3.00 am Tuesday 29 April 2025 – Rebirth Day 10 I am back in Adelaide and my life has resumed the rhythm it developed in the months since Margaret’s death one year and eight months ago. On 7 March 2023, Margaret had her final session of immunotherapy. Immunotherapy had shrunk the cancer but another result was dangerous diarrhoea. The immunotherapy had to stop while the oncologist vainly tried to stop the diarrhoea. Margaret suffered constant night sweats which saturated the bed, plus the diarrhoea, plus a bladder that gave her no rest – and she also had broken bones in her back and broken ribs. I suffered during every moment that Margaret suffered. I watched her life shrivel into a pain-filled shell In 2023, Easter Sunday took place on 9 April 2023 – eleven days and 2 years before my rebirth day on Sunday 20 April 2025. I no longer have to worry about Margaret being in pain because she is no longer in any pain. Margaret has left her pain behind her and because of my rebirth, I am evolving into a man who sometimes manages to be pain free. … and then something happens and in an eye blink, I am in pain all over again – suffering because she suffered so much. So, I dive back into my box of tools looking for something that will ease my pain. I have experimented with so many tools hoping they will ease the pain. I throw away the tools that do not help me. Meditation sometimes helps … but sometimes it is no help at all. I went to a meditation retreat starting late afternoon on Friday 28 March 2025 and it lasted until early afternoon Sunday 30 March. I was doing fine until the afternoon of the Saturday when one of the retreat staff told me to stop talking. This completely ruined the rest of the retreat. I wrote the words “retreat blues” in my diary. Margaret would have had her 75th birthday on Saturday 29 March 2025. The well meaning idiot who told me to shut up did not know this, but I did. The well meaning idiot should have noticed I immediately plunged into retreat blues, but he did not. The retreat blues lasted a whole two weeks. I slowly got rid of them by promising myself that I would be able to get by - not into the indefinite future - but for the next two weeks. I trick myself this way. If I can put the blues onto a shelf for a short period, they might just stay on the shelf and not come back. It is easier to persuade myself to keep going for a short period than it is to persuade myself that I have to get rid of the blues for a long period like a year. I cannot manage a year, but sometimes I can manage two weeks. Give this a go, it might help you sometimes. Yoga always helps in the rebirth process. My yoga session on the day Margaret died, quite literally helped me to keep breathing. My body wanted only one thing – to shut down completely. My body decided it had gone past its expiry date and wanted to do nothing at all, except rejoin Margaret once more. But I had to stop my body from doing this. I had promised Margaret that I would be okay. That meant I had to force my body to keep functioning. I had to stay alive or I would break my solemn promise. I forced myself to do yoga and after one solid hour of yoga, the tears stopped. And then they started up again. To stop the tears this time around, I went for a walk in the Park. If there were other people in the Park wondering why this grown man was sobbing, I have no memory of them. Eventually, the walking also brought a temporary stop to the tears. So, those are my primary tools. I walk, I do yoga and I meditate. Every day, I try to create a brand new universe with my thoughts – one where I do not always want to cry; one where everyday things make more sense. As yet, my reborn universe is most noticeable for the people who are not in it. There is no Margaret in it. Margaret’s brother, sister, nephew and niece have chosen to ignore my new universe. Margaret’s former friends have chosen to ignore it and Margaret’s former closest friend Ann Ryan wants to blow it up. Being born again is extremely hard work, but my promise to Margaret means I must make it happen. Margaret wants me to live, so I must live. You may think you have no reason to be reborn or to live, but you are so very wrong. You matter. The universe will be unable to sing if you are not in it. The very air you breathe will notice your absence and lapse into deep mourning. You matter and I matter too. We all matter equally. If you help me, I will help you. The whole world can be reborn if we come together and make it happen. | 
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