i’m coming to see that i have been mis-naming the emotion associated with lingering memories that continue to be emotionally charged for me.

for example many years ago i became a single parent to 2 very young children. overnight my children & i went from being part of a 2 parent household with a stay-at-home mom to a household with an absent dad and a mom who had to return to full time work and who due to time, money and emotionally constraints was unable to give her children the time, attention and experiences that they needed and that i and they would have liked.

previously when i would be visited by these memories i would name the accompanying emotion as guilt. guilt for things that i had done and things that i had not done. now i’m coming to see that these memories also contain an element of grief. and perhaps as i allow the grief to come to the forefront then the guilt will dissipate