A jumble of truths.
February 5, 2010
I want to say something meaningful.
Something big and deep and thoughtful and… POSITIVE.
I’ve been mired in negativity this past week – this sense that everything is going downhill and that things aren’t going to turn out okay.
PMS is a bitch.
But more than that – the fears that I have that my life isn’t going to get on track.
That I’ve signed up for this long and hard journey with Nick, that these positive hopes and dreams that we’re having together aren’t going to come to fruition.
I have this great, wonderful husband who, because of complications in my life is having to put off starting his own family and buying a house and moving forward – and he’s not putting any bitterness towards me about it. He’s being wonderful.
And I have this daughter – this love that is totally encompassing – who can drive me crazy and make me pull my hair out – but at the end of the day makes me happier than any human can make another human… and I’ve put us all in this terrifyingly scary position of Change.
Change isn’t bad.
But change that you aren’t in charge of.
A destiny that you don’t have much of a hand in – well, that’s terrifying.
How can I feel so guilty and so angry and so blessed? All at the same time?
Guilty that I’m asking this of my daughter. Nick is a grown man and made his decision as such. But Abbey doesn’t have as much say in the choices she has – oh, she has more than enough say in the choice of which of the two to pick – but she wasn’t in on the discussion of the types of choices she was going to choose from.
How do I ask her to choose between not great and not great? Especially when I KNOW being with me is the best choice for her future – if not the most comfortable and happy NOW.
I don’t like change either!
And I’m angry. At myself. At the weight I’ve become. At this letting go of myself in these areas that I had always prided myself on before. Where did it go? That pride? That sense of self?
I can’t blame it all on the ‘well-meaning’ comments of the men that love me the most. They knocked me down, for sure, but only I can keep me down. And I have. Why? The distance? The futility of this never-ending court case? The changes coming?
I’m not sure. Which makes me angry.
I’m making the decision to put my family in this situation and that makes me angry.
I’m angry that my knees and back hurt. Angry that Nick brought me a small hot chocolate. Angry at my father for telling me to avoid sodas. Angry at looking like a blueberry in the shirt I’m wearing today. Angry that I don’t automatically get custody because I’ve spent all these years taking care of Abbey and her business and it’s just The Right Thing – and yet I have to fight to prove that to someone who can be taken in my Ben and Melissa’s big brown eyes and emotional plea for their rights.
What about Abbey’s rights?
Her right to understanding? Her right to say no? Her right to have her own opinions and voice them? Her right to speak her mind? Her right to grow up without the racial prejudices and stereotypes that keep her father’s household prisoner? Her right to learn AND CHOOSE about love and God and faith and relationships without the yelling and worrying and ugliness that comes along with emotional immaturity? Her right to HAVE rights in the first place?
So I’m angry.
Angry and guilty and it’s mashing together into this overwhelming ball in my guts that just waits for the conclusion to this most recent battle.
Good or bad, it’s my fault.
MINE.
So there are ups and downs.
On one hand I’m carrying around my self-made concrete albatross of guilt and anger.
On the other hand I’m overwhelmingly happy with the love that I’ve found and my child and my life. I’m blessed in that. In our good health. In our finances. In our family. In our emotional maturity and the ability to talk to and have fun with one another. I’m blessed that Abbey can have privileges that I provide for her – so many families fight for that. I’m blessed that I have the parents I have, that have given so much. I’m blessed in my dogs – they are healthy and crazy and wonderful.
And I’m blessed in my husband – a man I respect and love in a way I never thought possible.
I suppose this is being an adult.
Being a human.
I can’t protect my daughter from Life.
Wouldn’t want to – she needs to learn and I make a good home base on that particular playing field.
I’m scared of losing this.
Scared of what it would mean to Abbey.
Good or bad I want it to be okay for her to make choices and learn from them.
I want her to know that there aren’t any good or bad religions or races – but good and bad people.
I want her to have freedom to find her own way, to be who she wants to be and to aim for HER dreams. Not someone else’s dreams for her.
And I think I’m the only way she’ll ever get a chance to do that.
I’m fighting a battle I cannot lose – and only a 50/50 chance of winning.
God, please bless my family.
Please watch out for my daughter during this time.
Please strengthen us so that we can get through this with as little hurt and fear as possible.
And please help us to choose the right path.
And please, please make sure Abbey is okay – REALLY okay – through this all. I love her. So much.
Amen.
And sometimes Tuesdays are Mondays instead.
February 2, 2010
Today is one of those days where it is taking EVERYTHING IN MY POWER not to run screaming from the building.
A bullet point kind of Monday.
February 1, 2010
- From Marisa on www.notquitebettycrocker.com: “My mom once told me that I’d know I was a grown up when I didn’t see anything but gray. I thought she meant hair, but no, she meant life.”
- On Carolyn Hax’s column in response to a father that feels the need (and right) to comment on his daughter’s weight gainto try to “help”: “Does this college-educated 22-year-old need you to tell her that most fast food has a lot of calories and bad fat? That without exercise, her body probably won’t burn all that energy? Does she need you to tell her that unburned food will be stored in her body as fat? Does she — or anyone, for that matter, with even semi-fitted clothing and a mirror — need you to tell her she’s getting fatter?
At face value, you’re calling her fat. If she digs, she’ll see you’re calling her stupid.” - “At fourteen you don’t need sickness or death for tragedy.”
– Jessamyn West
The same for 13, I’m learning. - From the ShopGhoulieGirls Etsy shop:
I don't know either.
Progress.
January 28, 2010
I didn’t listen to the State of the Union last night.
I had no intentions of doing so and was in bed by 8pm.
The truth is…
I don’t think the President can be that effective in the changes he’s trying to make – changes that I agree with – as the plan currently stands.
There has to be a starting point and well… moving the mountain isn’t necessarily the best starting point to choose.
For one, you have to gather workers to help you move the mountain. Then you have to motivate them to move it. You have to have a plan to give them to help them help you move it. And you have to have a plan on how to feed them, provide shelter for them, etc. while you’re moving said mountain – after all, it takes more than a day to move one and your workers WILL have to eat.
Then. You have to coordinate that food. And the shelter… and you keep coordinating with people and plans until you’re down to the smallest of details because without those details in place, the mountain CANNOT be moved.
So. My point is, why not start by moving a rock, just to show folks it can be done? Get a little positive karma on your side – after all, it couldn’t HURT.
You see… We’re living in a country where you can’t MARRY someone of the same sex but many times you CAN add them to your health insurance policy. The insurance companies and businesses are trying to avoid cries of discrimination but the States are advocating it?!
And where a married man and woman can work themselves to the bone and not be able to carry insurance for their own health because it’s too expensive or too much of a pain for their company to even try to deal with. And if they’re self-employed or have some major pre-existing condition… such as needing Prozac for anxiety, FORGET it.
After all, what insurance company would want to risk insuring someone that took the time out to see a doctor about a problem, was then prescribed an anti-anxiety/depression pill and TOOK it, of all things, before it turned into a more serious dilemma? That irresponsible uninsurable person!
Even still… We’re living in a country right now that has basically had its ass kicked by the economy.
Your average Joe might be worried about healthcare, but HIS healthcare. Not mine. Not yours.
He might be worried about how YOUR healthcare is going to affect his finances… but not whether or not you can get help by going to your local family practitioner.
For him, it may be just that simple.
In short, Yes. I see the mountain.
It’s there.
It’s blocking my view and everything.
It bothers me every bit as much as it bothers you.
I want that mountain moved.
I would like it moved now.
I just can’t quite figure out how to get to the mountain to start pushing with all these stupid rocks in the way.
Power of Suggestion – Illogical suggestions.
January 27, 2010
Power of suggestion has always had way too big of a hold on me.
If you suggest a certain meal, more than half the time the suggestion will sit in my mind until I’m drooling over something I wasn’t in the mood for before that conversation.
The mere mention of things, both good and bad, songs and stories, stay with me for days – sometimes forever.
Worries more so than anything – I’m a paranoid person by nature, worrying about everyone I love and wishing that I had the power to protect the ones I love from anything that could go wrong in their lives.
I can’t.
But I worry about myself too.
And when I started getting sick this week I discovered a new paranoia and a new part of being married.
The Baby Phenomena.
Logic would tell folks that with my husband and I being separated the majority of the time that getting pregnant is somewhat low on the probabilities list.
However, when you’re a newlywed, apparently probabilities don’t matter that much as Every Single Person close to me has asked me ‘Are you PREGNANT?’ when I’ve mentioned my nausea.
Including my husband.
What? He’s been there every single time I thought of… eating Jello.
So, surely he knows… just how much Jello I’ve had and the odds of that… Jello making me sick.
Right?
But, apparently, if you’re a newlywed, a female and sick – that is The Most Logical Cause.
I’ve been home a week from Minneapolis and the paranoia had begun.
A visit to the grocery yielded chicken soup, applesauce and pepperoni.
The smell of frying potatoes almost sent me outside to hide.
But, this morning I woke up feeling very differently, a little silly, and completely glad that I know this about myself and don’t have to worry for the next two weeks.
You know.
As long as someone else doesn’t mention it again.
Runneth over.
January 22, 2010
I don’t talk about this much.
Not out loud.
I lost a friend during my wedding.
It started long before the actual official losing and I’m still not sure why.
I lost someone I love very much, who knows me about as well as anyone.
I hurt that person unintentionally during my busy day and for that I’m incredibly sorry.
The reason behind the hurt makes sense logically and emotionally but the continuation and holding on to that hurt/anger does not.
So. That hurts too – that it seems such a small thing to throw away a friendship that has lasted more than half of my life.
That I’d hoped that person would know that I would sooner step in front of a bus than hurt her intentionally.
That that doesn’t matter stings.
Right now that person apparently has some changes going on in her life.
They’re not mine to speak of, but knowing that she neither cares nor wants to hear from me seems. Wrong.
It hurts.
So, I’ll say here, because I can’t say it anywhere else.
I love you, Les.
I love you like a sister.
I’m so glad that these changes in your life are bringing about happy things and that events in your life are happening that you never really thought would.
I wish all of you – the entire lot of you – the very best.
And I hope you know that no matter what, you can always come to me.
My Spoonful of Sugar.
January 21, 2010
I stare at my rings a lot.
When I was dating Nicholas, I’d walk through with my soon-to-be Sister-In-Law (Lots of hyphens, yo) and we’d try on costume jewelry designed to look like incredibly gaudy rings.
It was a bit of fun in our frustration – our guys hadn’t caught up yet to the very bit of knowledge we were already in possession of – they were stuck with us.
But we tried them on and laughed and had tons of fun.
And as our relationships got more serious we tried on real rings… and laughed when the salesperson thought WE were getting married.
But now it’s real and concrete and sits on my finger with the beautiful band that I chose to go with it and it shines at me.
It’s beautiful.
And surreal.
I am a married woman.
My decisions and life is now tied to something more than just me.
Not more important or bigger or the beat-all-end-all… but something MORE.
I’ve spent the past week in Minneapolis visiting with Nick – a treat, as that’s the longest visit I’ve ever had up there and the only visit that he’s ever taken off days to spend with me.
We had a moment or two, but for the most part it was like sitting in a comfortable armchair.
Every part of me can relax around him in a way they haven’t around anyone else. The tense insecurities may still exist, but when I curl up next to him at night I feel at HOME.
That’s what I miss when I come home to Mississippi.
Oh, I could tell you the bad things that happen. We’re both so stubborn and we aren’t used to being around one another so there are misunderstandings and expectations that don’t get met. I’m a night person (who’s turning into an afternoon person as she gets older) and he’s a morning person that thinks every morning would be complete with a few hours of exercise beginning starkly at 6am. Because he’s insane.
I lounge in bed while he bounces off the walls complaining about not leaving the house. Later in the evening he’s closing his eyes at 8pm instead of watching the oh-so-exciting American Idol…
But these aren’t new discoveries. They’re just part of Who We Are.
And while we expect/hope at times that they might change, the truth is that his motivation for staying up late involves video games and mine for getting up early involves sex.
So there are bad.
But every time I look at my ring I think of the million different moments that brought us to this point.
And I’m excited and scared about the million that we have left to create.
But how lucky am I that I get that chance?
It’s like that with child rearing too.
I missed my daughter tremendously while away – The Absolute Best Feeling in the world is sitting in the same room with my husband and daughter and hearing them talk or laugh or learn together.
And while I may not get that option very often, I DO get to feel that thing – that absolute planets-aligning feeling that comes with having the people you love most near and safe. And I know, because of that feeling, that home is going to be where THEY are… and that this fear I have inside of me – this not knowing what is going to happen is going to pass and that we’re all in this together.
And so I’m feeling pretty blessed right now.
I look at my rings and remember this surreal relationship and life of mine is full of happiness even though it may be difficult at times.
And I look at my daughter and know that the choices I made in my husband and for our future are Right.
And that’s kind of nice.
When you don’t have much to say.
January 14, 2010
A less than endearing comment on my character:
I have had the thought, over the past day or so, that I am VERY glad not to be honeymooning in Haiti at this time. Not that it was ever a possibility, but what a strange thankfulness to have in the midst of so many others’ suffering.
I will say, my mind cannot even comprehend what the photos emerging from Haiti are showing. I keep looking around Memphis trying to imagine the various buildings around me in pieces and cannot.
Or trying to imagine the shock of the building collapsing around me or the weight of concrete on me and cannot.
That sounds morbid, but for those of you that know me, you know that my first reaction is almost invariably to put myself in the shoes of others and my inability to do so now tells you just how my mind runs from the idea and exactly how far out of my privileged realm of reality this situation falls.
I’ve been reading Anderson Cooper – whom I love dearly, can I say? I find his words always seem to echo a levity that people ought to feel and so often don’t, and so I feel that I get a more realistic picture from his words – and at the same time a form of protection from ever having to see those things.
And it hurts.
The children, the absolute confusion.
How does he see so many of the things he sees and still function?
And.
What are these people going to do?
How does a country move past something like this?
Prayers and hopes and worries and finger-crossing heading their way.
I hope they’re enough to make a difference.
Should I decide to undergo a career change…
January 11, 2010
While I’ve enjoyed many aspects of my ever-changing life, especially during these three whole months of marriedness, one thing that I have NOT enjoyed is changing my name.
Not that I don’t like my new last name.
I do.
I just like it better after Nick’s first name. It’s familiar and comforting that way.
Much less so after my name, which is why I’ve chosen to go by my full name instead of abbreviating. A mixture of comfort and familiarity combined with new exciting future.
After all, 30 years of one name doesn’t make the jump any easier… especially for one as stubborn as me.
Mostly it’s fine and dandy.
Sometimes… it’s just a litany of repeated spellings and pronunciations.
Today though – a bit of humor to go along with the incorrectness of it all.
A client called in to the 1-800 number at work requesting to speak to me… only. Not me.
Instead of “Alisha Labello” this client requested “Lisa Libido.”
Luckily the operator didn’t put two and two together until a moment or so after the frustrated client hung up – or one might have had to cue the 70s disco music.
Help Wanted: Self Confidence Locator needed.
January 7, 2010
Part of the pain of being a plus-sized woman is how others view you.
You’re unhealthy for being big.
You’re lazy.
You eat too much.
Sometimes that’s true. Sometimes it’s not.
Either way – none of the plus-sized folks I know need that information pointed out to them.
Having people coat it with a healthy dose of “I’m just worried about your health” is merely icing to try to cover the concrete cake they handed you with their unspoken judgements.
You can HEAR the unsaid.
It’s worse when the unsaid is coming from your spouse.
Because then the healthy comment becomes valid.
Then the saying something becomes valid because like it or not, your looks and behavior will affect their lives as well.
If you develop diabetes, they’re going to adjust their life and food habits with you.
If you become unable to take care of your children, they’ll pick up the slack.
Us fatties GET that.
We really do.
But when you add a loss of sexual interest on top of that, it’s a rejection that becomes overwhelming to bear.
Simply put, there is not a lot you can do to take that back – that feeling and loss of self worth in the relationship in which we’re supposed to feel the most accepted and comfortable.
Sure, I get that you start dating Barbie and end up with Roseanne that’s going to change a few things.
But what if you marry Roseanne in the first place – and then decide she’s too icky to touch?
Where’s the fairness in that?
There was an article today on plus-sized models.
Gorgeous, sexy plus-sized models that I just dropped my jaw at.
Lemme Link.
HERE.
You see?
They’re beautiful.
They’re sexy.
They’re not perfect… and sure, parts of them are airbrushed – their dimples don’t show and I get that mine do.
But, they’re amazing looking.
So much sexier to me than any of the sticks that get pictured today and I wish – how I wish – that we could combine an acceptance of looks like that and health at the same time.
That it’s okay to be healthy AND be curvy – that plus-sized doesn’t mean gross.
What if those had been the examples in the magazines when I was growing up?
Would men look at me differently now? Would my ugly years have been my skinny years? Would my husband chase me around the furniture again? Would men turn to watch me on the streets?
And more than that…
Would my daughter realize she doesn’t have to stuff herself into clothes that are too small just to give a smaller numerical answer when people ask her what size she wears?
Would I be able to somehow help empower her sense of self?
Makes me wonder.
How would my life be different right now if that type of women were the definition of beauty rather than the ‘fatties’ that disgust those around us?
