When words are not enough...

Sometimes, you lose things. Things like your glasses, your cell phone, the remote control...whatever.
Those are small things. Maybe at the time losing something like your house keys or your smart phone feel like you've lost everything... but the feeling passes.

Then, other times, you lose big things.... Things like your parents, your friends, and, god forbid...your children.

Sometimes you don't lose them to death either, sometimes to drugs, mental illness... the point is, the person you love is gone...and a shell remains. Sometimes they come back, others.... you have to face that things just are as they are... and keep hope. Goddamn it, ALWAYS FUCKING KEEP HOPE. It's all you have.

I've lost all those things. Every. Last. One.

My oldest son is struggling and I don't know who he is anymore. My mother is dead. Six months ago I cleaned house and got rid of a few 'friends' who weren't.... I lose my keys all the time. So often I need to move somewhere where I don't have to lock the fucking doors. I lose my cell phone (when I'm talking on it), my glasses (even though I wear contacts) I've lost my way.... in more ways than one - sudden forced career changes, I've had to move quickly due to a series of unfortunate events... But that's not even the end of the world.

The end is when you lose hope...

Hope is a weird little fucker. Sometimes all it is is a deep breath when you wake up and say, "It's gonna be ok." Sometimes it means having something to look forward to... a new job, a trip...anything. But still...

What happens when you lose yourself? When you wake up one day after 37 year of being someone's mother/sister/friend/daughter/wife/girlfriend that you don't know who the hell you really are? When you can't tell where mom stops and wife begins? When you realize you've become such a damned enabler (enabler - definition - the person who co-signs your bullshit) that your own garden has weeded over so badly that you don't know if those things are roses or daisies???

Then pitty sets in. That little asshole... The 'why me' bullshit. Then you go from enabler to victim...mostly of your own circumstances...(see enabler above) Every thing that goes wrong is someone/something else's fault. Instead of getting up and brushing some shit off, you wallow. I hate that word...wallow. It is as ugly as it sounds, Wallow. Ugh.

People notice the change long before you do, but often don't act because they have no idea what to do. I don't. I hate human emotion. Some people like to be touched, others don't, I never know how to react, so I end up sitting there like a huge fucking asshole just nodding my head HOPING the ugly scene ends soon. I don't mean to be that way, I just am.

At this point, as I approach my 37th year... I am at a crossroads. I have lost everything. Well, almost everything...80% of anything that ever meant anything to me (thanks to the 10% that are still here..I think I'll keep ya) I'm struggling still with the enormous amount of loss I've suffered (suffering) from the last 6 years, the normal confusion that sets in when you wonder what now?

Well, What now? I just lost a job I hated, no biggie except it paid the bills... and then got cheated out of a new opportunity. But I'm also struggling with a start up company that will take some time, but will cover the bills sufficiently eventually. I do not have the luxury of relaxing. I have a toddler, a teenager and and adult child (who is probably more stress than the others combined)  I used to have weekends off from the toddler, which was nice, but his dad relapsed with his drinking and got into some trouble and I can't leave him with his dad anymore. I'll spare you the details, you'd cry...I did. I do. I am now.

It's so easy to fall into patterns, both old and new. So fucking easy. By the grace of something, I am not doing that right now. I've been a single mom on and off for 20 years, so it's old hat, but fuck if I'm not tired.

Sometimes I want to give up...like my mother did. She just took off when my baby sisters were in their teens. They hadn't even graduated high school. She left them with their father, a man not competent to raise them..and then a few years later... no, a year later...she died. Her death hurts me more this year than normal. I don't know why...it's been five years, Maybe just because the last time I felt like this she was here with me, now, she's not. She wasn't a really great mom, but she was mine. Even a drunk can listen, you just decipher their responses and walk away with what you want to. Her last words to me were, "Melissa...what I admire most about you is your strength. Nothing stops you. (she laughed) I don't necessarily want that for myself (she was a comfortable victim) but I think it's really cool you have it. I've never really connected with you because you were so different than me. Never mind the fact that there was no controlling you (another laugh), but I have always loved you...don't ever doubt that, Not for a second, do you hear me??" That was the most useful thing she ever said to me.

I took a framed picture from her house when she died. It says:
"Three Wishes
When you are lonely,
I wish you LOVE
When you are confused,
I wish you faith
When you are down,
I wish you joy"

It is, quite literally, one of only four of her belongings I was able to have. The other is a picture that says 'Laugh as long as you breathe and love as long as you live". The other two are a perfume atomizer that I have taped closed because it smells like her and an old scarf her ex mother in law gave her in the eighties. The reason why I only have those four things is not important.

She floated all her life...she lit up rooms with laughter...people were drawn to her, they loved her....she was the most suicidal woman I have ever met. Cancer took her at 51, 2 days from her 52nd birthday, and I think she was relieved.

Back to the point.... I'm the strong one, For my friends, my sisters sometimes, my kids (of course) for employers.... It is exhausting. Literally exhausting. Like, someone let me take a nap, exhausting. I'm also good at stuff. Look, I just made you believe you knew Debbie, didn't I? And in as few words as possible. It took me (is taking me?) 5 years to grieve her passing. I handled the arraignments because no one else "could'. I flew out to her Florida home to close it down with a 45 minute notice before my plane took off because my sister (who in all fairness was only 20, ten years younger than me) backed out saying "It's really you're place, you're the oldest". I went. I had a sinus infection, a kidney infection and I ran to the gates without putting my shoes back on from the security check point because it took 30 of the 45 minutes to get to the airport. I did it all sober, even. Sometimes I wonder, which one of my three kids will do that for me? It's too soon to tell with Ugga Bugga yet, but it will probably be Middle Boy. Poor guy. I hope I don't leave the mess Debbie did...

Then those thoughts bring me back to what matters... those boys. I have one I had to give up on. That's the hardest thing a parent will ever have to do...ask my dad...he had to do it with me. But I have to keep myself together enough for these other two who didn't ask for any of this.

I picked my Ugga Bugga up at a gas station early Monday morning...without a diaper on under his pants, soaked through, in single digit weather, because his dad was drunk and decided to get drunk and get gas at midnight and blew a tire. This broke the actual FUCK out of my heart. I mean, passerbys heard it shatter and looked around... (I lied...I didn't spare you ALL the details)

No one knows what to say to me... They say stupid things like "It'll pass" Of course it will, stupid. Even a kidney stone eventually does. Everything passes, my mother did. Or, "You're really smart, you'll figure this one out" Fuck off.

Even if I knew really articulate people...and I know a few... words would never change anything. Not even hugs or any of that other 'awkward for both parties' bullshit.

One day, while drinking, a friend of mine wrote on the bricks of my house "Time heals MOST"

I think he's right. Nothing ever heals completely... even a skin wound leaves a scar. Sometimes our scars define us...but they don't have to. Right now, mine do. I am who my scars are. But hey, I'm strong, remember? It'll pass.... :)

The Awful Truth About Love

You've probably already blown it.

All your life you have been told it's about birds singing and fireworks and all this other bullshit... You know what? You probably met the 'love of your life' years ago, but fucked it all up because they weren't what you're looking for....

Well, ain't that a bitch.

Since the earliest days, we are taught to look for a special kind of explosive kind of love...typically using whatever our parents had/didn't have as a guide in regards to what we don't want. Then deposit fairy tails, Disney princesses, wedding catalogs... You're fucked.

I've recently told a friend that I am to the point where I've given up on love. My goal was to find one other crazy asshole to hang out with and not judge me too harshly til one of us dies. If that asshole can manage to fall in love with me, well, then that's all the better. That...was when it occurred to me... Isn't that what love is???

The idea of love at first sight is a bunch of horse puckey, my friends. If there is someone you can't stop thinking about, someone that invades your thoughts constantly.... Well, experience has told me to run. That person is no good for you. I just don't think it really happens like that.... not long term anyway.

You can fall in love with an idea really quick. A person? Not so much. People do stupid things... gross things... even really cool people. You gotta take all that weird, stupid and gross shit on...long term. Dude, people are an acquired taste, like vodka. No one likes vodka the first time they taste it. Well, not if they are being honest with yourself anyway. You just kinda....get used to it.

True love involves a hell of a lot of tolerance. Like, a shit load. It's not about accepting someone for all that they are or aren't, it's more so that realizing that both you and your partner have mental or physical ailments that you have to learn to live within. Now, I'm not suggesting that it's really cool that your dreamboat dresses up as a bunny and beats people to death with a steel dildo, that's more than a mental ailment. That is batshit crazy. When I say mental, I mean just enough dysfunction to make you funny... just the cutest touch of mental illness. SWOON.... (Unless you are into the whole bunny suit thing, then rock on, sista!)

My point is this... wait, huh? SAIL!

You've probably already met them. You probably already cast them away, friend zoned them, whatever... You might have even had the brass balls to assume you were too good for them, or vice versa. If you're really lucky, one day when you're at the gas station in sweats and flip flops, lookin' a wreck, you'll run into them when the fountain machine sprays slushie all over you. Hopefully they'll grab you a towel, however, I'd know he was the one if he laughed his ass off at me first, THEN got the towel.

A guy once told me that I shouldn't take all his yelling and ranting personally. I was like, WHUUUUT? how the hell do you not take all that shit personal, especially when it's directed at you pretty much non stop. It's how every day began... When I asked that, he said, "Well, sure. Don't let anyone else talk to you like that. But when I do it, don't take it personal." I'm pretty sure that's Latin for "I'm a DICK." We end up with dicks because they look intriguing, or tortured geniuses or whatthefuckever lie we wanna tell ourselves. The only tortured anything is yourself, years later, wondering how the hell you got where you are. (This was not in the brochure!)

Slow down. It's not a race. People get married at 90. People have been instinctively coupling for eons... It'll happen. Wait for it. Maybe the problem is you.... maybe when you met the right person, you weren't the right person yet. Do a little work on yourself, take a little inventory. The right person won't save you, they'll compliment you.  They'll instinctively pick up when you begin to drop. It's a beautiful dance that can only be perfected after practice....lots of practice.

It'll all be alright in the end. If it's not alright? Well, then it's not the end yet.

xoxo

Working Through Psychosis...

Well, maybe I'm being over dramatic... (as if!)

We all have our struggles in life. ALL OF US.

I recently went to a psychiatrist to be treated for what I was SURE was Borderline Personality Disorder. Awesome, right? I mean, if your gonna get a mental illness, why not one of the single most difficult to treat? Turns out that was NOT the diagnosis.

I suffer from "Mid-Level Depression and Bi-Polar Type 2"

It is treatable with medication, therapy and a little self forgiveness. I'm not crazy, but my depression makes me think I am.

So, I start thinking to myself, how many other people are silently suffering from depression because they think they are simply bat shit crazy? Oh, probably a shit ton! I thought I would share my story with you and highlight a few of the unusual symptoms I had that I would not have associated with Depression.

I am moody as FUCK. I mean uber uber doober moody. I'll come home from work and see a few dishes on the counter and my brain will say, "Hey! This looks like an AWESOME time to alienate your entire family make them feel like shit for not reading your mind and cleaning off the goddamned counter! Let's get really loud, slam some shit around, but most importantly, you need to be super irrational. Now when I say irrational, I mean take it up to an eleven. Once you REALIZE you are being irrational, understand that is no place to stop! that means pursue your dreams! Go big!"

Seriously.

I start with, "Hey, you left shit all over the place (gross misrepresentation of three cups on the counter)" and end somewhere with "YOU"RE THE BIGGEST JERK I'VE EVER MET AND I WANT TO PUSH YOU OFF A CLIFF!"

That's logical, right?

The worst part is realizing that exact moment that I have gone over the edge but not being able to stop myself. I mean, why stop there?

Then there is the illogical logic. Ha. I'll ask you a question. Like a normal person, you will respond. Perhaps you will leave out details or give an incomplete answer... Brain says, "Well lookie here! Clearly what he meant by 'Oh' was 'I think you're an idiot. When you to sleep, I'm going to pack up everything WE own and leave. By the time you get up, not only will you be alone, but broke... so good luck finding me!"

Well, maybe that's a stretch for even my brain's standards... but not much.

I can't remember anything. Dates, events, conversations I'VE JUST HAD.... nothing. (unless it took place 20 years ago, then I am quite like an idiot  savant) I will never be able to recall what my agenda was for today at work without use of notes or Outlook reminders, but I will NEVER forget that time in third grade where Danny Smith Depantsed you in front of the whole school and how you cried tears of shame into your beautiful paisley blouse...Isn't paisley underrated by the way?"

Which leads me to my next point. Attention span. Don't got one. I will day dream about puppies and kitties and what I could  be doing later while you tell me your inner most desires. I don't mean to. I just can't.

I am not my BiPolar.
I am not my ADHD, ADD or any other combination of letters.
I am not Schizphrenic.
I have PTSD.
I am not a looney toon.


I am not a doctor. I don't even look good in white.... I am not saying that if you feel the same way there is nothing serious going on in your  mind or body. What I am saying is you don't need to be afraid. Slice of Humble did a blog today on some things she went through post pardom. She's not a nut either. She's a really good friend. The point is, don't be afraid.

You don't need to feel like shit. You don't need to suffer through hours and hours of anxiety attacks like I did. You don't need to rock yourself back and forth in the dark while talking to your cat Fluffy telling him you turned out just like your crazy dead mom. WHAT??  Get help. Talk to someone.

Stress is a motherfucker, guise. I mean it! It can make you nuts. being a single mom, however rewarding, is stressful as fuck. Losing a parent, no matter how much you couldn't take their insanity, is stressful as fuck. Keeping inside dark secrets are stressful as fuck. And you know what? Thinking there is something wrong with your beautiful, intelligent self.... is stressful as fuck.

I'm on day four of an anti depressant and a sleep aid. Even the colors around me look brighter. Seriously. I laugh more. I smile more. I SNAP LESS. My doctor and I chose Prozac because it is the most 'forgiving' of all anti depressants... you can stop taking it at any time without withdrawal symptoms. So, when enough is enough, I can just stop. Ambien is my little sleep angel and I look forward to having unconscious sex or eating whilst driving to Las Vegas in an Ambien induced slumber soon. (Disclaimer:  no, I do not. )

Guys, how are you feeling?