A Good Goodbye

I finished out my appointments with Dr. L. It was so very hard to keep going into her office and seeing things disappear. I had grown accustomed to the bookcases and could find books easily that I had burned holes in with my eyes to keep from retreating into my cave. The four chairs and electric fireplace with the pictures on top. Each week as things started to leave the office made it more real that she was leaving. I had tried to ignore that little fact. I wanted to just go on as if it wasn't happening because goodbyes hurt. People always left my life it seemed. So if I didn't think about it then I wouldn't get engaged in it and it wouldn't hurt! She and I had yet to talk about her move but finally in the last 3 weeks we did. She started to tell me about her new job waiting for her. She would tell me about the things she was looking forward to doing when she got there such as hiking and eventually writing a book about her practice. I wondered if I would make in the book as the most introverted human being she had experienced! After talking for a bit about her move to Alaska I would change the subject. She would ask why and I told her I don't like goodbyes, they are never good. She said that maybe this was God's way of showing me a 'good' goodbye because they can happen. Its not always because someone walks out of your life because of something bad. People grow and people change and therefore people may leave to go after their dreams, they may get married and go with their husbands, etc. I couldn't feel it, I refused to feel the emotions of her leaving while I was in the office with her but she could read them on my face and in my body language. She knew that I was really struggling to stay in the moment with her when all I really wanted to do was run screaming out of the office into my cave and ignore that she was leaving.

Our last meeting was the Wednesday the evening before Thanksgiving. She looked at me and asked me if I was really in the office with her or was I in my cave. I told her I was in the cave. She asked me to come out to try and enjoy our last hour together. Good goodbyes are that they are good. They are bittersweet and its OK to feel sad. Its okay to cry and grieve the loss of a new friendship. But its not a loss, the friendship will remain. I can still send her an email every now and then to update her on my status. That wasn't enough though, I wanted to keep meeting with her. I wanted to be her friend because she was someone I liked and trusted. Being a nurse I knew that could never happen due to the patient/doctor relationship rules. That's crossing the line. She told me that for one year there could not be much contact but she would respond to my emails if I had a crisis or something. She couldn't advise me though. I knew that but it still hurt and it confused me so much. I mean, I hated going into her office, I hated talking about me and my problems, I hated opening up and facing the demons of my past that held me captive for so many years but I grew to like her.

After our last meeting I went to our Thanksgiving Eve service at church. It was so hard and I needed a hug from Roni. I just needed to be hugged and told I would be okay, things would be okay. I needed to know she wasn't leaving too. She knows me so well and told me that she wasn't leaving but she won't be this person in my life forever. But of course I wouldn't hear that from her. She told me to be sad for a bit but to pick up and move forward there really are 'good' goodbyes.