So in the spring softball was my only full time activity left. I had played softball since I was in Kindergarten and it was my favorite sport. This year was the first that our school had a team and we were playing fast pitch. I went back to practice when I returned to school. I had to sit out a few games because I had missed all the practices for Spring Break and the week after. I was going through the motions but I was feeling very overwhelmed with keeping up with the laundry, making dinners, homework, and being gone for softball games and practices. My dad and siblings were all trying to chip in and help get all this done at home, but I felt that it was my responsibility and I felt a lot of guilt about not being home.
I earned the opportunity to play in my first game and it was away. It was my first high school game and I was pitching at the JV level. (I never said I was good at fast pitch softball, so yes, I was a Jr playing JV). The catcher was Amy, a close friend of mine today. My dad was not able to travel to the game and I think this was the first game I had ever played in with out either of my parents there. I was extremely nervous and sad all at the same time. The sport I had loved and enjoyed for so many years was now just making me sad.
I had to prove to myself that I could do this and that just because this terrible thing had happened that I could still play. Amy's dad was in the stands and he cheered me on with every pitch. I remember how comforting it had been to hear him telling me I could do it. In my mind, he was my cheerleader that day. He was my comfort in that moment of sadness and doubt. I finished that game and struck out one batter. I could do this!
That night on the way back to school tears rolled down my cheeks as I stared out the window into the darkness. I had proven that I could do it. I could pitch in fast pitch softball even after my Mom had died. I also knew that I had to quit, because my heart just wasn't in it and I didn't have the energy or stamina to juggle softball and all these new hats I was wearing.
I felt great guilt in quitting, because I had been taught after you commit to something you see it through. I had never quit anything in my life, but even though I felt that tremendous guilt of quitting the guilt I felt for not being home was greater.
So the next day after practice I tearfully told my coaches that I had to quit. I cried with my teammates and friends because we had played together since our Pee Wee Pros days and I was leaving them. It was a very hard decision for me to make and very hard activity for me to walk away from, but I needed some time to be home and to figure out how to make life work with out my mom.
As I look back today, I don't regret this decision, but I also still feel guilty because I can't say I never quit anything. I just remember all of the emotions being so overwhelming... the grief, the sadness, the guilt.... I just felt everything so strongly during those first weeks. I'm still teaching my boys that we don't quit. Once we commit to being on a team, we have to finish the season. However, I believe this taught me that there are always exceptions in life, even to the hard fast rules and sometimes you have to do things that you have been taught are wrong, just to make it through.
