What is wrong with me? The final solution

I haven't written here since my birthday and thought I would see if I have anything to say. First I am great probably the best I have ever been. My life as you know has been a search to figure out how to do better and most of all to feel better.

I give recent credit for healing to my therapist and to EMDR. I have handled life by bracing my self for something awful or swimming through treacherous waters, I have felt like an alien visiting here watching other people just move through life not thinking too much and not worrying too much.

I took a trip to see my family earlier this month and is actually felt good. Everyone older and wiser including me. On the way I listen to a book "What happened to you?". It summed up where I have been and where I am now.

The author is a trauma specialist and said something that spoke to me. She said instead of saying "whats wrong with me?" say "what happened to me?".  I have said the first for as long as I remember even now if I feel sad or just not interested in life I say "whats wrong with you?"

My work with EMDR has brought forward some significant events to the surface. Things that I have known about intellectually for a long time. What happened to me early in my life and the guilt I have for even thinking about it after so many years.  

I have written about those here hoping I could just let them go by putting them on the page. I have let those painful experiences go so many times but not really. The book talks about trauma in the body mostly early trauma and how it stays with children forever. 

The EMDR has helped me experience these painful times as an adult. Going back to the moment in mind as an adult and walking through my feelings until they dissipate. When I have my next session I can hardly remember what was addressed before. 

There isn't anything wrong with me I just had some things happen to me that made me think I was a problem and a real burden to everyone around me. I was regularly punished for being who I was and asking too many questions all in the name of love.

 I lost my family after my mother died and I found the best way to be loved is to earn it by doing things people wanted done and doing them perfectly. I learned to anticipate their every need.  As an adult when I had a crisis and couldn't fulfill my previous roll I was left.

I thought this was my fault that I was flawed in some way and didn't deserve love. I am free from that thought now and have moved through the events that created this belief. I have forgiven the child that I have been trying to solve the problem of me. 

This blog saved me and gave me a place to tell my story with honesty and freedom. I want to let you know to never give up on finding a way to feel better. Finding a way to knowing there is nothing wrong with you.  Finding peace with the past and loving yourself when it feels impossible. 

Letting go - Short cut to happiness - I felt better

I am a seeker by nature always looking to make anything better this hasn't always helped me in the letting go department.  I can always see the many possibilities that others aren't ready or even interested in seeing.  My belief that there is a solution has sometimes left me stuck. I can't let go or move forward because I am sure there must be a way out. I have had to wait until something major happens to force me to more on. 

I watched a show on Netflix about a process where you mentally - Just Let Go - You imagine your worries clenched in your hands and then you imagine releasing them. This does really work just like turning your problems over to God or meditating and watching your problems float off in a bubble one by one. 

I have researched a lot modes of healing and they all have worked for awhile and I have benefited greatly from trying them. They brought me closer to seeing the power to control my own beliefs about myself. My mind and spirit working together to help me see how I was really hurting myself repeating my own jaded stories about who I was and what had happened to me. 

It hasn't been a quick road for me but that is because I would have never accepted the simple idea that I had the power to heal myself. I loved and protected the story I had about myself and truly believed that I was permanently damaged to the point that I wasn't lovable.  I proved this theory by surrounding myself with people who were just like me they could not love themselves either. We were broke together. 

I think my stubbornness or really my inability to give up the narrative in my head kept me from taking responsibility for my own suffering. I was comfortable being the victim it gave me permission to do lay back and feel helpless for as long as I wanted. I had to get sick of this and write new stories.

I am not saying that I haven't been mistreated because I have but it is what I read into these times in my life that did the real damage. I felt like I needed these people to love me in order to feel like I belonged on this earth. I couldn't make this happen so I was lost still searching for a permanent connection. 

I have made huge strides starting with counseling almost thirty years ago. My counselor was tough and didn't let my natural ability for self BS to distract the both of us from really scary parts of my story. The main benefit for me was that I had refused to grieve the many losses in my life. I cried for weeks until I got caught up. It was a huge relief and our time together was over. I felt better.

She suggested Al-Anon and I started going and was a quick study. I didn't just dip my toe in but I was all in I had tasted relief with counseling and I wanted more. Everything said there including the what I considered "silly slogans" literally saved my life. The meetings kept me from being alone in my head and blaming myself for all the things I had done to get myself into this mess. I felt better.

I did what we all do I met someone and spent a lot of years distracting myself with life doing what everyone says you are suppose to do to be happy. I adopted and created a new family and stayed a busy as humanly possible to avoid what I felt when I stopped long enough to feel anything. Dead inside.

You could say it was fate or you could say I manifested my own freedom but the shallow roots of my life were suddenly ripped out of the ground.  All the stable things in my life were gone overnight. I had let my guard down thinking I was secure and there was nothing and I lost it mentally, emotionally and physically. I could no longer operate as the person I had been up until that moment. At first I had to deal with finding a place to live but once the dust settled I had nothing left. 

My spirit was done and I could no longer run from what was chasing me. I let go and floated around in the the nothingness for what seemed like forever. I did what I had to do and pretended that I was the same person but I wasn't. Inside I had let go of the identity I had created for myself about myself. I gave up all the labels that I tried to live up to even being a spiritual seeker.  I couldn't identify with anything I had been before I was too tired to fight. I was at zero. 

I ask myself if I could live at zero and I said "yes". The funny thing is that immediately I felt better like the holding on had zapped all my strength. I didn't really have anybody left in my life by then. This was in part because those that like to help couldn't. I wasn't the rock anymore I couldn't assure them that I would be okay. This was uncharted territory I was letting go of everything. 

One friend stayed by my side until they felt I was safe.  They didn't ask anything of me or try to cure me in anyway they just let me tag along. I imagine it was like toting around a mannequin perfectly harmless but kind of strange. Looking back I want to believe that my spirit and my brain were healing me even without my conscious participation. 

Letting go saved me in the end and even now while I am writing about the past I know that it was necessary for me to see through the lies I told myself. I felt damaged by my past to the point that I didn't think I could be happy but I was wrong. Nothing anyone has said to you or anything you have said to yourself is true. The events happened but only you give them long term meaning and accept the permanent damage you think they have done to you. This is a choice we make everyday.

It doesn't mean you don't have a right to be mad or even have to forgive those people but realizing that you are free to heal even if those people are gone or even dead. We give them so much power even from the grave sometimes. I am enough no matter what.

I keep writing here hoping that I can help keep someone out there from taking the long way like I did. I have found the person I was before bad things happened. I have found a way to stop running from the things that scare me because I know I can face them. I have learned to be grateful for what I have in my life today. I can talk about my past without permanently attaching it to who I am right now. 

I can be happy and not be afraid of just letting go.  

 

Mental Health - Denial - Lives are wasted

This is the moment when we find out what we are made of and if the tools we have picked up along the way will sustain us. It is natural to feel shocked and overwhelmed by the people around us that don't feel the same way we do or worse they assume we believe the way that they do.

I got a pretty outrageous text from someone that said the people on TV were hired by the government to impersonate normal flag waving patriots despite the fact that their leaders have been identified. I did not reply because I wondered if I had given them the idea that I would be be happy to get this message. I thought it might be a group message but it was only for me.

Our chemistry dictates that we feel better when we belong to a group. Our serotonin goes up and stays up when we feel like we are some how part of a special group. That need is strong especially now when we have to rely on our own emotional stability to survive. Hours and hours alone with the our media of choice pumping us full of fear we want to feel like we are right and they are wrong. This is our brain at work. 

We aren't feeling stable and safe enough to take a time out and be okay not knowing what will happen tomorrow. Our brains want more information so we can solve the fear and uncertainty we are feeling or to make easy we just choose black or white. 

I have had a lot of experience with feeling so insecure and scared that my mind literally took a time out. It broke and I felt blank for awhile. You know this if you have been here before. 

The good news is that we will make it. The world and politics moves slowly whether we like it or not. Healing moves slowly whether we like it or not. All we can do is control what we are letting into our brains. We have to stop feeding the fear and find peace for today.

The text made me sad and I am not sure what I will say about it but for now I am putting that relationship on hold until I decide what needs to be said.  Although the relationship is casual it feels dishonest to me to just pretend I am on the same page. 

Denial is our way of coping with when we can't come to terms with the truth. This is why we stay in relationships too long or ignore the abuse in an alcoholic relationship. The thought of facing the pain that comes with seeing the truth is too terrifying. We get stuck thinking things will change. 

I do think we stay denial until something bad happens and then we either say enough is enough or we dig in deeper. I am a coward when it comes to this and something bad has to happen to make me snap out of it. In relationships this hurts everyone and the end result doesn't change it just gets postponed and lives are wasted. 

I have a lot experience with denial and it saved me on more than one occasion. It has it's purpose and while our sub-conscious is sorting things out it is a nice place to visit. Living there will alienate you from the people that want to help you to get better and to move on. You are left with those that are like you that feed the sickness and keep you stuck. Only we can only decide when to face the truth and go from there. 

When faced with the denial of others we can only watch. We have to wait until they are ready to move on but can't pretend to go along with it. This prolongs the inevitable awakening or in some cases the loss of someone we love. 

This post is mostly about relationships and not politics but the denial of another does force us to choose our own sanity over trying to change another person. We can still love them from a distance and not banish them from our lives but we have to protect our own peace.  

Shutting out the noise - Choose Peace

I could write about state of the our nation but I will leave that to others let's face it we have address our own lives and decide whether to let these things control us by filling us with fear.  I don't believe in the good old days every decade has sucked for someone somewhere. Life is full of scary things.

We have to just decide how to move on with the world that is presented to us today. Every intelligent awake person could see this coming a mile away.  I told someone that if he loses it will take tanks to get him out of the White House. He lives only in his mind and has no connection to reality. Surrounding himself with only people that agree with him. The "emperor's new clothes"comes to mind. 

Okay just a little politics.  I have been easing back into work and enjoying the little quiet time I have left and doing a lot of writing. Like I have said before I am writing my life story because it helps me to know where I am emotionally and what areas are still buried. 

In this process I have been doing a little fact checking and realized that my mental timeline has been off. Things actually took months not years. I believe that everyone has their version of the truth. When we have been hurt deeply we make up the story of that hurt and we carry it with us for as long as it serves us. We repeat the story to ourselves and depending on how creative we are we smooth over the details and maybe embellish them.

The worst thing we do is let the story we tell ourselves create a permanent scar on us emotionally. We then have to walk around as wounded adults that need to be fixed. For me I have carried the burden of my own story all my life and I have the embellished facts of my story to back me up. My story was the idea that I was not lovable.

Writing it all down even though very emotional and painful at times. Painful enough that I had to stop and take a break also lets me place these memories outside myself. It is more like a character in a novel and not really me anymore. It puts distance between the part of me that gets stuck in the past. 

Holding on to what hurt us keeps it alive while those that hurt us live on without a thought about what they did. Most of the people I have loved never really saw me and weren't capable of shared love. They couldn't show love or emotion except maybe anger. This is how I grew up and this kind love felt so familiar to me and I have picked it again and again. I know how to be invisible and I know how to be autonomous. In the past decade I have learned to love and take care of myself. I am no longer waiting for others to value me to value myself.. This has felt like freedom.  

When I write about my life I sometimes feel it is totally narcissistic but I get a sense of healing. I chance to see just how far I have come. I guess it takes a lifetime.

I know the world is an overwhelming place right now but we can only live minute to minute. We can  choose peace by finding a quiet place even if that sitting in car somewhere to just soak in the silence.Turn of the the news and our phones for 15 minutes and just soak up the silence.  Of course I recommend writing without censoring what is being written. The mind is always trying to heal itself. 

 

"I am enough" - short cut to happiness

I have spent a life time wallowing in my own recovery.  I know it had to be done so I don't fault myself but I feel I have missed a lot during my suffering.  My desire is to somehow help other people take a short cut to finding healing for emotional trauma.

I think it is important to know where you come from and whose words shaped you into the person you are today.  Sometimes it isn't words it is maybe a look or in my case a lack of interest in me at all. As kids we take this stuff in and we believe it because it is our only experience.  We think it is true because it was one on the first things imprinted in our little minds.

To find happiness for myself I have had to look a my own thoughts and the phrases I say to myself to find out what opinions I have of myself that hurt me.  At first  I had to stop the negative comments I constantly made to myself.  I had to make friends with the woman in the mirror.

That was a good start and gave me a lot of peace in my life but I still felt like something was missing.  I knew there was more because sometimes I would feel sad and lonely and words of blame would surface.  I would go over everything that brought me to the place I am today.  All the mistakes I made and the people I trusted with my heart.

What I have realized this past year is that I can't change the past but I can stop blaming myself for where I am today.  I am only suffering because I chose to feel the weight of not only my choices but the choices of every other person in my life.  Life is messy and people are messed up.  We want to fix the past so we stay there too much.

I don't believe that regurgitating our past does anything to heal us. It is a bad habit that must be broken to move on. It is narcissism at its best and will keep us from finding happiness with where we are today. We can identify the beliefs we created from those events but then let them go. We are no longer experiencing them unless we relive them in our minds. It is a story and telling our story over and over gives it power over us. We are not our story unless we want to be.

I have been lost for a long time believing that I was somehow "not good enough" and this was why I didn't find the life I imagined I would.  But really it is this believe that kept me from enjoying the times in my life that were really wonderful. I wasn't emotionally engaged and surrounded myself with people just like me. It was where I was comfortable being invisible lost in my own painful thought.

I have had a good life and even though sometimes I wish it was more like a Hallmark movie - who doesn't?  I am thankful that I am healthy and my mind is good and I have a job that I love. I know now that I can decide to enjoy the day and not wish for something more.

Parents Wedding Facing the truth

I am spending the weekend alone which isn't such a shock but this weekend I am not particularly inspired to do anything.  I did pull weeds yesterday morning but that is about the only routine thing I have done.  I usually have a least a to do list my head but I decided to just do nothing.

This isn't something I am at all comfortable doing and lets just say that my idea of doing nothing can sometimes translate into another persons doing a lot.  I talked to my sister for a couple of hours yesterday while she fixed herself lunch and then walked to the bottom of her property and pulled weeds while we talked. Our friendship is growing as she realizes we are more the same then she imagined.

Today I got up and decided to clean my home office and move towards changing it into a studio. I don't really like this room and when I bring work home I sit at the dining room table. The office is paneled at the bottom and has a large bookcase a perfect set up for a working space.  It is northeast facing and seems dark and uninviting.  I painted it a saturated blue to contrast with the dark paneling but it made it worse. I do write my blog here but that is really it.

To start the cleaning process I first took the two last boxes of my old business files upstairs. When I got there I faced a bed covered with family photos.  A few months ago I started looking at mostly my mothers family photos and got too overwhelmed and left it. Today I decided to put them away and move on and then I stumbled upon my parents wedding album. It is the original with thick white pages with plastic on both sides of each page. It has no cover or order and some of the plastic has cracked.

This album used to be kept in the bottom drawer of my mothers secretary. As a child I loved to pull it out regularly and look at my parents getting married.  I have often thought of creating a new album but this one has a smell that reminds me of my childhood.  Probably off gases of the plastic they used back then but I could bear to get rid of the original album.

Today I brought it downstairs and started scanning the pictures.  I want to make a digital photo album for my sister.  Along with the wedding the album has all the professional pictures of our family.  Ones with Santa and a few during a time when my mom bought one of those packages from Olan Mills.  I have added a few random photos I have found over the years. 

My mother had dreams for herself and for us.  She made every moment count with her entrepreneur spirit she made our lives feel full and safe.  She kept us motivated and everything at our house was organized and drama free. Her own family growing up was plagued with addiction and lived drama to drama this sometimes invaded our lives with phone calls in the middle of the night. She always downplayed the situation and everything went back to normal. 

Looking at my little family today starting with my mothers late teenage years.  She was at a dinner getting and award for vocational leadership to the last professional family picture just before she got sick. Her smile from the first picture change from genuine to fake to even forced in the last one.  She gave up her own ambitions mostly at the direction of the church. It was a choice she made and certainly had nothing to do with my father who would have joined the circus to be with her.

Her mother and the indoctrination she received from her church kept her on the straight and narrow.  She chose that path and lived it with her whole heart and would not be happy about me writing this.  We make choices based on what we know and who is influencing us day to day.  My dad raised a Methodist loved the rigidity of my mothers religion. He didn't like to make decisions for himself so it was great to have the church do this for him.

Looking at all the pictures together has helped me to see the bigger picture and where I come from.  I can see where everything is a choice and how I can choose again. My mother didn't choose to get sick but I think she lived against who she really was and that can make you sick. I only remember her wanting to get well for my father.  Anything treatment he found she would try.  In the end because she had to have faith she couldn't be honest with us girls that she wasn't going to make it.

I am glad my sister and I are getting closer.  We have been alone most of our lives emotionally and spiritually with only our faith to get us through.  I am grateful for my family history and the values both my parents gave to me.  It has served me well.

Being enough - healing - just someone's opinion

I got to work yesterday and walked in with co worker we were both a little early so I went to my office and started on my mountain of responsibilities.  Hoping if things were slow I would get caught up from my two days off.  After the rest of the crew arrived someone came into my office and said the coworker was crying hysterically in the bathroom.

I went in to find out what was going on and she couldn't talk.  She wouldn't open the door to the stall but after a little prodding finally came out. Evidently she lives with her dad and she was suppose have deep cleaned the house the day before and had to work late and didn't get it done.  She had left him a note that after work she would be home to finish. He called right when we opened and started yelling at her.

The back story to this is that he found out he was sick last week. He is lashing out and made the statement "you are trying to kill me" to her.  I hugged her until the crying stopped and said this isn't about you it is about him.  He is scared and you are the closest and safest person to lash out at. I know him and he is a perfectionist and his standards for himself and everyone else is really high. He takes care of everything and has the energy of 3 people. I feel a growth opportunity ahead.

I felt sad for her and it reminded me of my riff with my dad. It seems sometimes parents don't see their kids as separate adults with feelings. At least that is my experience with my family. They thought I was a tool to make their lives a little easier.  I owed it to them because they were paying my way. This was totally my dad. He was raised on a farm where you hoped for as many boys as possible to keep things going. He was the oldest and ended raising his three younger brothers and two sisters while his mother worked at a mill.

People that we love and that are suppose to love us we just can't see each other as fully formed. They are a version of our imagination a story we have about each other from the past instead of who we are now. He said to her "you have a terrible work ethic" after she spent time off work last week taking him to the doctor. This isn't the first time I have been a part one of the incidences. She wants so bad to to please a man that cannot be pleased.

I wanted to call him and say "you know your daughter can walk out of your life and never come back." This is what I did only after I could not take the emotional abuse from my stepmother. I was never enough for her and my dad never stood up for me. It didn't matter how carefully I cleaned the house to her specifications or the errands I ran or even when I gave her flowers. I was invisible unless I wasn't meeting her standards.

I was just a young girl who had lost her mother looking for someone to let me know that I mattered. When I left they didn't even try to stop me this re-in forced what I already knew. I was not loved or cherished.  At least this is what I took with me that day.

I do know now that this wasn't personal. My dad and my stepmother were not the adults in the room that day. They were stuck and not capable of giving more and would never be. My sister and I spoke about this during my visit. She was going on about how my dad had said he was sorry about not being there for her.  The girl in me said " did he say anything about me" still longing for evidence that I meant something to him.

I recently heard Joel's message called "The blessing" it was how important dads are in their daughter's lives.  How they are the first example of how men treat women. How girls can repeat that relationship over and  over.  I really get that I have repeated the relationship of indifference over and over my whole life. At work at home and even with my friends. These relationships feel familiar to me and I know how to play my part.  Joel's final word was the God can be the father you wanted.

I have been a little weepy today gathering my thoughts. I cried yesterday hugging my co-worker and hoping she can somehow understand she is enough no matter what her dad thinks. It is just his opinion and she has the power to decide whether to let it control her life.

 My father did love me in his limited way and I could have made more of an effort to bring us together but my own pain and immaturity kept me from doing that.  When he died we were on good terms and I have made peace with both our limitations. I guess today I am still healing.

Meanness - Put upon us.

A friend told us a story of his childhood last night during dinner.  How he had gotten a small plant as a boy and he was so thrilled he put it in the window and fussed over it everyday. One day he came home and it was gone. His mother didn't tell him where but he saw it later in the window of a neighbors house. She had given it away.

I said this was meanness of the worst kind from the most important person in a child's life. It made me want to cry these things that shape us forever. As a boy "don't get too attached to anything" or worse "Mom doesn't want me to be happy".  His mother was abandoned by her own mentally ill mother and dropped off at an orphanage only to visited periodically to rub salt in the wound. The nuns finally ask her to quit coming.

We all have experienced something that has shaped us in ways we don't even see.  We just think this is the way we are and I think it is the little messages or big messages of how unimportant we are to the people that were suppose to love us that does the most damage. We decide whether we are worthy of love from those moments.

We don't get to pick our parents. My own parents were loving for the most part even with the whippings my mother gave me. I was definitely a wild child and a handful but I felt totally loved. The school wanted to medicate me (this was the 70's)  She was strict but we were happy and she encouraged us to push our limits even as girls. This is why both my sister and I can do the work of 3 people on an off day.

The worst ideas that were planted in me came from my step mother,  Her jealously and immaturity over the relationship I had with my dad made her a the worst kind of mean. I was no match for her at 12 an easy target for her constant manipulation and mean comments about me. I think because my father didn't stand up for me I believed the things she said were true.  I didn't feel worthy I was worthy of love and I wasn't worth fighting for this is the belief has shaped my life. I have chosen the same kind of people over and over the kind of people that didn't value me.

I have finally learned to value myself and not look for any kind of validation from the outside. I understand that even with my stepmother she was damaged herself. Dumped by the love of her life just before meeting my dad. When I saw her recently after all these years she was still talking about it. The trap was familiar to me "not good enough" even though my dad worshipped her.

The story of my friend really touched me and I feel tears in my eyes now. He has a good relationship with his mother now and accepts her limitations.  What choice does he have if he wants to move on.

I think those of us working on what holds us back are lucky that we can recognize how we came to believe what we believe now.  What shaped us and how we can see that those ideas don't have to be permanent.  Just another person's sickness put upon us.  They didn't know.  It was about them not about us.

Looking for my mother - All grown up

It is a friend of mine is having a birthday tomorrow someone I have known a long time and I was once very close to.  Maybe the closest thing to a mother I have had. Our relationship has been different now since I had to go out on my own and learn to heal myself. I couldn't act like the the person I was before because that person does not exist.  I did try for a while because I felt bad that I was losing another person who represented a milestone in my life.

When I entered the program I met a lot of people that were all suffering and going through some of worst times in their lives.  We were all babies in the program and children looking for a safe place to land and someone to comfort us instead of us being the comforters.

She did this for us she cooked and made all our favorite foods it seemed for me the way I imagined my own mother would have done if she had lived.  She was a mother to us an in turn we were obedient children and did what she told us to do. When she said show up we did.  I imagine this is what having a mother would also be like.

I think the way we depended on her made her feel she was needed. In my last relationship I played the same part she did.  I took care things and made sure everyone had what they needed and felt safe and secure when I was around. The very thing I was longing for.

I enjoyed this role for a long time but towards the end it felt forced and the people I did for took my presence for granted. No one ask me to do this it was what I needed. I was trying to feel the void that was left in me after my own mother died.  I was trying to heal that part of me that didn't feel safe.

I know now that no one can keep you safe even if you have the best mother in the world life isn't safe. Things happen and you have to find a way to dig deep down and trust that you are going to be alright. It is good to have friends that comfort you but in the end no one can fill that void but you.

If we are lucky we grow up and learn that we must save ourselves and find our own inner happiness. This wasn't easy for me because I believed I had something permanently missing from inside of me. Something I would never be able to heal I thought I was damaged goods.  This was the lie I told myself and it affected every choice I made.  All the time I had the power to heal myself.

I know now this was the path I had to take because I took it.  Every choice was right for me and my own growth.  I wasn't born lacking in any way and my spirit was trying to find its way back to the freedom I was born with. To live life un-afraid and willing to accept that life changes and people change and we can either adapt or live in constant fear of what is next.

Happy birthday to my friend and thank you for the years you took care of all of us. We are all grown now but we still love and respect you for all that you did for us so many years ago.

Emotional Storms - Clearing the air

We had a big storm here in case you happen to be on another planet.  I didn't have any damage to my property and enjoyed the extra couple of days off.  My long time friend stayed at my house for the worst of it and we produced some art until the sun went down and we ran out of light.

I decided the day before to bake some bread and the morning of the storm to make a chocolate cake. I figured if we had to go days without power nothing would be as satisfying as homemade bread and chocolate cake.  

We did lose power even before the storm was near but I didn't really mind that much.  I like the quiet and I knew it probably wouldn't be out for long.  The next morning everyone was out cleaning up their yards manually.  The sun was shining and you could really feel a sense of community.

The neighbors next door had their kids raking the yards of people that had evacuated.  They are good people and I imagine spending the night with three kids and a German Shepard wasn't exactly stress free. 

It was just the two of us and we were getting each others nerves a little bit. We did play Scrabble and I found I could play with a real person and win.  Until then I had only played the computer and wasn't sure I could play against a real person.

Lately I have felt something shifting inside.  Every since I returned from the wedding I feel different. I faced a few ghost there and was un-affected.  Before the storm my sister and I got into another discussion about my dad.  She said I would never have forgiven him even if he had asked to be forgiven. For a moment things got ugly. I said I would have accepted far less than an apology and I didn't appreciate her thinking she knew what I would or would not have done. 

She then ask if I was over it why was I still talking about it.  I told her because she was the only one that was there and the fact that she dismissed what was done to me as my imagination that I felt I had to defend myself. I said we did not have the same experience and that I have spent a big chunk of my life getting over it. She said she fought to have a relationship with him and I said I was too immature back then to think I needed to fight for a relationship with my own father.

I was surprised by this conversation but it really cleared the air.  I ended it by saying that if the stormed wiped me out that I could at least go in peace. We have of course talked since then.

We all think we know what other people are experiencing but that to me is like playing God and I have done it many times. We think we can give them advice and make things better but this is not true.  We have to know that we can't feel their hurt we can only listen and comfort them and share our own experience. 

I am happy to be where I am now.  Having that discussion with my sister really freed me to relate to her as a person instead of listening to big sister advice.  Today I am grateful to be free from the past. 

Happy on the outside - Miss Wild and Dancing

I have always felt like I was on the outside looking in I could see early on that I was different my family was different.

We were Pentecostal this never was a problem for me until my teacher Miss Wild in the 4th grade started an half hour of dancing ever Friday afternoon. I loved her she looked like Cher and was the coolest person I had ever met. When I went home to tell my mother about the dancing she was appalled and made me take a note to Miss Wild saying that I wasn't allowed to participate in the dancing.  Every week while the other kids danced I had to sit and watch.

It was the burden I had to bare for my families beliefs. I felt lucky, unlike some of the other kids from our church,  I was able to wear pants. I think this came about because I was a tom boy and it was more important for me to be covered then the rules of dress.

I was odd from the beginning even in my own family I didn't really fit in too well. I looked at people and what they were doing and saying and I just didn't get it. The girls in my neighborhood were all very tight DeDe and Beverly were best friends and when they had a big fight one of them would befriend me until they made up and then they both would reject me.

My mother suffered over my social problems more than I did and she was always looking for a solution.  No one was sure what was wrong with me and at one point I was put into special ed with Bobby who lived on my street who what definitely a little slow.

I went along with this because this is what my mother wanted.  It was a few hours of free time each week a break from the seriously boring school day. I felt sorry for Bobby not understanding that people were thinking the same thing about me. Today I would be diagnosed with ADD and put on drugs even then they did offer drugs but we were health nuts and my mother refused.

This period with Bobby didn't last long but it didn't help me to fit with my schoolmates either. When my mother died in the 5th grade it sealed my fate for ever being normal in the real world. Headlines "Pentecostal girl loses mother and any hope of being accepted by the outside world".  My skin was pretty thick by then and I had created my own world a place where I controlled all emotion.  I accepted that I was alone and would have to figure things out for myself.

I remember once telling my mother not to worry about me that I was fine and I would find my own way. This was when she was first sick.  I meant it and by that time I was pretty autonomous and felt and had found my place alone in the world.  I had know idea what was coming but I was strong and my will kept me going.

This is my story of life from the outside. I never felt a part of any group until I went to Al-Anon.  The brokenness and strength I found there seemed so familiar to me.  People strong on the outside but with so many sad parts on the inside.  Everyone had been through something and wanted to get better.

The acceptance I found there was incredible.  I became a part of a clique which became the closest thing to a family that I have had.  Some of us are still together but some are not as comfortable letting the past go and being happy and healthy.  It does feel really awkward to not being broken and trying to fix myself.  I have done my best and it is time to rest and enjoy what the day has to offer instead of looking for the next problem to solve. Filling my days trying to solve an outside problem and when there isn't one looking for one on the inside. 

I feel whole for the first time in my life. I have always believed that because I didn't fit in that there was something wrong with me.  The search for the cure consumed my life. I tried so hard to find a place where I did fit in that I gave up parts of myself to appear normal.  Today I know that I am perfect just the way I am and that girl in me that tried to sooth her mother's worries is still here today finding my own way. 

Healing - Save Yourself

I watched this movie called "Take Care" about a couple who after he recovers from cancer he dumps her. In the movie she guilt's him into taking care of her after she has a serious car accident.  I liked the movie because it is about healing and about emotions what is really going on behind what people do.

On the surface it seems people do terrible hurtful things but it is never meant to be personal. In fact it takes courage sometimes to do the unpopular thing "save yourself".  I have never been that brave to look deep inside and decide my own happiness is more important than the promises I have made to others.

It isn't because I am such a good person it is because I feel more comfortable being the victim.  It is a role I have played in most situations where it was me versus them. Maybe because I know first hand what it feels like to be left and couldn't imagine putting someone through that. On the other hand I always think "this has got to get better" which as we all know sometimes that isn't true.

I am not a person of action emotionally.  I am conditioned to be more of a person of contemplation and by the time I emerge with a moment of clarity the world has passed me by.  The more impatient folks have gone on their lives.

I have accepted that this is my way.  Sometimes this way has left me isolated and sometime lonely but this where my life has led me up to now and I have few regrets.

When I see people behaving badly I hurt for them because I can only imagine what has gone on in their lives to bring them to this point.  What do they believe about themselves that could make them hurt other people or sometimes even themselves.

We are the sum of all the thoughts we have ever had about ourselves. Maybe some of them are true maybe we think some were passed down to us but which ones. We can't blindly trust what our mind tells us because sometimes our thoughts can hurt us and make us hurt other people.

In the movie the ex boyfriend admits he left her because she represented the cancer and he wanted to forget that it happened. Life gave him the opportunity to heal himself and heal the one left behind.

Painting over the past - No regrets

I have had a productive break and have transformed my house.  I am not sure where this blast of energy came from but I am grateful for it.  I have been tired and my house has been tired too. I felt like I couldn't make a decision about anything so it didn't. The timing just wasn't right I guess.

My design philosophy even before I knew what the word meant was if you don't like where you are and you can't move then work with what you have.  As a kid I got bored with the four walls and my mother would let me do whatever I wanted as long as she didn't have to get involved and it didn't cost any money. A designer was born.

Changing your space can lift your spirits instantly.  Along with the kitchen and powder bath face lift yesterday I painted midnight blue on one wall in my living room . With the rest of the walls white it really makes the furniture pop. I love color.

This change came about after a I purchased a used oriental rug for the dining room.  Painting gave me the opportunity to look at everything see everything in the room up close and personal.  Everything needed a serious cleaning and I ended up re-staining the baseboards and well as giving the furniture a good scrub down.

Even though I have done some things around the house over the years it has been out of necessity and not out of joy. I have mostly rejected this house since I moved here.  I didn't unpack for a long time and I wouldn't even shop at the nearby grocery store. I thought "I don't belong here."

My heart was broken and my life as I knew it was over.  Luckily I have always had divine guidance in my life someone that has kept me from bad decisions and that someone helped me find the perfect house.  Even though I was totally out of my mind I was able to find this house. My friend and my realtor both called me about this house on the same day and it was empty and move in ready.  It had everything on my wish list without exception.

While painting yesterday I was actually able to listen to a few Cd's that my ex and I use listen to all the time.  All the words I know by heart and they gave me comfort instead of pain for the first time.
Those Cd's represent a time when we were close a piece of my life that will never be again. I didn't feel any sadness just acceptance and now it all seems so far away. One song says "time heals the wounds that love made."

How much time nobody can tell you. My personal situation was stretched out by a number of things maybe one being my total emotional shutdown or denial that life as I knew it was over. Even if I really wasn't happy in the life I had before I didn't sign up for this or did I?

I think I can say with confidence that I have recovered. I have returned to a whole person I no longer have pieces missing like I did before.  I can celebrate that I have survived another one of life's trials and I am back on top.

I know my story is isn't unique many people have be left by the one they loved. The difference is that it happen to me at a time when I had just started to trust that it was real this time. It only took me 13 years to relax a little bit.  I know I was my best in that relationship and there was nothing more that I could have done to make it turn out differently.  I have no regrets.

I am happy to feel good for a change and I am ready to go back to work tomorrow. I have spent the holidays working on accepting my home.  After eight years I have decided that I am going to stay. I going to give my house the love that it deserves.  The last bit of healing.

A healing has taken place - There is always more.

I am in full blown remodel mode starting with my kitchen and the downstairs bathroom.  I look at everything in my house and it all feels very tired just like I have been.  I feel a new vitality after the Thanksgiving dip maybe because a more healing has taken place.

I am always surprised that there could be more healing at this point.  I thought I was done. I have been floundering here for what seems like forever waiting for inspiration. I didn't think that I was waiting for more healing.  

In my mind  I have been telling myself I should want more or at least have some kind of idea about what to do next but there has been nothing. I thought maybe my spiritual journey had taken me to a place where I know that finding the next thing won't satisfy me for long so what is the point.

I do know it isn't about the next thing for me anymore but then what should I be doing with my time. It doesn't help that the self-help motivators say "what is your dream - follow your passion?" Without a goal or passion there is something wrong with you. Is that true?

While drywalling and painting this weekend I was listening to 50 Spiritual Classics.  A collection of Cd's about the lives of great spiritual teachers.  I have listen to the Cd's several times during my own spiritual journey and it seems each time I hear just what I need to hear.

This time it was how one person being freed of the ego was an empty vessel waiting for daily direction to fulfill God's purpose for their lives. I heard that it is okay to empty and not in the pursuit of the next thing.

I want permission from someone to not be concerned that I don't have a passion or goal to strive for right now and if I never do then that is alright too.

I feel good right now mainly I think because I have forgiven myself for the mistakes I have made that led me to where am today basically alone. There is really nothing to forgive.  It is just my unconscious  belief that I some how could have prevented it if I had worked harder been a better person then I would not have been rejected.

I realize I have been punishing myself by not letting myself enjoy anything.  I think I divorced myself along with the relationship.  Accepting there was nothing of that person I wanted to keep.

I think I have finally let myself off the hook. I have gone from rejecting myself to being blank to finally starting to take back the pieces of myself that I do like.
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I feel ready to be happy  and whole again I don't feel like parts of me are missing any more. I am especially happy to get my house in order. Less internal work means more time for external work and I am ready.

Fathers - Healing

On the subject of  Father's Day. I loved my father and he loved me. I waited a lifetime for him to reach out to me and make me feel like I deserved to be loved, but it never happened. All of my relationships have been affected by the idea that my father didn't love me.  I felt that if I wasn't enough for him then I would never be enough for anyone.

I wasn't worth him taking the time to pursue me ever. After I left home at 16 he let me go and never looked back. Ironically I can be just like that too. I don't pursue but I wait until I am let go and I never look back.

This was just who my father was and it wasn't directed just towards me.  In recovery I got the courage to ask him why he let me go he said "every body's got to do what they got to do."  I knew at that moment that it wasn't about me.  I really wanted it to be.

It really felt worse because I knew I would never get the hole in my heart filled by the man sitting in front of me. I thought I would be forever broken  I thought he was the only hope I had for feeling normal.

It took another two decades (sorry) to get past that moment today I finally know it was this belief that I was broken that actually held me back. I thought had to accept the idea that nothing could be done about my brokenness and learn to live with it.

This was a big lie I told myself and I had plenty of other people telling me I had a perfect right to feel broken and hurt.  My friends and I were all the same it felt good to find others like me and this became my life's focus trying to make the best of my brokenness. Finding ways to find happiness despite the past.

I had to realize that dwelling on what I thought was missing made me miss the life I was actually living.  I was never 100% there because I was always trying to solve the problem of myself and what I was missing. Living with alcoholism helped because it gave me relief from the problem of me and put it on the problem of someone else.

I thought the best I could hope for was to deal with my feelings of the past.  Now I know I can choose to just think of my past as novel I finished reading yesterday. It is done it can't affect me today unless I want let it.  If I give in it might be because I enjoy identifying with the pain and suffering of the past. To me this was a habit I had done so long it was as natural as breathing. I see it now how stuck I was in my thinking.

When I go out in the world today I can be who I choose to be and if I want I can choose not to be that broken person in my head. Sometimes if I am with those that knew me before it is more difficult because they have their story of me and it hard for them to accept that I have changed. They may be holding tightly to their own story and it makes them uncomfortable that I have moved on.

I have lost some people in my life and I have given up others. I just don't fit with those living in the past or those that need someone to take care of.  I am no longer any one's project.

I am grateful for my past today but I am not going to live there. I am also grateful for my father who although he wasn't an emotional giant he did love me and said so even if i didn't believe him. He did give me the ability to fix all kinds of things and a curious mind.

I do agree with one thing my father said "every body's got to do what they got to do."

Going upstairs - This is not my life anymore

I having the first guest in my house next weekend. I have been working on preparing the upstairs where she will be sleeping. I am the only person that has ever slept up there and I did that because my groovey waterbed sprung a leak.

I think that was a couple of years ago. Grieving the loss of a relationship, depressed and menopausal I have no concept of time it could have been three years. I will have to check my blog to be sure. Pretty pathetic but at least I can laugh about it now.

When I go up there it feels really oppressive. It is full of things from the past which are still useful but don't necessary go together. Some things I keep for sentimental reasons others because it seems wasteful to just get rid of them.

The friend that is coming to visit will not understand the sentimental part related to stuff. She has been on the move all her life and told me once that her first thought when she acquires something is how will she get rid of it.

She has had commitment issues but strangely enough she told me last week she is getting married. Progress for her I think. I will be happy to hear the details.

When I go upstairs it reveals a lot of things to me. First it reminds of my past the things that represent something or someone that is no longer in my life. That's it, writing those words brought emotion. The tears are about the life that I am no longer a part of a dream that has been washed away.

It also reminds me of how sick I have been the past four years. Just barely able to get through each day. I feel like I have recovered from a long illness in that space and I want to do something drastic to erase the memory of past. There is just a bigger dose of it upstairs more relics.

It makes me mad that this still bothers me after all this time. It is a process I know but at least I know why I am feeling this way, but is always surprises me. Everything heals in time if you let it.

Truth and consequences

I have a birthday coming up on Labor Day. Isn't it nice that most of the country takes off to celebrate.

I am not sure what the plans are at the moment. I have to face the fact that I have jettisoned most of my casual friends and some of my close friends. I have some guilt about that when I think of all the birthdays we spent together.

I had to empty my life for what ever reason. I felt I drowning and weighted down my some unknown entity. I purged it all not knowing what was the problem. It was my past of course the belief that I could not escape it and I wasn't ready to face the fact that past only exist in my head.

I have moments of loneliness. Being fully awake has its drawbacks. I am responsible for being exactly where I am at this moment. The difference now is that I can feel the loneliness and let it wash over me as just for this moment of time. I don't have to thrash around and run like I use to chanting to myself. I don't want this, I don't want this...

I have felt such peace not resisting. I have been able to even look at my childhood religion and see that I have run from Jesus because I didn't want to have anything to do with anything my family was associated with. I could see that it wasn't him it was them I was running from. In my child like mind I didn't want to make them happy by accepting any of their beliefs, so I threw all of them out.

I liked the program because you weren't aloud to talk about Jesus. We talk about God and a higher power a power greater than ourselves. I wouldn't have stayed if Jesus had been involved. Jesus must carried the baggage of every crazy thing done in his name.

Hey I can say this because I was beaten in the name of Jesus so I understand the pain that goes with his name. I have been comfortable with God for a long time. I have read a lot of books on the idea of God. For me it was what I was resisting that was holding me back.

This was the boogie man in the closet for me the last childish thing. I had to see that it wasn't Jesus it was the negative power his name had over my life. The negative power I gave it.

I am not saying I have become a Jesus freak passing out pamphlets on the street like I did as a child or that I have joined a mega church. The point is that it is all OK with me now the resistance is gone. I can look at his teachings and take what I like and leave the rest. I can come home to some of my childhood beliefs and see the good there not just the bad.

I have found that anything that I resist has some fear associated with it. In this case a fear that I would become like them or I would fall in a hole that I could not climb out of. I did that anyway. I can separate from my emotions and say it wasn't all bad and some of the teachings were pretty good.

Byron Katey said if you stumble across a rope in the grass and you think it is a snake you might run off screaming. Once you see that it is just a rope you can never be afraid of it again. I am not afraid anymore.

A little less holy

It is quiet here today. I am in the showroom alone the owner has gone down south to see his new great grand baby. He has so many kids, grand kids and great grand kids he can't remember all their names. It is nice, he rarely takes off even though he could if her wanted. This is really his home, the showroom and he is still here six days a week.

I started a few different post and have ditched them for some unknown reason. Today I am moving slow and enjoying being alone here today. A couple of my customers came in one a new job the other picking up tile to finish her kitchen.

I feel good and have plans to drain the water bed later even though it is cold and the thought of messing with water is not appealing. Our contractor said there is some kind of device you can hook to your drill that is like a small pump. When I leave here I am going to the depot to see if I can find one.

I am trying to relax and take care of myself since business will be dead until after new years. It is a time to reflect and prepare for the future. In refection we can focus on regret or we can accept that we did our best and this was all we could do.

I had a heated discussion with a friend last night when I said we all do our best but sometimes it isn't good enough. Decisions we have made have hurt other people it wasn't intentional and we were working with what we had to work with. Our parents did the best they could with what they had it doesn't mean that it didn't leave some pretty big holes is our emotional make up.

This idea that it wasn't good enough sent her over the edge. She said it was what shaped us and made us who we are today and accepting people as they are or were is important. That everyone is exactly where they are suppose to be.

This isn't about blame for me, it is about recognizing how we got the holes and how we can heal them. We have done things that have caused harm to others and if we recognize that we can heal ourselves and others with amends. It did shape who we are today but for me I was Swiss cheese by the time I got to the program and my goal is to be a little less holy.

Isn't that the point our lives became unmanageable for a reason and figuring how my thinking became messed up I can move on. Most of it was from a child point of view anyway and as I become more mature I can stop taking the past so personally.

We finally agreed to disagree and decided to end the discussion with changing the premise to: Wouldn't it have been nice if ___________________ hadn't happen to me or Wouldn't it have been nice if __________________ could have been there for me.

Take what you like and leave the rest.

I Am Sam - Pleasing Others

I thought I better write before I run out of steam. I have been home for an hour and have eaten and finished up a scrabble game I started last night. I don't usually have food in the house but since I cooked this weekend I might have eaten a little too much for dinner. I am sleepy and it is below 50 outside and it is a good night to hibernate.

Nothing too exciting today at work just some paperwork. I did have a few customers come into the showroom. The first was an older woman with her grown daughter looking for a kitchen to install by Christmas, this Christmas. We do have a few displays we would be willing to sell. They decided to come back Saturday with the husband, nothing like waiting until the last minute.

The second customer to come in was previous client, we put his kitchen in a few years ago and wants more cabinets and a bathroom vanity. He brought a young boy with him, maybe about nine, I would it was his son, but he kept calling the man David. He was very articulate and had an opinion on everything. As they were leaving I said nice to meet you and I asked him his name, I thought he said Tim and he blurted out, I am Sam and then we bumped fist, not my idea.

After they left, I commented to the owner about the kid and he said while I was talking, Sam plugged up the toilet with paper towels. Oh well some things never change, kids and bathrooms not a good combination.

A pleasant day even if we are freezing our butts off here. I was suppose to go to a city council meeting tonight and see a presentation on a plan to improve my area of town. I was going to meet my old boss there because her husband is getting into local politics, I really didn't feel like going and I had a customer call and wanted to come by after work, so I sent an email saying I wasn't coming. A cop out I know, she was a tough boss and everyday in the office was a test of courage mixed with friendship. I know she will be disappointed in me. I never could please her no matter what I did.

Once, when she was still my boss, she asked me to feed her birds. She had a two page detailed list of instructions and homemade bird bread for them. I was terrified because she loved her animals more than any human. I came in and the bird was missing, I thought I was going have a stroke. I looked everywhere the cage was still shut, how can this be? The bird had burrowed under the paper at the bottom. I would have had to quit if the bird had been missing. I probably mentioned this tale before but I was really scared of her then.

She probably figured I wouldn't show up tonight. I was glad to have an excuse, not to go, but the truth is somewhere deep inside I still want to get her approval. I always was just short of the mark even though she kept promoting me there was always and under current of criticism. This is a pattern for me with those that do not trust easily. I am in one minute and then suddenly I am out. I then try to get back in by any means possible until I am exhausted and give up. I want to good enough.

I have disappointed a lot of people lately since I withdrew from my social commitments but it has been good for me and I needed to stop looking outside myself for approval. It was a test for me, was I enough for myself on my own? Could I love myself if I didn't have a list of things I had done or people I had pleased each day.

The answer is yes. I am enough just they way I am. I don't need to meet the expectations of others to feel worthy of love. But it had to start with self-acceptance, self love to make that shift. If I am whole I can give without needing something in return. I can stand on my own two feet and do what is healthy for me spiritually.

It hasn't been an easy time for me being alone, but without distractions I have healed places in my heart that I thought would never heal. The emptiness I have carried since my mother died. I wanted someone to fill this hole but I was the only one that could do that.

Words said and un-said

I had dinner with a friend in the program yesterday and a lot of heavy things came up for us both. I don't feel like I am really in a place to help any one right now, because I have taken a time out from my personal life including the program, but the emotions that surfaced yesterday made me realize that experience of others is a great teacher.

She was talking about some of the mistakes she made with her oldest daughter and how she openly favored her youngest daughter because she was easier to manage. This bought up my own experience of not being important to my family and how clueless we can be about the effects we have on others.

We all have experienced pain and have inflicted pain either with our words or lack of words and sometimes in our actions or lack of action. So what can be done to rectify the situation sometimes when decades have passed? How can we find a way to make amends and to forgive ourselves for things that we did knowingly or unknowingly?

Acknowledging what we have done is part of the 4th step inventory and part of the process of forgiving ourselves and realizing we were humans and as humans we weren't just victims but victimized others. This is why making amends has its on step and the key to healing our own wounds and the wounds of others. It was hard for me to accept that I wasn't just a victim but that my controlling angry sharp tongue had hurt the one person in my life I was trying to bring closer, at that time my husband.

Having empathy for others was something I didn't really know existed when I arrived in the program. I thought everyone should just suck it up because that was my experience. No one cut me any slack and I managed. My thinking was brutal towards myself and towards others. They needed to just get their act together. I really needed that first inventory to see how I also had done harm to others and start the healing process for myself.

About the unsaid, I waited my entire life for my father to acknowledge that he hurt me or worse ignored my existence and those words never came. He told my sister that he wished he had done things differently. Hearing those word would have made a huge difference to me without the words I spent my life speculating and not knowing and believing that I didn't really mean that much to him.

Before he died I did meet with him briefly to try to understand where he was coming from and what I got from that meeting was that he did love me. I also realized he wasn't capable of putting that emotion out on the table. So the words were left unsaid but I got what I needed in the realization he was also a victim and human.

I still have problems and realize that this is a journey without a real destination. I can only be who I am today and hope with the help of Step 10 that I don't get too far behind.