Oh Well...

I'm gonna get my ass kicked lovingly....

2008-04-01T22:57:00.003-05:00

...if I don't post something to let you know I'm okay! I'm sorry, that was really rude. I am actually doing...well! Even, dare I say it, happy? Yes, at times I'm feeling happy! I've spent some time away from the Internet almost entirely, partly because work was actually busy so I couldn't surf all day and then when I did think about blogging, it just didn't happen for whatever reason. I actually haven't even opened my email for two weeks. It wasn't intentional, but I think the Internet vacation has been good for my psychically. But I'm not saying I'm not going to blog anymore. And I'm not even saying I'm not going to bitch and blog either. But right now I'm kinda thinking I might try to make this more of a positive experience rather than a forum for my prolonged temper tantrums. We'll see how it goes. We'll PBE it (play it by ear--LilCherie came up with this acronym-expression and I just think it's fabulous so I'm trying to spread it around).

So that's a little update, and I will see you when the juices start flowing again!

karmagirl, you are so sweet to worry about me and I love you and I hope I get to see you again soon!

Today on Oh Well...: It's a PITY PARTY!!!!!

2008-03-22T21:01:00.004-05:00

So when you're already feeling suicidal, it's not a great idea to read the journal from when you lost the baby. FYI.

Oh, I'm sure I won't do it. I'm sure my inner voice of guilt will prevent me from checking out, you know, because of Bubba. But oh, why didn't I do it then? What in god's name kept me from chucking it all then? I cannot believe the pain of that. I mean, I remember it, but to see it all in such stark realness, such present-tense agony, is shocking even to me. Please don't try to encourage me by telling me that if I made it through that, I can make it through anything. I am deeply immersed in my own little pity party right now, so don't ruin it!

I have been working with my therapist for two years to try to change my "life sucks" viewpoint, and I've even felt at times that I've been getting there, but tonight I look at my life and think about what a fucking mess it is. What a fucked-up, pitiful conglomeration of tragedy, boredom and pettiness. What, exactly, is the goddamn point?

I am an unfortunate combination of selfishness and bad luck. I don't get what I want. Period. That's the major life-lesson for Depressionista. I wanted a husband who loved me; I got one who yelled at me today for leaving one dirty dish in the sink. I wanted a job that was fufilling; I got one where I have to write meaningless promotional material for the institution that killed my baby. I wanted a baby and my baby died. I wanted to experience motherhood and motherhood has been one fucked-up mental challenge from the day I got pregnant with Bubba. I want to kill myself; I can't, because I've already procreated and I can't do that to him, sweet little innocent Bubba. He's going to have to suffer from all of my mental shit and all of J.'s stupidity and moodiness. I can't even fully enjoy my depression because it feels so self-centered.

I'm sure my depression/suicidalness is wearing on everyone. In fact, I'm sure that before long, even my closest friends will stop feeling concern because they know I won't do it. Sometimes I feel like I should just do a half-hearted attempt, you know, just for the attention. Just to up the ante a little bit. Keep 'em coming back for more. Maybe get a break for awhile. Maybe get to leave my fucked-up mess of a life for a few days. Then come back to one that's even more fucked-up messy. Because everything I do just makes it that way--more messy, more ugly, more painful.

I'm closing comments here because I don't feel like I deserve people's compassion right now.

Breaking News: Reports Confirm Virus Unable to Thwart Girl's Night

2008-03-16T13:14:00.007-05:00

When Depressionista woke up from her four-hour nap on Saturday, she wasn't sure she even wanted to know if LilCherie had called or not.

"I pretty much figured Girls' Night was a lost cause," Depressionista said. "When my husband told me she'd called, I hesitated to even call back. I just didn't want the dream to die. But I knew that somehow, I had to find the courage to do it."

The call started out as most calls do--an exchange of pleasantries, updates on what each woman was doing at the moment. Neither seemed ready to broach the topic of whether or not the sinister virus at LilCherie's home had indeed ended what little hope was left for a Girls' Night that evening.

"I didn't want to ask, because I was afraid to hear the answer," Depressionista said. "I thought LilCherie sounded rather perky, but she often enjoys spending time with her family so I figured maybe she was okay with no Girls' Night. But then she asked me if J. had told me anything about their call earlier, and that's when I started to think maybe, just maybe..."

At 4:26 p.m., LilCherie confirmed that Girls' Night was a go. According to LilCherie, the D-Man was still feverish but his symptoms were being well-managed with ibuprofen, and Big R had recovered enough to be able to handle the next 17 hours on his own.

"I just couldn't believe it," Depressionista said. "I was so excited I squealed. After I calmed down, I got myself together and quickly got into gear to begin the preparations for the evening. I still had a shower to take, coffee to make, and also had to put in some kid duty to limit any guilt later on. I was so happy I even let J. take a nap while I waited for LilCherie to get here!"

LilCherie arrived at approximately 6 p.m. The two women laughed easily as they played with Depressionista's son while her husband finished his slumber. It was as if there had never even been a question about whether or not the evening would happen.

"I can't believe we did it," Depressionista said.

"Yep," LilCherie replied. "We pulled off another Girls' Night."

Their shared laughter floated through the air like bubbles in the wind as they reminisced about all the times it almost didn't happen. There were the Girls' Nights after sinus surgery, strep throat and a tonsillectomy; the blizzard a couple years ago that Depressionista weathered on the way to LilCherie's; and of course, who could forget the ice storm last November that LilCherie and PioneerGirl drove through to attend the Girls' Night Christmas 2007 Extravaganza?

"You know, we really shouldn't even worry," Depressionista said. "We're like the postal service. Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays us from the swift completion of our appointed rounds."

"Amen," LilCherie replied. "Amen."

In the Shadow of Sinister Virus, Two Women Struggle to Save Girls' Night

2008-03-15T00:44:00.016-05:00

When LilCherie's husband, Big R, came home Tuesday night, March 11, she thought nothing of his slightly nasal voice, sniffles here and there and his general malaise.

Tonight, however, on the eve of what is supposed to be Girls' Night with her friend Depressionista, she looks back with the knowledge that only time could bring.

"I was so naive," she said, shaking her head. "I thought it was just a little cold. Little did I know that it would become a full-fledged, weekend-plan-threatening flu."

By Wednesday morning, Big R's condition had worsened to the point that he had to call in sick to work. When Thursday morning arrived with little improvement in her husband's condition, LilCherie began to worry about the days ahead.

"Depressionista and I had planned to get together tomorrow night for Girls' Night. When Big R called in sick again on Thursday, I started getting a bad feeling about it," LilCherie said. "I still didn't want to say anything to Depressionista. I didn't want to worry her needlessly."

Things seemed to be looking up by this morning. Big R had started to feel a little better the night before and was able to go to work. The D-Man, the couple's son, was just as chipper as ever--in fact, he'd even gotten sent to the principal's office the day before for an unusual display of rebelliousness.

A phone call at 3:45 p.m. this afternoon, however, shattered the fragile bubble of LilCherie's optimism. It was a call from the D-Man's school, and it would change the odds for a successful Girls' Night that weekend dramatically.

"The school nurse said he was crying, and that he said he didn't feel good and he 'hurt all over,'" LilCherie recalled. "I knew right then that the D-Man had it. It was a nightmare. I just couldn't believe this was happening--not to us."

Soon after the call, LilCherie decided it was time to break the news to Depressionista.

"I was so glad I got her voicemail," LilCherie said. "I didn't want to hear the anguish in her voice when I told her that the probability of Girls' Night had just gone way down. On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being Girls' Night not happening at all, I probably started out the week at a 9. After Big R got sick it went down a few points, but it was up again this morning. When I got that call from the D-Man's school, though, it went all the way down to 3 or 4."

The D-Man came home with a fever and the chills, but after just one dose of ibuprofen he was almost back to normal by bedtime. That, coupled with the fact that LilCherie thought she was getting the virus Thursday but felt better by Friday, made it difficult to predict how the weekend might go. Complicating matters even further, she had her period, which made accurate interpretation of her body's signals almost impossible.

Riddled with uncertainty, LilCherie and Depressionista spoke to each other on the phone late this evening, trying to reassure one another in the face of the unknown.

"He seemed a lot better after he got some ibuprofen," LilCherie told her. "I'm not sure what will happen. I think we should PBE it [Play It By Ear]." She hung up the phone with a look of resolve and resignation.

"She took it well," LilCherie said. "I expected her to demand me to rate the chances of a Girls' Night from 1 to 10, but she didn't. In fact, she reassured me that whatever happened, it would be okay. Somehow, I'm at peace with it all. If Girls' Night is meant to happen tomorrow night--if it really is God's will--it will happen."

Check back for updates on this developing story.

Ripped From the Headlines...

2008-03-12T11:14:00.013-05:00

Click on the photos for more....

Something that made me laugh:

Wow....that tour seemed like SO much longer
than three hours, man...What did you say Gilligan?

Something that made me feel old:

Tom Hulce today....

....and back in the Oh Yeah,
You Can Rock Me Amadeus days.

The straight poop

2008-03-10T21:57:00.009-05:00

Hi everyone! I've been meaning to post for days but every time I get on the computer I end up getting completely absorbed in other people's blogs or weird stuff like this or this. Thanks, Cobblestone, for checking in, because it lit the small fire under my ass that was necessary to get me to write. For future reference: If you don't see me around for awhile that probably means that things are actually semi-okay in my life, because always seem to blog out my pain more than my happiness. Which is something I want to change...we'll see!

Also, thanks everyone for your thoughtful comments on my last post, and when I'm a little more somber, I'd like to delve into that discussion again. It's a good one, I think.

All kinds of things have been swirling around in my head to share with you. And then I forget them when I sit down to write, so forgive me if this feels very scattered.

Current Events
The hubbub about Gov. Spitzer. If he was using federal money to get off, okay, that's a problem. But from the little I've seen and read, the tone is one of shock and outrage that he slept with a prostitute. What? A man cheating on his wife? A politician involved with prostitutes? Is this even news anymore?

Today on "The Today Show," I caught a bit of Meredith Vieira interviewing Dr. Laura Schlesinger, along with two other "experts," about the scandal. Dr. Laura was vigorously supporting her stance that if women don't make their men "feel important and valued," they should not be surprised when their man "looks elsewhere to fill those needs." Hmmm. My first thought on this was to imagine what it must be like to live with the kind of man who would go to a prostitute to "fill his needs." My second thought was...is this 1958???

One of the other "experts" (I would include a name here but for the life of me I can't find a damn thing on The Today Show website) talked about Spitzer's "high cheekbones and large forehead" or something being a sign of high testosterone which makes him more susceptible to infidelity. So...it's either his wife or his hormones. It couldn't be that he's just an asshole now, could it? What a joke.

The lady who power-washed her two-year-old at the car wash. Sickening. I have spent the last several days trying to dodge this horrifying footage.

Salvia Divinorum becoming illegal, touted as "the new marijuana." Time to stock up, ladies. I don't see a problem with the old marijuana, let alone the new, but if it's good enough to be outlawed, I better get some socked away. I continue to be astounded at how American government continues to focus on issues that are non-issues while ignoring or bungling things that really matter to people, like the economy, war, health care.

I struggle with the reasoning behind taking away every means of mental escape from the masses--except alcohol and TV (neither of which are as fun as pot and hallucinogenics). I don't have a theory about how alcohol has managed to stay under the radar in this age of banning everything fun, but the TV issue is an easy one: it's a great way to force feed fear, which keeps people worrying about things that don't matter so that they won't rise up to change what does matter. Maybe this is why people are so much more violent and angry toward one another now? Heh, that's going to be my theory from now on. "Give us the pot and no one gets hurt!" No wonder we all need Zoloft and Xanax...which are, of course, okay because they help Big Pharma keep turning its wheels.

Here's an idea--why not just have the pharmaceutical companies take over the manufacture and distribution of the MJ, the 'shrooms, the salvia and all the other fun stuff? I'd be willing to pay a little more to have it legally, and besides, in a few years I'm sure psychiatrists would find a way to make it legitimate enough that my insurance company would foot most of the bill. Imagine that--going to the pharmacy and paying your $10 copay for your dime bag! Oh cruel dreams, you taunt me!

Breast Health. First, let me say I'm all for it. Second, I get a little uncomfortable when I hear commercials on TV about vitamins that promote "breast health," or when I see the headline I saw on CNN today, "Keeping your breasts healthy at every age." There is one reason this bothers me, and it's not because I am ashamed of the word or the appendages or anything like that. I am pissed about the double standard. I want to see a commercial for a men's vitamin that promotes "testicular health." I want to see a headline on CNN that says "Keeping your penis health at every age." Why don't we? Aren't men's testicles and peni as important as our breasts?

I think the media in general still trades on the sensationalism of talking about breasts. They've been used to sell everything else, why not use them to sell vitamins and news and cancer research fund drives? Hmm. Maybe I'm looking at it the wrong way. Maybe I should just stand in awe of the power of the female breast--I mean, look how much it can do!!!

A final unrelated note: I was just involved in a shit-standoff in my Safe Haven work bathroom in the basement. I walk into an empty bathroom, empty my bladder and am just about ready to drop my load when another lady walks in and parks herself in the stall next door. I decide to hold off, hoping she's just going to pee and leave, but she pees and then....nothing. Neither of us are making a sound. Finally, I decide to abort mission and suck it back in to hopefully get some privacy elsewhere. I hate that!! Once again, I wish for a ShitStall 3. This leads me (as most things do) to Poop Stories. Since I have some new readers, I'll put out the call again--care to share your all-time favorite poop stories? If so, I'd love to read them!

PostMortem

2008-03-02T04:52:00.026-06:00

It's 5:30 a.m., J. and LilCherie is asleep and Bubba is spending the
weekend at my sister's, so I'm up reading blogs. I read this post by charmedgirl and thought, wow, she's really going to try again so soon! Then I realized that it's been six months since she had P@ige, and thought about how six months after I lost my daughter, I had already failed one IUI and seven months later, I would be pregnant with my son.

Then I read this post by C. It's so raw, and so full of longing that it made my heart ache in such a familiar way. Being there came rushing back to me, and made me consider being here.

"We got so lucky with Bubba," I said to J. today in the car on the way to the antique show. "I always feel weird saying we got lucky."

"Me too," J. says. "I always feel like I'm tempting fate to take him away."

"Oh wow," I say. "I always feel like, 'how can I even say I'm lucky when one of my kids is dead?'"

At the antique show, I saw a family Bible inscribed with the names of twins, Louis and Victoria, born on the 25th of a long-ago September. Louis lived 10 days; Victoria lived 15 years. Someone lived long enough after they died to write it in the book.

"Hey, come over here," J. motions to me. I come over to look and he points out a postcard-sized black-and-white postmortem photograph of a little boy, probably about five years old, resplendent in his best knickers and jacket and laid out on the family bed.

The photos "were life-affirming rather than creepy and macabre, as most people think of them today," said Jack Kabrud, director and curator of the Hennepin History Museum. Its exhibit on the topic is called "A Semblance of Life: The Art and Culture of the Post Mortem Photograph," with about 50 photos from the 1850s to as late as the 1940s.

"These photos were the final gift to the survivors," Kabrud said. "It was something they could hold."

T he Art of the Postmortem Photo
by Peg Meier
The Minneapolis Star Tribune, Nov. 4, 2005

Later, at home, I walk down the hall and then stop for a moment.
Something's bothering me, what is it? Oh, the door to Bubba's room is closed. How long that door stayed closed, waiting for hope.

I open it part of the way, until it feels less dangerous.

Question

2008-02-29T13:57:00.002-06:00

Do you ever read someone's blog, see that they are entrenched in a major case of denial about a big life issue that will probably hurt them in the end, and you really want to challenge it by leaving a comment? Do you? Or do you just let them enjoy the denial while it lasts?

I have this question about a blog I just found not long ago (not anyone who has ever commented here, so don't get paranoid!)

Edited to Add: I meant to write this earlier and I forgot. If I am the blogger that you recognize this denial and/or other self-destructive thought patterns in, PLEASE feel free to leave me a real comment on it! Like Charmedgirl, I want to hear it all, no censorship please! Okay. Glad to get that out of the way!

Responses to the responses, and thanks!

2008-02-29T09:32:00.003-06:00

Wow. You guys are amazing! Thanks so much for taking the time to take the test and sharing your scores with me. It actually does help somehow, although again I can't really define why. Maybe I needed some kind of confirmation that I really do have some kind of problem? Maybe I wanted to see that it really isn't normal to feel this way? I don't know. But thanks just the same! I want to respond to a few of the comments--I always feel like I might as well do it in another post rather than in the comment thread, hope you don't mind.

Cobblestone: After reading your comment I did a little net search on Goldberg's Depression Test, it looks like it's a real test developed by a real psychiatrist but I'm sure some companies who peddle antidepressants use it to their advantage.

Anonymous: I am so, so sorry you lost your daughter Erin, and I admire your ability to stay standing. Thanks for coming here and for taking the test for me. I hope things continue to get less painful for you as time goes on.

Thrice: I'm on 225 mg of Effexor and 50mg of Zoloft. Are you on meds currently? Are they helping?

Karmagirl: If you don't think you're depressed, just go with that! Don't let the test get you down for crying out loud! Thanks for the good person comment, you are so sweet!

Meredith: I had no problem reading that you were a 4! I am glad for you, although I stand in utter amazement. I really don't think that I could ever get to a 4, and that's not my depression talking. I mean, I don't think it's in my personal psychological/genetic makeup to be able to get to a 4. I don't think I've ever, in my life, been at a 4. Wow. Good job!

Melissa and Cate: Ditto the above for your scores of 6 and 12, respectively! Holy cow! Good job.
And Melissa, I usually see the therapist every week on Tuesday, although this week I had to cancel because I had two other appointments that day that couldn't be put off. And I really like your advice that "it may seem pointless, but pretend as if it's not." Thank you for suggesting that, because that seems like something I can do!

LilCherie: 37, huh? That puts you just into the "moderate to severe" category. I don't think of you as depressed, but then again, I'm pretty narcissistic these days. Fodder for discussion tomorrow!

Charmedgirl: First, impressive that you scored a 20. That's really good. I'm proud of you. Second, your comment made a lot of sense to me. I'm definitely not going to stop therapy or go off the meds or anything, and I'm going to keep working with the psychiatrist, but I think you get to the heart of matter here. I've been thinking the last couple of days that no pill is going to make my job more interesting or fulfilling; no pill is going to make my marriage more satisfying; and no pill is going to make me enjoy all the "have-to's" in my life.

An interesting and I think related issue that I've been working on in therapy is that when my therapist asks me what I enjoy doing, or what I would like to do if I felt better, or what makes me happy....I come up with a total fucking blank. Is it any wonder that I'm sad? And you know, it's kind of scary to even try to think about it because I'm afraid there isn't anything there. That there isn't anything that will fulfill me. Logically, I know (or think I know) that that can't be the case...but the possibility of it scares me because if that's true then there really won't be much reason to keep going, you know? So I think that's why I put off thinking about it.

Last night I went home and went to bed until the guys came home. Then I really tried to rally and got up for awhile, but went down again at 7:30. I slept through until this morning, and do feel better today. It helps that it's Friday, and that my sister is taking Bubba tonight and tomorrow night and my mom and dad are taking him Sunday night, so we will get a whole weekend to ourselves. It also helps that J. has been really kind and understanding this week. He's done a few things around the house on his own, and taken care of Bubba quite a bit, including actually playing with him and not just watching TV. Last night I guess they worked on making a cardboard Millenium Falcon. J. also actually came into my room last night while I was still awake and laid down and talked to me, asked me how I was feeling, seemed actually concerned. I don't know exactly why he's being nicer, but it's helping things at our house quite a bit. He even got us tickets to go to an antique sale tomorrow, almost like a "date."

So today, so far, is better. Thanks again to everyone who commented.

Why?

2008-02-28T16:21:00.003-06:00

Well, I had a couple good days at least.

Everything seems so pointless that it's hard to even write post because I keep asking myself the question, "Why?"

Why do you want to hear about how depressed I am? I guess it really doesn't matter, right? I mean, it's a blog, you can read it if you want or click away if you want.

I see my psychiatrist on Monday. I don't think she can help me. I am pretty much losing faith in the psychiatric profession. It seems that most of the people who become therapists do it because they are fucked up themselves (case in point--I've even thought about it as a possible career!) All the psychiatrists I've seen seem to do the same thing--make me spill all of my deepest, darkest thoughts about why my life sucks and how messed up I am and then suggest a pill or a medication adjustment that doesn't work. It used to work, for awhile. Not anymore. These people have years and years of training and yet it's like they flail around in the dark, throwing pills at people randomly. I mean, I feel like I could do the same exact thing without any training. Let's try Effexor this time. Wait a couple months. Not working? Add in some Zoloft. Still not working? Up the dosage a little. Still not working? Well, let's wean off the Effexor and try the Cymbalta. It never seems to work....it never seems to end.

I almost feel.....uninterested in seeing the psychiatrist again. Again, that question, "Why?" Why go if it doesn't help? What else can she offer except more drugs that don't do anything?

I took this test today and got a score of 79. A score of 54 or higher indicates severe depression--I think the highest you can get is 90. A score of 79 while I'm on Effexor and Zoloft and seeing a therapist and in the first half (i.e. the "better" half) of my cycle. Will you guys do me a favor, if you don't mind revealing? Could you all take it and let me know what scores you get? For a reason I can't define, I feel like it would be a good way to sort of put my own stuff into context.

For Tingle's Boss

2008-02-26T21:29:00.025-06:00

My friend Tingle gave me and LilCherie an important job for our last Girls' Night. She asked us to come up with activities that her boss and her boss' daughter could do while recovering from a broken leg (boss) and a broken pelvis (daughter). Here's what we came up with! (Be sure to click on the photos for more information!)

Rent laptops and look at porn.
Cultivate a Chia Pet. ("I have been on this couch since that thing was bald!")
Watch seasons one and two of "Weeds."
Learn a new language!
Look at pretty sparkly things.
Shrinky Dinks and suncatchers! (Note: Need an assistant to do the baking)
Eat lots of Oreos.
Learn how to play the recorder.
Do a huge splatter painting (so they can just throw the paint at the canvas).
Have a babyfood tasting.
Have theme days like "Mexican Day" where they can work on piñatas, eat salsa, chips and tacos, and drink sangria.
Grow out their toenails.
Finger paint.
Make nippleprints.
Learn to identify different cuts of meat.
Build a model.
Make cool things out of Sculpey.
Learn to be a cobbler.
Start a blog!
Start their memoirs.
Puzzles.
Learn how to create a crossword puzzle.
Call us. Just call us!
Call 1-800 numbers and order samples and catalogs for other people.
Explore their genealogy.
Sleep.
Become wine, cheese, or beef stick connoisseurs.
Watch Court TV.
Write a soap opera.
Learn sign language.
Do projects like typing, organizing things, rewriting recipes, etc. for other people.
Decorate Easter eggs!
Organize a charity drive. Use the computer and Paypal and have people sponsor them by pledging $5 for every day that they are immobile.

Light

2008-02-24T14:45:00.003-06:00

I feel human again! Since I last talked to you I:
-Went to the oto, got antibiotics for yet another infection (definitely going for second opinion April 1).
-Actually started using my inhaler thing that's supposed to help me with the cough that is from the sinus drainage.
-Made appointment with ob/gyn for annual exam/hormone discussion/endometrial ablation discussion. Appointment is March 7, not bad.
-Really cleaned my house.
-Played with Bubba.
-Did laundry.
-Had Girl's Night with LilCherie and karmagirl (So fun! Thanks for hosting me, ladies!)
-Sent my husband flowers and jelly beans. I know, you are probably thinking "What the fuck are you doing???" Well....he was depressed last week too, and I felt sorry for him, and I wanted to cheer him up. He appreciated it. It was a nice thing to do. What can I say? I'm a pushover.
-Arranged for my sister to take Bubba next weekend, weather permitting.
-Had a pleasant discussion with my mother. She revealed that in her research on depression (i.e., reading the book I mentioned earlier), she has begun recognizing some of the same stuff in herself and especially in her mother! This is a huge breakthrough in my mother's Great Wall of Denial. I hope it will help her and me.

Aurelia commented on one of my earlier posts that I need to get on the pill. I really think that suggestion has a lot of validity, and I will discuss it with my ob. I took it for a long time when I was younger and didn't have any problems with it...but now only I'm 37 and I smoke. And I know myself well enough to know that I am not going to quit smoking anytime soon, just ain't gonna happen. But I'll ask the doctor about risks/options. I mean, I guess I need to figure out if it's more likely that I'll have a stroke while on the pill, or kill myself/ruin my life from the depression I suffer when not on it? I'm also curious as to whether there's something else screwy going on that's fucking up my hormones that maybe could be fixed to solve the problem. We'll see. But it's pretty amazing how by period day three I'm 80 percent better than the day/week/two weeks before.

I have other stuff I want to blog about but I'm hungry and my pizza is done so, you know, I have my priorities. And I probably should get to the store because tomorrow we are supposed to get ice pellets, then freezing rain, then rain, then 4 to 8 inches of snow. On top of the four feet of snow and ice that we already have. At least it's over freezing today so some of it is melting before we get dumped on again. I can't complain enough about how much this winter has sucked....but right now it's sunny and warm and it's nice to smoke on the porch. What more could I want? (ha ha).

Playing Tag

2008-02-22T00:14:00.005-06:00

CharmedGirl tagged me, which always makes me feel loved, so thanks! Here's the deal:

1) Link to the person who tagged you.
2) Post the rules.
3) Share six non-important things / habits / quirks about yourself.
4) Tag at least three people.
5) Be sure the people you tagged KNOW you tagged them by commenting what you did.

1. Food Weirdness: I segregate all my Lucky Charms while I eat them. I go for all the oat shapes first, so that at the end of the bowl I have a several yummy spoonfuls made up almost entirely of charms. I also do this with popcorn, saving the big, puffy, cloud-like kernels for last. Then I nibble off anything that's hard so that at the end, I have one handful of completely hull-free popcorn that melts in my mouth. When I was a kid, I used to personify my pancakes. When I ate the second-to-last piece of pancake, I would tell the lone piece left on my plate, who was surely lonely and scared, that it was okay, soon it would be with all of it's pancake friends in my stomach.

2. Every so often (right now, in fact) I decide to grow my toenails out. Not to be pretty, oh god no--in fact, just the opposite. I want to see how long I can stand the grossness and also enjoy disgusting my inner circle who is subjected to viewing the nails. The last time I did this, we had a ceremonial toenail-cutting during a Girls' Weekend at the cabin.

3. Once, after a Girls' Night at LilCherie's in which she forced me to watch titillating films from the 60s, I was so desperate to get off that I snuggled up to her electric shiatsu chair massager. It didn't quite work, but the frontal action was so exquisite that I bought my own the very next day. Now I keep an emergency vibe at her house for just such a situation. Always be prepared!

4. Occasionally, just for fun, I will fart loudly in a public place (usually Walgreens) to embarrass not only myself, but whoever is with me (usually it's LilCherie or Tingle). What can I say, I enjoy fart humor. And embarrassing people.

5. A local grocery store chain has special parking spaces at some of it's locations that are "Reserved for new or expectant mothers." It has a little stork on it and everything. When I was TTC, they irritated me, but after losing Hope they enraged me. Since then I have made it a personal mission to always park in this spot if it is available. Since I'm fat, it works out well--all I have to do is arch my back a bit and I can pass, if I feel like it. Otherwise, I just walk normally and send out the "I dare you," vibe to the universe. In some small way, it feels very satisfying.

6. I am somewhat obsessed with serial killers. I just find it fascinating and scary and it's kind of always been a fear of mine so I guess it's natural that I would want to learn more about it. My area of specialization would have to be Ted Bundy, because after reading "The Stranger Beside Me" by Ann Rule, I was hooked. This personal quirk freaked Tingle out quite a bit because, for some reason, this came up during her first visit to my house...and moments later, J., for some reason I don't remember, decided to show her and her hubby his grandfather's meat cleaver that had been passed down to him and was hanging in our basement. And she's still my friend. That's love, folks!

Alright....well, I hope after reading all that, you'll still come back! Now I'm going to tag Complicated Mama, Melissa, and Thrice.

Thanks, Charmy, for the fun topic. It was a great diversion!

Oh, poor little me!

2008-02-21T10:36:00.007-06:00

First, I want to say thanks to everyone and to let you know that your nonjudgmental support means so much to me. I made it through the day (and night) last night, feeling a little better today, especially after writing the dump below. I also want everyone to know that if necessary, I will go to the ER. I'm not there yet, but if I do, I will do it, even though I know, like Charmed said, that it could affect custody stuff. I look at it this way: in the event of a divorce, it would be better for Bubba to have me around and healthy, even if I didn't have primary custody, than it would be for him to have to deal with the after-effects of his mother committing suicide. But anyway...thanks again so much.

Okay...onward. The rest of this post is going to be a major mind-dump of narcissistic bitching about everything. You've been warned.

I was up until 4 a.m. Then I awoke for the 7:45 a.m. scramble that my husband is doing to try to get his own depressed self and Bubba out the door. Bubba wants a cuddle, so I'm cuddling him for a brief moment, and he tells me that "I don't want to go to school. Joe and Hans hit me yesterday. Joe says I'm not his friend." He had already mentioned this to me last night as well. I asked Bubba if he was afraid to go to school and he said yes. So I relay this to J., who says he will bring it up with the teacher. He called me later and said her explanation was "Yeah, yesterday was kind of a crazy day and we'll keep a closer eye on it." J. is calling right now to make an appointment for our meeting with the teachers. Yay.

Then I called my boss. That went well. We talked about maybe reducing my hours for awhile instead of a full leave, which I think makes sense because I don't want to fall off the face of the earth and down into this hole forever, and I think I could handle some work if I knew I also had some time to just...recover, I guess. Anyway, I'm going to take the rest of the week off, try to figure out what to do, and go back Monday.

Then I called my parents. I need to put a big sign up on my wall that says, "If you are feeling depressed, DO NOT CALL YOUR PARENTS." I called them today, mostly because I had worked up my nerve to ask if they could take Bubba for the weekend. I started off telling them I wasn't doing so well and that I was trying to figure out what do about work, etc. My mother starts telling me that if I lose my job I'm "really going to have problems."

"What are you going to do if you don't go to work? Just sit around being miserable?" she says. Then the crying starts. "We need to find something or someone who is going to make you better. You're too young to spend your whole life feeling miserable." She tells me she thinks maybe I need to "go somewhere" to get better, and that she will come with me or pay for it or whatever. She tells me she's even thought about "that place on Dr. Phil where they're always sending people." (Even in my depression, I think this is kinda funny...) "There has to be something I can do to make you better," she says, almost sobbing on the phone. This goes on, with my dad getting on the phone making comments like "If work was fun, they'd call it a hobby" and "It's a state of mind." My mother tells me about how hard this is for them. My mother wonders aloud if I "enjoy being depressed." They both want to know "what's causing it."

The end result for me, in my narcissistic daze, is the following:
*I feel like I am ruining not only my life and my kid's life, but also my parents'.
*I feel bad for causing them so much pain.
*I feel like a failure because I can't just get it together.
*I feel like my parents blame me even though they say they don't.
*I feel like a huge burden on everyone who cares about me.
*I feel like I should just try really hard to conceal this from them from now on, make them believe that I am better, and never confide in them about this again.

I told them that the biggest thing they could do to help me would be to do some research on what depression really is, because I want them to understand that it's not like I choose to be nonfunctional, it just is. It's not like there's some magic pill or magic therapist or whatever that's going to make it all go away. It reminds me very much of when I was grieving Hope and six months out, they told me that I had to get things together or I was going to lose my job and my marriage and that it was time to move on and get better. Like I had control over that. Anyway. My mother says she bought a book called "Undoing Depression" so that she could try to help me undo it, I guess. I told them that I would appreciate it if they wouldn't outline all the ways I'm ruining my life when I call them. I told them that sometimes I just need someone to listen, you know? I'm sure they don't get it. I said at one point that it would help if they took Bubba this weekend but then I said I was afraid to ask because I felt like they were mad at me and the conversation turned to them telling me they weren't mad at me and the Bubba thing was never addressed again...so it looks like that's a no go.

Look, I know that my parents love me and they don't understand and they are doing the best they can...but JESUS CHRIST. How do I keep forgetting that every time I call them with a problem, it becomes their problem that I feel bad about causing?

In the aftermath of the phone call, I am blowing my nose, and suddenly a bunch of fluid pours out of my right nostril. By now I know that it's a cyst in my sinus, because this is like the third time it's happened. So that's what was causing all my pain, maybe there's also an infection causing it to form, I don't know. I called my doctor's office. The phone rang about 10 times before someone answered. I say I need to speak with my doctor's nurse. "Well, they're in clinic in Xtown today," she says. "Okay, then what's the number there?" I ask. "Well, they don't take calls there," she says. "Okay," I say, clearly bitchy by now, "then I need to speak with someone else's nurse." At this point I have to give her my name, which is probably flagged with a huge skull and crossbones at the front desk or something, and tell her what is going on. I give her a terse history ("I had surgery in October, I had infections until January, I think I have another one and a cyst in my right sinus just ruptured.") Someone Else's Nurse calls me back (she's actually pleasant) and miraculously, my doctor has an opening tomorrow morning at 8 a.m. "Someone must have cancelled," she tells me. I think "cyst" and "rupture" were the words that got some action.

Then I called LilCherie's oto, in the town that's 40 min. away, and got an appointment for April 1. I'm going to get my records/scans and take them up there and get a second opinion and see if he can help me. I figure that if I've been having problems this long, I'll probably still be having problems in another month's time, so that should work out alright.

And I'm supposed to go to the dentist today at 4 p.m. to have them start working on fixing my bite, which is completely fucked up because I'm grinding the hell out of my teeth. Still haven't figured out if I'll go or if I'll have to come up with some excuse to get out of it.

Here's what keeps going around in my head. "You are causing problems for everyone who loves you. You are making your life worse by not dealing with it. You are so selfish to be so self-absorbed. Your life is not that bad, why are you such a wuss? Just deal with it!" Hmmm. Pretty much what I got from my parents. Believe it or not, I never really made that connection before. Ahhh, therapy by blogging. It's pretty amazing.

Oh, and I got my period yesterday, so today I'm dealing with Aunt Flo's Second-Day Hemorrhage.

In spite of it all, I am actually feeling a little better today. I'm feeling like I need to and possibly can make a plan to try to get better. It's all very confusing, but what comes to mind right now are the following (in no particular order). It all sounds very ambitious, but really I'm just brainstorming right now, so I'm not ruling anything out.

*See psychiatrist as soon as she's back in town (on vacation now, of course).
*Tell psychiatrist I need some major and immediate help, and that if she can't provide that she needs to send me to someone who can. Ask if it would be helpful to have therapy with her as well as med management.
*Get appointment with ob/gyn. Discuss period-related depression issues, ask about testing my hormone levels or other diagnostics to see if we can find a physiological problem, talk about endometrial ablation.
*Figure out reduced work hours schedule.
*Arrange a short break from everything--i.e., go away by myself for four or five days, spend the money even though I don't have it to give myself some pampering and some respite and some distance from everything that's bearing down on me.
*Look into some alternative therapies like acupuncture, reiki, herbal supplements, whatever. Just doing something else to feel proactive would be helpful I think.
*Try, really really try, to start getting some exercise, any exercise. I know better than to expect that I will be getting up at 5 a.m. to go running or anything, but I need to move my body.
*On the same token, I need to pay some more attention to my nutrition.
*Commit to marriage counseling. The counselor we were referred to has no openings, so I need to talk to J. about finding someone else, even if we have to pick someone out of the phone book. I'm still going to talk to the lawyer on Monday, but right now I don't trust myself very much, and I don't want to make big, life-altering decisions in this frame of mind. This might sound naive and stupid after everything I've written here, but what I really want is for this marriage to work and for us to both be happy--so that's what I should be working toward.
*Look for ways that I can do something meaningful with my life. I think a big part of my dissatisfaction with my job is that it is so pointless and doesn't help anyone or mean anything in the big picture of life. Man, I wish J.'s grandma would just die already so we could get a little money to go back to school or something! She's 98 fucking years old! (I am terrible.)

I'm thinking about actually writing this all down in a calendar book, actually scheduling them in small steps, like "Feb. 27: Call acupuncturist and make appointment" or "Feb. 28: Look into options for getaway" or whatever.

Whew. I do feel better. For anyone who made it this far, I thank you. For everyone reading, commenting, thinking about me...I thank you. Very much.

Dark

2008-02-20T09:23:00.003-06:00

My life is falling apart and I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I can't work. I emailed my boss today and I'm going to talk to her about a leave of absence, which will mean I will have to ask my parents to help me financially, but it's getting to the point where I can't ever make it in for a full week and even when I'm there I can't get much done.

Last night J. came home depressed himself, because he had some disappointing career news that I can't say anything else about, but he wanted to go to bed and I did the big sigh and then said okay, which really means no, so he stayed up and put Bubba to bed and then just went silently into his own bed and went to sleep. Then he got up and did all the Bubba care this morning to get out of the house by 8 a.m. I am such a complete loser. I go on and on about what a jerk J. is here, but I am just as bad. I sent J. an email half an hour ago asking him if he could get out of work a couple hours early and come home and talk to me. He hasn't responded so he either doesn't want to, can't, or hasn't gotten around to reading my note yet.

I think I have a sinus infection, and I called the doctor's office today and they didn't have an opening until next Tuesday. Next fucking Tuesday. This, after we struggled for almost three months, from October to the beginning of January, to get rid of the post-surgical infections. This, after my doctor told me, "If you have ANY inkling that you are getting another infection, call right away." I said to the receptionist, "So I have to wait a week to be seen for a sinus infection?" The receptionist confirmed this. I said, "Just forget it," and hung up on her. But I still have the sinus infection, the only other option in town is the U of WKWKYKBYSOUM. I may have to go to another town 40 minutes away if I switch. I should probably call my doctor back and demand to talk to his nurse, but fuck, I don't care enough. It's weird wanting to die but still worrying about your sinuses. I guess I just don't want any more pain. Ya know?

WHY is this so bad right now? WHY is my brain so screwed up and WHY isn't anything helping? I almost want to say...in fact, I will say that I am worse mentally than I was after Hope died. At least then I could make it in to work most days. At least then I knew why I was in such pain. At least then I didn't have another little life depending on me to be "okay." At least then, people knew and were understanding of why I was screwed up.

After Hope died, I did therapy, meds, got massages from a lady who helped me "talk" to my baby and told me about my auras, saw a shamanic healer, wrote in my journal, reached out for support from my friends and got involved in a support group message board which is where I found Tingle. I remember then thinking "I am doing EVERYTHING I possibly can to get better, and it's not working." That's how I feel right now. I wish it was a physical problem. I wish it was something I could point to, that people could see, so that I wouldn't have to just feel like a loser.

I made the call

2008-02-18T15:57:00.002-06:00

Right now I feel like this is the best outlet for all this stuff because often I am either too tired or depressed to talk to my friends about it or I feel like I don't want to always have it be all about me all the time so I don't want to go on about it, even though they never make me feel bad about it. Anyway. Expect lots of gut-spilling for awhile.

I called my lawyer friend and set up a consultation with her for next Monday. She said initially that she doesn't think there is any kind of conflict of interest. The whole thing makes me feel anxious and sick inside. I feel like a failure. I had the most ridiculous thought this afternoon about how crappy our class reunion in 2009 will be if J. and I are divorced and we have to face everyone who knew us back in the early days of our "romance." No, I don't have to go, and no, I don't care what these people think....but there's a part of me that feels really ashamed about all of this, a part of me that doesn't want the world to know that my marriage is this bad. But on the other hand, here I am blogging about it.

Anyway. I took a first step. We'll see where it goes.

Advice?

2008-02-18T12:02:00.003-06:00

Maybe somebody out there knows the answer to this question. I am trying to find a divorce attorney because the one I was going to go to is unavailable. I used to work with a woman who left to earn her law degree. I would call myself a distant friend of hers--you know, the occasional email, she took care of my cat once when we were out of town, we used to get together once a year or so but haven't for at least two years now. She is now an attorney who handles divorce. I was thinking about at least having a consultation with her, but I want to know if our previous relationship would be some kind of conflict of interest? I know nothing about this stuff.

Today, when J. was talking about how he needed money for something because he had accidentally left his ATM card in a machine and it got eaten, I said "Well, don't you have a checkbook?" And he shook his head no. I asked why not and he told me that he had been forced to close his account last May because it had been overdrawn too many times (he works for a bank and they have rules about that kind of thing). I asked why he had never told me and he said, "Well, it's not causing a problem, is it?" My name was on that account--neither one of us had gotten around to taking it off. I know, stupid. J. tells me it won't affect anything negatively for me. I'm not too concerned about it, but I feel....troubled by the whole thing.

I'm also troubled because there's a part of me that feels sorry for J. I really feel that divorce is the right thing to do, but on the other hand I worry that J. doesn't have much money, his parents are both dead and his friends network is pretty superficial...I worry that he will do something terrible like kill himself or something. I've taken care of J. for a long time and it makes me sad, in a way, that he won't have anyone to do it after I'm gone. I know, he should be taking care of himself....still I feel bad. Those of you who have been through this--did you deal with any similar feelings or fears about your ex?

One of the reasons this is so difficult is that there are parts of J. that I still love, and I still care about him. But I think I'm coming to realize that those feelings don't mean that it is best for us to stay married.

Yep, it's time.

2008-02-16T03:49:00.004-06:00

Everyone who posted...you are right. You so are right. I re-read my post today and it has crystallized. I feel that every time I realize that I really need to get out, it brings me one step closer to actually doing it, if that makes sense. Each time I realize it, then "give it another try," my resolve deepens just a little bit.

I am going to call a lawyer on Monday, the one that came recommended to me from one of the people I trust most in this world. I've already had the free consultation with her--did that a couple of years ago. I'll try to find that file and look it over again, but regardless, I'm calling the lawyer, explaining my situation, and start working on a real plan. I know lawyers are expensive, and I might end up broke at the end of it all, but I think I still have enough room on my card to pay for it now. I know my family will help me when I need it. I know I have friends who will support me as much as they can. I know that if worse comes to worst, I can declare bankruptcy or call a credit counseling place or something and get things under control again. I won't be in any worse shape, really, than I am now.

I think I'm going to hold off on any more divorce talk with J. until I see the lawyer. I might need to sit tight for awhile and try to get some things figured out--I'll see what she says. There are some things I need to do that will alert J. to what I'm doing: I need to get into our lockbox and I need to have my name taken off his bank account, which only he uses at this point. I also need to get documentation of our home equity loan. This is difficult because J. works at the bank where all this stuff is, so I'm just going to have to do it and let the chips fall where they may. Oh well.

Last week I looked through all my bank statements back to September (my account is at a different bank!) and wrote down in a notebook how much money J. had given me from each of his paychecks over the past six months. There were many "nothing" entries. I also started writing down when J. forgets Bubba's medicine or does something else equally stupid, when I buy groceries/medicine/gas/other necessities for the house and especially for Bubba, when he is gone working late/seeing friends, when I bathe Bubba, put him to bed, take him to the doctor, stay home sick with him, that kind of stuff, so that I can better prove, if necessary, that I am providing most of Bubba's financial support and a large part of his care at home.

Melissa, you asked what happened at my psych appointment. Basically, she added some Zoloft to my Effexor. I go back in about two weeks and at that point, if I'm still feeling nonfunctional, then we will talk about Prozac or mood stabilizers, which have a lot of shitty side effects so I hope the Zoloft works. I went in looking like hell, a huge breakout on my face and no makeup, unshowered, unkempt, and then when I got there I was all fidgety and almost paranoid and really nervous...and then I cried of course. It couldn't be much more obvious that I am on the edge. I'm not sure what else I expect her to do...but somehow, it doesn't really feel like enough. I've been on the Zoloft/Effex. combo since that day, last Monday. Not really feeling any difference yet.

I got out of the house tonight and came down to LilCherie's, which has been a great break, although I don't want to go to sleep (it's 4:15 a.m.) because I know when I get up I have to go back there.

I just feel so sorry for Bubba. I know that it's probably better in the long run for us to get divorced now and spare him the years of angst/bitterness/coldness between us, but man, it's going to be so confusing and scary and awful for him. And it will be that way for me when he has to be with his dad. I would love words of encouragement here from anyone with kids who has gone through divorce to let me know that it will all be okay. At least I know J. isn't violent or malicious toward Bubba in ANY way and that he loves him with all his heart, so what I'd most have to worry about is that Bubba won't get bathed, may not get his medicine (which shouldn't be life-threatening) and will spend the entire time watching stuff on TV that's inappropriate for his age. It could be worse. But it breaks my heart that we will be hurting Bubba in this way.

I really never imagined that our relationship would fall apart AFTER we were lucky enough to have a living child. I never would have imagined that the absence of crisis would mean the end of our relationship. I never would have imagined that trying to live in normalcy would be the challenge that we'd be unable to meet.

Fuck it all

2008-02-15T01:19:00.004-06:00

I am going crazy.
It's scary.

Last night: Woke up at 10:30 to coughing-to-the-point of vomiting child. Got him calmed down, nebulized, and back to bed but I was worried so I slept with him, waking up each time he coughed.

This morning: Woke up, did all the morning shit, got Bubba dressed and ready for school, drove J. to work so that I could have the car to take Bubba to his 10:30 doctor's appointment. When I climbed into the driver's seat I noticed the gas tank was far down into the red. "Thanks for leaving me some gas," I call to J. as he gets his stuff out of the car. He shuts the door and leaves, not saying anything.

Get Bubba to school and am at my desk by 8:40 or so. Finish work project in time to go get Bubba from school and take him to doctor. Doctor can't hear anything wrong with Bubba's lungs, but since the neb worked last night she prescribes an inhaler and spacer that we can use that will hopefully ease the coughing while he sleeps and also take less time/effort to give him, because Bubba doesn't like the neb so much.

Stop at gas station on way back from doctor's office. Cannot get gas cap off. This is an issue that's been going on for about a year, and about a year ago I asked J. to get it fixed. Since then, there have been occasional mentions of this problem, but no action. I wrestle with this thing for 10 minutes. Call J. to see if there's anything else I can try. He has no suggestions. I tell him that if I can't get it off I will call him back and he will have to get a ride to gas station so that he can get it off because I can't go any further without gas, especially with Bubba in the car.

Another five minutes and I get the thing off. Fill car with gas. Take Bubba, who has fallen to sleep in the car by now, back to school. Go to pharmacy to drop off Bubba's prescriptions. Pick up lunch to go and then pick up J. because he wants the car to go to the library over his lunch hour. He takes me back to work. The stress of the whole damn day pretty much has me in overdrive, and by 1:30 or so I'm starting to have the panicky anxiety set in.

At 3:45 I hear wailing on Bubba's daycare's playground below my office. I look out the window and see Bubba crying. He walks over to the teacher, explains something and points, she talks to him and he wanders back to a sled where some kids are playing. The teachers are standing there talking to one another. Bubba gets on the empty seat of a two-person sled, and is promptly shoved off, twice, face-first into the snow. No action from the teachers. Nothing, even though Bubba is seriously crying.

I truck it down to the daycare and take a minute to peer through the door to the playground before making my presence known. I see the teachers still standing there. Then I see one of them rush over to Bubba, at which point I go out to see what the situation is. I am seriously pissed. I call for them to bring Bubba over to me since I have crappy shoes on.

"Joe...pushed....me...off...the...sled," Bubba tells me in between hysterical cries, coughs and gags. I tell the teacher what I saw and that I was concerned that nobody was handling the situation. The teacher backpedals, saying that Bubba had been pretty much crying since he woke up from his nap 45 minutes earlier and that the incident she just took care of was the first one that period (which I know is false because I saw it evolving). I was so upset I was shaking and could barely speak myself. I reiterated that I was concerned and then scooped up Bubba and went in to get his stuff for the day. I ran into the lead teacher in his room and told her the same story, and she pretty much told me the same story that the other one had, you know, that my kid is sick or crabby and THAT's what was causing the problem, not the other kid or the negligent teachers. I am paying them $950 a month. This is the premier center in our entire town/area. The teacher/child ratio in Bubba's room is 1:4. They should be able to make sure my kid doesn't get shoved into the snow, especially after my child alerted them that there was an issue. The kid that shoved him is alternately Bubba's best friend and worst enemy. I know their relationship is difficult, and the teachers know it too. So wouldn't you think they'd pay special attention when they are playing together to make sure nobody gets hurt?

We always tell Bubba that if he's having a problem with another kid, he should go tell a teacher rather than hit or act out. I saw that that's exactly what he did, and the teacher did nothing. That makes me feel like I failed him.

I will be setting up a conference to talk to his teachers about this. Anyway.

I take Bubba up to my office and call J. to come get us (he has the car so he could go to the library, remember). I wait 15 minutes or so then go down to meet J., who is wandering around looking for us at the daycare (he can't call me because he hasn't gotten a new cell phone yet...another bone of contention since he hasn't had one since September and it causes a lot of problems). We get in the car and talk about the incident. I am shaking, sick to my stomach, crying but trying to hide it from Bubba, in the midst of a full-blown panic attack. It's 4:15 p.m. on the day that J. is technically supposed to get off of work at 3:45 p.m.

"Please tell me you're not going back to work," I say to him.
"I have to. I didn't shut anything down or anything and I have stuff I have to do."
"But isn't this your early release day?" I ask.
"Well, it just didn't work out that way today."

Nevermind that I spent three hours of the morning with Bubba/doctor/pharmacy, and now I'm leaving an hour early due to the playground incident. Let's not let that infringe on J.'s day at all.

So we get home, J. finds the time to get Bubba settled before racing back to work for another hour. I take an anxiety pill and vent, rather crazily and panicked, to LilCherie while Bubba watches a movie. J. gets home at 5:45 p.m., 15 minutes before the pharmacy closes. I give him a blank check so he can run up and get Bubba's meds (and mine, which I also had refilled). You see, he couldn't pick them up on the way home because he has no fucking money, even though he never gave me one dime from his last paycheck.

He gets home and I go lay down. I only intended it to be for a couple minutes, but the pill conks me out. I wake up at 11:30 to Bubba coughing and throwing up in his bedroom. J. is in there trying to get Bubba calmed down enough to take a neb treatment. Did J. think to give Bubba a neb treatment before bedtime? Nope. Did J. take the new spacer out of the soapy water I'd put it in to let it dry so we could use it? Nope. Did J. wake me up before Bubba's bedtime to get the spacer and inhaler together and give it to Bubba? Nope. Bubba coughed and threw up for about 15 minutes before he could calm down enough to have the neb, then had to watch a movie for awhile to settle back down for bed. Meanwhile, I'm starving since I missed dinner, and because I am the only one who buys groceries, and I haven't gone for a few days, there's not a damn thing in the house to eat, so I go to the store at midnight and buy $140-worth of food.

And here I am now, sitting in the living room, listening to Bubba's terrible cough and stressing out about it. I haven't eaten anything yet because I'm going back and forth between nausea and hunger and it seems like so much of an effort and nothing sounds especially good.

I hate my life, oh my god I hate it so fucking much. I am trapped. I can't live like this and maintain my sanity. I can't check into a hospital because I can't leave Bubba in the care of my worthless husband. I can't kill myself because of the same reason. Fuck.

Don't feel like you have to comment. I know it's getting old.

What I Accomplished At Work Yesterday

2008-02-14T13:19:00.006-06:00

Scenes From a Chinese Restaurant

2008-02-13T20:23:00.003-06:00

Is that the name of a Billy Joel song?

Today I was eating lunch at a small family-run Chinese restaurant smack in the middle of our college town. I really like this place. The food is really good, you get a ton of food for $5, and the family obviously works really hard at what they do--the same six or so people are ALWAYS working. The lady at the register is one of those really cute old Asian ladies. She can barely speak English and she is so sweet. Anyway, during the lunch hour at this place, the line backs up to the door, but I'd gotten there late so it was pretty calm.

As I was eating my Shrimp With Broccoli Lunch Special, I became aware of a very annoying college-aged girl and her friend sitting behind me. She had one of those whiny, privileged voices. "I, like, just had to eat some, like, crackers before coming here because I was, like, so hungry," she droned. My Delta-Delta-Deltadar was immediately on high alert.

Suddenly, the nasalization was punctuated with a dramatic, "Oh my god!"
"What?" her heretofore mostly silent friend gasped.
"I am so done with this meal," she says. "Look. There's, like, a hair in my food."
"Oh my god," friend says.
"I am like, just so done with this food," she says. "Hello, I am like, so done with this."

A few minutes later I see her marching up to the front of the restaurant, one hand holding the hirsute meal as far from her body as possible, the other planted squarely on her hip. After flirting with some guy she knew who happened to be getting takeout, she confronted the old lady. "There's, like, a hair in my food," she says.

Old Lady bends over and looks, then looks more closely.
"Oh, so sorry," Old Lady says and takes the food away. "You want something else?"
"No, I can't eat anything now," she says.
"We give you a refund," Old Lady says. The girl doesn't even respond, just takes the money and turns around. As she marched victoriously back to her table, I, like, so wanted to, like, just ask her, like, which sorority she like, belonged to, only, like, in a really, like, bitchy voice.

She sat down and started telling her friend about how the old lady had dared offer a different meal and how she just was not going to eat anything for god-knows-how-long because of the hair. While I listened to this, I watched the young guys flipping vegetables over the hot woks, the young, frazzled-looking woman delivering the food to everyone in the restaurant, and the old lady, moving slowly behind the counter where she stood on her feet for hours at a time. I had flashes of what I imagined sorority girl's life to be like and compared it against what I imagined the restaurant family's life to be like.

And I, like, so hoped that the girl, like, tripped on like, a huge patch of ice on the sidewalk and like, totally ruined the nosejob that Daddy, like, totally funded for her 16th birthday along with her, like, totally sweet Uggs.

So that I remember

2008-02-12T16:01:00.001-06:00

I just got back from a great therapy appointment. We "went into my heart" and did kind of a meditation thing (it's called The Remembrance in Sufism) and I felt like things really balanced out for me. I feel expansive and hopeful again. I want to get some of this down so that it won't fade into oblivion. It felt like important stuff.

The amazing thing about all this is that my therapist guided me into my heart, but I came up with all this shit on my own! Is that mind-blowing or what?

On the Topic of Anger
Bubba and I are learning about anger together (some background--Bubba has had some outbursts lately like scratching a kid at school, hitting J., and generally just acting out his anger in inappropriate ways).

It is amazing and wonderful and more than a coincidence that Bubba's process of learning about anger is happening simultaneously with mine.

He is a guide to me in this process, leading me toward the lessons I need to learn. For instance...

...In trying to teach Bubba how to deal with anger in a healthy way, I realize that I don't know how to do it....

....Because I was never taught how to do it....

....Because my parents were never taught how to do it...

....And on and on.

And what I'm doing by recognizing it and at least trying to change it is something that probably hasn't been done in generations of my family.

And that is important and good.

And it will not be a flawless process.

And Bubba will learn something from watching that process.

Rather than be "scarred for life," maybe he will learn the importance of trying, the importance of being merciful with oneself when he makes mistakes, how much his mother loved him for working so hard to fix something so that he wouldn't have to carry all of it's brokenness with him forever.

And maybe he'll pass that down to his children, and the process can start to go in the opposite direction.

Bubba's comment last Friday was not just about my anger toward him when he frustrates me. It was about the anger I have toward J. but more about the anger I have toward myself, toward my "troll," toward my skewed vision that life is terrible. And that anger shows on my face, even when it's not directed at Bubba. And he notices it. That's a big lesson, and I am really, truly grateful for it right now.

On the Topic of Mercy and Compassion for Myself
What makes me feel best in this life is doing kind things for other people...

...and that is connected, in some way I have yet to explore, with my difficulty in doing anything kind for myself.

We brainstormed on some ways that I might be able to strengthen my "real" self, or what I simply call "the good voice." (It probably needs a better name since the "bad" voice is called the troll. Although my therapist helped me see that the troll isn't really bad, because it is bringing up the stuff I need to "clear." Anyway, if you have a good idea for a name for the good voice, let me know!) Here is what I came up with for some first steps in being more kind to myself.

1. When I do something nice for someone else, take a moment and let it reflect back on me, like a mirror. Let myself feel proud and good that I have eased someone else's life, no matter how small of an act it was. Let that good feeling seep into my heart for a little bit.

2. Write down some things that I love about myself on some notecards. Some ideas that come to mind are good things I've done for others, traits I admire about myself, creative ideas I've had, accomplishments, etc. I'll take other suggestions if you have them. Then, when the troll starts yelling in my ear, just take one out and read it. It can't hurt, and maybe it can help.

3. On the same note, write myself a love letter. (Perfect for Valentine's Day!)

4. When I do something kind for someone else, "match it" by doing something kind for myself. As I told my therapist, it doesn't necessarily have to be some huge involved thing like getting a massage because I opened the door for someone. It could be something like just allowing myself to feel good about it. Open for feedback here, too, on simple ways to be kind for myself (a list here would be a good tool for me). And I'll just put it out there that I don't like baths. But there must be other ways I can be kind to myself. I just normally don't spend a lot of time thinking about it so it seems a little foreign.

As I read this, the troll tells me that it sounds like I think I'm a real Mother Teresa here, a real Good Samaritan. The good voice is telling the troll that I don't think that, but that I do have a lot of compassion for (most of) my fellow women, men, children and other living beings, so why not build on that strength?

A better day today

2008-02-09T22:53:00.000-06:00

First I want to say thank you again for your comments and for reading.

It's hard to write an update about last night because I feel like I keep writing the same thing over and over again, the cycle just goes forward. J. and I talked, fought, then reconciled again almost out of exhaustion more than anything. I went to bed at 7:30 a.m. this morning and slept until 1:30 p.m.

Somewhere around 5 a.m. I saw some notes on the table that J. had written following our discussion about the house and the stuff that needs to get done, the money situation, all of that. The notes kind of touched me--they seemed to be reminders for himself. I'll write them here:

Note #1
-Recycling
-Clean out garage
-Organize and go through stuff in basement
-Clean out car
-Scrape ice

Note #2
1. Laundry
a. Haul to basement
b. Sort
c. Wash, dry and fold, deliver all clothes
d. Not enough for full load, use hamper

2. Trash
a. Empty all wastebaskets
b. Remove big bag to garage or receptacle

3. Dishes
a. Do all non-dishwasher dishes
b. Drain and put away
c. Load and wash when full
d. Load or leave when not full

4. Toys
a. Put away

5. Flat spots [this is in reference to trying to keep some of the flat surfaces in our home clutter-free]
a. Put clutter in its rightful place
b. Clean up your own mess

6. Vacuum
a. Living room, hallway and bedrooms

Note #3
Sell CDs
Sell movies
Sell books

I wrote my own note and put it on top of those telling him that the lists touched me and that the unprompted effort touched me. So that was last night.

Today has been a good day, actually. I woke up and went to LilCherie's to bring her son back to our house so she and her hubby could get a break. She had a tonsillectomy on Tuesday and her hubby's had a cold all week so I thought it would be a good thing to do.

Having both the kids here today was great! J. seemed to really enjoy playing with them and roughhousing with them. I felt like tonight J. and I were really working as a team, and it's been a long time since I felt like that. He was really helpful with the boys and good-natured about it. It is amazing how much mental energy it takes with two rowdy boys, though. Wow, I couldn't do it all the time. It isn't so much the actual caretaking, because LilCherie's son (she needs to come up with a nickname for him so I can use it here) is six and pretty self-sufficient. It's more of the loudness of the kids going nuts with the toys and also worrying that they are going to hurt themselves because they get so wound up. LilCherie's son is just hilarious, and of course Bubba thinks everything he does is just the greatest thing ever. LilCherie's son thinks Bubba's imitating him is rather annoying, but he's also totally sweet toward Bubba when he gets hurt or needs help. It's really like they are brothers.

I've thought a lot today about Bubba's comment last night. It's hard for me to figure out if his comment was fallout from the potty incident a couple weeks ago or if I'm really that crabby with him or if it's because I've been so depressed and angry at life and J. lately and I probably walk around the house looking angry. I guess it doesn't really matter--obviously Bubba's picking up on it and I so do not want that to happen. So I'm trying to look at his comment as a gift, although a difficult one to accept. I thought about it several times today when Bubba was trying my patience and it jolted me back to calmness. I also found myself putting a smile on my face more today than I normally do, which I think is probably good for everyone.

More of the same--Updated

2008-02-08T17:38:00.000-06:00

I called in sick to work again today.

I made an appointment with my psych for Monday to talk about how my depression is uncontrolled. That is the word that came to me today, and that is how I'm going to describe it to her. Uncontrolled. I feel like the antidepressant I'm on is doing nothing--but then, I don't know how bad it would be if I wasn't taking it, right?

I don't know how much is my mental illness and how much is my marriage.

I got the name of another marriage counselor from my therapist. I told her what we were looking for and she recommended this guy, and to be truthful, I was kind of glad it was a guy because I think that might work better for J. and hopefully he won't be so fucking sappy. I know I'm making assumptions here, but sometimes they're right. I gave J. the name and number and asked him to make the appointment since his schedule is always so busy.

I spent the day cleaning the house, which was a disaster even though J. had just had two days off (he went to a concert Wednesday night that was 2 hours away so apparently, that was worth two days off, even though he had to go back to work Tuesday night, leaving me alone with Bubba again, to finish up all the work he had to do). I packed up all his books, CDs, DVDs, and other crap that is always just stacked around the house in disarray and dumped it in a big box and set it on his bed. I know he'll be pissed, because I've disrupted his "organization" method...but my answer is going to be that if I have to clean the house, I'm cleaning it my way. If he doesn't like it, then he can find a place to put this crap so I don't have to look at it all the time. In an admittedly immature move, I also dumped all of his clean laundry into a basket without folding it and put it on his bed as well. I know that's petty, but it made me feel better at the time. Wow, not folding his laundry! What a bold move there! Jesus. I am pathetic.

I called J. and asked him to take Bubba out to dinner tonight because I don't want to deal with either of them. Really, I don't want to deal with anything.

I'm thinking about starting another blog just to bitch about my marriage, because I worry that people will just get really sick of reading about how my life sucks and I never do anything about it. Then I worry that if I did that, I wouldn't have anything to write here. What do you think? Is this getting just too fucking depressing to read?

Updated to add: Tonight when J. and Bubba got home, I did my best to be "okay" and volunteered to do Bubba's bedtime. Bubba and I were reading a book about emotions. We got to the "angry" page which shows a little cartoon face all red and angry, and Bubba said, "That look like you, mommy. I don't like that page." I lost it, I really lost it. I couldn't talk. I started shaking. I choked out the last two pages then told Bubba my tummy hurt a little bit so I was going to have his Daddy come in. I haven't gone to bed at all tonight; it's 5:30 a.m. I'm just shaken. I'm so disappointed in myself.

Today's Musings

2008-02-04T21:05:00.000-06:00

Today I learned that...
Two pieces of cheesy garlic bread are not enough.

I'm done fuckin' around with those generic, cheaper brands of frozen garlic bread. If it's not Pepperidge Farm Garlic Texas Toast® then it's not worth it.

It's not a good idea to broil your second set of cheesy garlic bread Texas Toasts on "hi" without watching them or setting a timer.

While you're fucked up.

And your husband is just about there in terms of getting the 3-year-old asleep.

When the smoke alarm goes off.

Things I Feel Compelled to Share With You Tonight
The thought of LilCherie, in the Grumpy Pants I made her for her birthday, standing in the snowy parking lot of the hospital this morning after finding out that her surgeon was snowed in in another city and would not be able to perform her tonsillectomy, kicking her car in anger, really makes me laugh. Now that she's accepted it, I mean. I really felt bad for her at the time. But I still wish her husband could have secretly videotaped it for me.

I read the Lunchables® post over at A Little Pregnant and it really pissed me off. But I was too much of a chickenshit to post a dissenting view, because Julie is blog royalty and I didn't figure it was really worth it. Of course now that I'm putting this on my own blog it's "out there." Oh, jeez, what are we supposed to do? It's already out there! Call the cops! It's already out there! (Random movie quote -- do you know which one it's from?) But I was excited to see that Patty from Monday Changed Everything stuck up for herself. If you read her blog you'll see that she has a good excuse. I just feed my child crap because I'm lazy and depressed.

I'm half-afraid that I'm dying of cancer because I haven't felt like eating much lately, I'm really tired, and I have several unaccounted for bruises on my upper thighs (and one on my forearm). Of course, the appetite and fatigue could be attributed to the depression, even though I'm usually a "fat depressive" (I just made that term up. Impressive, huh?). And I guess the bruises could be from beating my fists against my legs in hopeless frustration, right?

I found out tonight that when trying to disinfect a light green throw rug after a dollop of your child's almost-diarrheal poo drops on it, a bleach-based cleanser should not be your first choice. There is now a five-inch circle of my throw rug that's the same shade as Greg Brady's hair in the episode where he buys the hair tonic from Oliver. Or, baby-ate-carrots-shit orange. I couldn't have just thrown it in the washer because you know, I was just too lazy and depressed.

I'm reading a great book right now called "Mommies Who Drink," by Brett Paesel. When reading books like this, I momentarily think to myself, "I could write this well! I could be this funny! Why am I not a published, successful author?" Then I remember, oh yeah. I'm too lazy and depressed.

I'm thinking of changing the name of my blog to "Lazy and Depressed." Do you think that would pull in the readers or what? Sadly, I would be all about a blog named that. I should do a blog search...maybe it's already out there?

Today's Aha! Moment
I think I've come to a realization about how men--or at least J.--think, and why it causes a problem in relationships. I think he is mentally incapable of moving past the first most-likely outcome of an action or comment. Here are a couple examples, including the correct "Mom thought" as well:

J.'s first thought: Bubba is thirsty.
Most likely outcome: I'll give him some milk, then he won't be thirsty anymore.
Mom thought: But Bubba has to drink four ounces of juice laced with laxative so that he won't have a hard poop because is his holding his poops in and we are trying to get him to go without the hysterical drama and causing Mommy to have to take one of her anxiety pills. So, I'll give him the laxa-juice now and then milk later.

J.'s first thought: I want to make Bubba laugh, so I'll put some Toobers and Zots® (I'm lovin' that symbol tonight, by the way) up my nose and pretend they are boogers.
Most likely outcome: Bubba will laugh. Job done!
Mom thought: Bubba will think it's great, then put them up his nose, and then put other things up his nose, and then we'll be in the emergency room at 3 a.m. while some poor staff physician fishes pus-covered gravel from our child's infected nose. So maybe we'd better not model putting stuff up our noses as appropriate behavior for our 3-year-old.

J.'s first thought: It's time for Bubba to go to bed, so I'm putting him to bed.
Most likely outcome: Bubba will go to bed.
Mom thought: It's time for Bubba to go to bed, so we better get him his allergy medicine because if he doesn't get it he will be stuffy and he already has a cough; fill and turn on the humidifier because of the aforementioned cough; see if he has to go potty one more time so that he doesn't wet the bed; and bring in a glass of water and the toothpaste so we can brush his teeth.

I think you get what I mean here.

And now I guess it's also perfectly clear why, when I was having a spiral last week and told J. I felt like I was turning into my mother--the ultimate killjoy-- J.'s. answer was a sobering, "Yep."

It is what it is

2008-02-04T10:32:00.001-06:00

Thank you so much to everyone who replied to my last post. I tried having "the talk" with J. on Saturday morning before he went to work. He started the conversation with an apology for the night before, which I accepted. I talked to him really calmly and told him I thought we needed to really figure out how to end our marriage, and explained how I hoped we could do it amicably and all that. He was a little more pissed off than I was at first but then just seemed sad. We were on the same page initially, that divorce is the next step. After a little bit of talking I kind of caved and suggested "one more time" of counseling, with the caveats that we find a new counselor who is a little less "touchy-feely" than the one we have now and that we focus on our situation NOW, not our past history/traumas/childhood scars etc. We need someone who can help us relate to each other and communicate, now. I don't know why I suggested it. I think I got scared.

I say I "kind of" caved about the counseling because deep down, I really don't think this will work. We've been down this road so many times. But I think it might be beneficial for a couple of reasons--first, we will be able to say we "tried everything" to make it work, and second, it gives J. another heads-up on where things are going.

Emotionally, I think we have pretty much made the separation. We have slept in separate bedrooms for...god, I can't even remember now, a couple years? It started out because I couldn't stand how much crap J. always threw all over the room and I told him that until he cleaned it up and kept it clean that I was going to sleep in the "guest room." He never did, and it's "Mommy's room" now. I think we've had sex once or twice in the last 8 months. If I'm playing with Bubba, he's smoking or playing his video games; if he's playing with Bubba, I'm smoking or on the phone with my friends or doing something else...it's like we're already taking shifts, you know? Like coworkers.

I do have my own bank account, but your comments made me think of a few things that I should get in order, for instance, getting my own lock box and moving my stuff out of our shared one. Basically, I'm going to start working on my plan while still going to marriage counseling. That might sound stupid or counterproductive or whatever. I mean, it would be great if marriage counseling would really turn things around and make our marriage work, and I'm open to that possibility...but not expecting it.

I also feel like I have to say here that I know I have my own issues and behaviors that have a negative effect on our relationship. But because this is my blog, you will probably only hear about what a jerk J. is. I guess I just need you all to know that I am aware that it's not entirely his fault. But most of it is (sort of joking there).

I hate that this is happening now, after we finally had a child. But it is what it is. Thanks for reading and for your support.

I need advice on ending my marriage

2008-02-01T19:44:00.001-06:00

I am becoming more and more certain that I need to end this marriage. J. blew up at me tonight for a stupid reason and his anger far surpassed what would be appropriate for the situation. I don't know how to get out, or where to start. My financial situation sucks, so in an ideal world I would like to figure as much out as possible with J. in an amicable sort of way before involving lawyers, but I don't think J. will be very much on board with that. I would love to just pack up and leave, but I can't do that because of Bubba and how it would jeopardize custody issues. I would love for J. to pack up and leave but he won't because he can't afford it and because I'm sure he feels entitled to stay here.

What do I do? Where do I start? How do I get this going so that we can end this pathetic, miserable existence?

A big long nasty stinky dump about my husband

2008-01-31T23:56:00.000-06:00

My husband isn't a terrible person. He has some really good traits--a great, dark sense of humor; a real ability to connect with people, albeit on a shallow/surface level; a sense of loyalty to his job (which isn't so great when they treat him like shit, which they usually do, but still, the trait itself is admirable). He used to be pretty carefree and easygoing when he was younger.

I start my post with that because pretty much the rest of it is going to be a confession of all the things I think and share with my closest friends but don't really admit to anyone otherwise, and I think these things are part of the reason why our marriage is so....broken and cold.

I have lost respect for him.

The word that comes to mind, as cruel as it is, is "loser."

There were hints very early on. He didn't make great grades in high school, and just barely missed being accepted to the state university, so he went to community college for two years, got his A.A. degree, and transferred to the university where I was. There, he basically flunked out of school because his parents were stressing him out all the time by not coming through with the financial support they had promised and, well, because he skipped classes and if the class wasn't interesting he just didn't study.

As I prepared to graduate from college, we were in my dorm room discussing what we were going to do afterward. I suggested we move in together. He was agreeable to that. Then I said, "Well, we could just get married," and he said, "Okay." "Really?" I asked. "Sure," he answered. That was my "proposal."

He bought me a $300 one-fifth carat solitaire diamond ring. He saved his wages from his job at the dorm's foodservice for weeks to buy it. At the time I thought it was so romantic and sweet. Now it just seems kind of pathetic.

We spent the first year of our marriage dirt poor, getting help from my parents to pay the rent and buy groceries. He worked at Hardees, I worked at Jack's Discount Store, unable to figure out just what I was going to do with the English/journalism degree I had since I had recently discovered that I hated newspaper work. After a year of poverty, I got my ass in gear, bit the bullet and got a job at a small-town newspaper. The salary was a pittance, but so was the cost of living, so we made it okay. He got a job at the lumberyard, and later at another Hardees, in management this time. We moved around several times due to my "career," and he always followed me in good spirits, working wherever he could find a job: a fireplace factory, a window factory, a discount store warehouse, a music store. Finally, after I got a good job in a town we loved, we decided we were "settling down." I saw an ad for a bank teller; he applied and got the job, and worked his way up a few notches to the position he's in now. He still gets paid about $13,000 less per year than I do, and I don't make all that much.

He works his ass off for this place because he always thinks it's going to pay off in some big promotion. It never does, and yet he works late several times a week, signs up for bank-sponsored charity events on his time off, works on the afternoon that he's supposed to have off every week, goes in on his Saturdays off to "back up the tapes," whatever that means. He does all this extra stuff for this place even though on his salary, he can't afford to pay his share of the bills. And then he complains to me that I get more time to myself than he does. Yeah, because I don't WORK FOR FREE for five to 10 hours a week.

So....he basically gives me whatever he feels like when he gets paid, which lately is enough to pay the house payment and that's it. That means that I have to spend my entire check on bills, groceries, the car payment, etc. If he was paying his 43.5 percent of the bills (we figured it out when I got my own account), I should have an extra $600 a month for myself. As it is now, I am charging groceries at the end of the month because I'm short. And none of the "extra" bills--like doctor, dentist, etc.--are getting paid at all. I bought every single Christmas present for my entire family, our son, his nephew by his sister who I've been estranged from since his parents died, and the one we buy in remembrance of Hope every year (he didn't even go with me to do that--Tingle did, which was nice but still). We'd agreed that his present would be a used electric guitar he wanted, so I let him spend $150 on that instead of giving it to me for bills, and then I felt like he should have something to open on Christmas, so I got him some books on learning to play guitar, a trivia book, and an iTunes gift card. I didn't even get a token Christmas present, which still burns me. And he has picked up the guitar exactly twice.

This week, I asked if he could pick up a prescription for me, since there was an actual blizzard warning in effect and it was zero degrees out and I had Bubba by myself since I had taken him to the doctor for a cough so I didn't really want to drag him out into the storm again. J. hemmed and hawed and asked me how much it was going to cost. I didn't know if it would be a $10 or $25 copay. "Is that an issue for you?" I asked. "Well, yeah," he says. Fine. I dragged Bubba out to get it.

(This part is embarrassing because it shows you how much I've been smoking lately, but...as my blog says, OH WELL.) The next day he asks if he can bum some smokes from me because he "doesn't have time" to get a pack before work. "Fine, just buy me a pack after work to replace it," I say. He says he will but he doesn't, so the next morning I ask him to do it on the way to work. He does. The following day I tell him I'm going to the gas station to buy some more and he says, "I wouldn't be against it if you bought me a pack too." I did it, but it just infuriated me. I pay for fucking EVERYTHING, and I'm sick of it. I came home and went to bed at 6 p.m. because I was so fucking depressed about it all.

J. and I have been together for 21 years now, married for 14. I have a long list of resentments that play over and over in my head, things he's said or done that are just too hurtful to forget.

The time he said he was "afraid of catching something" by having sex with me when I was dealing with the vulva stuff. Like I would ever have sex with him if things were not okay down there...and like I didn't already feel like a disgusting freak for having an abscess on my fucking vulva. Gee, thanks for the confidence boost there, J.! Frankly, I think that was an excuse anyway because his mouth hasn't gone lower than my bellybutton since before we were married.

The time we went to do karaoke with our friends Tingle and her husband, and, as usual, we were going through a hard time, and I got up on the stage and sang the Eagles' "Best of My Love" to him and he never looked up from his videogame.

The time after we had Bubba and I was going through horrible postpartum depression and he said "After the way you grieved for Hope, I thought you would be a better mother than this."

The time last year when I was wearing a new sundress, all white and frilly and showing a little skin, and I was feeling a little sexy and pretty, and he asked me if I was going to "change into something a little more appropriate" before we went out to eat.

The time he really pressured me to go to a "Family Fun Day" bank function a month after losing Hope. I practically begged not to go because I knew it would be excruciating. He got mad at me so I went, and saw about 8 million pregnant women milling about amongst the other 8 million happy families with small children, and ended up sobbing outside of a football stadium for 15 minutes before he came looking for me and took me home.

The time last fall when I wrote and sent him a love letter and he just never got around to reading it, and even said that he didn't consider it a gift because "it wasn't like it was wrapped up with a bow on it or anything."

And then there are all the disappointments. All the things he'll say he'll do but doesn't.

My 71-year-old father on a ladder, cleaning out our gutters, because J. never did it, or mowing our lawn because J. didn't do it, or taking back our recycling because J. didn't do it.

Christmas three years ago (I think, can't quite remember which year) when he presented me with a small, nicely-wrapped package "from Bubba" for Christmas...which turned out to be a box of drugstore chocolates that he had obviously bought that morning when nothing else was open. Or how about my Mother's Day gift, that infamous air popper? One more about gifts (and really, I'm not a materialistic person at all, people who know me in real life will attest to that). J. always bemoaned my small diamond even though I was always gracious about it and never even had an issue with it. "Just buy me something good for our 10th anniversary," I told him. This was during our 5th or 6th year of marriage. I said, half-joking, half-serious, "I'm telling you now, I want something good for our 10th anniversary, so start saving or putting something on layaway." We ended up spending our 10th anniversary in the hospital after having Bubba....and no anniversary gift (or even some "thanks for pushing my son out of your vagina" flowers) materialized. Ever.

All the times he's picked me up late from work, often when I'm waiting with Bubba, so I have to kill 30, 45 minutes in an empty building with an impatient toddler.

All the times he's fallen asleep in the emergency room when I was shaking with fear about whatever it was that I was in there for.

How he refuses to keep the car, which basically only he uses, in any kind of order, so that means that when I do have it, I have to lift my 37-pound son over a huge pile of crap in order to get him into his carseat in the middle of the backseat. I can really barely do it, but Bubba can't walk over the foot-deep pile of crap on the floor, so I have to. Oh, and he rarely fills it up with gas either--another thing I not only have to pay for, but have to do during -5 degree weather.

I came home tonight and made dinner for Bubba while J. fiddled with the VCR trying to get it functional to tape "Lost." (We've only had the VCR --which I bought him when the old one died--for about three months now, but he never got around to figuring out how to use it until roughly 45 minutes before the show). Then I gave Bubba a bath, and then I put Bubba to sleep--twice, because the first time, he was just about there when J. popped his head in the door to tell me he was taking my niece home, waking him up completely so I had to start all over again. Um, hello, ever hear of WRITING A NOTE? Jesus. So later on, after Bubba was in bed, I came out into the living room and just sat there with my cup of coffee. No TV on, no book, nothing. Just sat there in silence. J. came in from having a smoke and sat down and started reading his book. Never said one thing to me, even though I've told him so many times lately that it bothers me that we never have time to talk and that I have a lot of mental shit going on that I want to talk about but there isn't ever time. After half an hour I asked if he was ignoring me on purpose. "I just figured you were grumpy so I was giving you some space," he said. Another short silence before I just said, "I'm miserable." "Why?" he asked. And the thought of trying to even explain it to him for the millionth time overwhelmed me. "I just am," I said. And then J. went downstairs to wash his work clothes for tomorrow, and that was the end of the discussion.

My therapist would probably advise me at this point to write another post, listing all of J.'s good qualities, all the ways he hasn't disappointed me. Fuck it. He's always been better at disappointing me than loving me. I suspect J. is only putting off the inevitable divorce because he feels he can't afford it on his own (in fact, when we last discussed divorce, he said "I don't think either one of us can afford to live by ourselves." Well, newsflash, I can make it work and if I can't, I have a family who will help. He doesn't.)

All I've ever wanted is love. I never knew it would be so fucking hard to have it.

Still crazy after all these years

2008-01-30T13:28:00.001-06:00

Like many people, when I think of therapy, I generally think of dredging up the old shit that's dragging me down, exploring it, airing it out, coming to peace with it, and then moving on to the next piece of shit. My therapist, however, believes that it is better to just dump the old shit without giving it any more energy. Just jettison it, wipe the slate clean, and move forward. My therapist counsels from a Sufi perspective. Generally, I like this and it speaks to me more than any other therapy model has--but this idea of just getting rid of the shit without digging into it is hard for me to figure out.

I have a natural urge to really get in there, but only when the time is right. Which is why I've been putting off delving into some of the more traumatic stuff in my life--because I never feel like the time is right. On one hand, I think maybe my therapist is right--what will reliving it do? On the other hand, I feel like until it is dealt with in some way, it just sits inside of me, stewing around, and bubbling up in other ways that seem totally unrelated but aren't, and the only way to rid myself of it is to get it out there.

My emotional memory is caught in limbo. I am afraid of going back into the darkness, but I can't seem to find the light either. There's some kind of comfort in the idea of telling other people your story. Maybe I long for the sympathy; I have been known to enjoy my share of that. I think what bothers me the most about my hidden pain is that it is hidden. It bothers me, somehow, that people can't look at me and know what I have been through. I mean Hope, of course, but also the depression, the vulva issues, the other surgeries, the way it's scarred me inside, the way it's affected everything. I don't especially want special treatment--I just want people to know, for some reason. Maybe it's because I feel like so many health care professionals denied my pain, both physical and emotional, at different points in my medical past. Maybe it's because of society's emphasis on "getting over it" and "moving on," or even society's preoccupation with "being happy" (and the associated pressure that goes along with that). Maybe I resent the fact that people think I'm "fine" now, or count me among the "normal" people, when inside I still identify myself as someone who is broken in many ways.

The next logical thought is the old, "Maybe I enjoy being a victim." But I don't think that's a fair statement (feel free to weigh in here). I think maybe I just want recognition or acknowledgment (in what way, I don't know) for what I've gone through, and that doesn't come very often in this world, and especially not years after the fact.

It's odd because after Hope died, I tried so hard to just fit in with the world around me even though I felt so alien...and now, sometimes, I wish there was some kind of special mark that just arises on your cheek or something after you've been through the loss of a child. Like a medal of honor, of survival. A lot of us would have that mark, and that in itself would be comforting in a way. Terribly sad, yes, but comforting. To know that we are not so unusual.

Maybe that's what my problem is--that I still feel like a freak after five years, and I'm sick of the shame of it, the way I always have to think about it when someone asks how many kids I have, the way my heart beats a little bit faster whenever I know I am going to mention her name and the way my stomach drops in self-disappointment when I decide not to, the way I use her memory to punish people who seem to have forgotten. I shame myself by going around and around with her memory, telling myself that tomorrow will be the day when I really try to start talking to Bubba about his sister but knowing that I won't because it's just too hard to explain and then realizing that he is growing up not having a clue about her.

My god, it will five years this June since I lost my daughter. Five years. Having her and losing her was the defining moment of my life, even more so than having my son. I don't know what that means about me, or whether it's good or bad, but it just is.

Attention Pioneer Girl!!!

2008-01-27T02:28:00.000-06:00

Hey...
I saw your note over on LilCherie's blog...don't know when you left it, but it gave me the idea to leave a note for you here. I'm kind of afraid to call you because I don't want to cause any more problems. So call me, text me, email me, and let me know how you are doing! I'm thinking of you.
Love,
Me

The Vulvar Underground

2008-01-23T22:02:00.000-06:00

Okay, I've teased you long enough, and the payoff probably isn't going to be so great. But I have a few things to say about vulvas, so here goes.

If you are a devoted reader of my blog, you may remember this post, where I posted my sorry list of ailments over the years, most of them down under. Other than the loss of my daughter, by far the worst, most psychologically damaging health issue I've had is the "periclitoral abscess." Yep, an abscess right next to my clitoris. This ailment, which arose for no apparent reason, introduced me to the mysterious world of the vulva, a world with all sorts of different parts, all with their own Latin names. I could (and maybe will, for therapeutic purposes) write entire posts about the multiple traumas that went along with the abscess, many at the hands of medical "professionals." But the purpose of this post is different, and that is, to talk about the general shame involved in vulvar disorders and, indeed, in just saying the word "vulva."

For years, I had to see a doctor regularly for this issue, which wasn't so bad because he was actually a vulvo-vaginal specialist, and he was in his 60s, so one knew that he was pretty unflappable, so to speak. He also had fingers like tree trunks, but that's beside the point. During this time I would also have to go see general practitioners for the regular stuff, and was battling infertility so I was also seeing a rotating crop of four REs. Since I was either on medication or having surgery or both for the vulvar abscess, I would have to tell them about it, and the word "vulva" seemed to stick in my throat every time (that sounds kinda dirty, doesn't it?) Moreover, it also seemed to kind of embarrass even the regular doctors. Is it just me, or do people have trouble with the word "vulva"?

During the worst of it, I was googling for whatever information I could find on this, partly for knowledge and partly because I just wanted to know that I wasn't the only freak out there who was dealing with this. I didn't find much about women with my particular issue, but I did end up reading several sites that dealt with women's personal experiences with vulvar cancer. One night, as I was reading about the shame so many other women had about this particular kind of cancer, I just became incredibly angry that we feel so embarrassed and alone whenever anything is wrong with this part of our bodies. I am angry that just saying the word "vulva" makes most women giggle with embarrassment or look completely mortified. I'm angry that this part of our body is not given the respect it deserves.

There are, in fact, women who don't even really know what the vulva is. To be clear, it is the mons pubis (the soft, cushiony part where your pubic hair starts), the labia majora (outer lips), labia minora (inner lips), the clitoris, and the opening to the vagina. Here's a good link with a diagram and also instructions on how to do a self-exam for cancer.

It irritates me to no end when I hear people refer to this part of the body as "the vagina." The vagina is completely separate and different from the vulva, but I think people are just more comfortable saying the word "vagina." The vulva is not the vagina's ugly stepsister--it is a world unto its own! It's not right to reduce our sex organs to the just the part that gives men the most pleasure. Especially when the organ that generally gives us the most pleasure doesn't even have a uniform pronunciation.

It seems that for some reason, referring to the vulva is difficult for women (and men). When it comes to sex, that can cause all kinds of problems, from simple miscommunication to anorgasmia. When it comes to health, it can mean that women may not pay much attention to what's going on "down there" and/or postpone seeing a doctor if there is something wrong. And that can kill you!

Fifty years ago, breasts were treated in much the same way. It took some brave women like Betty Ford to "come out" about breast cancer and some purposeful advocacy to get to the point where breast cancer can be discussed openly (here's a good link on the history of breast cancer advocacy). Now, as we know, it's kind of America's sweetheart of cancer awareness (which involves a whole other set of complicated issues). I wish the same thing would happen for the poor old neglected vulva. Can you imagine a "Vulvar Cancer Awareness Month," complete with it's own little ribbon (what color? Red?) Or a famous woman coming out and saying "I have vulvar cancer, and I had my clitoris and labia removed to save my life?"Or seeing special reports on the six o'clock news featuring a little graphic of a woman feeling up her vulva for lumps (her hand strategically placed over her clitoris, of course)?

And let's not even get started on research efforts that might find other ways to cure vulvar cancer, treatments that could eliminate the horrific "standard of care" which is usually hacking off the clitoris, labia, and everything else in the area (although unfortunately, this is still the primary treatment for many cancers, including breast). I know that breast cancer is many times more common than vulvar cancer, but I still wish that women didn't feel ashamed of either one. I imagine that some men (by that I mean the ones who think about stuff other than Guitar Hero and sports and all the stupid shit men usually spend their time thinking about) feel similarly about the testicular cancer/penile cancer double standard...but I have to pick my battles and since I don't have testicles or a penis, the vulva issue takes top billing for me.

So that's how I feel about vulvas. I've never really known what to do with these thoughts, so writing this post felt really great. I know I'm not the person to take up the mantle of vulvar cancer rights, but in my own small ways I try to enlighten at least a few people here and there by sharing my story when it seems appropriate, by trying not to feel or seem embarrassed by saying the word or relating my medical history, and now, by writing this for you all. I'd love to hear what you have to say about it!

Happy Birthday LilCherie!

2008-01-20T12:07:00.000-06:00

Hey! It's your birthday! In approximately 2 hours and 7 minutes (can't tell I'm counting the minutes, huh?) I will be heading out to come to your birthday bash. I cannot wait!!!

So, you're 37 now, which means I have only six more months of being younger than you :-) Wow. 37! Remember when we were just 17 and thought we were so grown up? We were 17 TWENTY YEARS AGO!!!! I remember it like it was yesterday. So glad you're not still with Brent :-)

Hope you have a great birthday and a great 37th year. Thanks for sharing it all with me!

"You happy now Mommy?"

2008-01-18T08:40:00.000-06:00

Disclaimer: This is a long post bitching about being a mother. Which makes me feel guilty because I wanted him so bad and I'm a deadbabymama and had infertility and all that stuff. And guilty that some of the people reading this have suffered infertility and losses, some recent. So if you don't want to read the bitching, please, don't feel obligated. I understand.

Do ever get to work and think OH MY GOD because the last two hours you spent at home seemed like more work than the next 8 to 9 you are going to spend at work and then you know that the four hours after that will be more work than the two you just did?

Last night I came home and crashed at 6:30 p.m. The next time I awoke was at 3 a.m. when Bubba was having a hysterical meltdown because he wanted Daddy to sleep with him. Once again, we are trying to get Bubba to sleep in bed, by himself. J. actually started crying last night because it hurt him so much to say no. Eventually Bubba settled in on the floor in the hallway, and apparently later moved to the couch. Is this acceptable? I'm not sure where I should stand on that one so input is welcome!

This morning I woke up and took the morning shift because I knew J. had been up most of the night on the computer/dealing with Bubba. So from 6:30 to 8:15 a.m., I threw some clothes in the dryer, folded the laundry that J. has been working on all week but apparently just couldn't take it that extra mile and bring it upstairs while watching Bubba while he played with his Thomas toys in the basement.

Then I took a shower, got myself ready, dug through the clean laundry that was hidden in J.'s room to find Bubba's fresh jammies--one of only two pairs that really fit him--because today is jammie day at school. (Yesterday was blue day; we narrowly missed disaster because J. forgot and was about to dress him in a khaki theme before I figured it out. Next week I have to bring an orange-colored food to daycare for the coup de grâce of their colors week.) Then I fixed Bubba breakfast, put away the clothes I folded, fixed Bubba more breakfast because he was still hungry, and cleaned up the kitchen. Then lotioned and dressed Bubba, had the "we HAVE to go to school today, Bubba," argument while J. was getting ready, found him some Monster snacks for the car because apparently two waffles and three glasses of juice wasn't enough for him, got all suited up for the Arctic cold, and got in the car, where Bubba spent the next 20 minutes alternately arguing with us ("No it's NOT wintertime! No the sun ISN'T shining!") or telling us in detail the parts he really likes on Lilo & Stitch.

I'm sure this post is really boring, but I just had to get it out because my kid is driving me crazy. I think that's why I've been sleeping so much this week--I just can't take it! Yesterday I tried taking half an anxiety pill about half an hour before going home. I figured half a pill might keep me calm but conscious enough to function. I guess not.

Lately I just dread going home. Wednesday night (remember Wednesday? The day I posted about what a good mood I was in?) we got home and J. had to work late so it was Bubba and me. Because Bubba holds his poop in and it's a problem even with the Miralax he's on, I've been trying to get a habit going where every night, a few minutes after supper, he sits on the potty and just tries. Wednesday night he threw a huge, hysterical, kicking, screaming fit because he didn't want to do it. After I got him calmed down and on the pot (he didn't go), then he had another huge, hysterical, kicking, screaming fit because he didn't want to take a bath. Then he didn't want to get out of the tub. Then he fucked around while I was trying to get him in his jammies. Every fucking thing is a struggle. At that point I got the closest I've been to slapping him in a long time. I was kind of proud of myself because I didn't. Which is kind of pathetic. (One of the few things I can pride myself on in my parenthood "journey" is that I've never hit him.) He realized I was at the snapping point and started listening a little bit more, and then asks, "You happy Mommy?" I just could not bring myself to "get over it." I told him no, I wasn't happy. A few minutes later he says, "I'm listening now, you happy Mommy?" I barked back, "No! I'm still not happy!" Oh is he going to need therapy.

I feel like every time I start enjoying him, he enters a new phase that is totally and completely infuriating. I feel like I keep going back to that postpartum time when I couldn't stand being a mother. Then I wonder if I really did have postpartum depression or if it was just that I'm really not cut out for this parenthood thing. Then I feel really guilty because I finally got my living, healthy kid and this is how I feel.

Welcome to my hypomanic phase!

2008-01-15T15:27:00.000-06:00

Well, wasn't that nice of me? To dump a load of shit into the internet and then just disappear?

Why is pain so damn motivating?

Updates:
Bunghole: No pinworms. THANK THE FUCKING GODS. Just an itchy butt. Who knew it could be that simple?
Sinuses: No infection. Just "dry crusting" requiring more rinses and Vaseline. I'll take it.
Root canal: Part I completed, no big deal and tooth actually feels better than it did before.
Depression: Relief. Finally. I got my period yesterday and, like every month for the last year or so, I noticed a real lifting of the cloud a couple of days before that happened. Also, I'm finally up to my full dosage on Effexor, so maybe it's kicking in. I'm in a GOOD MOOD today. It's a miracle!
Marriage: Once again happily ensconced in the "let's work on making it better" phase. Three days and counting. I'm enjoying it while it lasts and doing my best to keep it going.

Things I need to do:
•Figure out if the days in which I hate my marriage/my job/my life/want to kill myself coincide pretty much exactly with my post-ovulation phase. Wouldn't it be a pisser to find out that I got divorced/quit my job/killed myself just because my PMS was out of control?

•Talk to psychiatrist about whether or not there's a limit on how many different kinds of depression and mood disorders I may be diagnosed with. Right now I'm confident about depression, trichotillomania, fairly confident about PMDD, and wondering about bipolar II.

•Write some fun posts about things like vulva awareness, weird crap LilCherie and I talk about at Girls' Night, guilty pleasures like TMZ.com (and the TMZ tv show that comes on at like 1:30 a.m.), maybe even ramp up Sex and the Silos again.

•Change my voicemail greeting on my cellphone. I like to do something unexpected and funny. Suggestions are welcome!

•Check into endometrial ablation. My GOD, the shit that's been coming out of my body for the last two days is simply disgusting. This morning after changing my tampon (the one I have to wear overnight for christ's sake so that I don't leak through the OVERNIGHT PAD) the bathroom looked like a scene from Carrie. Jesus. I mean, this morning I had to cover the obvious bloodstains with my hands while having my three-year-old fetch more toilet paper from the hall closet and while my husband fetched new underwear from the bedroom. Keeping my bodily fluids under control really shouldn't be a family project. Ya know what I'm sayin'?

Peace out, homies.

Sore throats and itchy bungholes

2008-01-04T13:22:00.000-06:00

I woke up today with a one-sided sore throat with white all over it and a sore ear on the same side. Mustered up the energy to go to the doctor; not strep, possibly virus, possibly draining sinuses (fucking sinuses!) She also checked my lungs which are still fucked up from whatever respiratory ailment I was fighting off before Christmas, so it's back on the inhaler for another MONTH, and back to the sinus rinses until I see my oto later this month.

The doc talked with me about possibly going to the University of We Know We Killed Your Kid But You Still Owe Us Money to have some sophisticated blood tests done for rare immune deficiencies because she is stumped by why I a) catch so many viruses, illnesses, etc., b) end up with so many secondary infections and c) have such a hard time getting over them even with treatment. (The obvious reason would be diabetes but I've been checked multiple times and don't have it...yet.) I'm considering it because I figure that just running some blood tests, especially since we're not investigating something that's immediately life-threatening, is possibly within the UofWKWKYKBYSTOUM's realm of competency. In the wake of my sore throat/sore ear/debilitating depression, I rescheduled my root canal, which was supposed to be this afternoon, to next week.

Why am I SO FUCKED UP?

In more health-related news, we are going to call Bubba's doctor today to find out what to do about his itchy bunghole. Dr. Google suggests pinworms, which gross me out so completely that the thought of "waiting and seeing" for the weekend makes me want to puke. I've had a longstanding phobia about any kind of parasitic bugs like lice and pinworms and the like, and thank Allah I have never had any of those...but I imagine that dealing with them will be just one more of the joys of motherhood that are to come my way. It isn't even the social stigma attached to these things, because I realize it's just a contagious bug like a virus or a bacterium--it's more the thought of a living, visible insect feeding off of our flesh...and the word "infestation" that goes along with it....eww, chills, yuck, eek! Thankfully, J. is handling this chore given my general malaise and depression. To give credit where it's due, I have to say J. has been very good the last couple of days, other than the housekeeping disaster yesterday morning. He came and gave me the car for my doctor's appointment then ran me back home so that I wouldn't have to deal with picking Bubba up from daycare, and is being pretty sympathetic during the 10 minutes or so every day that we have to talk to one another.

Finally, on the depression front--can't really tell what's depression and what's just general illness today. I feel like it may be lifting a little bit because I found myself interested in a couple of different things today: I was pleased that Obama won the democratic caucus here in Iowa even without J. and me; and I was intrigued by the latest Britney Spears spectacle. I can't help it, I feel sorry for her.

I'm also feeling a little more in the mood to write, which is nice. So, I will attempt to do the Mayfly meme that Melissa tagged me for. The goal is to sum up your year 2007 in 24 words to see what was constant, what really mattered, what the big stuff was. So here's my attempt:

Confusion. Considered divorce, still married; realized age three is better and worse than two; felt trapped, Girls' Nights (and my girls) kept me sane.

I think I'm supposed to tag someone else now, so how about Complicated Mama--don't know if she ever even comes here but I recently discovered her and I LOVE her writing; Nicole, who is a devoted commenter here and I really appreciate it; and Yodasmistress, who just visited here for the first time and whose blog I am interested in delving into more.

Still here.

2008-01-03T09:21:00.001-06:00

Thanks everyone for your comments on my last two posts. I really appreciate the support and the encouragement.

So I went to the psych yesterday (since we are a one-car family, I had to wait for J. to come pick me up. He was late!! Can you believe it? My appointment was at 11:45 and he got to our house at 11:43. That was helpful. If I would have been in a better mood, I would have laughed at the fact that all the way to the psych office, the song on the radio was "Love Isn't Always On Time.")
Anyway, she upped my dosage of Effexor. I'm not really sure this is going to be effective; the way she explained it is that at the dosage I was at (150 mg) it acts as a pure serotonin booster but at the higher dosage (225 mg) the norepinephrine part of it kicks in so it's almost like adding an additional medication. We'll see.

I also talked to her about the possibility of me having bipolar II, which I discovered recently in my obsessive googling. It's characterized by periods of deep depression alternating with periods of being in a really good mood but not quite mania, as well as the problem of antidepressants "pooping out" after a few months. I would put a link here but my computer has been infected, I think, with some kind of virus that hijacks my google searches so until I get that fixed googling is a pain in the ass. Anyway, it's a milder version of bipolar, and one of the big parts of it is that antidepressants don't really work for it--you have to use mood stabilizers instead. My doctor doesn't think I have that, but I'm not so sure. I didn't think I have the periods of really good mood, or hypomania, but when I talked to Tingle she thought I did. Anyway, my doctor said if we can't get things under control with the antidepressants then she can try adding in a mood stabilizer drug and see if it helps.

I didn't specifically talk to her about going to the hospital because I figured that she would be able to discern from my depressive symptoms whether or not I should go. I was completely honest with her. I was a little surprised, really, that my symptoms warranted nothing more than a few sample packs of Effexor and a "come back in two weeks." I mean, what warrants hospitalization? I told her how I was so depressed it was hard to move; that I was fantasizing about shooting myself in the basement (in the little-used bathroom down there, because I wondered how many days it would take J. to find me there); how I usually dismiss the suicide thought because of Bubba but that yesterday and the day before I was actually trying to talk myself into it by telling myself things like Bubba would be better off without having a psycho mother, etc. I admit I was a little disappointed that she didn't recommend the hospital. Is that sick? I guess I wanted some kind of break, to get out of this environment that seems to smother me, and to have my depression validated by something as serious as hospitalization so that my work wouldn't think I was just a fucking slacker.

So after my appointment yesterday I came home and went to bed. Sometime during the evening J. put Bubba in bed with me, thusly ensuring that I would be up every two hours or so every time Bubba cried, had a nightmare, needed to go potty or needed cream on his butt because he's had some itching issues from a large poop a few days ago. Meanwhile J. sat in the living room and played on the computer.

This morning I woke up when Bubba did, at 7 or so, and came out into a complete disaster of a house. Candy wrappers, movies all over the place, Bubba's toys strewn all over, dirty clothes on the floor, dirty dishes all over the kitchen. It really pissed me off that J. couldn't take 15 minutes to at least straighten things up a little bit. Sometimes I am amazed at what an asshole he is. Then I think I'm being a jerk because I should at least be grateful that he takes care of Bubba when I'm incapacitated for whatever reason. Then I think, well, Bubba's his kid too, and I manage to take care of him AND clean up the house, so why can't he?

So to update you on the sex issue, I woke J. up on Tuesday night and made him read my letter, which outlined in humiliating detail exactly what I was hoping for on Monday and why he hurt my feelings, etc. His response was that he was sorry, he "just wasn't on the same wavelength" as I was. That he just didn't "pick up on the vibe." When I said that maybe the bigger question is why he didn't think of it himself, he responded that our last six months or so of pretty much avoiding each other was still affecting his behavior. I told him I was dealing with the same stuff but still was managing to overcome it to try to make our relationship better. I can't really remember the last time he initiated sex. He said he's afraid of rejection. Ain't that a kick in the pants? Jesus.

So I'm home again today, but feeling a little bit better after my sleep marathon. I am hoping to go into work again tomorrow. I still feel tired, so I'll probably sleep some more. Tonight are the caucuses in Iowa and I really wanted to go and caucus for Barack, but I'm not sure I'm up for it. We'll see how it goes. I feel an obligation because even after this depression lifts, I'll still be living in this country, and I really want to have some influence on who will be running it.

Thanks again everyone for reading and commenting.

Has anyone ever gone to the hospital for depression? Updated

2008-01-02T08:53:00.000-06:00

I'm thinking about doing this today but I'm scared.

I called my psychiatrist and I'm meeting with her in an hour and a half and I'll discuss this with her then. Thanks to those who commented so quickly, it helped me make the call.

Fucking 2008

2008-01-01T21:48:00.000-06:00

My parents took Bubba for New Year's Eve so we could party with LilCherie and her hubby. We were to go pick him today at 6 p.m. and have dinner at parents'. We spent the night at LilCherie's and then had a whole day to spend as adults.

The day dawned bright and cold, finding me and in a pretty good mood with the thought of maybe, possibly having sex with my husband, since we could go home to an empty house and do it up, if we so chose. After a many-months-long dry spell because we couldn't stand each other, we finally did it a week and a half ago -- the culmination of us actually getting along for a few weeks.

I blatantly hinted to J. my plans for the day shortly after he woke up. He then spent the next hour and a half playing videogames in LilCherie's basement with her husband and son, even after I called down nicely to "remind" him that we needed to get going if we were to have any time to ourselves today.

I let it slide, and we got back to our house around 1:30. I took a shower, put on a little makeup, put in the diaphragm. So far, so good. Went into the bedroom with some old notes J. had written me in high school. They were sweet and loving and funny. I laughed out loud, calling out to J. (who was in the living room playing his trivia game on the computer) many times about how great they were and how he should come read some.

Now tell me this, friends--to me, it seems pretty obvious that no kid+fresh shower+earlier hints+wife calling out to you from the bedroom=sex. Is it just me, or is that pretty clear?

J. never came to the bedroom. He continued to play his trivia game. I packed up the notes, went out and had a smoke, came in barely holding back the tears then retreated to the bedroom. THIS is when J. chooses to get off his ass and come find me--when I am so humiliated and depressed that he is the last person I want to talk to. I try to pass it off with the "I'm just tired," excuse but it is unconvincing so I admitted I was depressed and told him I just wanted to be alone. He leaves me alone. I sob in bed for awhile. Come out to get a drink and take some leftover painkillers. I ask if J. can go get Bubba by himself so that I can be alone to spiral down into suicidal depression. He agrees. Painkillers cause coma and I fall asleep for three hours.

I wake up, write J. a long letter that he doesn't know about yet because there hasn't been a moment without Bubba around since he got back. Eat something. Start feeling a little calmer. J. and Bubba come home, Bubba's wired. J. lets me know that my parents seemed disappointed that I hadn't come for supper/the Bubba pick-up. I call my parents to apologize for my absence and to explain that it wasn't them, it was me and my depression, etc.

My dad decides to ignore the fact that I was calling to fucking apologize and tells me that I "owed" them at least a phone call to let them know I wasn't coming. He gives me a good old-fashioned guilt trip: about Mom slaving away in the kitchen all day, about how J. and I never seem to get any better and that it's causing HIM problems because he's so worried about us, about how unfair it is that he and Mom and everybody else has to deal with my emotional problems.

I pretty much went off on him. Told him I have an illness and yep, they have to fucking deal with it or not be around me because I have a fucking illness and it's not like I choose to be this way. That I'm not that shitty of a daughter. That reaming me out about not calling to tell them I wasn't going to be there is not "being supportive." That I can't solve my parent's marital problems and he can't solve mine and that's just the way it is. That the reason I couldn't "just make a phone call" in the midst of my emotional and psychological pain is that I was too busy fantasizing about going into our basement bathroom and putting a bullet in my head before I conked out in a drugged stupor from medication to try to calm myself down. When he started ragging on me about something else I said, "I learned from the best!" and hung up on him.

Then I cried, went to the store to get my son some popsicles and ice cream because he was incessantly asking for them, watched half of Shrek 3 while intermittently and surreptitiously wiping tears away from my face. The evening winds down and the bedtime battle with Bubba is beginning. "I wanna sleep in your bed," he whines, over and over again. What does my husband say?

"No, Bubba, you're going to go into your bedroom and Mommy's going to read you a story and then she'll lay with you until you fall asleep." Fuck me. The fucking LAST THING I CAN HANDLE IS FIGHTING WITH MY KID ABOUT GOING TO SLEEP, JESUS CHRIST, I'M TRYING TO FIGURE OUT IF I SHOULD GO TO THE GODDAMN ER AND GET ADMITTED TO A PSYCH WARD AND YOU WANT ME TO FUCKING PUT THE KID TO GODDAMN BED???? I tell him I can't handle it tonight. He sighs and trudges into the bedroom to do it. It seems I've failed once again.

I suck.

I'm Wearing My Grumpy Pants

2007-12-26T10:02:00.000-06:00

I am seriously grumpy today. I called in to work because I just couldn't face it. I'm counting on the assumption that if my absences become termination-worthy, someone will warn me and then I will have to start hauling my ass in even when I'm emotionally in the shitter.

I'm not sure exactly what it is. I think it's partly Christmas fallout. I woke up yesterday morning in good spirits, actually, and we had a fine present-opening with Bubba. with only a little bit of disappointment about the fact that my husband hadn't gotten me anything at all. I kind of expected it because he never has any money, but I figured maybe he could have found a little token something just so I'd have a present to open. It was a little bit sad when I gave J. the books I'd bought him, and the calendar with Bubba's picture and handprints that we'd made for him, and then Bubba said "Where's your present, Mommy?" and I had to say "I don't think I have one, honey." Sigh. J. said, "Mommy's going to get her present later. That's how it works sometimes." Yeah right. I don't even want the THING, whatever it is, I really just wanted to have something to open. Next year I'll buy myself a present to have under the tree, I guess.

Anyway, the plan was to do our little family Christmas and then head back to my parents' house (about an hour's drive) for the big family Christmas. There weren't any deadlines we had to meet, or so I thought--I just figured as long as we were back before noon things would be good. We all got cleaned up and loaded the car and dragged Bubba away from his V-Smile and were just about to get in the car at 10 a.m. when my sister called.

"Where are you?" was the first thing out of her mouth.
"Well, we're still at home," I said.
"Are you frickin' kidding me?" she says, and I didn't detect any kind of joking tone.
"Well, we had to do our Christmas here first," I said.
"Yeah, but Bubba gets up at 6 a.m. so you should have had plenty of time by now!" she says.
"Bubba didn't get up until 8:30," I reply. "We're just about ready to get in the car."
"Okay...well, Mom says the turkey will be done by noon. But don't speed to get here."

I got off the phone, and I felt like my Christmas mood had just been deflated like a popped balloon. I took my anxiety meds and we got in the car. About 15 minutes into the drive we realized we'd forgotten blankie and puppy, two critical items for both the drive there and back and for any hope of a nap for Bubba, so we had to go back, thus making us even later. We still got home by 11:15 because yes, we did speed--although J. does that regardless.

By the time we'd gotten there I was pretty mellowed out from my pill, and things went fairly well for most of the day, other than Bubba not taking a nap and his incessant neediness, which I feel bad complaining about but jesus, it's tiring. I was also a little disgruntled about how our family Christmas has devolved over the past several years to opening presents, eating, and then my husband and both my nieces playing video games all afternoon. I sat there yesterday wishing we could do something where we could actually connect as a family rather than just be stuck watching them play a game. Oh well!

At about 5 p.m. Bubba falls asleep so I have to wake him up so there will be a chance of him sleeping at night. I was cuddling with him on the couch and we were talking about "the sunshine song" that he likes me to sing to him. It's the "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine" song. I started singing it to him when he was a baby, only I could never make the "please don't take my sunshine away" part come out of my mouth because it always reminded me of Hope and how she had been taken away from me, so I changed the words to "and I know you'll never go away."

I said in passing to my mom and sister that I had changed the words and I sang my version to them. My sister, in one of her typically intense outbursts, says "Oh my God! When I said I would love for my children to live with me forever you were the one who told me I had to let them go and now this is what you're singing to your son!" Like I was some kind of hypocrite or something. I actually sat in silence for a moment wondering if I really wanted to drop the dead baby bomb and then decided fuck it, I'm telling her and I hope she feels bad about it. So I said, "I sing it that way because after Bubba was born it always reminded me of how one of my kids had already died and I didn't want another one to be taken from me." Then I got up and went to the other room, and was explaining the whole incident to J. when she came in and apologized and of course started crying. Her apology was genuine and I let it all go, but I really, really wish she would realize that she is very harsh sometimes and that the things she lets fly out of her mouth can really be hurtful. I don't suppose she will ever change, it's who she is...but in spite of all my therapy and drugs I just can't let it roll over me all the time.

So that incident got me sort of focused on Hope and remembering that first Christmas without her. I think of her every day, and especially on holidays, and in fact J. and I had gone to the cemetery earlier in the day to visit his parents' graves and we stopped by the baby section and I remembered Hope while looking at the stones of other little ones who were gone. So it wasn't like it was a shock or anything to be thinking of her, but usually I can remember her peacefully, and that incident with my sister got me thinking about the pain instead.

We headed back home about an hour later, and I sullenly sat in the car until I fell asleep, then grumpily hauled myself into the house and just went straight to bed, leaving J. to entertain Bubba who was oddly still awake. And I woke up today feeling pretty much the same way I did when I fell asleep. Now I am looking around my house at the post-Christmas disaster and dealing with mood where I just don't know what the hell I feel like doing because really, I just don't feel like doing anything, and yet I also don't feel like doing nothing.

God, it sucks being an emotional mess.

So that was Christmas. Thank god it's over! Hope you all had good ones, or if not, I hope you'll blog about the drama so that I can feel some cameraderie with you all!

'Twas the Night Before That Crazy Man Breaks Into Our House Leaving Loud Toys We Don't Need And That Bubba Will Cry Over When We Have to Go to NaNa's

2007-12-24T21:04:00.000-06:00

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house,
All the creatures were running from our child, the grouch.

The stockings were hung to be filled in the night,
While Bubba bawled at the table, refusing "just one bite."

Other children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While our precious son cried to "sleep in Dad's bed!"

And mamma with my Clonazepam and Daddy with his smokes,
Had just settled down for a long, calming toke,

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I rose heavily from the porch to see what was the matter.

Away to the window I stumbled and crashed,
Tore open the shutters and threw down my stash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen ice, sleet and snow,
Gave the lustre of mid-day to all the stuff down below that we haven't picked up yet from summer.

When, what to my extremely dry eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in couple of minutes that it must be St. Nick.
(Either that or it was pharmaceuticals fucking with me).

More rapid than a mother trying to get her puking son to a toilet his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;

"Now Dasher! Now Dancer! Now Prancer and Vixen!
On Comet! On Cupid! On Donder and Blitzen!

To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall!
Now dash away, dash away, dash away all!"

Like dry heaves from your child makes you grab him and fly,
St. Nicholas and his deer quickly took to the sky,

So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of more noisy, lead-ridden toys (and St. Nicholas too).

And then in a twinkling, I heard on the roof,
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.

Soon after, from the din, I heard my child rise,
Then I forced him to stay in bed so it "would be a surprise!"
As I finally got my kid asleep and unwound,
Through the open porch door St. Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot from all those richy houses that have fireplaces in their living rooms.

A bundle of toys he had flung in his sack,
That, hopefully we won't have to take back (because Nana already got it for our extremely spoiled son).

His eyes--how they twinkled! His dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!

His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
He was smiling, actually, like a real psycho.

The stump of the pipe he held in his teeth so tight,
Smelled familiar, then I knew how he flew so damn high.

He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
He must have had the munchies, 'cause he emptied my shelf.

He winked his right eye, and for awhile he zoned,
Then I knew for sure good old Santa was stoned.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings, then turned with a jerk,

And laying his finger aside of his nose,
He snorted some horse and then finally arose.

He staggered to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.

But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"Merry Christmas or whatever, and to all a mellow night!"

After he left, we finally rested our heads,
For about five minutes until Bubba started crying and climbed out of bed.

It was Christmas alright, there was nowhere to go,
Better wake up and face it. Ho ho fucking ho.

Merry Christmas!!!

No butts about it, it's her birthday!

2007-12-18T16:39:00.000-06:00

Hopefully she won't think I'm being cheeky, butt today is a special day--it is Best Friend Tingle's birthday!

Unfortunately, when I talked to her last night, she was in the throes of a bad stomach virus, vomiting, diarrhea, chills, the whole nine. I hope she feels better today!

Even though she never reads my blog anymore, I still wanted to publicly acknowledge the day of her birth. How happy I am that she is in the world, and how lucky I am to receive her gift of friendship.

Happy birthday, Tingle. I hope you get everything you wish for this year!

This moment is unveiling the divine

2007-12-18T16:27:00.000-06:00

I just got back from my therapy appointment. I came away with a few good things that I want to note for future reference.

I told her I've been in a rut lately where I feel like I slog through 8 hours of work and then gear up for another shift at home. I told her how I tend to dread doing some of the things that make up our evening routine, like playing with Gary, until they're actually underway and then I usually find myself having at least some fun.

She said, "So what you're telling me is that you get to go home after work, lie on your bed and listen to your son talk about love? Boy, that sounds terrible!" She helped me look at it as a way to unwind rather than something I have to do (even though I do have to do it, because if I didn't, the resulting tantrum would be so not worth it). Truthfully, though, it's my attitude more than anything else that makes it seem like a chore.

Another thing she said really made an impression on me. She said that when Bubba wants me to play with Gary, or "crash cars," or whatever, that he's inviting me into his world, and that as much as I can, I should accept those invitations so that when he's 30 and out on his own with his own family he will still be inviting me in (she's really good at saying things that I know I know as soon as she says them, but that I hadn't really brought up to the conscious level). This really made a lot of sense to me.

The final nugget, one that I think I'm going to post on the wall in my house, is something along the lines of "This moment is unveiling the divine." Translation for those who aren't all Sufi like my therapist: this moment, no matter how challenging--in fact, the more challenging, the more powerful it is--is an opportunity to stretch yourself to see how patient, how loving, how merciful you can be, either to yourself or to the person you are with.

My homework is to dance at least once before our next meeting in January, and to try to think of things that I think are fun, because I told her how I was trying to think of ways to make our time at home more fun and I came up with a big blank space that scared me so I stopped thinking about it.

My Life as a Trichotillomaniac

2007-12-15T22:14:00.000-06:00

So. I wanted to talk to you today about....trichotillomania, otherwise known as a "hair pulling disorder." I also want to give a shout out to Melissa, who bravely came out in the comments on my last post. Good for you!

I started pulling my hair in fifth grade. I remember the very first time I pulled out one of my own head hairs. I was in science class, and Mr. Hansen made everyone pull out a hair from their scalp and look at it under the microscope. I was fascinated by the root. It hurt, but not enough to prevent me from pulling out another one now and then to examine the root again. By the time I was in sixth grade, it had become a habit that I have lived with ever since. It didn't hurt anymore at all. I knew it was weird so I tried to hide it, but one day my mom found a huge pile of my long hair next to the chair where I used to sit and read. I told her what I was doing and she just told me to stop and seemed kind of disgusted, so after that I was more careful about cleaning up after myself.

I have always pulled from one primary location on my head, at the crown on my right side where I also have a cowlick. I also pull from the other side, but not as much. Throughout my school years, I don't remember it being so bad--I could do a comb-over and spray it with hairspray and it was pretty much undetectable. Now it's more noticeable, because along with adulthood has come more anxiety and thus, more pulling. I used to agonize over what I freak I was, try to stop, fail, and then feel even worse about myself. Now, I've kind of let myself go with it. Sometimes I still feel like a freak (like when I have to visit my stylist), but in general, I've kind of accepted it as part of who I am.

The only problem is that because I pull more, my bald spots are harder to hide. I now have long hair, so I'm able to pull it back into a barrette or put it up and hide the spot. I can never go out of the house with my hair down, because it would just be too apparent. Plus, because of the constant stress on those follicles, all the hair there is white.

So why do I do it? I tend to do it in two different situations: stressful ones, or times when I'm bored. I do it a lot at work. I do it a lot in the car when the drive is boring. There is a ritual to it: I feel for a hair that is particularly coarse, pull, examine it, and then usually chew on the root. I know, it's disgusting, but not that uncommon amongst those of us to have this disorder. It somehow relaxes me, even though there's still some residual shame that comes on after a big pulling binge.

You can read a lot about trichotillomania on the web. Some of the more interested tidbits to me are that the disorder is possibly related to Tourette's syndrome; some hypothesize that it's kind of an overexpression of normal self-grooming behaviors that our primate relatives engage in. There are also a couple of disorders related to trichotillomania including compulsive skin picking, which I also engage in, and obsessive compulsive disorder, one that I somehow escaped. While some think trichotillomania is or could be classified as OCD, right now it is labeled an "impulse control disorder." There's also a hereditary component, which I know is true in my case. My dad is a skin picker, and at my grandma's funeral I happened to catch one of my cousins pulling her hair out during the service.

The whole thing has given me a lot of angst in the past. The first person I ever really told was J., who probably knew already but still, reacted very supportively. Then I told LilCherie, and later on, Tingle. A few months ago my mother saw my bald spot and seemed completely shocked, even though I'd told her before that I do this. "What's this from?" she said sort of gaspy. "Mom, I told you--I pull my hair out," I said. I guess maybe she finally believes me!

By far the worst part of this disorder is--or I should say was--going to the hairdresser. They'd come across the bald spot and look troubled, then really examine it and say something like, "What's going on here?" or "What happened here?" I'd usually feign ignorance, like "I don't know, I just noticed it and I don't know how it happened." It was mortifying every time. I started seeing my current guy, Shawn, about 8 years ago. We were acquaintances already before he did my hair, so I felt a little more comfortable with him, but I gave him the same line or variations for several years. He is so cool, though, that I finally decided to just tell him. He didn't act like I was a freak at all. He asked me a few questions about it, like why I do it, but not maliciously. Then he just said "We all have our thing, you know?" Last week when I got my hair cut I came clean right away and told him I'd been pulling a lot, and he was totally cool. No big deal.

And this is going to sound minor but it does cause me a little bit of grief--I hate, hate, hate the saying "I was about ready to pull my hair out!" It's amazing how much people use this expression, which I'm sure I wouldn't notice if I didn't actually pull my hair out!

I have to say I feel much less stress about this part of my life since I've decided to be open about it with those who are close to me and my hair guy. It's easier to be myself when I don't have to worry about my bald spot showing. Nobody has acted like I'm a freak, which surprised me because I always felt like one. But really, is it that much different from chewing your lip or biting your fingernails, which people do all the time, openly?

I wish more people--hair stylists especially!--knew about this disorder and I wish it could be discussed more openly, because I think it's really sad that something that is such a minor quirk in the big scheme of things causes people so much angst and anxiety for years. It's so not worth it.

So, to all you closet pullers out there, my advice is: come out, accept yourself, and realize that it's just not that big of a deal. If you want to pull, pull, and don't beat yourself up about it. You're not a freak, you're not alone, and you're not crazy. It's okay. Like Shawn said, we all have our thing.

I'm happy to answer any questions you may have about my disorder. Thank you. Goodnight!

Notes From My Life

2007-12-11T10:09:00.000-06:00

Monday: During half-hour battle with 3-year-old son to get him to take Tylenol, he states with all the petulant, serious anger he has in his little body that the whole idea was "Tartar sauce!" (Toddler-friendly expletive courtesy of SpongeBob SquarePants).

Tuesday: Third ice storm of the month hits Iowa on the same day that Aunt Flo's Second Day Hemmorrhage floods my underpants. Bubba's still sick, so it's me and him, along with Manny, Sid and Diego (from Ice Age); Peter Pan, Wendy and "the Injuns" (have you watched this movie recently? Wow.); and SpongeBob, Patrick, Squidward and Gary for approximately 9 hours. Tree branch in backyard cracks just moments before my own sanity does same.

Wednesday: Morning with Bubba (still sick) and then on to the endodontist. LilCherie and I share the same endodontist who has a stunningly bad bedside manner but has the magic hands with the root canals. I am in his office for literally five minutes. He looks at the x-ray sent over by my dentist, puts an ice cube on my tooth, I say "Ow," and he says, "Yep, needs a root canal." For that, I am charged $60. If you break it down, he earned $12 for each minute I sat in his chair. I guess that's cheap compared to the approximately $40 per minute he gets for the actual root canal. Luckily the procedure can wait until after the first of the year, since I've already maxed out my dental coverage on this year's root canal/crown/pulp cap follies.

On my way back from that appointment, I stop at a convenience store for smokes. I am musing at the hillbilly who's ringing me up -- he's a hefty guy, with a lot of erratic facial hair and eyes that go in two different directions -- when suddenly one of his eyes seems to focus at something behind me and he says, "Hey. Ah laak that hat." I turn my head and there's an older guy behind me wearing a baseball cap emblazoned with a Confederate flag. "Yeah, me too," says the hat-wearer. "Ah'm a proud and true Tennessean!" Hillbilly cashier says, "Yep. Ah'm frum Kentucky." Luckily I get away before I overhear them talkin' 'bout the ole fashion lynchin' goin' on down at Redneck Corner at sundown! Christ!

Stay tuned for more excitement, as tonight I am going to my stylist for the first haircut I've had in about a year and a half or something like that. I've been putting it off because I have trichotillomania, and have been pulling a lot lately, leaving a couple of nasty bald spots on the top of my head. I've come clean with my guy, and he's really cool about it, but still...it's like having someone examining your freakitude.

What a trip.

Regrets That Haunt Me.

2007-12-08T05:16:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I read this story and it made me ask all those questions I periodically ask myself about Hope's birth and death, which are:

*What if I had ignored the doomsday scenario presented by my OB and just waited for nature to take its course? Maybe she would have hung out in there until at least 24 weeks. Bubba stayed put for a week even though I was 8 cm dilated and 100 percent effaced, and probably would have stayed in longer with the help of tocolytics but I refused them because of my feeling that he was better off outside of my body than in it at that point.

*What if I had DEMANDED tocolytics with Hope to stop my contractions and then just waited?

Both of these questions can be boiled down to one question: What if I hadn't given up? What I know now that I didn't know then is that doing something, anything, to try to save her, no matter how futile, would have at least assuaged the massive guilt I felt (feel) about her death. This is something my doctors didn't understand either, as they pushed me for a pitocin drip to just "get the inevitable over with." If I had done the two things mentioned above, I would at least have been able to say that I tried everything. As it is, I blindly followed my high-risk, cutting-edge university doctor's recommendations that I just give up. And just giving up is hard to live with after your baby dies.

For the most part, I live with these questions by reminding myself that I did the best I could at the time...but I'm still disappointed in myself, and stories like the one I linked to today bring it all back.

Next June it will be five years since I had Hope, and I know there are still parts of her life and death that are affecting me and that I haven't dealt with because I just don't want to feel the pain. Five years later, and holidays are still bittersweet because I think that I should have two kids decorating the Christmas tree. There hasn't been a Christmas yet when I don't think about that Christmas after she died, and the emptiness of her absence when she should have been there in her First Christmas outfit.

Five years on, and I still haven't addressed the massive anger I feel toward the medical people who were supposed to be caring for me and my baby. I know I need to delve into it and disassemble it in order to get it out of me, but I also know how much it will hurt and I just can't bring myself to go there. And that feels, in a way, like just another way I'm giving up on my daughter.

I know in my heart that I would never have chosen for things to turn out the way they did, and that if anyone else told me my own story I would hold them completely blameless and would shower them with compassion. It's just hard to do that for myself. Why is it so much easier to beat ourselves up than to support ourselves with love?

Here, for future reference in case the story I linked to comes down, is the story that prompted this entry.

It was to be the one and only cuddle Carolyn Isbister would have with her tiny, premature daughter.

Rachael had been born minutes before - weighing a mere 20oz - and had only minutes to live. Her heart was beating once every ten seconds and she was not breathing.
As doctors gave up, Miss Isbister lifted her baby out of her hospital blanket and placed her on her chest.

She said: "I didn't want her to die being cold. So I lifted her out of her blanket and put her against my skin to warm her up. Her feet were so cold.
"It was the only cuddle I was going to have with her, so I wanted to remember the moment." Then something remarkable happened. The warmth of her mother's skin kickstarted Rachael's heart into beating properly, which allowed her to take little breaths of her own.
Miss Isbister said: "We couldn't believe it - and neither could the doctors. She let out a tiny cry.

"The doctors came in and said there was still no hope - but I wasn't letting go of her. We had her blessed by the hospital chaplain, and waited for her to slip away.
"But she still hung on. And then amazingly the pink colour began to return to her cheeks.
"She literally was turning from grey to pink before our eyes, and she began to warm up too."
Four months later, Rachael was allowed home weighing 8lb - the same as a newborn baby - and she has a healthy appetite.
Miss Isbister, a 36-year- old chemist from West Lothian, said: "Rachael has been such a little fighter - it is a miracle that she is here at all. When she was born the doctors told us that she would die within 20 minutes. But that one precious cuddle saved her life. I'll never forget it."
Miss Isbister and her partner David Elliott, 35, an electronics engineer, were thrilled when she became pregnant.
At the 20-week scan at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, doctors told them she was carrying a girl and they decided to name her Rachael.
But at 24 weeks a womb infection led to premature labour.
Miss Isbister, who also has two children Samuel, 10, and Kirsten, eight, from a previous marriage, said: "We were terrified we were going to lose her. I had suffered three miscarriages before, so we didn't think there was much hope." When Rachael was born she was grey and lifeless.

"The doctor just took one look at her and said no," said Miss Isbister.
"They didn't even try to help her with her breathing as they said it would just prolong her dying. Everyone just gave up on her."
Ian Laing, a consultant neonatologist at the hospital, said: "All the signs were that the little one was not going to make it and we took the decision to let mum have a cuddle as it was all we could do.
"Two hours later the wee thing was crying. This is indeed a miracle baby and I have seen nothing like it in my 27 years of practice. I have not the slightest doubt that mother's love saved her daughter."
Rachael was moved on to a ventilator where she continued to make steady progress.
Miss Isbister said: "The doctors said that she had proved she was a fighter and that she now deserved some intensive care as there was some hope.
"She had done it all on her own - without any medical intervention or drugs.
"She had clung on to life - and it was all because of that cuddle. It had warmed up her body enough for her to start fighting." Because Rachel had suffered from a lack of oxygen doctors said there was a high risk of damage to her brain. But a scan showed no evidence of any problems.
As the days passed, Rachael began to gain in strength and put on weight. She had laser treatment to save her sight because the blood vessels had not had a chance to develop properly in the womb. And she also had six blood transfusions.

"We couldn't believe that she was doing so well," her mother said.
"Her heart rate and breathing would suddenly sometimes drop without warning, but she just got stronger and stronger."
After five weeks she was taken off a ventilator and Miss Isbister was able to breastfeed her.
Then, after four months, the couple were allowed to take her home - a day they thought they would never see.
Miss Isbister said: "She is doing so well. When we finally brought her home, the doctors told us that she was a remarkable little girl.
"And most of all, she just loves her cuddles. She will sleep for hours, just curled into my chest.
"It was that first cuddle which saved her life - and I'm just so glad I trusted my instinct and picked her up when I did.
"Otherwise she wouldn't be here today."

Just a bunch of stuff

2007-12-06T14:06:00.001-06:00

Health Update
Monday I went to the doc for my weekly sinus check. A cyst in my left sinus had reformed, so he had to go in and anesthetize the area and pull off a "chunk" of the cyst so that hopefully, it won't close up again. I also have to be on Bactrim for another two weeks (for a total of four weeks) because I'm still showing signs of infection, although it is getting better. In general, I'm feeling a lot better but not 100 percent.

A Very Special Christmas
Last weekend I hosted our Third Annual Girls' Night Christmas Party. It was a blast. Tingle made it in from Cleveland, and LilCherie and Pioneer Girl braved a major ice storm to get to my house. It was awesome. It started out a bit rocky as I was feeling crappy with what might have been a cold or could have just been sinus stuff, but as the evening wore on I felt better and it was amazing. To give my husband credit where credit is due, he kindly took Bubba and himself to his sister's house that afternoon so we could have the house to ourselves. We exchanged funny gifts and all wore our tree skirts (Pioneer Girl made all of them, and Tingle got one this year). My friends are the best!

Winter + Iowa = Pain in the Ass
The weather in Iowa has been challenging. The ice storm last weekend left a sheet of ice on our driveway and sidewalk that we haven't cleared yet. It's been very cold, snowed a bit on Tuesday, and now is snowing again with an expected 3 to 5 inches tonight. Then Saturday we are supposed to get more snow or possibly ice, which really pisses me off because I'm supposed to go see Oprah and Obama! I am really psyched up for this, so I can't miss it. I may have to leave for LilCherie's house at 10:30 in the morning like she did to come down to my house last weekend.

Ich bin sehr müde
I am so tired. I feel like Bancini in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." Tired, tired, tired of everything. Tonight I have Bubba-duty and as much as I hate to admit it, I'm just not looking forward to it. Sometimes I can get myself kinda psyched up for my Bubba time and really enjoy myself, but other times, I feel like I'm leaving one job just to go to the next, and I know my day won't be over until I fall into a coma next to him as I put him to bed. The total lack of "me time" during a day puts me in a bad mood--I'm selfish that way. And it may happen again tomorrow night, as I've told J. to try to plan something fun for himself so that I won't have to feel too guilty about essentially spending the entire weekend at LilCherie's/seeing Oprah.

Lately Bubba has been very clingy and whiny, and his favorite activity is sitting on my bed and playing with the body pillow. It's "J" shaped and Bubba calls it Gary because he pretends it's Gary the Snail from SpongeBob. So we sit in there for half an hour or 45 minutes while Bubba pets Gary, makes me pet Gary, talks about how cute Gary is, hugs Gary, pretends to have Baby Garys in his hand, kisses Gary, etc. It's pretty cute--for the first five minutes, and after that it's honestly really boring. The only way I've found to spice it up is to have Gary ask Bubba about school, because Bubba will tell Gary more than he ever tells me or J. But even that only lasts for about three or four minutes before Bubba declares "That's enough talking."

Sometimes I feel like I am just Bubba's handmaiden. "Fetch me some milk, you lowly wench! Turn on the SpongeBob! Take off my socks! No, put them back on again, me feets has got the chill! I need to go to the potty throne! I want some more candy! I don't want to eat supper! I don't like to have lotion on! I don't want to go to bed! I want to read the only book in the house that you cannot find!" It's truly exhausting.

I really don't believe it when I hear stars say that they don't have nannies or cooks or anything like that. There's no way. If I were rich, I would totally employ a nanny, not to raise my kid or anything like that but to just do the scut work, like running back and forth to fill milk cups, changing the DVD at Bubba's whim, changing his clothes and doing The Lotioning and maybe giving a bath now and then. Hmmm. That pretty much covers most parenting duties, huh? (Aha Moment: Parenting IS scutwork!) I like to imagine that while the nanny is bustling about, Bubba and I are engaged in enriching play, because if I had a nanny I wouldn't be so damn tired. Maybe I'd just hire a maid and a cook so that I could redirect that energy to Bubba-related stuff. Or, maybe I'd be just as lazy but not have as good of an excuse!

I heard her complain, often and loudly

2007-11-19T20:01:00.000-06:00

Today I dragged myself into work by 9:20 a.m. At approximately 9:35 a.m. I blew my nose. A big chunk came out; nothing new there, at least not since surgery almost a month ago now. Then watery fluid came pouring out of my right nostril, down onto my desk and onto the floor. With visions of a ruptured sinus and cerebrospinal fluid leak, I called J. for a ride, called my otolaryngologist’s office and started crying when she told me they didn’t have any doctors in the office at that time (what the fuck?) In a semi-hysterical state on the way to the car, I said “Well, do I go to the emergency room or what, because I’m sick and I’m scared and I need someone to look at me so you tell me where to go.” She sent me to the ER since my oto was there anyway in surgery, and he could see me in between cases.

Alas, no cerebrospinal fluid leak—but a CT showed that the fucking infection I’ve been fighting since the week after surgery is still there. It is now apparently invisible to the naked eye, since my oto thought everything looked good on Friday and again today when he looked before the CT. So is it in my bones now or what? I have to ask on Wednesday when I go back for my next follow-up. I got an IV infusion of antibiotics and a prescription for yet another one to take over the next week.

In the last two months, I’ve been on Amoxicillin for an unrelated respiratory infection; Levaquin for the sinus infection that broke the camel’s back and sent me to surgery; Ancef during surgery; Cephalexin prophylactically for the week after surgery; Augmentin for a week for the post-surgical infection, which I finished last Thursday; Rocephin today in the IV, and now Bactrim. As well as methylprednisolone prescribed last Friday for inflammation. And hydrocodone for pain, which I’m trying to limit but did take again today. Strangely, I still haven’t really lost faith in my doctor. I feel like his actions and recommendations have been rational and appropriate given the symptoms I’ve been exhibiting—they just aren’t helping so far. So I’m sticking with him, for now anyway.

I spent most of the six hours we were at the ER in tears. I am so, so very tired. We had to reschedule our marriage counseling appointment this afternoon, and we needed it. J. did come through pretty well at the hospital today, a real sacrifice for him I know since missing work is about his number one pet peeve. I feel like I’m trying to save my sanity, my health and my marriage all at once, and failing at all to various degrees.

I’ve been ordered off work for the rest of the week, which is only three days because of Thanksgiving. I have to give credit where it’s due and report that my Mom and Dad happily and cheerfully took Bubba on Sunday to Monday to give us a break, and then today volunteered to keep him over another night, which they are. So all I have to do tonight is rest…and for once, I just can’t. I’m lonely, but J. had to go back to work for the remaining two hours of the day, and then volunteer for a reception his workplace was hosting for a local athletic team. He is picking me up dinner on the way home so I guess I shouldn’t complain, but I sort of wish he would have just stayed home. Even though we don’t talk anyway. So scratch that. I don’t know what I wanted. Just to feel better, I guess.

I struggle with blaming myself for my bad health, but you know, I'm so tired of it all that I'm not even going to do the blame game. It's pointless. As Best Friend Tingle would say, it is what it is. I'm sick a lot. I've always been like this. What sucks is that I don't really have the mental stamina to deal with it. I've specifically instructed my loved ones that if I died from some kind of painful disease they are to make it known that I complained every chance I got. I hate it when i read about how "She had XYZ Most Horrible Painful Disease in the World but she never once complained." I mean, let's be real, people. Being sick sucks. And I complain about it, a lot, in real life and--so lucky for you--here.

There are some good things in my life, too

2007-11-14T21:01:00.000-06:00

I’ve been struggling with the fear that I’m alienating my few readers by posting things that are so damn depressing. Then, I remembered what I wrote when I started blogging again about how I really just had to blog for myself, not for anyone else, so I’m getting over it. It’s hard to remember, sometimes, that it’s not really about whether or not people are reading it—it’s more important that I’m getting it out. That said, I do appreciate those of you who still stop by, and I want you to know I’m reading your blogs even if I’m not commenting. I’m working up to it, I promise.

I stayed home sick again today. Called the doctor, talked to his nurse, who told me to “try to get up and around a little bit more to get your strength back” and to take Excedrin Migraine for my headaches. They just don’t get it. I’ve had enough bad infections in my life to know that there’s something going on. The exhaustion I am feeling is beyond just normal recovery. It is time for what my boss calls a “come to Jesus” meeting with my doc on Friday when I have my appointment.

I do want to write something a little more upbeat tonight, if for no other reason than to make myself feel better. First, the highlight of my day was talking to LilCherie, who called me on her way home from therapy. Lately I have been struck by what a lifeline LilCherie is for me. She is like a part of my body and my soul. I can’t imagine life without her. We met each other in second grade, so that was like what, 30 years ago? We became “best friends” in sixth grade, 24 years ago or something like that, and except for a brief two-year stint in college when we were stupid, we’ve been sharing laughter, secrets and tears ever since.

How lucky I am, not only to have her friendship, but to be able to see her at least once a week on our Girls’ Nights. I bitch about J. a lot here, but I have to say that a lot of husbands wouldn’t be so accommodating of that, and I am grateful. He knows my time with LilCherie is sacred and life-giving to me.

If LilCherie was my only friend, I’d still feel rich and blessed. But I have another soulmate: Tingle. Remember that cruel bitch Fate I was talking about yesterday? Well, she also brought me Tingle, right when I needed her the most. Tingle understands me in ways that nobody else can. She and I are so alike it is frightening at times, difficult at times, but mostly, reassuring and comforting.

I hate it that she is all the way in Cleveland, but one of the joys of our friendship is that even if our almost-nightly phone conversations consist mostly of “I’m tired” and “Me too,” there is never that awkward space between us that can happen in long-distance relationships. She is coming to see us later this month, to participate in our annual Pre-Holiday Girls’ Night celebration, and I am so excited to see her. I appreciate so much her efforts to visit and I hope she feels the same way about me. After this visit, I hope that the entire Depressionista clan can head out there, maybe in January if we have decent weather.

J. and I had our second marriage counseling session yesterday. Most of the hour was spent with me crying about my postpartum depression after having Bubba, but it was good to get it out. I think J. and I have isolated that time as when things really started falling apart for us. Yes, we had problems before, but it seems like that is when the anger really came down on us: he was angry and confused about my inability to be the mother he thought I would be, and I was angry and confused by his seemingly uncaring attitude toward it all. It was like that was just the final straw that made us give up, in a way, and we haven’t really had time to do any repair work on it, so here we are.

I think we both feel a little more hopeful just having started counseling. It’s not like the therapist is really doing anything spectacular…it’s more that we are just finally devoting an hour each week to talking about “the issues.” I told J. that I’m not sure we really even need counseling, per se, but rather just the time to talk about the big stuff. He wisely said that while I may be right, unless we are paying for it and actually going somewhere where we have to focus on that stuff, we just won’t do it, so it is good we are going. I agree. I think there is hope.

Another thing I realized after talking yesterday about that time when Bubba was an infant is how far I have come with him. I am truly enjoying being his mother right now. Things that others might take for granted, like missing their kid during the day or looking forward to seeing him at night, are somewhat new to me, as sad as that is to say. He is fun! He has such an amazing imagination right now, and we spend lots of time playing with pretend bunnies and baby Garys (the snail from SpongeBob). The funniest things come out of his mouth: last night, I told him I was going to make dinner, so I went and got things started in the kitchen and came out to find him already sitting at his little table in the living room (we are up and down with the “eating as a family” thing). He said, “Get back out there, Mama.” I looked at him, puzzled by what he meant, so he say, “Get back out in the kitchen and cook, Mommy.” It just cracked me up. Anyway, I’m grateful that at last, this parenthood thing is fun, and even more glad that Bubba and me seem to have a really strong, loving relationship right now—something I was afraid would never happen.

There are many things I have to be grateful for. It's hard to see them sometimes through a fog of pain and depression, but they are there, and I'm trying to remember that.

Mediocrity

2007-11-13T09:20:00.000-06:00

My life is not that bad.

My marriage is not that bad. Just bad enough to make me feel miserable, but not so bad that there’s a definable reason to call it quits, like abuse or alcoholism or anything like that.

My job is not that bad. Just bad enough to make me feel like my soul is dead, but not so bad that I can afford to sacrifice the benefits, flexibility and decent pay.

My health is not that bad. Just bad enough to keep me in pain most of the time, just bad enough to keep me from enjoying almost anything, just bad enough to keep me struggling to get to work for at least six hours a day, but not bad enough to get disability or a leave of absence.

I am struggling. I can barely get to work in the morning. Each day I struggle with myself about whether or not I can justify calling in sick yet again. It’s a combination of feeling like shit with my sinus pain, and depression from being in pain all the time and hating my job and not being satisfied in my marriage. I have not been sleeping well at night, even though I feel exhausted all day, and I don’t know if that’s because of the depression or because I force myself to make it through the day without taking a pain pill because I don’t want to get addicted and then finally, at 6 or 7 p.m., with my headache and facial pain in full swing, I take one so that I can at least deal with my three-year-old, and then I feel decent for a few hours so I take advantage of it and stay up later than I should. And then I wake up sluggish and tired and feeling like crap and the whole cycle starts over again.

I feel ungrateful for hating my job so much. It is a good job, a cushy job. I write articles for newsletters at a university. It’s pretty much brainless work, and generally there’s not much, if any, stress that goes along with it. I spend a good deal of the time here surfing the ‘net because I’m so painfully unmotivated to write yet another profile or story about the latest administrative changes or grant that’s been awarded. I’m left alone to do my stuff. I get paid more than my work is worth. I get more vacation and sick time than 90 percent of the working population. And yet every day, my soul cries out to me in protest. I can actually hear the words in my head: “You have to find a way out of this! This isn’t what your life is meant to be! You can’t stand this much longer! There’s got to be something else you can do!” And then I think about the benefits, and the subsidy I get for the university-owned daycare that Bubba goes to, and I realize I am stuck here, and I die a little more inside.

As I write this, I realize that much of the same could be said about my relationship with J. The two situations are more similar than I really realized before this moment. I am unmotivated, tired from the trying and the constant disappointments. I hear the same kinds of phrases in my head: “You have to find a way out of this! You need to leave. You need to realize it’s hopeless.” And then I think about how much debt we have and how difficult it would be to divide it and where would I live and how would we deal with custody arrangements. I think about how J. is really not that bad. He doesn’t drink, he holds a job, he doesn’t hit me or Bubba. Or I look at J. when he’s sleeping and my heart gets warm with the memory of how he used to be happy most of the time and how he made me laugh and I think of how much I want to work things out. Either way, I feel stuck here, too.

And that’s when I start thinking about jumping in the car and driving, just driving. Leaving all of it behind. But I can’t leave my Bubba. I have trapped myself in my own web of mediocrity without even trying (kind of ironic, isn’t it?) Is it a life full of “safe” choices that's brought me here? I look back on some of the decisions I’ve made and I see a pattern: I will study English because I’m not good at math. I will major in journalism because I have to earn a living. I will marry J. because who else would want to be with me, and this might be my only chance for any kind of love. I will work at this shitty job or that shitty job, because I have to get experience so I can get a better job (that I still hate). I have to, I have to, I have to. Rational. Practical.

The only big life decision that I can’t (or maybe don’t want to) put into the pattern is the decision to have children. I still haven’t figured out exactly why I did it…not sure if it was a response to a biological urge, or if it was because we’d been married for seven years and we were “supposed to,” or if I felt it was my duty as a woman, or if the more difficult it became to achieve it the more I wanted it. Probably all of those things. I strangely don’t remember much about really wanting to be a mother. I remember wanting a child, but not really thinking about being a mother. I never really looked too far beyond the mental image I had of contentedly nursing my newborn in the rocking chair, like something out of a commercial.

Sometimes I think maybe it’s time to stop the rationality, the practicality, the have to-s. To just say fuck it, quit my job, leave my husband, and start over. Try just having faith in the universe or whatever to carry me along and keep me afloat. As tantalizing as this is for a moment, I think about how royally the universe has screwed me over so far and I know this is a pipedream.

Fate hands some people in this world everything they could want or need. For others, fate’s hands are empty again and again, and they scrabble for a kernel of corn and a drink of water and watch their children starve. For the vast majority of us, though, it isn’t so black and white. I believe – and maybe this is where I’ve gone wrong all these years – that we have to play active part in steering our lives. I don’t have faith that if I just let go of the wheel, things will be okay. Maybe that lack of faith is the problem in my life…or maybe it’s what keeps me from being a homeless drunk. Who knows?

I don’t trust myself anymore.

In This Post, I Reveal My Real First Name

2007-11-07T22:32:00.000-06:00

I called my sister tonight just to say hello. It was a pretty mundane conversation for the most part. Then, in typical fashion for my family, it all went to hell in about 20 seconds. Despite all my whining on here, I must have done some kind of healing or had some kind of personality development since I left home because it seems like the older I get, the more obviously dysfunctional the rest of my family is. I mean, I am too, but at least I'm aware of it!!!

Anyway, I was telling her about how much fun Bubba is right now, how incredibly cute he is and how much I'm enjoying it. I related to her about how when we get home from work/daycare, he says "I wanna cuddle you," and we sit on the couch and watch a DVD and love on each other. He'll say "You love me Mama?" and I'll smile and say "I love you SO much!" and then he'll say "I love you too Mama!" with a big smile on his face; sometimes he'll reach is hand up and stroke my cheek. It's enchanting and magical and it's like a big huge reward for all the struggling I've had in the past three years learning how to be somewhat comfortable with motherhood and learning how to enjoy my child rather than pretty much hating the whole thing.

Her response was this: "Oh my god, Sue, don't make him into a wuss! He's gonna be such a mama's boy!" This really pissed me off. Here I am, trying to relate something positive (at last) about my experience as a mother and she just stomps on it. Nevertheless, I tried to be rational so I said, "It's taken me so long finally enjoy something about having a kid and I'm going to revel in it and enjoy it as much as I can." She said she just thought it was "weird." I asked why, and I'm sure at this point she realized she'd pissed me off, so she said she didn't know and that she was afraid of saying the wrong thing. I tried to get off the phone but she said she didn't want us to get off the phone with me being mad. I told her I wasn't mad, just felt defeated. In all honesty, I didn't want it to be a big deal because I've learned from experience that it's just not worth it in my family. So I told her I was having a hard week and that it wasn't a big deal and let's just stop talking about it. We talked about some other stuff and got off the phone with our usual "I love yous."

My sister and I have a complicated relationship (do all sisters?) She's eight years older than me and very bossy. She's an elementary school teacher and her husband is very passive so she pretty much runs the show at work and at home and it spill over into every other relationship as well. I don't think she means to hurt people; I think she's just so used to pushing everyone around that she doesn't have a filter there that the rest of us do. I also recognize the occasional bitchy, uncalled-for comment as a family trait. Christ, I did it to LilCherie last night. Still, I at least TRY to rein it in.

Obligatory Disclaimer To Address My Guilt Issues: I love my sister dearly, and in many ways she's like another mother, which is comforting at times but difficult at others. I can say that she's always been there for me, with one exception that I'll talk about some other time, and she's incredibly loyal. Generally, she's really a good person.

Like the rest of my family, and myself although I 'm working on it, she has a unique ability to turn anything upside down and inside out to make it negative, or to point out the worst possible aspect of anything you share with her. I doubt she even realizes she's doing it.

The other day I went back to my hometown, where she lives as do my mom and dad, and we were talking at dinner about Bubba's sleep issues (one of us pretty much has to sleep with him in order for any of us to get any rest). She starts going on about how "He's three years old. He's old enough to be sleeping by himself. What's he going to do when he starts getting invited to people's houses for sleepovers?" I said something about how that was a long ways off and hopefully we'd have made some progress by then; right now we're just trying to relax about it and wait awhile until he's a little developmentally older and we're a little more ready to deal with it.

At some point in the conversation she makes sure to remind us all (as if we weren't there at the time) about how her girls never had any sleep issues. They both slept through the night at six weeks (they honestly really did) and they never had to sleep with them. That helps a lot! Thanks, Sis!

I am naturally a very open, honest person and I kind of like to just let things be out in the open. I guess that's why I have to keep learning the lesson over and over and over again to never discuss anything that's important or meaningful with any of my family members. But in my defense, I shared the Bubba cuddling story with her because I thought it was charming and sweet. It never even occurred to me that she could spin it negatively.

Personally, I think it's healthy that Bubba and I are able to be that lovey-dovey with one another and I hope that it is evidence that Bubba will grow up to be a little more in touch with his emotions than his father and most other men are. I love it and Bubba loves it so that's enough for me, but I'm curious...what do you guys think? Do you think it's "weird"?

I'm such a Debbie Downer.

2007-11-06T21:35:00.000-06:00

I have to say that I am really touched by everyone's supportive comments on my last post, especially after my being gone for months and sinking into lurkdom on everyone else's blogs. This is the part of blogging that I really enjoy. I guess I shouldn't be so surprised, because in a way, this is what brought me and Best Friend Tingle together--not blogging, but sharing our experiences on the SHARE message boards. Still, I appreciate it very much. Thank you!

It is so interesting to hear about everyone else's experiences. I was really intrigued, Aurelia, about your comment that people with ADD need their therapists to tell them what to do, but that if the spouse does that, it backfires. This struck me close to home because this is where a lot of stress in our relationship comes from--me asking J. to do something and him not doing it and then us fighting about it. Right now he is on Adderall, a fairly high dose I think. It doesn't seem to calm him down, however--I feel like it's made him more aggressive. He would disagree with me. He's seeing a therapist who specializes in adult ADD and we've heard good reports from several different people who have been treated by him...but I don't really know what they are working on in therapy because he "doesn't want to share." For all I know, J.'s spending his time there complaining about how stressed out he is at work or something.

Thrice, I go back and forth between thinking that therapy is really something that can help and then feeling like it's a con-job. I did have that thought today as I was sitting there listening to the therapist talk about how it's not surprising that J. doesn't do much around the house since in his "family of origin" the house was always a shithole. I sat there thinking "yeah, but we've been fighting about this for 14 years now...at this point, his 'forgetting' to do anything I ask him to do around the house can't be blamed on his mother." I mean, I'm not expecting miracles--I just want him to take the fucking laundry to the basement. I would like to think that if it's a choice between hauling the laundry and saving the marriage or playing PlayStation, he'd do the laundry, but so far, that hasn't been the case.

After meeting with the therapist today, I'm still kind of neutral. I think she was fine, if a little bit touchy-feely for my tastes. More importantly, J. liked her and felt comfortable there, and I think that's a bigger hurdle to have cleared. Today's session was pretty much the get-acquainted appointment where we tell her our long tale of woe, which generally takes about the full hour. I suppose next week we'll get into the nitty gritty.

This last few weeks has been such a struggle. I have had a headache almost every day since my sinus surgery two weeks ago, and this week they seem worse. Not worse like I have an infection or a complication, just worse in that I feel more aware of my sinuses themselves and there's pain that's probably a normal part of the healing process but still severely limits my ability to function. Anyway, I felt like crap tonight and of course, tonight is J.'s softball night, but to give credit where credit is due, he went to the game, called me to check how I was feeling, and came home immediately afterward instead of going out with the guys. And didn't even guilt-trip me about it. That was nice. Still, it adds to that feeling of failure I've been carrying around lately.

Then while he was getting Bubba to sleep I talked to Best Friend LilCherie on the phone, sucking her into my vortex of pain and making an unintentional yet bitchy nonetheless comment about her husband. I apologized to her but still feel like I want to make a public acknowledgment of it and tell her again that I am sorry and that I appreciate how she's stuck by me through all my shit and how she lets things slide when I'm in this mode. She's a true friend in every sense of the word.

Wow, this is so uplifting, isn't it? I do have a happy post planned for sometime soon about how much I am really enjoying my kid right now, so it won't all be gloom and doom forever, I promise!

Marriage counseling again.

2007-11-05T15:20:00.000-06:00

So much for NaBloPoMo, huh? I briefly thought about back-dating some posts but then decided to just say fuck it. Still, in the spirit of it, I'm going to at least try to post more often.

Tomorrow J. and I have an appointment with a new marriage counselor. We tried counseling a couple of years ago, and for various reasons it didn’t work out. I decided we needed to give it at least one more go before calling it quits, and he agreed.

I don’t even know how to begin to explain the deadness, the emptiness, and the anger that seems to define our relationship. Those who have known us for a long time will note that we’ve always had conflict in our relationship, and that’s true. Since high school we’ve been fighting and making up and fighting and making up. The difference is that back then, there was genuine affection between us during the good times, and we made real efforts to stop doing the things that pissed the other one off. Now, the “good” times are when we are pretty much ignoring each other but not actively pissed, or maybe sharing a joke or some small talk. It doesn’t go beyond that—there’s no intimacy, no cameraderie…it’s just not loving.

Sometimes it feels very much like we are coworkers, and our job is Bubba. I almost added “and the house” but I am the only one who does any housework, so I guess that’s my job alone. J. has generally been a very loving and involved dad, but lately I’ve noticed that even that seems to be sliding. Maybe it’s because I feel I’m doing a better job at being a mother, so now I notice his shortcomings as a father. I don’t know. J. is very good about taking Bubba out to the park, out to the mall to ride the carousel, things like that. But at home, he rarely does any kind of play with him that requires effort or attention. Usually they sit and watch cartoons together.

Every night, J. has to be reminded to brush Bubba’s teeth and give him his medicine. When I had my sinus surgery, Bubba didn’t get a bath all week because J. just couldn’t be bothered and I was too sick. He got one the day before I went for surgery and got his next one on the first day I was even semi-functional again. This morning, Bubba had to go potty and J. was in the shower. J. had locked the bathroom door because he didn’t want Bubba to open the door and possibly expose J. to my parents, who come out on Mondays to watch Bubba. Like that’s even a big deal anyway—it’s not like they’d be looking, you know?

Anyway, I went to take Bubba into the bathroom and encountered the locked door. Bubba was rattling the door pretty frantically trying to get in. “Bubba has to go potty,” I called into the bathroom. “Goddammit!!!” J. yelled. Then, in response to Bubba’s rattling, he yelled “Stop it!” so harshly I figured he was talking to me. “Bubba’s doing it,” I called back. “I know, I wanted him to stop,” he replied. I was really taken aback that he would yell at Bubba like that for something as innocent as that. It worries me to think of what it would be like if we were divorced. What would Bubba do when he visited Daddy? Just sit in front of TV all the time? Would I have to call every night to make sure he got his teeth brushed and his medicine taken and got bathed once in awhile? Would J. yell at him like that every time he was grumpy and tired from playing PlayStation until 2:30 in the morning (which is almost every night)?

What really got me motivated to make the counseling appointment was the love letter. On Oct. 14, I wrote J. a love letter. It was a page-and-a-half long, and I sent it through the mail for him because in the past he’d complained about never getting good mail. I started the letter out with the sentence “Warning: This is a love letter.”

Now, as mentioned above, I’ve not been really feeling the love lately, but the night I wrote this I was feeling optimistic and trying to count my blessings. This letter was my way of reaching out and trying to get things on the right track again. I sent it to him on Tuesday, and it arrived at our house on Wednesday.

He opened it right away, read the first sentence, smiled, then said he’d read it later. Sounded reasonable, since he’d just gotten home from work and was still in his work clothes and Bubba was being demanding, etc. But three days later, it was still where he’d left it. I picked it up and put it with my stuff. Two days after that, he noticed it was missing and asked for it back. At first I said no, but then I decided to try to be a better person than that, to try to be compassionate, etc., so I handed him back the letter and said “Even though it hurt my feelings that you haven’t read this yet, I still want you to have it because I still feel these things for you.” I handed it to him as he was playing Guitar Hero (he paused it for me—how sweet).

Two weeks go by. I hear nothing about the letter. J. spends his evenings spending hours playing Guitar Hero or indulging in his latest obsession with crossword puzzles. So finally I ask him one night, “Did you ever read that letter I gave you?”

Nope. He hadn’t read it. He knew he was in deep shit because he actually uttered the words “I’m sorry” but then told me he’d just forgotten it was there. I asked him where it was because I wanted it back for good this time. He wouldn’t tell me, so I started rifling through his stuff, for some reason thinking maybe it had actually made it all the way back to his nightstand or something. Finally, angrily, he went and got the letter—off the kitchen counter—and handed it to me, snarling at me that I should “cut him some slack” because it had been a “crazy couple of weeks” with his bad cold and my sinus surgery.

When I pointed out that he’d had plenty of time to play games or do crosswords, he didn’t say anything. Then I asked him how he would feel if he’d given me a present and I just left it on the counter unopened for two weeks. “That’s not the same thing,” he said. “This wasn’t a present.” That hurt me quite a bit, because I really do consider a love letter to be a gift, and one that’s way better than a popcorn popper. “Just because I didn’t go out and buy it at a store?” I replied. “Well, it wasn’t in a box, wrapped up in paper and with a bow on it,” he said. It just seems so cold and heartless and insulting to me. It seems like he really just doesn’t give a shit about me or us.

This weekend we went to LilCherie’s annual Halloween party, which is always a blast and which we always really get into. We’ve gone for 12 years or something like that and only missed one; we’ve had some awesome costumes. This year I decided to be Britney Spears, and had a hilarious costume that I’d spent a lot of time getting ready. J. didn’t know what to be, so I came up with some ideas and he picked one. While I was recovering from surgery, and still feeling pretty crappy, I went out and got him all the stuff he needed for his costume, going to three or four different stores and shelling out probably $30 to $40 bucks.

Saturday came around and by Saturday afternoon, J. was acting kind of mopey. When I asked what the problem was, he said he’d been invited to too many things that night, none of which he’d told me about. Apparently, another friend was having a party, and his sister was having a little get-together. I told him, nicely, to do whatever he wanted to do, to just be happy. He decided he would drop me off at LilCherie’s, go to his sister’s for awhile, then come back to the party. When he dropped me off at 4:30 p.m. he said, “I’ll be back in a little while.”

Somewhere around 11 p.m. he came back to the party, only I didn’t know it because I was in another room of the house and J. didn’t even bother to find me to say hello. He just went straight down to the basement so he could play PlayStation with some of the guys. I didn’t even know he was there until 12:30 or 1 a.m., and by that time I’d taken off my costume. He never even got to see me in it. And he never even took his costume out of the bag. Later on, I just said to him, “I wish you could have seen me in my costume. It was kick-ass.” He said, “Well, you can show me later.” I declined.

I don’t know what’s going on. He seems so uncaring and distant. He sits outside of work and smokes for half an hour before coming home, so he doesn’t get home now most days until 6:20 p.m. or so. We don’t have sex at all, haven’t for months. We don’t sleep in the same room. Our friends notice he’s moody. My parents think we should get divorced and are actively starting to get angry at how he treats me and how he doesn’t do jack shit around the house. I can’t hold it together much longer.

Some of you might be thinking, “It sounds like he’s depressed.” He is, I’m sure. We both are. He’s on antidepressants, and recently, got diagnosed with ADD so he’s also on meds for that, which, in my opinion, have just made things worse. He feels they are helping, though, so he won’t quit them. He does go to therapy sporadically, but “doesn’t feel like sharing” what he is working on. Maybe that’s because all he talked about with his previous counselor, whom he saw for about a year, was current events, movies, and music. Gee, I wonder why it didn’t help anything?

So that’s the story of why we’re going to marriage counseling. If this counselor can’t get to the bottom of things, then I really think it’s over. It’s just hard to make the move to actually get divorced. I wrote in my journal the other day that it's like doing CPR on someone who is clearly dead: You don't know if the very next breath you give might be the one that saves the life, so you don't know when to quit, but in the end, you're still stuck with a corpse. I am afraid of what my life will be like financially because we have a lot of debt, and I’m afraid of how it might screw Bubba up. But I think this situation could screw him up too, and I know I can’t live the rest of my life like this.

Today I walked back from lunch and it just hit me what a mess my life is. I hate my job, my marriage is essentially ending three years after we finally managed to bring a kid into the mess, I’m depressed and old and fat and my sinuses hurt and I’m in debt. How did I get here? I can’t believe I’ve failed so spectacularly. I have always tried to do the right thing and make the right decisions, and this is where I end up. It feels very overwhelming right now, like I’m buried under a pile of shit and I can only claw my way out turd by turd.

So how was your day?

Nov. 1: What Kind of a Parent Am I?

2007-11-01T13:29:00.000-05:00

Tertia had an interesting meme/questionnaire on her site a couple days ago that I wanted to do, but since I got into so much trouble there the last time I posted, I'm going to just copy and paste here with my answers. As Tertia said on her blog, if you have kids, let me know what kind of a parent you are; if you don't have kids but hope to, let me know what kind of a parent you hope to be.

I would never:
Have another child. Does that count? If not, here's another: Hit or humiliate my son.

I always:
Tell him I love him and hug and kiss him about a million times a day.

I got an easy ride when it came to:
Potty training: it only took a week and wasn't that bad.

The part I dislike most about parenting is:
The constant worry and anxiety and guilt about everything related to my son and how I parent him; the comparison game with other parents; bedtime battles and middle-of-the-night wakings; never knowing whether you're doing the right thing or not; seeing all the bad parts of my mother come out in me when Bubba pisses me off.

The part I love most about parenting is:
Hugs, kisses, cuddling, hearing Bubba say "I love you," all the hilarious things he does every day.

My terrible parenting secret is:
Am I only allowed one? Probably would be that I smoked when I was pregnant. I will NEVER stop feeling bad about that one. There's also the time I left him alone in the car when I ran in to get a prescription. He was sick, sleeping, cool outside, and I knew it would only take about 60 second. Still, I used to say I'd never do that.

I would describe my approach to discipline as:
Good intentions, not so great on the follow-through. I give in too often when he cries because1) I hate it when he's sad and 2) I have a very low threshold for crying/tantrums.

My worst parenting habit:
Again, just one? Parking him in front of his DVDs to clean the house, take a shower, and smoke on the porch. God, I sound trashy!

The one thing I am really proud of is:
How hard I have worked to overcome postpartum depression, not be so angry, and be more in control when Bubba has a meltdown, and, going hand-in-hand with that, how Bubba and I have a really good, close relationship now.

I probably am too lenient when it comes to:
Letting him watch TV, letting him sleep with J. or me, and letting him eat sugary stuff.

I hope my kids inherit my:
Ability to feel and express emotion (I know, he's a boy...it's a long shot); empathy; willingness to be wacky sometimes.

I hope my kids don’t inherit my:
Mental health issues--the inability to be happy no matter what.

I love that my kids are:
Genuinely and intentionally funny--he's a little comedian and I love it; generally sweet and loving; social with other kids and adults.

The thing I miss most about my pre-mom days is:
The ability to be completely irresponsible sometimes. There's never really a "day off" because even when they're with someone else you trust, you still worry about him, think about him, talk about him, miss him.

Motherhood is:
Indescribable, in every sense of that word--the good, the bad, the ugly.

NaBloPoMo

2007-11-01T13:24:00.000-05:00

Okay, I did it. I signed up for the NaBloPoMo thing where you have to blog every day for the month of November or they cut your head off. No, really, it's one of those trendy blog-world things, but hell, I felt like doing it so there. I thought it might be good motivation to do it. We'll see if life allows it to happen!

The Worst Excuse Ever.

2007-10-27T22:27:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, my mother came out to my house (about an hour's drive for her) to take me to the doctor to get my nose sucked out and septum splints removed after my sinus surgery. Before we went to the doctor, we dropped Bubba off at daycare. He was not in the mood to go, and as I led him into school he looked woefully back at NaNa. When I returned, I mentioned to Mom that if she wanted to, she could pick Bubba up from daycare after my doctor's appointment and keep him for the night, and J. would pick him up the next day. I was thinking, oh, I don't know, that maybe it would be really nice to have a little break since I was still feeling Miserable with a capitol M and J. was dealing with either the fallout from last week's Cold From Hell or possibly a complication like bronchitis or something of that ilk. She seemed at least open to the idea and said "Let me think about it for a little bit." Seemed reasonable.

Well, after my doctor's appointment I asked if she had decided what she wanted to do and she replies, "I better not take him. I need to go shopping tomorrow for a new frying pan."

I was so drugged up on pain meds when this conversation occurred and the frying pan excuse was so shockingly bad that I’m still not sure if I made any kind of remark immediately after she said this, but after some uncomfortable silence I do remember saying “Okay. I don’t ever want you to feel pressured into watching my kid.” Then more uncomfortable silence, punctuated by a few small-talky comments we both made to just sort of ease the tension. I was pretty desperate for her to go home, however, so I sort of urged her to go home immediately by saying “I know you’ll want to be home for lunch with Dad.” Almost like the last turn of the knife, even though I know it was unintentional, she says to me as she’s walking out the door, “Well, I hope you feel better soon…let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.” As long as it doesn’t involve watching my son, I guess.

Here is where I must give you some essential background.
*My Mom does help me, Bubba and J. out a lot. Really. She's generally a very good Mom and NaNa.
*She does watch Bubba one day every week and has since he was born. This was at her request because she wanted to make sure Bubba "knew her" and that she had a good relationship with him.
*Mom is 68 years old. She's in better physical shape than I am; still, I understand that caring for a young child is tiring.
*Mom has never worked outside of the home, so since she stopped babysitting for my nieces about 10 years ago, she's been "retired." Which means, theoretically at least, that urgent shopping trips for critical items like frying pans could be carried out any day of the week.
*Before Bubba was born, there were many comments from Mom about how much fun it would be to have Bubba "come and visit NaNa and PaPa for a week!" She and Dad have taken Bubba for many one- or two-night stays, and shared a six-day babysitting stint with my sister when we went to Amsterdam. There have not, however, been any spontaneous requests to have Bubba for a week, and only one or two to have him for a night or weekend.
*Finally, I feel a disclaimer is necessary: I know I am lucky to have a mother who loves me, my husband and our child, and that she is willing to take him at all, ever, and I am eternally grateful for those things. I am still, however, a little pissed about the frying pan incident. Okay. Now I can move on and really get into the bitching.

Here’s what bugs me about this whole thing. First, if she didn’t want to watch Bubba, I wish she could have just said “I’m sorry, Depressionista, but I just don’t feel up to it today,” or “It just really tires me out to have him overnight,” or something even closely resembling the truth. But having to shop for a new frying pan???? Jesus!

Secondly, I think about all the times she said (and even as recently as last week, says) she wants to have Bubba for a weekend or an overnight but then never carries through on it unless I specifically ask (beg). What happened to the woman who just couldn’t wait for me to procreate so she could have all this quality time with my child?

Third, it sparks off a smidge of paranoia in me that wow, my kid must really be a brat. Maybe I’m delusional but I really don’t think he is (at least not any more than any other three-year-old) but an excuse like having to go shopping for a frying pan makes you kind of think twice, you know? And if, in fact, she really doesn’t like watching him because he’s a terror, I’d rather have her be honest with me and maybe give me some useful information that I could work with than making up this ridiculously stupid excuse.

Finally…she had to go SHOPPING FOR A FRYING PAN??? This is the best she could come up with after three hours, including a half an hour with nothing to do but think while she waited for me to come out of the exam room? This excuse was so bad that it was almost impossible for either one of us to pretend that it was even remotely believable.

I so wanted to call her tonight and ask her if she had found the perfect frying pan and ask her to tell me all about it. “Tell me, Mom, is it stainless steel or Teflon-coated? A Calphalon, perhaps Farberware? Ten-inch or twelve-inch?” And, in my fantasy, this final question: “Was shopping for the frying pan more fulfilling than spending quality time with your grandson?”

I really do hope that at some point, she does ask me if she can have Bubba for a night or a weekend, and I hope I will have the guts (and not be so desperate to unload my kid) that I'll be able to say, "Gee, Mom, that would be great, but we're going shopping tomorrow for a new frying pan and Bubba's really excited about it so I think we'll have to make it some other time."

In reality, I'll have to just let this slide because I know I will at some point be desperate to unload my kid and I'll have to ask (beg) her to take him again, and because I know from experience that any kind of honesty surrounding this issue will just cause more trouble than it's worth. I don't want to deal with the crying and the hurt feelings and Dad telling me how much I've hurt my mother, yada yada blah blah blah. But last night, when I was feeling sick and feverish and wanting to cry but trying not to so I wouldn't drown my poor, ailing sinuses in mucus, and this morning when I sat in the living room and did cry in spite of everything, and in front of Bubba who then asked if I was sad and brought me a tissue to wipe my tears, and as I watched my sick husband take our son out to the mall because I was feeling so horrible, and as I looked at all the laundry that needs to be done because I can't do anything and J. is expending all of his meager store of energy on taking care of Bubba...I felt really alone. And sad.

Blogalicious

2007-10-26T00:41:00.001-05:00

And just like that, I'm blogging again. Hi! I decided that it really wasn't fair to my minions to deprive them of my witty observations. I decided that I really do have a duty to make sure my revelations and my daily trials, tribulations and triumphs are available to help others deal with their own life challenges. I mean, how can I, in good conscience, not share this wisdom with the world? We all have a responsibility to do our part, and if this is my calling, well, I just need to put my own wants and needs aside and make this sacrifice for the greater good. Thanks to Oprah for setting such a good example!

I've actually done a fair amount of thinking about blogging. I've decided that I like putting my "stuff" out there, but that I really need to just be myself and be true to my own voice, as cheesy as that sounds. I guess I realize that if I can blog without worrying about offending people or whether or not I have any readers, then it will be a more honest experience for me, and that's what I'm looking for. I may never have more than three readers (Tingle, LilCherie and Pioneer Girl, I'm counting on you). I may never go to BlogHer and therefore never have the requisite "I'm so nervous about going to BlogHer!" and "BlogHer was awesome!" posts (although against my better judgment, I might jump on the NaBloPoMo bandwagon because I always thought tht would be kinda cool). But I hope to have some fun and maybe work some shit out along the way. I have no idea if this even makes any sense. It's 1:30 a.m. and I'm recovering from sinus surgery and totally drugged out on hydrocodone.

So...sinus surgery. Don't ever, ever, do this unless you really have some major, horribly painful sinus issues that need to be dealt with. I thought I did, but, three days after surgery, I'm wondering if they were really that bad. Honestly. I've had surgeries that required me to pack a gaping, oozing wound right next to my clitoris for Christ's sake and still, not as bad as this. I'm just sayin'.

I have lots of things I want to blog about. Here, for future reference, and so I can remember them later when I'm not fogged out on pain meds, are a few:

*Blogs I Like and Blogs I Don't and Why. What I Want This Blog to Be and What I Don't Want It to Be.
*Celebrating the Vulva, or, Why It's Kind-Of Embarrassing to Say the Word "Vulva," Why It's Kind-Of Embarrassing to Discuss Medical Issues Pertaining to the Vulva, and Ways to Bring the Vulva Out of the Closet.
*Why Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Everything Related to It Kind-Of Pisses Me Off.
*My Consternation Over the Fact that My Neighbor is Building the World's Most Awesome "Play Structure" for Their Son While We Will Never Be Able to Afford Anything Close to That for Our Son and Whether or Not This Will Scar Him for Life and Why, WHY Am I Even Spending Time Thinking About This?
*Oprah. Yes, I've blogged about The Big O before but I don't feel I'm done with this issue. Especially not after catching it today, on a day when I felt especially shitty about my physical health/life/the world, and it was fucking Seal and Heidi Klum and their awesome fucking life together. PUKE!
*How Much the Viagra/Cialis Ads Gross Me Out and Why.
*My Life as a Trichotillomaniac.
*Notes From Daycare: How They Automatically Make You Feel Like a Failure as a Parent.
*The Places I'm Afraid to Go in Therapy.
*The Grossest Thing Your Body Has Ever Done/Produced. This will require reader participation, so I might have to save this one for later, when my readership has grown exponentially despite my complete disregard for whether or not anyone is reading me.

So. Here I go again. I'm already having fun!

Taking a break, and here's why.

2007-06-20T16:17:00.000-05:00

So I've been thinking a lot about blogging lately: why I do it, why I haven't felt like it lately, what I get out of it, etc. An experience on another blog today illuminated it for me. My comments on Tertia's blog, So Close, apparently really pissed some people off.

Of course, at first I just wanted to bite back and try to defend myself and there was even a desire to really succumb to my base instincts and just hurl back my own insults. I'm glad that I didn't. Instead I just reiterated that I intendend no malice, and then I emailed Tertia privately to apologize for the firestorm.

It made me realize how absurd the whole "blogosphere" really is. There are several things that have been bothering me about it, which I will put in bullet points here for easy reading:

•People get personally, deeply offended by comments that are made about situations not involving them and by people they don't know.

•Blogs tend to have a couple different kinds of commenters: those who dissent and then get crucified for it, and those who support the blogger no matter what. "So you killed your mother? Well, I'm sure she deserved it because you are so great!!!!"-- that kind of post. Both of which equally bother me.

•I think at the beginning I got sucked into the blog world because I was reading other people's blogs and I really wanted to be in "the club." I wanted to belong. I wanted other people to link to me and leave comments. There's a whole high school mentality to it that was obscured to me by the technology and the coolness of anonymously posting my thoughts and ramblings.

•The high school mentality extends to situations like that in which I found myself today. The blog world is the perfect setting for backbiting, insults, in-fighting and exclusion, all done anonymously, behind a computer screen and a pseudonym.

•There's a selfishness to it that has been troubling me lately. Why should the world care about the minutae of my life?

I feel I MUST state that this is no comment on any of the wonderful blogs I often read or the (mostly) women who write them. I enjoy reading about other people's experiences and it is a way to connect as human beings. Sometimes, though, it seems like it's too easy, if that makes sense. There is no obligation to one another because most of us are anonymous and even if we aren't, chances are that without some major effort and planning, we'll never meet in real life. It almost gives people too much freedom, somehow.

I have "met" some great bloggers out there, and I've enjoyed this experience quite a bit most of the time. I've gotten a lot of support from those who have commented here, and I appreciate it. I love reading other people's blogs, and I can't say I will never leave a comment again. I also can't say I'll never blog again. My mind changes; I'm fickle. But for right now, I need to examine what I get out of blogging, and what that says about what I need in real life. Is it because I want to feel popular and accepted, and if so, what kind of insecurity does that reveal? Is it because I want someone to tell me how great/okay/normal I am, and if so, wouldn't it be better to work on feeling confident within myself? Is it because I just need to vent (and if that's the case, I'll probably be back!)

So....I'm taking a break. I don't know how long it will last. I'll still be lurking around on other people's sites, but probably quietly. Thanks to everyone who has reached out to me and read my words. Take care everyone, I wish you the best!

A quick note to say hi

2007-06-12T16:06:00.001-05:00

Hello! Anybody still stopping by?

I don't have a reason for my absence, other than just not feeling the urge to post. I seem to go through some kind of cycle where I inexplicably need to take a break for awhile and just disappear.

And this won't be much of a post either, because I'm a little under the weather and still not sure if I'm in the blogging frame of mind. But I did want to just put a little feeler out there to say hi to people. I'm still reading people's blogs but am also finding it difficult to comment.

I have some things to write about when I'm feeling better. I hope you'll stop back again and not give up on me when I take my little breaks.

Take care, everyone, and hopefully I'll be back in a few days.

P.S. I'd love to hear from a couple of bloggers: Thrice, from "After All That," and Rosepetal from "Moksha." Both recently went password-protected and I miss reading them...so if anyone knows how to get me in touch with either lovely lady, please email me.

Thanks friends!

The illusion of safety

2007-04-17T09:37:00.000-05:00

Yesterday's shootings at Virginia Tech are on my mind. Like any normal human being, a tragedy like this shocks me, sickens me, angers me. Since the birth of my son, tragedies like this rock me at a deeper level. My first thought was of the parents of those students who were killed; I put myself in their place, receiving that phone call or waiting for hours and hours for the confirmation that their child was among the dead. It physically turns my stomach. The tears have been stinging my eyes since last night.

On November 1, 1991, I was a junior at the University of Iowa. It was a dreary, snowy Friday afternoon, and J. and I were preparing to go back to our hometown for the weekend. When he picked me up at my dorm, he told me about how he'd had to come a different route because there were all kinds of emergency vehicles and ambulances around the Pentacrest, the heart of our campus. Puzzled, but able to brush it aside in the way that narcissistic college students are able, we packed up the car and hit the road. We were no more than 20 miles out of town before announcers broke into the music and reported that several people on campus had been shot.

At first, the numbers that were reported were up to 25; later, it turned out that five people were killed, one person was critically injured, and the gunman had killed himself. We listened to the radio all the way home in shock. In the days before cell phones, there was no way to know if my brother and sister-in-law, who worked on campus, or any of our friends were among the victims; there was no way to call our parents to tell them we were okay. When we got to my parents' house, my mother's relief was palpable. Not sure when we'd left Iowa City, she'd tried repeatedly to call us, but the huge influx of calls from anxious parents and loved ones had jammed the lines.

After calling his parents, me, J., and my family sat in front of the NBC Nightly News, watching Tom Brokaw report on the "massacre" that had happened at our school. Eventually we were able to reach my brother and our friends and they were all okay. The details trickled in. The shooter was a graduate physics student from China. He was angry because his doctoral dissertation wasn't nominated for an honor. He killed the student who received it, along with three physics faculty members. He then walked across campus to an administrative building, killed the associate vice president for academic affairs, and seriously wounded a student employee, who survived but is now quadriplegic.

We returned on Sunday night to a quiet campus (in my insular world that revolved around myself, I didn't even about what it must have been like for my parents to send me back that Sunday night). Classes were cancelled the next day, and there was a memorial for the victims. Students stayed in their rooms, gathered with friends, processed the awful event. More than anything, I remember the quiet of that day and the days that followed. It seemed like time stopped for a little while. Even when classes resumed, people didn't talk much, and when they did, it was hushed.

The feeling I had then was remarkably similar to the one I have now. I felt stunned and deeply saddened, sick — but also felt as if I didn't really have a right to those feelings, because I didn't know any of the victims personally; I wasn't touched directly by the violence. Although I like to think that as a human being, we are all touched — injured — when something like this happens.

Last night I sat on my couch and watched the coverage while my two-and-a-half year old son lay sleeping quietly in our bedroom. He was there in our home, safe in our bed...but I didn't feel any reassurance. Watching the images of a bloody student being carried from a building, of the crackling of gunfire coming from a building on campus, a voice in my head said "This is the world you have brought your son into. This is the world you will send your son into. This is the world you DO send your son into."

Today, I feel a deep sense of guilt for that. That my selfishness, my desire for a child brought him here to this cruel, senseless, violent world — a world where college students are gunned down for no other reason than that they were there; a world where children are snatched from their beds, raped and murdered; a world where the president of our country talks about the tragic deaths of these college students while he sends other (often less-privileged) 19-year-olds to Iraq to be gunned down; a world where the president says that schools are supposed to be sanctuaries, while schoolchildren in Iraq face violence and death every day at his hands.

The hypocrisy of that is stunning to me. The words flying through the airwaves today are empty to me. "How can we stop this from happening again?" "Are schools in America safe?" "What needs to be done to increase security?"

The truth is that we cannot stop this from happening again. If we could, there would have been one school shooting in history and then no more. Schools in America are not safe. America is not safe. The world is not safe. Increased security will do nothing but add one more hurdle that a deranged murderer will not hesitate to overcome.

As I walked to the bus stop last night, on the same campus where I went to school and where I now work, I thought to myself how nothing really changed after the shooting in 1991. There's a memorial walkway, dedicated to one of the victims; there are anniversary remembrances and vigils that are more sparsely attended every year. But it's no more difficult for a disgruntled student with a gun to mow people down now than it was on October 31, 1991. How could it be? What, honestly, could be done?

The truth is that safety is a necessary illusion that we nurture in order to be able to function every day. When something like yesterday happens, it is momentarily shattered, and then the rationalization and the empty words and simply time and distance from the event let us build it up again. We need that illusion to prevent us from completely giving in to debauchery and instant self-gratification, to be productive, to raise our children as if, by some miracle, they will survive intact to live out their projected lifespan.

For breakfast this morning, I let my son have a cupcake, because the only words in my head that don't seem empty are these: enjoy today as much as you can.

Neko Case Concert: A Dream Come True

2007-04-02T13:52:00.000-05:00

Warning: This post is going to sound like I am 15 years old again because, well, I was and am so PSYCHED about the concert last night that I can't contain myself.

Last night we went to the Beachland Ballroom to see Jon Rauhouse and Neko Case in concert. The ballroom is located in a completely charismatic, old-time working class neighborhood of downtown Cleveland. There were union buildings, mom-and-pop type storefronts, taverns...all with that heavy red brick, rundown feeling that is charming and wistful and sad all at once.

The ballroom was built in 1950 as the Croatian Liberty Hall. It has a tavern attached, and a music store in the basement, as well as some vintage stores elsewhere in the building, I think. The actual ballroom is a standing-room-only venue, and looks like a combination of an old-fashioned movie theatre, with amazing crown molding on the ceiling and interesting mural panels dotting the perimeter, and a school gymnasium, with its high ceiling and wood floor. Along each side is a little shelf for setting down your drinks. It smelled like old smoke, old shoes, and old sweat, and I loved it. It was like stepping back in time. I could imagine couples, dressed up for their night on the town, dancing away to big band music all night long, smoking their cigarettes before the government took it away (Cleveland has a law now that you can't smoke in any public place. In a place like the Beachland, it really is a shame, because it's kind of part of the ambiance. There were posters up all around the Beachland which expressed the management's view of this law. They said: "Big Brother Says No Smoking. Any Questions? Call the Cleveland Anti-Sex League at 1-800-XXX-XXXX." Like I said, this is my kind of place!)

When we got there a little past 7, there weren't many people there--maybe 30 or so. We got some drinks, went back outside for some smokes, then settled in at the right of the stage. We were able to rest for awhile before having to stake our claim to our spots about 10 to 15 feet from the artists themselves. AWESOME! The show got started a little late but opened with Jon Rauhouse's amazing Hawaiian steel guitar performance. I am going to his website today to buy it. It's old-fashioned, forties-style, non-cheesy Hawaiian music. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

After he and his band, including the amazing Kelly Hogan on vocals, played for awhile, Neko came out and began tuning her guitars. Jon, members of his band, and Kelly remained on stage to back up Neko. When Neko opened her mouth to sing, it came out of her so effortlessly and flawlessly. It was amazing to be in the presence of such talent, really. I mean, I can't imagine having a gift like that. She was really humble, modest and funny during the show. She sang all my favorites, including "Deep Red Bells," "Maybe Sparrow," "John the Baptist," and "Lions Jaws." I was awestruck, honestly. The main performance lasted for about an hour, then she came back for a three-song encore, then came back for one more song.

Not ready to relinquish the magic of the evening, Tingle, J. and I stood around the stage for awhile after most of the crowd had filed out. A few brave souls jumped on stage to grab some set lists. Then a stage crew person came out and someone asked him if there were any more. He found some, and Tingle spoke up and asked if we could have a couple, and he very kindly just handed them out. The one Tingle has is different from mine, and we were exactly sure which one was the one followed last night because they are very similar, but who cares? They were on stage!

As if this wasn't good enough, Jon Rauhouse then came back out and sat down at his steel guitar. "We have to go all the way to Columbia, Mo., tonight, so I have to replace this string right now." We told him how much we loved his performance, how we were going to be buying his CD, etc. Then we asked if he could sign our set lists, and he seemed flattered by the request. J. kindly ran and got a pen from the bar. We were so excited!

Then we headed out to the lobby area, where there were all kinds of cool things on sale, including awesome coloring books from girlsnotchicks.com. We wandered into the bar, just hoping maybe Neko would be in there milling about. No dice. We wandered back into the lobby area, and J. and Tingle were going to go downstairs to look in the music store. Tingle decided at the last moment that she would stay upstairs with me, since there was a rumor that Neko would be coming out to visit with the minions. J. went downstairs.

Then, she appeared behind the table, talking to the girls selling the merchandise. We were right up by the table...Some guy called out, "Neko, will you sign anything?" She replied, "Sure!" and sat down. Tingle and I moved up front and shoved our set lists in front of her. We were fucking shaking, we were so excited.

When she looked our way, I engaged with the ultra-original, "I love your music!" "Oh, thanks!" she said, very friendly. "Have you been singing as long as you can remember?" I asked her. "Well...at home," she said and smiled. "Well thank you so much for sharing your gifts with us," I said. Cheesy, I know, but shit, I was dumbfounded, okay? Then I told her that we had driven all the way from Iowa to see her. "Oh," she said and put her hand to her heart. "Bless your heart," I think she said, or it might have been, "Oh, that is so nice!" or something like that. "Make sure you drive carefully on the way home!" We said we would, then J. appeared and told her again that we were from Iowa City. I then said, "You should come to Iowa City!" And she said, "Yeah, the Englert! We'll be going back." I couldn't believe she just knew right off the top of her head about the Englert. I remembered then that she'd played there several years ago, before I knew about her. I told her that I'd missed her the last time she played and that I hoped she'd come back. Then we left, shaking with excitement.

I thought that was the pinnacle...but then, upon getting home and downloading our photos, I found that Tingle had shrewdly taken photos of Neko at the table AND signing my set list! FUCKING AWESOME!

Bottom line: Neko case rocks. Tingle rocks for getting J. and me the tickets for our birthdays. Beachland Ballroom rocks. The whole evening FUCKING ROCKED!!!!

Whew. I think I have to go have a cigarette now.

Smells like Cleveland again!

2007-04-01T07:20:00.000-05:00

The title of this post is inspired by my first real whiff of Cleveland, received yesterday on the way back from our museum run. Wow. For some reason, I've never really smelled it on our other visits; this time, with the heavy, wet spring air, it was at full strength and really, really awful. I had to adopt the patented Tingle Air Filter maneuver in which you pull the front of your shirt up over your nose, and even that didn't block it all. I told Tingle she should keep a bar of soap in the car to sniff on her commute. Or a gas mask/respirator combo. Jesus.

Hi folks!

I didn't intend to stay away from my blog for so long, but for some reason I just wasn't "feelin' it." The last couple weeks haven't been very remarkable. It's been one of those spans of time in which you feel you are just kind of surviving. Nothing major, just the daily grind. The sinus infection that won't go away (I'm now under the care of an otolaryngologist and taking $25 co-pay antibiotics, nose spray, prednisone, and chanting over chicken bones every night before I go to bed); Bubba's allergies/asthma (he and I are going to the allergist/asthma clinic in April); an unusually busy period at work, etc.

Today, I come to you from the fair city of Cleveland. J. and I are visiting Tingle and her husband for a few days. Bubba is staying with my sister and brother-in-law for the weekend and then with my mom and dad for Monday and Tuesday. The inspiration for this trip is the Neko Case concert we are going to tonight. She is playing at the Beachland Ballroom tonight in Cleveland, along with Jon Rauhouse. If you've never listened to Neko Case before, I highly recommend her. She is very difficult to describe, but here are some words that come to mind when I try: haunting, old-fashioned country flavor, soaring, intimate, deep, beautiful. Just go listen for yourself! We are SO excited to see her, especially in such small and intimate venue.

So far we have had a fun-filled, jam packed day and a half in Cleveland. We got here Friday night and had dinner at one of my favorite restaurants here, a little corner Italian place that has incredible eggplant parmesan. That night Tingle and I stayed up talking and playing show-and-tell with photos, drawings, and of course the gifts that Tingle showers on me every time I see her. This time she got me a sweet LED light panel that fades to different vibrant colors...it's very cool; a cool journal; a fun book about disgusting things; some hair combs; a sushi magnet; some fun stuff for Bubba; a lovely red sweater; a fiber-optic lamp; and probably some other stuff I'm forgetting. Tingle just can't help herself from buying stuff for other people. Her house is always dotted with little piles here and there of gifts for this person, that person, and oftentimes, me. I've given up on trying to match her gift for gift and have relaxed into the knowledge that this is how she is, so now I just get her something if it strikes me but otherwise accept her gifts with gratitude and peace.

Yesterday we went to the Monet exhibit at the art museum here. I have to say something about Monet. Yes, the paintings are beautiful, and yes, the man was extremely talented...but when I look at his paintings, for the most part, I think, "yeah, that's a pretty picture." And that's about as far as the reaction goes. Some of the paintings evoked a little more emotion in me, to be sure, but for the most part, he just doesn't do it for me. I think it's a combination of not really getting into landscapes all that much, and the fact that it isn't all that disturbing. Pain and darkness speak to my soul much more strongly than serenity and beauty. That's just the way I am. But J. and Tingle really wanted to go, so Tingle's hubby and I went along for the ride. I felt I learned something, so that's worth it.

We ate lunch at trattoria in Little Italy. Very good. We topped that off with pastries from an Italian bakery there, where I had an orgasmic napolean. That sounds like a band name, doesn't it?

Then the boys went off on their own to go to music stores and play videogames, while Tingle and I continued on to the Princess Diana exhibit at the Historical Society here. I'm fascinated by Princess Diana. She seems like a truly good person; human, of course, but basically good. The exhibit was great. Organized by her brother, it included some of her childhood belongings, home movies and snapshots her father took, a whole section on the charity work she did, the original, scribbled-on lyrics to the Candle in the Wind song Elton John and Bernie Taupin adapted for her funeral; and of course, the dresses, including her wedding dress. I felt like crying many times during the exhibit...then felt kind of stupid for wanting to cry about someone I never even knew. It was touching. I was especially moved by the entire wall, filled top to bottom, with condolence books from all over the world.

Then Tingle and I, almost crippled from our day standing at exhibits in museums, hobbled out to the car and came home for a hot bath (me) and a nap (Tingle), before heading out once again for a get-together with Tingle's boss and her husband at their beautiful home. They had intended for it to be a larger gathering of creative people they knew who would get together and discuss spirituality and stuff like that. We did do that, but unfortunately everyone else begged off for some reason, so it was just the four of us. They are a great couple and we had a great time, great snacks, and great wine. To top off our classy evening, Tingle and I stopped by Taco Bell on the way home.

We will be here two more days before heading back Tuesday morning. I have to say I miss Bubba much more than I expected to. More than I have on previous trips without him. It's reassuring to me that I feel this way, even though it is somewhat painful and I'm struggling against the natural urge to feel guilty for leaving him. I truly believe that it's good for Bubba to grow up knowing that Mom and Dad have other parts of their lives that don't revolve around him. I know from experience that it's a lot of pressure when YOU are your parents' whole life. I also know that it's good to nurture his relationships with the rest of our family. Yet, he's at an awkward stage where he knows that Mama and Daddy are gone, but can't really understand why, so I do feel a pang of pain at that. I checked in yesterday and he was doing great, playing with my sister's family dog, running around, doing Bubba things. I love him so much. Soon (hopefully) I will be posting a "funny things Bubba does" entry, because he's endlessly amusing right now and I want to get it down for posterity's sake.

So...that's my update. I haven't been checking blogs or commenting or anything, but I promise to try and catch up soon. Until then, take care!

Remembering

2007-03-23T15:14:00.000-05:00

Three years ago today, a dear friend of mine lost a much-wanted pregnancy. I just wanted to let her know I was thinking of her. I remember shedding tears with her on the phone; I remember the sad emptiness of realizing that our little babes would not be growing up together; I remember feeling guilty that Bubba was still growing inside of me; I remember feeling astonished at her generosity of spirit when she said she felt guilty, somehow, because she felt that her loss would be frightening and depressing to me in light of my own pregnancy.

I haven't forgotten and never will.

I love you, sister.

What Do I Want To Be When I Grow Up?

2007-03-21T22:49:00.000-05:00

I met with my therapist yesterday. (Warning: Praise of my therapist, to the point of being sickening, will probably occur in this post.) We had a "big" session. I could tell it was big by how uncomfortable I felt during most of it. I knew I was, however lightly, bumping up against some things that I manage not to touch very often; things I need to bump up against and push through in order to live a happier, more fulfilling life.

The session began with a discussion about my unhealthy habits, particularly how I eat and the fact that I don't exercise. I came to realize that the main reason I eat is for pleasure--the immediate, no-strings-attached, no-work-involved, pure pleasure of eating something that tastes good. One of the many things I love about my therapist is that she leads me through issues so that I come to realizations myself rather than just telling me her opinion; this is exactly what she did when she asked me what the "medicine" of food was "treating" in me. I realized it's the general dissatisfaction, malaise, depression, boredom, etc. that I feel about my life, especially my job. So that's how, after a half an hour of intense therapy, I came to actually understand phrases like "emotional eating" or "filling a void with food." I truly never "got it" until yesterday. I thought I did, but I didn't.

My therapist and I discussed how I wasn't living the life I was, in her terms, "put here to live." She told me how I was here in this world to do something, and that my heart would tell me if I would listen to it. I found it hard to accept that I could actually be worthy of a "calling" (and am still working that idea around in my head)--but she explained to me that everyone has it, it's just whether or not they can listen for it. She said, "Imagine the rainbow without the color blue. It would be a completely different thing. That's the world without you."

She encouraged me to completely and fully fantasize about my "dream" life. What I would be doing, where I'd be doing it, how it would feel...imagine myself as if I were actually living it. Then, the hard part--start taking steps toward it, even little baby ones. One of the things we talked about was my fantasy of living on the beach, writing personal essays for a living, walking along the shore contemplating the big mysteries in life. "There are people who live that life," she said. "What's the difference between them and me?" I asked rather pathetically. "They're doing it," she said.

She noted that she felt that along with my fear of failure and anxiety about change lurked a darker force that she labeled "an ugly little troll that lurks in the backround and says 'why bother?'" I immediately recognized the troll and told her I instinctively felt that I didn't even want to talk to the troll (yes, we laugh at this stuff in therapy too, but still honor it) and she agreed that we shouldn't give him any energy. Instead she said, "just kick it away." Then she taught me a cool Sufi thing where you pretend to spit over your left shoulder, and it symbolizes getting rid of bad energy and the like.

So my homework this week is to fantasize. I feel naturally drawn to two areas: my writing, of course, which is what's fed my soul for as long as I've known how to do it; and my experience with Hope and my desire to help others who have gone or are going through similar experiences. I want to keep an open mind that these aren't the only two areas of myself that I can explore in my fantasizing, though. In many ways, I feel that these two aspects of my life/personality/experience do define me, but in other ways, they restrict me. I know there is more to who I am and I want to explore that too. And yet, the fact that those two things immediately draw me in must mean something, right? I don't know. I'm still working it out.

I do know that this is what I need to do to break through my general unhappiness and disappointment in life. I need to find a path in life that excites me, that feeds my soul, that provides a fulfillment that tastes better than Oreos or pizza rolls. If I don't, then the best I can expect for the rest of my life is more of the same.

The Considerate Smoker's Manifesto Part II

2007-03-15T21:20:00.001-05:00

"Guess what I did tonight," LilCherie asked while we were on the phone tonight. "I bought a carton of cigarettes." In the past, LilCherie has had a personal objection to buying a carton of cigarettes because it is an admission of smokitude that she just didn't want to make.

However, our governor signed a cigarette tax hike today that raises the cost of a pack of cigarettes by $1. The total tax on a pack of cigarettes in my state is now $1.36. How rude.

Thus, the Great Cigarette Run of 2007 was set in motion. After our call I ran out and got a couple cartons myself.

This pisses me off for more reasons than just having to spend more on my bad habit. First, there's all kinds of rhetoric being spewed about how the tax will make Iowa a healthier state, people will quit smoking, it will be good for you, Big Brother says. But it isn't about Big Brother's concern at all. If that were the case, cigarettes would be illegal. What it's really about is making money. Cigarette taxes are just an endless source of revenue for the government, and one that nobody can argue about. Well, people who smoke can argue...but everybody hates us anyway so it's not real effective.

According to this article, Governor Culver said: "With the signing of this bill, we are sending a bold message throughout the state and around the nation that Iowa takes the health care of its people, especially its kids, seriously." The article said Culver pledged the money, which was projected to raise $138 million in fiscal 2008,to expand health care coverage for children.

The idea that health care coverage for children in our state depends on people continuing to smoke rather disgusts me. Shouldn't we be able to take care of our children (and the rest of us, for that matter) with all the other taxes we pay? Isn't it a little slimy to basically say, through a tax hike like this, that we need people to keep smoking in order to give children in our state adequate health care?

Another article said "Culver said the higher taxes will help thousands of Iowans kick the increasingly expensive habit while raising money to expand health care programs." So if the taxes go up, causing thousands of people quit buying cigarettes, aren't we just going to be breaking even here? What if the tax is so successful that everyone just quits tomorrow? What about those poor kids without health care?

Pro-tax individuals would say that the reduction in smoking-related illnesses and medical costs would make up for the shortfall. I don't buy it. A lot of people who smoke pay taxes and pay their own health insurance premiums. Yes, maybe health insurance premiums go up because of people who smoke. They also go up because Cletus can't lay off the cheeseburgers, Rhonda insists on roasting herself in a tanning bed, Harold won't control his diabetes and Tiffany won't wear her seat belt. If people are so concerned about smoking-related medical costs, why not funnel the $138 million into adequate and effective smoking cessation programs? Why not? Because that would be helping those dirty, stinky, scum-of-the-earth smokers!

People in our state who smoke shouldn't have to shoulder the burden of caring for our state's children. Shouldn't this be a responsibility of every citizen? Wouldn't it be more fair to add a smaller tax onto everyone's income tax, or maybe increase the sales tax for everything just a little bit?

Now I'm going to really get myself into hot water, but the very fact that I have to pay for all the uninsured children in this state pisses me off. Don't get me wrong. I would be the first in line to support nationalized health care--for everyone. But in our current system, there are people like my husband's older sister, who hasn't worked a steady job her entire life, despite any real disability other than extreme selfishness. She's popped out her two kids, who, due to neglect and the probable prenatal drug use they were exposed to, will need "services" for the rest of their lives until they finally end up in jail or in "the system" like she is. I don't think my money--from my cigarettes, my steady job, or the goods and services I am able to pay for because of my steady job--should have to support that. It's a difficult issue because of course I don't want to see a sick kid go without medical care; but it's also hard to pay for it when I know there are people out there like my husband's sister. I'd be more supportive if the money went to increase social services to help those who really want to get off state aid do it. I'd rather have my cigarette money go toward building homes--yes, orphanages--so that those children who are being neglected and being cycled through the wheels of the welfare system could at least have a stable life and a chance to grow up away from the constant personification of irresponsibility.

In the end, there's nothing I can do about it. I won't quit smoking, I know that about myself. The revenue from the tax hike probably won't even go to help take care of children. It will probably go to such critically important projects like this one.

I guess it doesn't even matter all that much. We're all going to die from global warming anyway. Unless someone comes up with a way to reverse it and the government actually starts giving enough of a shit to do something about it...and as long as people keep smoking long enough to fund it.

Just a Lil Note to LilCherie

2007-03-15T15:19:00.000-05:00

Hey...in my proofreading today, I found out this interesting fact:

Hypertension (high blood pressure) is THE major risk factor for cerebral hemorrhage.

Just thought you'd like to know.

Love ya!

Thanks Prednisone!

2007-03-13T03:50:00.000-05:00

So Bubba has caught something new right on the tail of his last cold. He came down with a runny nose Sunday morning but was spry and lively, so J. went ahead and took him on their previously-scheduled lunch date with J.'s sister, who needs a name because I'll probably be mentioning her here, but I'll come up with that later. Since the death of their parents in 2000, she and J. have been basically estranged because of all the shit she did while liquidating the estate. Stuff like stealing $8,000 from the estate to buy a car; forging J.'s names on checks; stealing furniture for her own house; not showing up at appointed times to clean out the house; etc. Anyway, she's fat, depressed and in therapy now like the rest of us and is reaching out to J. to mend fences, and J.'s on board with that, and I'm happy for them all but just don't see the point of getting involved in it myself. So I send J. off on these dinners and lunches with a smile but I am still protecting myself until I see more of how this shakes out.

ANYWAY, J. took Bubba with him for lunch on Sunday with his sister. His sister owns horses, so Bubba got his first up-close-and-personal horse experience, at which point we found that he has inherited J.'s mild horse allergy. So on top of the minor sniffles he was experiencing already, Bubba started sneezing a little and rubbing his nose like crazy. When they came home, Bubba was sleeping and when he woke up, we could tell he was sick. He had a terrible night Sunday. He had the most pathetic, scary, mucous-filled cough and would wake up gagging and crying about every hour or so. We had to do a nebulizer treatment at 3 a.m. I was so freaked out with panic that I ended up staying awake until 5 a.m. just monitoring the situation and Googling croup, pneumonia, tracheobronchitis and epiglottitis. I was determined that we would take him to the doctor yesterday, but then on Monday with my mom and dad, he seemed to be much improved. However, about half an hour after the doctor's offices closed and Mom and Dad left, he started crying about his ear hurting. Dammit! I knew I should have taken him to the doctor even though J. and Mom thought he "just had a cold." I am almost always right about Bubba being sick but because I'm also neurotic I sometimes don't trust it.

So yesterday I slogged through a day of work on three hours of sleep and also went to our great family oto yesterday to confirm my self-diagnosed sinus infection/bronchitis, which he did promptly. I love our oto. He gave me a brief, encouraging, "I know we can get you to quit smoking!" talk but then said, "That's all I'm going to say about it. I'm not going to make you feel bad, I just feel that I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't say something." One thing I really like about Dr. C. is that he actually sat there for a few minutes silently, reviewing my chart and actually thinking about what he wanted to do next. I admire that so much more than a doctor who just tosses off recommendations for tests and throws a prescription at you. Anyway, he did a nasal swab (my teeth are still hurting from this violation of my tender sinuses) and is culturing my "pus" to make sure I get on an antibiotic that will kill my 'crobes. Hey, that sounds just like "microbes." Cool. Until then I'm on the z-pack/prednisone combo. I'll be going in in two weeks so he can see what my sinuses look like when I'm doing well. There will probably be some allergy testing somewhere down the road, some feeble attempts at controlling anything I'm allergic too, and many fruitless attempts to get me to stop smoking before it all fails and I have to have surgery. But we're not that far yet--although I did predict at New Year's that "this year's surgery" would be my sinuses. We'll see! I just want some relief!

I love prednisone. It provides almost immediate relief of my sinus pain with the added bonus of being an upper that allows me to be up at 3:30 in the morning blogging like crazy. It also gives me the weirdest dreams, which I'm going to relate here whether you want to read them or not, because I like to have them documented and this is really my journal these days. But you don't have to read them if you don't have time; I understand.

Last night's dreams were very disjointed, but included a trip back in time to J.'s parents' farm. In the dream, his mother was already dead but his father was still alive. This is often the case in my dreams about J.'s family, possibly because in real life, his mother had been dying for two years with brain cancer while his father just dropped dead one night. In the dream, I was involved in looking after a little boy--I don't know whose it was--and we were just roaming around the barns and having fun investigating all the farm stuff lying around. When we went back into the house, J's dad mentioned something about how clean the house was, but I couldn't take any credit because I knew I hadn't had anything to do with it.

Another bit of dream that is sticking with me today is this: J. and I were at a doctor's office, standing at a metal counter/table thing. An anonymous doctor presented us with several eggs that looked like small chicken eggs, and apparently, these were my lost pregnancies. (In real life, the only pregnancy that I know I lost was Hope; but I also know that many women conceive and miscarry so quickly they don't even know it, which might explain our Great Pregnancy Scare of 1991). Anyway, we were given the eggs so we could crack them open if we wanted to and possibly find out more about the babies we'd lost. The whole thing was extremely distasteful and scary to me in the dream, but we went ahead with the first three eggs, which were each brown and just a bit larger than a robin's egg. They were just like regular eggs when we cracked them open. Relieved by this, we went on to to the last two eggs, which, in contrast to the others, were white. With much reluctance and hesitation, I cracked them open, and inside each one was a little, white blob that looked like a little poached egg. In the dream I was repulsed and put them down and pretty much ran away from the table, crying. I told J. "I didn't know this would be so hard." That was the end of that.

Then I woke up and started this entry, which I'm finishing now at 9:11 a.m. at work just so I can get it posted. I ended up working on another post that I will hopefully finish soon as well. It will be a busy day for me--I have a very minor, kind of silly part-time job I'm going to learn about in about an hour or so, then I have a therapy appointment later today, and in between I need to do some work (imagine that!) Hopefully Bubba will do okay at daycare--he seemed much improved again this morning and never complained about his ear again...but also was very clingy and crying when I dropped him off. So we'll see what happens. Like I told J.--do you ever have a feeling that your day is going to be a trial from beginning to end? I feel that way today. OH WELL!

It's 4 a.m. and nobody else is up so I have no choice but to ramble endlessly on my blog

2007-03-10T03:38:00.000-06:00

So we've figured out why men's butts stink. Now let's tackle another of life's mysteries: why does a simmering illness always become acute, or a new illness always present itself, after 5 p.m. on Friday and usually before noon on Saturday, when all doctor's offices are closed and you still have the majority of the weekend to survive?

Yesterday I came home early from work because I was just so exhausted. I laid down at about 5 p.m. and, other than a few feeble attempts, did not wake up until 2:30 a.m. today. As I was hacking up the chunky shit from my lungs that had accumulated over the past 9 hours, and blowing the chunky shit out of my nose, and feeling pretty much like I might pass out because I had been too fucking tired to even eat anything substantial for the past day and a half, I concluded that yes, my extreme fatigue, coupled with the chunky shit, probably meant I did have a sinus infection for sure and possibly a touch of bronchitis. Gee, it only took me a week to figure it out!

Obviously I had some kind of clue because yesterday, before I fell into a coma, I called our family otolaryngologist and made an appointment for myself because of the almost constant sinus issues I've been experiencing for the past six months (amazingly, I got an appointment on Monday!) And I called in my refills for antibiotics and prednisone, which I got that last time I had a sinus infection. So really, a doctor probably couldn't do much more, but damn! I'm sick of being sick on the weekend.

I had bizarre dreams during my fugue state. In the first part of the dream, LilCherie and J. were with me and we were carousing around Amsterdam and met this group of guys who were also from America and were touring the city and playing a few clubs with their band. They weren't famous or anything, in fact, far from it. Anyway, you'll know this was a dream because the totally hot bass player actually kind of had eyes for me and we were really attracted to one another. We flirted extensively with one another but it never went any further than that.

Suddenly, the bass player and I were at Nigel's Mom's parents' house in the U.K. She had this perfect life (imagine that!) and I was incredibly jealous. She was there getting married and I was there for the wedding. I was hanging out in the living room with Bass Player and my cell phone rang--it was my friend Pioneer Girl. I realized through the course of the conversation that she and Bass Player were actually an item and that they were going to be getting married. I was crushed! Bass Player continued flirting with me in a harmless way and I couldn't resist flirting back even though I knew it was a shitty thing to do, given his relationship with Pioneer Girl.

So...the wedding occurs and it's actually a double wedding, ostensibly between Bass Player and Pioneer Girl and my friend Nigel's Mom and her fiance, but of course in the dream they look completely different. I'm lonely and sad and just waiting to come back to the U.S. the next day, but still kind of sad about coming back because Nigel's Mom's parents' house is so perfect and happy and wonderful. During the wedding, there's a delay and they need someone to "entertain the crowd," so I end up doing this bizarre song and dance number about Christmas in front of the crowd. I notice a few little girls dressed in red, white and blue, obviously from America, and I say something to them in solidarity towards America or something. Finally the wedding occurs, we go back to Nigel's Mom's Parents' house, where I pack and count out my Euros to figure out if I have enough petty cash for the airport the next day.

Next thing I know, I'm in a car with J., heading for the airport, but he's not my husband. He's married to someone else. I say to him, "Do you really love her more than you love me?" He looks at me like he doesn't quite know what to say, like he's contemplating lying, and then lets his guard down and says, "No, I don't. Isn't it funny the choices we make when we're young?" I smile at him and we ride the rest of the way in a kind of friendly, wistful silence, wondering what could have been.

The general feeling I had when I woke up, and now two hours later, is basically one of sadness, lost opportunities, and jealousy, along with a dash of warmth because two men actually loved me or were attracted to me in the dream. The whole dream really took me back to the days of my youth when J. and I were really infatuated with one another. God, it seems like a million years ago. In some ways I feel starved for that kind of attention and adoration. It makes me sad to know that I will likely never feel that again in my lifetime, and because of my choice to marry the first man who ever showed an interest in me, I only got to feel it once.

The feelings J. and I have toward one another now are so much more complex. There's so much baggage attached to it all. All the shit we've been through--his parents dying, my surgeries, Hope--in some ways they deepen a relationship and in other ways they weaken it. You spend so much time just trying to save yourself that it's difficult to focus on the other person, and then the self-centeredness becomes a habit that's hard to break out of. And yet you feel incredibly bound to one another because of all the struggle you've shared. It defines your relationship in a way you never expected, and it kind of puts a cloud over it. When most of the seminal events of your marriage have been incredibly traumatic, the whole relationship seems locked in survival mode, rather than a higher place of love and respect. If that makes sense.

Yet there are some things that remain constant through it all. When I think of the time before I started dating J., when I first became attracted to him, the thing I remember first is sitting in the school library before school, his group of friends and my group of friends horsing around with each other. He made me laugh so hard and so much that I would leave after a half an hour with my face actually hurting. And through it all, I doubt there's been more than a few days here and there when he hasn't made me laugh, even during our darkest times. And I know deep down that I would rather have laughter than cheesy romance. I guess it's just human nature to want we don't have.

There have been three times in my life where I've felt that a dream of mine has actually come true, fully and completely. The first was when J. asked me out for our first date. The second was when I found out I was pregnant with Hope. The third was the day I gave birth to Bubba. When you really think about it, I'm pretty fucking fortunate to have had those three moments.

Help Me Choose My Glasses

2007-03-09T10:11:00.000-06:00

Okay, for those of you who don't know me, this might be a little more tough because you can't picture the face to go with them...but just keep in mind that I know this shape looks good on me, I just want to know which ones you think are the coolest!

Enjoying the moment

2007-03-09T09:22:00.000-06:00

Okay, brace yourselves....this will be a gushy, mushy post about my son. It's about time, huh?

Yesterday we had our first "parent-teacher conference" with Bubba's primary childcare provider, Christina. I put it in quotes because it seems so funny to have a parent-teacher conference for a two-year-old, but that's what they call it, and I guess that's what it is.

Anyway, Bubba got a glowing report. Really, it couldn't have been much better. Here are some of the comments Christina wrote on her report:

"Bubba seems to be doing great with separation from Mom and Dad in the mornings. Bubba does great with our schedule and is always excited to move on to the next activity."

"I think Bubba has a great sense of independence! He is able to play by himself and do things for himself, or at least try to. He has a great relationship with all of the teachers and children. Bubba is very kind to his friends."

"Bubba loves to try new things! He is always the first child in line when we get the sensory table out or get ready to do any new activity. He transitions well from one activity to the next."

We asked about Bubba's speech because it's one of those things we are just constantly worried about, and she said that compared to the other kids, he is well within the normal range. She said Bubba has a "ton" of words, it's just difficult sometimes for him to pronounce them, while on the other hand, some kids in his class can pronounce their words perfectly but don't have that many.

I also asked about tantrums, since that's an area we have difficulty with. She said he usually has one or two meltdowns a day, just like every other kid in the classroom. She also said he is a very happy kid and that they really enjoy having him in the room.

This caps off a week where I've really been enjoying Bubba a little bit more than usual. We began a couple new strategies this week that seem to be working well, for now anyway. When we do time outs, instead of having him sit in a chair, we have him stand with his face in the corner. When he was in the chair, he would just laugh at us like it was a game. However, he hates standing with his face in the corner with a passion, so we usually only have to do it for about 20 seconds before he's ready to listen and do what he's supposed to do. A side benefit of him really hating it is that we can threaten the time out and it actually alters his behavior. Score!

Another new strategy we've been using at bedtime is locking ourselves in the bedroom with Bubba. I think Aurelia suggested that--thank you! We lock the door, turn out the light and get settled, and then have minimal interaction with Bubba. Usually he jumps down and runs to the door, realizes it's locked, has a mini-meltdown and then comes back over asking to be put back in bed. Then he goes to sleep. Last night, he didn't even get down out of the bed, and didn't cry about bedtime. It was lovely! Our next step will be to get him a real-sized bed for his room and start the process in there. We just can't afford to shell out $500 for a new mattress set right now.

The last thing I only tried last night but it worked, so I'll be using it more to see if it has staying power. He decided to play with his cars rather than read stories, and when it got time to go to bed he didn't want to stop. I happened to have the alarm clock right there so I set it to go off in five minutes and told Bubba that when he hears the buzzer, it's time to put the cars away and go to bed. I reminded him a couple times during the five minutes, and when the buzzer went off, he looked up kind of startled, grabbed his blankie, and ran to the bedroom. It was like magic. I hope it keeps working.

Beyond the discipline stuff, he's just been fun this week. I noticed that he no longer says "Meese" anymore and now says "Please." He also learned "Okay" this week and uses it all the time, and it's just so cute. He likes to sit with me on the couch while he watches his movies, and he puts his blankie over me and says "Share!" The other day I was on the phone with my sister and he obviously didn't want me to be, so he came over and said "Ma all done talk." Last night, the weather was finally nice enough to go outside for awhile so we all went out and took a walk, saw the neighbor's dog, and played with the foam swords and the ball in the backyard. When we were getting ready to move from the front yard to the back yard, he started saying goodbye to everything. "Bye stick! Bye tree! Bye sky! Bye Randy's house! (our neighbors)." It was just so freakin adorable!

I've been going to bed with him a lot this week, mostly because J.'s been out doing things at bedtime and I've been really tired (still trying to figure out if I have a sinus infection, bronchitis, or what), and in spite of all the struggling to get him to settle down, it's kind of nice, because when he's just about ready to fall asleep, or when he's waking up, he'll stroke my face and say "Hi Ma," in this really soft, lovely little voice, or he'll come over and want to snuggle.

It seems like he is going through a "growing up phase" where suddenly, this week, he seems a lot older. It always makes me a little bit sad because I feel like I haven't really enjoyed the time up to now. I mean, I know I tried my best at the time, but in retrospect my memories always seem very blurry, very vague, and peppered with a lot of the struggle rather than the joy. I think I will continually be striving to "enjoy the moment." I think I have something to learn from Trish on that.

For right now, I am enjoying the moment. It might change tonight when we are fighting with him to get his jammies on or trying to force some food down his throat, but right now, I feel all warm inside and happy and proud of my boy. I love how friendly he is to other people (the other day, he got wanted me to roll the window down in the car so that he could say "Hi!" to some anonymous person riding a bike right next to us). I love how he really knows and loves members of our extended family, including our friends -- he is obsessed with a little photo we have of LilCherie and her family, and last night when I made the mistake of speculating out loud about how we should go to the cabin with them, he got all excited and started saying LilCherie's son's name over and over. He wanted to go right then! I love how every time I'm on the phone, he says "Tingle?" (well, not actually Tingle, but her name, which she probably doesn't want me to reveal. But it's very cute the way he says it), or when he looks at the photo we have on the door from when we went to Cleveland he says "Di-so-bows" (dinosaur bones) and then says "Unc-Tingle's husband's name?" I love how he calls me "Ma." I love how I end up doing ridiculous things for him, like running around while he chases me with a sword and then yelping when he gets me, or dancing like a dork to the Doodlebops song because he has commanded "Ma dance!"

There have been times when I've thought, oh my god, we still have 15 more years before he leaves the house! Then there are other times when I think, we only have 15 more years with him until he leaves the house! I hope we make those years fun ones. I hope we don't screw him up too bad. I hope he'll want to come back once he does leave. And I hope he'll still call me Ma.

Why Men's Asses Stink So Bad

2007-03-07T14:25:00.000-06:00

Inspired by Tingle's comment on my last post, I decided to put a few theories out there. Here are my thoughts.

Why Men's Asses Stink So Bad
1. They're too lazy to wipe their butts adequately after a dump.
2. After they take a dump, if not interrupted, they sit there for an average of 25 minutes reading a magazine. I posit that during this time, poo particles crust onto their skin and are not removed due to the inadequate wipe, which leads us to....
3. Later, rehydrated by the man's sweat, the particles release themselves into the underwear, causing the all-too-familiar skidmark and emitting that familiar odor of butt.
4. They purposely cultivate a little shitgarden down there just to annoy us.
5. They're too lazy to actually bend over or use soap in the crack area during their 30-second showers.
6. More hair down there (see #2 --ha ha, get it?--of this post.)
7. It helps them recognize each other in the wild.
8. The jalapeno burger for lunch, the Triple X chili at the Superbowl Party, Tabasco sauce on everything, the strange desire to prove to other men that they can eat something that's really hot...it adds up.
9. Moist farts.
10. Their ability to go an entire weekend without showering or shaving--and still leave the house and carry on with their normal business--even when they are completely healthy.
11. It's a diversionary tactic to try to get us to stop asking them about their feelings.

I know you all must have some good ones to add to this list. Let's hear 'em!

Just Another Post of Bitching About How Shitty My Life Is

2007-03-06T05:26:00.000-06:00

I've been trying, really trying, to be compassionate and understanding. It's what my therapy is all about these days, and for awhile it really seemed to be working--my relationship with J. really seemed to be on an upswing. I felt hopeful and optimistic. Then J. got depressed and it seems all the progress I thought we made went out the window.

I still want to be a compassionate person, so I'm still trying. But damn, it's hard. I've been sick, more or less, for the last two weeks and still, J. has done little to nothing to help out around here. A few examples: While J. worked Saturday morning, I watched Bubba and did all the laundry--at least five loads. It got backed up waiting for things to dry so when J. came home I asked if he could keep it going. This meant he would need to dry and bring up two loads of laundry. Nope, he didn't do it. I even had to rewash a load yesterday because it had gotten sour. I didn't complain or bitch. I just did it and stomped around so he'd know I wasn't pleased. He didn't even say he was sorry.

The only other thing I asked him to do this weekend was clean his shit stains out of the toilet on Saturday before the babysitter (that he'd hired so he could go to the casino with his friends while I did Girl's Night) came over. Said he would; I ended up doing it Sunday night.

Awhile back, I nagged at J. about a hundred times to not leave his meds right next to the edge of the counter where Bubba can get them. Finally, I had to tape a bright orange sign on the counter next to his meds saying "Please Place Meds Away From Counter Edge." Now he's good about that, but he leaves lighters all over the place. So now I've had to nag at him a million times not to do that, and he still does. Today I found one on the floor next to the couch. I suspect it fell out of his pocket, but jesus! We have a two-and-a-half-year-old for crying out loud! On a similar note, yesterday Bubba grabbed J.'s razor off the counter and tried to "shave" with it. No harm done because I caught it in time, but now this is something new I'll have to yell at J. about. He does shit like leave the computer charger plugged into the wall but not the computer, so if Bubba happened to find it, he could easily electrocute himself. This is ridiculous. I should not be the only one thinking about Bubba's safety.

J.'s cell phone does not work properly. This is kind of a sore spot anyway, because when he got a cell phone (about 2 years ago now, I think) he decided he must have the new Razr phone, even though it cost him like $200 or something when he'd just borrowed $300 from me because he couldn't make ends meet. He also got it from a different provider than I have, so we can't call each other for free (he did this because of their "awesome" deal on the Razr.) Then, not too long after he got it, it began malfunctioning. Many times, it doesn't ring, so he doesn't know if I'm calling or not. I also cannot leave a voice mail message because J. has never gotten around to setting up his mailbox. So I can call and call and call and he may or may not realize I'm calling. At least 50 to 75 percent of the time I cannot reach him. Yet he still doesn't go get it fixed or replaced. Plus, he doesn't answer his phone at work if there's a customer in his office. So if there ever was a real emergency, my chances of reaching him are at around 25 percent.

J. is the primary user of our car, since I often ride the bus when the weather is halfway decent. The thing is like a garbage can on wheels. Old bags of fast food, empty cigarette boxes, lighters all over the place, the miscellaneous sock here and there, half-filled sippy cups full of old milk. It stinks and it is disgusting. I've cleaned it out myself many times but it ends up like this in a matter of days, and no matter how much I complain it does no good. And, in fact, Sunday night he bitched at me for leaving a shopping bag of stuff in the back of the car, which had been there for exactly 7 hours.

Likewise, his room--which I've talked about here before--is such a disaster that I can't sleep in there anymore, and I've told him this, but it makes no difference.

My dad actually had a discussion with me last week about how he notices that J. doesn't do a damn thing around here and that he was getting disgusted about it and wanted to give J. a piece of his mind. I managed to thwart that from happening, since I know it won't do any good, but I don't blame him. My mom and dad come out every Monday to watch Bubba, and dad almost always does some shit that J. should be doing, like taking back the recycling or doing yardwork, and J. just lets it go again. Even my dad is getting frustrated with it. To top it all off, whenever my parents do something around the house, J. gets embarrassed and says "they really shouldn't do that stuff. Tell them not to do that stuff anymore." Well, I'm not going to tell them, because I need some fucking help around here! I don't have the time or the energy to clean the entire house, do all the laundry, do all the grocery shopping, do all the cooking, watch Bubba AND clean the garage, take back the recycling, clean out the car, mow the lawn and shovel the walk.

I don't know how to deal with this. I've set him up with a therapist. I think it was helping him, even though a lot of their conversations seemed to be about movies and music; but recently he decided things were going "so well" that he would wait to make the next appointment. It's been about three weeks now and he hasn't gone. I pretty much forced him to see a psychiatrist and cajoled him to take medication, which he now does willingly...but it's just not enough. You have to want to change and it takes a little bit of goddamn effort. I'm really disappointed because things were going so well there for awhile--and now I realize that it wasn't a real change, just another upswing on the bell curve that is our relationship. I find myself wondering if I could have done better. I find myself wondering if I would be better off now if only I had had the self-esteem when I was younger to be able imagine that someone else could find me attractive. Now I pretty much assume that if we get divorced, I'll just be single forever...and truthfully, that doesn't sound so terrible.

Well, I guess I've just written another post "bitching about how shitty my life is" as J. would say. To keep with my earlier promise, now I will try to think of something funny or lighthearted to post. Okay, this falls into the category of dark humor...which happens to be my favorite category. I hope you find it as amusing as I did.

My bus friend, Martha, was telling me that her elderly father died in January. He was an asshole, so she was pretty much okay with it and relieved. Anyway, she said it was apparently a bad week in his town, because the funeral home was hoppin'. When she went there to find out when her father could be cremated, the funeral home director said: "Well, since you're not having a visitation or anything...we might be able to squeeze him in."

Damn.

2007-03-02T13:16:00.001-06:00

J. just called with the devastating news that Nate won't be able to make it tonight. He is writing a paper and it's not going as well as he'd hoped and he has to get it in by the end of the day--like midnight--tonight. I'm still hoping he might get a burst of inspiration, get it done, and be able to come over...but it's not looking good.

I'll probably still make chili.

Sigh.

Like Chili (or Lasagna?) for Chocolate

2007-03-02T09:03:00.000-06:00

Today I decided to take the day off. It's snowy, windy and cold; my
sinuses are really congested and I'm blowing chunky shit out of my nose; I have a touch of the diarrhea; and, frankly, I just needed a day at home by myself and this is the only way I'm going to get it! Obviously, I don't feel 100 percent, but I feel well enough to enjoy a little time to myself.

The good news for the day is that Nate is coming over tonight to play videogames with my husband! Yesterday, I asked J. if he had anything fun planned for the weekend. He said no, so I said "Why don't you see if Nate wants to come over tomorrow night?" He teased me about my Nate-lust and then said it did sound like a good idea. Nate got back to him this morning and said he'd like to come over. Oh, joy! I told J. on the phone that I was kind of feeling weird now because J. knows about my lust. J. responded, "C'mon! It's your dream double team, isn't it?" Or something like that. I'm glad he can have a sense of humor about it. I just find it better to upfront about stuff like this, because I'm a terrible liar and trying to conceal anything from J. feels very wrong to me and infringes on my enjoyment.

So....anyway...I'm planning to make a lasagna to feed my men tonight. I always have some anxiety about fixing food for someone I don't know very well. I don't know that I've ever met someone who hates lasagna...but still, I'm always worried that I'll make the one thing they can't stand and then they'll feel like they have to eat it. Many years ago, when I was fresh out of college and working at my first "real" job at a smalltown newspaper, I had to interview a woman who had won an award from, I believe, the Egg Council or something, for her breakfast casserole recipe. Yes, this was worthy of a feature story in this town of 1500 people, most of whom were related to one another.

Anyway, I get there for the interview and she sits me down at the table and brings out a steaming dish of her award-winning egg and sausage creation. Now I abhor eggs. I hate them. I hate the way they look, I hate the way they smell, I hate the way they taste, I hate the boogery texture of them in my mouth, I hate the fact that they are pooped out of a chicken. I once stopped eating pancakes for an entire year because I found a microscopic piece of cooked egg white peaking out from inside of one. It's almost a phobia.

What did I do? I briefly contemplated telling her I had an allergy, but she was just too sweet. So I snarfed it down as quickly as I could to get it over with and tried not to be too obvious about the fact that I wasn't chewing much and was drinking a lot. I'm still scarred. I never want anyone to feel that way in my house, so I really do my best to serve stuff that usually has universal appeal, rather than breaking out the Mexican Meatloaf or any kind of casserole (those often gross me out, too, unless I've made it and know what's in there).

I could also make chili; I have a really mean veggie chili recipe that has won universal raves when I've served it at potlucks and such, and what man doesn't like chili? I honestly can't think of one; can you? Let me know what you think--lasagna or chili? Which dish better says "Please come back and visit us again so I can feast my eyes on your hot bod, laugh at your sexy sense of humor and fantasize that my awesome cooking will just make you lose control and fuck me?"

I'm such a freak.

Laugh and the World Laughs With You

2007-03-01T20:29:00.000-06:00

The other night, I read some of my wittier, in my opinion anyway, posts from this blog. He listened half-heartedly and when he looked like he was about to fall asleep I stopped and then we fought for awhile about how I wasn't being "understanding" enough about his depression. Anyway, he made the comment that "all your blog is is bitching about how shitty your life is."

I've kind of been thinking about that lately and while I don't totally buy it, I do believe I need to sprinkle in some more lighthearted or funny posts here and there. In an effort to make this blog more enjoyable and maybe even improve my own mood, I am committing to attempting to include a funny, lighthearted, cute or otherwise warm and fuzzy anecdote with every post. Unless, of course, the post itself is funny, lighthearted, cute or otherwise warm and fuzzy, in which case that would be redundant. Or whatever. You know what I mean.

As part of my job, I encounter a lot of names. Not as many as a telemarketer or a salesmen, but a goodly amount. A few years back, I decided to start keeping a list of real names that were really funny. My husband got on board awhile ago because he also encounters a lot of names in his line of work.

My criteria for the list is simple. Is it someone’s real name, and is it funny? If so, it’s on. Even just a little chuckle counts. I’d really like to post it here but I’m afraid someone might Google themselves and find me and boy, that would be great, huh? Plus, someday I might publish a bathroom reader of funny names and I don’t want to give them all away here, right?

But I will tell you the one my husband sent to me today. I feel okay putting this one up because it’s the first two initials, coupled with the last name. I can put it out there without feeling like I’m compromising someone’s identity.

B.J. Belcher.

J.’s comment on this name was “ick.”

Just so you don’t think I’m a total bitch, I did have a really difficult, embarrassing last name when I was growing up, so I have enough karma built up that I can make fun of people’s names with impunity.

The Considerate Smoker's Manifesto

2007-02-27T23:16:00.000-06:00

Day before yesterday, I was standing more than the required 25 feet from any doorway and smoking a cigarette while waiting for the bus. I purposely stationed myself as far away from any human activity as possible--away from the sidewalk, away from any buildings, away from the bus stop.

About halfway through my cigarette, I notice a frumpy woman walking down the sidewalk in my direction, and she clearly has me in her sites. She comes right up to me and says, "I'm not sure you are aware, but this is a smoke-free campus."

I am aware that the campus soon will be smoke-free, as our office has been involved in publicizing this change, but I also know the campus is currently still smoke-full.

"I believe the change is not going into effect until April 2nd," I say.

"Oh, you're absolutely right. Well, good luck!" she says brightly, and continues on her way.

"Um...thanks?" I say after her.

This woman is obviously very psyched about the no-smoking policy, so psyched that she can't wait another five weeks for the power trip. Someone this psyched would HAVE to know that the policy was not yet in effect, so I figure she just assumed I looked like someone who didn't know about it. Or maybe she just figured that people who smoke can't read.

I particularly enjoyed the "good luck" she tacked onto the end of the exchange. This comment provoked a real moment of esprit de l'escalier (for those who are not familiar with this term, as was I until about a month ago when it came to me via dictionary.com's Word of the Day, this is a great expression that means 'In the original it refers to that infuriating situation in which you leave a drawing room and are halfway down the stairs before you suddenly think of that devastatingly witty comment you could have made.') At the time I just threw out a half-hearted, questioning "thanks" because I couldn't figure out why she was wishing me good luck; upon more reflection, I realize she probably just assumed that I would soon be attempting to quit in order to be in line with The Policy. Silly woman.

Anyway, here's my "esprit de l'escalier" -- the witty comment I should have made.

"Good luck!" she said brightly.
"Oh, that's kind of you...it'll be tough, but I'm sure I'll still be able to find somewhere to smoke after the policy is in effect!"

I wish I had some kind of a badge or a certificate I could show proving that I am a Considerate Smoker. I understand that not everybody wants to breathe my smoke. I understand that there are many people who do not participate in my love affair with the burn in the throat and the rush of nicotine in the blood. Therefore, I do my best to be a nuisance to no one when I am indulging in my vice. Usually I smoke on the top floor of the parking ramp next to my building, because there are very rarely people there and it's the top floor--i.e., no roof and lots and lots of ventilation. I never smoke next to a door or a window, and try to remove myself several feet from sidewalks and other thoroughfares so people will not have to walk through a cloud of smoke. If I see someone coming and it looks like they will intersect with the mushroom cloud, I hold the cigarette down and do not exhale until they are out of range. If I'm in a smoking section of a restaurant and there are kids there--even if their parents are smoking up a storm--I usually refrain or seriously limit my puffing because of the guilt factor. In the summer, I even have a fan placed on my screened-in porch to blow the smoke away from my neighbor's house just in case they might catch a whiff when the wind is blowing that way.

Yet I know this doesn't matter to the Smoking Police. It seems that in the crazed puritan/public health/big brother war on smoking, the message has gone from "smoking is bad" to "smokers are bad." (By the way, I hate the word "smoker" because it labels a person as their bad habit. I prefer "people who smoke. But sometimes it's just the easiest word to use, so I've had to relax my rules here. We smokers are rule breakers anyway, you know.)

Yes, in general, we smokers are a surly bunch. I mean, why do you think we're smoking? We've got issues, man! Do you think we enjoy being ridiculed, discriminated against and looked down on? C'mon! Do you think we'd choose to be smokers? No! We were born this way!

Seriously, just because a person smokes doesn't mean he or she is the antichrist. It doesn't mean we are horrible people. You can still be friends with us. We won't try to convert you. Chances are, we don't even smoke in our own homes, so you can come over without being subjected to it. And, chances are, we have some interesting shit to say. Ever notice that at a party, everyone ends up hanging out with the smokers (or, if they aren't, they're the ones nodding off on the couch?) There's a reason for that. We're fun!

Usually, the Smoking Police legitimize initiatives like the smoke-free campus by calling it "a public health issue" or because of their overwhelming "concern for smokers." As far as the public health issue argument goes, I highly doubt that my cigarette, smoldering by its lonesome, outside, more than 20 feet away from any person, is as dangerous as the black clouds of exhaust coming from the back of the fifth bus that just pulled away from the stop. It seems to me that this kind of zealous enthusiasm would be better spent lobbying the government to require smaller, more efficient, "greener" cars, or working for greater production and use of clean energy sources. Likewise, if you're going to rag on my smoking, then make sure you don't stand too close to bus stops while you're at it, or walk through a parking ramp.

The "concern for the health of smokers" argument is especially bothersome. First, it's patronizing. Please don't be concerned for my health when I'm not! Secondly, it's bullshit. If they were that concerned about other people's health, they'd be reprimanding every person eating a Big Mac, having an alcoholic drink, riding a bike during rush hour or trying to raise a toddler.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not proud to be a person who smokes. I wish I'd never started and sometimes I wish I had the inner fortitude required to quit (more often, I just give in and enjoy it, sorry). I admire efforts to prevent kids from starting and to help people who want to quit succeed. I just get pissed off when it becomes more about a power trip than anything else.

Things That Would Be Awesome

2007-02-27T22:39:00.000-06:00

*To come home to a clean house after a fun evening out with my niece.
*To not have to smell the trash when I walk in the kitchen.
*To be able to walk to the bathroom without navigating Wedgit land mines on the floor.
*To be able to go bathroom to pee (after my fun evening out with my niece) without having to pull my pants back up and go out to the car to retrieve the only toilet paper we own, especially since I asked my husband to bring it in three hours ago before I left.
*To come home after my husband has been responsible for our son all night and see some kind of evidence that they did something, anything, besides sit in front of the television.
*To look in on my son and see that he had been put in his pajamas before bed rather than left in his clothes.
*To see him in his pajamas and then know that he had been lotioned before bed--especially since his eczema is flaring up and especially when I've had email correspondence with my husband about this specific topic earlier in the day.
*To have nights like this be an anomaly.

Have you ever seen The Shining?

2007-02-26T03:08:00.000-06:00

My weekend bore striking similarities to the good old Jack Nicholson movie, except for the fact that unfortunately my house is much smaller than the Overlook Hotel and Danny Torrance is a lot quieter than my kid (and not half as scary).

Most of my predictions came true. I was sick. Bubba was kind of sick. LilCherie’s boy really was sick. Girls’ Night was cancelled. The worst winter storm of about 30 years descended upon us and we lost power for a total of about 8 hours. Luckily, four of those hours happened after Bubba was asleep. Of the other four hours, approximately two of them were spent trying to explain to Bubba that the TV was “broken,” that there would be no “Thomas mooo-ie” or “Cars dee-dee-dee (DVD),” that there were, in fact, other fun things to do in the house besides stare at the idiot box, and in the end, just listening to him sob, yes, sob, about the lack of television. At risk of boring you, dear readers, I feel the need to describe my weekend in a little more detail, to purge it from my memory in the hopes that this weekend will be repressed in my memory and that there won’t be too much in the way of PTSD fallout.

For your skimming convenience, I’ve labeled each section so you can skip.

Bitching About the Weekend In General

Friday Night
Typical night; storm starts slowly with just a little rain/sleet mix.

Saturday
5 a.m.: Bubba’s up, therefore we’re all up. My left ear and the left side of my throat are killing me.

7:30 a.m.: We set out early to keep our commitment to be research subjects for a friend of J.’s, who is involved in a study of TENS. J.’s appointment is at 8 a.m. and mine is at 9. We get set up in a physical therapy student lounge that is complete with comfy chairs, a massage table, and a life-size model of a skeleton. Bubba and I had a great time with the skeleton. He wanted to shake hands with it, which was really cute.

10 a.m.: When we leave the building, there is a thin coating of ice over everything with more coming down. We get home without too much trouble and hunker down.

11:30 a.m.: My cold-turned-ear-infection-and-sore-throat gets the best of me, and Tingle pisses me off by making fun of my saggy tits, so I give up and take a long nap.

3 p.m.: I awake to what sounds like someone scraping a very heavy snow shovel across the roof above our bedroom. I stumble out to the living room to find the house quiet and J. and Bubba napping together on the chair. Still looking for the source of the sound, I venture out to our back porch and see that the branches of our tree are so laden with ice that many of them are hanging about 8 feet lower than they should be, and the hellatious wind is whipping them across our roof—thus the otherworldly noises that woke me up. More ominous are the branches that are sagging across the electrical and phone lines running into our house. Soon, the noises wake J. up—Bubba, thankfully, remained asleep for another hour and a half—and after whacking the branches with a machete to no avail, heads out into the storm to buy a set of tree nippers to take down the branches.

Approximately five minutes before he returns, the power goes out—not due to our tree branches but instead a neighborhood-wide issue. J. trims the tree to avoid any further issues and we set up house with candles, flashlights, and some tunes on the radio (before the radio stations went out, that is). For supper, we enjoy a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli, slow roasted in a cake pan atop a contraption designed to heat a pot of coffee with a small candle. I was really kinda proud of that idea.

4:30 to 6:30 p.m.: “I wanna watch Car moo-ie! I wanna watch Thomas dee-dee-dee! Mease! Meeeease! MEEEEASE!” Sob, scream, cry.

6:30 to 8:30 p.m.: We decide to build a fire in the fireplace downstairs, and Bubba finds this fascinating which thank god distracted him from the TV issue. We’re actually having fun by the time the power comes back on. As soon as the lights come back on, Bubba runs for the stairs yelling “I wanna watch Bob mooo-ie!”

8:30 to 10:30 p.m.: We put on the damn SpongeBob DVD and hope against hope that Bubba will fall asleep without a fight. Nope. Finally goes down after the usual crying and numerous escape attempts.

11:20 p.m.: Bubba has coughing fit; pukes all over himself. Change jammies, change bedding, squirt cough medicine down crying mouth; peace is restored.

11:30 p.m.: Power goes out again. J. and I, desperate to salvage some sort of enjoyment from the day, stay awake for awhile; I draw by flashlight while J. watches a DVD on the computer (yes, I know…we didn’t break it out for Bubba because we didn’t know how long the power would be out and we knew if it pooped out on us in the middle of the dee-dee-dee it would be worse than not having it at all.)

Sunday
12:30 a.m.: I cuddle up with Bubba and go to sleep.

1:30 a.m.: Bubba wakes up crying for Daddy and physically pushes me from the bed. I rouse J. off the couch to come sleep with Bubba and I curl up in my own bed.

2:30 a.m.: Bubba wakes up, jumps out of bed and runs around the house sobbing, having “one of his fits” as J. calls them (I’ve since diagnosed them on Google as confusional arousal episodes. Which you can’t do anything about. Just another fun thing he will supposedly grow out of.) After about 10 minutes he is subdued and the house is quiet once again.

3:30 a.m.: According to my bedside clock, this is when power was restored. I didn’t wake up for it.

8 a.m. to 1 p.m.: The ice is gone and now we just have rain interspersed with sleet now and then. Ear and throat still killing me, and I have a headache. We lounge around and have a decent morning, even though I have to force myself to work through my pain to do dishes, multiple loads of laundry and make lunch because J. is apparently going through a lazy mode lately and is basically doing jack shit around the house. We all watch Wizard of Oz, which Bubba quite enjoys, then switch over to Gone With the Wind, which he tolerates. He is practically falling asleep at his little table so we decide it’s nap time….

1 p.m. to 2 p.m.: Bubba will not go down for his nap. He cries, he screams, he demands a “krabby patty with cheese” and insists he’s hungry (not surprising, since he ate no lunch) so we make him a peanut butter sandwich only to have him refuse it. After half an hour of this nonsense I decide enough is enough, Bubba WILL take a nap. I spend about 10 minutes in the bedroom, physically restraining him to prevent him from crawling out of the bed. He yells, screams, cries and thrashes about. Finally I lose it (I believe the words “Fuck it!” escaped from my mouth….possibly followed by a crazed “Can you say that, Bubba? Can you say fuck it?” as I stomp to the kitchen). I blame J. for Bubba’s awful sleep habits; he blames me for not stopping him from doing them. He finally gets Bubba down and I go to my happy place—i.e., sleep—for the next three hours.

5 p.m.—present: Not too horrible. We ate, watched the Oscars, I did laundry, we didn’t even attempt to put Bubba down, opting instead for letting him play until he drops and then letting him fall asleep in J.’s arms, which happened at about 10 p.m. At 11 p.m., Bubba wakes up and comes out for comfort. At 12 a.m., he demands that J. come to bed with him, and that was the end of my day with the family. Now it’s 2:30 a.m. and I’m not tired at all. And tomorrow’s Monday.

Bitching About Bubba's Sleep Issues
Bubba’s sleeping is completely out of control, and I don’t really know what to do about it. I don’t understand how to do the “crying it out” method if he just keeps getting out of bed as soon as we put him in it. I mean, there’s not even enough time to get to the door before he’s up. When we’ve become desperate enough to hold the door shut so he can’t get out, he screams and cries so violently that he starts gagging and coughing like he’s going to throw up. Eliminating his nap does nothing to prevent the bedtime struggles and nighttime awakenings. We’ve adhered pretty strictly to our “soothing bedtime routine” of jammies, quiet play, brushing teeth and stories for months until recently, when out of desperation we’ve pretty much been doing anything to prevent the nightly struggle.

Bitching About Motherhood Overall
You know what? I’m sick of being a mother to a toddler. I’m sick of catering to the needs of a tiny tyrant all goddamn day. I’m sick of preparing meals he won’t eat, I’m sick of cleaning petrified corn kernels off the floor, I’m sick of sitting down only for Bubba to ask for more juice, more milk, for me to fix his train, get him the orange car, put on the Bob movie. I’m sick of listening to another human being cry multiple times every single day. I’m sick of being sick, of him being sick, of trying to figure out whether or not he’s sick and if so, whether or not he needs medicine, or whether or not he needs a nebulizer treatment, or whether or not he needs to go to the doctor. I’m sick of reminding J. to lotion Bubba’s skin and to take the yellow blankie back to daycare and to limit Bubba’s juice so he doesn’t get the shits. I’m sick of refilling humidifiers and cleaning nebulizer parts. I’m sick of watching SpongeBob and playing with Thomas the Tank Engine. I’m sick of trying to figure out how to get him to sleep.

I feel overwhelmed by the whole thing. I feel like a child myself, wishing that someone would swoop in like a fairy godmother-nanny and say, “Depressionista, it’s going to be all right now. I’m here to take over everything. I will raise your child to be an intelligent, well-adjusted, productive member of society and all you have to do is pop in now and then—and only, of course, when Bubba’s in a good mood.”

I’m sick of feeling inadequate and not up for the challenge. I’m sick of feeling guilty about not enjoying this and bewildered at people who seem to truly get some kind of pleasure out of raising their children. I’m sick of feeling like every time I complain about Bubba I am tempting the fates to take him away from me, or that I am betraying the sisterhood of women who are infertile and/or have lost a child.

When does this get fun? Ever? Or is that just a carrot people dangle in front of us so we won't kill ourselves? Because a lot of the time, it's just pretty unbearable, and I find it difficult to believe I did this to myself.

90 percent chance that I'll need to get sloshed this weekend

2007-02-23T10:33:00.000-06:00

How did Friday get here so fast without me posting at all? I think it had something to do with...
Monday: Bubba returns home with the sniffles.
Tuesday: Bubba has bad cough, stuffy nose, mild fever...a really nasty cold. I stay home with him all day and enjoy lots of cuddles, along with the occasional spray of spit and mucous as he sneezes on me. About three hours into the day, I hear some mild whimpering and come out of the kitchen to see Bubba sticking his tongue out at me. "Tongue hurts!" he says. "Owie....kiss!" Throwing caution to the wind in order to comfort my son, I kiss his tongue, then move swiftly out of his line of vision to rigorously wipe my mouth. Tuesday night I meet my old work spouse for cocktails. I have two of my new favorite--the chocolate martini--then bend Tingle's ear while I sober up enough to drive home. I fall into bed shortly thereafter.
Wednesday: Bubba still really sick. J. stays home with him. I start feeling not-so-great that afternoon. We take Bubba to the doctor at 6:30 p.m. and get the official diagnosis, which is: Bad Cold. At 9 p.m. I fall asleep next to Bubba. I wake up the next morning sick and still in my work clothes!
Thursday: Bubba's getting better; I'm getting worse. Wait for my mom to come out to watch Bubba on his last sick day at home, then get a ride to work from LilCherie, who is in town to get a massage. That was so nice! Later she comes and takes me to lunch, which was also lovely. All in all, other than the cold, not a bad day. I rallied yesterday evening and J. and I watched "Little Miss Sunshine" which was AWESOME. I felt bad that the title put me off of it for so long.
Today: Woke up feeling like a small rodent had crawled into my mouth and died during the night. Lots of congestion. Extreme fatigue. Managed to get myself to work and here I am...being really productive as you can see.

So that's my week. It looks like the gods of illness and weather are converging to ruin any chances of a Girls' Night this weekend, as LilCherie's little guy is now down with a fever and runny nose, etc., and we're under a winter storm watch from now until Sunday afternoon, with phrases like "ice pellets" and "90 percent chance of precipitation" and "ice accumulation of up to a quarter of an inch" in the forecast. Looks like it will be a weekend full of runny noses and temper tantrums...and that's not even counting Bubba.

I better get to the store this evening before the big storm and stock up. Hopefully there won't be too much of a run on cream, chocolate syrup, and creme de cacao.

If only I were five years younger, beautiful, single, thin...you get the idea

2007-02-19T19:55:00.000-06:00

I was up until 4 a.m. and still managed to haul myself out of bed before 11 a.m. this morning, all by myself! And, I'm feeling pretty decent, which is also unusual and pleasant.

It's a veritable heatwave in Iowa today. My morning smoke on the porch was actually enjoyable! We're at 43 degrees already. What a relief.

Over the past two days, I've been nursing a crush on one of J.'s friends that I met for the first time on Saturday when he came over to the house for the guy's night that turned into a party. J. warned me before he came over that he was "pretty good-looking" and that he was going back to school for "literature or something like that" (turns out he's studying to be an English teacher). I joked with J. that I couldn't be responsible for my behavior in this situation and that maybe he'd better think twice about having him to the house, but J. decided to risk it anyway.

He was the first to arrive, and I immediately saw that he was not "pretty good-looking" but, in fact, downright HOT. He looks like he's about 27 or so but is actually 31 (thereby making it possible for me to fantasize about him without feeling like a pedophile). He has close-cropped reddish brown hair and a nice scruff on the face. He has a soap opera name...man, I wish I could just write it here but oh my god if he Googled himself and found this he'd probably never come back to our house, and we do not want that to happen. So let's just call him....Nate, since I've always thought that name was sexy.

Nate's one of those people, like another friend of ours, Don, who we say "has the vibe" -- the irresistible combination of boyish charm, bad boy rebelliousness, and confidence that is like a, well, for lack of a better term, chick magnet. Unlike Don, this guy didn't have an asshole component, which made him all the more attractive.

It's been awhile since another man (or any man, really...let's be honest) had the effect of actually giving me a...physical reaction...just from looking at him. Nothing outlandish, now, but certainly a "fire in the loins." Not only is he physically attractive and engaged in the study of one of my favorite things--words--he also was completely laid-back, funny, and easy to laugh at my jokes. When everyone else was giving some pretty lackluster responses to my favorite party game , which is Let's Ask Fun, Embarrassing and/or and Difficult Questions to Get to Know Each Other, he was enthusiastic and into it. "Keep asking the questions, I wanna hear what you've got," he said.

As an added bonus, he "got into a lot of trouble" when he was in high school and early adulthood--minor stuff like getting into a fight or stealing something small--and has spent a night or two in jail. Hot, I tell you!

He brought my husband three books to read. Poetry by Leslie Marmon Silko; The Death of Vishnu by Manil Suri, which includes the phrase “In a fevered state, Vishnu looks back on his love affair with the seductive Padmini and wonders if he might actually be the god Vishnu, guardian of the entire universe,” on the back cover; and Bel Canto by Ann Patchett, which includes the review “the most romantic novel in years” on the back. I mean, could it get any better?

Well, it turns out that it could. He spoke freely about how he lost his virginity and how he once had sex with a “voodoo chick” in an empty church. He was funny and ribald, two of my favorite traits in a man. I was so smitten that I ended up using him as the muse for one of my erotic drawings, as well as a semi-depressing poem focusing on the fact that I'm old, fat, and ugly, and that my chances for getting this kind of action are pretty much completely gone for good. I'll include it here for your reading pleasure:

Middle Age Crush

When the first bird began chirping at 6:34,
I was sketching you in crayon and Sharpie
From memory and imagination.

You crushed me with your grin as you looked at my yearbook.
I was amazed at how swiftly you knocked me back to 15 years old and lip gloss and initials sunburned into my skin,
And how that made me feel every one of my 35 years more sharply:
Every extra pound more burdensome;
Every scar more sad and used.

In two days your energy will dissipate.
In four, I’ll laugh at my foolishness.
But this morning I picture you sleeping,
Your whiskered babyface drooling on the pillow,
And I just long to be next to you,
To bask in your adoration for just one night,
To feel the thrill of a longing fulfilled,
To be restored to what I might have been,
To be wanted for who I am.

I have been known to occasionally lust after someone on the bus or a group of college guys working on construction sites during the summer. But when the combination of attractive physicality mixes with my favorite things like humor, a sense of naughtiness, a willingness to reveal oneself and be interested in others’ revelations, and an appreciation for the written word, well, I honestly can’t fault myself for turning into a junior high school kid again.

It’s fun and only slightly painful. Do any of you have secret (or not-so-secret) crushes, or am I alone in my freakitude? Inquiring minds wanna know.

This is why moms need breaks

2007-02-19T03:11:00.000-06:00

Depressionista's Helpful Hint of the Day: When blogging in the middle of your frigid living room, keep a hot rock nearby to warm your typing fingers. It works like a charm!

Status Report: Possible PMS as indicated by libido level (high), tolerance level (low), zit category (nasty, oil-filled hideous bumps, or "under-the-skinners" as LilCherie and I call them) and distribution (big nasty on the chin and two more along jawline). It would be a little soon, since I just had a period a month ago, but every once in awhile my body throws me for a loop and does something the way it's supposed to.

Bubba spent yesterday to today at my sister's house, and is spending tonight at my Mom and Dad's (they all live in my old hometown). I had grand plans to organize my clutter, be creative and finish the next chapter of Sex and the Silos, change all the sheets, make a little scrapbook for Bubba, maybe even have sex...and I accomplished none of it. Instead I got together with some friends, have been reveling in the quiet, puttering around, and pretty much doing whatever I want, including pulling all-nighters and sleeping all day. For some reason I love the middle of the night, so whenever I am left to my own devices, my sleep schedule flip-flops to the exact opposite of what is necessary to be a productive member of society. I've decided to not spend the time worrying about the next day and instead enjoy it until I get tired and deal with the fallout later. Luckily, except for going in for a one-hour meeting in the afternoon, I am taking tomorrow off since J. has it off for President's Day. Bubba will return somewhere around 3 p.m.

I miss the little bugger. I know, I know...I complain about him all the time here and then when he's away for a day I talk about how much I miss him. What can I say, I'm never happy! I think it's just easier to remember what you like about your child when he or she isn't screaming "THOMMMMMASSSS MOOOOOOVIEEEE" in your ear.

I know I don't mention it here nearly enough, and I don't remember it nearly enough in real life either, but we are so incredibly lucky to have our Bubba. When I have the peace to stand back and look at it, I realize how much I am learning by being his mother, and how much more I need to learn. It's odd to think of Bubba as my teacher, but he most definitely is. And the toughest one I've ever had. It's even harder than algebra II.

While he is often a holy terror at home, I take solace in the fact that he is most definitely charming, which I think will get him out of a lot if he keeps learning how to work it. Almost every report we get from daycare says "Bubba had a wonderful day!" or "Bubba was in a great mood!" Everyone who sits for him is amazed at how "easy" he is. I can already tell that the study of people is going to be a lifelong hobby for my son, who takes every opportunity to interact with others, adult or child, family and friends or strangers. When we started riding the bus when he was just about two, he became the personal greeting section of the bus, waving and saying "Hi!" cheerily to every person who came down the aisle. At the park or--much to my inner germaphobe's chagrin, at the doctor's office--he goes right up to whatever little kid happens to be there, sticks his hand out in a kind of reaching wave, and throws them the cheery "Hi." If he's rested and not sick, he will even share his toys without prompting.

Because I can never enjoy anything without worrying about it, I worry sometimes that he is too outgoing and will someday be a) abducted, b) hurt by rejection (well, who isn't, I guess) or c) is exhibiting the signs of some kind of social interaction disorder. But after I give each fear its obligatory 10 seconds of anxiety, I can step back and see how adorable this side of his personality is. I think the thing that really tugs at my heart is that you can tell that he just assumes that everyone is his friend, and god, that's sweet!

He also is such a demonstrative little guy. He will play a game with me where I give him a kiss and then I say his favorite phrase, "one more time?" and he kisses me again and I keep saying it and pretty soon we're just smooch-smooch-smooching as fast as we can. Other times he will just cuddle up with me and as we nuzzle each other he will say "Awwwww," in his cutest voice and tilt his head over to the side and smile. He'll also give me a hug just about every time I ask...but only as long as I say the magic word "please." He's a stickler.

He must have all ouchies kissed which amuses the hell out me, especially when they're on his butt. He finds certain parts of his favorite movies hilarious, and will bellylaugh at Shrek and the freaky scarecrow on Bob the Builder. The other day, J. farted in the bedroom and Bubba said, "Daddy poop!" "Did Daddy poop his pants?" I asked. "Yeah," Bubba said with feeling. "Daddy poop...potty!" Clearly, although he hasn't mastered it for himself yet, Bubba is realizing that poop goes in the bathroom.

Now if I can just teach J. :-)

Thank god I have family members who love my child so much and want to spend time with him, and family that he wants to spend time with (he was so excited to go yesterday that he barely could stop long enough to kiss me goodbye). It's been wonderful having some time alone and I'm still enjoying it, but I am looking forward to getting a hug and a kiss tomorrow from my Bubba.

Anger, Part II

2007-02-19T01:02:00.000-06:00

First, thanks to Nicole, Aurelia and Vixanne who commented on my last post. I appreciate your support and the thoughtfulness of the comments so much. I found myself thinking quite a bit today about Vixanne's question of why I lurk around on infertility/loss blogs and boards. I don't do much on the boards anymore--I broke my addiction to SHARE a few months ago--but I still can't help but search out and read people's personal stories of their journeys through loss.

Like Vixanne said, it is like picking at scab, and at first I couldn't come up with a good reason why I do it. As I thought about it though, I remembered the words my therapist has uttered so many times--"it's coming up for a reason; to be transformed." I think because I haven't been able to come to terms with the anger, because I haven't been able to transform it into anything positive, it needs to keep coming up, and I facilitate that by seeking out things that will do it for me. The problem is that I don't yet have the tools to transform it. That's what I hope I will gain from therapy and from my own internal reflection.

Vixanne commented that "I can't really imagine that it happened to me." I really have been feeling this way a lot lately. I look at Hope's photo on the bookcase and her little urn and it seems so surreal, so unreal. My life has changed in so many ways since that day in 2003. In the course of two years, I went from infertile to pregnant to grieving to infertile to pregnant to mother of a living child. I met Tingle and we walked together through some of the worst of our grief. I watched LilCherie's son grow into a little boy and stood by as she lost her dear grandma. I got close to divorcing my husband and am working on rebuilding our relationship. All of those events were (are) impacted in one way or another by my experience of having and losing Hope, a lot of them in positive ways--but it remains stunning that it was me who laid there in the hospital that day losing my child. Sometimes I feel like I am fighting against the part of me that tries to protect my psyche from damage, the part that wants to bury the trauma and not let me access it anymore. I need to be able to access it, not only because it's my daughter and I have a duty to her--not to dwell in a mire of pain, but to remember--but also because there are riches there that are mine if I am courageous enough to keep going back to get them.

Anger

2007-02-16T12:05:00.000-06:00

Have you realized yet that I am kind of an angry person? I mean, not all the time, but often. Anger is a big part of my personality, my reaction to things. It's one of the main things I'm working on in therapy.

But I am angry right now, this minute, about losing my daughter, and about how I lost her.

The anger surrounding my daughter's death has been the single-most intense and lasting emotion from that time. Yes, I think, even greater than the love I feel for her, although it's hard to admit that. I know that the anger is so great because the love was/is so great, but it saddens me that this is the emotion that is still hanging in there.

It pops up rather unbidden. I lurk around a lot on infertility/loss blogs and sometimes that triggers it, but usually what triggers it even more is the story of the "miracle" that I didn't get to have. The 11-ounce baby who lived, the woman who actually got some treatment when she went into premature labor and now has her child.

I work for the major university in my state and that's where I went for care. I've written a bit before about it. I work in public relations for the health colleges here. From 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., I'm supposed to trumpet the amazing, cutting-edge research, education and clinical care that goes on at this university, and I do it, all with a bitter taste in my mouth, because I know the reality of this place. I know my reality of this place.

I know there are people who get their miracles here. Recently, through the course of my work, I became aware of this woman. She got her miracle (so far; she's still battling the cancer, of course). As I sat in our staff meeting I wondered...how is it that this woman from North Carolina can have a tumor half the size of a golfball on her cervix, end up here, and end up with a healthy baby, when I, an employee of this place, a PR person nonetheless, went in with a much more common complication of pregnancy and left with nothing but a bereavement envelope?

The whole truth of my experience here on June 9, 2003, is that I could have stayed at home. That is honestly the true amount of help I got from them. The only thing I got from this "cutting-edge" facility that I couldn't have gotten at home was two shots of Nubain.

If I had stayed at home I wouldn't have had to hear the minutes-old healthy babies crying in the rooms around me.

If I had stayed at home I wouldn't have had a nurse hand me a bedpan when I told her I thought I might be having the baby. "It's probably just a bowel movement," she said. "The only doctor here is in a c-section. These babies are so small, sometimes they just come out so fast that nobody can be here when it happens," she said.

If I had stayed at home I would have held my daughter during her 9 minutes of life, instead of being told there was no heartbeat. Two hours after her birth, when signing the birth and death certificate information for her, we saw that the birth and death times didn't match. That's how we found out she'd lived, if only for a few moments and if only by the most technical definition--a heartbeat. Apparently, it was not important enough for them to tell us. I can only hope they didn't lie to me when they told me a nurse held her the whole time. I can only hope she didn't live her few precious moments on this earth lying alone and naked on a cold metal counter.

If I had stayed at home, maybe, just maybe, when my contractions stopped at 2 p.m. that afternoon, they would have stayed gone for a week and a half more, and my cervix may have stopped opening for a week and a half more (like it did with my son), giving my daughter a chance at life, instead of being coerced into hurring up "the inevitable" with a drip of pitocin.

If I had stayed at home, an ignorant and arrogant nurse would not have told us that our child was a boy, in spite of our doubts and our repeated questions for confirmation. We would not have named our son, we would not have cremated our son (complete with a Star Wars t-shirt that was my husband's when he was little and a letter to "my sweet boy Jack William" that I tucked alongside her little body), we would not have dozens of cards in our child's scrapbook expressing sympathy for the loss of our son.

I am angry that I didn't get to see a licensed doctor for four hours after I came the hospital bleeding. I am angry that nobody did a damn thing to even try to save my daughter. I am angry that I didn't get any drugs to stop contractions, that I didn't get even an attempt at an emergency cerclage, that I didn't even get compassion from most of the people we dealt with that day. I was just another woman losing just another fetus. Just another day at the "premier" health care institution in my state.

How do I come to terms with this? Yes, I've made progress since that day. I've gotten very good at pushing it into a part of my brain and heart that I refuse to let myself access most of the time. I won't say the anger has diminished because I don't think it has; I think I've just gotten really good at burying it and staying away from the grave because I couldn't function otherwise. Feeling that anger could be a full-time job. A lifetime isn't long enough to feel all of it.

At home, I have a little treasure chest my father made for me when I was 12 or so. A year or so ago I cleared it out and filled it with the papers, medical records, and audio tapes I made from phone calls with my OB and the head of the OB/GYN department, things I gathered when I was consulting with lawyers. Every so often I am tempted to listen to them, but I instinctively know that I cannot endure the pain of them. I know hearing the endless suffering in my voice would unearth that grave full of seething rage that I have worked so hard to keep covered.

On our answering machine, we have three messages. They all begin the same way. "Um, Depressionista? Um...." And that's all I hear because both J. and I skip past them every time we're clearing it out. But we save them, and have saved them for almost four years. They're messages from my old OB, calling to tell me the results of the genetic tests we had done on Hope. I don't think they say much, other than "The results are in, please call me," and stuff like that. But neither one of us can bring ourselves to erase them. It somehow would feel like erasing our daughter. Those messages prove that she lived, and they prove that we forced a doctor to think about that for at least a few minutes.

I hope we show up in her dreams, my daughter and I.

I hope we show up in her nightmares.