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We have to be thankful everyday... bleeding stubs and all?
Emptying it all out, I pray this all is for a reason that is real.
Date: 11/14/2017 9:33:59 AM ( 7 y ) ... viewed 929 times Am I just getting the jist of life? That everyday I have to suit up, go out there in this world to meet every smiling face, and act out of every smiling face has a dagger behind its back? Including my own family? Seems to be that way as I reflect.
Not one surviving sibling came to my mother's funeral. Out of 5 remaining from 8, only I was there. Only I managed, paid, saw to the details.
Yesterday I deleted their phone numbers from my mobile. I am protecting them and myself from any angry lashes I may feel justified to distribute.
Two of the four did come to the funeral of my son over a decade ago - and that was the last they came to me.
I did force myself on one sister when my husband demanded a divorce. She bought new furniture with the rent I paid each month. I was fired and then laid off twice in the year. I could barely hold employment - but work I must.
I realize in the years that sister took in my mother she in turn saved enough to buy not one, but two homes.
Interesting. As I was sobbing yesterday after I deleted their numbers I realized the big picture of the actual numbers.
My mother died warm in her bed. My mother was fed good meals. My mother did not have strangers being mean to her at her most vulnerable. My mother did not have me at her side. I delivered the very same care to her as she delivered to me after my son had died. I could not do more. I tried. 2009 when I cooked Thanksgiving dinner for her and gathered her estranged grandchildren around her. I believe 2 of 16 showed. I knew in that moment I could not be her caretaker. It was three years since my son had passed and I knew I was barely surviving. I could not hold us both up. Not in that dark, dingy apartment. Not with the television going every waking moment. I knew that every day would be a fight to not feel as though I had become the biggest failure having lost my son and my husband divorce me in anger that I was "not normal".
So, two of her three sisters lived nearby - they said they were taking care of her. This, in 2003 when I secured an apartment for her near me 250 miles from them. She declined my offer to be a part of my newly-wedded family and her grandson's life. She spent the last years of his life in front of her telly.
When he passed and I needed her, begged her to come - she did not. She could, she advised, come in three weeks. She had a birthday party to attend and could not miss it.
And my sister? Well, tropical islands thousands of miles away called to her. What should she do, she asked? Should she move in with me as she had offered just days earlier, or take this new job offer 3500 miles away? What could I say? I need you? Help, I am dying? No. Go. Please. Just, go.
One month later I was in the hospital for suicidal ideations. Involuntary commitment for a week to ensure my safety.
My then-husband made my meals for a week. Then, it was up to me to get on my feet and get on with life. There was "nothing wrong with me". I "should make a gratitude list daily". Understand that "God has a plan in all of this". I should "have faith in God's Will". Damn it, my stepkids and husband "needed me". I needed to make their meals, clean their house, do their bidding, bring home a paycheck - without so much as a conversation heart-to-heart as to what was happening, what had happened, how we were going to "do this", how things had changed.
Green popsicles.
Why were there only green Popsicles in the freezer?
Well, those were the ones (He) ate. But, now he's gone.
And cream cheese.
Why is no one eating the cream cheese I am buying?
(He) liked cream cheese. We don't. We never eat cream cheese.
Water bottles.
The water bottles are all coming back home. They're all here. Is no one using them?
No, it was (He) who would always lose (His). (He) could never remember where (He) had left it, or even that (He) had brought one.
That was the extent of our "family" conversations. All the others? Well, those were reserved for when I was not home. My grief, well it was uncomfortable. It scared everyone. It was too big, too overwhelming, too much. Not normal. Just go away - you and "all that is going on there". Just. Go.
Afterall - he's got his boys to think about. This isn't right. It is not okay that they should be subject to my never-ending grief, my seemingly endless insomnia, my waking up wailing and sobbing or worse, screaming (His) name when I did sleep. I would whimper, even cry in my sleep, I am told. No one should be subject to this - well, not after the first 6 months it was implied.
When will my wounds, my stories, just go away?
When will these stories just dissolve?
Never.
They are a part of me. They are the ruts in the roads I once called my relationships.
I was thinking yesterday: When was the last time I did something "social" with someone? When did I go out to eat with a friend that I actually liked to just "have fun"? 8 months? Yes, I think it has been since March.
And date? When was the last time I had been on a date? I think - 2010, maybe? 6 - 7 years.
*sigh*
So, this morning I woke. Panic basted my brain. My life - what a mess. Ever since I started taking meds - 2013, my life had remarkably gone downhill. I had stumbled considerably in July 2014 - just angry and it began to come out. I've been tumbling and rolling and finally to a grinding stop in June of 2017. For four years I have been trying to manage my anger, confusion, and utter despair as I simultaneously try to educate myself and rebuild this life.
Funny thing is this: I cannot remember waking more than once in a week and surely never, ever two days in a row where I felt like I am happy to be alive, that I have strong, faithful hope for my future, and that I have every confidence in myself.
I cannot stand myself. I am trapped in this body and am bolted on this planet to perform this task that I simply do not understand the rules of engagement of. It is truly like a vice tightening on the sides of my head and I must get out of bed to pretend another day.
What happened? There were 7, maybe 10 weeks in 2010 when I felt hope, clarity, and Light within. Now make no mistake - there was sheer panic for the future and terror in my vulnerability. Yet, there was something Lit in my core that I recognized. I was walking an hour every day, I was raw vegan, I was attending AA faithfully. I. Was. Beautiful. Like a Sprite. I really was. I was also very, very afraid.
Then, he came back and I let him in. After all he had done to me. It was all my fault that he had. "Any guy in his position" he had explained. And I took him back. I had a chance to somehow get my family back, my stepsons, my memories of what used to be. Someone who was a part of those memories that I would give my own life for to relive, to be a part of again. My son. It would bring tangible pieces of my son back to me.
And, give my very life I did.
It makes sense to me now, why I did that. Why I took that man back not once, but twice. I would give my very life to bring my son back in any way I could, to bring my family of 6 back together - even if the 1 I loved most was never coming back.
What prompted my writing this morning was that I dreamt about the four boys last night. Vividly. They were in a car driving away from me. (He, #2 in age of the 4) was driving, #3 was next to him and #1 and #4 were in the back seat. They were doing what teenage boys do - driving in a car going to have fun somewhere.
I remember #3's smile. He was always smiling, that one. He's the one most angry with me as well. He dislikes me now so intensely that I fear for my safety sometimes.
He's a hunter. He also had a standoff with the State Police to the point where the state highway was closed down. He had a rifle he hunted with. His girlfriend called the police. He was threatening suicide.
But, coming from the political family he does, no charges were brought and there is not one snippet on the internet about it. There was in the month that followed. But, his uncles took care of that too. Ahhh, money and privilege will wipe the slate clean. Now, what if - just what if we were allowed to talk as a family after (He) died? Would that young man have been so bottled up with rage? I don't know. I just don't know.
All I am told is this: I was the problem. If I had only flown right, grieved after 9pm in the privacy of my own room until 10pm, and then joined my husband for a restful night's sleep until 5am - then, made a gratitude list before I left for work and went about the business of serving others joyfully all day - none of this would have happened. None of it.
None. Of. It.
Do you know what I heard every day, all day long? Stories of happiness. Mothers, children, grandparents - all chirping about their lives in events, celebrations, milestones and the festivities that marked those stories.
Those powerful uncles? Well, the very first Christmas dinner - the toast was celebrating the memory of "those who have left us, specifically (and I quote) Dear, Old Dad." Yes, 10 months after my dear son's death we toasted specifically by name the passing of "Dear Old Dad" who had died more than a decade earlier. My son's name was not mentioned once. My husband did not stand to mention my son's name, my mother sat there in silence. I died, again. The best I could do? Engage in the bullshit flirting my husband was dishing out at the table. Yes, my husband - best he could do was sexualize dinner. My mother on my left, he on my right, his sister across from us. The best I could do? Just play along. What I wanted to do? Call everyone out - this entire charade, the roles being played, the terror and sadness that was being ignored - managed, even. Yes, managed. All without words. That was the beauty of it all. No written script, no verbal direction - but sort of a shove with silent expectations was always, always present.
I shamed myself, lived beneath myself in principle - just to play along. My life was surrounded by imbeciles as I was corroding from this inside. And, then to take the entire blame for it all - including that table conversation with my husband. Oh yes, all of it. My fault, my doing, my evil nature.
This is how deep the blame goes. This is what it was for me when dressing daily was beyond my comprehension.
My rage, my explanations of what I needed to survive - it was all met with the exasperation as though I were speaking Russian. I'm sorry - what? Family counseling? What? What? I can't hear you. What?
What?
What?
Fast forward to November 14, 2017.
I sit here in my life and I ask - What?
What? You want me to - what?
What do you mean - find something I enjoy and "just do it"?
Find something I "enjoy".
Does anyone not "get" that the very synaptic path was dissolved?
Does this world not "get" that?
The very cells, the transmitters, the chemical soup of my brain, the actual function -
dissolved, long ago.
Yes, like speaking Russian to my own brain now.
The memory of "enjoyable", the sensation - it does not carry over. Like the long-term retention function has truly dissolved from this life through this experience.
I took Benzo's for one year and lost my trained profession. Lost part of my mind, my self, all I fought to regain - just so I could enter a room and bear the conversation of familial bragging. Yes, that's right. That is what it took for me to stand your world one moment longer - just to feel like I wasn't being stung by giant jellyfish in every conversation.
Now, it's amphetamines. ADHD/Inattentive, I've tested off-the-charts for. I quit high school three times. Could not function in class, could not study, get homework done. Screams from the alcohol/tobacco drenched mother - "Do your work, goddammit!!!" Weekend thrills, as she worked second shift. She did work days, after I left home. Lovely.
And sister? Well, Dad took her to the coast to live and if I "wanted to go, well then no one would go." Again, well done you. Dead 30 years and I still feel it. ADHD, I am told. Brain does not complete the firing mechanism to complete the job at hand, so grief does not resolve, executive functioning cannot form, maturity - well, basically that of an 8 year old at times.
But, this pill, this *pill* will help.
And, it does - to be fair. Not a straight path to Emerald City, but I can at least find relief in solutions that I could not formulate not matter how hard I tried. It is like my brain, all our brains really, is a maze. At certain junctures the doors open that the flood gates let it all pass through. In ADHD brains, those gates will not open. The force of the oncoming flood of synaptic firing slams against that gate and it forces the current back from where it came as though it were water rushing. Not dissimilar to atopic tachycardia, in nature. I've studied the heart, the brain, worked on neurology for over 4 years (over 9,000 actual work hours, thank you very much) - and I've lived in this body with this brain for over 50 years. I know.
I did not want to power walk, as I know I must, this morning. I am geared up. I decided to write down my dream of the four boys that I had last night. It turned into this.
I love my son. I love my step sons. I miss them dearly and painfully. They drove away from me last night in my dreams. I am to put my gear on and go power-walking for two hours in the frigid late mid-autumn temperatures under the gray sky, and face the equally tepid wind and loneliness. The pattern of my failure, the seeming inability to get on my feet, the waning enthusiasm as to why I must, and the very absence of inspiration to do so.
So, I write. To empty out. To somehow, with the faintest of hope, one day create the magic space and miracle moment that the dam will break and all will be made right again.
My takeaway? I was never so happy, so full of faith, or closer to my Creator as when I was raw vegan and power-walking an hour every day.
What is a power-walk, you might ask and how is it different from running or walking briskly?
Full-range of motion, swinging arms when bent at 90 degrees and the stride with the legs stretching at fullest length possible in both directions, all the while the spine is stretch at its fullest upward out of the waist and shoulders back.
That, my Love is a power-walk.
Looks crazy as hell - but oh, you should see it all dressed up afterward. I was truly Lovely then. Angelic even, dare I say. Never closer to my Creator than then.
Enough, now.
Off I go - off I go to find Her again. This time, I pray I hold on to Her longer than 7-10 weeks. I pray with all my might that I do.
xoxo
Came back to plant this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu9a29UR2dU&app=desktop
Turn. It. Up.
Loud.
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