Sometimes, I get so caught up in my own cave/bubble that I forget how truly, truly blessed I am. I have to stop and remind myself that I have the most important things I could have. My parents, my siblings, my cousins, my son, my extended family, you get the picture. So many people are mourning lost parents, lost children, lost siblings, and I seem to think that my pain is equal to theirs. I get so caught up in my own head that I forget there are real people with real issues in their lives. With real pain and real grief. That’s a side effect of mental illness, not being able to see past your own pain. I know that all pain is pain, but let’s be honest, some pain in so much more palpable than other pain. How do we decide what pain is? Is it anything that hurts us? Is it physical or emotional; or is it both? I think I prefer physical pain. That pain can heal and go away. Emotional pain/grief is with you forever. It never goes away; it can be triggered in an instance. How do people learn to cope with their pain? I have a very special person in my life who has lost a parent and a sibling. This person is the strongest person I have ever met. I ask them all the time how they do it. There is no clear answer. Lots of prayer. I often forget in my own pain and despair that they have gone through something equally traumatic. Maybe even more traumatic than what I have gone through. Which again makes me ask, how do we gauge pain? How do I know if I am being selfish in my pain? How do I know if I am being there for them when they need me? I feel like I am selfish in my pain. I feel like maybe I am not there for my people as I should be. I try very hard to be. I never thought of myself as selfish until today. I saw where a friend was grieving the loss of a sibling. I thought about my blogs talking about my painand it got me to thinking about my relationships and my participation in those relationships. Am I there for my people when they need me? I think I am; I hope I am, but now I am actually questioning that. I’m questioning whether I am a good friend. Whether I am actually theperson I think I am. I am so thankful for my people, my tribe. The one’s who hold me up when I am down, who help me keep my head above water when I’m drowning. But am I there for my tribe? Do I add anything to their lives, or am I just a burden to them? Am I a taker, but not a giver? I’ve never thought about that before. I am now analyzing that with every relationship that I have right now, and that I’ve had in the past. There is a song that I am in love with right now that says: “You better believe I’m trying to keep climbing but the higher we climb, feels like we are both none the wiser. So I hope I learn to get over myself, stop trying to be somebody else.” I connect so deeply with those lyrics. Am I someone that needs to get over myself? Am I self-centered in my pain; Unable to see anyone else’s needs or pain? I pray that I’m not that way. I pray that I am self-less in my love and my friendship. That I give more than I receive. I pray that I am a friend that my tribe can count on in hard times. That steps up when I need to. That I can overcome myself and be there for others when I’m needed. That is something I definitely need to pay more attention to. To make sure I’m checking on my people. To make sure that I am doing what is necessary as a friend. I want to be the person that people say good things about. I want to be remembered for being strong for my people. For helping when needed, whatever that may look like. For being a good daughter, sister, mom, friend, cousin, niece, granddaughter. I don’t want my tribe or friends to feel that they can’t call me with their troubles or their pain. I am here! I am available! I can handle anything that you need me to handle! I am here for you as you have been for me. If you are one that feels like I only take from you, please, please let me know. I want to be aware; I want to do better. I want to be better. My goal in this life is to be present for my people. To hold them up and remind them of how wonderful they are. To give kindness and compassion to everyone. I’m trying. I am someone who wants to be better and do better each and every day.

I am a terrible friend. I mean, I’m a great friend, I love hard, I would do anything for those that I love and call friends, but I am terrible at sustaining that relationship. I get so sucked into my own cave, that I can barely see out sometimes. I would rather be home than go out. Honestly, I love when I go out but it absolutely exhausts me. Even a simple dinner, just does me in. I’m sure that’s my anxiety. Having to fight that the whole time I am out. I don’t know why. I love my friends, I love spending time with them, but being home is so comfortable. No one to put on airs for. None of my friends ask me to put on said airs, but I feel like I must if I want them to continue being my friend. I feel like I’m being judged in everything, from the way I dress, to my makeup, to my hair to the way I speak. All things that they don’t care about, but the little devil on my shoulder tells me they do. That little devil pretty much runs my life. I don’t know how to make him shut up. The whole process of getting out is exhausting. I wonder if my friends understand that about me. Understand how exhausting it is to just gear myself up to go out somewhere. Even a dinner date. The only person I can truly make myself do something for is The Boy. It’s still exhausting and I still feel judged, but I can do anything for him. Why does life seem so hard for some and so easy for others? Are they just that good at pretending or is it really that easy for them? Does everyone feel sick to their stomach’s when they think someone is upset or mad at them? Or that they have done something wrong? If I think that someone is angry at, upset with, disappointed in me I get so sick to my stomach. I just can’t describe the feeling that I feel. It’s another reason I disconnect so easily, I can’t handle that feeling of disappointment/rejection. That feeling of not being good enough. I know that people make mistakes and I know that no one is perfect, but perfection is what I expect from myself. If I’m not perfect, no one will love me or they will stop loving me. I can’t explain it. How I feel inside. The absolute chaos that goes on inside me when I think that I have done something that isn’t perfect. Currently dealing with something involving work that I know I did properly but the client is not telling the truth. It makes me sick to my stomach. It makes me feel like I didn’t do something right when I know I did exactly what I was supposed to do. This is why I disconnect. I don’t know how to handle this feeling. I don’t know how to process it and let it go. I feel that way with everything in my life. Everything that doesn’t go as I have planned for it to go, I have a hard time processing; of letting it go. I spend the rest of the day/night/week trying to make it up to whoever I think I’ve wronged. It is especially bad when I know the person that is making me feel like that isn’t telling the truth. I know that I can’t control what other people say and do, but it does bother me and makes me feel like I need to continue explaining myself to prove that I didn’t do anything wrong. How do you make right what you know you didn’t do wrong? That is the million-dollar question, isn’t it? I hate that about myself. I hate that I let one little thing ruin an entire day, week, weekend for me. I hate that I am not one of those people who can just brush it off and go on with my life. I hate that other people’s opinions matter so much to me. You would think after all these years, I would know better. And I do know better. I preach it to everyone else in my life, my nieces, nephews, son, friends, family……. I just can’t do it for myself. I can’t let that part of my brain heal itself. I don’t know how to heal that part of my brain. I do know that every single day, I wake up and try to be a better person than I was the day before. I try to excel at anything that is thrown my way. I try to give out kindness and compassion to everyone I come in contact with. I try my absolute best to be a good person, a person that other people want to be around and want to be friends with. I realize that my friendship follow through is lacking, but I do try. I try so hard and I do not know how to not be the way that I am. I don’t know how to de-program my mind. Just know, that if I am your friend and I can’t follow through, it’s all me. I will work on it, I promise. Just stick with me a little longer.

This has been one of those weeks where I feel like I am chasing my tail.  It feels as if I am constantly behind.  I haven’t overslept, I haven’t been late to work, I’m just rushed, anxious, unable to feel at peace.  It has been like this for a few days.  I feel like every nerve I have is on the outside of my body. I’m short-tempered and impatient.  This is one of those days where I am the absolute worst version of myself.  I do my best to act normal and be how I always am, but inside, I am a ball of nerves.  I feel manic in a sense.  I’m more easily irritated.  I hate this feeling!!  I don’t really know how to handle it.  It happens occasionally, and each time I wonder how to fix it or more importantly, what causes it.  Do people without depression/anxiety deal with these types of feelings?  My depression runs deep, as does my anxiety.  I take medications daily that help tremendously, and I have no idea how anyone could be around me before I found the right medicine combination for me.  It took some time, but I am finally straight, almost normal even.  I guess this is more about “normal” people.  Do you have days where you feel like me?  Days that you feel like you are going to jump out of your skin.  That you become more irritable that usual?  That your brain is running a million miles a minute and you can’t make a coherent thought.  All the boxes that you’ve closed and hidden away all seem to open at one time and each one is trying to talk over the others.  It’s quite deafening.  As I think back on my younger self, this has been a common feeling for me, I just couldn’t understand it.  So many times, in my life, I’ve felt disconnected from the present, but connected to the side.  They say that some people, especially Empaths, can use their sixth sense to feel things and see things, etc.  Now, no I don’t believe in ghosts or paranormal entities, but I do believe that if we can tap into that sixth sense, we can be privy to information that others can’t see/hear/feel.  I can’t tell you how many times I have dreamed something, and it came true.  Good things and bad things.  Do you know how weird and scary it is to be sitting in a situation that you’ve already been in and already know the outcome?  Some people call it Déjà vu.  I don’t know what it is, but it is definitely strange. It is terrifying if I’m being honest.  It doesn’t help that fact that it adds to my anxiety.  It sends my brain into warp speed but slows down all at the same time.  It feels almost like the Matrix if you’ve ever seen that movie.  That’s why my brain does when this feeling occurs.  I’m always hoping that it doesn’t happen. I can’t control it when it does, but it doesn’t happen as often as it used to.  That makes me feel like an outcast, I certainly don’t talk about it.  Do other people have this same feeling?  Do others understand what that feels like? How do we, as a community and society, help people like me?  If I knew that answer to that I would be a billionaire.  I’m always struggling with the feelings inside my head/body and how they relate to my faith.  There seems to be such a disconnect. Like the 2 really don’t have a place to be together.  Like they can co-exist.  I know that they can, I am proof, but I do wonder if anyone has figured out the secret to making them coexist peacefully.  They certainly don’t coexist peacefully in my mind.  They are at constant war.  The angel on one shoulder the devil on the other.  One telling you to let go and trust and the other telling you that you are worthless and insignificant to this world.  Isn’t that an age-old problem?  Everyone fighting that inner demon.  The one that has the power to turn a believer into a non-believer.  I know that my mental health exasperates it for me and yet I still don’t know how to control it.  I still don’t know how to “Let Go and Let God”.  The urge to hold on to that shred of control is just too strong some days.  Why is it that I need to feel that control?  What happened to me that made me believe that if I let go of control my world would end?  That the world would stop spinning.  That in my mind, I would literally die.  Does everyone struggle with this feeling?  I am a planner.  I am not a fly by the seat of my pants person.  I’m not sure I ever have been.  I do not procrastinate, I don’t plan by the hour, but if for some reason, we don’t leave for our adventure at the time I intended to leave, my day is pretty much ruined.  I don’t know why. I wish it wasn’t that way, I wish I could be more like my best friend.  Wake up, make a decision and fly with it no matter what.  That seems so much easier than how I live my life.  You know what else is easier, following through with plans.  I am terrible at follow through.  I want to, so bad.  I am so excited to make those dinner plans with friends I haven’t seen in forever, yet when that day actually gets here, I am so nervous and anxious of what they will think of me, or too anxious to want to leave the house, that I cancel.  Sometimes legitimately, but other times not.  I’m not proud of it, it’s extremely embarrassing to be honest, but I don’t know how to fix it.  I don’t know how to change that part of me.  I don’t know how to get out of my own head.  How to un-isolate myself from my own prison.  I try so very hard, each and every day, but most days, I completely fail.  I feel that I am failing at life.  I feel like I can do nothing right.  I feel guilty if I do something for myself, because I should be doing for other people.  I’ve recently started hearing the phrase “you can’t pour from an empty cup” and I do believe that.  I also believe that people think I’m a terrible person/mom if I do things for myself.  I have lived so long with all this bottled up inside, I sometimes wonder how I’ve done it.  And most importantly, why I care what other people think.  When I figure it out, I will let you know.        

 

 

Vulnerability – the quality or state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally. Does anyone else feel physically ill at the thought of being vulnerable? For me, being vulnerable makes me feel like I am failing. I should already know things, right? Already be confident. I know that vulnerability is directly linked to emotional health and the ability to love. If you’ve been reading along, or know me personally, you know that I am not emotionally healthy. I am an emotional mess. I feel too deeply, I love too deeply, I hurt too deeply, I feel failure too deeply. Everything I feel is always magnified by 100. I am a perfectionist when it comes to my work. I don’t mind asking for help if I don’t know something, but if I have found out I have done something wrong, oh my goodness. I feel physically sick to my stomach. I want to cry. Now, my rational brain knows that I am not perfect, that I am going to make mistakes, but my irrational brain always thinks the person who stumbled across my mistake will think I’m unintelligent, that I shouldn’t have this job, that they don’t want to have to correct my mistakes. I am the world’s worst overthinker. I overthink every single thing in my life. I overthink everything someone says to me, I overthink the response that I want to send. It is actually really sad. As I start writing things down, I’m trying to find the root of the problem, but I have no idea what that could even be. I feel like it started from birth. I don’t remember every being any other way. I remember always caring what other people thought. I don’t know why, I don’t know what happened that made it matter to me, but for as long as I can remember I have cared what other people think. Believe me, at my age, I know how stupid that is. I try every single day to remind the boy that what other people think is none of his business, but I can’t live that myself. For me, the worst punishment there could ever be isdisappointment. If I thought that you were mad or disappointed in me, I felt sick to my stomach. I would do whatever it took to make you happy again. And I still do that. I can’t not do that. I can’t help but feel responsible, even if I didn’t do anything. I am constantly apologizing, for everything. Even things that don’t require an apology. I have been single for 12 years now, and I have been told by several guy friends that the reason no one wants to date me is because I have no confidence in myself, I overthink, and I apologize constantly. Seems to me I am doomed. These are all inherent traits that I have. I don’t know how to change them. My life is so lonely, yet I don’t have what it takes to change the things that need to change. Shouldn’t there be someone out there that accepts those flaws and loves me anyway? I don’t know why I’m so hard to love. Maybe one day I will figure it out. Maybe one day, I’ll learn how to stop hating myself. Maybe one day, I will become the person that everyone needs me to be. I’ll learn to be actually happy instead of pretending. I miss having someone to share my life with. Having someone help me make huge life decisions. Someone to comfort me when the world feels like it’s closing in on me. Instead, I’m drowning, in the ocean, treading water every single day. I don’t know how to change. I’m tired. I’m tired of people telling me to snap out of it. To get over it. Do you know how many people have said to me, you’ve been divorced 12 years now, you should be over it. I’m curious if those people have ever endured the pain I have endured. Have they had their dreams crushed? I am over my divorce; I am best friends with the boy’s dad. Doesn’t mean that certain situations don’t bring up that hurt and pain and lack of confidence. The sense of failure. I feel extremely bad because I depend on my dad so much. I shouldn’t be doing that at my age. He gave me away, to someone else to take care of, and that someone else is me. I do take care of myself. I am strongly independent, and I am financially independent. I am not emotionally independent. I feel vulnerable every single day. I feel judged every single day. I feel like I am failing at something every single day. Maybe one day, none of this will even matter. Until then, I am just me.

I’ve been doing this for a week now, and I wonder if I’m even making a difference. Does anyone really read these? Are the experiences I’m writing about even matter? Am I just wasting my time? I had this idea to start this blog because I have been through some stuff. Some really, really hard stuff and I was hoping by sharing my experiences, my ideas, my opinions, it might benefit someone else in their struggle. I know it’s only been a week by I am feeling discouraged. So that begs the question…… am I doing this to get attention or to actually help people? Can the answer be both? Why does it even matter? I enjoy writing. Most times, I start writing and the words just pour out of my like a faucet. I have no idea what I’m writing or what I’m saying until I’m done, and I re-read it, and sometimes I don’t even read it. It is good therapy to write. I can’t write everything out, sometimes it’s too painful, but I try to be as honest as absolutely possible. I wish I knew how to write music. I think songwriting would be such a huge outlet, but that would require knowing how to play an instrument and I do not know how to do that. I’ve also thought about a book. I am writing ideas down on that. Is it helpful or harmful when we put this stuff out there? Does it help people feel included? Like they are less alone somehow? I am craving feedback, maybe that will help me feel less alone. I have so much to say and not sure how to say any of it. Maybe that’s the conundrum that most of us face. That we have so much in our hearts and minds, yet we are scared to let it out. Scared of rejection, scared of embarrassment, scared of being shunned. Have we really become as progress and inclusive as we pretend to be? Everyone has a cause, but do any of us use our platforms? That’s all I have right now, just a bunch of questions with no feasible answers.

Baseball season is here. The boy has been playing since he was 4. I have a love/hate relationship with it. I love it because watching him do what he loves brings me such joy. Seeing him interact with his friends, the comradery, the teamwork, it is such a joy to watch. It does my heart so good to know that he has friends, good friends. Friends who will be there for him and who will help him through the tumultuous high school years. Here’s where the hate comes in…… I must be social. I must put on my smile and go out in public. I love the parents on this team. They are such great people; they cheer for my boy as I would. They take pictures with good camara’s and share them with me. I couldn’t ask for anything more. Except I feel as if I don’t fit in. I feel like I’m sitting in a boat in the middle of the ocean, and everyone else is on the island that’s 500 miles away. I am no longer good at making friends. I’m no longer good at walking up to complete strangers and introducing myself. If I’m asked it’s ok, but I’m not good at doing the asking. All the other mom’s, they know each other, they know each other’s names, they all carpool each other’s kids, they have a connection I am not privy to. We do not live in any of the neighborhoods they live in, so the boy never had an opportunity to carpool His dad and I always got him where he needed to be. I don’t think he missed out on anything by that, I enjoyed the extra time with him and am extremely thankful that his dad and I have been in a position to do that. I do think it has hindered my involvement. I feel like I am in a different class than everyone else. I don’t think that has hurt the boy, at least I hope it hasn’t, but I do feel that it has hindered relationships on my part. I am so insecure and awkward now. When did that happen? When did I turn into this person who sat on the bleachers by herself for baseball games without interacting with others? Without other’s interacting with her because they all already knew each other. The loneliness I feel at the ballfield is so palpable. I sit there, on my bleacher, by myself, and cheer for my boy. If nothing else, he always knows I’m there. So, here’s the big question…… with me not being as “social” as everyone else, am I harming him in some way? Am I causing him to be excluded from things that he would otherwise be apart of? Am I an embarrassment to him because the other parents don’t really want to have anything to do with me? Why do I not know hardly any of the boys on the team? In little league, I was allowed and able to go to every practice, able to be hands-on, now, practice is during working hours. Most activities are for players only, not parents. Am I failing somehow? Am I doing something wrong? I am the most uninvolved I’ve ever been, and I don’t really know how to change that. I want to be involved. I want to know the boys; I want to not have to look at my roster when they are batting or make a good play on the field. I want to be able to know that already. There are so many things in my life that make me feel like a failure. This is a big one. I feel like I have let the boy down in some way. I am pretty much at every game, on the top bleacher, by myself cheering, but am I harming him by not being good enough? By having this anxiety of being in a crowd. Of being afraid to try for fear of rejection. How did I get here? If you talk to anyone who when to high school with me, I talked to everybody, I was somewhat of a social butterfly. Was I compensating back then, or was I comfortable because I had known them all my whole school life? Does anyone have any answers? How can I be better, do better, love better, fail less? The highlight of my life is my boy. He is my greatest accomplishment, but am I his biggest regret? His biggest failure? How do we know if we are doing a good job with our kids? If we are a help and not a hindrance to them? I know I’m not his friend, and I don’t want to be, my job is to teach him to be a contributing human being, right from wrong, morality and ethics. I also don’t want to be a bad mother. I want him to have all the experiences he should have, and I don’t want to be an embarrassment or a hindrance to him because I am socially awkward these days. Maybe this year will be different. Maybe this year, I will find my courage.

Why are people so rude? Why do they take their stuff and dump it on complete strangers? Why do you think it’s ok to think I’m being rude if you don’t like the answer that I gave you? When did all of this start to happen? It used to be occasionally, but now; it is constant. It is so hard to find just nice, pleasant people from restaurants, to stores, to customer service….. It is insane. When I first started working, there was only one rule……. The customer is always right; even when they weren’t. You go out of your way to make them feel heard and to fix the issue. Now, people just spew all of their hatred at whoever happens to be in front of or on the phone with them at the moment. It’s no wonder this country is falling apart. What happened to love thy neighbor? Or treating people the way you want to be treated? It is insane to me how many people in this world have no regard for self or for others. Most of them act as if you are a hindrance to them, that they would just as soon shoot you as look at you. This is a culture we are raising our children in. The same generation that is going to be responsible for running this country in the future. Do you think being confrontational and rude is going to keep your country from going to war? Everyone should really be concerned about this. Not just for us, but for the fate of our country. Did our forefather’s fight and die, their families grieve and grow up with out dad’s, brother’s, and husband’s so that we can be hateful to everyone? Military ties run deep in my family, and I know that they did not sacrifice so much for so little. Add with that the government, far left/far right trying to sensor our children’s education and we are going to have an extreme disaster on our hands. Critical Race Theory is so important to our history. Yes, it is uncomfortable and painful to talk about and read about and think about, but guess what, it doesn’t hurt you as badly as it hurt the actual people it happened to. We are so blessed to be in a place in our country where we can do whatever we want, whenever we want. We can protest what we feel is unjust, we can go to whatever church we choose, we can choose not to go to church, we can choose where we live, where we work, we can vote, we can run for government, we have all these liberties, yet people act like they have been slighted in some way. Tell me, have you been more slighted than our Civil Rights leaders of the 60’s? The families who had bricks thrown through their windows because of the color of their skin or because they aligned themselves with someone of color? Did you survive the Holocaust? Were you in Auschwitz, starving, watching your family taken to the gas chambers? Do you have a barcode tattooed on your arm showing proof of that horror? Were you a POW? Have you watched your friends die right in front of you knowing that there wasn’t anything you could do to help? These things are so important to our history, to our children. How are they supposed to be grateful for the rights they have, if they don’t know how they got them? Isn’t that what we want? Our children to do better and be better than we are. I want that, I want my child to know about the horrors of this country and this world. How important it is to use your voice if you so choose. If you want to make a change, use the tools that people fought for you to have. Censorship has no place in today’s schools. My opinion only. I don’t care what books they assign to read. It is my job as the parent to be able to speak to my child about whatever is in that book and make sure that he is aware of why it was written. Every book has a place is history. It also must be age appropriate. Are we not going to read Nathanial Hawthorne because he talks about sex and adultery? It is my job to explain both of those things, not the book, not the school. Just because you don’t agree with something doesn’t mean that it’s wrong. And just because you do agree doesn’t mean you’re right. Let me tell you a story. When I was in high school, I was 1 of 3 white people on the football field. It didn’t bother me in the least. My best friends were all on that field. One particular school that we played didn’t agree. The football players and cheerleaders of that school threatened me the whole game. Talked about the things they were going to do to me after the game. You can use your imagination there. I was terrified. The football players overheard everything they said. At the end of the game, those players, my friends, took me and my family, surrounded us on all sides in a circle, walked us to our car and then escorted us out. The love that I was showed that day never went unnoticed by me. I changed that day. I had never had so many people want me to be ok. It was amazing. Yes, the roles were reversed, but racism was alive that night and my friends showed up for me. They did the right thing by me and my family. I hope that they can look back on our time there and feel that I showed up for them as well. I never saw color. Ever. It was so foreign to me when I got out into the real world and saw how it was so different than the town I came from. Now my town wasn’t perfect, andthere was a private school in our town, but my experience is different than anyone else’s. I say that story because it is my favorite story about overcoming race for the greater good. This belongs in history. This deserves to be remembered. Our children deserve to know not just the bad, but the good. I think we all need to take a cold, hard look at ourselves. At our inner beliefs and our inner self and do our best to get back to that place where taking care of people is what we do.

Have you ever had a toxic relationship? Whether it be romantic or friendly? A relationship that every time you spoke to or saw that person, you always ended up feeling badly. I am an empath, super sensitive. I feel everything that other people are feeling, I also take on other people’s feelings. Your mood directly affects mine. If you are happy, I’m happy. If you are sad, I’m sad. Every emotion you have directly affects mine. I often wonder if other people feel as deeply as I do? Am I normal, or an anomaly? Did you know until recently, like the past 5 years or so, mental health was taboo? No one spoke about it, if you had a mental health issue you were a piranha to society, you were crazy. Mental health issues are heredity I believe. I believe that you are predisposed to certain behaviors. Just like your eye color, your height, your hair color are based in genetics, I think mental health is, too. I believe that there is a 6th sense for some people who suffer. Empathy is a direct side effect of some mental health issues. My Grandaddy and multiple of his siblings suffered from mental health issues. No one talked about them really. I don’t know if it was because of the times or because of embarrassment, but I see a lot of myself in him at times. In the way he reacted to certain things. His patience or lack there of at times. He was hospitalized several times. I was told he was sick. I’m glad they had resources available for him, I just wish I knew about it. I think if I had, I would have realized that the pit in my stomach, the headache that I got, the way I felt sick anytime I was nervous about something was anxiety and it was normal. Instead, I thought something was wrong with me medically. I always felt like I was not normal. That something was wrong with me. I remember living in Texas. I was probably 6 and we lived in an apartment. I refused to sleep in my room on the second floor. I was terrified that someone or something was going to be able to crawl up that wall and sneak into my room and take me/hurt me. It was a palpable fear; a fear that made me physically ill. I could not be by myself. I was so scared. I’m not sure what caused that fear, but it followed me all the way into adulthood. I don’t’ think I slept by myself until I was probably in college. At some point in the night, I either ended up in my brother’s room, or he came to mine. I couldn’t be alone, and it wasn’t something that I felt until the night. The dark. Funny how what I feared so much back then, I feel most comfortable in today. I’m not sure what changed, or how became able to deal with that fear, but at some point, I realized that I could control the fear. I had recurring dreams in middle school/high school where everyone in my family would die and I would be the only one left behind. Hence, fear of abandonment that follows me to this day. I dreamed that dream every single night. Someone would break into our house, they would go to my brother’s room first, then my parent’s, I would hear them and sneak out the window. I always ran up to my grandparent’s house only to find them hanging from a tree in the back yard. Leaving just me. Then I would wake up. At first, I always woke up crying, but eventually, I would just wake up in a cold sweat. My other dream was always a car crash that killed everyone but me. I have spent my entire adult life trying to decipher those dreams. What was my self-conscious was trying to tell me? I still don’t know, and I have relegated those memories to the box in the corner of my brain that I try not to access. I don’t’ think there is an easy answer. I think it is a lot to unpack, but there is no actual “reason” And if there is a reason, would I want to know? I don’t think so. I think that would make it worse. I wonder if my granddaddy had nightmares. If he feared being alone or feared the dark. Did he feel like I did? A pit in his stomach? Did he feel like his nerves were on the outside of his body like I do sometimes. Was he uncomfortable in big crowds? Did he sometimes get anxious at the thought of large family gatherings? I really want to know if he felt like he was having to put on a maskto face the world. I wish I had known enough about myself to be able to ask him these questions before he passed. Oh, to go back in time, and ask those questions. To help me learn who I am and why I am the way that I am. I know that he would have been a wealth of knowledge in helping me understand my feelings. I wonder if he had a dark cave… A place that he went to that he felt he couldn’t climb out of, I also wonder how my Granny dealt with it. I don’t believe she had any mental health issues, but I’m not 100% on that. Wouldn’t it be great if we could have just one more conversation with a loved one, to be able to ask those questions that haunt us, that keep us up at night? Would it make things better or worse? I don’t know the answer, but I do wish I knew then what I know now so that I could ask those questions. I feel like it would help me understand myself better, and maybe even make me a better person.

Just heard a song that talked about a memory I don’t mess with. What an incredibly sweet song. I started thinking about memories that I have. Memories that I want to forget, memories that I’m afraid I’ll forget, and memories that are always there. Isn’t it funny how a smell or a song can bring up a memory? My grandmother died when I was 19. I was in college, and I remember the phone call. I remember every single moment that happened after that phone call. I remember the viewing, the graveside ceremony. I remember what I was wearing. I was in a fog that day. It was surreal, she was the first person super close to me that passed away and that was the first time I ever had a panic attack. I didn’t know at the time that it was a panic attack. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t catch my breath, crying uncontrollably, and then I fell. My knees gave out. Thank goodness for Nechia who was there with me the whole time and caught me. I bring that up to say that my Granny had a specific smell. I don’t know what the name of it was, but I can be in a store or at work and smell it and it takes me right back to her kitchen table. Sitting in a blue robe, which I now have, drinking black coffee out of a brown coffee mug and smoking a cigarette. Such a vivid memory. I can hear her laugh. I remember Thursday night spaghetti dinners. All of us gathered around her big, round kitchen table. Lots of conversation about lots of different things. That’s a memory I have every time I make spaghetti for dinner. It floods me with warmth. It brings me such joy. Memories are funny like that. Some I wish I could forget. Some are associated with shame. Some are funny, happy, sad, exhausting, you get the idea. A song can take you back to a lover that you no longer have. I friend that you don’t see much but know that they still have your back. Memories are like quilts. So many squares. Each square representing something from your memory. The good the bad and the ugly as they say. One square may cause you to cry yourself to sleep at night. Another square can make you laugh uncontrollably, while yet another square can bring you to your knees. Do we get to decide what we remember? What memories take up residence in our heads? I find that I can’t control them. I remember everything. Some may say that’s a good thing and maybe it is. But what about the memories that embarrass us, or make sure feel shame. I don’t want to feel those feelings. They hurt; they stab like a knife. They are a constant reminder of all that is wrong in my past. We can’t outrun our past, we can just learn from it. I try not to go to the dark box of memories. I try to keep them tucked away, but sometimes, that song comes on and the flood gates open. The tears flow, the shame comes to the surface. Those are the times I feel most alone. No one to comfort me. No one to remind me that the past is just that, the past. That the past doesn’t define me. What’s strange is that I know this. I tell friends/family this all the time about their lives, but for some reason, I can’t make myself believe it about me. I can uplift everyone else when their memories take over, but when my memories take over, I fall back into my cave. My dark cave that I feel most comfortable in. The one that I am desperate to get out of, but not sure how. If you could change your memories, would you? If we had the ability to go into the compartment and mess with them, would we? Should we? Would it change our lives, change the person we are? I think it would. Every memory makes up a part of your character. It makes us who we are. My divorce is painful, but my wedding was beautiful. I like that memory, wearing the dress, walking down the aisle, promising forever, and meaning it with every fiber I had in me. Dancing at the reception. Leaving and driving to our honeymoon. Starving because I was too nervous and anxious to eat that day. It was beautiful. The reception was perfect. The music was perfect. This is a memory I don’t want to forget. It is sometimes a painful memory, but a happy memory. Usually, I think of that day when I hear a song, or when I get a wedding invitation. I think of what might have been. What I wanted it to be. What it inevitably turned into. Just because something ends doesn’t mean it wasn’t beautiful. I then go to the day that it was decided we would divorce. I remember everything about that day as well. The date, what I was doing, what was said, where I was sitting, everything. That is a devastating memory. It is something that keeps me up at night, sometimes. That memory makes me feel like a failure. That memory I like to keep locked away. So many memories that can flood your mind, your body, even your soul. Those are memories I don’t mess with.

As I lie on a blanket in the grass, looking up at the stars, my mind can’t help but wander. Thinking of life, of death, of the in-between. Somewhere between life and death I’ve gotten lost. I’ve been wandering in the in-between. Not going forward, not going backwards, just stuck. I find myself wondering if there is more to life than the in-between and if there is, how do I find it? How do I go from being in-between to being present? What exactly does “being present” mean? I am a fixture in my child’s life, I am a fixture in my work life, I am a fixture in my family’s life, but I don’t feel like I am a fixture in my own life. I feel like I am floating around the sun, never making landfall, never participating, always lacking something. I wish I knew what that something was. I wish I knew how to change my fixture out. How to become “present” in my own life, not just in everyone else’s. These are the things I think about as I try to fall asleep. I feel like a hamster in a cage. Spinning on the never-ending wheel of death. I wonder what would happen if I stepped off the wheel……. Would I find myself? Would I finally have some clarity of who and what I am? What I’m supposed to accomplish while I’m here in the in-between? Can life actually save you? Do we learn from our mistakes, and allow them to make us better people? When you’re at the bottom of the well, do you believe people are going to recognize you aren’t around? I don’t think they would. Invisible. That’s a good word for it. Inthose time, the dark times, it’s hard to feel present. It’s hard to find you’re footing. Imagine you are rock climbing and every time you try to place your foot in the foot hold, it falls and leaves you dangling. Then the rocks start to fall. Your own personal hell. Day in and day out. Trying to be everything to everybody, when all you see isdarkness, is exhausting. You just want one glimmer, one little glimmer of pixie dust to remind you that the light is there. That if you follow the pixie dust, you may just find your way out of the tunnel, out of the well. Will you know how to act if you find your way out? All you’ve known is the dark, it’s comfortable, it’s like a warm blanket. The light is new, bright, scary, it makes you vulnerable. Vulnerable is a scary feeling. I don’t like to be vulnerable. It makes me feel weak, out of control. I can’t be out of control, that is too unfamiliar. As I ponder whether I want to even try to find the light, I think of my son. He deserves to have me in the light. Everyone should be in the light, but how many of us are existing in the dark, the in-between? How many of you are just trying to make it to bedtime every day? One day at a time, one hour at a time, one minute at a time, one second at a time….. Then bedtime, which means I’ve won the day. Are any of us doing more than just trying to make it to bedtime? If you are, what’s your secret? What’s the reason you get up every morning? The reason you do more than just survive your day. Did you find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow; maybe you’re knight in shining armor; or maybe your saved yourself. What an idea. Being able to save ourselves. Being able to pull ourselves out of the in-between for the light. Definitely something worth exploring. My blanket is starting to get damp and it’s starting to get cold. I’m sure the stars will have some answers for me tomorrow.