Another Lesson Learned

Tonight, I learned something I wish I never had to learn.

It is not a sin to expect.

Not even the smallest expectation -- not even one as tiny as the tip of a needle.

Because what I was hoping for was not something grand. Not something demanding. Not something heavy.

Just a simple acknowledgment.

A “Thank you.”An “I got your message.”A quiet sign that I still exist somewhere in her world.

But tonight, there was only silence.

And it is a different kind of pain -- the kind that does not shout, does not argue, does not even explain itself. It just sits there, heavy and unmoving, pressing against the heart until breathing feels like work.

I know what this night looks like on the other side.

They are together.They probably went out.There was laughter, maybe a cake, maybe candles, maybe photos taken.A celebration.

And I was not there.

That is the part that hurts the most -- not just the silence, but the contrast.

They are living the moment.

I am here… holding it.

Holding love that has nowhere to go.

Holding memories that no longer have a place to land.

Holding a role that I am no longer allowed to live.

I showed up today as a mother.

I greeted her.I gave what I could -- even a small gift, a love gift, something that says, “I remember you. I celebrate you. I am still here.”

And on the other side -- nothing.

No reply.

No acknowledgment.

No bridge, even a fragile one.

And I ask myself, quietly, painfully -- is it wrong to have hoped?

No.

It is not wrong.

The hope did not hurt me.

The silence did.

There is a difference.

I did not fail by expecting something human. I did not lose dignity by wishing for something small. I did not become weak for wanting to be seen.

I simply loved.

And tonight, I am learning what it means to love without being met.

It is a brutal lesson.

Because love, when it has nowhere to land, does not disappear. It stays. It lingers. It turns inward. It becomes weight.

And I carry it.

I carry the memory of who I was to them.

I carry the truth of what I gave.

I carry the quiet knowledge that even if I am not seen, I did not love halfway.

I loved fully.

And that will always be true -- whether it is acknowledged or not.

But I will also be honest with myself tonight.

This pain is unbearable.

There is no poetic way to soften it. No metaphor that can make it lighter. No wisdom that can erase the sharpness of being unseen by your own child.

This is the deepest wound I have ever known.

To still love… and not be loved back.

To still remember… and be forgotten.

To still reach out… and touch nothing.

And yet -- even here, even in this silence -- I know this:

What I gave today was real.

My love did not disappear just because it was not answered.

It reached her.

What she does with it is no longer mine to control.

But what I gave -- that is mine.

And I will not rewrite that part of myself just because it was not returned.

Tonight, I grieve.

But I do not deny who I am.

I am still a mother.

Even in silence.

Even in distance.

Even in a world where my voice no longer reaches the people I love the most.

And maybe that is the hardest truth of all --

that love can remain, even when everything else is gone.

Why I Sat Down Again

Bloom where you are planted -- even when the soil is grief.

There are days when I sit at this table, in this quiet room, and I have to remind myself why I began.

Not because I forgot.

But because the pain is still loud.

I did not return to studying because life was stable.
I did not seek another certification because I had extra time or clarity or ease.

I came back here because something inside me broke -- and I refused to let it stay broken without meaning.

There is a kind of grief no one prepares you for.

Not the grief of death.

But the grief of distance.

Of being slowly set aside by the very people you once held closest to your heart.

Of feeling misunderstood, misjudged, and somehow reduced to the sum of your lowest moments.

Of realizing that love, even maternal love, is not always enough to keep a relationship whole.

I live with that kind of grief.

Every day.

I carry the silence.

I carry the absence of ordinary things -- conversations, laughter, small updates that used to come so freely.

I carry the weight of words that were said, and the heavier weight of what was never said back.

And at night, when the world grows still and there is no more distraction left to hold me together, I find myself speaking quietly to God.

“Have mercy. Please make this stop.”

There were nights I whispered,
“Tama na, Lord -- hindi ko na kaya.”

Enough, Lord -- I cannot carry this anymore.

And sometimes -- if I am honest -- it felt like heaven was quiet.

Like His face was turned away.

Like I was left alone inside a pain that did not know how to end.

It is from that place that I chose this path.

Not from strength.

But from survival.

Because if I must sit with grief -- then I will learn it.
If I must walk through loss -- then I will understand it.
If I must endure the breaking of what I once believed would never break -- then I will not let it be wasted.

I chose Grief Coaching last year -- in January 2025 -- not because my life is free from sorrow, but because sorrow has lived with me long enough to teach me its language.

And this year, I am continuing that path by working toward becoming an End-of-Life Doula -- not because I have all the answers about death, but because I have come to understand something about presence.

About sitting with what hurts.

About not turning away when things become heavy, complicated, or unfinished.

This is not just another certification.

This is a quiet vow.

That no one I encounter in their final days, or in the aching days after loss, will feel as alone as I have felt in mine.

That I will sit beside them -- not as someone who has conquered pain, but as someone who has learned how to stay.

Every time I sit at this table, I remember.

I remember why I opened my laptop again.
Why I enrolled.
Why I am choosing discipline over despair.

It is because pain, when left alone, can consume.

But pain, when given purpose, can transform.

I do not know yet who I will become at the end of this journey.

But I know this:

I did not choose this path because life was kind.

I chose it because life was not -- and I am determined to become someone who is.

Reading The Prophet After Everything

My mom gave me an old, worn-out copy of The Prophet in December 2023 while I was here in New Jersey. It had been sitting in her stash for years -- yellowed pages, softened spine, the kind of book that looks like it has survived more than one lifetime.

I only started reading it yesterday.

And I was not prepared.

Love.
Marriage.
Children.
Prayer.
Farewell.

Those were the sections that hit me really, really hard -- not as beautiful poetry, but as uncomfortable truth.

 
On Love

Almustafa says love will crown you and crucify you.

I used to think that was dramatic language. Now I understand it is not dramatic at all. It is honest.

I loved deeply. I did not love halfway. I did not enter marriage casually. I endured. I stayed. I sacrificed. I mothered. I carried emotional weight that was not always equally shared.

Love did not just give me joy. It broke me open. It exposed my fears. It tested my pride. It revealed how much I could tolerate before collapsing. It showed me how far I was willing to stretch to keep something alive.

And here is the truth I am finally admitting to myself:

The fact that my marriage failed does not mean I failed at love.

It means I loved fully.

If anything, I loved beyond comfort. And sometimes, that kind of love reshapes you through pain.

I was not foolish. I was faithful to love.

 
On Marriage

“Let there be spaces in your togetherness.”

That line unsettled me.

Marriage is not supposed to suffocate. It is not supposed to erase identity. Two pillars must stand apart yet upright.

In my marriage, I stood. I tried to keep standing. I tried to preserve the structure.

But one pillar cannot hold a temple alone.

When one grows and the other resists growth…
When one carries emotional responsibility and the other withdraws…
When animosity replaces partnership…

That is not sacred space. That is imbalance.

I see now that I was trying to sustain something that required two steady pillars. I was exhausting myself trying to compensate for what was missing.

That realization hurts.

But it also frees me from the quiet accusation that I simply “wasn’t enough.”

Marriage requires two whole people. Not one person over-functioning for two.

 
On Children

“Your children are not your children.”

That one pierced me.

I did not try to own my children. I poured into them. I protected them. I sacrificed for them. I built foundations so they could stand strong.

And now there is distance.

It feels like abandonment. It feels like rejection. It feels like something I must have done wrong.

But Gibran’s words forced me to confront something uncomfortable:

They are separate souls.

They have their own journeys -- including their own blind spots, pride, confusion, and emotional immaturity. I cannot force them to see me correctly. I cannot force them to defend me. I cannot force their father to help bridge the emotional gap. I cannot script their emotional development.

I carried them in my body.

But I cannot carry their adulthood.

That is the part no one prepares a mother for.

Their distance is not necessarily a verdict on my motherhood. It may simply be a chapter in their growth -- one that wounds me deeply, but does not erase who I was to them.

I can love them. I cannot control their path.

That is the most painful release.

 
On Prayer

When I reached the section on prayer, I expected comfort.

Instead, I felt exposed.

He says not to pray only in sorrow. Not only in need. Not only in desperation.

And I realized how often I have prayed in survival mode.

I have prayed through a failing marriage.
I have prayed through emotional abandonment.
I have prayed through health scares and silent nights.
I have prayed when I felt alone.
I have prayed when I felt misunderstood.

Those prayers were real.

But what struck me was this:

Prayer is not begging.
Prayer is not bargaining.
Prayer is not panic.

Prayer is connection.

It is not about informing God of my needs. It is about opening myself.

Prayer does not always fix marriages.
It does not force children back.
It does not instantly heal illness.

But it stabilizes the soul.

It softens bitterness.
It loosens resentment.
It quiets panic.

Maybe prayer is less “Fix this for me” and more “Strengthen me within this.”

That thought humbles me.

I do not have to grip everything so tightly.

I can pray without performing.
Without explaining.
Without solving.

Prayer changes me more than it changes circumstances.

And maybe that is the deeper miracle.

 
On Farewell

“A little while, a moment of rest upon the wind, and another woman shall bear me.”

When I read that, I did not think of reincarnation first.

I thought of reinvention.

I have lived multiple lifetimes inside this one body.

The young wife who believed endurance was strength.
The mother who carried everything quietly.
The woman who stayed from 1996 to 2018 in a marriage that did not make her happy.
The woman who walked away.
The mother who now feels the ache of distance.
The woman managing her health, her vulnerabilities, her aging body.
The woman rebuilding identity piece by piece.

I am not the same woman I was ten years ago. I am not the same woman I was even five years ago.

Parts of me have died.

Parts of me have been born.

The line about being borne again feels less mystical and more personal.

I am already that “other woman.”

Not another person -- but another version of myself.

Stripped.
More aware.
Less naïve.
Still capable of love.
Still wounded.
Still standing.

Reading this old, worn-out book now -- not when it was handed to me, but now -- feels intentional.

I was not ready before.

Now I am reading it not as literature, but as a mirror.

Love refined me.
Marriage revealed imbalance.
Motherhood taught me release.
Prayer is teaching me surrender.
Farewell is teaching me rebirth.

My ex-husband’s indifference does not erase my worth.
My children’s distance does not erase my motherhood.
My health challenges do not erase my resilience.

If anything, they prove I have lived deeply.

I am still here.

Still becoming.

And maybe this book found its way back into my hands at exactly the right time.

___________________________

 

I did not read The Prophet as a detached observer. I read it as a woman who has loved deeply, stayed too long, endured silently, mothered fiercely, prayed desperately, and survived quietly. Every page felt like it was peeling something open in me. I see now that my love did not fail — it refined me. My marriage did not collapse because I was weak — it revealed imbalance I tried to carry alone. My children’s distance does not erase my motherhood — it forces me to release what I cannot control. My prayers are no longer just cries for rescue — they are lessons in surrender. And every goodbye I have lived through is not the end of me, but the making of another version of me. I am not destroyed. I am becoming.

Three Gardens, One Soil

There are three gardens in my life.

They live in different corners of the internet, but they grew from the same ground. I did not fully understand that until now.

The first was Like Showers On New Grass (October 2009 – October 2012).

Letters to God...

It was a season of hopeful reaching -- words lifted upward, mostly filled with light, good news, and grace as I understood it then. I was not yet ready to name drought. When I stopped writing there, it was not because faith disappeared, but because exhaustion did. It is difficult to keep writing about showers when you begin to feel cracks beneath the soil.

The second was Stories From My Garden (October 2010 – December 2018, revived August 2025).

Bloom Where You Are Planted…
A Blog in Pictures and Seasons About the People and Fur People I Love Most

This one was different. This was the real soil -- the people and fur people I loved most, the birthdays, the memories, and eventually, the fractures. It was not curated. It was not filtered. It was life as it unfolded. When it fell silent in 2018, it was not because there were no stories left to tell. It was because the stories had grown heavy. Sometimes the gardener steps back when the ground beneath her feet feels unstable.

Then came Rose Blossoms In The Wind (July 2013 – present).

Stop and Smell the Roses…

This became the rhythm. For years, I posted every single day -- roses gathered carefully, beauty arranged faithfully. When life felt uncontrollable, this garden remained steady.

Eventually, that daily rhythm softened into weekly bloom. Three hundred sixty-five became fifty-two. And something surprising happened. I realized I could still breathe. The oxygen was not gone; it had simply adjusted.

Rose Blossoms had been oxygen for me. It was the garden that never withered when the others did. But I see now that the strength was never in the roses. It was in the gardener. I was the one who kept showing up. I was the one who refused to let at least one space go dark.

I used to think Rose Blossoms was easy. The poetry and images were gathered from books and the web. I have black thumbs. I can kill a cactus. So I planted flowers in cyberspace instead. But tending a virtual garden consistently for more than a decade is not ease; it is resilience. When real soil felt heavy, I gathered beauty where I could find it. That was not pretending. That was surviving.

If I look at the three now, I see the pattern clearly.

Like Showers was my hopeful spirituality.
Rose Blossoms was my curated beauty.
Stories From My Garden is my unfiltered truth.

Prayer. Beauty. Soil.

They are separate spaces. Sacred in their own way. But they are not separate selves. They are seasons of one woman learning how to live through different weather.

Like Showers remains paused. Not abandoned. Just resting. Some gardens lie dormant until the right rain returns. Rose Blossoms continues its weekly bloom. Stories From My Garden stands here now, revived, less afraid of naming erosion.

All three remain mine.

They share the same roots.

If you are curious, you may wander into the other gardens here:

Like Showers On New Grass -- https://likeshowersonnewgrass.blogspot.com/

Rose Blossoms In The Wind -- https://roseblossomsinthewind.blogspot.com/

And if you stay here --

this is the soil I stand on now.

Still rooted.
Still learning.
Still blooming where I am planted.