Tariro

This quote was shared by a dear friend of mine a few years ago. It was something her sister, who was our age mate, had said to her before she passed on. It spoke to me and touched me deeply. I reached out to my friend and asked if I could create a graphic to share the quote and credit her sister. She agreed, and it has remained on my IG timeline ever since. I often think about this: Life rewards you for the portion you fight for. It forces me to examine my life – what I’m prioritising and the outcomes I’m achieving. We often complain about different aspects of our lives not working out – work, parenting, marriage, friendships, businesses. But what are we really pouring into those areas? A few stories for you around this… After giving birth to my son, I wanted to lose weight. But that was all there was to it: I was simply WANTING IT. Was I exercising? No. Did I adjust my diet? No. Doughnuts and fried chicken were “life”. Yet, I felt sad about being three sizes up from my usual. I wasn’t doing anything to achieve the outcome I desired. Over the past year or two though, I’ve finally managed to shed a few kilos. I try to walk more, and I hope to be running again soon (yes, I used to run 5K “easily”!). My portions have gotten smaller and I try to avoid junk food, though that latter part has been a real fight for my life. I love love love potato crisps! I’ve talked to several friends and acquaintances who are interested in working remotely. When I ask what they’re doing every day to get closer to their first, second, or third client? Crickets. “Build it and they will come”, right? Wrong! Like any business, you have to work every single day to get the attention of your intended clients. If there’s a probability that out of every 100 people you sell yourself to, one will buy, then for the 100 items or service slots you have, you should aim to sell them to at least…10,000! If you only manage to sell to 100, it would be overly ambitious to expect your items to sell out – almost unrealistic. I’ve shared about my son being diagnosed with autism. He is classified as non-verbal, which means he cannot communicate using spoken language. However, as we learn to navigate the challenges of his condition we have found other ways to encourage communication, even without words. Hours upon hours of speech and occupational therapy have also helped him improve things like eye contact and following instructions – both of which are a huge part of communication. Just yesterday, he wanted to go outside with me and came running to the door. I told him, “Go get your shoes,” and he quickly ran to the room to get them. It’s little things like this that remind me how far we’ve come on this journey. Yet, on some days, I do feel like we’re not making any progress. Why, you might ask? Well, individuals on the spectrum thrive on routine, and when they fall off that routine, it’s incredibly hard to get them back on track. These routines encompass their basic life activities like eating, going to school, bathing, brushing teeth, potty training, tidying up, and even sleeping! My son doesn’t even like us changing the direction we take when going to or coming from school. And it’s not like he will say, “Oh mummy, I don’t want to take this route.” He will throw a tantrum loud enough for bystanders to think I’m trying to kidnap him because he can’t use his words. So as I think about where my son is now and where I hope he’ll be in the near future, I realise that I can’t take his routines lightly. I can’t afford regression in the important and basic things. I need to be increasingly intentional about his life. As much as I believe God is ultimately in control, I know I must do what I can while I still can. The rest I surrender to God, because He is my son’s Maker, knows what he needs and gives it to him on time. His will takes precedence over mine. It’s my birthday this month, and I’ve been thinking: if I could be granted one wish, even for just a day, it would be to have a conversation with my son. I’d love to know what he’s thinking, how he’s feeling, what he thinks of me, whether he likes my cooking. I just want to know. When he came into this world just over four years ago, I never imagined that I would be wishing for these things at this point in his life. I recently looked at old videos of him before he turned one; how he could say “thank you” and clap his hands upon instruction. But that all went away. That’s autistic regression for you – a loss of previously acquired skills or a backtracking of developmental milestones. A few months ago, my son was reading more than 50 random words – mostly animals – but today, he doesn’t. I’m honestly not sure whether he can’t anymore or just doesn’t want. Sometimes it feels like someone switched my child and gave me another or pressed RESET on his brain, but that’s regression. For basic life skills regression can set you back weeks or even months! Routines are crucial in ensuring he masters the skills so that he can eventually do them independently. This year, my son finally started feeding himself. Although it’s still incredibly messy on most days, I’m glad he doesn’t just sit there expecting someone else to feed him all the time. Of course, there are days when he doesn’t want to lift a finger, but there’s definitely progress in the right direction. Thank God! Today, I feel like I’m fighting the fight

Two years ago today, you cut your last birthday cake. You’d turned 73, and every time I look at the pictures and videos from that day, I am so sad seeing how frail you had become from all the chemo you were having to go through. Yet you remained positive and still tried to live your life as normally as possible – working and all. I remember in that moment, when you were cutting your cake, you said, “Ndinoriona here ini rechi74?” (Translation: Will I get to see my 74th one?) I swallowed a blob of hurt and pain hearing you say that, even though we did encourage and assure you that, of course, you would. But you didn’t. God decided it was time. Exactly 34 days later, He called you Home. Oh, the pain of that day! Even as I type this out, it’s cutting through my chest like a blunt bread knife – rough, painful, lasting. And that blob in my throat is back, wanting me to cry. I don’t even think I realised the full impact of losing you at that moment because of everything that needed to be done—funeral logistics and all the drama associated with that. Then it all passed, and life had to go on. The fact that the real funeral starts when everyone else is gone is not talked about enough. By the time you passed, I was already in therapy dealing with the lemons life had dealt me. So I continued, but to be honest, I didn’t feel better as soon as I would have wanted. Life seemed to be getting worse. On the outside, to someone who I hadn’t told what I was going through, it appeared like I had it all together – a strong woman who had it all figured out. But deep down inside, my world was falling apart. Everything was just crumbling, and more than anything, I needed you. I needed my daddy. I needed your assurance. I needed your encouragement. I needed your protection. I needed you to deal with some people who were getting on my nerves because some people really muster the audacity to deliver nonsense behaviour once one’s parent is gone (I wish I were joking about this one 🙄). But no, daddy, you were gone. In a last-ditch effort to “find you,” there was a day I went to the prayer garden at your parish, and the cry I cried that day. I was tired of a lot of things, and my spirit just needed some peace. That cry made me feel better. So I continued for a few weeks. Every day after dropping off your grandson at school, I would go into that garden – first to cry, then to pray. Eventually, it became just to read the Bible and pray. Some days, I would just sit and talk to myself. I don’t remember at what point I stopped, but I know I was beginning to feel better. I guess this was the beginning of my journey with God and learning to depend on Him wholly and fully. Because prior to that, ah, I depended on you, daddy – the solver of my two million seven hundred thousand five hundred and sixty-two problems. I was telling someone the other day that you took care of so many aspects of our lives that after you left, I was so disoriented that I even struggled to eat right for a bit. You always made sure there was healthy food around and would challenge us to make healthy choices. Dude, I know snitches get stitches, but the amount of cake that was eaten in the house last year? You would have been disgusted, I know. Also, Mum, if you are reading this, I am not saying you don’t give us healthy options. You just don’t make us feel bad for eating cake. Anyway, I digressed. So fast forward to this year – emotionally, I have gotten better. I started finding my way out of the pit of depression and sadness that clouded me after you had gone. The forgiveness journey my therapist got me started on two years ago began putting more pressure on me this year as I came to understand more about what Jesus did for me on the cross and the depth of God’s love for me. And understanding that I always have a Father in Him. He loved me first. I started rebuilding my life (again 😂). They should crown me the Queen of New Beginnings at this point, right? I also accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. I got baptised. I forgave. I asked for forgiveness. I went back to school. I started reading more books and watching less TV. I lost a whole 10kg since your funeral! Your girl is out here drinking water, eating more cabbage, minding her own business and making you proud 😂. I’ve started feeling a sense of calm even in the middle of storms. There are so many things that don’t appear “right” in my life at the moment, but since I learned another (more sustainable) way to fight my life’s battles, I have found so much reassurance from the promises of God’s Word. I read my Bible often, and it is so comforting. That said, I still think of you and every memory we shared often. And I miss you every day. We used to drive each other up the wall, but we still had each other. You always had my back in all seasons, even when your support was sometimes served with a side of your unfiltered, Korekore ChiKunda-inspired comments. There are things I go through today that make me wonder what you would say about them. For instance, I know for a fact if you were here, you’d be the one telling me everything I need to know about Autism because you liked to read on EVERYBODY’s behalf and then hook us up with the summary. But

I was today years old when I learned there was a difference between these two words: expectation and expectancy. Seriously…They meant the same thing to me! It actually took me back to a few years ago when I had a friend lecture me about having expectations of people. “That’s how you get disappointed Tari,” she said to me. At the time, it didn’t make sense to me. I expected people to behave in a certain way, to treat me in a certain way because I had been kind to and considerate of them in past interactions. But, I quickly learned that that’s not really how life goes. Another friend is always telling me, “Stop expecting other people to behave or react how you would in a particular situation.” We are all different. We have different priorities, levels of integrity, moral compasses, you name it. We are not the same, and, most importantly, we are not perfect. Then a few weeks ago, as I was listening to a discussion on an episode on Better Together TV, I heard one of the ladies talk about why we need to stop having expectations and instead have an expectancy. Huh? Yes, that was my reaction, literally. I rewinded. What are you saying? Immediately, I started looking up definitions for these two words as a start, because to me, “it didn’t sound right”. But how they unpacked it all blew my mind away and I immediately put this title in my drafts because I needed to share it with someone. Now, according to Oxford, expectation is defined as a strong belief that something will happen or be the case in the future. It’s rigid, it’s fixed and 99.999% of the time, it’s tied to a specific expected outcome. I hate saying this, but it actually reeks of entitlement. Of course, going back to my conversation with my friend, I started thinking, was I being entitled? OK, let’s keep going. I did create a picture in my mind of how things were supposed to unfold and, as my friend literally put it, I set myself up for disappointment because what then happened to me in reality didn’t match what I had established in my head. Sigh! Think about this: If you are expecting a promotion at work because you’ve been putting in extra hours, you are going to be very frustrated if and when it doesn’t materialise. I remember when I used to work at the bank, very long hours during my time as a graduate trainee. The major reason I was doing it was because it gave me an opportunity to learn more. There were so many distractions during the day from colleagues needing help and support and we would only get that focus time after hours, when everyone had gone home. That was the major reason. Now, on another side of my brain and soul, I was thinking, if they see me putting my head down like this, working hard (and late) they would see that I deserved a raise, a promotion and more resources on my team to support the work we were doing so that we didn’t have to put in these long hours. That was my expectation. And when it hardly materialised in the way I pictured in my head, it led to a great deal of frustration on my part. I’m sure you all know by now how that story unfolded. Outside of work, let’s think about friendships or any social relationship we can think of. This is where I was struggling with this because if I had been a good friend (sister, daughter or partner) to you, I expected you to extend the same “kindness” or “graciousness” or “loyalty” to me when I needed it. And if I didn’t get that, best believe, I’m going to be beyond disappointed. I’m going to be pissed! And this is what my friend was trying to rescue me from because she could tell how disappointed I was. And I remember thinking, how can I just go through life expecting the worst from people because that’s how I then translated it. It was either black or white. You either do or you don’t. And because I kept having these expectations, I continued to feel a lot of disappointment and sometimes even resentment and bitterness. Now, expectancy on the other hand, is the thinking, hoping or feeling that something, especially something pleasant, will happen or be the case – as the Cambridge dictionary puts it. It’s more fluid, open, and adaptable. When we live with expectancy, we are hopeful and optimistic without being tied to a specific outcome. That last part – without being tied to a specific outcome. Expectancy allows us to remain positive and open to various possibilities, reducing the sting of disappointment. Personally, it actually reminds me to maintain the posture of knowing that “No experience is wasted”. Everything is happening for my better good and this scripture has never been more true “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” – Romans 8:28 NKJV In my journey of life, shifting from expectation to expectancy has been a game-changer, especially for my emotional and mental well being. When I expect people to treat me a certain way, any deviation from my script leads to hurt feelings and resentment. But embracing expectancy means I can hope for positive interactions while understanding that people are complex and unpredictable and also making space for that. This mindset shift has not only improved how I approach and navigate my relationships but also my own sense of peace. Consider this: with expectancy, you can still hope for that promotion, but you’re open to other opportunities and outcomes. Maybe you won’t get that specific promotion, but perhaps another exciting project or role will come your way. Expectancy keeps your mind and heart open to the myriad of possibilities life can offer. So,