When “normal” isn’t normal.

Normal. adjective

1. Confirming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected.

Yesterday was…a good…normal…day.

I’m extraordinarily hesitant to define it as such, because normalcy is just such a craved and foreign phenomenon around here.

And, in fact, it was such a weird day, that it couldn’t POSSIBLY be defined as “normal”.

My oldest son stayed home from school, thanks to the flu. But, he was….well behaved.

I finally felt good again, after a hell of a week battling the flu myself, and it was the first day I just felt…functional. Like, I could do something other than just lay in bed all day in a heaping pile of pain and sickness.

I took my younger son to his therapy appointment in the morning, went to my other sons school for his ARD meeting to hear about the evaluations they’ve been doing on him and the specific services he qualifies for (spoiler alert, he’s basically a genius and only requires physical help/accommodations), came home and took a nap (the flu fatigue is real as shit!!!) and then continued my day until it was time for therapy.

My husband, who also has therapy on Monday nights as of late, chose to ride with me, instead of taking 2 cars. Our therapists are in the same office complex, but my sessions are 2 hours, and his are only 1. Still, he didn’t want to take separate cars, and wanted to drive together. I didn’t object, although I did feel badly that he’d have to wait for me.

He came and sat in my therapists waiting room after he was done, and it was…comforting. I liked knowing he was there. Even though he wasn’t in my session with me, it still felt like we were together. I texted him some specific things that we were talking about in therapy that we wanted his input on, and he responded.

Then we left together, drove home together, and sort of debriefed on both of our sessions. It was nice to not walk in on him at home, for once. He always gets home earlier than I do, whether he has therapy or not, but it was just so nice to have the car ride to talk to each other. And communicate openly and freely.

We came home, both still in surprisingly good moods, both with each other and otherwise, and just…were normal. I made a drink, he asked if I wanted a snack. I said no, but he asked if I would be upset if he made one anyway. So he made a pizza mozzarella roll type freezer snack, and I folded laundry and emptied all the trash cans while I waited for him to be done. At like 8:30pm.

I guess the adderall was still strong enough to kick my brain into chore drive, I mean, last night was the first night I’ve taken it in like a solid week thanks to the flu…but it felt good to come home and be productive FIRST, and then have a drink second. Yes, I made a drink, but I didn’t actually drink it until my husband was done doing whatever it was in the kitchen he was doing.

I continued being quiet in my heart the rest of the night.

Maybe that’s what peace is.

Feeling quiet in your heart.

My body didn’t feel tense, or like it didn’t belong there, or like I had to use my muscles for anything fight or flight like. My brain was slow, or maybe you people call that “moving at an appropriate speed instead of 100x faster than normal”.

I just felt……okay.

I didn’t even feel like I needed to drink in excess.

Yes, I’m still dealing with the after effects of the flu and, no, those are NOT insignificant, but even still…I didn’t crave drinking more.

My drinking is 100% correlated with how I feel emotionally. When I feel….safe, loved, grounded, whatever…I am so much more successfully able to moderate my drinking to what we’ve (me, my therapist, etc.) deemed “reasonable”…or at least, predicable.

Last night was so normal.

It was a normal day.

We had therapy (separately). We came home. Together. And we communicated.

We loved each other. I took care of him and his needs.

I didn’t need or want to drink the night away. In fact, I was perfectly ready for bed by 10:00.

It was such a normal night.

Or, at least, that’s what I imagine a “normal persons” normal night looks like.

Normal feels so abnormal.

I loved it. I loved last night.

“Normal” is defined as “conforming to the standard or the common type; usual; not abnormal; regular; natural.”

Perhaps last night wasn’t quite so “normal”, as defined by the dictionary.com definition of the word. It was not common. Or standard. Or regular.

But it felt like it should be.

It’s what I wanted it to be.

It might not have been “usual, typical, or expected”….but I want it to be. I want these nights to look like this.

I want THIS kind of night to become normal.

Not…the ones that are hard. And strenuous and full of tension.

I like this. This is the normal I want. Even if it isn’t quite the definition of normal.