changing

So...today i chopped off all my hair, well most of it anyway. (I'll post pictures later) the last week has been memorable, but sadly for all the wrong reasons. Between heavy ugliness in my personal life and having my car broken into and realizing dreams I have are further away than I would like to believe, I have had a tough week. In response to all this stress, I cut off my hair. I have found altering something I can control can help, at least temporarily restore my equilibrium and sense of being able to affect my own life. This week has left me questioning almost everything i thought, and everytrhing I took for granted. Some people were not quite what they seemed. Maya Angelou said once "When someone tells you who they are, believe them the first time." I chose to believe this person this time and made some choices in my life because of it. I hear a voice in my head, as I look around at where I am, and it tells me 'this isn't so bad, accept it, this is your fate to remain in this stasis you call home'. I cannot believe that. Even as I hear it said, something in me rebels like a hormonal teenager. No, my heart cries, this can't be it, this can't be all there is. I want, I need so much more. I ask myself if I'm greedy to want more than I have.

I feel good though, because for maybe the first time in my life I stood up to a situation that was unacceptable and didn't go along to get along. I found my backbone and called it by name, not sugar coating or lying about it. I didn't accept good enough as good enough. I know I deserve more. As can be seen in my dating history, I'm not known for being very good and calling people on lousy behavior. In the past i have accepted things I should not have because I wanted and needed that person to accept and validate me. I sought my identity through them, trying to become what would make them happy. I saw myself starting to do that again with this person. anything to make them happy. And hey even if this person made my cry sometimes, that's just how it goes right? This time, I saw it for exactly what it was and didnt pretend I didn't see it. I validated myself. Feels pretty good. There's more to come, in the more mundane aspects of my life, I want more. (I also want another tattoo, that will be very soon for sure) I have avioded getting one because 'some' people wouldnt like it. People might dissapprove, might say something.  Fuck em. I seem to have stumbled across my voice somewhere along the way. Funny thing is, the person who triggered this whole post might just be part of the reason I found it. Yeah, there's some irony there for sure. I am worthy, not because of who i'm with, but because of who I am. I don't totally buy this yet, but the seed has been planted.

unedited

I told a friend of mine that she should write a post that is no hold barred honest, and i saw later that I've never really done that myself. If your feeling sensitive, stop reading now.I'm done. I'm done hiding and done pretending.  All the time I've been writing this, i know who reads it and who doesn't, and due to that i have edited what i say and how i say in in the effort of protecting those who's feelings might be dinged by what i say here. I'm doing no one any favors that way. The whole point of this is the figure out what my fucking problem is and why I'm pissed off and frustrated all the time. I'm so done with all that. i don't care what anyone thinks anymore. If i hurt your feelings, please address it with me directly and i woulds be glad to open a discussion of it with you. I'm done pretending. The only editing I'm going to do to this entry is in my spelling. If i hurt your feelings, and you feel the need to not talk to me anymore, then fuck you. I'm angry, I'm  really fucking angry.i 'm frustrated and becoming a little bitter day by day. This does not mean mean there are not moments where my kids make me laugh ,like crazy and i can just relax and just be silly. Count your blessings, i say, and i do., more and more often every day. I make myself stop and tell myself that i have so much to be grateful for and it does help, for a bit. My ex husband dropped has responsibility's towards his children like a bad suit and yet he gets to live like  normal person even though he dropped his kids like a habit. I am here every day reading stories and handing out band aids and truly loving every moment of it, cause this is the one place in life I know just how lucky i really am. They are my gift. They are what gets me up in the morning and what gives me my smile when i go to bed at night. I am angry because the situation I'm in right now is so fucking unfair that i am forced to love with people that do not appreciate what i do for them day in and day out and have no appreciation for the effort i out forth to keep the house looking nice and presentable and i see no way of moving out right now no matter how big i talk. People, it's all a facade. I talk the talk about how i don't care what anyone else thinks and i don't need to find anyone Else's approval for my choices in life its all a facade., I care more than i should. I have not yet been able ton find that place inside of me that knows I'm ok without external validation and I'm still looking for it. Every day that goes by the things i want get further and further way and i wonder some,times if I'm ever going to get there. what do I want? My own place, somewhere where i can be to find out who Th fuck I am for the first time. somewhere where the choices i make on a daily basis aren't measured by what someone else will think. Even as i write this i tell myself that i shouldn't even say this cause there are some people who don't have a momentary and ill bet those people would trade the aggravation for having them for one more day. i know what i would give to have one more day with my dad. but yet, here i am. Struggling with the injustice of my personal situation. People around me get jobs and good ones that they have worked hard for. I don't know why I'm so pissed off all the time but i am going to give myself that voice and say that its ok that I'm angry and that I'm bitter and that I'm frustrated at my total lack of progress in my personal life. I do feel like I've missed the point in my own life but I'm in therapy now and i hope that will help shed some light on what my real problem really is. Cause really, i don't know. If you have insight, please feel free to let me know and isn't be polite, i would welcome your input. sometimes others can see things that we cannot or will not. I want your opinion even if you think what you have to say is gonna piss me off. The anger is there, and i can say that now. I'm angry, I'm frustrated and I'm pissed off and I'm bitter about where I've ended up. I hate people around me that get to shirk their responsibilities and reap the benefits that life has to offer. i hate that i have to clean up messes that other people make without a thought towards their consequences and the impact of their actions on others. I've told myself all this their karma will get those people in the end, but I'm going to draw short of calling those people what they are, cause at least i get to be the good person in comparison to them . Someone told me today better angry than sad cause angry is easier, but what if under all this angry and frustration i feel is really a lot of sad. What do i have to be sad about?  I have a good life and i should take pride in that, but its all a facade, really. I;m faking it trying to get other people i don't really know to accept me. Fuck them this is what i am . I'm tired of hiding, I'm tired of pretending. Please don't take this a cry for help, cause that's not what this is at all. I'm just done pretending. I'm done trying to be something else.  I feel more in control by calling things as they really are than i have in years. I know there is something more that I'm not seeing that is holding me back,  but I'm working on figuring out what that in in therapy. I'm trying to find my own voice and i realize now i don't even know what i want or what my own voice sounds like. I want my own place and i see other people letting their responsibilities to their children slide, and i want to blame them for where i am. I know there is some truth there for sure, they have to live with the weight of their choices. when their children want nothing to do with them, i hope they understand the true reason why. I am angry and I'm growing bitter and I'm still trying to figure out why. I'll let you know if i come up with something.

addendum

You gotta read the post just before this, or this one won't make much sense. Hell, maybe it won't anyway, at least not to anyone but me. I don't care.

Maybe it wasn't just me. Maybe she was angry too. She was invisible too, once. I can remember the stories told about her childhood, how other family members stood out above her, and she was the good girl. Maybe it was her too. Growing up, safety was her main concern. Ironic, right? Maybe that's cause she knew how dangerous people could be. Maybe. I may not ever answer these questions, but knowing to ask, maybe that's what matters most. I see patterns now I didn't before. I see trends and how elements of her life so closely mimic my own. Could be, there's a reason for that. Maybe, locked deep away, she's angry too. Its an interesting thought I hadn't had before that is worthy of further reflection.

displaced anger

As a side note, I must mention I have opened and closed blogger four or five times in the last two hours without writing a thing. I didn't know if I even wanted to write this post, and yet I felt this pull to come back time and time again to try and put to words what's in my head. I cannot gaurantee if any of this will even make sense to anyone but myself, but here goes.

Why do some people get under our skin and others do not? Why do some people do something, seen by others as minor and inconsequential but to us its a constant thorn in our side? I have found myself asking this question over the last few months but haven't come up with much of an answer. At least I wasn't coming up with some kind of answer until something I read in a magazine triggered an odd train of thoughts that seem to have lodged in my brain and won't let go. I find myself asking why what one person does gets under my skin and what I'm really mad about. Perhaps there is the possibility the urge I feel to lash out comes from something unresolved, something much deeper.

I believe that parents main role in life is to protect their children. I also know that all parents are human and doomed to be imperfect no matter how hard they try simply because they're human. As parents we all make mistakes. That being said. I want to see this from the parents perspective but as someone who is a child as well its too easy to see both sides of the argument. Parents are supposed to keep them safe and when that fails, the second half of that chore is to notice when something goes off track. If parents drop the ball on the second half of this duty, what then? What reaction is the child left with? The people who should have noticed, should have seen, didn't. What does this leave the child with? Potentially a feeling of being unheard, unseen and ultimately, invisible. (If you've been reading any length of my blog, you should recognize a theme here)

So what then, as that child grows they eventually becomes adults and what becomes of the left overs from feeling unheard and invisible when they were younger? Do they continue to feel invisible, do they get loud and make sure no one ever ignores them again? Do they make themselves into something they are not or make sure they are hyper vigilant to maintain that fragile feeling of security they crave? Or do they recreate the situation over and over again in adult relationships without seeing the connection?

What I think is eventually what happens is that child, the adult person the child has become gets angry. Sometimes very angry. This anger may not surface in obvious ways but may sit in the unconscious for a long time, only coming out in small semi-passive agressive ways over the course of time. Little things fester and burn when if it were anyone else, these issues would be quickly discarded. But if its that one person, those small things can take on a larger significance. And yet both parties can be totally unaware of what moves and breathes just under the surface. Neither party sees what's just beyond reach, until one article in one magazine creates a shifts and pieces start to fall into place. Like those magic pictures where you can only see the image if you focus your eyes a certain way, suddenly you can see things for what they are.

What now? I have no idea. But knowledge is the first step.

new anxiety battles to fight

Raising children constantly fascinates me. How can someone you love so intensely and so completely, frustrate you so badly that you just want to hide under a pillow for as long as you can, or run away to a secluded beach somewhere? I have been dealing with Patrick’s anxiety on an almost daily basis for around two years now and you’d think I’d be used to it by now. Although we’d known about the anxiety since he was 6 or so, it hadn’t been much of a daily issue for us up until the fire. Before that, he might require a little extra patience and some more planning and such, but basically he was a very trusting soul. We were treating the ADHD and making slow progress with special education and I was beginning to think we had this thing under control. “If you want to hear god laugh, tell him your plans” The fire came into our lives and no area of selves, our lives or our existences were left untouched. A few weeks later his anxiety escalated to previously unseen levels and I ran to take my child back to the psychiatrist, half convinced he was losing his mind. Lord knows I was certain one of us was. With some patience and time and therapy, we found our way to a happy mostly sane place again where the day to day wasn’t fraught with invisible pitfalls and tantrums over the smallest things, and stubborn behavior fueled by fear. Special Ed was working and I was back to getting glowing reports from both his teachers and day care staff. I think I got lazy. I got soft. I stopped keeping an eye out for the potential issues because I thought we have this licked. The coping mechanisms he was learning seemed to be working and all was right. And then…my mom got sick. It was a curveball I wasn’t expecting. Although its not life threatening she will require surgery and some recovery time. This information sent Patrick into a tailspin I haven’t seen in some time. Temper tantrums out of nowhere, anger lashing out, combined with clingy neediness that seems to have to salve to ease it. The more I give the more he seems to need some days. Then followed the emails from his teachers, crying in class, refusal to participate, hiding under his desk, lashing out at other students. This was different from the first time. The first real appearance of the anxiety was more of a panic response. This is clearly more of an anger response. That’s concerns me some, because these behaviors are not tolerated anywhere, whether you’re a kid or not. There are moments I find myself staring at him, asking myself, “Why does this have to be so hard?” People get sick, and many times they get better. In life there will be bumps. It’s just the way it goes. I watch this behavior, tired from weeks of trying to walk him through it and all I can think is “Kid, if you don’t get this under control, the world is going to eat you up and spit you out.” I want so much more for him that what I see now. I have to stop and remind myself that he’s only 10, but on the other side of that he won’t be 10 forever. The time to learn to handle the upsets of life is when you’re young and have someone to hold your hand and walk through them together. Time seems to be passing so quickly these days. There are moments I want to tell him to just cowboy up and deal with it like the rest if us do, but I also get that’s just not possible right now. Of course it could be said its not possible because the people around him aren’t allowing him to demand enough of himself. At what point to we stop catering to the disability and start making him as accountable as everyone else his age is? I struggle with knowing what’s appropriate and knowing what he’s truly capable of. I want to hold him to a high standard because I know how smart he is, but I have to winder if I’m only setting him up for failure when I do that. I can see his potential and I want him to find every bit of it in life. I’m just still stumbling along the right path, following my gut instinct, hoping I’m doing the right thing. That’s the hard part about parenting; you don’t know whether you’ve done it right until after it’s passed. So we make the appointments with the psychiatrist again and hope for the best, and continue on with therapy hoping this time will resolve itself over time like it did before. I try not to worry about the long term coping skills he hasn’t seemed to develop yet too much and keep putting out fires. I’ll be glad when I can get back to life where I’m not holding my breath when I pick him up from school, hoping he’s had a good day. This action plan seemed to work last time, I can only hope the recipe hasn’t changed too much since then. I remind him of what he’s done well so far and give him to opportunity to catch him being good and making the right choices. I know it’s a reminder to me that patience is the main ingredient he needs right now, and hope this too shall pass.

a few small repairs

I’ve spent a good portion of the last few days thinking and re-evaluating my life, and my place in it. When a new role was called for in my family I stepped into it without question, without being so much as asked. I knew it was expected and just filled in, taking on extra responsibilities of more meal planning and transportation to doctors’ appts and researching medical conditions. I step back now and ask myself why I did this. This is the role I play, the caretaker. Why is this my role? Was it handed to me, or was it self-assigned? And as a person in the role of caretaker, why do I not take care of myself? The stress these new assignments gave me was something I was not ready for. I’ve assumed this role before and been able to keep moving without so much as hitch in my stride. What made this one different? It could be this added job was the final straw, the one I couldn’t handle. I don’t like admitting that there’s something I can’t handle. I’ve had my share of bullshit thrown my way over the years and although I’ve stumbled here and there and been sent to my knees more than once, I’ve always managed to find a way to assume the extra weight, re-adjust and get back up. Many times this was not done without the help of those around me. If I could do it before, what makes this time so much different? My mental set is changing this time. I’m finding myself taking a step back from the whole mess and taking in the view with a fresh set of eyes. I have become the person who picks up the slack for the person around me. There was a time I would have had little respect for someone like me, who just does and does and does because that’s what is expected of her. I have very little respect for myself now, it would seem. If I treated someone else the way I have treated myself I would fully expect them to call me on it. Well this time I’m calling myself on it. I have allowed this to happen.


That thought is where the change I’m making begins. I called myself on my behavior towards myself. This is unacceptable. I will not allow me to treat myself this way. I know my worth and I know my value and by allowing myself to continue to struggle under the weight I was currently carrying is not going to continue. With this thought I look again around the world I live in and ask myself what does the world I want to live in look like? It looks like a place where my needs are asked about and respected. It’s a world where I don’t feel the need to be nice all the time and just do what needs to be done. Ok, so we’ve started to get an image of what I want around me, now I compare what I have with what ui think I should have. Little things become glaringly obvious. My boundaries, my places my space is not respected, most of all not respected by me. I begin my respecting my own space and my own boundaries. I draw my line in the sand.

This is not to say I won’t continue to care for and look out for my mother and her medical needs and I won’t care for my children and continue to raise them as I see fit. There’s the key, as I see fit. I’m not going to live to please others, I will try not to silently seek approval for the things I do and say. I’m going to speak my mind. Its as simple as this, if someone else treated me as badly as I treat myself, I would have a problem with that person. So it only makes sense that when I do it to myself, I need to self correct the behavior. This means speaking my mind and giving push back where its deemed needed and not taking so much in stride. People are always going to push, the difference is now I plan on pushing back until I’m heard.

Part of the problem I’ve had with this whole issue has been the fear that taking care of mom has just become a life sentence. I saw myself being mandated to step into the shoes she had to fill when her parents fell ill. Both times she took on the new load and found a way to carry on no matter what it cost her. Even some of the behaviors she adopted were becoming my own, although unconsciously. I am choosing to set down the parts of the load I cannot handle and giving myself a rest. This translates into small things like making myself go to bed at a decent hour and going to the gym to burn off some stress. It also translates into larger things like saying no, and delegating some duties as needed in order to ease the load. It could also mean making more space in my life but easing out the part some people have overtaken in my life in order to have some more elbow room for myself. I allow myself to listen to the voice within me that tells me what I want. I already know what I need, I think we all do. I just need to allow myself to have it. It isn’t easy to stand my ground, but already I’m doing it. And I LOVE the way it feels.

whats too much

How much is too much? I have always believed that God does not hand you anything you are not equipped to handle. I have found myself in a place right about now where I am forced to question that. In the last few weeks I've been handed job stress, money stress, relationship stress, and family stress. Mom is sick and will most likely need surgery. My family demands have grown threefold overnight. I have bills to pay and not enough $$ to cover them. My job makes me document every move I make them gives me grief about taking one day off to take my mom to the radiologist. They ask if I have to have the entire day. My family puts demands on me to cook, clean and keep everything running. And the final straw, Pats been having behavior problems at school. He is a very angry kid and I have no idea why. I question him and run into brick walls. All I know is he's not happy I just can't tell you why. I have moments when I have to wonder why all this is handed to me now. I am only one person and anymore I'm stretched so thin I don't know how I can get anything else done. I would ask for help but there's nothing anyone else can do to help. I have nothing left some days and yet the demands don't ever stop. Moms issue requires a special diet so now I'm cooking two dinners instead of one. I don't know what I even need some moments. My friends listen and that is my salvation. Mom is stressed and she leans on me, getting progressively more clingy as the days pass. And I'm here, because I have to me. There's simply no other choice. I need to be there for her because that's what you do. People think I will continue to do whatever needs to get done, but I have to ask myself where I am in my own life. I've vanished from it completely. At least before I was there a little. Now, I don't even exist. And there's simply no space to fix that. When I'm done with what is needed, I'm too tired for anything else. I find myself craving an escape into books and sleep more and more often. They are the only things that are mine and I prtect them fiercely. They are my refuge in the storm. And for now, I hang onto that.