WOW!

SO, I just figured out that I am such a dork!  I couldn't get into my blog and it was because I was trying to sign in under the wrong email address.  I really need to change things so I have one email address, because apparently 40 is getting to me!   Thanks to David Kutcher who helped me figure it out.  :)

On to the post!  So, 10 days ago, I turned 40, and I'm loving it!  I just feel this total sense of self, it's so awesome.  I just feel like I know what I want, I know where I'm going, etc.  I know that probably sounds weird, but it is what it is...

On Jan 11, 2013, I will have two years sobriety under my belt.  It's so cool to know that I don't have to be afraid to feel, and I don't have to turn my feelings into anger.  I'm still a long way from well, but I'm different from what I used to be...

Even with whatever flu/illness I've got going on, I am happy, I feel good (though not so much physically today) and I love my kids.  Anyway, I feel like I just can deal with what I have now, that I have the tools to continue on.  :)  If you think you have a problem with alcohol or substance abuse, I recommend going to AA.  There are people there who can help you!  :)

Autism speaks? At my house it screams.

I'd love to sit here and write a post about what happened between 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. from the time my 15 y/o autistic super hero got home from high school, til the time I got home.

I'd love to tell you about the raging, screaming, swearing tantrum (oh, sorry, I'm not allowed to call it a tantrum, I'm supposed to call it a melt down, despite the fact that it's a big effing tantrum) and the two broken picture frames he threw.

But I can't, because I have glass to clean up, and two autistic littles fighting.  Sometimes my life really sucks.

Drowning...

A month ago, I checked myself into a mental health facility to get myself a medication adjustment that needed to happen immediately.  I have been suffering from sever, debilitating depression since last May when my medication abruptly stopped working one day.  (It probably wasn't all that abrupt, but that's how it felt to me.)  So now, I struggle to figure out which issues belong to my alcoholic/addicted brain, and which issues belong to my depression and bipolar.

Then, in addition to this, my husband's ridiculous travel schedule.  I can't think straight, I'm agitated all the time. I don't feel normal.  I feel like I'm going to explode.  AND in addition to all of that, I feel completely ignored by him.  He tells me I'm not alone, but he acts like I'm not here, except to come in and ask me what my thoughts are for dinner.  I feel like telling him his head on a platter is what's for dinner.  I am left with screaming, fighting, autistic kids, most of whom have no way of self regulation.  I can barely function, yet I should know what we're having for dinner.  I can't even find clean underwear so I can shower most of the time.  This medication I am taking is fine, except for the dosage increase has left me feeling irritable, unable to concentrate, shaky, and mildly psychotic.  I am SO sick of having a couple of moments of peace here or there.  I am out of control, because I have no control.  I should just let my kids do whatever the hell they want whenever they want, so that they can be criminals.  And I have NO help, because my husband is ALWAYS gone.  And when he is here, I'm never doing it right.  There's always an issue with something I've done.

I give up.  It's NEVER EVER going to be good enough, right.  I'll never BE enough, worth enough, worthy enough.  I was in that psych ward with a crazy woman who kept praying, "Dear God, please take my life." Over and over.  She just kept repeating it.  It freaked me out.  But you know what?  I GET IT.  Because I know what it feels like to be irreparably broken.  To be in so many pieces that I cannot heal.  I sit and think about ways to die.  Which ones would be easy/painless.  I can't shoot myself, I don't have a gun, and I don't want anyone to find me like that.  If I took a bunch of pills when I went to bed... I could just go to sleep, and die.  I think about going to the lake and floating it after I take pills, but if/when they found my body, it would be nasty looking, and I wouldn't want to leave that image either...  I just don't know how much more of this I can take.  Between this and the fucking clique in our AA group, that CLEARLY is all in my head, NOT.  They go to LUNCH together, and if I get to go, it's because I happened to overhear and invite myself.  They all went fishing, and it was NEVER announced at group level, people were just talking about it.  Well, it's not polite to butt in and say, "Hey, I want to come."  They're all camping this week.  Good for them.  But it fucking hurts, and I am sick of feeling like I'm in high school.  SO, it's time to graduate, kids.  Grow the FUCK UP.  It's ridiculous for people in their 50s and 60s to act this way.  Time for me to find another group, I think.

OK, that's it for me.

Fifteen

I took my oldest son to the pediatrician today.  He will be 15 years old tomorrow.  Everything seemed fine, until the doctor mentioned that my son has only grown 1.5 inches in 18 months.  He's not progressing through puberty like he should be.  SO, I had to take him to the hospital for a blood draw, where they are checking testosterone levels, among other things.  And they took an x-ray of his hand to compare to other x-rays, to see his "growth age".   I am trying not to be freaked out about this.  But it's hard not to.  I was planning on an uneventful well check for him.  Especially with everything else going on.  My life feels like it's just falling apart.  I'm just going to put my trust in God that He will take care of things, and handle them the way they need to be handled.  Sometimes that is easier said than done.

Isolated

I don't remember a time as an adult when I've felt so isolated and misunderstood. I am utterly alone. I'm not sure that I'm any better now than I was when I got sober. I feel like shit. And I don't know how much of it to attribute to my depression, and how much of it is me being crazy, and how much I can lay at the feet of others and say, "Here. this is yours and I won't carry it for you any more." My husband has barely spoken to me, talked to me or touched me since he came home Thursday night. So I've been largely ignored while I go through some pretty difficult AA related crap. But then when I decide I need to go to a meeting this morning, I get the third degree, am I ok, etc, because he's worried. Well, then I'm just pissed off, because he has hardly spoken to me for two days and he wants to be worried. I just want to go to my meeting without feeling GUILT! Is that really too much to ask? I have been trying so hard to do what I'm supposed to be doing. I'm reading the big book, I'm reading my scriptures every night, and I have been for months now. I need help, and I'm starting to think that the help I need isn't on this earth. It's not getting any easier, only harder, and sometimes I feel like giving up. Like maybe everyone would just be better off if I used. Because I may not have been involved then, but I wasn't screaming and swearing, etc. my stress/anxiety level is through the roof. But heaven forbid you take any anxiety medication, because according to people in the program, that's just a cocktail in a capsule. Well, guess what? My sponsor and I discuss when I need to take them. That means if you aren't my doctor or my sponsor, you get no opinion. I just don't know what to do anymore. I keep praying for God to help me and I get a tiny bit of comprehension here or there but it doesn't last for more than a couple minutes. Then I'm back to where I started. I think i might just be better off if I died. Because I just can't take this much longer. It is no way to live, not for me, not for my kids... I just don't know what to do.

Feelings....

Today, I went to a meeting.  I know, I know, I said I wasn't going to do that anymore.  But God has a way of gently pushing me to do things I need to do.  There is a wise woman I know who tells me almost every day that I get to make a choice about what kind of day I'm going to have.  So at noon when she told me that, I said, "OH, yeah.  I think I'll change my mind about the choice I made this morning.  It's time to start over."  And that's the great thing about my life today.  I can start my day over at any time I choose!

Today's meeting topic was resentment.  HA!  How ironic is that?  And the last sentence in the reading was that we couldn't afford to hold on to resentments.  Absolutely.  It reminded me of something my dear friend Sherri told me once.  "Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die from it."  And she's right.  So right now, I am feeling very quiet.  That was not so much the case earlier.  I don't like to hurt people, and if I've done something that hurts someone else, I want to fix it.  But if that person has to hold on to it, I can't do anything about it.

I have no control of people, places, and things.  I need to exercise restraint of tongue and pen (and type) *giggle*.  And I need to say a LOT of the serenity prayer.  "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference."

One day at a time...

So, there are a few things about AA that I've noticed seem to contradict each other.  Like praying.  We're supposed to pray, and "improve our conscious contact with God".  But then when something happens that is an answer to prayers, or is an answer that we maybe didn't want, but we know is good for us and still is an answer, we get told, "It had nothing to do with your praying.  It was God's will."  Uh, what?  I'm sorry, but I disagree.  The God of my understanding and choosing is a loving God who hears His children.  And answers their prayers.

I have also noticed that there are a bunch of people that want to act like they're still in high school.  I don't want to go there again.  I've told my 16 year old daughter that I wouldn't go back to high school for all the money in the world, even knowing what I know now.  So WHY is it that I continue to go to meetings where sick people go and attempt to make them like me?  Well, I'll tell you why.  Because I'm SICK.  And I'm starting to think I may never get well.

I made some comments at lunch today regarding a political thing that happened, and during the discussion, things got heated, and I got loud.  I tend to do that when I get passionate about something.  And someone told me I was being loud, which never goes well for me, because immediately, I revert to a childlike state where my mother is shaming me in public for being loud - but in our house growing up, that was THE only way to get your point across.  You had to yell the loudest.  It's NOT an excuse, it's a fact, and I'm trying, at 15 months sober, to undo 39 years worth of training.  But, I immediately lowered my voice to say two sentences and then let the subject drop.  And when I was finished talking, I heard one of my table mates say to someone else "The entire restaurant would know she's here."  And I just looked at him and said, "You know what, as soon as it was pointed out, I lowered my voice immediately, so you just need to get over yourself."  His response was that it wasn't him that he needed to get over.  And the kicker is that  *I* am the one that is spinning about this.  He doesn't give a shit.  And what really sucks is that months ago, I went to him and asked him if I'd done something to make him mad, because it seemed to me that everything was fine, and then all of a sudden, he stopped speaking to me and would no longer come to the meeting I chair, AND makes no secret about it.  BUT when I asked him about it, he said, "It's more me than you, don't worry about it."  So I didn't.

AA is HUGE on amends.  And I try to do that.  Amends is more than saying "I'm sorry."  It's changing behavior, and making restitution, righting your wrongs.  How can I make amends on something I don't know about?  AND if it is an ongoing thing, I STILL can't fix it if I don't know.

The biggest thing that gets me is that I was talking to a couple other friends in the program, and one said, "He's mirroring something about you that you don't like about yourself."  And I've been pondering that for a couple hours, and that's not it.  I figured it out... THIS is what it is:

I grew up with a sister that I loved and always wanted to be close to.  And my parents couldn't control her, so when there was squabbling among us, I was the one expected to give in and keep the peace.  Because I "could" and she wasn't capable.  And when we were in school, because we were so close in age, and because I started Kindergarten at 4 in Pennsylvania, I was in K and 1st grade at the same time for a while, because I was further ahead than my peers of the same age.  SO, we had some of the same friends.  Well, I'll tell you, that did NOT last for long at all.  My sister made certain that her friends were NOT friends with me, not at school, not at church, not anywhere.  So for the entirety of my school career, I spent it with only a handful of friends, feeling like I was on the outside looking in, and feeling like I was constantly in a popularity contest I could never win.

The other thing was, this girl had the sharpest tongue ever.  And there was no restraint there.  When I was in an abusive relationship, I used to tell him to hit me instead, because some of the things that he said to me hurt more than when he was physically abusive.  And that's how things were w/ this sister.  She said things that cut to the bone, and nothing was off limits.  And no matter what I did, no matter what I endured from her, no matter how nice I was, I was kept at arms length.

And that's how it is now.  I'm on the outside looking in.  And I'll never be one of them, even though I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict.  Because I just don't fit.  I've been changing, but how much do I change before I'm no longer myself?  And this time is NOT like last time.  When I stopped drinking, God just helped me, immediately.  I just got that conscious contact with Him, and it was immediate and amazing, I still remember exactly what I was doing, where I was standing, what I was listening to...

But when I lost that baby, I turned my back on Him.  And I've been trying to make my amends to Him.  But the process has been agonizing this time.  I'm human.  Painfully so.  And I have an ego, and a will, and it's strong, and I'm trying to break it.  I think it might actually kill me.  I'm thinking I might just give up program stuff and just try to deal with God myself, with my husband and kids, and my shrink and a counselor.  Because I deal with enough drama with my family, and I just don't feel like I need to continue to volunteer myself for more of it.  It's just too much.  I have a breaking point, and it has been reached.  Today.

Please, GOD, help me.  Because I can't do this anymore.  I've been praying this same simple prayer for MONTHS now.  Maybe I'm beyond help.  And I'm pretty sure that if I killed myself that this pain would go right with me, because it's not physical.  It's my soul.  I don't know if it's ever going to heal at this point.

WHAT????

OKAY... I'm sorry, but I MUST rant for a moment here. Mostly, I do it on Facebook, but I would never want Ollie's mom to see it there, because the last thing I want to do is hurt her feelings... A long time ago (18 months, maybe more?) someone created a page on Facebook named "Prayers for Oliver P." Well, people get on there and send thoughts and encouragement, etc. Great!

Well, the last couple of days, this guy gets on there, (maybe it's a woman, I can't remember) and tells Stacy that she needs to call him right away. A few hours later, this big post, the gist of which is, "Stacy, I really feel like I need to tell you that Oliver should have another MRI." Um, WHAT? Who the fuck are YOU???? You aren't that kid's father, nor are you married to Stacy, so -and excuse my SpongeBob sentence enhancer here, but-SHUT THE FUCK UP. YOU do NOT get to tell someone what to do with their kid, EVER. God doesn't give you revelation for someone else's kid/family. A$$HOLE. I am really angry about this (can you tell?) This child is dying. He can't really even get out of bed, he uses a urinal to pee, but yeah, let's load him up in the car and drive 90 minutes to Iowa City. Who the hell are YOU???

Which brings me to the next issue... I was hoping that ranting about dumbass up there would make me feel better, but it hasn't so much... BUT I will try to be sensitive... In fact I should have been more sensitive with that guy too, I don't know who he is, so...

I read this morning a post that said, "Oliver, hold on to all our prayers." OK, I understand the sentiment behind this, but it's extremely selfish. Oliver has told both his parents that he is ready to die. He is miserable in his body that is failing him. He has a constant headache. He is bloated from constant steroid use. But yeah, let's guilt him into holding on because WE don't want him to die.

Let's be clear about this. I don't want Oliver to die. I never have. And a miracle could still happen. The Lord could raise him after he is dead if that was His plan for Oliver. But I do not know God's will. The ONLY thing I can do is pray that it is His will that is done, not mine. And my prayer is that God's will be done, and if it is that Oliver go home to Him, I pray that it is with the least possible amount of suffering for Oliver. That sweet brave little rock star has been through SO much already. Ollie, you are, and always will be, my hero.

Life is Fragile...

I am amazed sometimes how quickly I can forget how fragile life can be. How excruciatingly delicate. On March 12, 2011, I participated in a fundraiser for St. Baldricks, an organization which raises money for kids' cancer research. When I say I participated, I mean that I had my hair, which is naturally curly, and was almost to the middle of my back in length at the longest layer, shaved off with clippers. What was long enough, we sent to Locks of Love, so it could be made into wigs for cancer patients.

The reason I participated in this event was because my friend Stacy has a son. Oliver. Her oldest child. Oliver was diagnosed two days before Christmas 2010 with DIPG, a rare and aggressive type of brain tumor that is inoperable. And incurable. When he was diagnosed, they told Stacy and Ed that they could expect approximately 6-9 months if they chose no treatment, and 9-18 if they chose to do some treatments that would extend his life. Of course, they chose the treatment.

On November 1st of 2011, Ed and Stacy took Oliver to University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, where he had an MRI. The results showed that the tumor had resumed growth. Hospice care was arranged. And Oliver was given 6-8 weeks to live the remainder of just over a decade of life. It's now been 14+ weeks. I can't help but smile that Oliver has continued to defy the odds of what he's "supposed" to do. What an amazing little fighter! And he's always so upbeat.

But the last two days have begun a rapid decline. Oliver told his mom and dad he's just ready to die. He understands more than any 10 1/2 year old ever should have to about what is happening to him and his body. And he is cognizant of everything that is going on around him. There is just no control of the body that is failing him.

As a mother who lost a child suddenly, I used to wonder if it would be different for me if I'd had some warning, some time to prepare... and now I know. It would have been absolute hell.

I just cannot even conceive of having to watch helplessly while my child slowly declined. It breaks my heart. Those parents are my heroes. And Oliver is my hero. Rock on, buddy. Rock on.

One year

My last post was depressing, no? Well, the good news is that I am still sober, and tomorrow, I will have one year. I was having some serious medication issues, and they took care of that, but it took a while. Then, I felt good for literally two days, and then had surgery to remove my ovaries. Oh, and we filed bankruptcy. You know, the only good thing about that is that we get to start over. We're still paying too much for this house, but we can only do what's right for our family.

Things with the hubby are much better, thank goodness. I was worried for a while. Though I think it was more my own crazy than anything. Sometimes I think I am my own worst enemy. In fact, I know it. But for now, things have settled somewhat...

I say that as I found out this morning that my 7 year old has to start braces, and my new medication is going to cost $80 a month. Oh well, it is what it is. Here we go. Hold on and enjoy the ride.