Tag: #memoir

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Tea cups….

I should never be trusted with soft and luxurious white hooded sweatshirts! They never stay without stains.

We lost a twin today. How does one even feel about that? I’m supposed to be happy we see one heartbeat right ? This has been such a roller coaster I’m just swirling around in a tea cup ride of emotions. The whole rest of the world is a blur. If the other one makes it to term will it feel like something is missing it’s whole life? I’m quite sure I’ll be told to think positively etc, but are real human feelings actually negative or are they just feelings? These are mine either way.

I am waiting to decide how to feel.

And we are also waiting to see if the rest of the pregnancy is ok. We did see a tiny heartbeat today. A glimmer. My intelligent mind fears the fact that if the genes are identical and one didn’t make it, that logically the pregnancy is in trouble.

And my heart hopes.

But what this blog post is really about is the first thought that plagues me as we haven’t been able to get pregnant for so long and now this.

This is unnatural, it’s a sin, and we are being punished. It’s against God. We are two women we shouldn’t be having a baby.

I know I don’t hold these beliefs and if there is a God, ours loves us too. I know that, but I have to fight so hard to feel that way.

I’ve forced myself to treat myself as normal as anyone else. To bravely announce proudly everywhere I go I have a wife. One day I just got tired enough of feeling like a bad person in so many ways for being gay. For breaking up a family, for hurting my kids, and their dad and his family.

Eventually all that responsibility just got too heavy for one person to hold.

I cracked open into fearless courage. It became necessary. It was a natural evolution to how deeply I harmed myself with negative thoughts about myself for so long. I tried to beat the gay out of myself. I would have done anything. I tried everything.

I think I’ve been in denial. I’ve built such a strong outward presentation for myself, that I’ve ignored the sting of my minority status.

I don’t speak to my mother. Guilt. I’ve been divorced twice. Guilt. I’ve put my feelings and needs before my children’s at times. Guilt. I can make deep connections but almost all of my early ones are severed. Guilt. I’m fucking gay. Guilt. I have a million thoughts. Guilt. I talk a lot. I am big and enthusiastic and open.

More Guilt.

I am guilty of being in denial.

I am denying the fact that if just in one aspect life could feel any easier for me for one second. If my family could walk down the street and have people look at us like a thing of stability and beauty, like the majority of families are already guaranteed. Instead of wondering who will whisper or become nervous around us.

I forced myself long ago to be so out and so proud, that I’ve been hiding in my comfortable life not advocating for those who aren’t as lucky yet.

I shouldn’t have to work at feeling normal should I?

So because we are gluttons for punishment we ate food we didn’t taste, shed tears we didn’t feel, and went and saw Boy Erased. It was intensely emotional.

After the movie I wonder why I don’t specialize in LGBT clients. I mean I never wanted to be pigeon holed to one population, but now I’m wondering if I would have just felt like a fraud. How can I help someone with something I still haven’t figured out.

Why is my first thought of us not being able to get pregnant and the potential of losing this one that it’s not the way things are supposed to be.

Why am I stuck with a belief in my head that’s not my own?

He’s the Boy Erased, and I’m the Girl in your Face…..

and the tea cup spins.

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These Dreams Go on When I Close my Eyes….

So this morning I am scheming and dreaming. I’m at the vision board and I’m designing.

The goal: my wife and I want as much time together as humanly possible. We found each other late in life. I understand with extreme clarity the fragility of our time together, and I don’t want to spend it in an ordinary way. What I mean by this is toiling and only having a free few moments together. I don’t want to be rich in money, I want to be rich in time. And it would seem though that money can buy time, and as long as you don’t spend ahead of the making, and get above your means, I think this can be achieved.

This is what I’m thinking about most of the time lately. Originally I had hoped to do this by writing a book. However as I learn myself more and more, I realize that to sit quietly I need time, and to get quiet time I need money. And with twins on the way I’ll never have that hehe 😉 but I still think I can do it. I always think I can do it. It is this naïve enthusiasm that has powered me this far.

Couldn’t we all have more naïve enthusiasm?

The problem: My wife is a 911 dispatcher and 7 years invested in a pension. And she holds our amazing health benefits that keep my Crohn’s securely cared for and has funded our IVF. Her schedule is terrible. She works 7-3 one week then 2 days off and then 3-11 the next week and 3 off after. We can never get into a schedule and I cannot imagine how she will do this with twin babies. Her commute is an hour plus filled with traffic. And her job is a lot of sitting to which her body feels as if it’s falling apart. It has gotten us this far, but we have added so many other elements to the story we are going to need a change.

Needs: good benefits for us 4, the big kids have Tricare insurance through their father. A flexible schedule to be able to take care of the kids. Less commute, more time together. Yes these are needs, not wants. So this is a tall order right ?! But how can you say it doesn’t exist if we don’t look? At this point we could have a reality tv show 😉

So we need to find her ideally a part time job with good benefits that she can enjoy, but have most of her time at home crafting and being a mom like she wants and loves. Something she can be active and engaged doing what brings joy to her.

So if you want something different you have to lay blueprints to those dreams. Then you have to ask, look, research, and not stop until you’ve found a solution. There are always many solutions it just never feels like it because our minds are wired to see potential danger. We don’t see possibility nearly as often as we see the potential for a harmful outcome. Fear rules the roost.

Our dreams: time together raising our family, having the means for a vacation together and to see Hamilton as a family, having a family cottage we can create memories in and mom can write a book, our little identical twins make it safely into the world, Tyler gets into the college he wants and transitions as smoothly as possible, our family will love and accept us and want to be engaged in our lives, writing and sharing our story, and there are many more! Oh and paying off student loans and financial freedom to buy time together.

To enjoy life. To really taste food. To get goosebumps more often. To art. To cry regularly. To love gently. To encourage and nurture humanity in humans. To be kind. To learn new things.

In other news I have been enjoying talking to people, walking in neighborhoods, fresh air and perspectives. I am enjoying the newness of it all. I’ve also begun to feel the heat a beat of less relaxation and more my mind spinning towards one task or another. And scheduling has been hell! Trying to fit dr appointments, knocking time, trainings, meetings, baby appointments, kid appointments, client appointments, and the list goes on.

I have long known that this level of chaos feels at home for me, but also parts of me have changed in that regard without really knowing. When I am busy and engaged I am happy. It’s no longer trying to outrun something, but more an energy fueled be enthusiasm. Yes that’s it! I’m not running away, I am running toward. And I feel good about myself in the world.

If you would have seen me 5 years ago, my struggles, my behaviors, my outlook…. you wouldn’t even recognize me. Life is all a matter of perspective, self-acceptance versus critical abuse, and finding connections that energize your soul.

I had to pick this post up later, and I’ve been very scattered. I would guess it reads that way. Life is a jumble when you’re in the midst of change, and it’s difficult for most to tolerate that feeling. I’ve lived on a healthy dose of it my whole life, and have found the payoff to be quite grand.

Write a new blueprint anytime you want to make a chance, you are after all the lead architect of your life, and you don’t want fear getting a heavy hand in your project.

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Big Dreams growing even Bigger

*I was pleasantly surprised to find this morning that even though I’ve prioritized some different matters lately, I am still a writer. This is an actual text I wrote to my wife this morning. “Babe I’m not out here separate on my own creating dreams and you asleep in bed. I’m out here trying to reach dreams because of how tenderly you wrap me in every fold of your heart. No one has ever loved me like you do. Not even a parent ever. Don’t you know what that means.”

I love a good blogging on a Sunday.

I was thinking this morning how amazing a thing it is in humanity that we can try on new ways of being in each new day. I think sometimes we forget we can give ourselves this special permission. It’s so exciting to try something you haven’t done before. Upset about your sex life? Do something about it! Go buy an outfit or read a book by someone blessed with the ability to have found openness in that department. Ps they never look how you think do they? We picture kinky sex goddesses and then see the author and surprise it’s just a normal person of average height and size.

Funny before I wrote this sex wasn’t close to my mind, ha. It’s odd how life and the mind work, and these days I am loving not having it figured out. But seriously take anything you’ve wanted to try or be more of. Want to be more adventurous, plan an adventure. Don’t think about it just pack enough stuff in a bag for the night drive away and stay somewhere. Stay in an air bnb, meet new people, eat at a new place. Actually taste your food, rather than eating on the go.

Have kids and think adventures like that are no longer yours? Make whatever you’re doing an adventure. A trip to the grocery store can be an adventure. Try a new sample, pay a person a compliment, drive a different route there and take a walk.

Anything can be an adventure!

A dose of mindfulness can bring magic to the mundane. Anytime, anywhere, anyhow. It’s all in your mind and your story.

Want to try a different kind of job? Do it! Where there is a will there is a way and if we plant an intention and water it with curiosity and exploration, anything can happen.

Many of my important a ha moments and inspiration for dreams have been brought about by movies. Which is really watching someone’s creative endeavor about a story right? So in my quest for love there have been some key movies. Julie and Julia helped me know how I wanted to treat and be treated in relationship. Watching Stanley Tucci and Meryl Streep delight in one another. That movie was more me than I was at that time, and it gave me a road map to my dreams.

A roadmap to my dreams was carefully wrapped in a 90 minute film that many might consider corny or not worth their time, but for me it resonated. A roadmap to our dreams can be anywhere. It can be hidden in the most obvious place. All you have to do is look with the magical gaze of childlike enthusiasm. Somehow I never lost mine. I thought I had, but when I met the love of my life it opened like a dam.

I’ve been blooming with creativity ever since and the courage to accept my dreams that have been laid here before me all along.

Another one of these movies was Cheaper by the Dozen. My favorite line was Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt looking over their high school yearbook and that one of them wrote to the other, “I finally found someone whose dreams are as big as mine.” I think of that line all the time in my current love. And of course my mind that was afraid to accept my own greatness thought well that’s just a movie, and of course in the movies people always have enough money etc. and that was just another way I told myself I wasn’t worth my big dreams. And I held myself back.

So not too long back I wrote about a dream about a cottage on a nudist colony in Woodstock Connecticut. One where I can write naked a jay bird and in my most authentic. A place that is free from all varieties of shame. My shangrila if you will.

But how would I do that? I was behind as usual, which is why my constant inner fairy godmother led me to solar, and here I am. I refuse to give up. So now I am banking the funds for my cottage in the woods. I mean look at this place?!!

Cottage is a bit of an understatement eh?!

Anyway so let’s do a dream checklist? Though I’m thinking of an art project that involves a dream map, and all the places the my roads diverged, and then when I have arrived so far….

Feeling like I belong: check

A healthy, respect filled, glowing love: check

Financial stability: while I often still have fears around this: check

Kids healthy, safe, and know they are loved: check

Education on a career that I adore and am passionate about: check

Writing: check

Self-love: so so much further towards this check than I ever was… in progress as always

Life still being filled with adventure: check

Big family: double check. Double being the operative word here.

Anyone see what’s going on in here ?! It’s very early to be completely sure, and can we ever be completely sure of anything ? But it looks like we are going to be having identical twins. We know they are identical because we only transferred one embryo from our IVF cycle.

So please sign us up for family of 7 reservation to our colony cottage. Mini-van and sanity checks necessary. 😉

Now just to wait and see if they are boys or girls….

And a fond shout out to the one who makes all these dreams possible my lovely wife. My wife who has endured hormones, injections, and poking and prodding over the last year that I’m quite sure she never anticipated in her life. An egg retrieval procedure, and then an embryo transfer. My wife who is battling through fatigue, 3 x daily progesterone insertions, nervous anticipation, nausea, new aversions and smells, bloating, and all the while enduring a horrific commute and protecting our streets by day and night.

My wife and my kids are my heroes and my biggest inspiration! They are holding down the fort and cooking meals, while I am knocking doors day and night to fuel our many giant dreams.

I am blessed beyond explanation, but par for the course, that doesn’t mean I’ll stop trying.

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It’s the day before another beginning… IVF moments

Some of the beginning of us…..

Anytime my thoughts are all tangled up in my brain, like many a brightly rainbow ball of yarn, my blog is the place I come for comfort.

Time has been standing still again.

We are in another freeze. We are 10 days post fresh embryo transfer. We have done everything right. We are quite literally on the edge of our seats. Tomorrow morning we go at 7 am to get the blood test that will show if her progesterone has spiked tremendously (mustn’t it considering the three times daily suppository), that basically says we are pregnant ish, or a stranger will tell us your result is negative, please stop taking all meds, and you will get your period in one to two days.

My emotions have always been intense and of the roller coaster variety. This however is like a ride you can’t even fathom in your imagination. It’s like being on the worlds scariest, tallest, most dangerous one with a faulty seat locking mechanism. If you can picture this whole thing it might look something like me upside down dangling out into the air with only my strength to hold me in the seat until it returns to a right side up position. Each time my palms more sweaty than the first and feeling like for sure I’ll just slip out and be on a free fall that ends with a plummet into the cement. The end.

Is it the end or another new beginning? And either way it will be the beginning. We will either begin to grieve and make decisions about taking a break, a vacation, though those funds become used in IVF, or whether we can dare to get excited. Even more nerve wracking is that we are hosting thanksgiving. So we are either going to be happily chirping about dreaming of our little speck happily bouncy in it’s turkey and cranberry sauce induced euphoria, or have to find a way to manage cooking through heart ache. And to smile back the tears.

If this is the case I feel like a dark cloud will always threaten our Thanksgivings. They don’t have a great track record so far, and already this year there are some disappointments before we ever don an apron.

The truth is I’m scared, and I’m also not scared. Because the world won’t come crashing down this time. I have finally gotten out of that purgatory, and it’s taken me almost a lifetime to do so.

This love strengthens me, and the love I am talking about is for myself. I often praise my wife (and she does the same for me), but the most profound thing here is that I am not nearly as unkind, if at all, to myself anymore. I will allow my feelings and honor them, and create room for my loved one’s as well. I’m not worried about falling into a destructive tailspin or checking out, or behaving impulsively to cope, thereby sucking out all the energy in a space.

I have learned that I can love myself more when I am stable and able to weather emotional ups and downs in such a way that I don’t do “must be nice”, to all the happy new parents right now. It’s still a bitter sting, but has nothing to do with something they have I don’t. Because I am learning to trust my journey and have faith.

After faith betrayed me so hard in the beginning (never faith itself, more the institutions that professed to sell it), I never would have imagined I would find my way back.

The truth is though to have faith in a higher power, but none in yourself would be a grave situation indeed. I am learning not to be bathed in such self-doubt, and so many painful pages replaying of my story. Each day is a new adventure and even the hard ones, especially the hard ones are more opportunity for growth.

Now if you ask me to sound this calm and grounded if we hear that negative result for the 4th time, I won’t be able to find it for a bit. But I will be able to rest in the arms of my loved one, and hold my children in mine (ours), and we will learn to be more loving and grateful for every small thing through this process.

This process makes me take my children for granted less. This baby is not the only thing that matters while they dust in a corner. This whole process has brought me to my knees in some kind of sacred prayer that I have these three. And I would say if you can find that during the teenage years, even for a moment you’re doing something right.

This whole thing is just another piece of my thawing. And if for some crazy reason we are not meant to have a baby together I have to try and believe that was so we could love each other, and the kids we have now even more. I have to choose to have this be my process before I encounter the actual emotion, or I run the risk of being sucked under.

Finally making this blog post feels like I’ve just been administered CPR and taken my first gasp of air. I have so many loves in my life. So much love inside and outside of me.

I almost can’t even paint anymore that something won’t be ok. Of course my brain already is harping away that that is when life gets you, and it will. To be human is to suffer. It will reach you. If you were lucky enough to avoid too much in the beginning as you age and watch people lose loved ones, and have profound disappointments, and watch the news and see the violence and shambles our nation is in right now.

I’m always my most afraid because with a very difficult beginning your only hope becomes some relief. So then when you go into the years that naturally hold more disappointments, when you are no longer naive to the pain of the world, you feel like none of your layers of skin are there to protect you.

I thought I was fragile by now. Since my long ago forged armor has fallen away. And I’ve transformed my disconnect from me emotions into my own connection system. And I’ve fashioned the self I want to be from scratch. I’ve put in all that effort, so if the story turned to tragedy after all that, it used to feel like the world would end.

But now I am much wiser than I once was and much kinder, and since I can trust and love that self I know that I can be graceful in my disappointments and teach my family from that composure. Most days anyway 😉 I’m still as human as ever. Actually much more human than I was ever allowed to be.

I cry when I need to cry, I rest when I need to rest (or I try anyway ha), I ask to be touched when I need to reconnect to a safe space versus fear, I give myself what I need when I need it. It feels calm.

So right now I feel calm and scared. Before I would have felt panicked and scared. My wife is the one who has undergone all the procedures, her poor body, all the hormones, and who has bravely jumped right into the middle of a harrowing adventure book. She jumped with her whole heart. She knew I never needed someone to only stick a toe in the water again. And that has given me all the strength and courage I ever needed to become who I always was.

Here we are….thank you for loving us and being on our journey.

Trying to bring a new member to share all our love with….

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Ivf: a love story

Every time I have fallen in love I’ve always thought my heart could not possibly get any more full or it would burst. Then every time I do, I realize it’s stretching capacity. It’s like a pair of jeans that never get too small, every person’s dream right 😉

What I am in the midst of learning blows away every variety of rigid thinking, supposed to or should be. Never underestimate your adaptability folks. Your brain is wired for it. It can be a little hard to wrap your mind around that, because it’s always wired to complete tasks quicker by the railways of habit. So when you make it think a different way and go off the tracks it’s first reaction is to balk.

But if you keep going through that resistance that’s where the payoff lives.

Lately I am completely wordless with presence. I’m living less in my head and more in the storybook creation of my life. I like the layout, the language, and I can’t put the book down right now.

Yesterday was embryo transfer day, and I am just here basking in the glow of so many emotions I didn’t even know were there. Sometimes you can’t know how you will feel until you’re feeling it. Sometimes you’re just called by an unnameable gale force wind and you have to follow that absurdly until the next great realization.

I’m in love with my life lately, and that’s more than I ever imagined. It’s like being on ecstasy 24/7. Disclaimer I’ve never actually done that truthfully, drugs freak me out I’m too much of a hypochondriac. Life already burns bright for me. I feel gratitude for every tiny thing.

Anyway yesterday we experienced being able to see our new baby be transferred inside my wife. It was unreal. Admittedly there is a lot to sort through emotionally using the sciency approach and fighting feeling it’s somehow still less natural. It’s always a challenge in some way not to feel less than, and that challenge is increased when you’re a woman, a minority in any capacity, etc.

But it’s the challenge that makes you even more fiercely grateful, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world.

We are lucky and blessed to have our family and friends cheering us on at this time. I’m still my whirling dervish self and constantly need to be learning and challenging myself to new growth levels. And I’m enjoying being a parent, a partner, a warm guide, and a friend.

Baby’s first photo. This is a fully formed highest quality level blastocyst (baby dust) hatching from its protective layer. Hopefully right now the little one is firmly embedding itself into the uterine lining and will develop from the size of a microscopic speck (anyone else thinking of Horton Hears a Who), into our much anticipated bundle of joy. And sleepless nights.

Yesterday was a gorgeous New England fall day (in November).

My wife’s twin was able to come, and the reaction of all the fertility doctors and nurses was hysterical, many double takes. They made the hole thing really fun and many hugged us and wished us well. Snow patrol chasing cars came on and of course tears were shed. The embryo traveling in looked like a quick shooting star, and there it is: we must wait and see if that spark becomes a glow, and that glow becomes our beacon. And if for some reason this one isn’t the one for us, we must have the courage to begin again, but we aren’t at that part of the story yet. And for once in my life I refuse to skip ahead. I want to taste every delicious word as it unfolds.

We celebrated our victory by getting tacos and an authentic churro to share, at the food trucks on Long Wharf. The water sparkled under the sun’s golden fingertips like a bed of diamonds. The air was crisp and cool, and not a single fearful emotion could touch my mind, not a single one.

This is what living is really all about. Daring to reach for what you really want in life, sometimes not even knowing what exactly it is until you have created it!

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Ivf Retrieval Day

It’s retrieval day!!!!

It has been feeling like the (an) end to this journey, but it’s actually just the beginning.

It’s the end of hormone injections and the related symptoms, and the end of a great many questions and nervousness. The end of three failed iui treatments and all the associated emotions. And yet it’s the beginning of an even more intense period of waiting for phone calls from the lab on the development of our little one (ones).

It’s beginning again down a road into a dark forest and not knowing what’s on the other side.

Will we get lost in there? Another gigantic disappointment, another cycle to wait and more hormones before a frozen transfer if this one doesn’t stay? How much of this roller coaster can we take? It’s been such a wild ride. But for the first time in my life even amidst sometimes crushing disappointment nothing feels like life or death.

I never even pictured having another baby, ever.

I spent most of my life worrying I didn’t deserve, nor was I up to the task of the first three. So to find myself standing here, calmly walking toward my next dream with confidence and joy. It is a dream like no other. I’ve already won the lottery, and written the best seller, and recognized my singing voice on stage in a moment of sheer shock and gratitude. Finding my love already feels like all those things mixed.

It has changed me so profoundly I am becoming rewired.

So many of my anxieties are calmed. And this isn’t a momentary high from idealizing something that turns out much differently. This is the real deal. Steady on my feet and walking headfirst toward another amazing dream, one I never saw.

It’s not very often life surprises me.

This is because whenever it did when I was young, and that was often, those were not good surprises. I became hyper vigilant and carefully in control of each happening to avoid further pain. But that has its side effects. And finding this love has surrendered me back into a childlike dreamer I was always meant to be.

I’ve turned my Stephen King movie into a John Hughes one. Sorry Stephen I love your work, I just wouldn’t want to be in one…. again.

And I used to be too fragile to be in the creation of a dream. Any setback would crumble and tumble me, and lead me down a path of dark thinking and misery.

Now I am finding faith and a well balanced way to view reality.

So it’s neither fantastic or terrible, but a mixture of both of those moments on a steadfast bridge of love.

I have a family of best friends on there with me, and I’m finally adjusting to life in partnership and belonging that I couldn’t feel I deserved before. Now I am accepting this as my life, and everything that comes with it.

So here we are…. I’m about to be a “nearing 40” new mother. Here I am, the happiest I’ve ever been.

At another new beginning….with knowing there will still be so many more.

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Letter to a friend, profound gratitude at 4 am

My dearest Katelyn,

It’s 4 am. The bulldog had an itchy fit. That creature is an abomination sometimes, often, lol. Anyway I got so cranky he wouldn’t let up I’m now wide awake. I’m struggling to breathe, damnit I’m so allergic to cats. We will have to take my car on our next adventure, and before you feel bad don’t, I had the best day.

So here I am in the bath contemplating my existence and what came is how grateful I am for you. Both you and Courtney seem to see me through a lens of generosity I can hardly even comprehend.

In some ways you’re like Teflon it seems, like nothing can touch you and so brave and outgoing, and yet inside you’re so incredibly sensitive and care so much for others, it’s actually humbling. In both these ways you’re almost like a mirror for me. A twin flame of sorts. And I can’t imagine what I’ve done for you, other than make your best friend happy. 

Kate I am becoming emotional now because you cannot imagine the world I crawled out of. Most of the people I grew up with are either recovering or not recovering in NA and AA. My grandparents who sort of raised me are dead and gone, nothing left, and my only memories are of me torturing them as a teen, I never got to see the other side of adult relationship where I cherished them. My father will be dead two years this December and his parting words to me were concern about my emotional stability, cold steel blade to my throat. 

After one last time of thinking I could weather a relationship with my mother for her benefit I cut the cord and let myself loose again, floating out into the unknown that had to be better. 

As far as biological family I am alone in the world, and not only alone, but ever aware of the wreckage I arose from.

I know a flare for the dramatic in writing. But how can you know what even a single kindness means if you do not know these things.

And I’ve grown wise enough to know that people can still have their family close and be just as hurt by their intended care. I am not as naive anymore, I do not assume I have it worse. I used to feel sorry for myself in this way. Not productive.

Your line about the difference between people who don’t make it at Vivint resonates strongly with me. “They are the weak”. And we are most certainly not.

I love what working for Vivint represents to you and how much you have grown as a result of rising to that challenge. If I understood it correctly you were coming off a partnership that challenged your worth as an earner and as having passion. And it appears there were so many other benefits as well. The people you’re connecting with, your self-concept, and financial security and confidence to name a few.

It’s actually your strength and energy that makes me think I can do this at all. The fact you believe in me, and even said I could be “better than you”, not that this is relevant, but I can’t tell you how much your investment and faith means in me.

You, Courtney, and every person who so easily sees me potential, worth, inner nature, you are the parents I never had. And it heals me constantly.

This is what I feel energized by. You’re like a lighthouse. And I’m so hopeful that I can turn this opportunity into something that can help me enjoy the confidence of freeing myself from feeling a financial burden. I’ve been behind since before I began.

Making continuous poor decisions financially with no parachute, because I never had one. I’ve been free falling, grabbing onto a cliff here and there, bloody knuckles and hands and clinging for brief rest, and letting go again.

And now I have gear, goggles, helmet, glider, chute, all the protection of friendship and a found family, and from all that security I am able to have fought hard enough to be able to enjoy bringing a life into the world with a true love, one that is the kind I am wired for. To feel I deserve that second chance and this much love and support, is a daily task. My beginning experiences tell me otherwise all the time. This is a battle I have made companions with, its familiar, but it may never fully be over. 

And here you are another beautiful gift from the Universe helping me with an opportunity that can alleviate the stress of my student loans and not being able to provide enough for the children I in many ways grew up with. I want to give them the world for having faith in me, when it’s been so hard to find it in myself.

Even buying those Hamilton tickets would have been unthinkable a couple of years ago. And it would be hard to do much of my dreams or fun things, if I can’t make sure the responsibilities I already created are not set up. My life force begs me to do both/ all. But my thawed out heart forces me to have enough empathy to consider the feelings of those that my choices impact.

So if I can make my days feel a little less life or death all the time by being able to pay off my student loans and help the kids more and support Courtney and our baby… then sign me up. I am so hopeful I am up to the task and that I can weather fears of making others uncomfortable and rejection that has been the hallmark of my life, that I’m so nervous about that trigger. Except I think that this task is before me, to realize the enemy isn’t that big anymore.

This is yet another opportunity to learn how to love myself better by rising to a task and learning from the whole process.

So all of these words, these intense, dark, deep, grateful words are to say thank you for believing and investing in me.

Thank you…

Christina

Sent from my iPhone

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Time. A most valuable asset.

Time in reflection is so necessary for gratitude.

There was a time that I ordered one meal at a restaurant and split it three ways for my kids. A time we all rented a small room upstairs in the home of a generous woman as I labored through school. A time when we finally got our first real home approx 7 years ago. Nicer and larger than any space we had occupied as a family. There was a time when in this home a relationship didn’t work out, and I didn’t know how I would pay the mortgage. This is when friends who became family moved in and we made it work.

There was a year I was so lost and lonely. Alone on Christmas Eve, I watched The Holiday and cried, and cried the whole day because I wanted that forever family with a person who saw me, didn’t resent me, and is a woman 😉 I never thought I would find that with how full our lives already are. I had been told and shown that a lot of people prefer to create their own from scratch, not learn how to mesh in an already made world. It’s not shame or in need of pity it’s just true.

I’m a lot. I think a lot. Strive a lot. Dream a lot. And before I was loved as I am now I panicked a lot! I wasn’t always kind when I was scared. I own those truths, and I need to live with them, and continue to try and be a better version of myself…

And now this a time where I get a constant infusion of unwavering enthusiastic love streaming through my veins. A partnership where we truly are best friends and want the same things. My wife teaches us the art of small ego each day. She doesn’t take things overly literally or get bent out of shape easily. She is genuine and loving. And we can be lighter, and more genuine and loving as we learn from her.

This is a time where being kind is more important than being right. A time when it’s ok to slow down and feel feelings and moments without rushing. Without rushing. Unimaginable for me. If you only knew.

This is a time where I have money in my bank account and have paid down debts, and can love myself more for those efforts. A time I am learning to put off instant gratification just a little bit more to create a safety net for my family.

This is a time I can play and enjoy life a little bit, there was a time that I thought I would never have time like this.

All the time I have left in this world is yours….

💜💜💜

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On becoming real…

I have a relationship with my writing that has developed silently by; that I am only realizing now. If I just trust myself a little (ha) and trust life a little bit, my needs are met much more easily than I ever imagined possible. Writing shows up, and I’m learning to show up for it as well. We have had a tentative courtship for years, but I always RE-coiled as less than worthy, and so writing couldn’t be close either.

Recently I saw the movie a Star is Born. It awakened the young songwriter and poet that I dismissed when I was young. I forgot all the dramatic song singing, all the pretend play, all the notepads filled with writing. I’m slowly remembering them now, going back for my child, reuniting us.

It’s raw and difficult work. It seems so secondary to the pressures of adult life, but something is slowly showing me that it’s actually necessary. The catch to all this new enlightenment ?! I feel everything. I am raw all the time. Vulnerable as a newborn baby. Living new lives within a single life. Defying gravity.

I continue to progress and grow as a Clinician, my sessions deepen and my clients return. I am learning new ways to love and be loved. I can cry when I feel like crying. As a mother I struggle to keep the same rigid beliefs and templates. But I just can’t. I empathize now. I am closer now.

I always thought I was keeping them at a safe distance from me. But really I think I was keeping a self that is so much more fragile than she ever knew safe.

Life is going to touch me now. “I’m a real boy”, the wooden parts abandoned for soft and breakable skin. And this means I am scared to death lately of my own emotions sucking me under. They are giant, terrible and beautiful things. They are mine and I can’t reject them anymore, or hold myself compartmentalized. But I am so very raw.

I’m safe and strong now, and I’m also the small child I was never allowed to be. And that’s confusing and scary. It’s not supposed to be, my backwards life. It’s intense and too much to bear or understand for most people. It’s weird and unknown.

“Tell me something girl, are you happy in this modern world. Or do you need more, is there something else you’re searching for.

“I’m falling’

In all the good times

I find myself longin’ for change.

And in the bad times I fear myself

Tell me something boy, aren’t you tired of trying to fill that void. Or do you need more, ain’t it hard keepin’ it so hard core…

I’m off the deep end, watch as I dive in. I’ll never meet the ground. Crash through the surface, where they can’t hurt us. We’re far from the shallow now.”

The movie was a spiritual experience for me.

My work deepens. No shallow living here.

Part of me still tries to panic as we ready ourselves to create a life and bring them into the world. But that part has grown quieter, it doesn’t run the show anymore. In its absence peace and joy are filling in.

And as an existentially minded person I know beyond a shadow of a doubt the cost of loving with the much of an open heart will be excruciating pain at some point. I can’t use a superstition or an illusion to numb me from that truth.

I always know. I am acutely aware. And the acutely attuned suffer more. I’d take a guess that’s why so many artists numb in ways that destruct themselves, and obliterate their loved ones with them.

And I’m so aware I can’t even do that. The tendencies are all there, Born or learned they are there. They try and seduce me; but there’s just too much life to experience that I must feel. And I could never live with myself if I let those I love suffer with my self destruction. So I recognize I can’t destroy my soul either, by not allowing my emotions, because they overwhelm me.

Everything overwhelms me….

If I don’t feel I can’t art, and if I can’t art what’s the point of it all anyway.

And if I can’t love two feet in…. my kids, my wife and myself….

then I can’t rest.

And if I can’t rest, I can’t write

And if I can’t write I can’t breathe.

I’m two feet in now….

Maybe I should write a song about that,

About what that feels like.

Maybe I will….

Once you realize all your dreams really have come true…. once you’re not running anymore….. you have nothing left to do but surrender into whatever moments life has in store for you. And that’s such a foreign feeling.

I’ve been creating my life for so long, so intensely. I don’t know how to sit back and enjoy everything I’ve worked so hard for. And if I don’t find out how, I’ll drive through the rest of all of our lives frantic and seeking, when everything I wanted is right here.

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Bathroom accidents or profound life lessons?

To the tune of I saw the sign by Ace of Base….

Today’s lesson brought to by my second “near death” experience in the shower/tub.

You may recall a few weeks back that a cabinet fell of my bathroom wall and showered me with breaking glass and debris and turned my writing sanctuary into a post accident trauma scene.

Well I had a similar experience this morning. My wife had installed a shower caddy to hold our ever growing family’s bath time needs. She had also installed the cabinet so she’s beginning to doubt her installation abilities, we don’t want that. Plus this makes for great life lessons.

Any tiny thing can be a profound life lesson if you choose to see it that way.

So this morning as I was filling the bath, not even in it yet, the whole damn supply tree flew at me, two deep bruises and a tiny cut, not to mention a big mess to clean up.

But not nearly as big as helping my kids not worry about me or my giant emotions. That one will take some work.

My first thought “my bathroom is trying to kill me”, or my wife 😉 second thought “what did I do to deserve this, as if today isn’t tough enough already.” I’m preparing for my 4th colonoscopy tomorrow morning. I’ll spare you the gory details, but it isn’t much fun.

As I traveled through those emotionally driven negative thoughts I began to think, if this has happened twice in a short amount and of time what exactly IS the message here.

And a wiser and calmer conclusion appeared:

“When things get too heavy and full they come crashing down.”

We can’t blame the installer here, because in both cases with a large family and a minimal understanding of physics (though our son is working on it), the clear culprit here is over-loading.

The universe always seems to have my back.

Any and all of the problems in my home currently between family members is a crashing down from being over-loaded with something, and then our less than best selves emerge.

We can become heavy with our own thoughts, too many bad ones about our selves and the shelf comes crashing down.

We can become over-whelmed when we don’t make enough time for play along with our responsibilities.

We can become pressurized to the point of bursting when we don’t feel close with others and like we are seen and understood.

The good news ? Wait there is good news?

Yes. It wakes us up to reconfiguring the whole set up. It helps us to examine and reassess the situation. So when we set it back up, we can make adjustments.

Now we will only use the necessary bathroom items on the caddy. Now we can clean up everything and put it back neater than we found out. Figure out what is necessary and what is just junk on there.

Now we can notice when the thing begins to get over-crowded and looks like it’s going to snap. And we can do that for and with each other as well.

As someone who lived much of her life just piling things on herself and believing she could carry it no matter what. This lesson teaches me to pause and be deliberate about my decisions, check in with myself and my family. This heals the impulsivity that was naturally gifted to me by my experiences in childhood.

I learned to run fast, and as I am learning from Madeline L’Engle in her book Walking on Water: reflections on faith and art, and from Pete Walker: Surviving to Thriving, and my vicious bathroom:

I must slow down, stay open, and RE-assess the situation. Simplify rather than complicate my life.

Now after a lifetime of the opposite just how am I supposed to do that? 😉

“Generally what is more important than watertight answers, is learning to ask the right questions.” Madeline L’Engle

❤️