much gave up on it, and I felt like maybe this just wasn't meant to be. My husband left uh for school back in April, and I'll say a couple of weeks before he left, we were just not in a good place. I mean, leading up to him leaving, we were not in a good place, and throughout this time period that he's been gone, we're still not in a good place, and although I still have hope that things can be worked out, I still don't know for sure. I thought in my mind that having a child at this period in my life would involve a two-parent home. And when I imagined and dreamed and prayed of having another child, it indeed included being married and my child having a two-parent home. That's something that I was not able to provide my first child for a very long time, first 13 years of his life. I intentionally made sure that I waited until I married again to conceive. But then once I got married, it was very difficult for me to conceive. Now that I am, and things seem to be falling apart, I'm frustrated, and I'm just like, I don't know exactly what's going on here, I don't know why this is happening the way that it's happening, and it's very discouraging because the thought of being a single mom again is very scary and heartbreaking. And although I am a hundred percent sure that you know he would still be there and be a great father, it's still not the same as being together, being happy, being in a healthy relationship, and raising that child together in the same home. It's not the same, it's not the same, and I do understand that sometimes it may be a better situation. I do wish that my parents would have separated many, many years, you know, before I became an adult. Um I think that that would have been a lot better for us if they would have just divorced instead of staying together. Um, but my situation was very, you know, different and unique, and so it's definitely no comparison to my situation with my children. I definitely had these dreams, and they just don't seem to be coming true. Um, so many different things that I thought was gonna happen, like the excitement of finding out that you know I was pregnant, and um I really, really wanted a baby girl, but come to find out I am having a boy, and so I'm not gonna lie, I was kind of disappointed, and I'm glad I did not have a gender reveal because I would have surely been judged. Nevertheless, it is what it is. Um, I'm gonna love my baby regardless, but it was just another thing that was added on that was like, damn, okay, not what I was looking for, but this it is what it is. The fear of being a single mom again has been completely overwhelming for me. You know, I don't have I don't have a lot of people that I can rely on. I have some. I I don't have as many as I did with my first child. Um I had a lot of support, a lot of help, but in this scenario, it's just not the case. My husband's family is they're all in Mississippi. There's nobody here. So relying on them would be kind of difficult. Not saying impossible. I know that they would be there for them, uh, for us, whenever they can. But seven hours away, you can't just call and say, hey, you know, can you come over tonight and help us out? That's just not gonna happen. Um, my mom is always gonna be there, but she's got a lot of her plate. She is still taking care of my older sister who is, you know, disabled from strokes that she had a couple of years ago, still in a nursing home. She was one of my biggest supporters, um, my sister, my older sister. And um knowing that she's not gonna be able to be there for this child the way that she was with the first child, it's just frustrating, and um just knowing that one of my best friends and somebody who is a phenomenal aunt is not gonna be able to really fulfill that role. It's discouraging. My other sister is an hour away, and I know her. I know she's gonna be there if I need her. She's always there for me, but yet she still has her own family, she's married, she has two kids. It's just like, damn.

unknown 8:22

But you can feel it.

SPEAKER_00 8:23

I'm gonna be doing most of this alone. Like, I I do have good friends, I I do have, like I say, my mom. But I I just don't. This is very, very different from the first go-around. And mind you, this is me just pretty much thinking about worst-case scenario. Okay, there could be a situation where we decide, hey, we're gonna stay committed, we're gonna do this, we're gonna do that, everything's gonna work out, we're still gonna be together, my child's gonna have a two-parent home. There's still that possibility, but I'm always trying to prepare myself for a different scenario, a different possibility that life is just not gonna work out the way I planned. It's not gonna work out the way I thought, and so I am constantly grieving the fact that oh my god, I planned my life out, and some of it went as planned, some of it turned out great, and I'm very proud of myself and very happy that I was able to do some of the things that I planned to do, but then there's a lot of other stuff that that just did not go my way and is not going my way, and I'm having to separate my anger and sadness and disappointment from the intellectual thought process of fully understanding life in its capacity and understanding that this is just life, and it's not just me. Everybody goes through this, everybody goes through a time period in their lives where things are not going as planned, things are not what they thought it was going to be. Um, I mean, there's people that have planned out their lives and gotten exactly what they wanted. I I think that's a pretty rare situation. I think majority of people experience life in a form where it is not what they planned or thought they'd be where they are. I said all that to say that it's important to understand that you can't make it to the next level of your life until you accept the fact that it is not what you wanted it to be, and it may never be what you want it to be, and that's not to be discouraging or say life sucks, even though sometimes it does. Life is beautiful in the whole realm of life itself. It is it is quite amazing and beautiful, and I'm so very blessed. There's so many things that I can be grateful for and that I am grateful for. Um, but I won't deny the struggles that I'm experiencing, I won't deny the pain that I'm feeling, I won't deny the grief. I just won't. And I think it's important for me to feel all the things that I'm feeling. It's important for me to feel the sadness and and just being upset about what I thought my life would be like. I feel like that's okay. I don't think that's being pessimistic. I think it's a very good thing because when you allow yourself to feel all things that you need to feel, then you allow yourself some relief from from your heart, from your soul, from your spirit, from your mind, from everything that's inside of you. You have to release those things. And once you do that, once you're able to get that relief, then you're able to feel better. And you're able to think logically and move forward in peace. So while I am in this process, in this grieving process, I'm still looking forward to the other side. I'm still looking forward to the goodness that I know is going to come after this storm has passed. Although I don't have a whole lot to give other than the truth about what I'm going through right now, I will say that I I encourage you to not just sit with your discomfort but also allow yourself to grieve. Grieve the life that you thought you would have and know and understand that it's okay.