"I can't seem to face up to the facts
I'm tense and nervous and I
Can't relax
I can't sleep 'cause my bed's on fire
Don't touch me I'm a real live wire..."
~Talking Heads, Pyscho Killer
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
listen...
Attentiveness is the path to true life;
Indifference is the path to death.
The attentive do not die;
The indifferent are as if they are dead already.
-Dhammapada
The Psychic Stuff, the beginning
This is the beginning of a tale that may take me a few days to get out. It involves psychic ability, Satanism, and channeling. If these things bother you, or you want to dispute the validity of my experience, go somewhere else. This is my blog. This is my story.
It's amazing how many things I could think of to do rather than write this. Really. But here goes...
I hear dead people. That is to say, I channel. I don't do it well. I have refused to practice. When I tell my tale, you may understand why, if you do not already.
It doesn't start at the first time I knew it had happened, I think it goes back before that. I think this story starts when my brother became a Satanist, because that was when I started becoming very in tune with the other side.
I was about thirteen, maybe just turned fourteen. My brother was two years older and had fallen in with the bad crew in high school. A lot of kids smoke pot and listen to heavy metal, but my brother took it so far beyond that it wasn't even comparable. I mean, you have kids drawing upside down crosses on their desks and then you have my brother, who researched specific demonic symbols and painted them eight feet tall on his bedroom walls.
Shit started getting really weird around our house.
At the time, I was still going to church with my parents, my brother refused. I was still involved in the church choir, sacred dance, youth group, just a happy little church goer was I. But I was starting to notice things.
I think the first thing I noticed was a fear to go into his room, but I suppose that isn't too terribly surprising. One day my mom was out in the backyard gardening, and everyone else was gone. I had snuck into my brothers room to use his boombox (if that didn't date me, this will:) to play my new Bon Jovi cassette. I didn't have a tape player, and my brother liked to refuse me use of his just to lord it over my head that he owned one and I didn't. Plus, he didn't want my stupid girly music playing in it.
I had wedged his door shut tight (it stuck, it didn't fit in the jamb right) so that I could listen to it quietly, and if I saw him come home it would give me an extra second before he came bounding up the stairs to hide my tape and pretend I was looking for some...thing. The fact that I wedged his door tight is important, because otherwise it would just blow open.
Then my mom called me. I jumped up, yanked my tape out, and went flying towards the door. I had to yell from MY bedroom window, you see, so she wouldn't know I'd snuck in there either. Not that she really cared, but she would bitch at me anyway.
As I ran for the door, the door flew open and slammed against the wall. I was terrified, but because I thought my brother must have come home and realized I was in his room. I thought it was him smashing the door open to yell at me. I stood there for a second and realized no one was there. Then I was even more terrified and ran through.
I just ran downstairs and out the door, and my mom said, “Are you ok? You look like you've seen a ghost?�
If you're wondering why my Christian parents allowed him to do this, I don't know. Were they terrified, too? I don't know. I have never asked.
The next bit of weirdness happened one night when I was home alone, and I was washing the dishes. I couldn't tell you how much time had passed, but I do know that by that time I could hear them. Them meaning some sort of voices. I thought I was going crazy at first, but then I decided to fight back in whatever way I could. So, being the church choir girl that I was, I would sing hymns and songs while I was home alone. I was aware that it didn't ...banish their presence, but it did annoy them. I think it annoyed them just that I wouldn't give in. It's not like Holy Water, just that I...had strength of character enough to not give in.
The incident with the dishes was after the time that I heard them telling me to kill myself one night while I waited for my mom to finish up at choir practice. I was downstairs listening to some record in the youth room, and had gotten as far as pulling out the butterfly knife and holding it against my arm, rubbing it back and forth while singing along to “Dream Weaver� before deciding that it was Them and not Me and I wasn't going to do it. I still think of that when I hear that song. I just sat there listening to it over and over again, singing as loud as I could to drown out the voices....one young girl sensitive to the other side, in the dark basement of a church with her mother and the choir upstairs, clueless to the battle of “Good Versus Evil� actually taking place below them. How fucked up would that have been to find my dead body in the basement when practice was over? Yah. Stop thinking about it. The fact is I didn't do it.
Back to the dishes. By that time, I was used to hearing them, and while that didn't make me any less afraid (my mom could never understand why I would turn on all the lights, inside and out when I was home alone, floodlights and all) it did make me more brazen. The night with the dishes, I was washing the dishes (all the lights on, yes) and turning to stack the clean dried ones ones on the island behind me. After making a nice little stack of clean plates, I turned around once more to find the stack was gone. Gone.
Ok, I realize it retrospect that this is going to sound even crazier, but you have to understand, I was used to it. Weird fucking shit had been happening and I was used to it. Anyway, my reaction was to turn around and yell, “I'm washing this next plate and when I turn around those plates had BETTER be back!� and they were.
~shrug~
I felt like...they were trying to make me crazy. I felt like...that's the way “evil� works. It's not some force that commandeers your body all at once, it's a gradual process of you giving in and becoming weak.
My brother and I would have conversations about it sometimes. I asked him why Satanism? He said, “For the power.� I asked him, “But if you have to sell your soul to do it, how does that make you powerful? Someone is still more powerful than you. I don't buy it.�
There were so many times...god, such awful fucked up things. One night I was in my room and kept hearing this repetitive thumping noise. I walked into my brothers room to find him in the closet, pulling the “closet divider� off of the wall and smashing it back against the wall, over and over. I touched his shoulder and said, “(his name)�? He turned, one look over his shoulder at me and said, “Fuck you.� But, there is no way I can possibly explain the voice. His eyes were bloodshot as hell, but the voice...wasn't his own. It was horrible. I ran back to my room and hid in my bed, head buried under the pillow.
Many nights I would have these dreams, nightmares about being in his room. I would be near the door, in the pitch black, and trying to get out of the doorway and back into the hall that separated our rooms. As I got to the doorway I would feel...well, it wasn't even feel in the normal sense of the word. I would sense these fingers closing around my ankle and start to pull me back. They were long bony claws, four, and they never touched my skin, just...I could sense them wrap around my ankle and there was a pressure and then I would start being dragged backwards, with me clawing at the door frame and carpet to escape. I would always wake up before I was pulled all the way in.
The shit went on for years, and finally my brother joined the Navy and left home. His room, however, remained the same. Why? Every day I expected my mom to paint over that horrible shit and every day I would open up my bedroom door to look across the hall and stare at it.
Finally I had enough.
I went to the basement and found can of white paint, and a paintbrush. I didn't ask anyone if it was “Ok�, I just didn't give a fuck if it was ok. It had gone on long enough. I walked in there and started painting over the symbols. Since it was red paint he used, it took a few coats, and it took me a few hours to do. When I finished, I took a pencil and wrote over the paint in tiny letters, “love conquers all�.
I told my parents what I did and they didn't have anything to say about it. Nothing at all, in fact.
That night, I had the same dream, but for the very first time, I escaped. I didn't wake up, I got OUT of the room. And there, on tiny landing between my brother's room and mine, I had a stand off with Satan himself. (He'd like a capital H on himself but too bad, pssshh.)
I stood in front of my bedroom door and he just appeared in front of my brother's door. He was your typical devil, smaller than I expected but you know what they say about those Napoleon complexes. He was shorter than me, red, the pitchfork, forked tongue, pointy tail, the whole bit. Wisps of smoke curled around him and he just stood there, in what he viewed and what I was supposed to view as His Satanic Majesty. I started yelling at him.
I told him how my brother might have thought that he needed him but that I most certainly did not, and that I understood that my power came from somewhere within, and he was no longer needed here, thank you so very much.
He just stared, angry, for a moment. I did this thing...I don't know what it is, still to this day. It's like emitting a thunderclap of energy, radiating out in circles, like a pebble thrown into a lake. And he snapped his fingers and ~poof~ dissappeared in a puff of smoke.
The dreams stopped. The weird shit stopped. And I have never been the same.
It's amazing how many things I could think of to do rather than write this. Really. But here goes...
I hear dead people. That is to say, I channel. I don't do it well. I have refused to practice. When I tell my tale, you may understand why, if you do not already.
It doesn't start at the first time I knew it had happened, I think it goes back before that. I think this story starts when my brother became a Satanist, because that was when I started becoming very in tune with the other side.
I was about thirteen, maybe just turned fourteen. My brother was two years older and had fallen in with the bad crew in high school. A lot of kids smoke pot and listen to heavy metal, but my brother took it so far beyond that it wasn't even comparable. I mean, you have kids drawing upside down crosses on their desks and then you have my brother, who researched specific demonic symbols and painted them eight feet tall on his bedroom walls.
Shit started getting really weird around our house.
At the time, I was still going to church with my parents, my brother refused. I was still involved in the church choir, sacred dance, youth group, just a happy little church goer was I. But I was starting to notice things.
I think the first thing I noticed was a fear to go into his room, but I suppose that isn't too terribly surprising. One day my mom was out in the backyard gardening, and everyone else was gone. I had snuck into my brothers room to use his boombox (if that didn't date me, this will:) to play my new Bon Jovi cassette. I didn't have a tape player, and my brother liked to refuse me use of his just to lord it over my head that he owned one and I didn't. Plus, he didn't want my stupid girly music playing in it.
I had wedged his door shut tight (it stuck, it didn't fit in the jamb right) so that I could listen to it quietly, and if I saw him come home it would give me an extra second before he came bounding up the stairs to hide my tape and pretend I was looking for some...thing. The fact that I wedged his door tight is important, because otherwise it would just blow open.
Then my mom called me. I jumped up, yanked my tape out, and went flying towards the door. I had to yell from MY bedroom window, you see, so she wouldn't know I'd snuck in there either. Not that she really cared, but she would bitch at me anyway.
As I ran for the door, the door flew open and slammed against the wall. I was terrified, but because I thought my brother must have come home and realized I was in his room. I thought it was him smashing the door open to yell at me. I stood there for a second and realized no one was there. Then I was even more terrified and ran through.
I just ran downstairs and out the door, and my mom said, “Are you ok? You look like you've seen a ghost?�
If you're wondering why my Christian parents allowed him to do this, I don't know. Were they terrified, too? I don't know. I have never asked.
The next bit of weirdness happened one night when I was home alone, and I was washing the dishes. I couldn't tell you how much time had passed, but I do know that by that time I could hear them. Them meaning some sort of voices. I thought I was going crazy at first, but then I decided to fight back in whatever way I could. So, being the church choir girl that I was, I would sing hymns and songs while I was home alone. I was aware that it didn't ...banish their presence, but it did annoy them. I think it annoyed them just that I wouldn't give in. It's not like Holy Water, just that I...had strength of character enough to not give in.
The incident with the dishes was after the time that I heard them telling me to kill myself one night while I waited for my mom to finish up at choir practice. I was downstairs listening to some record in the youth room, and had gotten as far as pulling out the butterfly knife and holding it against my arm, rubbing it back and forth while singing along to “Dream Weaver� before deciding that it was Them and not Me and I wasn't going to do it. I still think of that when I hear that song. I just sat there listening to it over and over again, singing as loud as I could to drown out the voices....one young girl sensitive to the other side, in the dark basement of a church with her mother and the choir upstairs, clueless to the battle of “Good Versus Evil� actually taking place below them. How fucked up would that have been to find my dead body in the basement when practice was over? Yah. Stop thinking about it. The fact is I didn't do it.
Back to the dishes. By that time, I was used to hearing them, and while that didn't make me any less afraid (my mom could never understand why I would turn on all the lights, inside and out when I was home alone, floodlights and all) it did make me more brazen. The night with the dishes, I was washing the dishes (all the lights on, yes) and turning to stack the clean dried ones ones on the island behind me. After making a nice little stack of clean plates, I turned around once more to find the stack was gone. Gone.
Ok, I realize it retrospect that this is going to sound even crazier, but you have to understand, I was used to it. Weird fucking shit had been happening and I was used to it. Anyway, my reaction was to turn around and yell, “I'm washing this next plate and when I turn around those plates had BETTER be back!� and they were.
~shrug~
I felt like...they were trying to make me crazy. I felt like...that's the way “evil� works. It's not some force that commandeers your body all at once, it's a gradual process of you giving in and becoming weak.
My brother and I would have conversations about it sometimes. I asked him why Satanism? He said, “For the power.� I asked him, “But if you have to sell your soul to do it, how does that make you powerful? Someone is still more powerful than you. I don't buy it.�
There were so many times...god, such awful fucked up things. One night I was in my room and kept hearing this repetitive thumping noise. I walked into my brothers room to find him in the closet, pulling the “closet divider� off of the wall and smashing it back against the wall, over and over. I touched his shoulder and said, “(his name)�? He turned, one look over his shoulder at me and said, “Fuck you.� But, there is no way I can possibly explain the voice. His eyes were bloodshot as hell, but the voice...wasn't his own. It was horrible. I ran back to my room and hid in my bed, head buried under the pillow.
Many nights I would have these dreams, nightmares about being in his room. I would be near the door, in the pitch black, and trying to get out of the doorway and back into the hall that separated our rooms. As I got to the doorway I would feel...well, it wasn't even feel in the normal sense of the word. I would sense these fingers closing around my ankle and start to pull me back. They were long bony claws, four, and they never touched my skin, just...I could sense them wrap around my ankle and there was a pressure and then I would start being dragged backwards, with me clawing at the door frame and carpet to escape. I would always wake up before I was pulled all the way in.
The shit went on for years, and finally my brother joined the Navy and left home. His room, however, remained the same. Why? Every day I expected my mom to paint over that horrible shit and every day I would open up my bedroom door to look across the hall and stare at it.
Finally I had enough.
I went to the basement and found can of white paint, and a paintbrush. I didn't ask anyone if it was “Ok�, I just didn't give a fuck if it was ok. It had gone on long enough. I walked in there and started painting over the symbols. Since it was red paint he used, it took a few coats, and it took me a few hours to do. When I finished, I took a pencil and wrote over the paint in tiny letters, “love conquers all�.
I told my parents what I did and they didn't have anything to say about it. Nothing at all, in fact.
That night, I had the same dream, but for the very first time, I escaped. I didn't wake up, I got OUT of the room. And there, on tiny landing between my brother's room and mine, I had a stand off with Satan himself. (He'd like a capital H on himself but too bad, pssshh.)
I stood in front of my bedroom door and he just appeared in front of my brother's door. He was your typical devil, smaller than I expected but you know what they say about those Napoleon complexes. He was shorter than me, red, the pitchfork, forked tongue, pointy tail, the whole bit. Wisps of smoke curled around him and he just stood there, in what he viewed and what I was supposed to view as His Satanic Majesty. I started yelling at him.
I told him how my brother might have thought that he needed him but that I most certainly did not, and that I understood that my power came from somewhere within, and he was no longer needed here, thank you so very much.
He just stared, angry, for a moment. I did this thing...I don't know what it is, still to this day. It's like emitting a thunderclap of energy, radiating out in circles, like a pebble thrown into a lake. And he snapped his fingers and ~poof~ dissappeared in a puff of smoke.
The dreams stopped. The weird shit stopped. And I have never been the same.
Sunday, May 28, 2006
for words, I am at a loss...
Recently I wrote about how the fucking-napper-pisser-puker was in town, and I wanted to give y'all a little update. 'Cause I'm hormonal as hell and somebody sure as fuck is getting my wrath- why not have it be someone who deserves it?
Well, the Napper was in town, called to find out where the hot titty bars were, then made some lame comment about how we'll hang out while he's here. Ok, said believing me, "I still have your pictures to give you."
A week later, I received a few phone calls but no messages from him, typical shit. Two years have passed, and it's the same old non-communicative shit. I held back my irritation, thinking maybe they're all just really busy with the job they were doing.
Then my son's birthday party came up. I invited Napper and the crew, who all knew me and my son, and who at one time, not so long ago, I considered friends of mine. None of them came. Napper told me he'd call if he wasn't coming, but of course, he did not.
A few days later, I got a message that said, "Hey. we're still in town and leaving tomorrow..." etc etc, I sent one back that said, "Baby baby baby bitch, for words I am at a loss..." He loves Ween and knows damn well what the next line was. We went to three Ween shows together. He managed to miss half of the first set of each one because he was too busy doing coke with his friends, or finishing "One more beer".
He called the next day or the day after and left me a dumb as fuck message, saying, "So....uh...I got this weird message from you....er, last night. It was late.......so.....oh, well......anyway, uh....call me back."
"It was late." Yes. It was late. You see, in his world (read: drunk), messages that are received late at night might not even mean anything. Could be dialed incorrectly. Could be meant as a drunken joke. Could be anything, really. Hence his pause after he said it, which is when I believe he figured out that my message was no less sincere just because it was "late". I don't drink. Which is to say, I might have five drinks a year. I'm just not a drinker.
I didn't bother to answer him. I had already taken all his giant stack of photos down to the post office and sent them off that morning, asking the postal guy if they had a "No Class" stamp they could toss on there. The poor fellow asked me if I wanted to send them priority mail and my peals of laughter required that I explain to the poor guy why I was laughing so hard. I told him they were pictures of my ex that I was sending back to him. I told him that he was actually HERE in town but couldn't be bothered to come by to pick up his own photographs, and that I was sick of holding on to them. "Bad break-up, eh?" asked the guy. I stared at him. "It was TWO YEARS AGO! I'M MARRIED NOW!" I howled with laughter, holding my diamond encrusted hand. "Shit!" I said, "First class! Send them No Class. Run over them with your damn postal truck. Have the neighborhood cat piss on em for all I care! First class!" and burst into laughter again.
By then the rest of the post office were laughing, too. He took the package, I hauled my backpack back up on my back and said, "Damn, I feel lighter!" as I walked out the door to the sounds of their laughter echoing behind me. It was good.
That night or the next, I get a text message from him that simply says, "?" I laughed so hard and told Jack I really wanted to type back , "!" as a joke. I did not.
I did, however, send him this yesterday. It was too irresistable.
Words? I'm still at a loss. But then, that's what knowing him is like. Non-communication. I told Jack I'm so fucking irritated that this fucking fuck-monkey piece of shit couldn't even bother to come to the birthday party of the kid he spent 5 years with, supposedly loved so very much, or even CALL to say he wasn't coming was just the last fucking straw. And then to find out he was actually still in town 4 days later? Oh hell no.
So, I told Jack, I think the only thing I can do that will make me feel better and finally forgive this son of a bitch for what he put me through is to spend the next 5 years of my life (equal to the time I spent with him) tormenting him with non-communication. Empty postcards. Blank text messages. I don't know. Let him know how it feels.
"The power you have given me I will lay down when this crisis has abated. I promise you."
~Chancellor Palpatine
"Baby, baby, baby bitch, I'm better now please fuck off..."
~Ween
Well, the Napper was in town, called to find out where the hot titty bars were, then made some lame comment about how we'll hang out while he's here. Ok, said believing me, "I still have your pictures to give you."
A week later, I received a few phone calls but no messages from him, typical shit. Two years have passed, and it's the same old non-communicative shit. I held back my irritation, thinking maybe they're all just really busy with the job they were doing.
Then my son's birthday party came up. I invited Napper and the crew, who all knew me and my son, and who at one time, not so long ago, I considered friends of mine. None of them came. Napper told me he'd call if he wasn't coming, but of course, he did not.
A few days later, I got a message that said, "Hey. we're still in town and leaving tomorrow..." etc etc, I sent one back that said, "Baby baby baby bitch, for words I am at a loss..." He loves Ween and knows damn well what the next line was. We went to three Ween shows together. He managed to miss half of the first set of each one because he was too busy doing coke with his friends, or finishing "One more beer".
He called the next day or the day after and left me a dumb as fuck message, saying, "So....uh...I got this weird message from you....er, last night. It was late.......so.....oh, well......anyway, uh....call me back."
"It was late." Yes. It was late. You see, in his world (read: drunk), messages that are received late at night might not even mean anything. Could be dialed incorrectly. Could be meant as a drunken joke. Could be anything, really. Hence his pause after he said it, which is when I believe he figured out that my message was no less sincere just because it was "late". I don't drink. Which is to say, I might have five drinks a year. I'm just not a drinker.
I didn't bother to answer him. I had already taken all his giant stack of photos down to the post office and sent them off that morning, asking the postal guy if they had a "No Class" stamp they could toss on there. The poor fellow asked me if I wanted to send them priority mail and my peals of laughter required that I explain to the poor guy why I was laughing so hard. I told him they were pictures of my ex that I was sending back to him. I told him that he was actually HERE in town but couldn't be bothered to come by to pick up his own photographs, and that I was sick of holding on to them. "Bad break-up, eh?" asked the guy. I stared at him. "It was TWO YEARS AGO! I'M MARRIED NOW!" I howled with laughter, holding my diamond encrusted hand. "Shit!" I said, "First class! Send them No Class. Run over them with your damn postal truck. Have the neighborhood cat piss on em for all I care! First class!" and burst into laughter again.
By then the rest of the post office were laughing, too. He took the package, I hauled my backpack back up on my back and said, "Damn, I feel lighter!" as I walked out the door to the sounds of their laughter echoing behind me. It was good.
That night or the next, I get a text message from him that simply says, "?" I laughed so hard and told Jack I really wanted to type back , "!" as a joke. I did not.
I did, however, send him this yesterday. It was too irresistable.
Words? I'm still at a loss. But then, that's what knowing him is like. Non-communication. I told Jack I'm so fucking irritated that this fucking fuck-monkey piece of shit couldn't even bother to come to the birthday party of the kid he spent 5 years with, supposedly loved so very much, or even CALL to say he wasn't coming was just the last fucking straw. And then to find out he was actually still in town 4 days later? Oh hell no.
So, I told Jack, I think the only thing I can do that will make me feel better and finally forgive this son of a bitch for what he put me through is to spend the next 5 years of my life (equal to the time I spent with him) tormenting him with non-communication. Empty postcards. Blank text messages. I don't know. Let him know how it feels.
"The power you have given me I will lay down when this crisis has abated. I promise you."
~Chancellor Palpatine
"Baby, baby, baby bitch, I'm better now please fuck off..."
~Ween
the pleasantest way to live
In reply to the question, 'What is the best that people can possess, what brings them truest happiness, what is the sweetest of the sweet, and what is the pleasantest life to live?' the Buddha answered:
'Trust is the best that people can possess; following the way brings happiness; truth is the sweetest of the sweet; and the practice of insight is the pleasantest way to live.'
-Sutta Nipata
Thursday, May 25, 2006
fuck today
Today seems to be a big fat pile of what the fuck sprinkled lightly with a dash of fucking A.
Let me back up.
Jacks' been out of town. While that sent me into near hysterics (for many reasons of paranoia), he is now back. Ok. Yay?
While I had dreaded his trip, it seems to have been quite enlightening. (deep breath) Ah..I enjoyed the time away from him, perhaps so much so that I feel awfully guilty about it.
It was just my son and I, and other than a few minor bumps, everything went very smoothly.
I managed to not call Jack every other waking second, because he and I have really been.... (how does one say?) crawling up each others asses a lot lately. I wanted him to feel like he was AWAY. I wanted him to feel away enough that he would MISS me. I wanted to feel like he was away enough that I could gain some perspective on what's been going on.
I felt like maybe I did. Maybe... I don't know. (heaving sigh) It seems like a big fucking lump of tangled up shit in my head right now.
What I noticed was this- almost as soon as he got home, got settled in and we were in bed talking, I was annoyed with him. He was yapping about a book I was reading. He, never having read the book, was talking out of his ass, in my sleep deprived opinion. And then there was something about him smelling like gas. I told him he smelled like gas when he came home, and wondered if there was something wrong with my truck, or if the city he was in (Las Vegas) was just so damn polluted I could actually smell it on his clothes. (I have a very sensitive nose.) He opined that it could be due to the fact that he had parked my truck at the airport, and airplanes use really high octane fuel, and maybe that's why he smelled like that. I thought that was stupid, but why I don't know. I was so fucking tired, and hearing him rattle on about his opinions about this and that was just making me want to grind my teeth into dust.
For real.
Ok... the big picture includes me having not slept much for days (sleep deprivation makes me psycho, it's not good, people) and I'm all PMS-y and it was 2 am and I was fucking over it.
His clothes smell like gas. Is the truck ok? Ok? Good. I don't care then. I just wanted to know if the truck was ok.
The book- I was explaining that the author goes off on tangents, and that's why it's taken me awhile to read it. That's all. Just stating a fact, period. Instead I got a speech about how some writers tend to assume that their readers are familiar with their personal sci-fi lingo, and something about...the building of subtext and how some people use books like that for escapism and how all the tiny details are being argued about my some homely dudes in their moms basement somewhere.
I just stared at him, like, who the fuck cares? How is this possibly relevant? I'm just saying it took me a while to read the book. I can normally breeze through a book in a day, two tops. This was an unexpectedly long read. That's all.
When I take a moment to think about it, and try to stare past the screaming agony that is my scrambled sleep deprived thought pattern, I see that these conversations may have been more interesting...some other time. At the time, they were the equivalent of him coming in to poke me with a stick while I slept.
I wasn't in the mood for conversation. I'm glad your home. I really truly am. Now shut up and go to fucking sleep before I kill something. Or someone.
Ok. So. This morning I get up, start the day, and my son is just dragging his ass around as if it were made of lead. He does this little theatrical thing, he's such a fucking drama queen. (I've promised that one of my future books will be titled, "Everything I Learned About Being A Drama Queen I Learned From My Son." The other book I've already named is, "Sleep Deprivation: I Don't Do It." )I'm not kidding, he's a total thespian. And this morning he was pulling his, "Oh god, however will I drag my 65 pound body all the way over to the table and seat myself in a chair? How, god, how?" while staring balefully at me as if I'd requested he deliver me the moon on a plate, pulled out of ass while riding a fucking unicycle. He then laid his head on his arm, on the table, and sat there, flopped over and moaning.
"Knock that shit off," I said. "I'm not buying it." He went on and on, and basically required that I sit there and bark at him every few minutes, "EAT!" so that he would pick up the spoon, giving me that wretched pitiful look, and lift the 5 million pounds of Frosted Mini-Wheats into his mouth, only because I, his evil overlord, was forcing him to.
He missed the bus.
I drove him to school, and he heard it most of the way there, when I wasn't just sitting and broiling in silence. I told him I didn't know what his fucking problem was, but that he had been fine for days while Jack was gone, and suddenly the theatrics were back in full force and I wasn't ABOUT to have any of it. Besides, Jack wasn't even out of bed, and missed his whole performance, I pointed out. So, if that was for Jacks's benefit, he missed it. Instead, I got the show and I don't LIKE the show. As a matter of fact, I explained, the show makes me quite angry. I told him I was pretty sure that wasn't the point of his show, to invoke my wrath, but that is what he did, and perhaps he could spend some time today pondering exactly WHY he did that, and also how he wasn't going to do it again.
I drove home aimlessly, wanting to go down to the beach and just jump into the water, fully clothed, jibbering like a maniac and just have a nice little nervous breakdown. I wasn't pleased with that feeling, and was trying to waste time and rid myself of my foul mood before arriving back home.
Didn't work. I came home. Jack asked me what was wrong, and also noted that he felt I swore too much at my son and that I should stop.
I told him, "He's a little fucker," in protest.
And he is. I love him, and he's a little fucker sometimes. So am I. So what? I think we should all be held responsible for our own actions, and should be informed when we are acting like assholes. This morning, he was being one. I informed him of that fact, in case he was unaware.
Jack said it wasn't good that I swore at him. I managed to not let loose with a cannon full of curse words at Jack, who was laying in bed during my sons morning production, but instead said, "Your dad didn't swear at you, did he?"
He told me his dad swore, but not AT the kids. "Yah," I said, as if that explained it. "Mine did. Granted, he would say hell or shit or crap or damn, I've never heard him say the F word, but my uncles...now, my uncles cussed like sailors." I always found it an excellent warning system. One uncle in particular. My cousins and I knew that when he started cursing, they were one or two steps away from getting the belt, and the thin ice they were skating on was about to swallow them whole. His cursing wasn't traumatic, it was informative.
My husband seems to think it's emotionally abusing my child. I'm sure a lot of other people would agree. Me, I don't know. I'm used to my dad, I'm used to my uncles. I'm also used to my mom, who never cursed but would manage to fill her words with poison darts meant to permanetly disable a person emotionally. I've learned you don't need curse words to abuse someone.
I am also aware that I don't have the slightest fucking clue what a healthy family is supposed to be like, so I could be wrong. In fact, I very likely am.
After finishing my book and taking an extended nap, I feel vaguely human again, and not like a wounded cornered animal that everyone seems to be trying to poke at.
My point? I don't fucking know. Today sucked ass so far. Hopefully it will get better. And that there's lots more on my mind, but my thespian will be home any minute and I need to focus and balance myself before he arrives.
For both our sakes.
Let me back up.
Jacks' been out of town. While that sent me into near hysterics (for many reasons of paranoia), he is now back. Ok. Yay?
While I had dreaded his trip, it seems to have been quite enlightening. (deep breath) Ah..I enjoyed the time away from him, perhaps so much so that I feel awfully guilty about it.
It was just my son and I, and other than a few minor bumps, everything went very smoothly.
I managed to not call Jack every other waking second, because he and I have really been.... (how does one say?) crawling up each others asses a lot lately. I wanted him to feel like he was AWAY. I wanted him to feel away enough that he would MISS me. I wanted to feel like he was away enough that I could gain some perspective on what's been going on.
I felt like maybe I did. Maybe... I don't know. (heaving sigh) It seems like a big fucking lump of tangled up shit in my head right now.
What I noticed was this- almost as soon as he got home, got settled in and we were in bed talking, I was annoyed with him. He was yapping about a book I was reading. He, never having read the book, was talking out of his ass, in my sleep deprived opinion. And then there was something about him smelling like gas. I told him he smelled like gas when he came home, and wondered if there was something wrong with my truck, or if the city he was in (Las Vegas) was just so damn polluted I could actually smell it on his clothes. (I have a very sensitive nose.) He opined that it could be due to the fact that he had parked my truck at the airport, and airplanes use really high octane fuel, and maybe that's why he smelled like that. I thought that was stupid, but why I don't know. I was so fucking tired, and hearing him rattle on about his opinions about this and that was just making me want to grind my teeth into dust.
For real.
Ok... the big picture includes me having not slept much for days (sleep deprivation makes me psycho, it's not good, people) and I'm all PMS-y and it was 2 am and I was fucking over it.
His clothes smell like gas. Is the truck ok? Ok? Good. I don't care then. I just wanted to know if the truck was ok.
The book- I was explaining that the author goes off on tangents, and that's why it's taken me awhile to read it. That's all. Just stating a fact, period. Instead I got a speech about how some writers tend to assume that their readers are familiar with their personal sci-fi lingo, and something about...the building of subtext and how some people use books like that for escapism and how all the tiny details are being argued about my some homely dudes in their moms basement somewhere.
I just stared at him, like, who the fuck cares? How is this possibly relevant? I'm just saying it took me a while to read the book. I can normally breeze through a book in a day, two tops. This was an unexpectedly long read. That's all.
When I take a moment to think about it, and try to stare past the screaming agony that is my scrambled sleep deprived thought pattern, I see that these conversations may have been more interesting...some other time. At the time, they were the equivalent of him coming in to poke me with a stick while I slept.
I wasn't in the mood for conversation. I'm glad your home. I really truly am. Now shut up and go to fucking sleep before I kill something. Or someone.
Ok. So. This morning I get up, start the day, and my son is just dragging his ass around as if it were made of lead. He does this little theatrical thing, he's such a fucking drama queen. (I've promised that one of my future books will be titled, "Everything I Learned About Being A Drama Queen I Learned From My Son." The other book I've already named is, "Sleep Deprivation: I Don't Do It." )I'm not kidding, he's a total thespian. And this morning he was pulling his, "Oh god, however will I drag my 65 pound body all the way over to the table and seat myself in a chair? How, god, how?" while staring balefully at me as if I'd requested he deliver me the moon on a plate, pulled out of ass while riding a fucking unicycle. He then laid his head on his arm, on the table, and sat there, flopped over and moaning.
"Knock that shit off," I said. "I'm not buying it." He went on and on, and basically required that I sit there and bark at him every few minutes, "EAT!" so that he would pick up the spoon, giving me that wretched pitiful look, and lift the 5 million pounds of Frosted Mini-Wheats into his mouth, only because I, his evil overlord, was forcing him to.
He missed the bus.
I drove him to school, and he heard it most of the way there, when I wasn't just sitting and broiling in silence. I told him I didn't know what his fucking problem was, but that he had been fine for days while Jack was gone, and suddenly the theatrics were back in full force and I wasn't ABOUT to have any of it. Besides, Jack wasn't even out of bed, and missed his whole performance, I pointed out. So, if that was for Jacks's benefit, he missed it. Instead, I got the show and I don't LIKE the show. As a matter of fact, I explained, the show makes me quite angry. I told him I was pretty sure that wasn't the point of his show, to invoke my wrath, but that is what he did, and perhaps he could spend some time today pondering exactly WHY he did that, and also how he wasn't going to do it again.
I drove home aimlessly, wanting to go down to the beach and just jump into the water, fully clothed, jibbering like a maniac and just have a nice little nervous breakdown. I wasn't pleased with that feeling, and was trying to waste time and rid myself of my foul mood before arriving back home.
Didn't work. I came home. Jack asked me what was wrong, and also noted that he felt I swore too much at my son and that I should stop.
I told him, "He's a little fucker," in protest.
And he is. I love him, and he's a little fucker sometimes. So am I. So what? I think we should all be held responsible for our own actions, and should be informed when we are acting like assholes. This morning, he was being one. I informed him of that fact, in case he was unaware.
Jack said it wasn't good that I swore at him. I managed to not let loose with a cannon full of curse words at Jack, who was laying in bed during my sons morning production, but instead said, "Your dad didn't swear at you, did he?"
He told me his dad swore, but not AT the kids. "Yah," I said, as if that explained it. "Mine did. Granted, he would say hell or shit or crap or damn, I've never heard him say the F word, but my uncles...now, my uncles cussed like sailors." I always found it an excellent warning system. One uncle in particular. My cousins and I knew that when he started cursing, they were one or two steps away from getting the belt, and the thin ice they were skating on was about to swallow them whole. His cursing wasn't traumatic, it was informative.
My husband seems to think it's emotionally abusing my child. I'm sure a lot of other people would agree. Me, I don't know. I'm used to my dad, I'm used to my uncles. I'm also used to my mom, who never cursed but would manage to fill her words with poison darts meant to permanetly disable a person emotionally. I've learned you don't need curse words to abuse someone.
I am also aware that I don't have the slightest fucking clue what a healthy family is supposed to be like, so I could be wrong. In fact, I very likely am.
After finishing my book and taking an extended nap, I feel vaguely human again, and not like a wounded cornered animal that everyone seems to be trying to poke at.
My point? I don't fucking know. Today sucked ass so far. Hopefully it will get better. And that there's lots more on my mind, but my thespian will be home any minute and I need to focus and balance myself before he arrives.
For both our sakes.
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
"I thought of you when I read this...."
Have I ever mentioned how utterly hilarious my mother is? No?
Yah. There's a reason for that. A whole lot of reasons, in fact.
Yesterday I got a big fat envelope in the mail. It was from my mom. Hmm, I thought, I wonder if this is some sort of peace offering, some nice gesture on her part?
I opened it.
Inside is a Christian magazine called "Worshiper". My mom had stuck a post it note to the front of the magazine. The note reads:
"I thought of you when I read this article. Maybe it can help you to move on. Love, Mom."
It's got an arrow pointing toward the middle of the front cover, which clearly states "THE AMAZING POWER OF FORGIVENESS".
I stared at it for a few moments, trying to figure out which was more enraging, the fact that she sent me a Christian magazine while knowing that I am not a Christian, or the two words, "move on".
I decided it was "move on". Maybe it can help me to move on. Indeed. Maybe I'm not ready to move on. Maybe I'm not done reaming your ass out for all the shitty fucking things you did to me when I was a child. "Move on"- if anything it just makes me want to wind myself back up again and go off on her some more. I wasn't finished, I just got tired. And then Mothers Day came up, what was I supposed to do, ream her out on Mothers Day? I may be a thirty one year old woman nursing a whole hell of a lot of hurt, but I'm not a cad.
Move on...indeed.
I decide to overlook it all for a moment and give the article a chance. It could be enlightening, I was willing to concede to whatever wisdom it might offer up.
I started to read the article, and I'm not sure how I can express the total and utter, complete and annihilatory disdain I felt reading it. So I'm just going to tell you what it was about.
The article starts out telling a story about a group of missionaries who went to some God-forsaken place to teach the poor Godless people The Way. Never mind that these people may have their own way, and their own gods/God/whatever. Missionaries are funny like that. Of the road paved to hell with good intentions, they are the main brick layers, I believe.
So, some missionaries go and try to spread the word of God, and for some reason, the tribespeople freak out and kill them. I mean, I personally don't see the great leap of logic it took to figure out why they did that, but this being a Christian magazine, it comes out a bit biased, as if it were some unfathomable horror. Again, let me repeat: I am not a cad. Murder is terrible. I'm not debating that. That said, pause for a moment and picture the reaction the citizens of the United States would have to a group of people coming in and telling them that their religion is wrong, that they sin sin sin and are going to hell unless they change their entire belief system, throwing away the culture and history passed down from their grandfathers.
You know, just a thought. I'm just saying I don't think that shit would fly.
Anyway, the article goes on to say that eventually some of these tribal heathens came to know Jesus and that the wife and son of one of the murdered missionaries grew to be very close with the man that murdered their husband and father.
The article goes on. There's lots of talk of forgiveness, some Christianity peppered about, and a few tidbits of wisdom and insight.
It was the beginning. I couldn't get past it. My mother read this article and thought of me. She hopes I can move on.
~scratches head~
Yes. My mother the missionary, coming into my heathen life and telling me everything I do is wrong, everything I am is wrong, and trying to squash any bit of individuality and independant thought out of me. I rise up. I try to kill her.
Ok, I never tried to kill her. But still...the irony of this article was lost on my mom. She didn't notice it while she read it. She thought of me. She didn't notice it while she actually wrote a little post it note, stuck it in a magazine sized envelope, took it to the post office, addressed it and sent it to me. She never noticed the irony.
Maybe it can help me to move on.
I'm not exactly sure how it's going to help me move on, unless she's trying to point out that there is no possible way to close the chasm between us, that the distance is too great, I should stop trying and just accept that we will never be close. This gesture tells me one thing very clearly: My mother and I will never be what I want us to be- understood by one another.
Perhaps that is my lesson. I want the ideal. I cannot have it. It just is not meant to be.
I need to move on.
Indeed.
Yah. There's a reason for that. A whole lot of reasons, in fact.
Yesterday I got a big fat envelope in the mail. It was from my mom. Hmm, I thought, I wonder if this is some sort of peace offering, some nice gesture on her part?
I opened it.
Inside is a Christian magazine called "Worshiper". My mom had stuck a post it note to the front of the magazine. The note reads:
"I thought of you when I read this article. Maybe it can help you to move on. Love, Mom."
It's got an arrow pointing toward the middle of the front cover, which clearly states "THE AMAZING POWER OF FORGIVENESS".
I stared at it for a few moments, trying to figure out which was more enraging, the fact that she sent me a Christian magazine while knowing that I am not a Christian, or the two words, "move on".
I decided it was "move on". Maybe it can help me to move on. Indeed. Maybe I'm not ready to move on. Maybe I'm not done reaming your ass out for all the shitty fucking things you did to me when I was a child. "Move on"- if anything it just makes me want to wind myself back up again and go off on her some more. I wasn't finished, I just got tired. And then Mothers Day came up, what was I supposed to do, ream her out on Mothers Day? I may be a thirty one year old woman nursing a whole hell of a lot of hurt, but I'm not a cad.
Move on...indeed.
I decide to overlook it all for a moment and give the article a chance. It could be enlightening, I was willing to concede to whatever wisdom it might offer up.
I started to read the article, and I'm not sure how I can express the total and utter, complete and annihilatory disdain I felt reading it. So I'm just going to tell you what it was about.
The article starts out telling a story about a group of missionaries who went to some God-forsaken place to teach the poor Godless people The Way. Never mind that these people may have their own way, and their own gods/God/whatever. Missionaries are funny like that. Of the road paved to hell with good intentions, they are the main brick layers, I believe.
So, some missionaries go and try to spread the word of God, and for some reason, the tribespeople freak out and kill them. I mean, I personally don't see the great leap of logic it took to figure out why they did that, but this being a Christian magazine, it comes out a bit biased, as if it were some unfathomable horror. Again, let me repeat: I am not a cad. Murder is terrible. I'm not debating that. That said, pause for a moment and picture the reaction the citizens of the United States would have to a group of people coming in and telling them that their religion is wrong, that they sin sin sin and are going to hell unless they change their entire belief system, throwing away the culture and history passed down from their grandfathers.
You know, just a thought. I'm just saying I don't think that shit would fly.
Anyway, the article goes on to say that eventually some of these tribal heathens came to know Jesus and that the wife and son of one of the murdered missionaries grew to be very close with the man that murdered their husband and father.
The article goes on. There's lots of talk of forgiveness, some Christianity peppered about, and a few tidbits of wisdom and insight.
It was the beginning. I couldn't get past it. My mother read this article and thought of me. She hopes I can move on.
~scratches head~
Yes. My mother the missionary, coming into my heathen life and telling me everything I do is wrong, everything I am is wrong, and trying to squash any bit of individuality and independant thought out of me. I rise up. I try to kill her.
Ok, I never tried to kill her. But still...the irony of this article was lost on my mom. She didn't notice it while she read it. She thought of me. She didn't notice it while she actually wrote a little post it note, stuck it in a magazine sized envelope, took it to the post office, addressed it and sent it to me. She never noticed the irony.
Maybe it can help me to move on.
I'm not exactly sure how it's going to help me move on, unless she's trying to point out that there is no possible way to close the chasm between us, that the distance is too great, I should stop trying and just accept that we will never be close. This gesture tells me one thing very clearly: My mother and I will never be what I want us to be- understood by one another.
Perhaps that is my lesson. I want the ideal. I cannot have it. It just is not meant to be.
I need to move on.
Indeed.
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
now, here, and then
If you want to know the past, to know what has caused you, look at yourself in the present, for that is the past’s effect. If you want to know your future, then look at yourself in the present, for that is the cause of the future.
-Majjhima Nikaya
-Majjhima Nikaya
cool is in the arms of the beholder
I found this pic and yoinked it off of MySpace. We'll see how long the link lasts...
Bikes like this are all the rage here. It baffles me. Here's the deal:
You take a useful form of transporation. You then add chrome, huge everything, and ride around very slowly like that. And that is cool.
I am not cool. But I can see from the looks on the faces of the people riding contraptions like this that THEY are obviously cool and that they believe I should agree.
It's a funny thing, perception. When I see dudes riding by on these things, I think of apes. It's the chopper bars. Now, a real motorcycle with chopper bars doesn't make me think of apes because we all know apes don't wear leather.
(Or do they.....?)
At any rate, I can't figure out where you're supposed to have sex on the thing, since there is no back seat, I guess people around here just get each others phone numbers and hook up later? I don't know. I didn't grow up here.
Personally, I think this is the hotness:
Nothing like a sunshade and an empty shopping cart to get my wheels turning...
'Doodle, you grew up here. What is this shit? And the rest of you....
Hotness? Or Notness?
Monday, May 22, 2006
you yourself
To probe deep into your roots:
The ignorance and confusion are you yourself.
The preconceptions which are yourself
Are envoys and agents sent by yourself.
-"Drinking the Mountain Stream: Songs of Tibet's Beloved Saint, Milarepa"
The ignorance and confusion are you yourself.
The preconceptions which are yourself
Are envoys and agents sent by yourself.
-"Drinking the Mountain Stream: Songs of Tibet's Beloved Saint, Milarepa"
female bonding
I've noticed an interesting thing happening lately, that I simply can't let slip by.
Bonding.
Not bondage, no. Bonding.
When I first started blogging I didn't take it seriously at all, it was just a few random words I threw down and nobody read. It didn't matter.
As time passed, more and more people grew to know me, while at the same time I grew to know myself. As I've unraveled me, in all my glory and filth, you've been able to read along, observing my joy and disgust, my thrill and misery.
For me, that upped the ante. Suddenly, I had "readers". Do I write things that they want to read, since my ultimate goal is publication...or do I continue to roll along on my own path and see where it leads?
Well, anyone who's read me for any length of time already knows the answer to that: I roll on.
At times it's really fucking hard. There are many days I want to come in here and tell some hot story of my awesome life, but there is nothing to tell. As a matter of fact, many days there seems to be a black hole in my screen, sucking me into a darkened abyss of loneliness, which is odd considering how many of you are on the other end of this screen.
Bit by bit...I've been reaching out. Exposing just a little bit more, through stories, pictures, e-mail between you and I. Some of you I've grown quite close to, and it makes it...softer. The world is softer with you in it.
There have been many an e-mail between The Yearning Heart and I, and damn if I'm not downright smitten with her sweetness, her love, her family, her. She's beautiful, and now we are friends. Friends? I ask her. Friends! She says, and it makes me choke up a little. Also, as she mentions in her blog, the littlest boy calls her "Peppymint". Now everytime I get in the shower (no foolin') I think of her because I have this peppermint foot scrub in there and I even refer to her to Jack as "Peppymint". (Busted!)
Is it less because it's cyber friends? She and I would never meet in real life due to distance. The sad thing is, she's so glorious... there are few people like that in the world. I need those people. I need to surround me with them. I need them as cushions, I need them as nourishment, I need them as I need faith.
I need.
I'm not ok with needing people. Being a classic enabler, I'm perfectly ok with people needing ME, but me needing others? (vomits) That's just sickening. Weak.
Well, aren't I the tough little bitch? What's the point of that? It works great if I want to keep you all away, sure. And those of you who are full of hate and malice, I DO want to keep you away, but let's face it- I've worked hard to make this blog so heart wrenchingly honest it's hard for people like that to make it very far. There is far easier prey out there. I don't fall for the typical troll attack, and anyone trying to cut me down tends to be attacked by the rest of you anyway (laughs), my lovely guards. ("You like me! You really like me!")
Then there is my lovely Daisy, who I have grown closer to over time. We have a ways to go before SuperBestFriend status, but I'm working on it. (smiles) She just wrote this post that really struck me. In particular, she mentions "I don't quite know how to share or receive comfort from the faceless masses who read but don't comment. I really wish I had someone to talk to, to vent to, to bitch and work though it all with. Dmast has been my best friend for years. It is quite a shame that the one I usually turn to in times of trouble is the one who I can't speak of it to right now."
Jack and I have been having this same issue, but in particular the problem is that I burden him with all of my "talk". Meaning, instead of spreading out my angst amongst friends who can help me bear the load, he gets the whole of it, part and parcel.
I have a shrink, but at 45 minutes every other week, whoopdedoo, I wonder why I bother at all? By the time I've explained the massive and complex reasons that I've come to Conclusion A, our time is up and I have no answer as to how to undo the damage the the extrememly misguided Conclusion A is wreaking upon my life.
One of my friends here in town pointed that out to me that I need to spread out my needs farther and not overload Jack in such a way. What's amusing to me is that she is the one, out of all of my friends, that I feel guiltiest bitching to. The poor thing barely gets a word in edgewise when we hang out. I mean, she doesn't talk much, really, but still- I end up feeling like some hysterical drama case who just spent four hours yapping on and on about nothing and everything all at once. I frequently ask Jack, "Really...I wonder why she wants to be my friend? Is it fun? Interesting? Perhaps she doesn't like speaking so I just take up all the empty spaces for her?" The fact is, I'm always embarrassed. Maybe I'm just so starved for female companionship that I can't stop yapping, I don't know. And she's incredibly insightful and articulate, but the only reason I know this is from the e-mails she sends me. I mean, what does that say about me? Is it even about me? Am I just being self concious? I can't tell. I really can't.
I have a long way to learn about what is healthy, and what is normal.
*looks shocked as audience bursts into applause as I run to the stage to accept my Understatement Of The Year Award*
Recently, my lovely Cerise got my curiousity up and running about a character in a book that she compared me to. When I couldn't find the book at the library and I lamented so, she sent it to me.
She SENT it to me.
Ok, it's not like I'm handing out my address here, folks. Besides, with all this girly talk, most of you boys haven't made it this far down the page anyway. (gives rasperries) The thing is, I've been reading Cerise for awhile, and vice versa, and I felt safe enough to do so.
Now here's the interesting part- the box arrived while I was in the midst of my Saturday oh-god-I'm-gonna-die ulcer incident. I remember the door being banged on, I remember Jack coming in with a box and telling me I had a package, I remember being a bit horrified that I had forgotten to mention that I had handed out our personal address to a fellow blogger, but he knew and it was ok. I fell back asleep.
When I woke up, I rolled over to see this box. There is was, a very simple cardboard box, but yet still...something about it was just fucking MAGIC. It wasn't an e-mail, it wasn't a comment, it wasn't a blog, it was a BOX and it was sitting on my BED. A woman I've never met knew there was a book I wanted to read and actually bought it and sent it to me, and there it was, on my bed. A box.
I looked at it for a long time, not opening it, just laying there and reveling in it's realness, in it's tangibility, in the love or respect or faith that went behind the action that propelled this box to my bed. And then I opened it.
Inside was not one but two books, Cerise added this note: "Now look, Lamby-toes. If it turns out that's Sunshine's nothing like you, remember that you and I have never met. But I love you and I think of you when I read this. Cerise."
I started to choke up. I walked into the kitchen and said, "Look...look...look...." and shoved the paper at him. "She said, 'Lamby-toes!'" I hitched. "Lamby toes...." and clutched my books and my note tight, as one does with things that are precious.
Even now, it's making me all weepy, golly gosh darn it. Lamby-toes. I mean, baaa-aaa-aa-aaah! What can I possible say to THAT?
We've e-mailed back and forth a few times, and I have hopefully reassured her that I love this book and do not find Sunshine to be some crazy shew. In fact, I get it. At least, I get it in my own way. The way I see her (and I'm only halfway through it) is that she's ordinary, but she's forgotten who she REALLY is, and who she really is is magical.
So far, that's what I've gotten out of it. At one point, silly Cerise even mentions that she didn't want to insult me because the character keeps referring to herself as a wuss. I have to laugh, because HELLO???? I am the pussiest of all pussies. I am afraid of the movie Gremlins, for fucks sake. Spiders. Really, nearly any bug. I'm afraid they will go into an orifice. Yech. Any orifice. Gross. I don't think I have ever recovered from my bother telling me there was a T-Rex living in the woods behind our house (I was younger and believed him, that bastard) and couldn't watch Jurassic Park without total and complete girly screaming horror.
Wuss? Shooo.
At any rate, it's really late and the point I'm trying to make is going to get lost if I don't hurry it up. My point is: I want you. I need you. I don't care if you're "cyber friends", that doesn't make you less to me. And if we send each other things in the mail, it makes it magically real. And that is beautiful.
"But I'm on your side
And I don't want to be your regret
I'd rather be your cocoon..."
Jack Johnson, Cocoon
Bonding.
Not bondage, no. Bonding.
When I first started blogging I didn't take it seriously at all, it was just a few random words I threw down and nobody read. It didn't matter.
As time passed, more and more people grew to know me, while at the same time I grew to know myself. As I've unraveled me, in all my glory and filth, you've been able to read along, observing my joy and disgust, my thrill and misery.
For me, that upped the ante. Suddenly, I had "readers". Do I write things that they want to read, since my ultimate goal is publication...or do I continue to roll along on my own path and see where it leads?
Well, anyone who's read me for any length of time already knows the answer to that: I roll on.
At times it's really fucking hard. There are many days I want to come in here and tell some hot story of my awesome life, but there is nothing to tell. As a matter of fact, many days there seems to be a black hole in my screen, sucking me into a darkened abyss of loneliness, which is odd considering how many of you are on the other end of this screen.
Bit by bit...I've been reaching out. Exposing just a little bit more, through stories, pictures, e-mail between you and I. Some of you I've grown quite close to, and it makes it...softer. The world is softer with you in it.
There have been many an e-mail between The Yearning Heart and I, and damn if I'm not downright smitten with her sweetness, her love, her family, her. She's beautiful, and now we are friends. Friends? I ask her. Friends! She says, and it makes me choke up a little. Also, as she mentions in her blog, the littlest boy calls her "Peppymint". Now everytime I get in the shower (no foolin') I think of her because I have this peppermint foot scrub in there and I even refer to her to Jack as "Peppymint". (Busted!)
Is it less because it's cyber friends? She and I would never meet in real life due to distance. The sad thing is, she's so glorious... there are few people like that in the world. I need those people. I need to surround me with them. I need them as cushions, I need them as nourishment, I need them as I need faith.
I need.
I'm not ok with needing people. Being a classic enabler, I'm perfectly ok with people needing ME, but me needing others? (vomits) That's just sickening. Weak.
Well, aren't I the tough little bitch? What's the point of that? It works great if I want to keep you all away, sure. And those of you who are full of hate and malice, I DO want to keep you away, but let's face it- I've worked hard to make this blog so heart wrenchingly honest it's hard for people like that to make it very far. There is far easier prey out there. I don't fall for the typical troll attack, and anyone trying to cut me down tends to be attacked by the rest of you anyway (laughs), my lovely guards. ("You like me! You really like me!")
Then there is my lovely Daisy, who I have grown closer to over time. We have a ways to go before SuperBestFriend status, but I'm working on it. (smiles) She just wrote this post that really struck me. In particular, she mentions "I don't quite know how to share or receive comfort from the faceless masses who read but don't comment. I really wish I had someone to talk to, to vent to, to bitch and work though it all with. Dmast has been my best friend for years. It is quite a shame that the one I usually turn to in times of trouble is the one who I can't speak of it to right now."
Jack and I have been having this same issue, but in particular the problem is that I burden him with all of my "talk". Meaning, instead of spreading out my angst amongst friends who can help me bear the load, he gets the whole of it, part and parcel.
I have a shrink, but at 45 minutes every other week, whoopdedoo, I wonder why I bother at all? By the time I've explained the massive and complex reasons that I've come to Conclusion A, our time is up and I have no answer as to how to undo the damage the the extrememly misguided Conclusion A is wreaking upon my life.
One of my friends here in town pointed that out to me that I need to spread out my needs farther and not overload Jack in such a way. What's amusing to me is that she is the one, out of all of my friends, that I feel guiltiest bitching to. The poor thing barely gets a word in edgewise when we hang out. I mean, she doesn't talk much, really, but still- I end up feeling like some hysterical drama case who just spent four hours yapping on and on about nothing and everything all at once. I frequently ask Jack, "Really...I wonder why she wants to be my friend? Is it fun? Interesting? Perhaps she doesn't like speaking so I just take up all the empty spaces for her?" The fact is, I'm always embarrassed. Maybe I'm just so starved for female companionship that I can't stop yapping, I don't know. And she's incredibly insightful and articulate, but the only reason I know this is from the e-mails she sends me. I mean, what does that say about me? Is it even about me? Am I just being self concious? I can't tell. I really can't.
I have a long way to learn about what is healthy, and what is normal.
*looks shocked as audience bursts into applause as I run to the stage to accept my Understatement Of The Year Award*
Recently, my lovely Cerise got my curiousity up and running about a character in a book that she compared me to. When I couldn't find the book at the library and I lamented so, she sent it to me.
She SENT it to me.
Ok, it's not like I'm handing out my address here, folks. Besides, with all this girly talk, most of you boys haven't made it this far down the page anyway. (gives rasperries) The thing is, I've been reading Cerise for awhile, and vice versa, and I felt safe enough to do so.
Now here's the interesting part- the box arrived while I was in the midst of my Saturday oh-god-I'm-gonna-die ulcer incident. I remember the door being banged on, I remember Jack coming in with a box and telling me I had a package, I remember being a bit horrified that I had forgotten to mention that I had handed out our personal address to a fellow blogger, but he knew and it was ok. I fell back asleep.
When I woke up, I rolled over to see this box. There is was, a very simple cardboard box, but yet still...something about it was just fucking MAGIC. It wasn't an e-mail, it wasn't a comment, it wasn't a blog, it was a BOX and it was sitting on my BED. A woman I've never met knew there was a book I wanted to read and actually bought it and sent it to me, and there it was, on my bed. A box.
I looked at it for a long time, not opening it, just laying there and reveling in it's realness, in it's tangibility, in the love or respect or faith that went behind the action that propelled this box to my bed. And then I opened it.
Inside was not one but two books, Cerise added this note: "Now look, Lamby-toes. If it turns out that's Sunshine's nothing like you, remember that you and I have never met. But I love you and I think of you when I read this. Cerise."
I started to choke up. I walked into the kitchen and said, "Look...look...look...." and shoved the paper at him. "She said, 'Lamby-toes!'" I hitched. "Lamby toes...." and clutched my books and my note tight, as one does with things that are precious.
Even now, it's making me all weepy, golly gosh darn it. Lamby-toes. I mean, baaa-aaa-aa-aaah! What can I possible say to THAT?
We've e-mailed back and forth a few times, and I have hopefully reassured her that I love this book and do not find Sunshine to be some crazy shew. In fact, I get it. At least, I get it in my own way. The way I see her (and I'm only halfway through it) is that she's ordinary, but she's forgotten who she REALLY is, and who she really is is magical.
So far, that's what I've gotten out of it. At one point, silly Cerise even mentions that she didn't want to insult me because the character keeps referring to herself as a wuss. I have to laugh, because HELLO???? I am the pussiest of all pussies. I am afraid of the movie Gremlins, for fucks sake. Spiders. Really, nearly any bug. I'm afraid they will go into an orifice. Yech. Any orifice. Gross. I don't think I have ever recovered from my bother telling me there was a T-Rex living in the woods behind our house (I was younger and believed him, that bastard) and couldn't watch Jurassic Park without total and complete girly screaming horror.
Wuss? Shooo.
At any rate, it's really late and the point I'm trying to make is going to get lost if I don't hurry it up. My point is: I want you. I need you. I don't care if you're "cyber friends", that doesn't make you less to me. And if we send each other things in the mail, it makes it magically real. And that is beautiful.
"But I'm on your side
And I don't want to be your regret
I'd rather be your cocoon..."
Jack Johnson, Cocoon
female bonding
I've noticed an interesting thing happening lately, that I simply can't let slip by.
Bonding.
Not bondage, no. Bonding.
When I first started blogging I didn't take it seriously at all, it was just a few random words I threw down and nobody read. It didn't matter.
As time passed, more and more people grew to know me, while at the same time I grew to know myself. As I've unraveled me, in all my glory and filth, you've been able to read along, observing my joy and disgust, my thrill and misery.
For me, that upped the ante. Suddenly, I had "readers". Do I write things that they want to read, since my ultimate goal is publication...or do I continue to roll along on my own path and see where it leads?
Well, anyone who's read me for any length of time already knows the answer to that: I roll on.
At times it's really fucking hard. There are many days I want to come in here and tell some hot story of my awesome life, but there is nothing to tell. As a matter of fact, many days there seems to be a black hole in my screen, sucking me into a darkened abyss of loneliness, which is odd considering how many of you are on the other end of this screen.
Bit by bit...I've been reaching out. Exposing just a little bit more, through stories, pictures, e-mail between you and I. Some of you I've grown quite close to, and it makes it...softer. The world is softer with you in it.
There have been many an e-mail between The Yearning Heart and I, and damn if I'm not downright smitten with her sweetness, her love, her family, her. She's beautiful, and now we are friends. Friends? I ask her. Friends! She says, and it makes me choke up a little. Also, as she mentions in her blog, the littlest boy calls her "Peppymint". Now everytime I get in the shower (no foolin') I think of her because I have this peppermint foot scrub in there and I even refer to her to Jack as "Peppymint". (Busted!)
Is it less because it's cyber friends? She and I would never meet in real life due to distance. The sad thing is, she's so glorious... there are few people like that in the world. I need those people. I need to surround me with them. I need them as cushions, I need them as nourishment, I need them as I need faith.
I need.
I'm not ok with needing people. Being a classic enabler, I'm perfectly ok with people needing ME, but me needing others? (vomits) That's just sickening. Weak.
Well, aren't I the tough little bitch? What's the point of that? It works great if I want to keep you all away, sure. And those of you who are full of hate and malice, I DO want to keep you away, but let's face it- I've worked hard to make this blog so heart wrenchingly honest it's hard for people like that to make it very far. There is far easier prey out there. I don't fall for the typical troll attack, and anyone trying to cut me down tends to be attacked by the rest of you anyway (laughs), my lovely guards. ("You like me! You really like me!")
Then there is my lovely Daisy, who I have grown closer to over time. We have a ways to go before SuperBestFriend status, but I'm working on it. (smiles) She just wrote this post that really struck me. In particular, she mentions
"I don't quite know how to share or receive comfort from the faceless masses who read but don't comment. I really wish I had someone to talk to, to vent to, to bitch and work though it all with. Dmast has been my best friend for years. It is quite a shame that the one I usually turn to in times of trouble is the one who I can't speak of it to right now."
Jack and I have been having this same issue, but in particular the problem is that I burden him with all of my "talk". Meaning, instead of spreading out my angst amongst friends who can help me bear the load, he gets the whole of it, part and parcel.
I have a shrink, but at 45 minutes every other week, whoopdedoo, I wonder why I bother at all? By the time I've explained the massive and complex reasons that I've come to Conclusion A, our time is up and I have no answer as to how to undo the damage the the extrememly misguided Conclusion A is wreaking upon my life.
One of my friends here in town pointed that out to me that I need to spread out my needs farther and not overload Jack in such a way. What's amusing to me is that she is the one, out of all of my friends, that I feel guiltiest bitching to. The poor thing barely gets a word in edgewise when we hang out. I mean, she doesn't talk much, really, but still- I end up feeling like some hysterical drama case who just spent four hours yapping on and on about nothing and everything all at once. I frequently ask Jack, "Really...I wonder why she wants to be my friend? Is it fun? Interesting? Perhaps she doesn't like speaking so I just take up all the empty spaces for her?" The fact is, I'm always embarrassed. Maybe I'm just so starved for female companionship that I can't stop yapping, I don't know. And she's incredibly insightful and articulate, but the only reason I know this is from the e-mails she sends me. I mean, what does that say about me? Is it even about me? Am I just being self concious? I can't tell. I really can't.
I have a long way to learn about what is healthy, and what is normal.
*looks shocked as audience bursts into applause as I run to the stage to accept my Understatement Of The Year Award*
Recently, my lovely Cerise got my curiousity up and running about a character in a book that she compared me to. When I couldn't find the book at the library and I lamented so, she sent it to me.
She SENT it to me.
Ok, it's not like I'm handing out my address here, folks. Besides, with all this girly talk, most of you boys haven't made it this far down the page anyway. (gives rasperries) The thing is, I've been reading Cerise for awhile, and vice versa, and I felt safe enough to do so.
Now here's the interesting part- the box arrived while I was in the midst of my Saturday oh-god-I'm-gonna-die ulcer incident. I remember the door being banged on, I remember Jack coming in with a box and telling me I had a package, I remember being a bit horrified that I had forgotten to mention that I had handed out our personal address to a fellow blogger, but he knew and it was ok. I fell back asleep.
When I woke up, I rolled over to see this box. There is was, a very simple cardboard box, but yet still...something about it was just fucking MAGIC. It wasn't an e-mail, it wasn't a comment, it wasn't a blog, it was a BOX and it was sitting on my BED. A woman I've never met knew there was a book I wanted to read and actually bought it and sent it to me, and there it was, on my bed. A box.
I looked at it for a long time, not opening it, just laying there and reveling in it's realness, in it's tangibility, in the love or respect or faith that went behind the action that propelled this box to my bed. And then I opened it.
Inside was not one but two books, Cerise added this note: "Now look, Lamby-toes. If it turns out that's Sunshine's nothing like you, remember that you and I have never met. But I love you and I think of you when I read this. Cerise."
I started to choke up. I walked into the kitchen and said, "Look...look...look...." and shoved the paper at him. "She said, 'Lamby-toes!'" I hitched. "Lamby toes...." and clutched my books and my note tight, as one does with things that are precious.
Even now, it's making me all weepy, golly gosh darn it. Lamby-toes. I mean, baaa-aaa-aa-aaah! What can I possible say to THAT?
We've e-mailed back and forth a few times, and I have hopefully reassured her that I love this book and do not find Sunshine to be some crazy shew. In fact, I get it. At least, I get it in my own way. The way I see her (and I'm only halfway through it) is that she's ordinary, but she's forgotten who she REALLY is, and who she really is is magical.
So far, that's what I've gotten out of it. At one point, silly Cerise even mentions that she didn't want to insult me because the character keeps referring to herself as a wuss. I have to laugh, because HELLO???? I am the pussiest of all pussies. I am afraid of the movie Gremlins, for fucks sake. Spiders. Really, nearly any bug. I'm afraid they will go into an orifice. Yech. Any orifice. Gross. I don't think I have ever recovered from my bother telling me there was a T-Rex living in the woods behind our house (I was younger and believed him, that bastard) and couldn't watch Jurassic Park without total and complete girly screaming horror.
Wuss? Shooo.
At any rate, it's really late and the point I'm trying to make is going to get lost if I don't hurry it up. My point is: I want you. I need you. I don't care if you're "cyber friends", that doesn't make you less to me. And if we send each other things in the mail, it makes it magically real. And that is beautiful.
"I'm on your side
And I don't want to be your regret
I'd rather be your cocoon..."
Jack Johnson, Cocoon
Bonding.
Not bondage, no. Bonding.
When I first started blogging I didn't take it seriously at all, it was just a few random words I threw down and nobody read. It didn't matter.
As time passed, more and more people grew to know me, while at the same time I grew to know myself. As I've unraveled me, in all my glory and filth, you've been able to read along, observing my joy and disgust, my thrill and misery.
For me, that upped the ante. Suddenly, I had "readers". Do I write things that they want to read, since my ultimate goal is publication...or do I continue to roll along on my own path and see where it leads?
Well, anyone who's read me for any length of time already knows the answer to that: I roll on.
At times it's really fucking hard. There are many days I want to come in here and tell some hot story of my awesome life, but there is nothing to tell. As a matter of fact, many days there seems to be a black hole in my screen, sucking me into a darkened abyss of loneliness, which is odd considering how many of you are on the other end of this screen.
Bit by bit...I've been reaching out. Exposing just a little bit more, through stories, pictures, e-mail between you and I. Some of you I've grown quite close to, and it makes it...softer. The world is softer with you in it.
There have been many an e-mail between The Yearning Heart and I, and damn if I'm not downright smitten with her sweetness, her love, her family, her. She's beautiful, and now we are friends. Friends? I ask her. Friends! She says, and it makes me choke up a little. Also, as she mentions in her blog, the littlest boy calls her "Peppymint". Now everytime I get in the shower (no foolin') I think of her because I have this peppermint foot scrub in there and I even refer to her to Jack as "Peppymint". (Busted!)
Is it less because it's cyber friends? She and I would never meet in real life due to distance. The sad thing is, she's so glorious... there are few people like that in the world. I need those people. I need to surround me with them. I need them as cushions, I need them as nourishment, I need them as I need faith.
I need.
I'm not ok with needing people. Being a classic enabler, I'm perfectly ok with people needing ME, but me needing others? (vomits) That's just sickening. Weak.
Well, aren't I the tough little bitch? What's the point of that? It works great if I want to keep you all away, sure. And those of you who are full of hate and malice, I DO want to keep you away, but let's face it- I've worked hard to make this blog so heart wrenchingly honest it's hard for people like that to make it very far. There is far easier prey out there. I don't fall for the typical troll attack, and anyone trying to cut me down tends to be attacked by the rest of you anyway (laughs), my lovely guards. ("You like me! You really like me!")
Then there is my lovely Daisy, who I have grown closer to over time. We have a ways to go before SuperBestFriend status, but I'm working on it. (smiles) She just wrote this post that really struck me. In particular, she mentions
"I don't quite know how to share or receive comfort from the faceless masses who read but don't comment. I really wish I had someone to talk to, to vent to, to bitch and work though it all with. Dmast has been my best friend for years. It is quite a shame that the one I usually turn to in times of trouble is the one who I can't speak of it to right now."
Jack and I have been having this same issue, but in particular the problem is that I burden him with all of my "talk". Meaning, instead of spreading out my angst amongst friends who can help me bear the load, he gets the whole of it, part and parcel.
I have a shrink, but at 45 minutes every other week, whoopdedoo, I wonder why I bother at all? By the time I've explained the massive and complex reasons that I've come to Conclusion A, our time is up and I have no answer as to how to undo the damage the the extrememly misguided Conclusion A is wreaking upon my life.
One of my friends here in town pointed that out to me that I need to spread out my needs farther and not overload Jack in such a way. What's amusing to me is that she is the one, out of all of my friends, that I feel guiltiest bitching to. The poor thing barely gets a word in edgewise when we hang out. I mean, she doesn't talk much, really, but still- I end up feeling like some hysterical drama case who just spent four hours yapping on and on about nothing and everything all at once. I frequently ask Jack, "Really...I wonder why she wants to be my friend? Is it fun? Interesting? Perhaps she doesn't like speaking so I just take up all the empty spaces for her?" The fact is, I'm always embarrassed. Maybe I'm just so starved for female companionship that I can't stop yapping, I don't know. And she's incredibly insightful and articulate, but the only reason I know this is from the e-mails she sends me. I mean, what does that say about me? Is it even about me? Am I just being self concious? I can't tell. I really can't.
I have a long way to learn about what is healthy, and what is normal.
*looks shocked as audience bursts into applause as I run to the stage to accept my Understatement Of The Year Award*
Recently, my lovely Cerise got my curiousity up and running about a character in a book that she compared me to. When I couldn't find the book at the library and I lamented so, she sent it to me.
She SENT it to me.
Ok, it's not like I'm handing out my address here, folks. Besides, with all this girly talk, most of you boys haven't made it this far down the page anyway. (gives rasperries) The thing is, I've been reading Cerise for awhile, and vice versa, and I felt safe enough to do so.
Now here's the interesting part- the box arrived while I was in the midst of my Saturday oh-god-I'm-gonna-die ulcer incident. I remember the door being banged on, I remember Jack coming in with a box and telling me I had a package, I remember being a bit horrified that I had forgotten to mention that I had handed out our personal address to a fellow blogger, but he knew and it was ok. I fell back asleep.
When I woke up, I rolled over to see this box. There is was, a very simple cardboard box, but yet still...something about it was just fucking MAGIC. It wasn't an e-mail, it wasn't a comment, it wasn't a blog, it was a BOX and it was sitting on my BED. A woman I've never met knew there was a book I wanted to read and actually bought it and sent it to me, and there it was, on my bed. A box.
I looked at it for a long time, not opening it, just laying there and reveling in it's realness, in it's tangibility, in the love or respect or faith that went behind the action that propelled this box to my bed. And then I opened it.
Inside was not one but two books, Cerise added this note: "Now look, Lamby-toes. If it turns out that's Sunshine's nothing like you, remember that you and I have never met. But I love you and I think of you when I read this. Cerise."
I started to choke up. I walked into the kitchen and said, "Look...look...look...." and shoved the paper at him. "She said, 'Lamby-toes!'" I hitched. "Lamby toes...." and clutched my books and my note tight, as one does with things that are precious.
Even now, it's making me all weepy, golly gosh darn it. Lamby-toes. I mean, baaa-aaa-aa-aaah! What can I possible say to THAT?
We've e-mailed back and forth a few times, and I have hopefully reassured her that I love this book and do not find Sunshine to be some crazy shew. In fact, I get it. At least, I get it in my own way. The way I see her (and I'm only halfway through it) is that she's ordinary, but she's forgotten who she REALLY is, and who she really is is magical.
So far, that's what I've gotten out of it. At one point, silly Cerise even mentions that she didn't want to insult me because the character keeps referring to herself as a wuss. I have to laugh, because HELLO???? I am the pussiest of all pussies. I am afraid of the movie Gremlins, for fucks sake. Spiders. Really, nearly any bug. I'm afraid they will go into an orifice. Yech. Any orifice. Gross. I don't think I have ever recovered from my bother telling me there was a T-Rex living in the woods behind our house (I was younger and believed him, that bastard) and couldn't watch Jurassic Park without total and complete girly screaming horror.
Wuss? Shooo.
At any rate, it's really late and the point I'm trying to make is going to get lost if I don't hurry it up. My point is: I want you. I need you. I don't care if you're "cyber friends", that doesn't make you less to me. And if we send each other things in the mail, it makes it magically real. And that is beautiful.
"I'm on your side
And I don't want to be your regret
I'd rather be your cocoon..."
Jack Johnson, Cocoon
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Saturday, May 20, 2006
crumbs and the evil of toast....a follow up post
(It took most of my energy to type this. Forgive the typo's, I'll edit it later. Tomorrow. Sometime.)
Ah, yes.
I woke up this morning thinking, “Well. I suppose I'd better get up and write the follow up post...�
Then I got up. Then I laid back down. Then I got up, realizing that laying down hurt too bad. Then I realized sitting up hurt too bad as well. Jack had come in while I was still laying down and actually shut the door so I could sleep in.
That has never happened before.
Alas, my happy happy sleep-in time was not enjoyable. I didn't want to come to the living room, I didn't want to see Jack's back at the computer, and I didn't want to eat.
THAT is highly unusual.
I sat there, in various positions of pain and tried to stretch. Nothing. Various back spasms, agonizing muscle cramps, and the knowledge that sooner or later I was going to have to walk out and see Jack, and say....something. I'd hit my limit the night before so something had to be said. A conversation was damn well going to be had, but...I was in so much pain, I just couldn't really bear the thought of it.
An hour went by. I finally walked out. Jacked was cheerful and said, “Good morning, baby!� to which I growled. He came up beside me and said, “Is something wrong?�
Ok- at that point I don't know what the hell I said. We were talking about the whole “not paying attention to me� stuff and my back was spasming out of control. At some point I just started sobbing hysterically, to which his response was a very genuine concern. “What's wrong? What's wrong?�
I howled something about being in so much pain. He asked me if I wanted him to rub my back. I told him I didn't think he'd have time. He was insulted that I thought so little of his concern for me. I was offended that he couldn't understand why I would assume he would be busy. We bickered back and forth, but one particular spasm just sent me over the edge into sobbing again, and he helped me down the hall to the bed. He helped me because I ran into the wall on the way.
I flopped down on the bed and he started rubbing, but it was just making me cry harder and harder. Finally he stops and says, “Baby? I don't think this is your back. I think this is your ulcer.�
lightbulb goes off and immediately shatters from the sound of my howling in pain
“Have you eaten?� he asks. “No!� I answer, “no, I don't want to eat. I don't want to eat...� He says, “Baby, this has got to be your ulcer then.� I sob, “Please don't make me eat toast again, anything but toast...�
The last time my ulcer flared up this bad he woke up to find me sobbing in the living room, having been awake for hours with back pain. Once the ulcer problem was established, he insisted I eat something. It's the only thing that will stop the pain, but I gag and choke on it the whole way through. It's really awful. Even though I know it will help, I can't manage to get it down without gagging on it the whole time. To say it fucking sucks would be an understatement. That time, he literally had to stand over me and force me to eat it. That or the emergency room, take your pick. I hated him for it at the time, horrible taskmaster, but thanked him profusely afterwards.
He asked me what I wanted to eat. “Nothing!� I sobbed. “Soymilk? Can you get some soymilk down?� I nodded, knowing that I would hate it but it had to be done. I nearly threw it up on his pillow, but I got it down and it stayed down.
Once that was down he asked me what else I wanted to eat. Want? Ugh. He made me some Kashi oatmeal. At one point I told him I felt like I eating a bowl of bland flavored vomit, but as I ate, the spasms stopped.
It's weird, Jack commented, that my ulcer never just appears in my stomach, it's always some strange combination of other symptoms. It's true. Had I been paying closer attention, I would have noticed that I've been wanting to eat constantly the last few days, but haven't let myself because I've been trying to lose weight. And then two nights ago, as I lay in bed and waited for him to come to bed (sigh) I thought about puking up my dinner. One huge ass bowl of a tomato based soup- Stomach Ulcer Enemy Number One. And last night, I could barely get my dinner down. It took me forever to eat. But, trying to lose weight, it just made me happy. Like, Yay! I'm not hungry! Hurrah!
I also remember making the 3 bowls of strawberry shortcake and not wanting to put strawberries on mine. I love strawberries, so that's fucking odd. My body was instinctually trying to tell me to stay the fuck away but I wouldn't do it.
~sigh~
Anyway, I've spent the day forcing bland food down my throat and staying heavily sedated. I can't take anything for the back pain. Here's the bitch of it all: I take Motrin for the migraine, but it eats a hole in my stomach. Then, the ulcer comes screaming in with a vengeance. Suddenly I'm totally out of my fucking mind, everything hurts and I can't even think anymore. Oh, let's not forget the hot and cold flashes.
Now that you know what my morning has been like, let me continue with last night. I am in no way saying that my ulcer made me nuts and Jack is an angel. Oh frik frak fuckitty no. No. What I AM saying is that we're both really fucking stressed over something coming up, something which I have not blogged about at all, for safety reasons. Those of you who know me well enough can e-mail me for details. The rest of you will have to remain unaware, sorry. I tell you all a hell of a lot, but not when it involves the possibility of putting myself in dangers with the telling of details, I leave it out. So, there is a huge chunk of this story that isn't being told. I can clue you in a few weeks, but not right now.
Jack and I have both been dreading this Thing, and deal with it in our own ways. Jack is far more stressed out about it then I am, I dare say, but we are each freaked out for our own reasons. And we each are expressing our freaked-out-ed-ness in our own dysfunctional ways.
My way: cling, exhaustion, ulcers, migraines. PMS is NOT helping. Fucking fuck. Reads books to escape reality. Fluctuates between accomplishing nothing at all to going beserk in a mighty effort to eliminate all tasks in one fell swoop. Frequently hurts self in process.
His way: Manly overdrive, must accomplish everything, or at least look extremely busy. Starts examining possible flaws in plans with microscopic viewing, missing big picture entirely. Becomes microcosm within self, snarling at outside contaminants of micro managed micro universe.
A note: I have PTSD, he has ADHD.
In the last blog post, my darling Cerise posted this as a comment:
5.Please tell me you were kidding when you quoted him as saying "You can help by leaving me alone." Please tell me he didn't say that.
He most certainly did, but I realize without the background that sounds incredibly horrible. He was doing computer programming stuff, which basically involves him writing in some alien language. He and I have many times discussed that it is imperative that he not be interrupted while he's doing code, because it causes him to have to switch gears between computer speak and human speak, and for someone with ADHD, that's about as delicate as a 7 year old switching gears on a stick shift. I can actually WATCH the grinding happen on his face. That's when that particular comment was uttered. For him to be able to finish that particular thing, yes, he does need to be left alone.
Still, it's a bitch to be told that.
As far as comments 1, 2, 3, and 4:
1)Yes, thank you. As they tell you in airplanes, when the air masks drop down, put yours on first, THEN put it on the child next to you. Reason being, if you can't breath and pass out, you aren't shit for help. This applies in many relationship aspects, and this one is no exception.
2)The two hours on Friday night is from watching John Doe and then Doctor Who. We are hard core sci-fi junkies. Until Battlestar Galactica comes back on with the new season, we're trying to fill in the gap. For us, Sci-Fi Friday is the equivalent of going to church on Sunday for other people. We don't miss it. It just isn't done. And he barely saw John Doe. He was mostly seated in front of the computer. Doctor Who had his full attention.
3)This morning he rebuted my claim about that by saying, “If you just TELL me it's important, I'll stop.� And he would. But as I told him, “What am I supposed to say? I know you're fucking stressed, this is how you deal with stress, we've had this conversation before, you know I'm feeling puny, how is that not clear?�
That one is still unresolved. Something needs to be done, yes. I don't have the energy to do it, no. Not right now. And I really don't think he has the energy to devote to a solution right now either. We're both at our breaking points and aren't communicating well. This will change soon, once The Thing We Both Dread is over.
All in all, I'm trying to say that he IS a good man. Anyone who reads me regularly knows this. Alas, this is a rough spell, and I don't spare the bad times either. I write about it all. I could gloss it over and make it sound all very lovely, but that isn't who I am, and it's not the point of my blogging.
For those of you close enough, I'll send you out the details of what the fuck is going on. The rest of you will have to wait a few weeks to hear it.
Until then, ugh.
And for now, I would like to note that Jack has spent the day taking care of everything and now we're all going out to play. He's been taking care of the little monkey and working on fun science projects, keeping him occupied while I laid in bed and slept, sedated, recovering and letting my body get some rest.
I have hope today. Last night I just had anger.
Ah, yes.
I woke up this morning thinking, “Well. I suppose I'd better get up and write the follow up post...�
Then I got up. Then I laid back down. Then I got up, realizing that laying down hurt too bad. Then I realized sitting up hurt too bad as well. Jack had come in while I was still laying down and actually shut the door so I could sleep in.
That has never happened before.
Alas, my happy happy sleep-in time was not enjoyable. I didn't want to come to the living room, I didn't want to see Jack's back at the computer, and I didn't want to eat.
THAT is highly unusual.
I sat there, in various positions of pain and tried to stretch. Nothing. Various back spasms, agonizing muscle cramps, and the knowledge that sooner or later I was going to have to walk out and see Jack, and say....something. I'd hit my limit the night before so something had to be said. A conversation was damn well going to be had, but...I was in so much pain, I just couldn't really bear the thought of it.
An hour went by. I finally walked out. Jacked was cheerful and said, “Good morning, baby!� to which I growled. He came up beside me and said, “Is something wrong?�
Ok- at that point I don't know what the hell I said. We were talking about the whole “not paying attention to me� stuff and my back was spasming out of control. At some point I just started sobbing hysterically, to which his response was a very genuine concern. “What's wrong? What's wrong?�
I howled something about being in so much pain. He asked me if I wanted him to rub my back. I told him I didn't think he'd have time. He was insulted that I thought so little of his concern for me. I was offended that he couldn't understand why I would assume he would be busy. We bickered back and forth, but one particular spasm just sent me over the edge into sobbing again, and he helped me down the hall to the bed. He helped me because I ran into the wall on the way.
I flopped down on the bed and he started rubbing, but it was just making me cry harder and harder. Finally he stops and says, “Baby? I don't think this is your back. I think this is your ulcer.�
lightbulb goes off and immediately shatters from the sound of my howling in pain
“Have you eaten?� he asks. “No!� I answer, “no, I don't want to eat. I don't want to eat...� He says, “Baby, this has got to be your ulcer then.� I sob, “Please don't make me eat toast again, anything but toast...�
The last time my ulcer flared up this bad he woke up to find me sobbing in the living room, having been awake for hours with back pain. Once the ulcer problem was established, he insisted I eat something. It's the only thing that will stop the pain, but I gag and choke on it the whole way through. It's really awful. Even though I know it will help, I can't manage to get it down without gagging on it the whole time. To say it fucking sucks would be an understatement. That time, he literally had to stand over me and force me to eat it. That or the emergency room, take your pick. I hated him for it at the time, horrible taskmaster, but thanked him profusely afterwards.
He asked me what I wanted to eat. “Nothing!� I sobbed. “Soymilk? Can you get some soymilk down?� I nodded, knowing that I would hate it but it had to be done. I nearly threw it up on his pillow, but I got it down and it stayed down.
Once that was down he asked me what else I wanted to eat. Want? Ugh. He made me some Kashi oatmeal. At one point I told him I felt like I eating a bowl of bland flavored vomit, but as I ate, the spasms stopped.
It's weird, Jack commented, that my ulcer never just appears in my stomach, it's always some strange combination of other symptoms. It's true. Had I been paying closer attention, I would have noticed that I've been wanting to eat constantly the last few days, but haven't let myself because I've been trying to lose weight. And then two nights ago, as I lay in bed and waited for him to come to bed (sigh) I thought about puking up my dinner. One huge ass bowl of a tomato based soup- Stomach Ulcer Enemy Number One. And last night, I could barely get my dinner down. It took me forever to eat. But, trying to lose weight, it just made me happy. Like, Yay! I'm not hungry! Hurrah!
I also remember making the 3 bowls of strawberry shortcake and not wanting to put strawberries on mine. I love strawberries, so that's fucking odd. My body was instinctually trying to tell me to stay the fuck away but I wouldn't do it.
~sigh~
Anyway, I've spent the day forcing bland food down my throat and staying heavily sedated. I can't take anything for the back pain. Here's the bitch of it all: I take Motrin for the migraine, but it eats a hole in my stomach. Then, the ulcer comes screaming in with a vengeance. Suddenly I'm totally out of my fucking mind, everything hurts and I can't even think anymore. Oh, let's not forget the hot and cold flashes.
Now that you know what my morning has been like, let me continue with last night. I am in no way saying that my ulcer made me nuts and Jack is an angel. Oh frik frak fuckitty no. No. What I AM saying is that we're both really fucking stressed over something coming up, something which I have not blogged about at all, for safety reasons. Those of you who know me well enough can e-mail me for details. The rest of you will have to remain unaware, sorry. I tell you all a hell of a lot, but not when it involves the possibility of putting myself in dangers with the telling of details, I leave it out. So, there is a huge chunk of this story that isn't being told. I can clue you in a few weeks, but not right now.
Jack and I have both been dreading this Thing, and deal with it in our own ways. Jack is far more stressed out about it then I am, I dare say, but we are each freaked out for our own reasons. And we each are expressing our freaked-out-ed-ness in our own dysfunctional ways.
My way: cling, exhaustion, ulcers, migraines. PMS is NOT helping. Fucking fuck. Reads books to escape reality. Fluctuates between accomplishing nothing at all to going beserk in a mighty effort to eliminate all tasks in one fell swoop. Frequently hurts self in process.
His way: Manly overdrive, must accomplish everything, or at least look extremely busy. Starts examining possible flaws in plans with microscopic viewing, missing big picture entirely. Becomes microcosm within self, snarling at outside contaminants of micro managed micro universe.
A note: I have PTSD, he has ADHD.
In the last blog post, my darling Cerise posted this as a comment:
5.Please tell me you were kidding when you quoted him as saying "You can help by leaving me alone." Please tell me he didn't say that.
He most certainly did, but I realize without the background that sounds incredibly horrible. He was doing computer programming stuff, which basically involves him writing in some alien language. He and I have many times discussed that it is imperative that he not be interrupted while he's doing code, because it causes him to have to switch gears between computer speak and human speak, and for someone with ADHD, that's about as delicate as a 7 year old switching gears on a stick shift. I can actually WATCH the grinding happen on his face. That's when that particular comment was uttered. For him to be able to finish that particular thing, yes, he does need to be left alone.
Still, it's a bitch to be told that.
As far as comments 1, 2, 3, and 4:
1)Yes, thank you. As they tell you in airplanes, when the air masks drop down, put yours on first, THEN put it on the child next to you. Reason being, if you can't breath and pass out, you aren't shit for help. This applies in many relationship aspects, and this one is no exception.
2)The two hours on Friday night is from watching John Doe and then Doctor Who. We are hard core sci-fi junkies. Until Battlestar Galactica comes back on with the new season, we're trying to fill in the gap. For us, Sci-Fi Friday is the equivalent of going to church on Sunday for other people. We don't miss it. It just isn't done. And he barely saw John Doe. He was mostly seated in front of the computer. Doctor Who had his full attention.
3)This morning he rebuted my claim about that by saying, “If you just TELL me it's important, I'll stop.� And he would. But as I told him, “What am I supposed to say? I know you're fucking stressed, this is how you deal with stress, we've had this conversation before, you know I'm feeling puny, how is that not clear?�
That one is still unresolved. Something needs to be done, yes. I don't have the energy to do it, no. Not right now. And I really don't think he has the energy to devote to a solution right now either. We're both at our breaking points and aren't communicating well. This will change soon, once The Thing We Both Dread is over.
All in all, I'm trying to say that he IS a good man. Anyone who reads me regularly knows this. Alas, this is a rough spell, and I don't spare the bad times either. I write about it all. I could gloss it over and make it sound all very lovely, but that isn't who I am, and it's not the point of my blogging.
For those of you close enough, I'll send you out the details of what the fuck is going on. The rest of you will have to wait a few weeks to hear it.
Until then, ugh.
And for now, I would like to note that Jack has spent the day taking care of everything and now we're all going out to play. He's been taking care of the little monkey and working on fun science projects, keeping him occupied while I laid in bed and slept, sedated, recovering and letting my body get some rest.
I have hope today. Last night I just had anger.
crumbs and the evil of toast....a follow up post
(It took most of my energy to type this. Forgive the typo's, I'll edit it later. Tomorrow. Sometime.)
Ah, yes.
I woke up this morning thinking, “Well. I suppose I'd better get up and write the follow up post...�
Then I got up. Then I laid back down. Then I got up, realizing that laying down hurt too bad. Then I realized sitting up hurt too bad as well. Jack had come in while I was still laying down and actually shut the door so I could sleep in.
That has never happened before.
Alas, my happy happy sleep-in time was not enjoyable. I didn't want to come to the living room, I didn't want to see Jack's back at the computer, and I didn't want to eat.
THAT is highly unusual.
I sat there, in various positions of pain and tried to stretch. Nothing. Various back spasms, agonizing muscle cramps, and the knowledge that sooner or later I was going to have to walk out and see Jack, and say....something. I'd hit my limit the night before so something had to be said. A conversation was damn well going to be had, but...I was in so much pain, I just couldn't really bear the thought of it.
An hour went by. I finally walked out. Jacked was cheerful and said, “Good morning, baby!� to which I growled. He came up beside me and said, “Is something wrong?�
Ok- at that point I don't know what the hell I said. We were talking about the whole “not paying attention to me� stuff and my back was spasming out of control. At some point I just started sobbing hysterically, to which his response was a very genuine concern. “What's wrong? What's wrong?�
I howled something about being in so much pain. He asked me if I wanted him to rub my back. I told him I didn't think he'd have time. He was insulted that I thought so little of his concern for me. I was offended that he couldn't understand why I would assume he would be busy. We bickered back and forth, but one particular spasm just sent me over the edge into sobbing again, and he helped me down the hall to the bed. He helped me because I ran into the wall on the way.
I flopped down on the bed and he started rubbing, but it was just making me cry harder and harder. Finally he stops and says, “Baby? I don't think this is your back. I think this is your ulcer.�
lightbulb goes off and immediately shatters from the sound of my howling in pain
“Have you eaten?� he asks. “No!� I answer, “no, I don't want to eat. I don't want to eat...� He says, “Baby, this has got to be your ulcer then.� I sob, “Please don't make me eat toast again, anything but toast...�
The last time my ulcer flared up this bad he woke up to find me sobbing in the living room, having been awake for hours with back pain. Once the ulcer problem was established, he insisted I eat something. It's the only thing that will stop the pain, but I gag and choke on it the whole way through. It's really awful. Even though I know it will help, I can't manage to get it down without gagging on it the whole time. To say it fucking sucks would be an understatement. That time, he literally had to stand over me and force me to eat it. That or the emergency room, take your pick. I hated him for it at the time, horrible taskmaster, but thanked him profusely afterwards.
He asked me what I wanted to eat. “Nothing!� I sobbed. “Soymilk? Can you get some soymilk down?� I nodded, knowing that I would hate it but it had to be done. I nearly threw it up on his pillow, but I got it down and it stayed down.
Once that was down he asked me what else I wanted to eat. Want? Ugh. He made me some Kashi oatmeal. At one point I told him I felt like I eating a bowl of bland flavored vomit, but as I ate, the spasms stopped.
It's weird, Jack commented, that my ulcer never just appears in my stomach, it's always some strange combination of other symptoms. It's true. Had I been paying closer attention, I would have noticed that I've been wanting to eat constantly the last few days, but haven't let myself because I've been trying to lose weight. And then two nights ago, as I lay in bed and waited for him to come to bed (sigh) I thought about puking up my dinner. One huge ass bowl of a tomato based soup- Stomach Ulcer Enemy Number One. And last night, I could barely get my dinner down. It took me forever to eat. But, trying to lose weight, it just made me happy. Like, Yay! I'm not hungry! Hurrah!
I also remember making the 3 bowls of strawberry shortcake and not wanting to put strawberries on mine. I love strawberries, so that's fucking odd. My body was instinctually trying to tell me to stay the fuck away but I wouldn't do it.
~sigh~
Anyway, I've spent the day forcing bland food down my throat and staying heavily sedated. I can't take anything for the back pain. Here's the bitch of it all: I take Motrin for the migraine, but it eats a hole in my stomach. Then, the ulcer comes screaming in with a vengeance. Suddenly I'm totally out of my fucking mind, everything hurts and I can't even think anymore. Oh, let's not forget the hot and cold flashes.
Now that you know what my morning has been like, let me continue with last night. I am in no way saying that my ulcer made me nuts and Jack is an angel. Oh frik frak fuckitty no. No. What I AM saying is that we're both really fucking stressed over something coming up, something which I have not blogged about at all, for safety reasons. Those of you who know me well enough can e-mail me for details. The rest of you will have to remain unaware, sorry. I tell you all a hell of a lot, but not when it involves the possibility of putting myself in dangers with the telling of details, I leave it out. So, there is a huge chunk of this story that isn't being told. I can clue you in a few weeks, but not right now.
Jack and I have both been dreading this Thing, and deal with it in our own ways. Jack is far more stressed out about it then I am, I dare say, but we are each freaked out for our own reasons. And we each are expressing our freaked-out-ed-ness in our own dysfunctional ways.
My way: cling, exhaustion, ulcers, migraines. PMS is NOT helping. Fucking fuck. Reads books to escape reality. Fluctuates between accomplishing nothing at all to going beserk in a mighty effort to eliminate all tasks in one fell swoop. Frequently hurts self in process.
His way: Manly overdrive, must accomplish everything, or at least look extremely busy. Starts examining possible flaws in plans with microscopic viewing, missing big picture entirely. Becomes microcosm within self, snarling at outside contaminants of micro managed micro universe.
A note: I have PTSD, he has ADHD.
In the last blog post, my darling Cerise posted this as a comment:
5.Please tell me you were kidding when you quoted him as saying "You can help by leaving me alone." Please tell me he didn't say that.
He most certainly did, but I realize without the background that sounds incredibly horrible. He was doing computer programming stuff, which basically involves him writing in some alien language. He and I have many times discussed that it is imperative that he not be interrupted while he's doing code, because it causes him to have to switch gears between computer speak and human speak, and for someone with ADHD, that's about as delicate as a 7 year old switching gears on a stick shift. I can actually WATCH the grinding happen on his face. That's when that particular comment was uttered. For him to be able to finish that particular thing, yes, he does need to be left alone.
Still, it's a bitch to be told that.
As far as comments 1, 2, 3, and 4:
1)Yes, thank you. As they tell you in airplanes, when the air masks drop down, put yours on first, THEN put it on the child next to you. Reason being, if you can't breath and pass out, you aren't shit for help. This applies in many relationship aspects, and this one is no exception.
2)The two hours on Friday night is from watching John Doe and then Doctor Who. We are hard core sci-fi junkies. Until Battlestar Galactica comes back on with the new season, we're trying to fill in the gap. For us, Sci-Fi Friday is the equivalent of going to church on Sunday for other people. We don't miss it. It just isn't done. And he barely saw John Doe. He was mostly seated in front of the computer. Doctor Who had his full attention.
3)This morning he rebuted my claim about that by saying, “If you just TELL me it's important, I'll stop.� And he would. But as I told him, “What am I supposed to say? I know you're fucking stressed, this is how you deal with stress, we've had this conversation before, you know I'm feeling puny, how is that not clear?�
That one is still unresolved. Something needs to be done, yes. I don't have the energy to do it, no. Not right now. And I really don't think he has the energy to devote to a solution right now either. We're both at our breaking points and aren't communicating well. This will change soon, once The Thing We Both Dread is over.
All in all, I'm trying to say that he IS a good man. Anyone who reads me regularly knows this. Alas, this is a rough spell, and I don't spare the bad times either. I write about it all. I could gloss it over and make it sound all very lovely, but that isn't who I am, and it's not the point of my blogging.
For those of you close enough, I'll send you out the details of what the fuck is going on. The rest of you will have to wait a few weeks to hear it.
Until then, ugh.
And for now, I would like to note that Jack has spent the day taking care of everything and now we're all going out to play. He's been taking care of the little monkey and working on fun science projects, keeping him occupied while I laid in bed and slept, sedated, recovering and letting my body get some rest.
I have hope today. Last night I just had anger.
Ah, yes.
I woke up this morning thinking, “Well. I suppose I'd better get up and write the follow up post...�
Then I got up. Then I laid back down. Then I got up, realizing that laying down hurt too bad. Then I realized sitting up hurt too bad as well. Jack had come in while I was still laying down and actually shut the door so I could sleep in.
That has never happened before.
Alas, my happy happy sleep-in time was not enjoyable. I didn't want to come to the living room, I didn't want to see Jack's back at the computer, and I didn't want to eat.
THAT is highly unusual.
I sat there, in various positions of pain and tried to stretch. Nothing. Various back spasms, agonizing muscle cramps, and the knowledge that sooner or later I was going to have to walk out and see Jack, and say....something. I'd hit my limit the night before so something had to be said. A conversation was damn well going to be had, but...I was in so much pain, I just couldn't really bear the thought of it.
An hour went by. I finally walked out. Jacked was cheerful and said, “Good morning, baby!� to which I growled. He came up beside me and said, “Is something wrong?�
Ok- at that point I don't know what the hell I said. We were talking about the whole “not paying attention to me� stuff and my back was spasming out of control. At some point I just started sobbing hysterically, to which his response was a very genuine concern. “What's wrong? What's wrong?�
I howled something about being in so much pain. He asked me if I wanted him to rub my back. I told him I didn't think he'd have time. He was insulted that I thought so little of his concern for me. I was offended that he couldn't understand why I would assume he would be busy. We bickered back and forth, but one particular spasm just sent me over the edge into sobbing again, and he helped me down the hall to the bed. He helped me because I ran into the wall on the way.
I flopped down on the bed and he started rubbing, but it was just making me cry harder and harder. Finally he stops and says, “Baby? I don't think this is your back. I think this is your ulcer.�
lightbulb goes off and immediately shatters from the sound of my howling in pain
“Have you eaten?� he asks. “No!� I answer, “no, I don't want to eat. I don't want to eat...� He says, “Baby, this has got to be your ulcer then.� I sob, “Please don't make me eat toast again, anything but toast...�
The last time my ulcer flared up this bad he woke up to find me sobbing in the living room, having been awake for hours with back pain. Once the ulcer problem was established, he insisted I eat something. It's the only thing that will stop the pain, but I gag and choke on it the whole way through. It's really awful. Even though I know it will help, I can't manage to get it down without gagging on it the whole time. To say it fucking sucks would be an understatement. That time, he literally had to stand over me and force me to eat it. That or the emergency room, take your pick. I hated him for it at the time, horrible taskmaster, but thanked him profusely afterwards.
He asked me what I wanted to eat. “Nothing!� I sobbed. “Soymilk? Can you get some soymilk down?� I nodded, knowing that I would hate it but it had to be done. I nearly threw it up on his pillow, but I got it down and it stayed down.
Once that was down he asked me what else I wanted to eat. Want? Ugh. He made me some Kashi oatmeal. At one point I told him I felt like I eating a bowl of bland flavored vomit, but as I ate, the spasms stopped.
It's weird, Jack commented, that my ulcer never just appears in my stomach, it's always some strange combination of other symptoms. It's true. Had I been paying closer attention, I would have noticed that I've been wanting to eat constantly the last few days, but haven't let myself because I've been trying to lose weight. And then two nights ago, as I lay in bed and waited for him to come to bed (sigh) I thought about puking up my dinner. One huge ass bowl of a tomato based soup- Stomach Ulcer Enemy Number One. And last night, I could barely get my dinner down. It took me forever to eat. But, trying to lose weight, it just made me happy. Like, Yay! I'm not hungry! Hurrah!
I also remember making the 3 bowls of strawberry shortcake and not wanting to put strawberries on mine. I love strawberries, so that's fucking odd. My body was instinctually trying to tell me to stay the fuck away but I wouldn't do it.
~sigh~
Anyway, I've spent the day forcing bland food down my throat and staying heavily sedated. I can't take anything for the back pain. Here's the bitch of it all: I take Motrin for the migraine, but it eats a hole in my stomach. Then, the ulcer comes screaming in with a vengeance. Suddenly I'm totally out of my fucking mind, everything hurts and I can't even think anymore. Oh, let's not forget the hot and cold flashes.
Now that you know what my morning has been like, let me continue with last night. I am in no way saying that my ulcer made me nuts and Jack is an angel. Oh frik frak fuckitty no. No. What I AM saying is that we're both really fucking stressed over something coming up, something which I have not blogged about at all, for safety reasons. Those of you who know me well enough can e-mail me for details. The rest of you will have to remain unaware, sorry. I tell you all a hell of a lot, but not when it involves the possibility of putting myself in dangers with the telling of details, I leave it out. So, there is a huge chunk of this story that isn't being told. I can clue you in a few weeks, but not right now.
Jack and I have both been dreading this Thing, and deal with it in our own ways. Jack is far more stressed out about it then I am, I dare say, but we are each freaked out for our own reasons. And we each are expressing our freaked-out-ed-ness in our own dysfunctional ways.
My way: cling, exhaustion, ulcers, migraines. PMS is NOT helping. Fucking fuck. Reads books to escape reality. Fluctuates between accomplishing nothing at all to going beserk in a mighty effort to eliminate all tasks in one fell swoop. Frequently hurts self in process.
His way: Manly overdrive, must accomplish everything, or at least look extremely busy. Starts examining possible flaws in plans with microscopic viewing, missing big picture entirely. Becomes microcosm within self, snarling at outside contaminants of micro managed micro universe.
A note: I have PTSD, he has ADHD.
In the last blog post, my darling Cerise posted this as a comment:
5.Please tell me you were kidding when you quoted him as saying "You can help by leaving me alone." Please tell me he didn't say that.
He most certainly did, but I realize without the background that sounds incredibly horrible. He was doing computer programming stuff, which basically involves him writing in some alien language. He and I have many times discussed that it is imperative that he not be interrupted while he's doing code, because it causes him to have to switch gears between computer speak and human speak, and for someone with ADHD, that's about as delicate as a 7 year old switching gears on a stick shift. I can actually WATCH the grinding happen on his face. That's when that particular comment was uttered. For him to be able to finish that particular thing, yes, he does need to be left alone.
Still, it's a bitch to be told that.
As far as comments 1, 2, 3, and 4:
1)Yes, thank you. As they tell you in airplanes, when the air masks drop down, put yours on first, THEN put it on the child next to you. Reason being, if you can't breath and pass out, you aren't shit for help. This applies in many relationship aspects, and this one is no exception.
2)The two hours on Friday night is from watching John Doe and then Doctor Who. We are hard core sci-fi junkies. Until Battlestar Galactica comes back on with the new season, we're trying to fill in the gap. For us, Sci-Fi Friday is the equivalent of going to church on Sunday for other people. We don't miss it. It just isn't done. And he barely saw John Doe. He was mostly seated in front of the computer. Doctor Who had his full attention.
3)This morning he rebuted my claim about that by saying, “If you just TELL me it's important, I'll stop.� And he would. But as I told him, “What am I supposed to say? I know you're fucking stressed, this is how you deal with stress, we've had this conversation before, you know I'm feeling puny, how is that not clear?�
That one is still unresolved. Something needs to be done, yes. I don't have the energy to do it, no. Not right now. And I really don't think he has the energy to devote to a solution right now either. We're both at our breaking points and aren't communicating well. This will change soon, once The Thing We Both Dread is over.
All in all, I'm trying to say that he IS a good man. Anyone who reads me regularly knows this. Alas, this is a rough spell, and I don't spare the bad times either. I write about it all. I could gloss it over and make it sound all very lovely, but that isn't who I am, and it's not the point of my blogging.
For those of you close enough, I'll send you out the details of what the fuck is going on. The rest of you will have to wait a few weeks to hear it.
Until then, ugh.
And for now, I would like to note that Jack has spent the day taking care of everything and now we're all going out to play. He's been taking care of the little monkey and working on fun science projects, keeping him occupied while I laid in bed and slept, sedated, recovering and letting my body get some rest.
I have hope today. Last night I just had anger.
Friday, May 19, 2006
pity party, table of one: crumbs, please.
I'm writing this in the middle of my usual PMS migraine. It's nearly 3 am. Jack woke me up and pissed me off, not that he meant to. Guess if I'm in a good mood?
Now that all the cards are on the table, let's play, shall we?
Let's see... ah yes. I see I've drawn a hand of crap, yet again. I've been drawing those a lot lately. It looks like this:
Jack comes home from work, usual stress. Heads straight for computer. I stare at his back while I make dinner. I even bring him a little cup of fresh fruit to snack on while he waits.
An hour later, dinner is done. Jack has informed me he'll be working this weekend. There's stuff he has to do, which, of course, involves the computer. I assume this is what he is doing and serve him his dinner, at the computer. I hear some mouthfull mumbled, “This is great, baby,� and look over to see his back. Yah. Whatever.
One of his favorite Friday night shows comes on TV. He comes into the room to watch, then goes back to the computer when it's over. I try to talk to him about something or other, he listens for a moment and then calmly explains that he's busy. Ok. Whatever.
His second favorite show comes on as I'm serving up strawberry shortcake. He comes to watch, and then goes right back to the computer. Once again, I try to break in before he becomes too involved in what he's doing, but he once again explains to me that he's busy, and that he will be for some time.
Shut out again. Ok. (deep breath)
I, in the meantime, am doing my usual nightly routine of cooking dinner, serving it, cleaning up afterwards, all with a raging fever. It's one of the major side effects of my migraines. I'm hot, I'm cold, I'm nearly stupified with a fever.
He gives me some “you poor baby� faces and....no, wait, guess! Goes back to the computer.
Finally I give up and tell him I'm just going to go to bed. He thinks that is a GREAT idea. I'm sure he fucking does- I can't annoy him with my whole “trying to interact� thing while I'm asleep, can I?
Now, I know he's stressed out. I do. I know this is what he does when he's stressed out. The problem is, we've HAD this conversation over and over again. Staring at the computer (he wasn't doing “work related� stuff, just “trying to make this thing work�. I hear that line so often it's retarded...�I'm just trying to make this thing work....� whatever the thing is, it's irrelevant. It's always Some Thing.) doesn't help. He turns to a computer screen for solace, to erase, distract, and make him forget about whatever is troubling him. Once in a great while it works, but it usually just leaves him as pissed off as when he began, but with a lot less time to do things that might actually help, like sleep.
We talk about these things. He asks me to help him get more sleep. He asks me to help him get out more. He asks me these things, but then refuses to do them, leaving me to look like a nag or someone who just doesn't care, take your pick. Either I can harrasss him into doing what he wishes he was REALLY doing and get bitched at for annoying him, or I can give up and let him do what he's going to do, and then get bitched at when he finally comes to bed to find one irritated me.
Sure, there's ways around it. But so far we haven't utilized them, and so far is all I'm writing about right now.
The thing that hurts me the worst is that he keeps making promises and not keeping them. “I'll be to bed soon, baby, then we'll cuddle.� He comes in hours later and I never notice him. How bonding. I feel so comforted, thanks. Or he'll tell me, “I just have to finish this thing and then I'll spend lots of time with you later/tomorrow/some magical future time that most importantly IS NOT NOW� and then of course, more “Things� come up.
I am as patient as I can be, but it's gotten to the point where he tells me quite sincerely, “I'll spend the whole weekend with you, I promise,� and gives me sweet little kisses and hugs and I just play along, knowing damn well it's not going to happen.
I get the crumbs. I bitched about this recently. I'm pretty sure darling Jack still hasn't bothered to read that post, though I've pointed it out to him numerous times. It's a discussion we could HAVE, but god forbid we make time for that. This way seems like maybe it would be easier- maybe if I just put it on the COMPUTER, he may find time for it.
(rolls eyes)
Not even.
So, here I am, another night, writing away about how I'm sick of looking at my husbands back, while he sleeps away.
Tonight I fell asleep with the migraine. He made five minutes to come in a rub my shoulders, trying to help me get to sleep. Nice. As soon as I feel asleep, all bets were off and that whole, “No, really, I'll be there in just a minute, I'm really tired thing� went right out the fucking window.
I've told him- I stay awake trying to get you to go to bed, and then I'm sleep deprived and miserable too. So, fuck you very much, I'm just going to start going to bed. You want to sit in front of a stupid box for hours and simmer in your own stress while doing absolutely nothing about it, that's your perogative. But I'm done losing sleep, sitting here, staring at your back, and having you snap at me or just plain lie and say your almost done. Fuck it.
Anyhow... (it's really fucking late and my sleep deprived ass should NOT be awake) he rubbed my shoulders and I fell alseep. He said he would be “right in�.
Two hours later I woke up and stumbled down the hall, coming to rest in the chair next to him and laying my head on the desk next to his elbow. “What happened to 'in a minute'?� I asked. He said, “I just have to finish this thing.�
Of course.
Oh, fuck you, I'm going back to bed. Enjoy your thing. Enjoy your list of never ending things. There will always be things, so enjoy, enjoy, enjoy! If it comes to it, you will have a lovely life with your things and no one to bother you at all. You pick your priorities sir, and words are cheap. Eventually I won't even want the crumbs. Let's be perfectly clear about that.
So, I went back to bed. Two more hours pass and he finally comes to bed. He kisses me, snuggles up and I ask him if he wants to hear about the very strange and symbolic dream I was having. He says yes. So I tell him, but near the end he cuts me off and tells me, “Is this going to go on much longer? I'm almost asleep.�
~clunk~
And the great stores of emotion within me shut the iron doors and I answer, “No. Whatever,� and lay there. He apologizes. I shrug. He says I love you, I don't answer. He finally pokes me in the head (good one, that's a GREAT move, remember that for future moments when you wonder, “How can I piss off my wife some more?�) and says, “Are you mad?�
Am I mad? Am I mad? Fuck, I don't know. Define “mad�. While you're at it, define “I gotta finish this thing� and then define “I'm almost done� and then define, “I'll be there in a minute�. Am I mad?
I tell him, “You're going to get defensive when I say it but I'm going to say it anyway- crumbs. I'm getting the crumbs.�
I was right. He defensively shoots back, “It's 2:30 in the morning! What? I came in here to go to bed, not talk. There is a time for talking, and it's not 2:30 in the morning. Not then. It's NEVER time to talk.� To which I thought, “Holy shit, you stole the words right out of my mouth.� He really did. We almost said “It's NEVER time to talk� in unison.
Yah, I get it. 2:30 am, bad timing for a conversation, right. But when that is the only option you give me, what am I supposed to do? Please, tell me when this magical “correct� time is, and I'll happily use it, but some days all I do is hear about how stressed out you are and then stare at your back.
Can I help? (“You can help by leaving me alone.�) How is that helping? You're just as stressed out at the end as you were when you started, all you managed to do was waste time until you were tired enough to fall asleep.
I can only take so much of this, and it may be the PMS, it may be the migraine, but I'm starting to crack. I'm starting to just not give a fuck. Fine. Sit there. Fine, ignore me. Fine, fine, that's all just fucking fine. What option do I have? If we can't talk about it, we have nothing. Nothing. And like I said it my last post about this, you leave me with the undeniable impression that I am, if nothing else, a burden. Talking to me is a burden. You want me to quit being upset, but you don't want to change anything to make it happen.
Good plan. Let's see how that one works out.
Now that all the cards are on the table, let's play, shall we?
Let's see... ah yes. I see I've drawn a hand of crap, yet again. I've been drawing those a lot lately. It looks like this:
Jack comes home from work, usual stress. Heads straight for computer. I stare at his back while I make dinner. I even bring him a little cup of fresh fruit to snack on while he waits.
An hour later, dinner is done. Jack has informed me he'll be working this weekend. There's stuff he has to do, which, of course, involves the computer. I assume this is what he is doing and serve him his dinner, at the computer. I hear some mouthfull mumbled, “This is great, baby,� and look over to see his back. Yah. Whatever.
One of his favorite Friday night shows comes on TV. He comes into the room to watch, then goes back to the computer when it's over. I try to talk to him about something or other, he listens for a moment and then calmly explains that he's busy. Ok. Whatever.
His second favorite show comes on as I'm serving up strawberry shortcake. He comes to watch, and then goes right back to the computer. Once again, I try to break in before he becomes too involved in what he's doing, but he once again explains to me that he's busy, and that he will be for some time.
Shut out again. Ok. (deep breath)
I, in the meantime, am doing my usual nightly routine of cooking dinner, serving it, cleaning up afterwards, all with a raging fever. It's one of the major side effects of my migraines. I'm hot, I'm cold, I'm nearly stupified with a fever.
He gives me some “you poor baby� faces and....no, wait, guess! Goes back to the computer.
Finally I give up and tell him I'm just going to go to bed. He thinks that is a GREAT idea. I'm sure he fucking does- I can't annoy him with my whole “trying to interact� thing while I'm asleep, can I?
Now, I know he's stressed out. I do. I know this is what he does when he's stressed out. The problem is, we've HAD this conversation over and over again. Staring at the computer (he wasn't doing “work related� stuff, just “trying to make this thing work�. I hear that line so often it's retarded...�I'm just trying to make this thing work....� whatever the thing is, it's irrelevant. It's always Some Thing.) doesn't help. He turns to a computer screen for solace, to erase, distract, and make him forget about whatever is troubling him. Once in a great while it works, but it usually just leaves him as pissed off as when he began, but with a lot less time to do things that might actually help, like sleep.
We talk about these things. He asks me to help him get more sleep. He asks me to help him get out more. He asks me these things, but then refuses to do them, leaving me to look like a nag or someone who just doesn't care, take your pick. Either I can harrasss him into doing what he wishes he was REALLY doing and get bitched at for annoying him, or I can give up and let him do what he's going to do, and then get bitched at when he finally comes to bed to find one irritated me.
Sure, there's ways around it. But so far we haven't utilized them, and so far is all I'm writing about right now.
The thing that hurts me the worst is that he keeps making promises and not keeping them. “I'll be to bed soon, baby, then we'll cuddle.� He comes in hours later and I never notice him. How bonding. I feel so comforted, thanks. Or he'll tell me, “I just have to finish this thing and then I'll spend lots of time with you later/tomorrow/some magical future time that most importantly IS NOT NOW� and then of course, more “Things� come up.
I am as patient as I can be, but it's gotten to the point where he tells me quite sincerely, “I'll spend the whole weekend with you, I promise,� and gives me sweet little kisses and hugs and I just play along, knowing damn well it's not going to happen.
I get the crumbs. I bitched about this recently. I'm pretty sure darling Jack still hasn't bothered to read that post, though I've pointed it out to him numerous times. It's a discussion we could HAVE, but god forbid we make time for that. This way seems like maybe it would be easier- maybe if I just put it on the COMPUTER, he may find time for it.
(rolls eyes)
Not even.
So, here I am, another night, writing away about how I'm sick of looking at my husbands back, while he sleeps away.
Tonight I fell asleep with the migraine. He made five minutes to come in a rub my shoulders, trying to help me get to sleep. Nice. As soon as I feel asleep, all bets were off and that whole, “No, really, I'll be there in just a minute, I'm really tired thing� went right out the fucking window.
I've told him- I stay awake trying to get you to go to bed, and then I'm sleep deprived and miserable too. So, fuck you very much, I'm just going to start going to bed. You want to sit in front of a stupid box for hours and simmer in your own stress while doing absolutely nothing about it, that's your perogative. But I'm done losing sleep, sitting here, staring at your back, and having you snap at me or just plain lie and say your almost done. Fuck it.
Anyhow... (it's really fucking late and my sleep deprived ass should NOT be awake) he rubbed my shoulders and I fell alseep. He said he would be “right in�.
Two hours later I woke up and stumbled down the hall, coming to rest in the chair next to him and laying my head on the desk next to his elbow. “What happened to 'in a minute'?� I asked. He said, “I just have to finish this thing.�
Of course.
Oh, fuck you, I'm going back to bed. Enjoy your thing. Enjoy your list of never ending things. There will always be things, so enjoy, enjoy, enjoy! If it comes to it, you will have a lovely life with your things and no one to bother you at all. You pick your priorities sir, and words are cheap. Eventually I won't even want the crumbs. Let's be perfectly clear about that.
So, I went back to bed. Two more hours pass and he finally comes to bed. He kisses me, snuggles up and I ask him if he wants to hear about the very strange and symbolic dream I was having. He says yes. So I tell him, but near the end he cuts me off and tells me, “Is this going to go on much longer? I'm almost asleep.�
~clunk~
And the great stores of emotion within me shut the iron doors and I answer, “No. Whatever,� and lay there. He apologizes. I shrug. He says I love you, I don't answer. He finally pokes me in the head (good one, that's a GREAT move, remember that for future moments when you wonder, “How can I piss off my wife some more?�) and says, “Are you mad?�
Am I mad? Am I mad? Fuck, I don't know. Define “mad�. While you're at it, define “I gotta finish this thing� and then define “I'm almost done� and then define, “I'll be there in a minute�. Am I mad?
I tell him, “You're going to get defensive when I say it but I'm going to say it anyway- crumbs. I'm getting the crumbs.�
I was right. He defensively shoots back, “It's 2:30 in the morning! What? I came in here to go to bed, not talk. There is a time for talking, and it's not 2:30 in the morning. Not then. It's NEVER time to talk.� To which I thought, “Holy shit, you stole the words right out of my mouth.� He really did. We almost said “It's NEVER time to talk� in unison.
Yah, I get it. 2:30 am, bad timing for a conversation, right. But when that is the only option you give me, what am I supposed to do? Please, tell me when this magical “correct� time is, and I'll happily use it, but some days all I do is hear about how stressed out you are and then stare at your back.
Can I help? (“You can help by leaving me alone.�) How is that helping? You're just as stressed out at the end as you were when you started, all you managed to do was waste time until you were tired enough to fall asleep.
I can only take so much of this, and it may be the PMS, it may be the migraine, but I'm starting to crack. I'm starting to just not give a fuck. Fine. Sit there. Fine, ignore me. Fine, fine, that's all just fucking fine. What option do I have? If we can't talk about it, we have nothing. Nothing. And like I said it my last post about this, you leave me with the undeniable impression that I am, if nothing else, a burden. Talking to me is a burden. You want me to quit being upset, but you don't want to change anything to make it happen.
Good plan. Let's see how that one works out.
the gerbil wheel of parenting
It's Friday.
Friday is a magical stupid day. Friday is the day each week that I try as hard as I can to relax. Yah, roll that over in your head once or twice, "Try as hard as I can to relax". You see how that doesn't work.
Since my hubby oinks the computer all weekend, I can't use it. I feel compelled to write on Fridays, because I won't be able to say another word into the blogosphere until Monday, and I'm usually so stressed out by then I just want to stare at the walls.
This stress thing...gotta fix that. Put it on my list of things to do. I'll just shove it in there inbetween all the other things I'm working on, right?
Ha.
I'm fucking hilarious.
My son is getting closer and closer to his summer vacation, and, call me spoiled, I'm not looking forward to it. Last year was the first year that I spent the entire summer with my son. You see, before that I was always a WORKING mother, and my son went to a daycamp during my working hours.
If you wonder to yourself, "Wouldn't staying at home with your child be better than going to work?" I have to honestly admit, no. No, it is not. I like work. I like being around adults. I like being around other people for at least 8 hours a day, that are responsible for their own damn selves and do not require my constant supervision so that they can rememeber to pee, eat, and not get run over by cars or stab themselves with their own writing utensils. I find spending 3 months of 24/7 supervision to be tiresome, yes. Very fucking tiresome.
To further clarify, we have no family nearby, and no regular babysitter. So, it's just me and him, and then hubby comes home. And that will be life for the summer.
He may spend some time with his dad, but that's MORE stressful. His dad is a meandering jackass. Imagine, if you will, a retarded burro wandering around a construction site, and maybe some bees are stinging its ass, making it just plain irritated. Now you have a clear picture of my sons father.
So other than that, there is no break.
It's not that we don't have fun, we do. We go on little adventures and go to the park, go to the beach, go to the pool, whatever. It just seems as if my mental clarity/stability pivots on my ability to have a few hours to myself, just thinking about stuff, mulling things over in my head, etc.
Hence all this writing I do. Without daily doses of introspection and contemplation, I start to broil my own brain, simmering in the juice of my own unacknowledged thoughts till I spill over the pan and some shit catches on fire. Usually that thing is my patience.
Some posts take hours to write, and it's impossible to keep a train of thought with a constant barrage of, "Mom, when are we going swimming? Where is my pencil? What is for dinner? Do I like that? Can so-and-so come over? When are we going somewhere? Do we have to go to the store today? Can I watch TV? What are you doing?"
He may as well ask me to explain the very nature of quantum physics spelled out in binary code.
I've thought about scheduling our days, Mommmy writes now, you hang out in your room and be quiet...but then that all goes to hell. I decide we'll go swimming in the afternoon, but then there's thunderstorms coming that afternoon, better go in the morning... We go. We come back, I'm exhausted and don't feel like writing anymore. What takes priority, my writing or my child? When I put it that way, I sound like a bitch. If I look at it with the eyes of "My writing IS time for myself" then I can put myself first...sometimes. I still feel guilty.
Last summer I let him play video games till his brains rotted out, and my husband would be irritated with me over it. (snort) But when I went on trips to the store without them on the weekends, I would come home to (guess what?) my husband sitting in front of the computer and my son playing video games. "He's no problem at all!" he'd tell me, beaming. "What have you guys eaten?" I would ask, suspicious. "Oh, I let him have some pudding and then we both ate a pile of chocolate chips and some cereal..."
Dude. You don't GET it. If he's going to lecture me about the proper care of a child, then he could at least hold up his own golden standards while I'm away. "But I had to get this blah-blah-blah done," he would lament and I would say, "Yah! I know! I know exactly how it is! That's how every damn day goes! I know!"
Now, this year my son is on this ADHD medicine. Will this make it better? I don't know. I still can't decide how I feel about the two of them (my son and hubby are on it) being on the stuff. It seems like it helps, but only for periods of time, and it's not predictable. Sometimes my son can take his "focus medicine" and be straight as an arrow, creating projects, reading books, and behaving himself quite well. Other times he's bouncing off the walls and I don't have the slightest fucking clue what causes that difference.
~sigh~
I just get so fucking frustrated with him, and that's not something any parent wants to admit, but it's true. Like I told a friend years ago, "I really thought I wanted like, 10 kids, and then I had one and realized what a selfish person I truly am and realized I don't want any more." She just gaped at me and said, "I've never heard anyone be so honest about it before."
Well, honestly: it's true. I have shit I want to do, damn it. Finding pencils and picking up randomly flung socks and finding ways to keep my childs brain engaged aren't things that are high on my list.
More clarification: things that are high on my list are-
1) learn to relax
2) write until a book comes out of my ass
3) publish it and be able to contribute financially to family
4) work on various emotional/mental issues (which is what the writing is about)
5) keep family happy and healthy and running smoothly (because that is my JOB)
Problem: my list items are entangled in each other, and all require silence. Solitude.
And I am more than slightly depressed over the fact that I thought I would be a lot further along my own lath of recovery (see list) than I actually am right now. I'm making a lot of progress, I am. Maybe I'm just being impatient. Maybe my expectations were unrealiztic. It seems like this year had been crammed full of one incredibly stressful thing after another, a lot of which I don't blog about. Ha. I don't have time.
Fuck. I'm going to go read 2010 until I fall asleep. That's my plan for now. Just thinking about this makes me feel like a gerbil in a running wheel, and while I know that isn't right, I can't put my finger on what is wrong.
Hurry, hurry, Jill...relax! Think about it, QUICK! Relax!
And around and around I go....
Friday is a magical stupid day. Friday is the day each week that I try as hard as I can to relax. Yah, roll that over in your head once or twice, "Try as hard as I can to relax". You see how that doesn't work.
Since my hubby oinks the computer all weekend, I can't use it. I feel compelled to write on Fridays, because I won't be able to say another word into the blogosphere until Monday, and I'm usually so stressed out by then I just want to stare at the walls.
This stress thing...gotta fix that. Put it on my list of things to do. I'll just shove it in there inbetween all the other things I'm working on, right?
Ha.
I'm fucking hilarious.
My son is getting closer and closer to his summer vacation, and, call me spoiled, I'm not looking forward to it. Last year was the first year that I spent the entire summer with my son. You see, before that I was always a WORKING mother, and my son went to a daycamp during my working hours.
If you wonder to yourself, "Wouldn't staying at home with your child be better than going to work?" I have to honestly admit, no. No, it is not. I like work. I like being around adults. I like being around other people for at least 8 hours a day, that are responsible for their own damn selves and do not require my constant supervision so that they can rememeber to pee, eat, and not get run over by cars or stab themselves with their own writing utensils. I find spending 3 months of 24/7 supervision to be tiresome, yes. Very fucking tiresome.
To further clarify, we have no family nearby, and no regular babysitter. So, it's just me and him, and then hubby comes home. And that will be life for the summer.
He may spend some time with his dad, but that's MORE stressful. His dad is a meandering jackass. Imagine, if you will, a retarded burro wandering around a construction site, and maybe some bees are stinging its ass, making it just plain irritated. Now you have a clear picture of my sons father.
So other than that, there is no break.
It's not that we don't have fun, we do. We go on little adventures and go to the park, go to the beach, go to the pool, whatever. It just seems as if my mental clarity/stability pivots on my ability to have a few hours to myself, just thinking about stuff, mulling things over in my head, etc.
Hence all this writing I do. Without daily doses of introspection and contemplation, I start to broil my own brain, simmering in the juice of my own unacknowledged thoughts till I spill over the pan and some shit catches on fire. Usually that thing is my patience.
Some posts take hours to write, and it's impossible to keep a train of thought with a constant barrage of, "Mom, when are we going swimming? Where is my pencil? What is for dinner? Do I like that? Can so-and-so come over? When are we going somewhere? Do we have to go to the store today? Can I watch TV? What are you doing?"
He may as well ask me to explain the very nature of quantum physics spelled out in binary code.
I've thought about scheduling our days, Mommmy writes now, you hang out in your room and be quiet...but then that all goes to hell. I decide we'll go swimming in the afternoon, but then there's thunderstorms coming that afternoon, better go in the morning... We go. We come back, I'm exhausted and don't feel like writing anymore. What takes priority, my writing or my child? When I put it that way, I sound like a bitch. If I look at it with the eyes of "My writing IS time for myself" then I can put myself first...sometimes. I still feel guilty.
Last summer I let him play video games till his brains rotted out, and my husband would be irritated with me over it. (snort) But when I went on trips to the store without them on the weekends, I would come home to (guess what?) my husband sitting in front of the computer and my son playing video games. "He's no problem at all!" he'd tell me, beaming. "What have you guys eaten?" I would ask, suspicious. "Oh, I let him have some pudding and then we both ate a pile of chocolate chips and some cereal..."
Dude. You don't GET it. If he's going to lecture me about the proper care of a child, then he could at least hold up his own golden standards while I'm away. "But I had to get this blah-blah-blah done," he would lament and I would say, "Yah! I know! I know exactly how it is! That's how every damn day goes! I know!"
Now, this year my son is on this ADHD medicine. Will this make it better? I don't know. I still can't decide how I feel about the two of them (my son and hubby are on it) being on the stuff. It seems like it helps, but only for periods of time, and it's not predictable. Sometimes my son can take his "focus medicine" and be straight as an arrow, creating projects, reading books, and behaving himself quite well. Other times he's bouncing off the walls and I don't have the slightest fucking clue what causes that difference.
~sigh~
I just get so fucking frustrated with him, and that's not something any parent wants to admit, but it's true. Like I told a friend years ago, "I really thought I wanted like, 10 kids, and then I had one and realized what a selfish person I truly am and realized I don't want any more." She just gaped at me and said, "I've never heard anyone be so honest about it before."
Well, honestly: it's true. I have shit I want to do, damn it. Finding pencils and picking up randomly flung socks and finding ways to keep my childs brain engaged aren't things that are high on my list.
More clarification: things that are high on my list are-
1) learn to relax
2) write until a book comes out of my ass
3) publish it and be able to contribute financially to family
4) work on various emotional/mental issues (which is what the writing is about)
5) keep family happy and healthy and running smoothly (because that is my JOB)
Problem: my list items are entangled in each other, and all require silence. Solitude.
And I am more than slightly depressed over the fact that I thought I would be a lot further along my own lath of recovery (see list) than I actually am right now. I'm making a lot of progress, I am. Maybe I'm just being impatient. Maybe my expectations were unrealiztic. It seems like this year had been crammed full of one incredibly stressful thing after another, a lot of which I don't blog about. Ha. I don't have time.
Fuck. I'm going to go read 2010 until I fall asleep. That's my plan for now. Just thinking about this makes me feel like a gerbil in a running wheel, and while I know that isn't right, I can't put my finger on what is wrong.
Hurry, hurry, Jill...relax! Think about it, QUICK! Relax!
And around and around I go....
Get It Together
-India Arie
One shot to your heart without breaking your skin
No one has the power to hurt you like your kin
Kept it inside, didn't tell no one else
Didn't even wanna admit it to yourself
And now your chest burns and your back aches
From 15 years of holding the pain
And now you only have yourself to blame
If you continue to live this way
Get it together
You wanna heal your body
You have to heal your heart
Whatsoever you sow you will reap
Get it together
You can fly fly
Dark future ahead of me
That's what they say
I'd be starving if I ate all the lies they fed
Cause I've been redeemed from your anguish and pain
A miracle child I'm floating on a cloud
Cause the words that come from your mouth
You're the first to hear
Speak words of beauty and you will be there
No matter what anybody says
What matters most is what you think of yourself
Get it together
You wanna heal your body
You have to heal your heart
Whatsoever you sow you will reap
Get it together
The choice is yours
No matter what it is
To choose life is to choose to forgive
You don't have to try
To hurt him and break his pride
To shake that weight off
And you will be ready to fly
One shot to your heart without breaking your skin
No one has the power to hurt you like your friends
Thought it will never change but this time moved on
An ugly duckling grew up to be a swan
And now your chest burns and your back aches
Because now the years are showing up on your face
But you're never be happy
And you'll never be whole
Until you see the beauty in growing old
One shot to your heart without breaking your skin
No one has the power to hurt you like your kin
Kept it inside, didn't tell no one else
Didn't even wanna admit it to yourself
And now your chest burns and your back aches
From 15 years of holding the pain
And now you only have yourself to blame
If you continue to live this way
Get it together
You wanna heal your body
You have to heal your heart
Whatsoever you sow you will reap
Get it together
You can fly fly
Dark future ahead of me
That's what they say
I'd be starving if I ate all the lies they fed
Cause I've been redeemed from your anguish and pain
A miracle child I'm floating on a cloud
Cause the words that come from your mouth
You're the first to hear
Speak words of beauty and you will be there
No matter what anybody says
What matters most is what you think of yourself
Get it together
You wanna heal your body
You have to heal your heart
Whatsoever you sow you will reap
Get it together
The choice is yours
No matter what it is
To choose life is to choose to forgive
You don't have to try
To hurt him and break his pride
To shake that weight off
And you will be ready to fly
One shot to your heart without breaking your skin
No one has the power to hurt you like your friends
Thought it will never change but this time moved on
An ugly duckling grew up to be a swan
And now your chest burns and your back aches
Because now the years are showing up on your face
But you're never be happy
And you'll never be whole
Until you see the beauty in growing old
Thursday, May 18, 2006
fugly footwear
I would like to take this moment to congratulate Payless Shoes for having what can only be awarded:
Although I must give them an additional award, now that I really stop to think about it. They also receive:
Congrats, Payless. You may now go back to being my favorite place to buy cheap ass shoes. Thank you.
Ugliest Shoe Ever
Although I must give them an additional award, now that I really stop to think about it. They also receive:
Best Shoe To Beat Someone Over The Head With In The Most Disgraceful Manner Possible.
Congrats, Payless. You may now go back to being my favorite place to buy cheap ass shoes. Thank you.
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Where I come from
* It was 12 miles to Eminem's house but a different reality.
* It was 10 miles from Jack Kevorkian's home and we all supported his cause. We would give each other Jack Kevorkian gift certificates as practical jokes for birthdays.
* What used to be field and marshlands, lakes and dunes, is now strip malls and suburbs and golf courses. This makes me very sad.
* Is beautiful in the summer and truly ugly in the winter. Fresh snow glistens: snow piled up on the side of a busy road is gray and dirty and gross. The sky was gray all winter. It was very cold and bleak.
* I lived in suburbia, the Metro-Detroit area. It wasn't till I moved down South that I realized there was supposed to be spaces inbetween towns, not just another street sign saying, "Welcome to Clawson, Welcome to Royal Oak, Welcome to Ferndale" as I drove down Woodward Ave.
* I had a friend whose parents owned property further up in Michigan, where it is still beautiful all the time. Going camping with them was some of the happiest memories of my youth; the endless bikerides, going though deserted houses in adandoned farmland, watching the Harley Davidson crews go on canoe trips down the river- the women where almost always topless. That's some crazy shit for a city kid.
* I witnessed a car wreck in Cass Corridor in the middle of a frigid winter night, only to have the cops arrive and then some fifteen year old black girl came screaming down the street, half dressed, sobbing how some man was trying to rape her. We could look up the dark ugly street and see her clothes where they were ripped off of her as she ran. I don't think I'll ever get over that sight. She threw herself into the back of the cop car wearing half of her pants and a bra, unashamed, and freezing. I took off my sweater and gave it to her, covering myself up with a coat. I felt helpless, only being able to help preserve the tattered remains of her dignity. Her dignity seemed to be the least of her concerns.
* There were lakes everywhere. Within my mothers house, should I have walked a mile in any direction, I could hit six different lakes. Four were private, but we would sneak in anyway, and just swim away when the people came to check our non-existant ID's.
* In the winter the lakes would freeze over and we would ice skate while the boys played hockey. One year my mom hooked up the hose and just sprayed water all over our back yard, unitl it froze over and we could ice skate on it. That was way cool. My neighbors parents helped them build a giant igloo in the back yard, and we were all very sad when it warmed up and melted.
* Our neighbors were pot dealers. The other neighbors were coke dealers. My mom didn't know that, because I wouldn't tell her.
* Our neighbors tried to kill our dogs by throwing poisoned meat over the fence one day. Either that or it fell magically from the sky. Our neighbors were obviously stupid, because it smelled so bad the dogs wouldn't even eat it.
* A friend and I decided that the theme song for our hometown would be the sound of squealing tires. No matter where you were, you could hear someone taking off too fast from a light or slamming on their brakes to avoid an accident. We tried to figure out how to make that into a song, but were really way too high to figure it out.
* The all pervasive yellow street lights polluted the night sky. It was always tinged yellow-orange. When I moved to Asheville, NC I was flabbergasted at the clarity of the sky. I had never seen it before. Not like that. Ever.
* I never noticed racism, at least not in action. When I moved South I was horrified. I thought it was mostly extinct. I was wrong.
* It was 10 miles from Jack Kevorkian's home and we all supported his cause. We would give each other Jack Kevorkian gift certificates as practical jokes for birthdays.
* What used to be field and marshlands, lakes and dunes, is now strip malls and suburbs and golf courses. This makes me very sad.
* Is beautiful in the summer and truly ugly in the winter. Fresh snow glistens: snow piled up on the side of a busy road is gray and dirty and gross. The sky was gray all winter. It was very cold and bleak.
* I lived in suburbia, the Metro-Detroit area. It wasn't till I moved down South that I realized there was supposed to be spaces inbetween towns, not just another street sign saying, "Welcome to Clawson, Welcome to Royal Oak, Welcome to Ferndale" as I drove down Woodward Ave.
* I had a friend whose parents owned property further up in Michigan, where it is still beautiful all the time. Going camping with them was some of the happiest memories of my youth; the endless bikerides, going though deserted houses in adandoned farmland, watching the Harley Davidson crews go on canoe trips down the river- the women where almost always topless. That's some crazy shit for a city kid.
* I witnessed a car wreck in Cass Corridor in the middle of a frigid winter night, only to have the cops arrive and then some fifteen year old black girl came screaming down the street, half dressed, sobbing how some man was trying to rape her. We could look up the dark ugly street and see her clothes where they were ripped off of her as she ran. I don't think I'll ever get over that sight. She threw herself into the back of the cop car wearing half of her pants and a bra, unashamed, and freezing. I took off my sweater and gave it to her, covering myself up with a coat. I felt helpless, only being able to help preserve the tattered remains of her dignity. Her dignity seemed to be the least of her concerns.
* There were lakes everywhere. Within my mothers house, should I have walked a mile in any direction, I could hit six different lakes. Four were private, but we would sneak in anyway, and just swim away when the people came to check our non-existant ID's.
* In the winter the lakes would freeze over and we would ice skate while the boys played hockey. One year my mom hooked up the hose and just sprayed water all over our back yard, unitl it froze over and we could ice skate on it. That was way cool. My neighbors parents helped them build a giant igloo in the back yard, and we were all very sad when it warmed up and melted.
* Our neighbors were pot dealers. The other neighbors were coke dealers. My mom didn't know that, because I wouldn't tell her.
* Our neighbors tried to kill our dogs by throwing poisoned meat over the fence one day. Either that or it fell magically from the sky. Our neighbors were obviously stupid, because it smelled so bad the dogs wouldn't even eat it.
* A friend and I decided that the theme song for our hometown would be the sound of squealing tires. No matter where you were, you could hear someone taking off too fast from a light or slamming on their brakes to avoid an accident. We tried to figure out how to make that into a song, but were really way too high to figure it out.
* The all pervasive yellow street lights polluted the night sky. It was always tinged yellow-orange. When I moved to Asheville, NC I was flabbergasted at the clarity of the sky. I had never seen it before. Not like that. Ever.
* I never noticed racism, at least not in action. When I moved South I was horrified. I thought it was mostly extinct. I was wrong.
Monday, May 15, 2006
Linux can suck my ass
Dearest husband of mine,
I know you are a big geek. I love you. I love your big geekiness. I do.
But now...now you have drawn the line. This switchover to EVERYONE MUST USE LINUX bullshit must come to an end.
We got the fancy super fast computer. I must say, it doesn't do me a fucking bit of good, because it's taking me 400 times as long just to find my way around, and most everything I'm looking for seems to be invisible. Maybe you haven't moved it over from the old computer yet, or whatever the fuck it is that you're doing, all I know is that I had a whole list of things to do on here today and I can't do a goddamn thing.
I would sincerely like to take a fucking sledgehammer to your beloved new computer stuffed full of what you claimed would be Linux love and demolish it to miniscule pieces of crap, so that you may understand exactly how I feel when I look at it.
I don't know if you can run both Windows and Linux on the same computer, but we may have to find out. Because this shit...is making me into an enraged psychobitch.
So far, I hate Linux. I hate it more and more every frustrating minute that I use it.
Good luck, honey. Good luck convincing me to love it.
Your wife
I know you are a big geek. I love you. I love your big geekiness. I do.
But now...now you have drawn the line. This switchover to EVERYONE MUST USE LINUX bullshit must come to an end.
We got the fancy super fast computer. I must say, it doesn't do me a fucking bit of good, because it's taking me 400 times as long just to find my way around, and most everything I'm looking for seems to be invisible. Maybe you haven't moved it over from the old computer yet, or whatever the fuck it is that you're doing, all I know is that I had a whole list of things to do on here today and I can't do a goddamn thing.
I would sincerely like to take a fucking sledgehammer to your beloved new computer stuffed full of what you claimed would be Linux love and demolish it to miniscule pieces of crap, so that you may understand exactly how I feel when I look at it.
I don't know if you can run both Windows and Linux on the same computer, but we may have to find out. Because this shit...is making me into an enraged psychobitch.
So far, I hate Linux. I hate it more and more every frustrating minute that I use it.
Good luck, honey. Good luck convincing me to love it.
Your wife
Sunday, May 14, 2006
the birth of my son/ it's not a zen thing
It's Mothers Day.
I am reminded of this fact by one orange balloon that has mostly lost it's helium as it keeps bopping around my head, pushed by the air vents in the house into concentric circles in this corner where the computer sits.
It's a leftover remnant from my son's birthday party.
The year my son was born, I was sixteen days overdue (to go into labor) on Mother's Day. I was pissed. I should have BEEN a mother by then. I was scheduled to go to the hospital the next day and have labor induced, since my son apparently had no intentions of leaving the snuggly warmth of my innards.
By that time I was telling people that I wasn't having a baby at all, but an elephant, and was a mere halfway through my pregnancy. As I would walk endless treks around the lake, trying to get myself to go into labor, the cute old people would say, "How soon, darling, how soon?" (This was the South, after all.) I would speed walk past them, cheerfully yelling back over my shoulder, "Sixteen days ago!" and pause just long enough to watch their jaws drop.
For those of you unaware, being that far overdue begins to get dangerous. Apparently the placenta can begin to break down at that point. It's not meant to drive cross country, you know. The placenta is NOT an all terrain vehicle, but mine had aspirations of greatness.
I had gone to the doctors, and they did an ultrasound to tell me what kind of shape I was in and basically decide when they were going to insist on inducing me if labor didn't happen on it's own. The placenta is fine, they said, no signs of degradation but uh....that's a ten pound baby you've got in there. You don't want it getting any bigger.
Sure, why not? If my poor birthing parts are going to have play "Push The Baby Out" like a freakin' accordion, why not play a note or two higher? I mean, what's the fucking difference?
Well, Mother's Day came and went. I spent the day keeping a friend occupied on "supposed" birthday plans, while the rest of her friends were putting together her surprise birthday party.
Birthday girl, pregnant me and my best friend went to Indian food. My best friend was carrying a stopwatch, and was getting more and more worried as I was having contractions. Psssh. I'd been having what is labeled "false contractions" for weeks, and didn't think a damn thing of it. She would ask me when they would stop and start, and tell me, "You know, they're getting closer together..." with a worried look on her face. Yah, whatever. It's a fucking elephant, I'm telling you. I'm not due for another six months or a year- however ridiculously long an elephant's pregnancy is.
The Indian food place was handing out flowers to each mother that came to eat there, and I was, I admit, pouting that I didn't get one. I should have gotten one, darn it. It's not my fault I've grown a Super Baby that wants to bulk up another hundred pounds before he comes out to take over the world. I blamed it on the super incredible prenatal vitamins I was taking.
Finally the old Indian lady came over and handed me a flower. "You are a mother already, although your body doesn't fully recognize it yet," she said, and I was genuinely touched. Ah, yes. I am a mother.
Well, we got the birthday girl to the party and I sat through that for an hour or two, but by then it was getting really late and I had to pack to go to the hospital the next day to be induced. I wasn't looking forward to it and had put it off till the last minute.
I was really hoping for an all natural at home water birth with a midwife and all, and had one, and had been training with her all along. When I became so far overdue, she insisted on the ultrasound to see how big the baby was. When we found out "It" (I didn't ask to know the sex) was ten pounds, she highly advised me to change plans and have the baby at the hsopital instead. I refused, until she explained, "Look. When a baby is that big, and starts coming down the birth canal with the cord wrapped around it's neck, you have one minute (maybe two) to get it out before it chokes to death. With a baby that size, that usually involves the emergency procedure of breaking it's collarbone to get it out." I stared at her, and nodded, mumbling, "Hospital. Good. Ok."
The problem was, I hated hospitals and had put off packing.
Oops.
I got home and was packing stuff up, when I noticed that those false contractions hurt. They never hurt before....OH. Oh, shit. I started packing faster. At midnight, the jackass male counterpart of my spawn suggested I "just forget about it and get some sleep." He was tired.
Oh, well, ok. I'm in labor. I'll just...forget about it. SpermDonor slept. I packed, inbetween painful contractions.
Two hours later I was panting and calling my midwife, then calling the birthing crew. I had a friend who was driving us and my best friend who wouldn't miss it for the world (she was the one with the stop watch in the Indian food place). They both showed up by three a.m. and we woke up Mr. FuckingHelpfulSpermDonor and off we went.
The hospital we went to was over an hour away, which is no fun at three in the morning when you're already exhausted but helplessly in labor. Alas....
We got there, got settled in and my midwife checked me- one and a half centimeters. The cervix has to dilate to ten centimeters before you can start pushing. Fuck. I had a long way to go, and was in excruciating pain, or so I thought. I learned later what excruciating truly was.
The hospital we went to actually had huge birthing tubs in the rooms. That thing kicked ass. It's just like a regular bathtub, but deeper, maybe 2 feet wider and a good 4 feet longer. It's like a small pool, and full of warm water. Soothing warm water, at least, when you're not in the middle of a contraction. Then, not so soothing. Not soothing at all, in fact.
It turned out that my son was flipped slightly sideways, and so with each contraction I had, his head wasn't pushing on my cervix, helping to open it, it was instead ramming the bottom of my spine. When I was in child birth classes, I had opted for the more forward thinking style of "The Bradley Method", which involves a sort of slow breathing meditation instead of the rapid paced breathing of Lamaze. I learned something that day: when a child rams your spine during labor, The Bradley Method can suck a dick. Without even knowing how to do Lamaze, instinct kicked in and that's what I began doing instead.
My midwife even coined a phrase for my bizarre position in the birthing tub, 'The Splayed Frog." I was on my hands and knees, head out of the water, with one leg kind of kicked back behind me.
It was the only way to keep the pressure off of my spine and keep me from screaming. You can't do that during a contraction, you HAVE to breath, or the pain becomes a thousand times worse. Oh, agony.
This went on for hours, hours, hours...my midwife kept telling me to conserve some energy, because I was going to need it for delivery, and I would pant at her, "Fuck. You. Have. To. Be. Kidding. I. Have. To. Do. This.......HAVE.....TO."
I've never been so fucking high in my life, and I did a lot of drugs back in the day. There is no better endorphin rush than labor, I say. So for my lesbian-ain't-never-given-birth midwife to tell me what I HAD to do, well, I just wasn't having it. Let her trade places with me and try to see if she would "conserve some energy". I wasn't worried about the future, in fact, I don't know that I have ever, or will ever be, so fully and totally in the present moment as I was then. It was all about the pain, the easing of pain, the breathing, the counting till a break between contractions and then the total collapse to rest until the next one hit a minute and a half later, just to start it all over again.
By that time, it was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I had, unbeknownest to me, been having contractions the entire day before, then painfully having them from midnight on, all through the night and was now in the second day, in agony. Focus? Conserve energy? What the fuck was she talking shit about? Is she out in the hall smoking crack while I wasn't looking? For real?
Finally she suggested that she manually break my water, in the attempt to speed things up. She told me that I was at a mere 5 centimeters and if we didn't hurry it up, my body would eventually shut down and I would end up with a C-section, which I desperately did not want. Unfortunately, breaking the water meant I had to stay out of the tub, for some reason. Whatever. Ok. I moved to the bed, and that was like going to hell. I'm not kidding. The bouancy of water cannot be underestimated, and gravity is a harsh mistress, especially while you're in labor.
At that point things start getting very hazy, and had my best friend not been there taking pictures, roll after roll (about 12 in all, I believe) I doubt I would be able to recall it at all. I remember begging them for coffee. I was a big coffee drinker back in the day, and I was so fucking tired. My midwife refused me, telling me I would just vomit it up later. Again! With this talk of some magical fucking future moment I'm supposed to be concerned about! Sheesh! Who gives a shit if I puke coffee up? I'M IN LABOR!
This is the picture of me sitting on the bed inbetween contractions, sobbing, sobbing because they wouldn't give me coffee:
Bastards.
Mostly I was at the end of the bed, standing on the floor, holding on to the rails throughout the contractions to steady myself. Laying down hurt too badly, but a half crouch seemed to do the trick semi-ok. This I remember clearly: I was starting to pass out between contractions. I was standing up, and when the contraction would end I would start falling forward, ready to just fall asleep. Talk about misery, only to be slapped awake again by another contraction.
My midwife suggested we try Pitocin, the drug that they would have used to induce labor. The idea being, my body was exhausted and Pitocin forces the uterus to contract. It could speed things up considerably, she said. Fine, whatever.
Not fine. The difference between natural labor and having Pitocin running through my veins was like the difference in pain levels between being hit in the spine with a sledgehammer and being hit in the spine with a train. It was too much. And I had hit my limit. I had been in labor for almost 17 hours, not counting the painless day before, and 17 hours of agony has it's toll on even the most strong willed of bitches.
The various expressions of Pitocin:
I cannot recreate that expression. I've tried. Can't be done.
The next time my midwife suggested a light painkiller, I agreed. That did nothing. Nothing. Nothing. After another hour or so of mind numbing misery (in which my water finally broke and I vomited all over the place), I told her if I wasn't going to do it naturally, she may as well give me a SERIOUS painkiller. I got Demoral, I believe, through an IV. Psssssh. Nothing. I couldn't even tell the difference.
At some point I actually passed out unconscious, and I can see from the pictures that everyone else looked very relieved. From what I was told later, the surgeon had been walking in and out of the room, cheerfully informing my midwife that I was a C-section waiting to happen and to let him know when she was ready to give it up. That lasted about 45 minutes, which was just swell for everyone else, but no matter to me. It's a funny thing about being unconscious- you don't realize that you are. For me, there was no rest for the weary.
I came back to with my head propped very weirdly in the air by my friend D. I opened my eyes, and was staring into his face. He stared back, his elbow on the bed, arm going straight up and his hand was cradling my head. I was laying on my side, facing the wall, with D just holding my head up in the air. I took a loooooooooooong deep breath, and slowly exhaled into his hovering face. I remember wondering how horrible my vomit breath was.
D said quietly, "She's awake" to the people standing behind me. I stared at him, slowly breathing, so fucking out of my mind in pain that I just couldn't do anything else. I heard my midwife ask, "She's awake? Are you sure?" to which D stared at me while nodding. I heard my midwife behind me ask, "Jill? Are you awake?"
What kind of stupid question is that? Who cares? Again, may I point out- I'M IN LABOR. Awake, asleep, vomiting, whatever, I'm still in fucking labor. Instead, I managed to mumble,
"It's....not.....a.....zen.....thing."
"What?" she asked D. "What did she say?" I said it again. D repeated it to her. She repeated it to herself, perplexed. No one seemed to understand what I meant, and so she came over to my side of the bed and said, "Jill, what do you mean? It's not a zen thing? What does that mean?"
I told her, "I'm done. It's over. I'm done." She asked, "Do you mean you are ready to have a C-section? Is that it?" I just nodded, yes, yes, get it out of me, I have nothing left. There is nothing left to be done, I have nothing left to give. I'm done. It's not a zen thing, this slow breathing, I'm fucking DONE.
She took a deep breath and said, "Ok......ok. I'll call in the surgeon."
I had met him before. I actually adored him. He looked just like Santa Claus in a surgeons suit, with one long white braid down his back and Birkenstock's. Who could not love that?
He arrived, someone changed the IV in my arm to something that would stop the contractions. Oh, sweet heavenly Jesus....when the surgeon got close enough to me I grabbed his white doctors coat and pulled him close, spitting out the words, "Demoral is a JOKE!" in a rather unladylike and venomous manner.
By that time is was 11:30 at night, I say in my defense. I had been in horribly painful labor for 24 hours.
They got me ready to go and wheeled me off to surgery. I remember grabbing a male nurses arm and semi-hysterically informing him that whatever they gave me to stop the contractions wasn't working yet. He just kind of nodded and told me to not worry about it. I wasn't afraid, I just wanted those motherfucking contractions to stop!
We got to the OR and they prepped me, rolling me onto my side to give me a spinal. I opted to stay awake. After waiting that long, I wasn't about to miss the big moment, shit.
For those of you unaware, a spinal numbs you from the injection point down, and involves one freakishly large needle. They give you a shot first just to numb the area they are giving you the second shot, the actual spinal. That on top of Demoral, and I still bucked when they stuck it in. It was, blissfully, the last painful moment I experienced though.
For a C-section, they strap your arms to a T-shaped table so you can't thrash, move, I don't know. Then they put up a small curtain inbetween my view and them. This was good. Unfortunately, my childbirth class instructor thought it would be wise to show us all a video of a C-section one day in class. I actually had to leave the room, it was so gory.
But, reality being what it was, it was then ME who was strapped to the table, and despite the curtain, I knew DAMN well what they were doing. SpermDonor was there, holding my hand. He told me later that I looked like a terrified horse- when they open their eyes real wide, in that moment before they tromple your ass into mincemeat.
My son was so large, it turned out that they couldn't get him out. They used forceps even, to no avail. They finally had to remove my uterus, set it on my stomach, pull him out and put my uterus back inside, sewing me all together again. Fucking gross.
The pulled him out, they announced he was a boy, SpermDonor cut the cord, and my son pissed all over the surgeon/Santa Claus. He laughed, HO HO HO and showed me my son.
One look at that giant skull and I stared wide-eyed at the doctor and said, with the most sincerity of my entire life, "THANK YOU." My vagina would have been ruined for life. Oh, thank you, thank you, Santa. You have given my vagina the most wonderful present of all- being spared that freakishly gigantical head.
This pic is from a few weeks later, but you get an idea of what a total chunky monkey he was:
They sewed me up, and sent me upstairs after making sure my vital signs were steady. I got to see my son soon thereafter, just after midnight.
And now, nine years later, the little monkey is eating cereal behind me and clamoring for my attention. Time for me to get sloppy kisses and the cuddles of a nine year old who won't be cuddling his mom for too many years longer. I've got to live it up while I can.
Happy Mothers Day.
I am reminded of this fact by one orange balloon that has mostly lost it's helium as it keeps bopping around my head, pushed by the air vents in the house into concentric circles in this corner where the computer sits.
It's a leftover remnant from my son's birthday party.
The year my son was born, I was sixteen days overdue (to go into labor) on Mother's Day. I was pissed. I should have BEEN a mother by then. I was scheduled to go to the hospital the next day and have labor induced, since my son apparently had no intentions of leaving the snuggly warmth of my innards.
By that time I was telling people that I wasn't having a baby at all, but an elephant, and was a mere halfway through my pregnancy. As I would walk endless treks around the lake, trying to get myself to go into labor, the cute old people would say, "How soon, darling, how soon?" (This was the South, after all.) I would speed walk past them, cheerfully yelling back over my shoulder, "Sixteen days ago!" and pause just long enough to watch their jaws drop.
For those of you unaware, being that far overdue begins to get dangerous. Apparently the placenta can begin to break down at that point. It's not meant to drive cross country, you know. The placenta is NOT an all terrain vehicle, but mine had aspirations of greatness.
I had gone to the doctors, and they did an ultrasound to tell me what kind of shape I was in and basically decide when they were going to insist on inducing me if labor didn't happen on it's own. The placenta is fine, they said, no signs of degradation but uh....that's a ten pound baby you've got in there. You don't want it getting any bigger.
Sure, why not? If my poor birthing parts are going to have play "Push The Baby Out" like a freakin' accordion, why not play a note or two higher? I mean, what's the fucking difference?
Well, Mother's Day came and went. I spent the day keeping a friend occupied on "supposed" birthday plans, while the rest of her friends were putting together her surprise birthday party.
Birthday girl, pregnant me and my best friend went to Indian food. My best friend was carrying a stopwatch, and was getting more and more worried as I was having contractions. Psssh. I'd been having what is labeled "false contractions" for weeks, and didn't think a damn thing of it. She would ask me when they would stop and start, and tell me, "You know, they're getting closer together..." with a worried look on her face. Yah, whatever. It's a fucking elephant, I'm telling you. I'm not due for another six months or a year- however ridiculously long an elephant's pregnancy is.
The Indian food place was handing out flowers to each mother that came to eat there, and I was, I admit, pouting that I didn't get one. I should have gotten one, darn it. It's not my fault I've grown a Super Baby that wants to bulk up another hundred pounds before he comes out to take over the world. I blamed it on the super incredible prenatal vitamins I was taking.
Finally the old Indian lady came over and handed me a flower. "You are a mother already, although your body doesn't fully recognize it yet," she said, and I was genuinely touched. Ah, yes. I am a mother.
Well, we got the birthday girl to the party and I sat through that for an hour or two, but by then it was getting really late and I had to pack to go to the hospital the next day to be induced. I wasn't looking forward to it and had put it off till the last minute.
I was really hoping for an all natural at home water birth with a midwife and all, and had one, and had been training with her all along. When I became so far overdue, she insisted on the ultrasound to see how big the baby was. When we found out "It" (I didn't ask to know the sex) was ten pounds, she highly advised me to change plans and have the baby at the hsopital instead. I refused, until she explained, "Look. When a baby is that big, and starts coming down the birth canal with the cord wrapped around it's neck, you have one minute (maybe two) to get it out before it chokes to death. With a baby that size, that usually involves the emergency procedure of breaking it's collarbone to get it out." I stared at her, and nodded, mumbling, "Hospital. Good. Ok."
The problem was, I hated hospitals and had put off packing.
Oops.
I got home and was packing stuff up, when I noticed that those false contractions hurt. They never hurt before....OH. Oh, shit. I started packing faster. At midnight, the jackass male counterpart of my spawn suggested I "just forget about it and get some sleep." He was tired.
Oh, well, ok. I'm in labor. I'll just...forget about it. SpermDonor slept. I packed, inbetween painful contractions.
Two hours later I was panting and calling my midwife, then calling the birthing crew. I had a friend who was driving us and my best friend who wouldn't miss it for the world (she was the one with the stop watch in the Indian food place). They both showed up by three a.m. and we woke up Mr. FuckingHelpfulSpermDonor and off we went.
The hospital we went to was over an hour away, which is no fun at three in the morning when you're already exhausted but helplessly in labor. Alas....
We got there, got settled in and my midwife checked me- one and a half centimeters. The cervix has to dilate to ten centimeters before you can start pushing. Fuck. I had a long way to go, and was in excruciating pain, or so I thought. I learned later what excruciating truly was.
The hospital we went to actually had huge birthing tubs in the rooms. That thing kicked ass. It's just like a regular bathtub, but deeper, maybe 2 feet wider and a good 4 feet longer. It's like a small pool, and full of warm water. Soothing warm water, at least, when you're not in the middle of a contraction. Then, not so soothing. Not soothing at all, in fact.
It turned out that my son was flipped slightly sideways, and so with each contraction I had, his head wasn't pushing on my cervix, helping to open it, it was instead ramming the bottom of my spine. When I was in child birth classes, I had opted for the more forward thinking style of "The Bradley Method", which involves a sort of slow breathing meditation instead of the rapid paced breathing of Lamaze. I learned something that day: when a child rams your spine during labor, The Bradley Method can suck a dick. Without even knowing how to do Lamaze, instinct kicked in and that's what I began doing instead.
My midwife even coined a phrase for my bizarre position in the birthing tub, 'The Splayed Frog." I was on my hands and knees, head out of the water, with one leg kind of kicked back behind me.
It was the only way to keep the pressure off of my spine and keep me from screaming. You can't do that during a contraction, you HAVE to breath, or the pain becomes a thousand times worse. Oh, agony.
This went on for hours, hours, hours...my midwife kept telling me to conserve some energy, because I was going to need it for delivery, and I would pant at her, "Fuck. You. Have. To. Be. Kidding. I. Have. To. Do. This.......HAVE.....TO."
I've never been so fucking high in my life, and I did a lot of drugs back in the day. There is no better endorphin rush than labor, I say. So for my lesbian-ain't-never-given-birth midwife to tell me what I HAD to do, well, I just wasn't having it. Let her trade places with me and try to see if she would "conserve some energy". I wasn't worried about the future, in fact, I don't know that I have ever, or will ever be, so fully and totally in the present moment as I was then. It was all about the pain, the easing of pain, the breathing, the counting till a break between contractions and then the total collapse to rest until the next one hit a minute and a half later, just to start it all over again.
By that time, it was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I had, unbeknownest to me, been having contractions the entire day before, then painfully having them from midnight on, all through the night and was now in the second day, in agony. Focus? Conserve energy? What the fuck was she talking shit about? Is she out in the hall smoking crack while I wasn't looking? For real?
Finally she suggested that she manually break my water, in the attempt to speed things up. She told me that I was at a mere 5 centimeters and if we didn't hurry it up, my body would eventually shut down and I would end up with a C-section, which I desperately did not want. Unfortunately, breaking the water meant I had to stay out of the tub, for some reason. Whatever. Ok. I moved to the bed, and that was like going to hell. I'm not kidding. The bouancy of water cannot be underestimated, and gravity is a harsh mistress, especially while you're in labor.
At that point things start getting very hazy, and had my best friend not been there taking pictures, roll after roll (about 12 in all, I believe) I doubt I would be able to recall it at all. I remember begging them for coffee. I was a big coffee drinker back in the day, and I was so fucking tired. My midwife refused me, telling me I would just vomit it up later. Again! With this talk of some magical fucking future moment I'm supposed to be concerned about! Sheesh! Who gives a shit if I puke coffee up? I'M IN LABOR!
This is the picture of me sitting on the bed inbetween contractions, sobbing, sobbing because they wouldn't give me coffee:
Bastards.
Mostly I was at the end of the bed, standing on the floor, holding on to the rails throughout the contractions to steady myself. Laying down hurt too badly, but a half crouch seemed to do the trick semi-ok. This I remember clearly: I was starting to pass out between contractions. I was standing up, and when the contraction would end I would start falling forward, ready to just fall asleep. Talk about misery, only to be slapped awake again by another contraction.
My midwife suggested we try Pitocin, the drug that they would have used to induce labor. The idea being, my body was exhausted and Pitocin forces the uterus to contract. It could speed things up considerably, she said. Fine, whatever.
Not fine. The difference between natural labor and having Pitocin running through my veins was like the difference in pain levels between being hit in the spine with a sledgehammer and being hit in the spine with a train. It was too much. And I had hit my limit. I had been in labor for almost 17 hours, not counting the painless day before, and 17 hours of agony has it's toll on even the most strong willed of bitches.
The various expressions of Pitocin:
I cannot recreate that expression. I've tried. Can't be done.
The next time my midwife suggested a light painkiller, I agreed. That did nothing. Nothing. Nothing. After another hour or so of mind numbing misery (in which my water finally broke and I vomited all over the place), I told her if I wasn't going to do it naturally, she may as well give me a SERIOUS painkiller. I got Demoral, I believe, through an IV. Psssssh. Nothing. I couldn't even tell the difference.
At some point I actually passed out unconscious, and I can see from the pictures that everyone else looked very relieved. From what I was told later, the surgeon had been walking in and out of the room, cheerfully informing my midwife that I was a C-section waiting to happen and to let him know when she was ready to give it up. That lasted about 45 minutes, which was just swell for everyone else, but no matter to me. It's a funny thing about being unconscious- you don't realize that you are. For me, there was no rest for the weary.
I came back to with my head propped very weirdly in the air by my friend D. I opened my eyes, and was staring into his face. He stared back, his elbow on the bed, arm going straight up and his hand was cradling my head. I was laying on my side, facing the wall, with D just holding my head up in the air. I took a loooooooooooong deep breath, and slowly exhaled into his hovering face. I remember wondering how horrible my vomit breath was.
D said quietly, "She's awake" to the people standing behind me. I stared at him, slowly breathing, so fucking out of my mind in pain that I just couldn't do anything else. I heard my midwife ask, "She's awake? Are you sure?" to which D stared at me while nodding. I heard my midwife behind me ask, "Jill? Are you awake?"
What kind of stupid question is that? Who cares? Again, may I point out- I'M IN LABOR. Awake, asleep, vomiting, whatever, I'm still in fucking labor. Instead, I managed to mumble,
"It's....not.....a.....zen.....thing."
"What?" she asked D. "What did she say?" I said it again. D repeated it to her. She repeated it to herself, perplexed. No one seemed to understand what I meant, and so she came over to my side of the bed and said, "Jill, what do you mean? It's not a zen thing? What does that mean?"
I told her, "I'm done. It's over. I'm done." She asked, "Do you mean you are ready to have a C-section? Is that it?" I just nodded, yes, yes, get it out of me, I have nothing left. There is nothing left to be done, I have nothing left to give. I'm done. It's not a zen thing, this slow breathing, I'm fucking DONE.
She took a deep breath and said, "Ok......ok. I'll call in the surgeon."
I had met him before. I actually adored him. He looked just like Santa Claus in a surgeons suit, with one long white braid down his back and Birkenstock's. Who could not love that?
He arrived, someone changed the IV in my arm to something that would stop the contractions. Oh, sweet heavenly Jesus....when the surgeon got close enough to me I grabbed his white doctors coat and pulled him close, spitting out the words, "Demoral is a JOKE!" in a rather unladylike and venomous manner.
By that time is was 11:30 at night, I say in my defense. I had been in horribly painful labor for 24 hours.
They got me ready to go and wheeled me off to surgery. I remember grabbing a male nurses arm and semi-hysterically informing him that whatever they gave me to stop the contractions wasn't working yet. He just kind of nodded and told me to not worry about it. I wasn't afraid, I just wanted those motherfucking contractions to stop!
We got to the OR and they prepped me, rolling me onto my side to give me a spinal. I opted to stay awake. After waiting that long, I wasn't about to miss the big moment, shit.
For those of you unaware, a spinal numbs you from the injection point down, and involves one freakishly large needle. They give you a shot first just to numb the area they are giving you the second shot, the actual spinal. That on top of Demoral, and I still bucked when they stuck it in. It was, blissfully, the last painful moment I experienced though.
For a C-section, they strap your arms to a T-shaped table so you can't thrash, move, I don't know. Then they put up a small curtain inbetween my view and them. This was good. Unfortunately, my childbirth class instructor thought it would be wise to show us all a video of a C-section one day in class. I actually had to leave the room, it was so gory.
But, reality being what it was, it was then ME who was strapped to the table, and despite the curtain, I knew DAMN well what they were doing. SpermDonor was there, holding my hand. He told me later that I looked like a terrified horse- when they open their eyes real wide, in that moment before they tromple your ass into mincemeat.
My son was so large, it turned out that they couldn't get him out. They used forceps even, to no avail. They finally had to remove my uterus, set it on my stomach, pull him out and put my uterus back inside, sewing me all together again. Fucking gross.
The pulled him out, they announced he was a boy, SpermDonor cut the cord, and my son pissed all over the surgeon/Santa Claus. He laughed, HO HO HO and showed me my son.
One look at that giant skull and I stared wide-eyed at the doctor and said, with the most sincerity of my entire life, "THANK YOU." My vagina would have been ruined for life. Oh, thank you, thank you, Santa. You have given my vagina the most wonderful present of all- being spared that freakishly gigantical head.
This pic is from a few weeks later, but you get an idea of what a total chunky monkey he was:
They sewed me up, and sent me upstairs after making sure my vital signs were steady. I got to see my son soon thereafter, just after midnight.
And now, nine years later, the little monkey is eating cereal behind me and clamoring for my attention. Time for me to get sloppy kisses and the cuddles of a nine year old who won't be cuddling his mom for too many years longer. I've got to live it up while I can.
Happy Mothers Day.
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