Leather pants probably wouldn’t help me either.
October 6, 2010
Songs MEAN something.
You can ask everyone around you and you’ll find that there are certain songs that they hear that immediately transport them into a mood, a memory, or even an alternate reality.
Some songs do all of those things.
For instance, I can listen to “Dreams” by the Cranberries and immediately be filled with a cheerful, purposeful feeling.
Edwin Starr’s “War” puts me in a head-bobbing, ridiculously silly mood.
And, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” by the Stones brings to mind many things – frustrating my child when she was younger and begging for new toys, my basic theory on why my custody battle will never stop going or stop hurting, and Mick Jagger in leather pants. Creepy.
I found myself yesterday singing this particular song aloud at my desk. Complete with Jagger facial expressions and vocal stylings.
And by found myself, try realized I was doing so only after getting strange stares and pointed questions.
Le sigh.
You really can’t always get what you want.
When times are hard I try to remind myself of how blessed I am.
A great family, great friends, great job, great life.
But it’s hard.
Hard right now to think of positive things when this never-ending custody battle is draining the life out of me. Dramatic, I know, but as a parent you’re designed – to the core – to protect your children at all costs. Right now I can’t do that.
It’s not even a topic that she would have faced in the Life’s-Not-Fair adulthood school – it’s one of my own making and this total limbo of not having a decision is eating her up.
I seem to be the only one aware of this. Aware that it’s bigger than his rights/my rights. What gives parents the right to screw up their kid in their own selfishness?
Why is the fact that she’s hurting not THE most important thing?
I get tense even typing this.
I’m scared to death for all of us.
I can’t get what I want. She can’t get what she needs.
Art Appreciation. Or, Thoughts in spurts.
October 1, 2010
Lawyers of the world,
You suck big, huge, donkey toes.
Light yourself on fire.
My sweet baby girl,
I love you more every day.
Always stay the same.
Baby Gigantor,
I’m really tired of peeing.
Move off my bladder.
Ms. Lady Lawyer,
You’re appointed to my daughter.
So HELP already!
My dear husband,
Five bicycles is too much
For any household.
Dear knitting project,
I wish you could knit yourself
My elbow is tired.
To my beagle girls,
Stop barking at 2 a.m.
Or prepare to starve.
Dear Memphis traffic,
Turn signals will not kill you,
Texting will. Stop it.
Co-workers of mine,
No more candy temptation!
Damned diabetes.
And following September…
September 28, 2010
I went for a walk last night.
The weather has cooled off – down from the three digit temps into gorgeous Fall weather temperatures that reward me for surviving yet another summer in rural Mississippi.
The trees are just starting to turn and everything, including the sunlight, is this gorgeous golden color that you only see this time of year.
I love Fall.
I love October.
I often confuse the two – I’m convinced October is a season unto itself. It smells different and feels different and is full of good times and memories and happiness the way no other season is.
That’s why I got married in October.
My daughter was born in October.
It’s just the best time of the year.
The smells in the air have convinced me that the season is upon us.
My walk was perfect. Two miles at a brisk pace, but nothing escaped my notice. I live in a gorgeous rural area and the lack of cars and power lines and noise mean real relaxation that urbanites just can’t understand.
I won’t have it for much longer and so every outing I make has me reacting like a sponge, soaking up as much as I possibly can so I can weather the winter in Minneapolis.
I sat on the front porch for a long time when I got back.
I could close my eyes and be a million different places all at once.
At my grandmother’s before she passed, getting ready for Thanksgiving, family all around and the smell that only her house held. So comforting.
My aunt’s for Halloween. Before her divorce and my grandmother’s death. When we all still joined together for family events – like her Halloween party – when I was young and so excited about the ghost-shaped cookies and trick-or-treating.
On my wedding day, seeing my husband face to face for the first time before the ceremony – knowing that I was marrying someone I could count on – someone I loved – someone I could trust.
Remembering when my daughter was born and how everything I could have ever wanted from life changed in that instant – the world became entirely about her – and still hasn’t changed.
Thinking of the way my mom’s perfume smells and how much I’m going to miss her and my father when I move.
Thinking about what home and family feel like; what they mean.
Things both happy and bittersweet.
October, you see.
I’m so glad I get this one last fall in this area.
I needed it.
Things are swirling around so fast that it feels as though my feet barely touch anything steady.
Walks and silence help, give me a chance to search, if not find, perspective again.
Ode to The Doughnut.
September 27, 2010
You learn a lot about yourself when you pack up an office and move it across the city.
I learned that I’m incompetent.
And that one of the things I’ll do is forget to pack all of my files… and will leave them in the old office that will be immediately thrust into remodeling (think walls being knocked down)… and will have to beg a co-worker to go rescue said files because I’m an idiot.
Oh.
I’ll also misspell names on the new business cards of the brokers I’ve worked for for six years.
Pour paper confetti all over the nice new floors that won’t be cleaned for days.
Get so stressed that I’ll accidentally forget I’m now gestational-y diabetic and will eat a doughnut… (no harm, no foul – the blood sugar never rose above normal).
I’ll drive the new hour long commute with a white knuckled grip, glaring at other drivers that swerve through traffic without signaling, wishing they’d get crotch rot.
Days like today make me really miss refined sugar.
And beer.
Mooning the world! In my own little way.
September 21, 2010
So it’s been a few days.
One of the things that you’ll learn about me and/or my varying levels of mental illness/anxiety/OCD/depression is that everything waxes and wanes in my life.
On the days when the meds are working great, I’m motivated to interact with the world.
On the days when the meds are lacking, I accomplish only that which I have to during the day until I can surround myself entirely with my house and family.
During this pregnancy, because I’ve lowered my meds enough to help me “get by” and not really thrive in the hopes of lessening their effects on the baby girl, well… there aren’t really DOWNS, per say, so much as there are days where I find myself staring blankly ahead of me, out of the window, at my feet – wherever my attention caught and failed. These days are almost a pleasure because I can reach the introspective side of me that so rarely emerges on the full doses of medicine. I’m more creative, more emotional, more dramatic – and such a pain in the ass. But I recognize this side of me much more easily than I do the energetic, more motivated side that appears once dosed up. You see, it’s this side of me that takes blame for everything, that carries around a load of guilt that couldn’t possibly be attributed to only her and that finds an unrealistic negativity in everything that she does.
She’s masochistic and though sometimes it IS a pleasure to sink into that dark abyss, I’ll be so glad when she’s gone again.
She’s been whispering her seductive tales of failure and circumstance today, after we were both diagnosed with gestational diabetes this morning. She tells me that it’s my fault, that I’m overweight, that I’m eating wrong, that I’m a genetic hopeless case. The doctor disagrees but she’s the conceited one, knowing more than the doctor, more than anyone else could possibly know – after all, it’s her body too!
::sigh::
I’m scared.
I know it’s a common diagnosis.
I know that diet and exercise can help make this a non-issue in the long run, but still there’s that little whisper in my head telling me that MY case is worse than the others – apparently the masochistic side of me is a little egocentric as well.
I guess only backbone will tell.
Backbone and green vegetables, that is.
Is that a mole or the Tasmanian Devil?
September 16, 2010
People take things for granted.
They really do.
We all know someone with cancer, we almost take a diagnosis for granted – not that it’s less horrible, but we’re inoculated from that immediate bone-deep fear for that person that used to accompany a diagnosis because of the knowledge that there are tons of medicines available to help treat and prolong life for an individual with cancer.
That’s not to say we aren’t afraid, sometimes VERY afraid, but being a layman on the outside of the medical field, we assume, many times incorrectly, that there exists some sort of magic drug that will help cure this person that we love.
The most misunderstood cancer?
Skin cancer.
So common. So overlooked.
We ignore warnings heralding the use of sunblocks for years, tanning in the tanning beds to make ourselves look skinnier or prettier – just better overall.
We basically thumb our noses up at biology, assuming, as we young folks do, that everyone is exaggerating about the risks.
Sure, there’s a harsh story every now and again – some young mother with 2.5 children that contracts melanoma and dies at an early age because she just didn’t know. Didn’t understand.
But that’s not about US. That’s about HER.
We use sunblock for a week or two after hearing her tale and immediately forget in the months following.
How fucking arrogant we can be.
Texting while driving.
Junk food for every meal.
Tanning bed worship.
All sort of a ‘Fuck you!’ for the gifts that we’ve been given in a body that truly is a miracle. Fat, thin, old, young – our body gets us through the day to day bits that we demand of it, with few complaints considering.
My mom recently did a full body scan at her dermatologist’s office. She’d thought about doing one earlier in the year but hadn’t liked her doctor and had shopped around. Months later she jumps into this VERY invasive search of her body and ends up with a few biopsies to show for it.
The diagnosis?
Early stage melanoma, just on top of a lymph node.
Stage 0, requiring ONLY surgical removal and follow-up scans every 3 months for 2 years.
The prognosis? Excellent. 100% survival rate – not really a big deal in the world of cancer, but the truth is, she found this insidious little monster only by accident.
She’s a freckled woman – moles and freckles cover her entire body. One looks pretty much the same as another and more than anything, she was just curious about the scan. Being in her fifties means she has age spots starting and the concern was more a flitting thought than a real worry.
A few times she thought of cancelling the scan – who wants to have their… gasp!… girlie areas poked and prodded when they never see the sun anyway?
Most of the spots biopsied were harmless – we’d never noticed them before and other than the icky shape biopsies leave in your skin, we’d never notice them now.
But the melanoma was a surprise. A spot on her neck – not raised, not really eye-catching when you consider the ABCDE’s of skin cancer, turned out to be the main culprit. Just under her ear, we’d noticed it, but hadn’t thought much of it.
As it turns out, timing was everything.
Had she had the scan done earlier in the year, the spot wouldn’t have been there – it showed up over the summer.
Had she chickened out, it would have deepened and become a much more serious problem, especially considering the location.
How many people put these things off indefinitely?
How many people, like me, never think of doing something like this in the first place?
Wake up.
It’s no joke.
Common or not, curable or not, cancer’s a hellish dance partner.
My mom’s going to be absolutely fine – a bit scarred, but none the worse for wear.
And I personally don’t want to be the next idiot who took my health for granted and found out later that I’d pay for my ignorance with a much more serious fight.
Play it smart, folks.
Moving
September 15, 2010
Though rarely talked about here, work is tangling up my life with it’s responsibilities and demand for me to stay awake when the baby demands I nap.
Pregnancy has changed how I view my job and while I still love the knowledge that I gain on a daily/weekly basis, I no longer care about using it.
Let me explain.
Now that we’ve decided I’m going to be a home mommy I’m DYING to start preparing the house that we don’t have yet.
There is nothing that occurs during the day that I can’t directly relate immediately to my husband or two children and while that can be attributed to Pregnancy Brain, it can make for quite a boring conversation if you have the misfortune to run into me.
Our office is also in the midst of moving cross-city… and we’re a large office combining two large offices in some hodge podge cataclysmic event that has everyone scurrying – including me. All day long I’m packing boxes, organizing 20 years’ worth of gizmos, and basically exhausting myself.
Combining that with my propensity to drink and retain water like a camel, let’s just say that these aren’t my most favorite days that I’m having in my pregnancy.
Where I should feel like this:
By around 11am I feel like this*:
I do tend to wear a maternity belt to help with the weight of this tiny baby and my 400 pound ovaries, but by the end of the day I’m limping and stabbing people in the face with my laser-eye glare.
What worries me about this is that I’m moving an area of space that is smaller than most public restrooms (if you want to know why that’s a frame of measuring reference then YOU get pregnant) and bordering on homicidal.
What am I going to do when I have to move a household full of stuff across country?!!
(Note to self, try to remember to take a picture at the end of the day so that your husband has sufficient warning in the coming months…)
All in all, I’m definitely looking foward to the end of this phase in my life.
Phases.
Moving.
Pregnancy.
Finance.
Filing.
*Yes. I did type this entire entry JUST to be able to use this photo.
The Sink or Swim Method
September 13, 2010
I’ve been thinking a lot about the paths in my life that I’ve meandered down.
Some going forwards, many going backwards, some going really nowhere at all.
For me parenting has been one of those winding paths.
I don’t think that you can become a mom in your teenage years and not go in a gazillion different directions trying to find the Right Way.
Life surprises throw you curve balls and it’s a measure of character just how you field those when they reach you.
I made a semi-joke on another blog today (on a very clever blog post by one of my newfound favorites, Fierce Beagle) about Nick and I handling this pregnancy with the Sink or Swim Method – a joke that doesn’t even come close to the juggling and planning that is going into making sure this child’s life is a bit smoother than Abbey’s.
You see, I had to sink or swim with Abbey too – but entering adulthood at 16 is far different than dealing with an unplanned pregnancy at 30.
At 30, I define my pregnancy as unplanned simply because I hadn’t penciled it in to my schedule – hadn’t yet made the decisions and sacrifices needed to choose to parent again. But I was conscious of biology and knew, on a subconscious level, that it was just a matter of time.
At 16, my pregnancy was unplanned because EVERYTHING was unplanned. Even the act that provided my fertile self a baby was unplanned. Heck, my afternoon SNACKS were unplanned.
And so I entered parenthood completely clueless – and am continuing through parenthood so incredibly grateful that I am blessed with the family I’m blessed with, that Abbey and I had the support needed PSYCHOLOGICALLY to ensure that she hasn’t had to pay for my lack of planning. I had to work hard, 2 or 3 jobs at a time to handle the monetary part of parenting, but I KNEW I could do it because of my support system.
Now, with this pregnancy, everything has changed.
Oh, not the support.
My family is still here for me, but this time my support has evolved.
I’ve added age and wisdom, a husband, a TON of in-laws, a maturing and wonderful daughter, and more than anything, I’m in a different place mentally.
I’ve grown up.
And even though I’m still completely clueless – now starting all over after having separated the two pregnancies by slightly more than 14 years – it’s almost a joyful cluelessness. The problems that I face with this child will be entirely different than the heartbreaking problems that go along with missed chances and opportunities of growing up as a child raising a child.
It’s bittersweet, knowing that I have a chance to fix many of the wrongs from the first time around – not merely the parenting mistakes that we all make, but the mistakes that come from following your hormones at 15 and having a child pay that price with custody battles and therapy appointments.
You see, she and I did play sink or swim.
And we continue to swim, though more in a dog paddling sense than the assertive breast stroke sense.
But our life is changing.
With this second pregnancy, to sink or swim means that we’ve decided I’ll stay at home. It means we’re questioning our priorities and our quality of life choices in order to provide more support for my two children from this point on. We’re going to continue to drive that 14 year old Mustang, to continue to budget shop, to continue to pray to avoid medical surprises. Our children will have a better foundation now – while we are still energetic enough to provide it – and less of a financial push later on, when they may very well need – or hope for it.
They’ll have to sink or swim based upon their choices too. Colleges and car payments, relationships and faulty judgments. And making that decision for the two of them has been scary.
Weighing the benefits of this life versus the life with the shinier cars and splashy vacations that we all want is petrifying. Choosing the road that is (now) less travelled is petrifying.
Everything about standing on a fence, knowing that a large gust could send us to either side – either make it or break it – is petrifying.
But I think we’re doing the right thing.
Sometimes the good in life stems from the sacrificing versus the spending.
Erin spoke on her blog of the American Dream and while Nick and I may never have that, I think we’re defining our own dream, bit by bit.
He may be bald with stress by the time we figure out if this will work or not, but we WILL figure it out.
We have to.
Because you see, I much prefer swimming to sinking.
Buyer’s remorse.
September 3, 2010
Let me just start by saying that they shouldn’t allow me in Best Buy until at least a week after I get paid.
And by they, I mean my husband.
And yes, I fully expect him to fly from Minneapolis and bar the door in order to prevent certain things from happening – like spiders and soap scum.
I bought $50 iPhone headphones.
I felt justified because my husband has the same exact pair, but now I have buyers remorse because they’re $50 HEADPHONES.
They go in my EARS, they don’t cure cancer!
And the little devil on my shoulder is waxing on about how I could have just bought the new iPhone (that my husband is going to buy me for our anniversary… the 1st is the iPhone anniversary) that comes with free headphones and saved myself -$200, but NOOOO.
And the headphones came about because I needed a car charger for my phone and something about the car charger made me need to spend money on my phone.
Because iPhones are such a gimmicky bit to own that they require their own blankets, pillows, food and shelter… all found at your handy dandy Best Buy in a handy dandy section that they line with quicksand.
But late last night, when I tucked in Mac Jr. into his pretty little blanket-lined nightstand drawer and turned out the light, I swear, though I didn’t have my glasses on to be sure, but I swear his little screen lit up with the words “Thank you, Mom.”
Maybe those headphones weren’t such a bad buy after all.
I signed up for WHAT?
September 2, 2010
Preparing mentally for becoming a Stay At Home Mom (yes, that should be capitalized and perhaps even shouted!) has been one of the most challenging things I’ve ever had to do.
Mainly because 1, I never thought I’d be in the position to be a SAHM and 2, everything about baby #2 is a surprise – including that I’m having a baby #2.
After all, my first child is a teenager and only minutes away from riding off into the sunset with a college diploma in one hand and the world on a string in the other.
Being faced with this upcoming change in circumstances has caused me to question a good many things I know about myself.
My eating habits, for instance. You could say that I’m a person to whom eating a balanced meal means eating a plate full of junk food balanced properly on my lap.
With the last year addition of my husband, Healthy Hunk, this meandering version of nutrition no longer flies as acceptable behavior. He wilts if he doesn’t have enough good food in his diet and nobody wants to see a giant Italian man wilt in their presence.
Plus, apparently Italian babies require meat, potatoes AND vegetables in order to grow large, strong Italian eyebrows. And who am I to stand in the way of the Bert-like eyebrows my child’s heritage so claims as her DNA-like right?
And Laundry.
Laundry, for me, is a very necessary evil punctuated by bouts of wrangling jeans over door frames for maximum drying capabilities and separating anxiety when faced with the prospect of washing too many new clothes without the salt-filled pre-soak.
Adding this stereotypical notion that Laundry will now be part of my Official Duties as a SAHM has thrown me – even though I rarely will allow anyone else near the stacks of dirty laundry for fear that they’ll do it their way and NOT mine.
How many other stereotypes of SAHMs are there that are waiting to bite me on the toe?
Cleaning? I’m to take care of a helpless ankle-biter AND keep the house spotless? Time travel truths must rest in the arms of all of the Stay At Home Moms that accomplish this task, because my memories of newborns don’t include the many hours of inactivity needed to maintain a spotless house with 2 dogs, 1 husband and 2 children.
Regular meals? People like to eat REGULARLY? And I’m to cook those? Have any of you seen what cooking for me entails? Long shopping trips, fresh herbs, homemade ingredients and 2 hours of preparation? And I’m to do this over and again? Not just for special occasions and holidays? BALANCED MEALS?!!
And I’m supposed to do this and maintain the household without catching anything on fire, chopping my husband into stew, losing the baby in the laundry pile, hanging the dogs by their toes or stuffing a teenager into a trash compactor?
I seriously hope my husband can pay me enough for a post-work-day massage.
