Where I go from here, and other unknowns. Part 1 (?)

Sharing about land transition, getting pregnant, housing insecurity and the birth/death portal.

“Then the youth understood that the Moon, like God and Fortune, does the most for those who do the most for themselves.”

— Aradia, Gospel of the Witches - Charles G. Leland

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I have this habit of minimizing or downplaying what I have gone through, or what I am currently going through.

“It’s no big deal”

“It could be worse”

“I’ve been through worse”

It usually takes talking to another person, to realize that, hey, actually maybe things have been a bit challenging.

Isolation makes echo chambers. Communicating and coming out of our familiar inner landscapes can provide fresh perspective.

The beginning of the year started off pretty normal, in my high desert home of North East Oregon. I experienced deep loneliness in my 3.5 years out there, but it was so good to me. Quiet, vast, warm, cold, dry. I’d taken every opportunity given to me to learn all the secrets of the little corner of Oregon I lived in. Because of my military upbringing, a sense of “home” and place was very foreign to me. Oregon felt like home, but I’d only known western rain forests. Then, then I would eventually come to experience the sagebrush steppe, and high alpine peaks and it was there that a sense of “home” settled into me and it felt so, so good. And I’d ended up there mostly by accident.

Early this year of 2022, I met someone and we really liked each other. It wasn’t crazy infactuation or anything, we just had a really nice time together doing activities we both love. We were also both serious about our recovery from addictions of our past — and we both have a mutual understanding about how important sobriety is to us. About two months into dating, and on my birthday we were at our beloved weekend hangout spot, a local hotspring. The pools were a toasty 105 degrees and thick billows of steam were rolling off the thermal lake and pools around us… I remember not being able to handle the heat that day, which is very unusual for me. I’d been having low back pain, and all I wanted to do was soak it away. My period was also a mere two days late, nothing to really worry about. The heat overwhelmed my body and I had to take frequent breaks. I noticed a shortness in my breath and suddenly a sense that, something in my body was very different — but what?