Space: In terms of family, it’s just a myth.

Today’s Photohunt Theme is “Space”

No matter how much space you have between you and the family members you grew up with, they can reach out and slap you as easily as if they were just whispering in your ear a moment ago.

It’s not just the fact that we are so connected nowadays, though that is what enables it.  But the slap is sharp and quick because they hold a part of you.

No matter how far away from you they are, no matter how long it has been since you have spoken or seen one another, they have the ammunition to bring you to your knees.

They know things that no one else knows.  They are always the quickest to offense and the most equipped to pull you down… and why is it that they always seem to opt to exercise that power when you’re finally lifting your head above your own sordid bullshit?

Many of us have stories that fall into this zone, this space of feeling and emotion.

Sometimes, I just want to stop hearing the ones that play over and over in my head. And I’d like to stop adding new ones to the list.

And if you could successfully edit the reel of memories that plays back inside of you from the past… would you even want to?

Can we appreciate the good times if we don’t have the bad times?

This double edged sword of emotions is piercing my heart today.

Haiku Assvice.

Scraping the barrel
like never before these days.
Weak, and yes, ashamed.

I know it takes time.
Am no stranger to symptoms;
it is depression.

From this low vantage
I can look up and see those
who are still moving.

Hear what they say, watch
what they do, and be amazed
at what’s important.

Be amazed at what
some find worthy of energy.
Anger. Ugliness.

It is so easy
to become ensnared in that.
Don’t let it happen.

With experience
comes perspective, and when it’s
shared, take what you can.

Try not to jump so
quickly to offense, anger…
do you benefit?

It is not easy
to step back and remain calm
with little practice.

I say this because
I know. I’m quick to anger,
easily annoyed.

And so often quite
the righteous rebel. And what
have I gained from this?

Drama is pointless.
Time passes by and I am
wasting my focus.

Have always found it
easy to see negatives.
Overlook the good.

Life is rich, complex.
Try to remind yourselves of
of this and do your best

to just ignore the
insignificant bumps and
enjoy all the rest.

How I’m doing.

(In case you were wondering.)

Today, we went to Walmart to get:

1. Juice
2. Creamer
3. Vitamins
4. Margarine

On the way to the back of the store, we passed the baby section.

I gave it the finger, as hard as I could, the whole way by.

Never even looked in that direction.

Hand high up in the air, That Lone Finger stabbing relentlessly at the air that it was slicing through, I walked on by, emanating the directive.

You know. THE directive.

I think that’s right on par with where I should be in the healing process.**

**According to Lotus’s Handy Dandy 23423042394 Step Guide to Healing from being SUPER Frackin’ Pissed Off at the World at Large as well as Specific Elements of It in Particular, thank you very much.

Also, I have something(s) to share with you soon. Not now, because I don’t feel like it yet. But soon.

So there.

Goodbye, Cruel Year

December 31, 2008

Dear 2008,

You were my first full year of blogging on my very own, self-hosted website from beginning to end. That was a happy thing about you. As I have written and published posts on my website this year, I’ve learned, grown, healed, changed, triumphed, laughed and cried.

I had a few trolls, it’s true. And unfortunately, I often take the trolls too seriously. I’m an emotional, sensitive chick with a high need for love and a fair amount of insecurity – it’s easy to slice me to the core. But, yes, trolls are just silly, angry people with too much time on their hands. I think Backpacking Dad said it in my favorite way recently, on Redneck Mommy‘s site:

“I love trolls. They’re so cute when they take their little poos everywhere.”

What’s more important about blogging for this whole year is that I’ve made wonderful friends and received love and kindness, as well as laughter and good cheer, from people I never would have met if I hadn’t stuck with this blogging business.

2008, that was so good about you.

My baby turned into a little boy this year, too, 2008. He had his first haircut and finished getting all his teeth (finally!). He asked to sit in a big chair (!!!), and the high-chair is gone.

My little boy, just this past week, left his crib. He is sleeping in a bed now. *heart beating hard*

He sings songs with words, and dances. He counts to 20 and knows all his letters. He can drink from a juice box and he’s learning how to brush his own teeth. He can take off his socks, pull down his pants, and he’s playing with the idea of actually using the potty again.

He snuggles his cheek up against mine, puts his hand on my other cheek and says, “Hufff-yooo.”

He quotes Spongebob Squarepants and asks me for milk when he’s thirsty.

He looks at me and says, “Aww, duuuude.”

No longer a baby, he is a boy.

This is bittersweet, 2008. My heart gets this panicky, tight feeling as I watch Braden grow so fast, 2008. So very fast.

But then it swells with pride. He is MY boy. I am so grateful for him.

So that has been good, as well, 2008.

I even finally lost the last 15lbs of my “baby weight” and got back to pre-pregnancy sveltness while you were around! That was phenomenally good, 2008. I was so incredibly happy to be moving more swiftly, and feeling lighter. (And fitting back into those hot jeans was certainly not a bad thing – bow chicka.)

Also, 2008, you gave me not just one, but two more babies. What a joy it is to find out there is a life growing inside of you. What an amazing, phenomenal thing that so many take for granted – a thing many of us just brush off as easy, or incidental.

It’s not, 2008. It’s incredible. It’s a delicate, vulnerable thing.  A beautiful thing. When a live baby is born, it is a miracle of sorts.

Every time.

You taught me that, 2008.

You took them both back before I got to kiss their foreheads. I miss them so much.

That was very much not a good thing. I don’t like you right now, 2008. It’s going to take me a very long time before I can look at you again without tears in my eyes. I want to grab you and shake you until you feel as bad as I do.

I keep trying to be mature about it, 2008, and see all the good things we had together.  I keep trying to count my blessings, 2008, because I know they are many!

But you know what?

Right now, I just can’t. And that’s okay. For awhile, I think I am going to let myself hate you with all of my heart.

For awhile, I am going to be a child.

It’s not fair, 2008. It’s not fair.
I’m not your friend anymore, and I don’t want to play with you ever again.

It’s not fair.

2009′s Anxious Mistress,
Lotus

Thoughts From The Abyss

Late at night on Sunday, December 7th, I wrote this article, for Deep South Moms Blog, about what it feels like to face the holiday season with the first instance of the due date of my miscarried baby looming. When I miscarried back in April, I knew Christmas Eve would never be the same. That is when that first lost baby was due.

As I wrote the piece, I was reflecting on how far I’ve come since those first few days after losing the baby back in April. The utter hopelessness. The anger. The confusion and pain. I realized that the pain is so deep, it’s as if it will never go away completely… but over time, it somehow becomes easier to live with, and serves to remind me to be more thankful of the loved ones I still have in my life.

It has been almost 8 months since that first miscarriage, and I was just feeling like I had come out on the other side of the deepest of the immediate grief. And I knew that it was in part due to the passage of time, and the love and kindness of family and friends. In part it has been due to my being lucky enough to be able to write about my feelings and emotions here, and receive support from all of you. (Have I said thank you? Really. Thank you so much.)

I was feeling something I haven’t felt for awhile.

Hope.

But what’s really bitter now is that a large part of my renewed hope came from the fact that I had a new life within me. A life that was crossing into the second trimester of a pregnancy that I had not even expected, but that I was starting to believe was meant to help me heal.

I spent weeks upon weeks feeling tense. I spent almost 3 months checking my underwear multiple times a day, and staring at the toilet paper every single time I wiped.

Slowly, so so slowly, the tension had just started to recede.

I had seen and heard his tiny heart beating, quickly, with vigor. He was healthy, and moving. He was ALIVE. He was going to make it, damnit. He really was.

Surely, so so surely, the tension has just started to recede.

I found myself leaving the restroom and realizing, after the fact, that I hadn’t looked at my underwear. I hadn’t checked my toilet paper.

I believed. I wasn’t just saying I believed. I really did.

It felt so good.

And then on Tuesday morning, December 9th, everything fell apart around me (us).

It was as if I’d been walking carefully on a thin sheet of glass suspended over a black abyss for months, but somehow, I’d just started to believe it was cement, and I started tap-dancing. The bottom fell out – the floor exploded, and all I had to grab for as I fell were shards of glass that cut my hands as I dropped into the abyss.

No heartbeat on the fetal doppler for us to hear.

No little, pulsing muscle in his tiny chest for me to see on mini-ultrasound.

My lovely doctor trying so hard over and over to find it. My lovely doctor getting visibly frustrated, upset, but still trying and trying. My lovely doctor giving up and telling me she was so so sorry.

Ohhh, my inability to believe this was happening… and ohhhh, my immense guilt over believing for so long that it would end this way, anyway.

And Oh, my Anger that it actually did.

My hope? Gone.

No heartbeat on a full blown ultrasound.

I stared at the screen, at his tiny body inside of me.

People, he looked beautiful and perfect on that high-tech ultrasound screen. I saw his little body facing me, as if he was looking at me to say goodbye. His tiny little arms and legs were there, framing the perfect little body in the middle.

Framing the perfect, little, middle part, where everything was silent and still.

Not really so perfect at all.

Every night since then, I’ve stayed up late, so late, doing ridiculous things like working on my website redesign. Things that I can blur my mind with. I’ve stayed up until my eyes just couldn’t see straight anymore, until I just couldn’t hold them open anymore, so that when I did lay down in bed, I’d fall right asleep.

I’m not ready for the thoughts that will come in the quiet darkness.

Every morning when I’ve awoken, I’ve had that horrible moment when I realize that, Yes, this reality is my reality. There is still a dead baby in my womb.

And when they take him from me on this Tuesday morning, I don’t know what I’ll have left to do but start to move on.

And that is the saddest thing of all.

I just want to be that happy owl.

I’ve always felt a little bit crazy.

When I was a kid, I thought I was “crazy” because I liked things that it seemed the majority of other kids around me didn’t like.  I enjoyed reading, while they seemed to think it was a chore.  I barely gave a thought to what my hair looked like.  If it was clean?  I was okay.  I was more interested in climbing trees and building forts than making sure my hair smelled like Pantene.  I didn’t always know what was “cool.”  I didn’t always really care.  I had a shirt that said, “Dare to be different.”  I embraced that message.  There was a tree branch on that shirt, and 4 owls perched from it.  One was hanging upside down, and smiling.  That was me.

Different.

In grade school, my friends told me I was “crazy” because I liked to act silly and question standards openly. If something funny occurred to me, I wanted to share it. I suppose it was already obvious back then that my “filter” had bigger holes than people thought it should. And my penchant for crass humor was already making itself known. Can’t imagine where I got that from. *shifts eyes to father* I cannot deny being called “the loud one.” Or even, “the annoying one.” Or maybe, “the OMG AVOID HER AT ALL COSTS one.”

In high school, I was always searching for something to make me feel right.  All of a sudden, the “crazy” was more than just an oddity or a quirk.  Something was missing.  I asked myself often what it could possibly be.  “Is it fun?  Maybe I should not read so much anymore.  Maybe I should do some smoking, some drinking, some partying.  Maybe I should skip classes and flirt.  Maybe it’s a boy that’s missing.  I should get one of those, or two, or maybe three.”  It all made me happy.  Momentarily.  But then none of it made me happy.

I pushed on into college and grad school.  A young adult now, I was “crazy” silly to my friends, “crazy” ridiculous when I was drunk, and “crazy” bitchy and controlling to my boyfriend.  Add in “crazy” anti-social during those times when I just wanted to be alone in my apartment.  Which was often.  I have always really enjoyed being alone.  I think, maybe, because there is no pressure to hide exactly how one feels when alone.

No one is there to see how crazy you really are.

Over and over I’d have these periods when I felt that the “something” that would make me happy was always just a few steps ahead of me.  And I kept chasing it, doing the things I thought I was supposed to do, following the plans that I was supposed to make and follow through with.

Every day, going through the motions.  Hiding the anger I had at people as much as I could, pushing it down most of the time.  Hiding the tears, hiding the sadness.  Pushing on.  Past the crazy.

My outward “crazy” was manageable.  When the anger seeped, it was mostly rants that had a humorous edge.  If they stung a little more sometimes than others, I could usually cover with follow-up humor.  I never started fights, never hurt anyone physically.  But the anger was always there.  The sadness was always lingering just below the surface, too.  Humor is often a cover for so many things, did you know?

“Just be funny.  Just be ‘crazy.’  Then they won’t know you’re… well, crazy.”

Taking just a few more steps.  To try to catch The Happy.  And a few more, and a few more.

I put all my hopes into the things I thought would make me happy… my jobs, my studies, my boyfriend.

That was unfair of me.

No one can carry such a burdon for someone else.

That was unfair to me.

Because when you put all of your hopes for happiness into something else, or someone else, and then they fail you…

[And they WILL fail you because nothing can make you happy, and no-one is your perfect answer.]

… all you have left is the crazy. And you might try to get away from that, too, in the only way you know how.

Funny thing is, if you survive that, you might somehow still push it down and keep on taking a few more steps. Thinking that you can still chase down that happiness all by yourself.

I’ve denied to myself that I need help.  I’ve told myself that I don’t really feel crazy.  Not really.
I’ve kept telling myself that “The Happiness” is just. around. the. next. corner.

“I just need to take a few more steps!”

But for the first time in my life, now that I’ve been a mother for almost two years, I do feel like I’m actually crazy sometimes.

People: there’s this little person who’s running around in my house and he needs me all the time.

Even when I need to be alone with my crazy, he needs me.  When I’m feeling distant, when I’m feeling weak… He’s there. And he needs me.

And he needs me to not be crazy.  But he’s not giving me time to take a few. more. steps!

Somehow, that is making the crazy that wasn’t Really Crazy, you know, the one that I could just push down and ignore? It’s making that crazy grow.  The angry crazy is leaking out when he needs me, and when he doesn’t, the quiet, sad crazy is taking over.

For myself, I’m afraid of the latter.

For him, I’m afraid of the former.

Why?  Because every moment I need to myself, he is there.  Every toy has to be slammed into my face. Abruptly, he will run up and scream right in my ear.  For No Reason.  He dances around because he has to pee, but when I put him on the toilet, he looks down at his penis, grins, and then shakes his head, “No-No-No-No.”

30 seconds later, he is peeing on my coffee table.

Some days, I am amused. This is what being a mother is about, right?  This is what kids are supposed to do!

I know this.  And some days, I cope with it all brilliantly.  Some days.

But other days, I honest to goodness have to fight the urge to slam my fist through a window, fling dishes into the wall, or God Forbid, throw my son out the door or scream in his face.

And I’m not speaking in silly exaggerations.  I am not trying to color my words so they will be interesting.  I am not trying to spice up the page.  I literally fight the Real Life Urge to ACTUALLY do those things.

So far, I’m winning, but it would only take one weak moment for me to lose something I may never get back. That frightens me in a way I don’t know how to express.

I cannot stress to you how much I would never, never, never want to hurt my son.  I love him abundantly.  I give all of myself to keep him safe and happy, every day.  And still, I feel that I fail him repeatedly, because I have raged at him in my mind so many times.  In my mind, I am a monster.

And sure, sometimes I raise my voice, even yell, and I’ve thrown a toy down or walked out of the room when I couldn’t take it anymore.  Will those things hurt my son?  It doesn’t seem like it, if you take any one of those instances by itself.  But a lifetime of memories filled with those instances, for my son?  I don’t want that.

I want him to remember me as the owl who hung upside down. Not the one who came screeching at his face with its claws out, or hid behind its tree and cried all the time.

It’s time for me to admit that I need more than prayers, extra sleep, or a place to write about my feelings. It’s time for me to admit that I need help, and seek it out.

I can’t keep chasing after a happiness that eludes me, always a few steps ahead of where I am. I cannot keep trying to hold inside an anger that makes my chest tight and often seeps and leaks out, hurting others. I cannot keep denying that I am exactly who I am, and that’s okay. It’s okay if I’m crazy. It’s okay if I need help.

I don’t know exactly what kind of help I need, but I’m hoping the doctor I make an appointment with will have some idea. I’m hoping I don’t just get dismissed again, like I have in the past. I’m hoping that with all my heart.

Do you think it just might work out?

I’m almost afraid to believe that.

It makes me feel a little bit crazy.

The struggle is easy; letting go is hard.

I am struggling
not to feel empty inside.
It is not easy.

I am struggling
not to be angry right now.
It is not easy.

I am struggling
not to cry so I can breath.
It is not easy.

I am struggling
not to feel like I’m broken.
It is not easy.

I am struggling
to clear grey clouds from my heart.
It is not easy.

But I know that it
is not healthy to keep this
inside, so I won’t.

I am letting go.
I am allowing myself
time to just grieve now.

And I find that I
have these two guys to help me
clear grey clouds away.