*I love that I am in a relationship that I choose to drive 30 minutes in the opposite direction just to be with her for a few hours between clients and then all the way back to Fairfield. It’s already coming up on one year of marriage and I still feel this way.
An impromptu afternoon. The more that I sit and intend/attend to writing, the more comes. Surprise surprise. 😉 I am sitting at Safari Kaffeine across from the most beautiful woman. She is fiddling with her new toy (a Sketchbox), watching a tutorial on how to use special blending pens to draw a sketch of an attractive looking gentleman. She just paused to show me how the KOH-I-NOOR kneaded rubber eraser and the magical lifting effect it has on charcoal. The coffee shop was buzzing with various conversations from local valley inhabitants. Nothing could possibly interest me more. Except for maybe my attention being stolen for the purpose of sorting out car insurance for my firstborn son. That process arduous and frustrating as it may be.
Tyler as a character. Could I write him? Having read Anne Lamott this a.m. and having a nice dose of her as daily vitamin/medicine I am thinking about character development. Speaking of character development let’s talk about arguing for a minute. The purpose of it…. my ex-husband argues for the sake of doing so. Some internal ego battle being played out on the co-parenting field, wreaking havoc amongst the ranks, sigh. I can hear my grandmother delightfully chirping that song “if you can’t say something nice…. say nothing”. Interesting because she had an invisible way of being mean by the way of shame. When the person isn’t even aware of what they are doing or do, what use is it to try and make sense of it or point it out. You can really only try to do better yourself. This is what I have made most of my life into. I have unknowingly embarked upon a mission of being committed to knowing myself above all things. Mostly in my early years this resulted in a way to emotionally terrorize myself, as what I was most aware of were my many shortcomings. Natural behaviors of youth and immaturity became material to analyze for threat and I “worse case scenario’d myself” about myself for a long time. Finding no calm for this anxiety, and a variety of others as I discovered many things about myself including my many blind spots.
As I wonder about Tyler as a character I sift through what I know about young male characters. Let’s see we have Holden Caufield and a young David Foster Wallace…. wondering how he will be alike and different from them. How his unique experiences will shape the landscape of his life. I was thinking this morning about how to encourage him as far as college. Part of me wants to keep him as close as possible and of course reduce costs by encouraging practicality, and the other part is screaming screw practicality get on the other Coast or another country even and see new things, and DO STUFF. In the end these choices will be his, but I know I have a tremendous influence on him as well. You don’t realize when your child is first placed into your arms that someday they will be a real life “almost adult”, and that you will be vulnerable to any suffering they experience without your consent. To love as deeply as I do is a divine suffering. To not love like this; impossible. The choice was never really mine. I didn’t know I loved like this when I first decided to have children. I didn’t know a great many things then. Knowing them now doesn’t make the feelings any different.
It’s time to head back to the office soon. I don’t want this time to end. I am sitting here thinking about how a coffee shop barista is not unlike a mental health counselor in many ways. People are looking to share their experiences and what is going on in their lives with others. A musician that plays with one of my favorites, Lee-Ann Lovelace who sings with her whole soul (they play Monday nights at Crave) came in for coffee, he is talking about how he brought his cat to the vet today. He ordered a large coffee with a little mocha. Never heard it ordered like that before. I like his hat. It reminds me of a hat of my wife’s that she wore on our most recent date to the casino. It’s very St. Patrick’s like… very Irish I suppose I mean.
Ok back to reading Every Love Story is a Ghost Story, basking in the glow of my love, and then my office and clients.
*When I was a kid I devoured as many Chicken Soup for the Soul books that I could get my hands on. I remember they stirred something in my empathic soul. I can still remember some of the stories to this day. I kind of wonder how much of my value system was formed in those, always telling tales of people who would go above and beyond and then the effect that had.
Let’s see what kind of Sunday thoughts I can organize (or not organize) with a house full of eight girls. Am I having a birthday party you might ask? I am not. My daughters are very social and love to host their friends. With such a great group of friends how can a mother argue. It’s such a wonderful thing to hear their laughter and to watch them all experimenting with who they are and coming into their own. This is one of those moments where I am at the top of the parenting mountain and able to catch my breath for a few moments and take in the breath taking view. These moments will quickly blur into the rearview and the next challenge will be on the horizon, but it’s incredibly important to soak them up and log them into the long term memories folder. The issues I was speaking about in previous posts with twin A have subsided for now. We finally came to an understanding, a partway meeting of sorts. Her attitude has been better ever since.
Today’s blog title began with me buying ingredients after I dropped my son and my adopted son (emotionally not literally) off for a day of work at Trader Joes. They are sixteen and part of the my first work program, and I couldn’t be more proud. It’s a great company to begin learning from, and a job that was able to carry me financially and personally in ways I only am able to see now through a painful divorce and many transitions in my life. My Trader Joes family will always be an important piece of my personal history. It is so good for my son to be out in the world learning about new things and people, rather than just holed up in his room playing video games. I am proud of the balance I have encouraged in his life. Granted it is not always easy to know how much to intervene and how much to let him have his own lessons and conclusions. I am putting a lot of work into that recently as a parent. A Client session recently and the movie I love Simon, brought to my awareness that I can be a little overly intrusive into my kids lives. You know trying to pry them open like using a knife to open a can of tuna, for their every feeling. I mean I know the value and necessity of having a space for that, but with my own children I just may not be that space. It’s heart breaking to acknowledge that. But seriously where is the magic formula for when to make sure you are involved, and for when to give them space? If I ever find one I’ll let you know.
So my trip to Trader Joes was for ingredients to make chicken soup. They are chilling on the counter right now, waiting for the teenage girls to depart the kitchen. The reason I am making a pot of chicken soup (not that I need one, it’s delicious and becoming a staple in our home) is because I am really struggling with my Crohn’s Disease right now. It’s flaring it’s ugly head. My typical MO is to try and deny or ignore, or reduce it. In the past I have told my self that I was sick, and therefore felt even more sick, believed I was sick. I believe in the power of the mind. This is a good thing except when that belief reduces the validity of my very real experience with this disease. It’s coming up on five years now since my diagnosis. The testing and my own knowledge suggests I had it for long before it was known though. I guess the theme of today is balance as my trouble here is trying to strike a balance between acknowledging and validating my disease, and yet not letting it take over my life. How do I know then when I am really sick … (ok the teenagers have asked me to play computer video games with them, and I’m actually really thrilled at this age I would even be asked, so I’ll have to come back to this).
This turned out to be a lot later. I just finished separating the bones from the chicken and the soup is nearly done. Turns out it is the perfect thing, because twin B has a sore throat and hardly slept. I got sidetracked and ended up trying to delete some of the 18,000 pictures/videos on my laptop. That task, much like cleaning out my e-mail feels insurmountable, and probably is. I wanted to sit and read for a good solid hour. It’s gorgeous outside so perhaps I will try for out there. It is still chilly though. I started reading Every Love Story is a Ghost Story, a book about the life of David Foster Wallace (author of The Infinite Jest). Something about it was calling to me. I have yet to figure out whether this reading ADHD is pure genius and exactly as it is meant to be or whether I could definitely be doing better.
Here are the books I am currently reading: Lisey’s Story by Stephen King (thought its been months since I picked this one up). Bird by Bird Anne Lamott (I don’t want it to be over). Carry on Warrior by Glennon Doyle Melton (Wambach). 3 or 4 books on brain and behavior wiring etc that are all WILDLY interesting. The whole series of Julia Cameron’s the Artist’s Way. The 3rd installment in the Ripley series (Ripley’s Game I think) (the book series that the movie The Talented Mr. Ripley was derived from, by Patricia Highsmith.) I am also trying to read magazine articles, because lately I am wondering if a way to begin with a smaller goal of getting my writing out there, would be to try to do articles first. I just started listening to 11-22-64 I think it is? by Stephen King on audiobook. It hasn’t captured me the way The Dead Zone did, but I also have been doing different things with my time.
On the home-front my first born son, (and only son I will ever give birth to) just passed his driver’s license exam, and pending some insurance sorting will be making his maiden voyage of a first solo car ride shortly. I am proud, astounded, nervous, awed, reflective, contemplative… and so many things about this. I told him this morning that if he isn’t careful and something happens to him I would stop breathing on the spot. Too much pressure? Seriously though I would. I feel simultaneously like still my 20 year old self, and also this foreign entity that has a 16 year old boy with a driver’s license. I am both selves, rich with everything in between.
The thing that is happening the most lately is the writing piece. If I look back over the past couple of years my reading and writing has grown exponentially. If I can avoid the gremlins who say things like: yes BUT you aren’t published, and who really reads what you’re writing anyway, and couldn’t you be doing something more productive to make money during that time, and it’s frivolous, and it’s already been said, and on and on and on. If I avoid those guys and just take an objective look at the facts. This is my 41st blog post, and even as I am writing it I feel it is just disjointed, and who would get something out of reading it, and my ADHD and Crohn’s is trying to sabotage my existence.
Speaking of Crohn’s to bring this post full circle. I am really struggling right now. The migraine’s have spiked up again, which likely means inflammation is wreaking havoc in my body. Last week I thought I was going to pass out while a new client sat across from me, I felt heavy and far away from my own body, and for a second I almost warned them. It passed, but the memory of the feeling and the fear it would soon return did not. I have been having ringing in my ears followed by rushing and pressure in my head often throughout the day, my hands and legs and fingers etc have been going completely numb or unpleasantly tingly during the night. I’ll wake up with a swollen hand, severe nausea, terrible stomach pain until I use the bathroom. My temperature regulator feels broken, I can be freezing and not able to get warm or too hot and puffy and swollen. My abdomen without warning will swell to a 5 month pregnant status. I can hear my stomach running and it feels like my food tries to call back out of my esophagus. At night I have been “flushing”, red hot feverish episodes that come on without any warning and leave people asking if I am ok. The only remedy is to lay down and rest. I don’t want to lay down and rest. My body is sabotaging my natural enthusiasm and joy for life, and it’s so hard not to be angry about this, to deal with it with grace and to not fear the worst. The possibility of surgeries etc. But even that is a distraction from the very real fact that each day having some unpleasant physical symptom that I am attempting to ignore, banish, push through etc, adds a gigantic extra layer of exhaustion to my life. More overwhelm, and lately this is the thing that feels the biggest threat to the breakthrough of me writing. 🙁
One of the worst aspects is the having 0 idea of when it will strike. Another terrible aspect is trying to look for ways that I have caused it by being unhealthy etc. From my understanding while certainly you can make it worse by being excessive in certain behaviors etc, for the most part you can’t really do anything when you have a disease to control whether you have symptoms or not. I mean you can try to be as healthy as possible, but it may or may not stop the symptoms, and unless you want to live in a bubble and not enjoy anything. I mean there needs to be what’s this b word again? BALANCE as with everything. But even then. It is hit or miss. I can eat something one time and be fine, and eat the same thing another time and be miserable for hours.
There have been times when I have had a few “bad tummy days” that I was afraid that I was coming out of remission, but I recognized that to be just fear. However I think this is different this time. Whether it is or isn’t the process is completely draining and sends me pummeling the air with my fists until I break into a fit of tears. I don’t want to give one ounce of my life up to Crohn’s. I refuse. My will is not enough here, and I have never come up against something where this was true. Somtimes when you write yourself all the way to the spot you needed to reach the emotions just end up flowing. This always happens for me, the dead center of the fear or the helplessness when touched with the tip of the needle bursts. I am at the mercy of this disease. Not since I was a child have a felt so helpless, and that was not a place that was very pleasant for me, so being brought back in this way evokes strong emotions from my core.
Back to David Foster Wallace for now. Oh a quick thought about that. I am still always more interested in reading about the creator, than what they created themselves. People will always be the most interesting thing… the why, the how, the when, the where of their lives. Endless fascination….
I think I’m getting sick. Ugh. My head is all fuzzy and fluffy and I just feel a genuine sense of being ill at ease in my body. There is a lot of pressure in my head and my ears keep popping. Yesterday between Clients I battled a migraine all day that finally won by the time my time was my own. I couldn’t get comfortable and hardly slept. Remnants of the migraine have threatened to come back today. I am not sure which is more responsible for my nervousness about something feeling “off” in my body; my Crohn’s Disease or my PTSD. Often my thoughts tend to find themselves preoccupied with thoughts of death. The better my life gets, the more at peace I am, the more these little monsters gnaw. My theory is that the writer in me as Anne Lamott says;
“The climax is that major event, usually toward the end, that brings all the tunes you have been playing so far into one major chord, after which at least one of your people is profoundly changed. If someone isn’t changed, then what is the point of your story? For the climax, there must be a killing, a murder, or it can be a killing of the spirit, or of something terrible inside one’s soul, or it can be a killing of a deadness within, after which the person becomes alive again. The healing may be about union, reclamation, the rescue of a fragile prize. But whatever happens, we need to feel that it was inevitable, that even though we may be amazed, it feels absolutely right, that of course things would come to this, of course they would shake down this way.”
is always trying to come up with a dramatic and unexpected ending. I mean isn’t there another way to do this without my immenent demise. Come on brain get on my side already.
Perhaps it is the inevitable part I mean. Why am I always trying to write a tragedy or the emotion I want the reader to feel is what coincides with the heroin’s end just as life get’s easier for her, just as she can have peace. It is as if peace was that unreachable, as if it was never hers no matter how hard she worked. She struggled her whole life to reach her dreams and bask in them for just a brief second before her end. Why is this the ending I keep seeing for myself? Why does anxiety rule so much of my land? It is exhausting. If I am the creator then why does the story feel like it’s trying to take a life of it’s own. I have a hunch that it is my existential roots rearing their pragmatic heads. I know, have always known that there are no guarantees and that “life can change on a dime”. This last line being in my head I can quote to having begun to listen to 11-22-63 by Stephen King. I am about 36 minutes in.
It’s an interesting tale of how I came about to be reading Stephen King in the first place. Let’s see my first knowing of him at all was when I worked in video stores (circa 1996) and would see movie covers for Carrie, Pet Cemetery, and KujoActually to this day I have never read or seen those movies. I think I read the Tommy Knockers during my young traveling days when I moved from Medford Oregon, to Moses Lake Washington (where I would give birth to my first born). I never even saw the original IT movie, while most of everyone I knew had. Several years ago to the movie Stuck in Love was recommended to me (I am trying to remember my whom, it was Ash I think ironically enough, that is a whole other story). Anyway in the movie one of the characters gives his girlfriend the book, and they share an intimate exchange where he says that she will cry in the end. Cry I thought? I thought this was a horror novel. It was enough to pique my curiosity. However due to my appetite for life and my many varied interests I still have not finished that on audiobook or paperback, yet I have finished The Dead Zone, Bag of Bones, am about 1/2 way through Lisey’s Story… and I have seen the new version of IT. Later someone I am a big fan of, brought Stephen King’s Memoir On Writing to my attention. It has one of those jacket’s that is soft and buttery to the touch. Of course now it is all worn from carrying it everywhere. I blew through the first half all about him specifically, but I couldn’t bring myself to finish it. This unfinished book is because it was so dear to me and so good I couldn’t bear to have that feeling of loss when it was over. So it remains unfinished. I don’t know if there really is a mystical meaning to this madness of reading a little of this and a little of that, and the timing of when things cross my path, or if I just need to get my ADHD in check a little better. As I am writing a thought just crossed my mind, mine is a lot of acronyms for anybody to live with; ADHD, PTSD, HSP (highly sensitive person), IBD (inflammatory bowel disease)…. hmmm. Being sick scares me extra because of taking Humira and having a compromised immune system. I am waiting as usual for the story to take a turn that somehow feels due (again why I don’t know) where I end up having a real and true scare with a hospital visit and an infection I can’t seem to fight, like they warn in the fine print of the brochure. Why do I feel like a ticking time bomb? Why does it feel like I am due for a bad bout of things, and all the stories about these possibilities are regularly run pieces in my mind?
Some information about PTSD and feeling dread that the future may be shortened.
Sig is driving me crazy. He’s in tasmanian devil mode and it feels personal, as if my attempt at writing while already not feeling well is being utterly sabotaged. As I roll my neck and close my strained eyes, taking in a deep breath and attempting to block it out. Just as I do he ramps up and barks as loud as possible and smashes into my laptop. One of my least favorite parts of not feeling well is the irritability that goes so against my natural enthusiasm for life. I can’t stand feeling on edge to the point I grit my teeth hard just to maintain control. All of my muscles tighten. My already high priced small window of attention sits like a train that has been de-railed. Frustration sets in. Heartburn blazing through my esophagus threatening to burn right through. Sometimes I feel like I might go up in flames. No one is home right now which amps up this anxious feeling. If someone was home then they could at least find me if my now 2 day long stint of a head filled with pressure turns out to be more serious. What is the acronym for hypochondriac ? Add it to the list.
Well this took an unexpected turn. Tomorrow is a badly needed day off, though as of late taking care of the dogs is actually as bad as two toddlers, and the kids actually help with this a lot. I think it’s time for a vacation. Sounds like it eh?
Something always seems to prevent me from the well intentioned writing that I just keep getting closer to. I refuse to give up on this dream, no matter how difficult finding the space to nurture it may be. This past couple of days though it’s been physical aspects that stand in my way. In those moments I feel robbed unfairly of something that is supposed to rightfully be mine. Something I’ve worked incredibly hard for.
These are some of the scattered, painful, frenzied up close things. When I step back for perspective, what I see is someone who only spoke wistfully of writing (as if she dreamed of being someone else) now about to complete her 40th blog post. I see someone who couldn’t sit still long enough to read one book, having finished about 5 already this year and well on her way to several more. I see someone who while running a thriving private practice and learning about business ownership is still making daily steps to nurture her dream. This is how I battle the not feeling well. I keep my focus on my dreams. I dream of my first novel in print, what it will look and feel like. I dream of having a Stella with Elizabeth Gilbert and that she will endorse my book. I dream of being able to afford a life that is even more my own so that I have time to go to a cabin by a lake and be with my thoughts and allow them space. If you could literally see the dogs going nuts right now and how hard I am working to get the rest of this out, it would be comical really, or sad. For now I am going to curl up with Eat, Pray, Love the movie and try and rest my weary body. Try to beg for it to heal and let me have an energy filled day tomorrow so I can pursue my artist’s date and walk, and so I can find magic among the mundane.
I wanted to write a post about the debate I am having with myself over whether or not to take Martha Beck’s Write into Light course. I think I am running out of steam (patience), and will have to save that one for tomorrow hopefully. For now here is some information on the course.
I’ve been lost in the trenches lately. The high of finally finding a healthy love has waned into the realities of blending a family, and helping teens navigate the murky waters of adolescence. And that is ok, it’s part of the process. Wouldn’t we like to stay in the good feelings forever? Why must we also wait and feel through the hard times? For perspective of course. To wake us up to all that becomes invisible in the rush.
I’ve been riddled with ADHD lately. I am really suffering with it. As I vibrate with an almost visceral certainty that my story will be written and shared with others, the closer I get, the further I feel. What an illusion! The Universe is a great trickster, and I’m taking the joke overly seriously all the time.
I seek something to fix this pain all the time. Chocolate, food, happy hours, snuggles…. some healthier than others. My frenzied mind that constantly is telling me I’m running out of time. Always miles ahead in awareness. I can’t even hide from existential truths long enough to allow more joy. One of my greatest tasks right now.
This morning I’m thinking back to a time when I worked 40 hours, had internship and full time school. When I didn’t breathe, and I somehow managed, and now I have way more time… and yet it seems always not enough. I’m thinking this not enough bs is a filthy filthy liar. Why are we like this? Is it an innate drive meant to help us survive ? Then why is it killing us in droves? It’s killing spirits and dividing families, and it’s simply not true. We are enough, we have enough. We are usually more than we realize, and have more than we realize.
I have relationships with Clients that are valuable and I have one fully present hour a week, and even later move to every 2 or 3 weeks as they fly out of the nest more often. These are meaningful relationships and they are just one piece of the puzzle. So why do I always see mine with my children as I can never connect or do enough? It’s deeply painful. Maybe that’s also why they feel it’s not enough? I’m afraid sometimes that my kids get even less than that one present hour weekly even. Often my love is shown to them in acts of service in between things. We can’t always see a transition as it’s happening, and after are left reeling to figure out how to adjust. That’s what I am going through right now.
I stumbled across a show the other night on Netflix. It’s called Atypical. One of the best things that ever happened. First, it’s depicts so wonderfully some of the challenges children and parents with autism experience. I love that! But the part I really identify with is how as the teens grow and face growing up, the parents are also facing who they are, and what their roles are now? They are up against feeling less needed, and being pushed away. I identify so much. My last tiny one who has begged and begged for time with me is now bristly and defiant. The breaking of my heart is audible. Mostly because I realize how many times she asked for just a moment of my presence, and I didn’t know the value. I had free front row seats to Hamilton for one of the best experiences in life, and I was lost in my head worrying about providing, and my health, and figuring out how to run a business. If I had just lifted up my head out of that fog a little more. What if I screwed up? And see even now I’m doing this thing…. because weren’t there still moments of beauty in between? But my hurried mind is always trying to skip ahead, it can’t settle down enough to just be in a moment. I know I am not alone in this.
It can never just be that I am meant to be this way. It always has to be what’s wrong with me, and how can I do better. One of those questions helps, and the other hurts. I work so hard to ask my mind to just take it one moment at a time, but it wants to bite off ten. It’s painful really. We have to work with what we have though, and find outlets, and places and people who understand our brand of crazy. And we have to work harder to see enough versus not enough. It’s our only choice.
So many hard working beautiful people suffer at the hands of perception and misunderstanding, and our own innate nature as human beings. One of my greatest missions is to be a part of alleviating this. One of the best ways to do this realistically and fairly with life’s demands is simply to realize: your story as is has tremendous value!!
Hopefully in an upcoming post I’ll be talking about how wounded people, wound people, and that there is hope for this. Listening and seeing when we hurt someone, being willing to look at our own part is the key to change. It’s messy work, but on the other side it’s so worthwhile.
My life’s work has been on healing fractured attachments. I had to begin with my own, understanding my own behavior and actions, and fight to make changes. On the other side … this space where I am healing I can see where I have been, and it makes me able to help understand when others have found themselves there. A wounded healer, and an earned secure. This work is not for the faint of heart, and it’s also not impossible. Are you ready for your life to feel better ?
It’s been way too long since I’ve made a blog post. It hurts my soul, as if I was longing for a loved one gone. Like a magnetic force I am always drawn back to my roots, my grounding force, my solace. My own mind has always been where I have found my comfort, I realized that while on this trip. My wife and I have traveled to Maine, the car ride here was about 4 hours, minus a couple of stops. We finally have a chance to be away with our thoughts, feelings, and each other. Thank God… I can breathe again. And yet as quickly as I’m ready to be away I am also pulled toward home and my beautiful children. They never cease to amaze me and the growth and evolution of our relationships are a whopper of a tale. Speaking of that: memoir is what is on my mind the most this morning. The working title is still “And Then She Danced”…
When I was around 12 years old I found a new best friend. Her name is Gena. We have since grown into our own lives and don’t keep in touch, but Facebook indicates we are both living full lives of our own design with some of the most important goals we each set out for being reflected. To make a long story short (for now, you’ll have to read my book…), I’ll say that when we met she was hip and cool. She was up with the times, knew all the MTV songs, wore make-up, stole her brothers clothes and made her own style always. I learned a lot from her confidence. She was short and cute, a voracious reader. And of course my long time crush fell immediately in love with her, and they dated… I was devastated. If I knew what it was to be gay at that time, I would have realized I was jealous of him 😉
But anyway let me continue. She danced and I didn’t. I was always taught dancing was bad (strict Seventh-Day Adventist roots), and I also had lots of trauma making my body totally locked tight. I still do. It’s still a mission, on my mind a lot more lately. Body work I mean. Opening my hips and my chest, letting the demons that are stored within free, so my body can catch up with all the work my mind has done.
I always admired people who danced with confidence, and Gena was one of them. She had the movie Dirty Dancing at her house, and we watched it. My life was changed forever. Thrill and intrigue and I immediately wanted to have adventures and take risks and be like Jennifer Grey. Boy was I more like her character in many ways than I realized, albeit much more awkward. I asked Gena if I could borrow the movie, she let me, and what proceeded is a funny story I often tell whenever the movie comes up. I faked sick from school the next day and watched that movie over and over, pausing all of the love scenes and rewinding them, and of course any of the dancing scenes. This was my forbidden fruit. I was remote-ready for anyone to walk in, lest it be taken, or I would have been accused of terrible things.
To this day I could probably recite that movie from beginning to end by heart. Sometimes we don’t realize until we look back how much something had to do with the shaping of our mindset about life. Perhaps my sense of adventure and spirit was, to this day, to thank for coming across that movie at that time. I know that it was changed tremendously from knowing Gena and her family. So the beginning of my memoir might begin with a scene about me skipping school to watch this movie and all of my thoughts at that time…
Thinking as usual this post should have been titled “and I’ve had the time of my life”, or something of the sort. Through blogging I’m hoping to see on paper my styles and road blocks to organizing my thoughts into something enjoyably readable. This is what I am working through partly on here. You get to view content and process.
So here in Maine I’ve managed to add an item to my bucket list I never even realized was there. Thinking perhaps we all should have a “dark bucket list”, with things we wouldn’t necessarily add by choice, but by definition they end up being also an important part of our life. Something like seasoning in a soup, the flavor, making it the best part.
My dark bucket list item: “Accidentally setting my hair on fire”, while away on mini holiday. This catchy title would probably have people definitely wanting to read more.
When I go away my priority is usually ambience, coziness, and water. These are my elements. Actually, funny I should add fire to this mixture, kind of appropriate. I mean I usually like a fire place. I don’t think I’m quite adventurous enough to want to actually be on 🔥. This clearly the product of too much multi-tasking. I had lit a candle on the side of the spa tub. I’ve never been good at gauging distance, in fact I’m remarkably poor at it. I had my hair up in a bun-like conglomeration. I had gotten lost in talking to my person and just the relaxation of it all. A couple of times we heard an odd noise that seemed like it was coming from the other room. We both looked at one another quizzically, but carried on. Turns out that strange crackling, rustling sound was my hair burning away behind my head. Her eyes widened as she saw what was happening before words could exit her mouth. I began to try and pat my head (like a true genius, at least my hands were wet…), and she finally shrieked put your head in the water, quick! I flailed about, slamming my knee into the faucet, hard enough to see stars, and also my head as I dunked under water. What followed was a hideous odor of burnt hair, and tons of tiny particles of it all over the water and in the air. Thrilling, let me just tell you…
My writers mind raced to worst case scenarios, like my scalp was actually burned in places and I would require medical attention, thus ruining our trip. This last part is what I’m always concerned with. Not my safety, but that I could make someone else uncomfortable or have made a time that was supposed to be relaxing worse for them. This has deep roots in core beliefs about being a burden. It is deeply ingrained.
Anyway the competing elements of the worst case of this scenario ended up being my battered knee and my bruised ego. My hair seems alright. Of course I haven’t dried and straightened it. In its wild, wavy state… it appears to be “manely” in tact. Ha, see what I did there? 😉 I’m lucky for many reasons, I have a lot of hair, and now I can include this one.
We managed to calm our frazzled nerves, and my frazzled ends, with homemade blueberry pancakes that were the fluffiest gall-darn things I’ve ever had. The bacon was cooked perfectly and the fruit medley with papaya was like manna from heaven. I don’t know why I would make a Bible reference when things have been so tough for us lately in the name of religion, but that’s another blog post altogether. This place is beyond amazing. The couple has owned the Inn for years and they bring fresh homemade breakfast to the room each morning at 10:00 am, it’s only a few more minutes now until today’s delight will be revealed and experienced.
We spent the rest of our day yesterday exploring the kitschy little shops, the ones that are open anyway, much of this town is shut down for the winter season. That’s how you obtain cheap Groupon rates, and how I am able to do this. We ate at a place called Federal Jack’s rich with the history of beer brewing. Had lobster rolls and havarti with dill and crabmeat sandwich. For dessert a homemade Boston Creme pie, with an Irish Whiskey whipped cream. Ridiculous. We have made somewhat of a tradition of playing cards at bars while away and asked for a deck. It was a Red Socks Deck, and Courtney said “make sure and wash your hands after touching these”, they were sticky, but nevertheless … it was a lovely time.
Afterwards we went through some more stores and procured the cutest damn lobster pants you have ever seen, a matching set of course… and an outfit for the baby…. the one that will hopefully come more into reality around March…. we will see. The outfit has lobsters on it and says “butter me up”. It’s insanely cute. I can’t believe I am 37 and going to begin this adventure again…. even more unbelievable is how I can’t find a shred of doubt…. I thought the selfish writer was my most prominent self. It actually may turn out that nurturing mother was possible all along, and not just some attempt at having a family I never really grew into. But really of my choosing before I ever even realized how much.
For as long as I’ve remembered I’ve been deeply concerned with what kind of person I was. Even as a child my constant focus of movie watching (even Disney) was making sure I felt like “the good guy”. I have had an over-sized conscience always. I remember often wanting to rid myself of it, so I could partake in normative teenage experiences. But I would over-think/ deeply think about everything. Nothing could just be done. Which is an interesting compliment to my natural ADHD blessing of impulsivity. Later in life after I had decided to choose to rid myself of religion as my reason for “trying constantly to do everything right by someone else’s standard of right”. When I finally started to allow myself my own life, which created tons of inner conflict, then impulsivity took me far out of balance in the other direction. Then I had to face the most egregious of all wars, knowing full well when I had made an action that was unfair to someone else. They say ignorance is bliss. “The mysterious they, whoever they are.” They in this case would be more correct than they even know. Ignorance is a bliss I have never been afforded. I was gifted with a keen awareness of self and others. I can make connections in an instant that others have kept carefully out of their awareness for years.
I cause pain. This gives me great conflict. But then pain opens up the possibility for healing. I don’t just rip off the band-aid. I apply salve and anti-biotics as well. I am saying this to myself for the first time. Realizing I am not sinister, even though the feelings of the actions suggest it to my “Jimminy Cricket.” Being unwittingly tasked with being a person who reveals painful truths for a living, I am only now coming into the full realization of how this mixes with my shit, and creates a dangerous cocktail. I am proud and it is an honor to do this work, and it also takes a toll. It takes a toll more when it is personal, as it is for me right now. When I am inside the pain, not an ally and observer.
I shake up systems. Family systems that have operated on unspoken rules for years and been “just fine”. The thing is those unspoken rules often create great invisible pain for those that are silently expected to repress in the name of someone else’s comfort. Do the others not realize the discomfort of the person asked to adjust? Do they literally shield themselves from painful truth that much? Or does some part of them know and refuse to look?
Part of my coming out process included me learning to introduce myself as gay and not wince. It took awhile, but I recognized early on that if I seemed ashamed people will hop right on that bus. I knew the feeling of repression before I knew how to name it, as most of us do. It’s a silent and slow death by poisoning. It saps just a tiny bit of your soul in each interaction. And since it can slide by so unknown the damage resides on the inside. A beautiful smiling husk that keeps others happy while the inside is rotten and burning with pain. The holder of the families pain, struggles under their burden sometimes named depression, all the whole elaborate defense mechanisms as intricate as scaffolding’s you see on skyscrapers in New York City. They deem themselves the weaker of the flock, when really they are the strongest.
I seem to always be the common denominator in the equation of relationship that demands truth to be fully seen and listened to. I have never been able to stay quiet about truth; my gift and my curse.
Today I sit in extraordinary pain as the love of my life and I experience what it feels like to be seen as different, somehow less valid. I am tasked suddenly, like being faced with an oncoming accident in progress, with navigating this treacherous terrain. Of behaving with grace and compassion in the face of invisible and subconscious judgment. It’s innocent enough. My partner being asked by a sibling to not make their father uncomfortable on his birthday by me coming to dinner. That’s in the name of justice right ? It’s his birthday after all. So my beloved is expected to take a seat at the table, hold back her tears, and her self. She is asked to present the husk, the representative only, her true self is not welcome to the table. “Forgive them because they know not what they do”, it is ironic isn’t it that religion should come to mind right now. The pain is searing. I wonder if they know that? I suppose they also take for granted their permission to get married, be a couple, and to show up at events not making anyone uncomfortable with their presence. She is “asked” to only talk about things that won’t make anyone uncomfortable. Keep it light you know, work, whatever can be accessed without revealing too much. Exhausting. I wonder if they know how exhausting to be asked that?
I am in a raw state of pain right now. So I turn to my writing and my speaking truth out loud. It is salve. It is bandage and medication. I am angry and hurting, and I promise to turn all of this emotion into something that helps others and not into the pain that caused it. That is my promise. My place at the table of warriors who protects those who don’t know words for their feelings, and who have been silenced by lethal expectations, sometimes unspoken: the ones the highly sensitive notice and take on themselves. Too heavy a burden for anyone, but their heart will try nevertheless.
I don’t trust myself right now to write any further without being unkind. I have learned to stop short of that and process and synthesize my feelings until how I express them is of my choosing. Using wisdom rather than weapon.
It’s been a weird couple of weeks. I wonder if it’s something in the Universe and others have felt this way as well, or if it’s just unique to me? I feel like when I haven’t written (on here) in awhile, I need to find my way back to my writer self. The muscles groan and protest, as if they are saying “you can’t just come and go as you please and expect us to function, this is a commitment. That’s how it feels anyway.
I’ve been consumed in not feeling well lately, and exploring the emotions that arise here. Lots and lots of anxious thoughts, and worst case scenarios. Probably not helped by the fact that I recently saw a campaign to raise money for a woman with stage 4 lymphoma. The woman was someone who traveled in circles of friends of mine at a significant time in my life. During my newly being “out” as a gay woman phase. I knew people who dated her. I hadn’t thought about her since. And here she is with a wife, two adorable children, and cancer.
As humans we protect ourselves in a variety of ways. One of those ways is a powerful, fully operational form of denial. It is constantly present. This idea that could never be you. The less degrees of separation bordering you from a truer realization or your fragility, enter more anxiety. I often function by thinking thank goodness that isn’t me, and quickly busying myself with a protective layer of every day life that holds no room for morbid thoughts. But I am the type of person who possesses a keen awareness of the whole truth and nothing but the truth, as much as my human mind can comprehend. Often I wish I wasn’t, because then my mind would not be able to drive me as crazy with its frenzied thoughts of madness. To live fully is also to be mad I think. Mad with desire and mad with fear. Because if you know how much true beauty there is to be had in even the simplest of moments, you also know how fleeting those are. Always outracing an invisible force, that only I seem aware of. Or only I appear willing to acknowledge, and when I talk about it frankly I know the darkness in my thoughts frightens others. It’s like we know but don’t say it. You’ll jinx it. What superstitious creatures we are.
The first of the not feeling well began with some odd pain in my upper back, and extreme fatigue. I remember laying with my partner and feeling the first 2 fingers on both my hands be sort of numb and tingly. This driving me crazy of course, firing all my alarms there’s something wrong here, and the story tells if worse horrors then a flare up. It always does. I couldn’t get warm to save my life. I’m often cold. As all the weird feelings took their turn on my body I steadied myself in her arms. A safe space. Thank God for my safe space these days. It’s the only reconciliation I can find for knowing that my days are numbered. All of ours are, and someday maybe, like my grandparents, we will be resigned to checking the obituaries page daily and reading aloud to one another about the latest friend who has passed away.
The episodes include flushing. A delightful thing that is triggered by being over-tired, alcohol such as red wine, and sometimes stress. It feels like you’re on fire, mostly just your face. Hot, head achy, and dizzying. All you can do is lay down, maybe and ice pack and wait to it to pass. Often this is followed by a bad stomach and then elimination that leaves you shaking and freezing in an exhausted heap after. Either too hot or too cold always, the days you feel good being remarkable in their noticeability due to rareness. During times like this it’s a guessing game of what yuck Unidentified symptom will be the flavor of the day, and how you will keep the silver linings ever present as protective cloak. After only so many days you feel your spirit being eroded away at, and the irritability sets in.
Being overwhelmed happens so easily when you’re trying inside your head to manage your invisible symptoms so no one worries or feels sorry for you. Trying to feel normal. If you fall into the trap of thinking about them too much, or too much validation you run the risk of letting it take over your spirit. I refuse to do that ever. But then I think of how draining this is, and cannot imagine fighting cancer to keep my life. It’s hard now. I fear I would not be up to that task.
After the couple of draining days follows a moment of hope, a good day. I bask in it, soaking it up to carry me through the rest. And then the back injury, ironically it happened when I wrote my last blog post. Sat too many hours in a tall kitchen chair without lumbar support (apparently). Because when I got up my back was sore and I couldn’t figure out why. But with as many ailments I thought par for the course and carried about my day. What was supposed to be a quick trip to The grocery store to drive my son to work, became a nail in the tire and 3 hours at a shop with bored twin teenagers. We ate McDonalds, gross no wonder I’m sick 😉 it was 16 degrees and the only walkable distance to bide our time. By the time I sat and got up a few dozen more times into that evening I was nearly paralyzed. Could not walk without agonizing pain. Since I’ve also been down this road I called a physical therapist I know and trust and got in right away. This story could become so long… so let’s just say I finally won the round for much needed pain medication. I may have won the round, but it feels like I lost the game. Going on two weeks of limited everything. Co-pays, heating pads, one wrong move and spasm again after so much hard work… the back let’s up and I get 1/2 a good day and the migraine strikes. Pulsating, furious, making me nauseous. I take the migraine medication and feel weird like I may not actually be breathing, like my heart may have stopped altogether, like if I go to sleep I may not wake up. All this has been in between work and life and dogs and snow and ice and teenagers.
So here I am today at the beginning of two much needed days off, and I’m so afraid they will need to be spent resting, because the migraine remnants have left nausea and a sapped spirit in their wake.
Amidst all of this writing is my breath of fresh air. This is me when I can find hardly the will to do anything still fighting for what I love. I have wanted so badly to write, and yet my mind has been consumed with pain. It’s nearly impossible to think when your body is racked with one symptom or another and you’re just trying to catch your breath in between. This is my way of honoring my experience. When I see it on the page I judge myself. I sound so dramatic, it’s not as if I have stage 4 cancer. This perspective becomes a slow dance with denial, so I can live as fully as I want to. I was blessed with an iron clad will. My gift from the Universe. It must have known I would need it. I choose my reality regardless of my circumstances. I have chosen for it to always be this way.
This is an experience I am having currently with chronic illness. Right now it refuses to be ignored, and constantly sucks at my writer’s soul. Stay tuned because I refuse to give in. Stay tuned because between the night sweats, pain medication roller coaster, confusion of “the correct approach at healing”…there is wisdom between the lines, and between the symptoms.
Remember that song by Meatloaf? I used to really like it. In fact I really love the 80’s and 90’s genre of music in general.
I’ve spent the last several days in a tremendous amount of pain and it’s taken me on quite the emotional journey inside myself. It’s amazing the more we exercise our awareness and noticing muscles, the easier it becomes to clearly connect the dots on the why’s and how’s of our behavior. For example I notice how short I become when I am trying to manage pain (in this case physical) on my own without asking for understanding and stating my needs openly. When I try to be strong, but that model seems to fail. The “suffer in silence don’t scare your children one”. I want to create a more in depth post about chronic pain versus acute, and a story about some of my experiences with both.
But first what’s on my mind tonight.
I am learning to realize you can apply some of the same concepts of romantic partnership to parenting. That in fact the old school model of parents and adults very separate from kids has its flaws. Of course on the other end of the spectrum is too enmeshed, which has its own set of issues. So what I was thinking about when I drove home is getting a bouquet of flowers and splitting them amongst my kids/partner. It was a daydream of sorts and random, but when I considered it’s meaning I found not to forget the little ways to let someone know they are special. And I know how to do this so much better in adult love when it’s only one person to please. With 4 people it becomes so overwhelming financially and thought wise that I usually give up. I show my kids they matter in all the normal parent ways, my responsibilities. But do I show them how much joy they bring to my life and not burden? I fear this because it is my nasty core fear that I keep trying to feed, and because I speak so openly about my struggles at times.
So on the way home I was brainstorming the how’s of this all… and then now I am still thinking about it. I thought what common ground do we have? How can I show them without being unfair or being accused of that anyway regardless? So I came home and laid down with one of my daughters in her room. And just decided to sit down and not rush or expect anything, to just talk. Meanwhile the other one became very frustrated that her Star Wars movie she had been watching with my person (her person too;)) was on pause and kind of blew her top. Alls fair in love and parenting. You can’t please them all, and you can’t take personally when a tiny, over-tired, irrational dictator, finally lets go of all the feelings she has been holding tightly onto. But because I am a human being I did. I came to hide in the bath. This is 1/2 good. It’s a healthy coping mechanism. I wrote through my feelings and much more peaceful now. But not before I told her very sternly that she won’t get what she is looking for by speaking to me like that. I was very angry. She really blew up and kept going and going. You can’t please them all, especially your own children. You will need to find validation and gratification for all the hard work and sacrifice you have done for your kids elsewhere. You most likely won’t get it from them anytime soon. I’m 37 and still learning lots about perspective and gratitude.
Anyway I had an adult temper tantrum, internally this time thankfully, and came to soak it out. I came to commune with all the invisible parent spirits before me who have been down this road. In the quiet of my magical sanctuary I can do this. So I started to think about ways to relate and to do things together. Things that aren’t focused around money spending and extravagant gestures. Just authentic connection. But also trying to feed their interest and encourage growth in that way. Tall order ? I think so….
And of course the mall popped into my head…. and I could nearly picture Rian beam with joy at a new outfit and shopping date. And picturing that even almost made me go out and arrange it right away. “I could be a hero just for one day.” In a music artsy mood tonight. I could. But at what cost to them?! What would I be taking away in all the giving.? If we are to consider things in one direction, always for good measure I try to run the opposite scenario.
Do you know how many people (myself included), give in to make their lives feel easier, and to feel better by the immediate gratification of a child’s smile. The problem is when it empties as quickly as it spread because their mind is already onto the next moment they get what they want. So the mall would be the easy way, but only on the surface. I don’t wish to live on the surface…. not ever. So I must dig deeper in myself for ways to be close with my kids and connect that don’t involve stuff, or getting their way. It works folks.
I’ve watched my children be better people when they constantly are forced to remember how fortunate they already are. Perspective is everything…. perception is important to look at. We are the teachers and the students and it’s harrowing work with very little observable gratification. Long hours of overtime and very low wages. But at the end of the day would you change a thing. You have only to call upon a special vivid memory to recall why anyone would want this. It will be your most meaningful work. Meaningful and gratifying are two different things… I think in the end it will be both. But both require you to see further, to see past the end of your nose, to see below the surface of the dawn lake water glistening under the first peek of sunlight, to see the gifts that lie deeply beneath what the eye can see. Your children are gifts and they have gifts, unlocking that potential lies in how much we build them up and encourage, not in one thousand trips to the mall for a desired item. Don’t lose vision and perspective, especially when it gets tough, that’s when life is asking you to step up, to grow. Rise to the occasion, and you will light the way for them.
*this blog became by unrefined process very disjointed. So here’s a little help. If you are interested in parenting and the struggle involved, if you are a Highly Sensitive Person, if you struggle with Chronic Illness. If you are seeking balance in your life in any way. If you have a blended family, or are struggling with co-parenting with an ex partner. If you enjoy reading other people’s story, and delicate weavings of past, present, and dreams for the future, then you may enjoy this. If you are willing to sit through a writer who goes off on tendrils of branches, and who is currently finding her rhythm and tone.
So here I am in the midst of daily struggles with teenagers. I want to share with you a raw accounting of my personal experiences, again so you may resonate and find something helpful within. I do this for myself and for my readers: gorgeous reciprocity. I know intuitively and from my daily work in my career that I am not alone in this battle. I spend the largest chunk of my time trying to sort through the insurmountable task of ever keeping the big picture in mind versus getting caught up in moments. This feels nearly impossible. I believe in fact we are wired to respond and react to what is right in front of our face in any given moment, and it takes a considerable larger amount of effort to sort through how we choose to act on any given impulse or reaction to the entire process. Exhausting. I am exhausted a lot of the time. So let me first lay forth the extra complexities of my personal situation at hand.
Factors to consider: I am divorced, their Father is involved and pays his share, which lessens my burdens considerably. I am always aware of this, and how much better I have it than others. Since scales of comparison are rarely helpful I usually don’t use them. But I am careful because parenting is the hottest of all topics I think. We are ever wanting to do it well, and mostly in situations that feel like we are failing.Everytime we figure out the system and make a grand jump over a hurdle clearing it with strength and agility, the course switches up on us, landing us on our faces.
Back to the factors: Despite his support and involvement in the kids lives that I am ever grateful for, our working together to parent has intense complications. He remains at a certain point in our lives that I have moved much further beyond, this means that he has an idea of me that is constantly creating complications. Think believing in the worst possible version of someone, and this is of course MY interpretation and I am aware of that as well as the fact like we all do, I have blind spots. I think it’s being revealed to you this is a loaded topic. So for the purpose of not losing sight of the original plan of this post we shall summarize as the logistics currently are probably the most difficult part. This means that due to his career in the Coast Guard he has mostly lived far away during their lives. Ohio, then Boston, and now Staten Island. He comes for all things important for the kids and shows up, which is lovely. BUT he has no space near here to have them at overnight etc. This is further complicated by the fact that Tyler now has a job and needs rides to it, and he can’t just go to his Grandparents in upstate NY on the weekends. So the time I was able to have just for me while they are with their other parent is really only decided last minute, and often with just hours spent with him, but not overnight and all of them away. This allows for tensions to build between us and difficulty to arise and not much of a break to get insight and recharge. I understand that with families not in divorce perhaps they get no breaks, but also this is their set up. Each of us have unique struggles. I can only write so intimately from my pool of truths, and subsequently learn from those.
I am definitely going into detail to the degree that I might be losing “the point”. I am learning about how my writing process works or doesn’t haha. I try to be concise and summarize, but perhaps in the feeling space, that is more difficult to do. You are getting unrefined writing here. Perhaps the flavor is not nearly as good as something that has been perfected, but we are not there yet. We are just beginning.
So factors: An ex who isn’t my biggest fan and navigating his military career and how that changes the choices, and map of how we handle divorce and co-parenting. The careful tip toeing of honoring another parent’s journey with their kids in the face of criticism and bitter old wounds, that the smallest of things seem to resurface, even all of these years later. A non-traditional, non-consistent custody schedule, a new partner that they are learning, after several partners they became used to who departed, (severed connections are no joke on the heart) their personalities, my personality, their wiring, my wiring. Add in a healthy dose of misunderstandings, high sensitivity, strong strong personalities and character which I love, but is impossibly difficult in practice….
I used to go eat out at buffet’s when I was little. My grandparents loved buffets. Always buffets. JJ North’s Chuckwagon and Home Town Buffet, low in quality and large in quantity and variety, food excursions. They disliked needing to tip (which I think that you are still supposed to, what can I say they lived through the depression), being limited to one type of meal, and not “taking care of it themselves I think”. Also they appreciated the affordability. And my Grandmother bless her church going soul, loved to pack as many cookies as she could possibly nab from the dessert area into napkins and into her cavernous handbag. I recall snickerdoodles and peanut butter being favorites. I chuckle at this memory. He most egregious of sins being all the VHS tapes we rented that she copied with glee and a touch of shame (as the warnings exclaimed that this was a federal offense), and her stolen cookies from the buffet. I imagine she experienced much guilt over this, and yet another part of her was exhilirated with the mischief. Anyway the point of this story was that if life was a restaurant I would choose a buffet (even though I won’t eat at them now, yuck) and I would fill probably 5 plates full of every possible food, and try to eat them all. Yep that’s what I do. And then I end up sorting through the indigestion and gastrointestinal distress of it all. Which is quite the fitting metaphor for someone with Crohns Disease.
Maybe I should have just called this blog post factors? Maybe I’ll just keep going and it will be the book. “Maybe it’s Maybelline at this point”…this popped into my head, a charming and witty line from a dear person who has been in my journey from their blog that I highly recommend. Credit Kat “the Wizard” from. http://www.seekerandthewizard.com
So here I am at present day with three teenagers whose turn it is to be allowed to learn/audition to navigate the world, when some parts of me are still so delayed in my own process. Here my partner and I are trying to establish a new connection and have enough time and resources for that, while having our main task be loving and teaching these kids well. This has gone quite poorly in the past, and my assessment of readiness and also the want to spend life in this way of people I chose in the past did not end up working out in the whole story. But in the scheme of things I have embraced each of those journeys as completely necessary and can find nothing but affection and gratitude for each of them.
We have a full home. We enjoy entertaining and offering what we have in love, food, comfort, and space to others. We both, all of us really, enjoy this. We like entertaining and cooking for others and inviting them over. We are very social creatures. However that takes a huge amount of effort in terms of upkeep. We have two dogs. One of them an overly neurotic border collie with a gargantuan pile of issues, whose favorite pastime is barking at the highest pitch you can imagine at the mail person the entire time they are on the street. We have a couch, it’s a funny story really in the scheme, perhaps I will tell it at some point. But both my person and I came with “stuff” from our past. We have a very over-priced couch she was forced to pay for in their break-up, and it has no place in our home of children, and misbehaved pets. So a great deal of time and stress is keeping this thing nice in a house that is not a museum. We even had a therapy session surrounding it once. This couch is the perfect couch for a single couple (gay of course because of it’s impeccable taste ;)), and for dinner parties and a gorgeous, clean, non-chaotic, floorplan. So both dogs attempt to scale the couch to get into the bay window to bark at anything they could possibly bark at. They are breaking down the cushions and increasing the wear and tear. And my second dog Sigmund Freud the therapy bulldog occasionally likes to mark it as his and relieve himself on it. This of course distressing my person greatly, as if nursing the wounds of the financial inequalities of that relationship were not enough, now the thing she was forced into buying herself is being peed on. To keep perspective I suppose if one of us was to fall ill the couch would become an after thought, as we should train ourselves to make it be without. Learn to have it be a funny story based on a lesson. I know personally I luxuriate over having such a piece of furniture as I probably would have gone my whole life without ever 😉 There are a variety of ways to look at this.
So we have five different personalities under this one roof. Five different people who each hold their priorities and process sacred, and need to learn to work together to acheive balance individually and as a family. How does anyone do this? My guess is with a lot of space, a great sense of humor, and not taking life too seriously? And this is a problem in our home. Highly sensitive people take everything seriously, and they also become easily overwhelmed. If you aren’t overwhelmed by reading the factors in my daily life, whether you have the High Sensitivity trait or not, I would be shocked.
Let’s list the complex factor’s without going further into each one, the blog itself will do that. I’ll just list words and see:
ADHD (most of us, if not all), High Sensitivity, Stubborn, Opinionated, all internal factors of our wiring and personality, how to fit each person’s needs and balance with their wants. Crohn’s Disease, Financial concerns, namely cleaning up after beginning my career very late, and being a “single” mother in the state of Connecticut for many years. I have debt that is impeding the larger than life dreams that I have. Which includes the possibility of another child, wanting to travel and explore, actually more of late really wanting to move to another Country, but seriously. Knowing with evermore certainly that some windows on my dreams are closing in that I cannot have them all. I have to CHOOSE. I have to choose which dreams to give life, and this is a Sophie’s Choice for me. This is deeply painful for me. Apparently I can’t list without elaborating, that has always been present, now how can I capitalize on it rather than thinking it is wrong? In addition to this I want to author books, I want to organize and produce theories from all my labors of love and learning as a counselor. I want to tour, and to talk to others, and to teach. I want to share my gifts on the largest scale possible, not for the wealth and the fame of it (in fact I think I would hate that), but for the purpose of it. I want to help. I want to contribute to society, and my process of needing to heal myself before I had room to do so has been lifelong and taken up so much space. I am aware and grieve that. I can’t help but indulge the what if’s of that.
I burn with desire, sometimes I burn up, and it’s not good at all,…..I burn to create. It is a drive, a compulsion, a non-choice it always seems. It is a brooding and painful thing all of these thoughts, that if I could just untangle I could help. My mind is painfully cluttered, and as I try to de-clutter it, more piles just topple over into the space I have cleared, and on top of it I just continue to add more ALWAYS rather than staying with what I’ve got and putting down roots. This task before me now is to SLOW DOWN and STAY with things, see how much more richness can be produced by choosing three things in particular and sitting with them and seeing them, and allowing my eyes to graze over my greatest works of art. And the fear in this? In this noticing? Is that it could hurt that much more if the connection is ever severed. And severed connections have been a thing most of my life, they are more consistent than safe ones. It’s all I know in a way. Being severed from these: unthinkable. I stop breathing even thinking about it. So I stand at a careful distance at times, from my own life. It is terribly painful knowing my kids can feel that, and may perceive it differently, personally as a way I feel about them, or don’t. And part of my life’s work is at least trying to put down in words enough that they will be able to read and understand who I am inside, and the why’s of my choices. That was something with both of my parents that I will never know. If I do nothing else right in my life: I will always show up for my kids. They may not always understand this or interpret it the same. Sometimes they will have to sort through the pain of their experience, without it being unthinkable to me or a threat to my ability of parenting. We are not there yet. I am a work in progress. But I will never stop trying. I’ll always show back up. These are connections that only death will sever, and perhaps not even that. This is the thing I’ve been so thirsty for in my life, and yet I so often am blind to the ones I already have. Or I move too quickly to stop and see. This is my current task as a person to slow down and develop my relationships I have now, and find a way to still do that while helping others along their journey.
My writing continues to take on a life of it’s own and go on a direction I never planned at the beginning. This is like all of life though. This is something we can count on. So I’m going to try for that to be ok for now, until my next victory opens up before me. They sneak up on you, you know. For one thing I’m writing so much more in so many more ways than I was last year. I write more, and more comes. It is unfolding.
I lost sight of the blog that was meant which was to describe a singular situation that happened with my daughter this morning, and to explain the different choices and outcomes of how it was handled. To illuminate what I have learned. Let’s hope I can learn to come back to this and also make that post. Or maybe it will get lost in the land of ADHD and life in general.
Thanks for listening….I wrote this in the midst as you can probably tell. The midst of real and everyday life. Not at a writing retreat, not on top of a quiet mountain. In the midst of scheduling, random questions (many), my daughter being up set over an overwhelming project, the dogs, the phone… LIFE… I write in the midst of life and I have ADHD, and I am trying to find out how I can produce great works of art without sacrificing my childrens childhood. Without us both missing out. How to be a driven thinker requiring quiet space, and a fully present mother. It is difficult. I think of Pema Chodron and her admissions on parenting at the end of Fail, Fail Again, Fail Better. This was comforting to me.
*seemingly random events are so often connected in ways that are only revealed in hindsight and reflection. If we don’t take time to reflect, if we don’t honor our whole journey we do ourselves and one could argue the Universe a great disservice.
I had a unique experience with my morning pages this am. I want to try and find the words to describe it and capture moments that will otherwise become lost. Isn’t that what writing is anyway? Capturing a feeling or moment and preserving it as you remember it with a clarity only being close up can provide.
The problem is always I don’t know where to begin to capture the whole backstory. I say that out loud so I can work through the problem. Much like a mathematical equation. If I just thought about the equation and tried to envision a successful solution without the help of brainstorming and visually seeing the whole picture, the result I fear would just be pure overwhelm. I wonder if that’s what is happening with my writing now. I just don’t get enough of it on paper, and this blog is my stage to do that. But it’s an odd show because instead of being dazzled by a fully formed finished product in my blog you are literally watching the process unfold. You are seeing the rehearsals and auditions, and we aren’t even there yet. Right now you’re seeing a thousand unformed things laid to paper. And I worry… why would anyone want to watch that?! Do they want to watch the making of the movie before they have even been impressed? I guess that can’t matter here. There is no place for it here, because this is mine and it’s ok as it is. Yes that is my choice of where to land from all these thoughts.
So this mornings magic. Perhaps it was a result of the Pure bath bomb labeled “Repair”, or perhaps the fact my phone was needing to be charged and therefore less multi-tasking. Perhaps it was the jets, ah yes the jets did help. I learned something this am. So often quiet seems the answer to collecting my thoughts, but quiet also haunts, and leaves lots of rooms for each tiny noise to be a distraction. I used my bath jets more than I usually do. Usually they irritate my senses, but this am without music on my phone they were comforting. Like the waves in the Ocean. I remembered something about my young self this morning. I remembered how I would always want to write whenever I was near the water. It called to me. Every ocean trip…. I felt the magnificent calling power of this larger than life body of water that contained so many unseen things beneath the surface. In that way we are all like Oceans. What an incredibly powerful thing.
So this morning my morning pages were different. Most often lately I’ll get 1/2 a page to 1 full one versus the 3 that is intended. I am multi-tasking like crazy. But after all writing feels in its beginning as a self-serving pursuit. If I get a wall painted and can show my person and family immediately my hard work, or cook an amazing meal we can all enjoy together, the gratification is much more accessible. And then I can feel like I’m doing the right things, and being a good person. Being lost in the recesses of my mind has never yielded positive feedback from my self or others. A denial of my very existence as usual. The deepest pain that has ever existed for anyone. The anti-thesis: living your life in your own way as you were meant to be. Permission to live in this way, but then why in God’s name is the the absolute hardest thing to do.
So this morning I started to think about who the cast and characters of my memoir will be and just start listing them. This process took me on quite the journey. It took me through my history and I was actually surprised at how many aspects I have blocked out, or never looked back upon to seek understanding. One could argue the only way to more fully understand our selves in the present is to occasionally peek (reflect) on our journey as a whole. Holy shit mine looks crazy. Do you know I have lived 1,000 different kinds of lives in this one?! I forgot how many houses I tried to live in, create …. how many jobs I tried on. How desperate my seeking was. And I didn’t even know what I was trying to find, but I knew I would fiercely try. If one thing didn’t yield an immediate desired result at that time, I would try another and another. In this way I have amassed so many stories I don’t know which to breathe life into. Do I write my current love story, or do I write how that one even became possible ? What has the most entertainment value? You see that is my last concern, I write for me, and yet I know that if people are to read it needs to have something that grabs them. You know what grabs me? True words in any form. And complex mysteries that slowly unfold. What grabs me is any person telling any piece of their story, and I’ve become intimately involved with 100’s. Please do not misunderstand this statement haha. By intimacy I mean knowing at a deeper level each persons story. I’ve been blessed in my life to know probably thousands. It could be the lady at the nail salon that notices the Brene Brown book in my lap. The lady that allows her curiosity to breach the unspoken contract of social etiquette. And we each take something away from that encounter. If nothing else that we are meant to connect, and allowed, and our lives are in fact enhanced by the answering of that attraction.
This writing I am doing now is the product of the wings of inspiration. It just flows, it is not labored and painstaking. It is joy in its purest form. That is the why of writing. To enjoy the craft. To do that though, for me anyway, some unlocking, and lots of unthawing, and undoing programming is in progress. What has felt like a labor becomes passion. They meet and intertwine, sharing a secret dance. A tango becomes a slow dance, and then the magic happens.
This morning I may have begun to craft my memoir. To at least lay to paper the swirling and merging characters of my personal story. As I thought of some more clearly, others swam into focus. It was 9 pages of honoring my journey, rather than omitting it due to shame, or not even being able to access it because I move to quickly onto the next.
Last night Victoria (twin B) and I watched No Reservations together. An adorable movie about a chef who lives to cook, and needs control over her environment at all times. Until life throws her circumstances that catalyze a change that runs much deeper than the original action. The change spreads and suddenly she is unfolding into the person she could never give herself permission to be….
This will have to be placed on hold, and hopefully returned to. I need to see my person before she heads off to work. Tomorrow is our day, the day I had the courage to follow an intuition, only a tiny inkling at the time. And our destinies have now forever changed. As we know that we want to spend the rest of our stories exploring together. Certainly more complex, and yet also greater reward. If extra complexity and challenge equals greater reward, if that equation is real and true. I am moving ever in the right direction. What a nice feeling to land on for the day.
Happy New Year’s Eve to my beautiful readers, my supporters, my friends, my loves…. the cast in my story. Thank you for your part!
