Life As It Is - Cheryl Perlitz

Life as it is Cheryl Perlitz, Excerpted from Soaring Through Setbacks: Rise Above Adversity Reclaim Your Life (Cameo Publications)

Life is predictable … at least I had always thought so. We perk along day-by-day, hour-by-hour, doing the very best we can. For the most part, life goes as expected, with only a few glitches along the way. We encounter irritants we can handle, and then we move on. We are walking along, zigging and zagging, and then … the mountain appears.

I always thought that…If we eat right and take care of ourselves, we would be healthy. We may get sick occasionally, but we will be generally disease-free and fit. BUT SUDDENLY the MOUNTAIN APPEARS…and we get REALLY SICK.

I always thought that…If we do our best at work, show up on time, do what is expected of us plus a little extra, we will be rewarded. If we get along with our co-workers, we will have healthy relationships at work. If we contribute to the company’s bottom line and financial success, we will be appreciated. BUT SUDDENLY THE MOUNTAIN APPEARS … and we LOSE OUR JOB.

I always thought that… If our country does the ethical things, with good intentions based on humanitarian needs, we will be safe and secure. BUT SUDDENLY THE MOUNTAIN APPEARS … and we are thrown into financial instability and our FREEDOM AND SECURITY ARE THREATENED.

The truth is, change is always happening. As soon as we think we have life all figured out and we know where we are going and how we will get there, a mountain appears in our path and we must look at life differently.

When My Own Life Fell Apart

I was securely entrenched in the suburban life. My husband, Tom, was a corporate ‘Type A’ hard working man, and I, a small business owner, running my business from home. Our daily life revolved around supporting our three boys in college. Occasionally we were able to find a break in the routine and throw our two large dogs in the back of the Suburban and take off to the forest preserve for a run. The end of the day was never really the end of the day. A quick dinner was always followed by more work from home. We were able to sneak an occasional respite from the routine with a trip to the mountains for hiking, biking, and adventuring.

Our dream was to get our children “launched” and then move to the mountains we loved in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. We were building a little log cabin on top of the mountain. Unfortunately, our dream was never to be.

We had just returned from a wonderful weekend with our youngest son, Chris, with whom we had celebrated Tom’s fiftieth birthday. Tom and Chris ran together in a 10K race on a tedious up and downhill course in Boulder, Colorado. Our first day back from Boulder, Tom felt fluish and complained loudly, as he always did when he was sick. I was away all day on business but checked in on him frequently. When I returned home in the early evening, he said he felt like he needed to go to the hospital. I’d heard that before, like when he had a red mark on his arm and thought he had gotten Lyme disease, and when he skate boarded into a parked car and thought the black and blue mark was an indication of a hemorrhage that was rapidly moving towards his heart.

Instead of rushing to the emergency room, we called the doctor. Tom explained his symptoms, and the doctor gave us the typical response: “Drink lots of liquids, take two aspirin, and call me in the morning.” When I arrived back home from a quick trip to the local grocery store, Tom reported that he was feeling better. When I checked on him twenty minutes later, he was dead.

The autopsy showed he did not have a heart attack, but died of myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart caused by a virus.

The boys received the dreaded phone call that night and were on planes home from their various campuses the next morning. Everyone’s reaction was different: one oblivious (me), one angry, and the others devastated with sadness. We marched through the next few days in a fog, with me showing no emotion at all, and them feeling sadness and shock in their own private ways.

The traditional dark, haunted day of Halloween was the day of the funeral. It was a rainy cold day, and the church was packed. Along with personal friends, business friends, and acquaintances from all over the world were representatives from the Make a Wish Foundation, Children’s Memorial Hospital, and several other charities Tom served loyally as a board member. Some of our neighbors spoke and with tears in their eyes and wobbled through their own tributes. A standing ovation brought a final end to a life well lived! John Denver singing Rocky Mountain High sent us off to Colorado and Tom’s final resting place.

The next morning at six o’clock, the four of us were on our way to scatter Tom’s ashes in the mountains of Steamboat Springs, Colorado. We all wore one of Tom’s hats, representing his various personalities. There was the “Elmer Fudd” hat with earflaps that he wore when he cut the lawn, the ski hat, the baseball hat, and the cowboy hat with the feather hatband. Looking like a sad version of The Village People, we went through the baggage claim. In a backpack, in a $3.00 plastic container, were Tom’s ashes.

When the inspector said, “We’re going to have to look in the backpack,” and then “I’m going to have to look in the black box,” we all looked at each other with expressions of shock. I piped in, “That’s only my husband,” and handed him the death certificate. The inspector took the box to the supervisor, holding it at arm’s length, and then returned it to us. In the plane, instead of putting Tom in the overhead, we passed him around between the four of us.

Once safely on the ground, we made the three-hour drive to Steamboat in a rental car in a blinding snow storm. We then went up to the top of Buffalo pass, sliding, teetering on the edge, and bumping on a dirt road full of boulders and pot holes. Finally, we arrived at the trailhead. After a painful two-hour hike uphill through knee-deep snow, we arrived at the peak. With snow blowing fast and furiously, making visibility nearly impossible, we took handfuls of ash, tossed them up, and let the wind carry them where it willed.

We found out later that Spring that Tom’s ashes landed in the middle of a large volcanic rock with an indentation loaded with wild flowers.

Several days later, I arrived at the bank where I met with a lawyer and account manager. After a review of my tax returns for the last two years and the year’s bank statements, it became clear I was headed for serious financial challenges.

I had to sell the cars, get rid of the house, and find a way to make a living. Taking it one step at a time, I sold the cars first. The five-bedroom house went next, which I replaced with a studio apartment. Finally I found a wonderful home for my two sweet Golden Retrievers and bid them a tearful farewell.

The next day I left for Prince William Sound where I spent a month kayaking in the beautiful Alaska wilderness, only to be air lifted out of there and back home due to the death of my other best friend – my mom. My new life had a shaky start, but at least I had few things left to lose. I had nowhere to go but up.

Losing What Was and Finding What Will Be

The transition between “what was” and “what will be” includes a period of grief, fraught with emotional agony and keen mental suffering. For most, this period is a rough ride of emotions and struggles. It’s a roller coaster through a tunnel that seems to have no end. Whether you’ve lost a job, a spouse, a child, a pet, a dream of what could be, or your financial security, the grief process is the same. We give up the past—a past that will never be again—and we find a future—a future we are yet to see.

I always thought that grief was a simple process. You feel sad for about a year, and then you get over it and move on. I’ve since learned that grief is a much longer process than that. When my husband died, I lost not only him, but also my identity, my security, my lifestyle, and my life as it was. My friendships changed, as did my family as I knew it. The grief process I went through will always be a part of who I am.

While losing a spouse is difficult, losing a child is a much more devastating loss. It goes against the natural order of things … the way life should be. We’re not supposed to outlive those we bring into the world and nurture. When you lose a child, you lose not only part of yourself, but also your dreams for the future. The family is forever different for the loss and pain it goes through together. That child and the pain of losing that life will always be part of who the family is and will become.

Losing a job means losing much more. For many, losing a job means losing your reason for existence—who you are and what you live for. Many people agree that a job is more than “just a job.” Our career is who we are, where we spend our time, and how we value our own self-worth. In a way, losing that identity is a death of who we are.

Along with the loss of identity comes the loss of financial means. We must find a way to survive without that monetary security. Those people with whom we have spent so much time are no longer a part of our lives. Only a rare business relationship survives the jolt. Feelings of betrayal, loss of trust, and disrespect remain. Retirement by choice, quitting, or losing a job against our will all mark an end of the old and the start of a new path.

The bombing of the World Trade Center on 9-11 was a loss far greater than anyone could have imagined. Aside from the loss of life, we as a nation lost our sense of security, our financial stability, and our privacy. The event forced us to rethink our policies and take a close look at our government and our relationships with other countries. It also caused many to examine their religious convictions. Our dreams of a peaceful, carefree life were shattered. Our identity, as a nation, instantly changed … and so must we.

Our dreams motivate our lives. What we think should happen and what actually transpires are often two different things. We want healthy, beautiful, and mutually beneficial relationships, but sometimes that doesn’t happen. Or we think we will have a certain kind of life, but we never reach what we strive for. Or we hope for wonderful, kind, loving teenagers, but then they go through their hormone surges and social pressures and turn into independent and sometimes “crazy” people. We then think, “Another dream shattered.” Not having those dreams materialize is death of another kind.

Every one of the 6.3 billion people on this planet has lost something, from baby teeth to a loved one. Whether we feel the physical pain of the new tooth coming in or the emotional pain of creating a life without a loved one, we know a door has closed in life. We are left standing between the closed door and the one that has yet to open—between the past and the future. Sometimes we are so busy looking at the door that just closed that we miss the one that’s opening. Sometimes we see the crack in the new door but hesitate to step through. Grief is that time between the doors when we are struggling to make the next step. It’s a quiet time, a turbulent time, and a time of indecision. It is the transition between the old life and the new life.

The Mountains

I grew up climbing mountains.

Mountains are beautiful and challenging, majestic and all powerful. They also have lessons to teach us.

Climbing mountains taught me about change. Every mountain has a surprise around the corner, an obstacle in the path, or a storm brewing minutes away. During every climb you find yourself teetering on a ledge, knowing you could fall, and agonizing over the moment of impact.

The drudgery and agony of trudging along step by step taught me the lessons of persistence, patience, and determination. During those times, nature provides wonderful treasures to keep us interested as she fills our hearts with wonder and awe … a glacier around the next bend, a few mountain goats teetering, a beautiful sunset.

No matter how challenging a physical mountain is, the hardest mountains we climb are the ones we can’t see. They are the ones life throws in our path, when things are humming along smoothly. Those are the mountains in my life I am the most proud of scaling.

Surviving the mountain of grief that came after my husband’s death was difficult because it wasn’t tangible. It was a mentally tormenting climb that seemed to have no end and no assurance of survival. The path was solitary and personal. To survive that kind of climb—and live to tell about it—is a real accomplishment.

Sometimes we are climbing several mountains at once. That’s when many aspects of life seem to crumble simultaneously. For example, when we have a major health problem, life as we knew it changes. Poor health is followed by fear of pain, loss of the dream for a long and healthy life, loss of freedom, and emotional and financial stress on the family. They are all mountains to climb.

Excerpted from Soaring Through Setbacks: Rise Above Adversity Reclaim Your Life

After the deaths of her first husband and parents, and a series of other losses, Cheryl Perlitz restructured her life and learned the true meaning of “climbing mountains.” Perlitz is an experienced adventurer and professional speaker. She shares the lessons she has learned from the mountain to help others transform their own challenges at home and at work into opportunities for adventure and positive change. The fact is change is said, painful, terrifying, overwhelming, and often overpowering. The wisdom and skills in Soaring Through Setbacks will show you how to transform your challenges at home and at work into adventure and positive change. For more information about Cheryl Perlitz, go to http://www.soarwithme.com. For more information about Cameo Publications, go to http://www.cameopublications.com or contact Amy Rigard, P.O. Box 8006, Hilton Head Island, SC 29938. (843) 785-3770, amy@cameopublications.com