My lovely computer died. It is at Dell getting a new life. Funny…I’ve been working on my new life, too.
I’m at the library, and I don’t feel much like writing about the stuff that’s happened in the past two weeks or so that I’ve been absent. Hopefully my reincarnated computer will be back to me this week and I can get on with the process publicly, with you.
Until then, love light and laughter to you all!
I’m not going to school this semester.
Something had to go. I’m not ready for school.
I divert my attention trying to “get it all done.” This results in frustration, yelling (at myself or someone else), and getting nothing done.
I try to force the kids to put the same amount of importance on things that I do. Chores, homework, etc. … my priorities.
Everything is my priority.
I’m inflexible,seeking to force everyone else to bend to my will.
I try to “be good and helpful” in other people’s eyes, diminishing my time and energy…diminishing my power. As if I know what everyone else thinks is “good and helpful” anyway.
I choose BECAUSE I “should”
I choose WHAT I “should”
I put more emphasis on what I said than what I want. I choose a past word over the present reality so I don’t look like a liar, a hypocrite, a whatever.
I impose my priorities on other people without taking theirs into consideration.
I think what I want and how I want to get there is the only right thing and the only right way.
I ignore my decisions. I decide, then I reconsider. Especially in situations that I have an old desire to people please or think that by keeping someone happy I will get what I want.
When someone asks for “help” but I haven’t asked for help, I feel obligated to them.
I allow my thought circles to diminish me and my goals.
I ignore what’s good for ME when I feel overwhelmed, then try to make everyone else feel bad because I’m ignoring myself.
I ignore my need to decide.
I put too much emphasis on “IF…THEN” relationships. I don’t allow for other possible “ifs” and the “thens” are designed to thwart myself.
I decided to take five things forward and leave two things behind.
5:
2:
What are your 5 & 2?
Hope is wonderful when it comes to hoping it won’t rain. But if you’re hoping it won’t rain, aren’t you also worrying that it will?
Hope is not good to base your life around. “I hope my life improves.” Good. That’s cool. I hope your life improves, too. I’m not going to do anything about it. Are you?
Hope is what’s left when I’ve done all I think I can do, but I’ve got to DO before I choose to hope. I will pray the whole time I’m DOING what I think to be best. I will pray for guidance as I take one step after another; backtracking if need be, forging a new path when I must, following the footsteps of a great one’s path whenever I can.
Prayer is not hope. Hope is never an answer to a prayer. Hope by itself swirls in front of me like a warm cozy ball of promised, but unreceived love. It looks good, but love unreceived is wasted love.
Would God really answer a prayer with love I cannot feel? Would She say, “Keep hoping” as She decides on a whim if the answer is yes or no? Hardly. She already knows the answer, so I’d better damn well listen for guidance and not settle for a warm fuzzy hope.
If I’m only hoping, then I’ll only hope.
Marc wakes me up at 3AM and says, “You need to go with Taylor’s mom to take the car he took back to her house.”
“What?!” I say, registering the time.
“Taylor drove over here without permission and now his mom is outside our house demanding you drive their car back to their house.”
“What?!” I say, registering nothing.
“She’s outside yelling and cussing. You have to get up.”
So I did that, but I didn’t go out until I’d questioned Marc. Taylor gave Marc $20 some time ago to buy him some cigarettes. Marc didn’t have the money (or the cigarettes) so Taylor had taken a family car without permission and come over here to smoke the (legal) salvia Marc had purchased from a local smoke shop in lieu of repayment.
I would have rather sent Taylor the money, but then I had known nothing of the $20, the promise, or the plan pertaining to how Marc was going to repay the money. Never mind that Taylor was going to sneak over to my house at the wee hours of the morning. On Marc’s school night.
I decided that I wasn’t going to drive the other car anywhere. We had doctor appointments in the morning; I had obligations, but driving this kid’s car back to his house wasn’t one of them.
I went to the living room and asked Taylor’s mom what had happened. She was indeed upset; she said Taylor had stolen her car and that I had to drive it home for her. Right now.
I said, “No. I have an early morning – ”
“Well so do I!” she snapped.
I knew that I would have helped her in other circumstances. I may have even helped her later today if she wanted to talk instead of order me around. However, I knew that I had to get to the bottom of what was going on with my own son and driving around in the middle of the night (and being driven back home by a screamer and blamer) was NOT either good for me OR what I “needed” to do.
I worry for Taylor. I’ve known this kid for a long time. I’m saddened and shocked by some of the reports of his behavior I’ve heard. I don’t want Marc to be his friend, but he is. I don’t want Marc to take part in sneaky plans (even for a legal plant), but he is. I don’t want screaming parents showing up at my door in the middle of the night, but one did.
Even though Taylor’s mom was acting like this was the end of the world and I needed to help her do something, it wasn’t the end of the world. I would have preferred NOTHING to happen at 3AM, but I didn’t have to stop my own life because it had.
“Fine, KELLIE!” she yelled at last. She stormed off into the headlights of the car she had driven to my house.
I talked to Marc briefly, then made him go to sleep in my room so I knew where he was. After a good old-fashioned round of second-guessing myself, I decided that I had made the right decision in not helping the mom out – especially at that time of the morning. It was pointless to keep myself up worrying about the “should I” or “shouldn’t I” questions. If I laid there awake torturing myself, I may as well have driven the woman’s car home and endured a return trip with a screaming blamer.
So I went to sleep. It was a good sleep. I got up on time, took Marc to his doctor appointment, also on time, and pressed forward with my goal to become emotionally, mentally and physically healthy to INCLUDE living up to obligations (like doctor appointments).
And I feel good. I feel really, really good about not driving that kid’s car home last night. I feel really good about telling his mother I wouldn’t do it (and grateful that she started yelling before the “old me” could hint that I’d help her later). I’m grateful that I didn’t jump all over Marc because of the way another person was acting or because I thought another person thought I should act a certain way.
Mostly, I’m grateful that I took the time to decide for myself what I was willing to do or not. I can’t remember the last time that happened in a “crisis” situation.
Is this what being proud of myself feels like?
Truly Good Things in My Life:
I truly and deeply love my boys.
My husband wants to be married to me, for better or worse.
My mother and sister and Nana and Granny support me and understand me better than I think they do, most all of the time.
Bonnet, Poppet and Scarlet are cuddly and cute, playful and mysterious. They are a joy.
I can talk to angels and god and my relatives who have passed any time I want to talk to them. They are always here.
My father-in-law cares about my family. He is helpful and kind, and always lends a hand when I ask.
I am living in a home that meets our needs and is full of pretty, useful, and memorable items and heirlooms.
I have a really cool phone.
I have a really cool computer that helps me get stuff done!
I am learning how to be healthier and putting new ideas into practice, even when it is hard hard hard!
We have plenty of good food to eat.
My husband works and provides a comfortable living for us.
I am going to be better, very soon.
I have a network of support for when I feel overwhelmed. I can call a hotline if I want…no one can stop me from moving forward with my life (not even the old me).
I have nice clothes to wear.
I am able to keep a clean house because I want to live in a clean house!
I can laugh at myself. Go ahead…do it now…
I can change my thoughts, I can change my mood, and I can determine how best to act on my emotions.
I love living this life of change and look forward to the day when the changes I am making come easier.
I can take medication that helps me deal with my depression and anxiety without losing feelings that are important to helping me make wise decisions.
I can make hard decisions and stick by them.
I can stop my mind from spinning.
I can talk to angels and god and my relatives who have passed any time I want to talk to them. They are always here.
I can cry without falling deeper into confusion and gloom.
I can handle my anger in positive ways. What needs to change? What can I change? What am I thinking about the thing that I’m angry about that KEEPS me angry at it?
I have working eyes, ears, arms and legs.
I have access to educational information that I can use and implement when I see fit. Or I can follow my own heart when the situation calls for it. There’s a time to end research…maybe this is a time to follow my heart, even if it makes my stomach churn? I feel better when I decide.
I can decide to feel better.
Yesterday I was feeling overwhelmed by the idea that I didn’t have enough time in the day to do everything I had set out for myself. Not just for that Saturday, but for every day coming up. I was operating from the belief that “everything” was leaving me time for “nothing.” I had turned my healing process into a schedule, and I was not going to be able to keep up with that fuzzily defined schedule UNLESS I gave up something else.
That’s not how I described it to my sister, Denise, when we talked. In the throes of overwhelm, I told Denise that I was anxious and nervous because I had sabotaged my own good intentions. I told her that the thoughts were swirling around in my head, and that I didn’t know which way to turn or what to do first.
I started to cry because the more I thought about what I was feeling, the more convinced I became that there was no way out.
So, Denise, on top of the world because she’s made a life-decision that suits her, told me, “Kellie, you are doing too much,” and that I had to let something go. She recommended that I let it all go except for my motherly duties. She said that I needed time to heal, and the other projects were not allowing that to happen.
“But,” I said. And as soon as I said it, I felt myself launching into familiar territory. The “buts” are usually reasons why I should continue staying in unhealthy situations. I’m sure my sister is tired of my “buts”.
But (!) here’s the deal. In the past, I have always always always always given up activities I enjoy when I am being emotionally battered about like a butterfly in a tornado. Whenever there has been a crisis in my relationships, I have always chosen the relationship with family OVER doing what is good for me.
What that means is that I perceive a crisis (and it’s all a crisis), and decide to mentally and emotionally obsess over that crisis until I am physically exhausted. Then, I’ll take a nap (because I need to be good to me, I tell myself) so I regain some energy to devote to obsessing over the crisis.
In the days (and months or years) that follow, I drop everything else. I drop doctor appointments, meetings with teachers, ensuring healthy food is in the house, housecleaning, time with my boys, fun stuff, financial stuff, … I drop everything EXCEPT for the obsessing thoughts, feelings and actions that merely fuel the obsession. And I do, think and feel nothing that helps to solve or end the crisis.
And that is what I have been doing for at least the life of my marriage. For 17 years, at least, I’ve spent my time and energy on obsessing over one crisis after another.
Then, because I haven’t done the things I really wanted to do, I blame the people on the other end of the crisis. Then I get angry with them. Then my anger fuels my obsessive thoughts and feelings and actions. THEY are the reason I haven’t completed college. THEY are the reason I have no friends. THEY are the reason I think so little of myself.
Bullshit. I haven’t done what I want to do because I chose to obsess over crises. One after another until I defined who I was by the crisis I lived.
So, I am not going to take my sister’s advice. Yes, I am concerned that the things I want to achieve will leave little time for anything else.
But, and here’s the really great part, if I spend all of my time doing these things, then I don’t need any more time. There is nothing else that needs my attention.
Therapy helps me hear myself think. Sometimes I think some things I don’t want to say out loud. Saying them out loud brings up feelings that I’ve tried to suppress for a long time, and I don’t like it very much.
It was my duty to love my parents, appreciate them, accept them; for the most part, I did. But for some reason, especially after I started to drive myself around, they didn’t support me. I started to feel that what I thought was support was really parental duty…they drove me because they had to, not because they thought what I was doing was worthwhile.
They paid for viola lessons so I could maintain the first chair in concerts they weren’t interested in attending. They bought me art supplies for artwork they wouldn’t try to understand. Thinking about me was a waste of their time. On some level, I agreed with them. I was wasting my time.
Looking back, I was being encouraged to develop talents that were marketable to colleges – but it turned out my parents never had the money to send me to college although I operated under the assumption they would. No, I’ll just say it. I was led to believe that they could and would be able to send me to college so long as I could come up with SOME scholarship money.
I ended up with high academic achievements and talents in art and music that ultimately meant nothing to them. My achievements meant nothing to them. My future meant nothing to them. I meant nothing to them.
And because I felt misled and alone, those lovely achievements meant nothing to me. I had worked SO HARD to make them proud, but there was never a “pay-off” of any sort. My dad slept during the last orchestra concert he attended. My mother commented that she had never liked the “monkey faces” in my artwork. Good grades got an “That’s what I expected of you.” And when I started to bring home average grades and the school was calling the house because of my truancies, no one said a word. Had they ever really cared?
When I joined the Army, my dad told me he was happy I joined the military because he couldn’t have kept me in school for more than a semester. I had wanted him to be proud of me because I was serving our country like he did, or because I was going to receive the GI Bill benefit and put myself through school.
But no. Me not being able to go to school was about HIM, not about me. He didn’t even care about me. At least that’s how I felt. I was crushed. But I played it off at the time.
When I left for the Army, I didn’t allow myself to think about those disappointments any more.
Frankly, it hurts to think of them now. More so, I suppose, because I’m examining the parts of my life that segued into my marriage, and I’ve used my marriage as an excuse to smother my personal aspirations. And why not? Personal achievement never impressed my parents, and since I was basing “who I was” off of their feedback (another can of worms), I’ve denied myself personal achievement since.
Why bother?
One hard lesson I want to learn and accept is that I must pursue things that are meaningful to me so I feel good when I accomplish something. Even if no one but me finds my pursuits meaningful, and even if no one ever praises me or gives me a cookie for pursuing them.
The question is, what is meaningful to me?
I’ve spent my lifetime trying to impress someone else. How do I switch gears and learn to impress myself?
“Releasing and healing parental and spousal emotional abuse and sexual abuse will do more for improving your diet and life than just about anything else.” ~from How To Naturally Beat Metabolic Syndrome
I believe that statement is true (although I’m not spending money on the diet the site promotes!).
As I unwrap layers and years of unhealthy thinking, I’m finding that I have more energy, more self-love, more time to think about what I’m doing to and putting into my body.
With that extra energy, I’ve noticed that I make a lot of (rotten) habitual choices when it comes to food.
For example, I don’t eat all day before I have to run some errands. So, what’s my first stop when I leave the house? Typically Taco Bell. “Hey – I can’t go to the grocery store hungry!” I tell myself.
Fact is, I didn’t have to leave the house hungry. The amount of food I throw away each month proves it.
I’m not to the point where I am ACTING on my realizations concerning food and physical fitness, but as these “rotten body habits” are starting to form a pile in my mind, I know that I’m about to start changing those habits.
And because I’m unwrapping layers of energy-sapping thoughts, I know I’m going to have the energy I desire to tackle those rotten habits very soon.
So, unwrap a layer of yourself so the good stuff can get in you!
