Trip to Tenneessee

Still writing from Tenneesee. We are a little crowded in the van, even with the two middle seats taken out. These are two faces only a mother could love, and I love them very, very much.

On the other side of Twizzler and O. is our other god-daughter, C. She's sleeping and drooling all over my pillows.


This black blob is Sam.

He is adequately tranq'd for both his and my benefit. He is never this mellow. He's lying on the floor where we took the two middle seats out. That's my Strawberry Shortcake blanket he's bogarting. How could I refuse him?

Somewhere under here is our god-daughter, O. , and our other dog, Twizzler, who is too prissy to get on the floor.

Twizzler is totally monopolizing the backseat like good dogs do. O.is a little camera shy. "Mom" she cries.

As a side note, they are African American and we are Caucasian. Info. just in case you read our profile.

Things are slightly better at the moment, but we spent the day in bed. I'm totally proud of our abiility to transfer pictures to our computer and put them on Flickr and on the blog, so you'll be seeing more pics in the future.

We are switching more. and I think that is due to the one member staying in bed all day. Once we started switching we got up and got on-line and showered. We never made it to Panera. Our streak is broken. Heaven help us.

More to write later.

Time after time

I remember it like it was yesterday. I was 18 years old, institutionalized on the mental health floor, and trying to justify my suicide attempt in group therapy. Another woman, about twenty years older than me, scolded me out because I wanted to kill myself and told me how lucky I should feel because I was getting psychiatric help at such a young age and that she had to live with her illness longer than I had been alive.

Well, here I am, woman almost fifteen year later, and still getting psychiatric help. I'm still in therapy and have been in the looney bin several times since I was 18. So what does that make me? A failure? Worthless? Wasteful? Shouldn't early intervention mean that my life would be a panacea and I would have no problems?

If that's the case then I have failed miserably. I've been in therapy for a long time and I've been to alot of groups with varying ages. I never tell someone younger than me that they are lucky to get help early in life. I never feel jealous because they are getting help as a teenager.

Just because you receive help doesn't mean you are helped, and that is the difference. And the help you get may not be what you really need, but it may just keep you alive for the moment.

I remember all my therapists. Some of them were great, some not so great. I've still got some of the same problems I had when I first started therapy fifteen years ago. I still dissociate; I still am depressed; I still have an eating disorder; I still self harm. If I wanted to I could throw a pity party and mope and mourn all the years wasted and sacrificed to ineffectual therapy. But even though I still have a long way to go to achieve mental health, I know that I've made progress.

Every stage of my life has given me opportunities to grow. I've done the best I can do at any given moment. The wear and tear I've experienced in my life has afforded me the opportunity to gain wisdom, so the therapy wasn't a waste. And I'm not a waste because I'm not the poster child for mental health.

So to the woman that told me 15 years ago how lucky I was to get help early, I say fuck off. By saying that you invalidate me and how I've been scraping and clawing and scratching my way up the mountain for help. I'm not going to let myself feel like a waste and a disaster just because I'm not "fixed."

To the rest of the world that might look at me and say "what the fuck is wrong with you that fifteen years of therapy won't fix?, I try to tell myself, "Big deal." So what that I've been in therapy for 15 years. That shows a sign of hope. At least I haven't given up. At least I still try.

I know that one day my smile will be genuine and my laughter authentic. Then will I celebrate all the years, whether it's 15 or 25, that I struggled and battled to be happy and free.

The dirty word called "trust"

It's taken a few days to write this post. I've been molling it over in my head. A week ago I attend a support group that I usually go to, Emotions Anonymous. The format consists of go around the room, saying our name, and giving a feeling word. Then a topic is introduced and we go around and make a statement about the topic, or we pass if we don't feel like talking.

Well, last Monday the topic was trust. Dirty word. Most people with truama histories have problems trusting. I find it hard to trust everyone and everything. It's hard to trust my T., D., my husband, and to trust even myself. I can be one of the worst perpetrators of abuse against myself with all the cutting, burning, starving, purging, etc..

I thought it was interesting to hear everyone's comments in the meeting. By far, the men asserted they were too trusting and the women complained they weren't trusting enough. It didn't surprise me. Women trust too much and get burned in the end when their hopes for friendship or courtship are dashed.

Well, yesterday's reading in my affirmation book put the punctuation mark on the topic. The topic started off with a quote from "The Desiderata" and it reads, "The world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is."

I have to make myself trust that there are good people out there, people that want to take the time to get to know me and be patient while we sift through the garbage and I can be a good friend. I have a lot to offer and I want to offer it. But right now, I can't afford trust. It won't always be that way because I see what I'm missing out on. It took the EA meeting and yesterday's affirmation to realize it.

If I look at everyone as someone out to get me, then truly everyone will be out to get me. My reality depends on what I choose to focus. To overly concentrate on the world's deceit has us constantly imputing false, shoddy motives to everyone we see or any activity we take notice of. If we regard the world this way, every gift becomes suspect, every kind deed a means for exploitation, and all innocence equals guilt or suspicion.

I've lived my whole life this way and all it's gotten me is alone. I don't want to be this way anymore. I have a lot that I could offer people.

I'm giving, concerened, empathetic, and agreeable. I would make a good friend.

The last quote of yesterday's reading reads, "The world is only as dark as the glasses I wear." I can choose to see only darkness and deceit in the world, or I can choose to see the potential that a trusting life can bring. Happiness determines my altitude, not just my attitude.

Now I just need hope. That will be a whole new post.