Is it normal?

Is it normal do you think that the best part of my week is the time I spend with my counselor, in my DBT (dialectical behavioral therapy group) and seeing my psychiatric nurse practitioner?  They make me laugh.  Sometimes they make me cry.  They make me feel things, real things.  They don’t look at me like I am crazy.  They don’t yell at me about all my OCD “rules” and rituals.  They don’t treat me like I am “sick” or like I am a specimen to be studied, but like a human, like I am an important human, maybe even a funny and smart human.  Someone who is more than just the crazy.  Someone who matters beyond what you see, beyond the hand washing, the disinfecting wipes, the checking, the fears, the depression, the anxiety, the hiding.

Do they see me? Is that why it’s the best part of my week? I don’t know, but it is.  And part of me is glad. I’m glad I have a best part of my week.  But part of me is not glad, part of me thinks it’s sad that the best part of my week is when I go to my mental health providers.

In an effort to be more productive….

The other day I was thinking about how much time I spend scrolling up and down my newsfeed, and refreshing over and over again.  I decided to shut off all notifications of facebook (but not messenger since that’s my main means of communication with just about everyone).  I moved the app to an unused page of my phone screen.

Poof.  Less facebook = so much more time for everything else right?  WRONG.  Haven’t been to facebook in 2 days so far.  But I find other ways to waste my time- staring at the kitchen clock works well.  As does laying my head on my laptop.  Oh Oh and sitting staring into space.  There’s not shortage of time wasters in my vicinity.

I have had super duper anxiety lately, and yet very little affect.  I just have no motivation to even move my face… but my legs are jiggling like crazy under the table….

I need to get motivated and get through this semester then – graduation at which time I can commence sleeping in my chair all day again.

Whipping Girl…

I am sick of life. I am sick of being the butt of every joke. I’m sick of all of it.

I’ve made some comments to my children about the fact that they constantly pick on me with “jokes”. Once in a while is funny, multiple times a day is harassment. They take my phobias and terrorize me with them- funny once, not funny after the 4th or 5th time in an hour.

Every appointment Big One has with his counselor is spent bashing me. I keep him on a tight leash. I expect too much of him. I give too much schoolwork. Every.single.time it’s about me.

This past weekend at his youth group retreat he made a very inappropriate joke about something he didn’t even know what it was- he had heard it at school, people laughed so he used it for his comedy. It then commenced a talk from the pastor. This was autism at its finest. We talked and talked about it last night he was so mad. Screaming. Yelling. And yet when he went to the counselor this morning they discussed me- and all the ways I fail.

I’m done. So freaking done.

“Best of Intentions?”, “Homeschool Part 2?”, or “Really?….No Crap?”

Which title fits this post the best? You decide.

I had big plans to write here more often in 2019.  I planned to chronicle my crawl back to … I don’t know where.  Maybe just my crawl forward…. but as always life gets in the way. First we went on a family vacation- which was nice.  It’s been a long time.  Then there was getting back into the swing of things, and finally last week was the week of appointments with a snow day smack dab in the middle of the week. Fun.

Last week… ugh.  Started bright and early Monday morning with an appointment with the endocrinologist who officially diagnosed me with type 2 diabetes.  Meds, meter, set me up with an appointment to see the nutritionist, have I heard of Keto?, lose weight.  (insert eye roll).  Tuesday morning saw Princess Glitter Sparkle- yes still seeing her, still loving her, though she did suggest I keep a gratitude journal (ugggghhhh fine… but I don’t have to like it– yes I am wicked pissy lately).  Then straight to Big One’s counselor who expressed his concern about Big One’s depression- we are too, trying to get a handle on what will help.  A short lunch break and off to Little One’s counselor.  I was sure making the rounds that day. (insert BIG eye roll here).  Wednesday plans (more appointments) came to screeching halt with a snow day…. yay?!?! Thursday trip to see the ENT for a hearing test referral to HOPEFULLY get to the bottom of the ringing in my ears that is threatening to put me in the looney bin faster than my life will.  He said it’s either hearing loss or… wait for it…. who the heck knows why ringing and either way there may or may not be anything that we can do for it??!?!?! If there is significant hearing loss I can fix it or live with it.  And if it’s unknown reason well I have to live with it. (Gosh I love being me).  After that went to Mary Poppins.  Still love her.  She wants to keep on keeping on regarding meds for now.  Im good with that.  Something stable right?  After her I met with my case manager – I need to come up with a name for her.  She drives me crazy.  I don’t think I like her.  Of course it could be that she handed me a big packet of articles about exercise, weight loss etc.  (bang head on wall).  Final visit rounding out the week was my urologist.  I’ll spare you the gory details, but his parting words were- “any extra weight we carry makes things worse”

I GET IT ALREADY IM FAT I NEED TO LOSE WEIGHT.  I get it.  I do.  I know that losing weight will make certain medical things better.  But I just can’t seem to get motivated to do that.  I want to say I need to get my head in order but really will there ever be a time where my head is in order and I am ready to lose weight? Who knows.  I KNOW I need to be the “no excuses” girl I was 5 years ago.  Sometimes I wish I could find her again.  Though I will admit there were things about her that I could live without… but that’s a topic for another day.

So let’s see that covers “Best of Intentions” and “Really?….No Crap?”… onto Homeschool Part 2.

I already mentioned we were going to be homeschooling Little One.  We started that last week in the midst of appointment-hell.  It went well so far.  She’s been happy to do her work, and seems to be enjoying what she is studying.  But Friday night things came to a head with Big One.  He’s been struggling… socially horribly all year… and it’s affecting his mood- obviously – he’s so depressed (as I mentioned above), and it’s affecting his grades.  Not cool.  He’s getting an F and a C-.  Not cool at all.  But Friday he got an email from his co-leader of the club he started at school, basically telling him that he was no longer a leader because he didn’t do enough behind the scenes things, and moreover that they weren’t friends anymore…. for basically all the issues that a child with Autism has—- self preoccupation, not thinking about how others are feeling, etc etc etc.  HE CANT HELP IT.  I wish I could scream that from the rooftops.  HE CAN NOT HELP THE WAY HE IS. We have worked on this stuff for… forever…. there is only so much we can do.

I don’t get it, with all the talk these days about tolerance, acceptance etc why is it ok for people to not be that way to people like him?  I can’t even.

So Friday night he got this email, and he lost it.  He yelled, he screamed.  He said he wouldn’t go back to school and he didn’t care who we called- crisis, the police he didn’t care.  But worst of all?  He sobbed and sobbed.  Uncontrollably.  My baby boy just shut down and cried.  I haven’t seen him do that in years.   YEARS.  My heart broke, and I wanted blood.  Of course I told him he didn’t have to go back to a place that has done this to him.

Insert note- I may or may not have had a PTSD moment bringing me back to my sophomore year when I was the child sobbing- into my pillow- and wishing I didn’t have to go back—

So we have been researching Charter Schools, but it’s hard mid-year.  So we may be homeschooling him for the remainder of the year as well as Little One.  That will bet interesting with my 4 classes.  But I know God will get us through it all.  But all I know is that I WILL protect my kids, no matter what.  And if that means discomfort for me, so be it.  I will take a much harder hit to my mental health if something were to cause my son to do something drastic… or even if he continued to be so unhappy.  So judge me if you will.  Some will.  Some will say I made the wrong decision.  Some will say he needs to be in school to get used to the “real world”.  And to them I say- until you have seen your 15.5 year old son turn into a little boy rocking in your arms crying and sobbing, don’t judge me.

Until next time- (which I hope is sooner rather than later)

Do you have that small voice?

Do you have that small voice in your head? You know the one that seems to wake up at bedtime and say “hey, you haven’t thought about <insert some worrisome thing here> in a while, let’s revisit that right now”.

Why???? Why must my brain constantly sabotage me? As if I don’t have enough on my plate- IEP for little one in 11hrs 29 mins… but who is counting…. oh yeah – me. Going in with my gloves on, but in truth- if they don’t give her what she needs I am probably done. I’ll take her out of school and homeschool her again. I know there are people who won’t support that decision but they don’t have to watch their child come home from school and lose it for most of the night because they held it together as best they could all day. I don’t know, little one could go one way or another if I pull her out she may be for it or against l. But I think it’s something her dad and I are going to have to think about and decide by Christmas.

29 days.

Alone

Sometimes I feel like I have no one to talk to, except my therapist. I wish I had her on speed dial.

I have friends. I have family. Sometimes I vent to them. But sometimes I feel like “that friend/family member that does nothing but complain”. And sometimes I just can’t talk about what’s bothering me, sometimes there aren’t words, sometimes my feelings are unreasonable and unrealistic and could cause hurt feelings. So I’ve been doing a lot of stuffing and avoiding.

People are noticing I’m isolating myself. People are noticing that I’m missing. And I care that they notice, and then I feel compelled to rectify that, and then I either stay missing or I go and spend the entire time on edge.

I’ve noticed some friends and I have drifted apart. And I want to get that back, but I just don’t have anything to give.

I’ve tried faking it at home, tried plastering on a smile and be Suzy-homemaker but that inevitably leaves me feeling resentful, and I end up just losing my temper because it’s all too much. Too much.

Thanksgiving was a perfect example of this.  We had 8 of us here, and hubby and I cooked- but mostly I cooked.  Something I always used to enjoy but now… not so much.  And I was stressed to the max.  I dropped all the carrots in the sink, a million dish towels, and utensils.  People at the table were “bickering”… goading each other just for the fun of it.  But I plastered a smile on my face, and only got after everyone once, and told them it’s  Thanksgiving,  cut it out, smile and you will have fun.

After dinner was over my inlaws stayed after my mom and step father left.  We were talking and I made a comment about something wiseass, and MIL said “you’re fine now”.  Like one wiseass comment means I feel fine.  She went on to say that because I was able to put on the meal etc that meant I was fine.  Um, hello? Really?  She wasn’t here yesterday (hubby’s 40th birthday) to see the aftermath of the day.  I was grumpy, had a short fuse, and was exhausted. Today I still am. Seriously, I don’t get it.

Princess Glitter Sparkle (a.k.a. my counselor) wants to call Mary Poppins (a.k.a. med management doctor)… I’m not sure why, I hope she tells me when I see her this week.

We have an IEP meeting for little one on Monday.  I had forgotten about it until I looked at the calendar tonight.  and now I have that to stress about.  I know they aren’t going to give her what she needs. I don’t think I mentioned she was diagnosed with ODD.  Did I mention she ran away from school 2x and came home?  She has OT delays, issues with self-regulation, and stutters.  She reverses her letters.  She’s 8.  We need to find out why.  I have asked for evaluations.  But I am sure she’s not going to get them.  I know I sound like a doomsday-er, but I have been here, done that, bought the teeshirt, and the hoodie, and the towel and the socks.  I am not doing this again.  I will take her out and homeschool her again.  I am just so done.

Did I mention that I went back to school?  Online- no way could I do this in the classroom- though this coming semester I have to take 1 class, 1 day a week at the campus and I am flipping out already.  As if I don’t have enough to do, I decided to finish my bachelors degree, I thought maybe having something to do would help- not so much, it has made so much more stress in my life.  But maybe my mom and some other people in my life will stop being so disappointed with the way my life turned out.  Maybe I will “shine”.

I don’t even want to post this… I know some of the people who know me “in real life” read this, and I don’t want them to think I’m talking about them, I don’t want them to feel the need to reach out, I don’t know what I want.

I’m still alive…

Again it’s been a long while since I wrote. Writing seems like so much work. And I’m already writing a lot… I’ll share about that soon – I’m not ready to spill the beans just yet.

So what’s new? Not much. I have ups and downs. The up days are way fewer than the down days. I’m trying- most days. Some days trying is too hard. Some days just thinking about trying makes me exhausted.

I’m still seeing my counselor an hour a week, and going to Dialectical Behavioral Therapy 2 hours a week. We are getting ready to start inner child work, we’ve been trying to start for a couple of months but things keep “getting in the way”. Honestly, I think I might be avoiding…. I need to face this. I don’t think I’ll ever be ok if I don’t.

It’s been 83 days since I last scratched. I’ve been looking at my scars, they give me comfort in a way. They are small, but there, sharing my pain. I’ve picked up some other coping mechanisms like pulling my eyebrows, and not leaving my hair alone.

My OCD is smacking me in the face constantly- especially since cold and flu season is here now. I’ve been wiping my inside clothes down with disinfectant wipes if someone in the family touches me. It’s so damn frustrating.

I have more to say but maybe if I save it I’ll write again sooner… until next time.

Maybe she’s right? Mother knows best?

I can’t let go of the text my mom sent about 6 months ago saying she wasn’t disappointed in ME, but that I don’t have the support I need to SHINE. I keep mulling the word over, trying to figure out what exactly I would need to do to shine, and I just was coming up empty until tonight,

Hubby and I were watching a movie and two people were cliff diving. I made an offhand comment that I would love to do that, that it looks like fun, but in the next breath said I would be too scared. I said “I am too scared to go out in our yard at night” and hubby said “you’re too scared to go out in the daylight”.

The sad thing is, he’s right. And maybe that’s what my mom means. I’m don’t live my life, I’m too scared of everything. I merely get by from day to day, trying not to mess things up too badly. And in all the “getting by”, I never live.

I’m too afraid to fail. I’m too afraid I’ll do something wrong. I’m too afraid germs will make me sick. I’m too afraid of screwing up my kids. Fear runs my life. I can’t plan everything when I leave my bubble so something unpredictable might happen, and that thing might be bad, and bad is… bad.

My brain instantly goes to worst-case scenario, and then all the ways to prevent that. It’s exhausting. So it’s easier to just not live than to risk it all…. and therefore I will never shine.

Well at least I think I have figured that problem out. Can’t have unclosed loops.

Broken…. A Poem

Please, don’t judge, there is really no structure to this poem, but it’s not a story, or a “post”.  But tonight was a really bad night, and I let my pen just scrawl along. 

Broken.

I feel the familiar “whoosh, whoosh, whoosh” of the blood in my ears.

My heart is racing, pulse is 120.

There’s a buzzing in my body.

I’m sweating, everywhere, even my legs.

My brain is going to dark, dark, places.

I want to see the red blood coming out of my arms.

I want to see the raised skin of the scratch.

I want to feel the sting and burn of the cuts.

I want my brain to stop.

FAT, UGLY, HIDEOUS, GROSS.

Bad mom, yeller, ineffective.

Bad wife, “makes” hubby do all the cooking and clean

up from meals, undermines his discipline.

LOSER, CAN’T FINISH ANYTHING, STUPID

Will never change.

Always a victim.

Don’t SHINE, am a disappointment.

Not good enough, NEVER enough.

Undermines my own dreams.

I sit, tears brimming, threatening to spill over.

I sit at my desk all the things I used to use to cut at my disposal.

But I can’t cut, no matter how much I want to, I’m on blood thinners. I don’t want to ruin my kids’ life any more than I already have.

So I push it down, down, down.  The whooshing, shaking, and sweating gets worse. My head pounds too.

How long can I do this? How long will I have to do this?

No one is going to save me, or the little girl inside.  Together we will drown and choke on our labels; the labels of rejection and the labels we give ourselves.  Never truly happy; never truly whole—

Broken.

Raising Teenagers Is NOT for the Faint of Heart

Big one is 15.  He is argumentative, oppositional, irritable and I am sure there are at least 15 more adjectives.  And yes, all of that is “normal” teenage behavior- but add the Autism Spectrum, bipolar disorder, ADHD, anxiety and possible narcissistic personality.  It’s teenager amplified.

Ive been trying to help him get ready for camp.  He was leaving today.  He wanted to bring half his stuff in random Walmart bags.  He has ZERO executive functioning skills, and he refused to let me even make suggestions without getting angry and screaming at me (at the top of his lungs- I feel like he’s 8 again. (our worst year to date)).

We definitely are not getting along lately…. yet I am the one in his corner.  I am the one making the cog wheels move so that he gets the help he needs, with the “least restrictive environment”.

But there are days I look at him, and I wonder what happened to my baby?  I think back to the day I found out I was pregnant with him, after failed clomid, attempts, failed IUI attempts, and 2 in-vitro cycles, how happy I was.  And when he was born, the struggles with his seizures, the struggle with developmental delays, giving him EVERYTHING I had.  Driving him 80 miles 2x a week for OT, finding him every therapy we could get. I think about the year he was 8.  The year he was violent, angry, physically abusive to me.  And I feel like I earned a little bit easier teenage years.  After all, we have his meds right, we have had therapy in place long enough.  I just want peace.  I want to remember these last few years as a teenager fondly, not with sadness, and regret.

My kids mean everything to me. They are my legacy, they are my best accomplishments, they are the best of me.  They SHINE in every way I don’t.  I gave them all my shine.

Maybe this is how all moms feel during the teenage years.  But this is my first time being there, it hurts, and honestly PLEASE don’t tell me it’s all normal, I KNOW that in my head, but it’s my heart that hurts, and that will only get better with time.