BPD

 I think I’ve been running away from this label for a long time, trying to gather evidence that it did not apply to me. Sure, I have high highs and low lows and am terrified of abandonment and struggle with low-self esteem and self-harm and an overwhelming lack of goals/dreams/or motivation…

But in a normal… ADHD enhanced way. Right?? Like, the rage monster is just depression? And the chronic loneliness is being married to a man? Because men are lazy selfish dogs, and this is all normal typical, manageable feminine shit. 

And not the overwhelming, terrifying, identity defining diagnosis that I am fundamentally flawed in my actual personality. I was reading articles, trying to find a light at the end of the BPD tunnel and just found whiney, self-indulgent, woe-is-me pity party that is women diagnosed with this disorder. And I hated the articles, almost as much as I hated the women writing them. Because they all could have easily been written… by and about me. 

I know I should be excited that there is a reason for my behavior, my mood swings, my insanity. But instead I’m annoyed that I am one of those women. The Crazy Ex-Girlfriends of the world. I’m frustrated and annoyed with myself. Like I could have tried harder to not be crazy. 

What are people going to think? Will I lose people? Will I be judged? Just telling people I needed mental health support got judgement. Implying that I was interested in trying medication garnered even more. I felt incorrect. I must be WRONG about my own mood swings. Someone not dealing with the same stuff or witnessing my day-to-day must know more than I do. 

It’s scary. It makes me so worried. I want to run more, flee the very idea that it could be that. Which is not going to solve anything. I know that. On some level, I know that getting diagnosed and medicated for the label I have been trying to outrun is a good thing. 

But I wish I could go back to before I knew.  

I need a break

 Sobbing in the kitchen because it’s been literally months since I could leave the house without anyone coming with me. I need a break. I hate my routine or should I say, lack of routine. I’m so burnt out, I’m nowhere near the person I want to be. 

I call my husband to ask when he’ll be home, because I’m a wreck and he’s at the store, perusing supplements. I lose my mind. I can’t even listen to my own music in the car because the kids want to watch DVDs. I’m never alone. Never. And he takes it for granted that at 6 at night he can just stop off at the store and look at pre-works outs and compare protein shake prices. 

Once he’s home, I’m sobbing as I say I need a break. I need to get out of the house. He’s angry at my outburst, angry that I’m overreacting about his little stop. He’s mad that I make him out to be my enemy. 

But I know he’s not my enemy. I’m my enemy. I say yes and its fine and genuinely think eventually it will be MY TURN to waste time out of the house and away from the kids. But then when my turn comes up, I let myself be talked out of it every time. 

I hate my life. I hate how little I take care of myself. I refuse to do what I need to regain my sanity. I said I was gonna be gone all day today. I swore on it. 

But when he said, “I was thinking I’d fill your new car with trash that’s been sitting in the garage for three years…” I let him do that instead. And I lay in my house angrier than I have words for. 

What’s wrong with me. What the fuck is WRONG WITH ME. WHY. I need to leave this house. 

     I'm about 70% of the way through The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah... and so much of it resonates. Yes, my father never hit my mom. And gloriously, we had each other, we had grandparents, we had a phone and eventually internet connection with the world. But this fear of the world... the fear instilled in us at a young age. Dad's flight of fancy where we trusted no one except him. The constant pins and needles where we ALL are required to put his feelings, his energy, his dreams and goals above ours... he was the center of our lives. We were supposed to shrink and define ourselves by his idea of what the world is and how we should feel about it. And mom backing him up, worshipping him as the smartest most spiritual person in the world, raised in a religion that backed up the idea that dad could even be a prophet... I sometimes think of the way I idolized his version of life... I feel like the scene from The Water Boy, where the professor is teaching about where the anger center of the brain is in an alligator and how it's enlarged, and me as the Water Boy, confidently raising my hand to quote "mama". Angry when I'm corrected. Because this was my reality.

    And having to redefine it because he was crazy and power-hungry and defended by ONE woman, gave him all the power I had to give. And every time she doubles down, or feels bad, or tries to forgive him and make us forgive him because she's forgotten and hopes we've all forgotten that the sad, vulnerable, sad little man he was controlled and belittled and shut down anything he didn't agree with and we were all supposed to blindly follow, love, and forgive him forever and ever for him to be able to function.

    He never functioned. He couldn't function and blamed the world about it. It must be the world's lies, Satan at work, only he had a hold on the God's honest truth of what really mattered. Because he couldn't do it. He was a failure from day one of adulthood. He failed to follow through on the potential everyone said he had, he failed his first marriage, he failed until he tricked mom into following him and he put his whole value into who he could convince her he was and we were born into this toxic dynamic.

    And now we're adults, getting to decide we don't want it anymore. Does he know us? No. Does he want to? NO. Does he support us and want the best for us? FUCK NO. Every accomplishment is a bitter reminder of all his failures. I will never let him back in. I don't want him in my life. I will never let him back into my kids' lives. He curated a life that protected him and his ideals and his creepy worldview and whatever he got away with, he did. I have no doubt that he has done every drug made available to him. I have no doubt that he had engaged in exchanges with other like-minded individuals. I have no doubt that he thinks as long as no one knows... as long as he can pretend and force other people to pretend... he will continue being as creepy and manipulative and self-serving as possible. I wish he would just become a product of his choices.

    Growing up isolated, far from the small community he claimed he believed in, constantly at odds with one part of the family or another because they wouldn't conform to his standards. His resentment of my mom's parents, the constant competitive edge whenever he interacted with her father... He was "protecting" us from love. From support. From people who knew better and could recognize the dangerous and predatory nature of my father's version of "love".

    Not just narcissism. But an inflated self-importance that only lacked organizational and charisma skills that came just short of full cult-leader ideals. "Aspie Supremacy". That his version of autism is the evolution of humanity, and we're all just inferior compared to him. That version of him, when he gives into that vanity and dominance, I have no doubt he would let nothing stop him from taking what he wanted, convinced he was doing no harm because they were too little to remember anyway. And we'll never really know for sure. And because of that? I cannot allow anyone to try to convince me it's worth it to let him back into my life.

If it looks like a duck, and gets accused of being a duck from people around you, and insists on befriending other ducks, knowing that they are ducks... and he occasionally SOUNDS like a duck... fucking chances are... HE'S a MOTHERFUCKING DUCK.

I Feel Like He Hates Me

 I went out of town for a concert with my friend. I came back on his birthday. 

Two and a half days, and the house is destroyed. There is literally no room on the counters, they are that filled with dishes. There is cat food water-falling down the stairs. Someone decided to play with my makeup and it’s ruined and on everything. There are no groceries left in the house. The furniture is turned over and dragged around. An 80’s movie style house party has nothing on the state of my home.

But it’s his birthday. I’m not allowed to be mad. I’m not allowed to lose my mind. I just got two and a half kid-free days. I’m not allowed to be disappointed. I’m on the clock now, time to clean it up, cook the meals, bring the enthusiasm, manage everyone’s feelings. No one is NICE to each other. They all fight and bicker and ignore each other’s feelings and make each other as miserable as possible. Even my husband… my fourth child. 

I have been trapped at home for the last month or so without a car, AGAIN. I have not been apart from the kids in at least… three months? Maybe more? And not for any length of time. The last time I spent the night away from them, I had gone home to say goodbye to my friend on hospice. 

He left me for Mother’s Day. Didn’t even send a text. 

Was the house trashed? Were the kids neglected? 

No. 

Life without him continues as normal. I am the only one required to care. 

Miracle Child

 I dream of a miracle baby

That despite the Nexplonon rod in my arm

Despite the many sheets of blister packs of Birth Control pills

To control the months of heavy, sporadic bleeding

That there is this strong, miracle child

Growing in my womb

That somehow, I am not so broken.

That even despite the science at work

God's hand is forming one more little one 

To grow our family.

What a hearty child that would be.

A warrior

A survivor

A thing which small words cannot begin to explain.

Even as I lie wrapped around my heating pad for the 4th day in a row

Changing pad after pad, 

Each drenched in the disappointment of a room filled with undone plans.

I dream of a child I cannot control, 

That comes bursting out of me, unbidden, unplanned

And totally wanted.

Wild with Life. 

Filled with Love

Completing my sad story with a joyful ending

Making all the sorrow a footnote in the incredible story of their LIFE.

But all I produce

Is a stupid poem

About a baby

That will never be born.

How greedy am I?

The mother of three incredible, amazing, unfathomable children

Children I fear I disappoint daily.

Children that grow with laughter and spontaneous songs 

Leaving thousands of sticky fingerprints 

Dancing across my windows, my furniture, my life

Sending my head reeling with the MUCHNESS 

Enough to overwhelm me constantly

And yet I mourn for the things that I cannot have back

The things I have to leave behind and stop dreaming for. 

There is time for a miracle

And I hope I can experience it

And I hope that I can see it for the miracle it is

And I know that I have a miracle in each of the magical little people

That are alive and well and strong and GROWING

But every so often...

Even in the pain of womanhood, with too much going on around me,

I yearn for a miracle child.

God the Mother

 I have often wondered what a bible would look like written outside of patriarchy, what God the creator would look like as a feminine energy, instead of a Vengeful Warrior. There are so many war metaphors in the Bible. Would God be depicted as a Victor in a text outside of a patriarchal society? And until we can separate modern ideology from religious doctrine, I fear we will never know the true heart of God. If calling God "they" or "she" is blasphemous or heresy... what are we really being told to worship?

Arguing in my head

 I’m not even mad. 

I’m not sad. I’m just done. I was done before we weren’t. I didn’t want to be friends anymore and it was sort of based on nothing. And everything. It was just a little bit exhausting at times, even when we were having fun. But I keep having arguments with you in my head. There is no winning. I don’t want to argue. But my brain loves to fixate. And I’m stuck on this repetitive argument where I just remind you who I am. Who we were. How fun we were together. But you didn’t want to be that version of us anymore. And I was tired of how we were now. 

When you’re only willing to surround yourself with people who agree with you, you will not grow. You have chosen self-righteousness which justifies violence. Something you used to be upset the other side did. And now you’re doing it. 

And I’m mad at myself for missing so many signals that you weren’t a safe person. And that you were becoming less safe every day. And I’m glad we don’t talk anymore. 

But once upon a time, you were a part of me. And I miss that. I miss having you when you were gentle and nice and friendly. I miss confiding before it was dangerous to confide. If I had hidden more of myself from you, we could have been friends forever. 

That makes me sad. 

I hope you’re doing well. But I know you will always chase an easy life but it’s a lie. Every “safe” and “easy” choice you make drives you away from the good stuff. I am sad your life will never be what you want it to be. He will keep cheating on you. Your son will go undiagnosed but over-medicated and coddled and it will always be a little bit too much of you and him together that will ultimately make you hate his girlfriends and eventually his wife. He’ll grow up to be just like his dad. You will run through relationships with friends because no one meets your standards and no one cares enough to stick through your rants. You will never find home. Europe doesn’t want you. And you don’t want America. I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry you won’t get the love and belonging that you crave… because you refuse to compromise, do the hard thing, fight for what you deserve. 

I’m sorry I couldn’t do it. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep showing up for you. I’m sorry I gave up on you. I chose me instead. I hope you choose yourself one day. 

Gratitude Day 1

 I am grateful for our trip to the Netherlands. 

I am grateful for Spring Break

I am grateful for Libby App

I am grateful for good friendships that make me feel loved and give me people to talk to and connect with.

I am grateful for the time we have left in Germany and grateful that we will be going back to the States soon. 

I am grateful for my bed. I love my bed. 

I am grateful for baths

I am so grateful for sobbing, for these blogs where I have poured out my heart.

Sarah, if you ever come back and read this, please know... This is a good thing you are doing. You are going to be okay. You are always trying to be better. You are always trying to keep yourself growing and moving forward even when it might not feel like it. YOU DON'T DO ANY DRUGS. You don't CHEAT. You don't mess around or take inappropriate risks. You are not a failure. You are growing and moving forwards and you are trying really really hard. DO NOT GIVE UP.

Pop

 Memories popped up today

Our family smiling

Hugging

Playing

Sun soaked memories on a beachy day. 

It looks like fun

It looks like peace 

It looks like the good old days

But you couldn’t pay me to go back. 

To be seeped in the pain

Of fresh betrayal

Shying away from truth

Lying to my loved ones

Vacation with my heartbreak

Coparenting with my sorrow

I lost so much in one moment

A bored moment

Poking around

In what I never considered

“Not my business”

Pop goes the trust

Pop goes the confidence

Pop goes the ignorance 

Of what I didn’t know I didn’t know

Time might not heal all the wounds

But it separates you from what came before

You forgive

What you can’t forget

And try to forget

What you can’t forgive

Overcoming in small moments

Popping the doubt

Popping the anger

Popping the hurt

Vacation with my heartache

Until the heart

Stops aching 

Moving forward 

Because I can’t live in that moment

Three years later

I see the smiling photos

Our family on the beach

And for a moment

The new bubbles we have put around ourselves

Pop

Discomfort by the unaddressed problems

Pop

Pain of unhealed trauma

Pop

Feeling totally and completely alone

Memories popped up today

Of a time I wish I could forget

But we had to be a family

And make memories

And celebrate spring break

And birthdays

All tinged with popped bubbles  

Clinging to me

Like a cold bath

Sloughing off my skin

Leaving the attempt to clean

With greasy soaped residue 

An easily popped bubble

When I never tried to rebuild with something better

Than the trippy twisty butterfly bubbles

Of new love  

What is old love made of?

I hope it’s better

Than bubbles

Losing friends

 My friend died on Valentine’s Day. 

I’ll never get to listen to her laugh. 

Or be lifted up by her love

Or feel her squeeze me so tight. 

I’ll never get to look forward to her calls, 

Her messages. Her visits. 

She’s gone. Forever gone. 

A friend stopped talking to me right before my birthday

I don’t know why. I miss her. 

I reach out and nothing reaches back. 

Just vague responses that make me feel like

Shes done being my friend

A friend hurt my feelings

Doubled down when I told her she hurt me

Hurt me more, worse

Confidences whispered to just her

In private moments of vulnerability

Turned around and fired from a gun I didn’t know she was hiding.  

My own secrets, bullets in the war that ends us. 

No longer friends. 

I cannot call

I won’t hear from her. 

My loss is now fodder for the building of a new friendship

“Oh, how I’ve been used.”

“Oh, how I have been mistreated.”

“Oh, how I have been abandoned.”

The same way, she built her friendship

With me. 

Close friends, deep friends

The unending, timeless friendships

That buoy me up

Hold me together

Create me and strengthen me

Are all back home, thousands of miles away

Back home where it’s safe. 

Where my secrets are kept

And disagreements can come and go

And the friendship remains.

Where we have hurt and cracked and rebuilt

So many times already

Our foundation is firm. 

And our future has each other in it. 

Where friendship only ends

Because someone dies. 

I long to be a person who knows I did it right

To be confident that I didn’t misstep

Or cause the schism

That I can say with all righteousness 

It was she and not me

That caused the death of us. 

But I cannot. 

I am fallible. 

And once hurt or rejected,

Whether Real or perceived,

I will hurt and reject. 

I have culpability

In why someone would reject me. 

My standards unmet, their standards unmet

Leading to videos that are mean

Selfish

And in one scorched earth move, 

You cannot contact me. 

And I cannot contact you. 

Blocked from our lives.

I do not want to lose people. 

I do not want to lose any more people

I cannot let hurt cause me to reject anyone else

Because I have a friend I cannot hurt

Who I wish could hurt me. 

I wish she could call me up and yell at me. 

Tell me all the ways I have let her down

Cry and scream and rant and then we could hug

Because she’s still here. 

Still alive. Still available to break my heart. 

I’d rather her be here, not talking to me

Then gone. Forever. 

Oh to be safe at home

With her

Wherever she is. 

No reason to hurt or be hurt 

Because all is well and perfect

In the great reward

Where everything is safe 

And our dearest friend

Treats us like royalty. 

Even if it’s made up

A great Lie

To ease the transition from being awake

To sleeping forever

I want to believe the lie

Because she’s alive there. 

And she will never reject me. 

Or hurt me. 

And we are friends. 

Forever. 

I’m over the stimulation

 On day 27 of Nexplanon bleeding, an hour past bed time, and all the kids are awake, screaming at each other. I have all the gifts to wrap, the house to clean, and a houseguest to entertain, all while also being a mom and cramping through an entire month on my period. 

Deep breathing is barely holding me together when I step in a puddle of some unknown liquid while I search for the toothbrush that seems to go missing every. Single. Fucking. Night. My oldest is singing a screetchy-off-pitch nightmare ballad she’s making up about how much she dislikes her baby sister, which in turn is making her sister howl with hurt cries and winds up to smack, which I barely catch before it happens. The reprimands are given in every direction, quickly followed by instructions on getting ready for bed. 

Sobs ensue, “I’m still hungry. No one fed me!” Which is the nightly cry of all the kids who refused to touch the dinner I spent 45 minutes making. I don’t give into terrorist demands, and these starving babies sob as they scrub today’s food pyramid of candy, french fries, and popsicles off their gums. My husband and I split into two, I take the littlest, he takes the older two, and the exhausting wait happens. I lay for a long long time, hoping at any second, she will stop moving, stop asking me questions or telling me stories. Stop rearranging dolls and stuffed animals. And just close her eyes and drift away to dreamland so I can attempt to sneak out and get some QT with the old man before descend into out bed one by one in the early hours of the morning. 

It feels like it will never happen. Until it does. And I slip out as slowly, quietly, carefully as I can… but it’s like she’s hardwired into the moment my body isn’t in her room and begins to shriek at the top her lungs… as if this has never happened before, how dare we leave her alone to sleep… instead of this being our daily routine. 

As I glance into the older kids’ room, I see the lights are still on brightly, my husband lounges on a bed, the Game playing loudly from his phone, and the kids roam the room with abandon. 

“Bed?” I call, the rage barely hidden from my voice that competes with my 3-year-old’s tantrum behind me. “We’re getting to it.” Comes the irritated response from my husband, who doesn’t look away from his phone. Does he not have a clock ticking away at our alone time? No desire to get it over with? No to-do list that fills his brain the second he is finished with the current task? 

I turn around and attempt to calm the baby. She is only assuaged by hugs and kisses and promises to come back, but I know this will be a long back and forth. I’m done. I’m ready to turn my anger on everyone around me. I step out of her room again, only to be meet by my son, out of bed, standing at my side with hands extended and a folded piece of paper, excitement dancing in his eyes. “WHY AREN’T YOU IN BED!?” I snap. 

“I made you this!” He is not deterred by my rage. He’s seen it often and doesn’t take me seriously. I unfold the hideous scribble, trying to bit back my deeply problematic hatred for this moment, for the offering, swallowing back my fury and smile through clenched teeth. “thank you. Its great.” But I straight up drop it on the floor as I head into the bathroom. 

I don’t know how to find the joy in these moments. To feel my purpose, or understand my calling to motherhood. Long nights where I am demanded to give up every piece of myself with no expectation of gratitude or reciprocation. Any free time is swallowed by responsibility and cyclical tasks that never end.

And I’m doing it all… on 27 days of unstoppable bleeding. 

Ready to chew this fucking thing out of my arm. 

Wednesday

 My in-laws are coming today. I need to finish doing my magic and making this very well-lived in house look a little more visitor-friendly. My friend came over yesterday and helped me get started, bless her heart. She did an amazing job, not only cleaning, but buoying me up and distracting me and making cleaning enjoyable. Women are wonderful. 

I leave in less than 2 weeks for a visit home. My dear friend Ali has been put into hospice care. And I’m going home to see her one last time. I’m nervous. But so grateful. And I’m going to take advantage of being home without my kids and husband to relax and figure out how to better serve myself so that I can take better care of them. 

My mom is coming back with me too, so I’ll be able to have more time to be taken care of again. Christmas will come and go. January will be a little sad and a little more relaxed. There is a small light at the end of the tunnel before the tunnel starts again, and maybe I can take that time to make candles to burn along the way. 

Nexplanon

 After my second late-ish miscarriage, we have decided that that’s all we’re willing to risk to add to our family and decided to move into the phase of life where we aren’t having more babies. 

Does that mean he made an appointment? Of course not. 

Carry the babies. Birth the babies. Breastfeed the babies, be favored by the babies (not always the blessing it sounds like it would be), miscarry the babies. And now… get painful, hormonally damaging, two week long period causing birth control shoved into my arm. 

The only reason toilet paper is free and widely available is because men shit. 

I’m sick of being a second class citizen even in my own marriage. 

Burn it all down

 I had a dream my childhood home was burned down

I was with my mom and my dad

We could see the flames eating the trees of the canyon, baring down from no man’s land

A house I haven’t lived in since I was 18, taken by the bank

Because my dad didn’t believe in paying bills

He invited the squatters.

They filled my baby brother’s Nemo themed bedroom with grow lights

And Pot Plants

I don't miss it

I don't want to go back.

Fires could pour in from every side and I wouldn't feel a thing.

In the dream, dad is desperate to save it

It's still got value for him.

Even though no one is in it. There is nothing worth saving.

It's just a place we used to live.

Its not memories that he wants to salvage.

There are no treasures left behind.

It's an imagined worth, a possible buyer

Who doesn't exist. 

Who will see the value of what my father poured his efforts into

When he emptied our trust fund

To dig a hole. And build a 10 foot tall, hideous fence.

He saved nothing. He worked on nothing. He invested nothing.

He took everything... and told us it had value.

And if a fire rips it from the earth

The only person who would care

Is him.

A memory I don’t Remember

 I can’t remember the first time I was told the razor story. I think it was my uncle who told me. I was at my mother’s parents’ home and alone in the garage when my uncle walked in to find me sitting on the floor, slicing across my fingers and palm with a razor blade. They told the story laughing, telling me I wasn’t crying or anything, that they suspected the thin blade didn’t really hurt, but I was fascinated by the red lines appearing on my fingers. My mom never laughed when the story was told. I suspect she was reprimanded for letting me off unattended and she was upset by the self-harm. But my uncle got a kick out of the telling. It shouldn’t be a surprise that he became a Coroner for the Sheriff’s office and enjoyed telling the stories of the many crime scenes he has seen. 

I don’t know why the razor story came into my mind as I was driving today. But I felt like I should write it down.   

Unhealed

 Ive been imagining stabbing myself in the stomach quite a lot. Something in me prods me on. “Do it for the plot. Maybe if I was injured, they’d cut the whole thing off. And if I was smaller, I wouldn’t feel so valueless. Self-centered, indulgent, goth. Healed people don’t seek validation from other people, I will never be healed because if it means giving up feeling pretty because someone tells me I’m pretty, I will die unhealed. 

Everyone feels like a burden. No one knows how to ask for help. So we all resent each other when someone comes to us for support. “Don’t they know I’m sad? Can’t they see I’m in pain?” Of course they can’t. Because you never say. 

I don’t want to keep going. I don’t know what its all for. I’m tired and I’m restless, I’m sleepy and unsure. 

I could live forever on being wanted lusted after and loved. But who lusts after the fat girl? The mom? The slug?

I’m run down. I feel worthless. I’m ruining my children’s lives. No one deserves to be treated poorly for what’s going on inside. I hate that they feel less than, because I can’t love myself. I wish I could do better. And improve my mental health. 

Do it for the future. Do it for him. Do it for them. Do it for anyone but me. Nothing motivates nothing. And nothing motivates me. 

I’d thank myself for starting a long journey today. But I’d rather rot and hate myself. It seems easier in some way. 

Triggered

     Petal loves Pickle ball. I'm pretty sure he would play every day if was available and I would let him. The thing about loving Pickle ball is... you cannot take the smalls to it. Maybe if it were just casual playing. But this is a league. He pays to play. And you cannot spend two hours paying to chase your own children around. So sometimes on Wednesday, sometimes Thursday, a few times on a Saturday... once or twice on a Sunday. And Monday. My husband will once again announce he's been "invited" to Pickle ball, like it's a social occasion and not something he pays fees to do. It's always at dinner and bed time. It always gives him an awkward amount of time between work and the sport. And I'm always left on duty until the kids are settled in bed. 

    And for the most part, I don't really mind. It's a nice hobby to have. Mostly old people play, so I know there aren't any hot young lady Pickle Ballers distracting him on the court. It's not too expensive. He loves it. And it's helped him meet a couple of lads that could be friends in this foreign country. But the later it gets in the day, the more dishes I have to wash or food the children refuse to eat, the more angry I become. The more resentful I am that I'm alone. Again.

    Last night was particularly bad, because he had also played the evening before, and I tried to say no. I tried to explain that I didn't want to do it again, a second night in a row and that I was feeling under-prioritized and a little resentful. And he looked disappointed. So I compromised. Like a good wife does, right? I asked, "Well, could you maybe pick up dinner for us? So I at least wouldn't have to cook? And it could be food I know the kids will eat, so it won't be a fight? Could we do that?" And he thought about it, and then agreed, "Yeah! I can figure that out. I can make that work." 

    But he picked the kids up from school and returned without food. And he faffed about, not helping with them, not getting the house ready or even helping me make dinner before he was decked out and running out the door for Pickle ball. I was just in single-parent mode, despite my one stipulation to make Pickle Ball work for the whole family... had not happened.

    He argues that I should have made it a bigger deal. I should have reminded him. I should have... I should have... I should have... It's my fault, right? Because he was here and I didn't nag him down the stairs. I didn't reprimand him for not picking up the food. I didn't command him to give me the time between the older kids coming home and him leaving to decompress and rejuvenate for dinner, clean-up, getting the littlest ready for brushed and dressed and read to and to bed before I did it all over again with the older two. That was my fault.

    I have been trapped at home for over two weeks, car-less and stuck. My dearest friend here in Germany is moving away soon and I haven't been able to see her or spend any time with her. I'm just stuck. I try to go on walks to feel human, but walking with an almost 3 year old who has NO fear is stressful. And I don't get much out of the walks we take. I spend every day doing the same things: Take care of the kids, make food, clean up food, clean the house. Re-clean the house. Circulating rooms. Processing laundry. SO MANY DISHES. And the house is NEVER clean, the kids are unhappy no matter what food I make, and there is always at least three dishes in the sink at any given time. Even now, after doing laundry for 4 days straight, there is a load in the washer, a load in the dryer, and three sorted baskets that need to make their way into dresser drawers. 

    I'm never alone. My baby is clingy and whiny and never content to be left to her own devises (one because she hates being apart from me, and two... if she is alone she is making THE MOTHER OF ALL MESSES. Think live-action Cat in the Hat level chaos and you might have some idea of what I deal with all day). As I type this, she screams in my face excitedly that "IT'S CHRISTMAS! MAMA! IT'S CHRISTMAS!" (It is NOT Christmas, and it will not BE Christmas for almost a full year). 

    I'm not trying to say my husband owes me anything. He has had to take on the chauffeur job, the grocery shopping job, the errand running, the book returns, the eye and dentist appointments, and everything in-between, all while trying to figure out where and how and how to budget for getting my car fixed so I can have it back. We're both in this. In the thick of it. 

    I'm just saying that bringing home dinner because I asked for it would have been nice. And when he treated it so optionally... when he was dismissive and flippant about it even after he agreed? It hurt my feelings. It made already feeling like low priority that much more central. 

    As I showered for the first time in too long, I was thinking about it. Why this was so triggering for me. And I remembered that it used to be like this all the time. He would go to Pickle ball rain or shine back in Cali. Multiple times a week. But I had some connections in Cali. I wasn't quite so alone. I had support. It didn't always help to have that support. But it was something. And it was baseball and basketball at our base before. Just me, sitting home alone in a faraway state with my infant... feeling like the lowest thing on his To-Do list. In a lot of ways, when you're living the military life, the wife is sort of just another thing that gets carted from place to place. In the states you can work. You can find some community. But here, overseas, it's much harder. You're just a thing moving around like the rest of the furniture. Stuck at home, cooking and cleaning. Very "American Traditional Family". It can be very dehumanizing. 

    But I don't think him going to Pickle ball IS neglectful or abusive or even that callous. I love that he loves it. I just wish him going to Pickle ball wasn't connected to such an intricate web of memories and hurt that it FEELS like neglect every time he tells me... "I've been invited to play Pickle ball tonight."

The Long Weekend

     My alarm hasn't gone off yet, but I'm not dreading it because there is no school or work today, we have a glorious 4 day weekend ahead of us and I'm looking forward to not holding myself to the standards of a normal weekday. 

    My two oldest children (who are 7 and 5) have already joined us in bed hours ago. I'm curled awkwardly to make room for my son pressing in on me from the middle of the bed and my daughter snuggled on the edge. I don't have enough neck support and my right leg is freezing because everyone is laying on different parts of the blanket and I am far from comfortable. And then the recently acquired kitten starts attacking our feet. My daughter is awake. Thrashing. She giggles when the kitten is being funny and cries when he latches on too tight. My husband is snoring, tucked in, two pillows, neither shared. And any time I move, my son tries to snuggle closer, closing any gap that I can wiggle for myself. 

    Then I hear the baby padding down the hall. She's not really a baby anymore. In fact, she'll be three next month. But she's still my baby. She comes in ready for the day. She's demanding water and breakfast and needs to go pee and she joins her older sister in playing with the kitten who can be quiet aggressive in his playtime. I have the scratches to prove it. 

    Baby girl is on me. There is no where else for her to be. Balanced on my tummy, laying across my chest, fighting with her siblings and screaming her discontentment if they fight her back, angry that I am not bigger, or have more sides so they can all have an equal share of me. 

    And Petal snoozes on, occasionally being jostled enough to be awoken when he barks at us all to be more quiet. 

    I'm awake now. My alarm is minutes away from chiming still. But I don't want to fight for a few more minutes laying in the dark. My body hurts. Surprise! It's that time of the month. I deal with that with an audience standing around me on the toilet asking why I need a pad and what does it do and am I going to die. This is not their first time. I have no lock on any of the doors in this damn German house and my children have witnessed me through the aftermath of a miscarriage, so mom bleeding isn't news. That doesn't stop them from taking turns asking me the same questions they ask me every month. 

    I help get them ready to go downstairs, find glasses, special toys, and we move down the stairs as a unit. Two hyper girls, one discombobulated boy, and one very grumpy mommy. I am not a morning person. I need time to start the day. Uninterrupted time. Where no one is talking to me. But that's not an option when you're a mom most of the time. I set them up with drinks and an easy-light breakfast and try to wake up the rest of the way on the couch as they bicker about who gets to choose which inane cartoon to watch. My baby will not participate in this as she knows she will NEVER get to pick and it's pointless to try. My back hurts and I just want no one to touch or talk to me. I didn't get enough sleep, I have a cramp in my arm from it being someone's pillow in the early hours of the morning. And I have never hated my husband more than right now. 

    When the whining gets too much, I finally get up and make a real breakfast for the kids and feed myself, the edges of my bad attitude softening a little, but my grump comes from so many places, it's not fixed so easily. I find myself staring at two days worth of dishes and decide if I'm going to be pissed anyway, I might as well take on the sensory nightmare that is washing too many dishes. I have to empty the dishwasher first. So I do. Meanwhile, now that mom has become mobile, the army of children has too, and they follow me in the kitchen complaining that they don't like the fluffy cheesy eggs I made for them, they want toast, but not cooked. They want toppings we don't have. They want endless glasses of juice and milk. "He hit me!" "She won't share!" "The cat scratched me!" The kitten following us as well, meowing wildly, but his bowl is full and his water is fresh, so what more do you want, you tiny striped dictator? 

    I hand out what I can, say no to what I can't, I break up fights and I try to regulate myself, but I'm buzzing, there's too much going on, I don't want to scoop a slimy chunk of old milk out of the drain AND tell you not to strangle the cat. Please can I just help you in a minute?? Can I have a minute?? JUST A MINUTE!!!

    I snap and bear my teeth and start to yell and then its physically removing them from the room and shutting the door and trying to breathe. But all that's inside me is rage. I don't want to be doing this. I don't want to when I'm having a good day, and today is a bad day, I have cramps and I heard and I feel bloated AND constipated and it's almost 9:30 now and my husband is still asleep. 

    I can survive for another half hour. But 10 is my limit and I'm going up there to wake him up AS SOON as 9 is no longer on the clock. 

Faith or Folly

     I just watched "Surprised by Oxford". There was a time in my life where a story of a religious boy saving himself for marriage looking for a girl who was doing the same would have been everything I wanted from a movie. Now, as an adult, watching a movie about a girl losing her dreams of a doctorate to become a religious christian and fall for a boy who "knows" more about God, causes me to roll my eyes. 

    I have lived the way that you're "supposed" to live. And the more I read the less I agreed and the less I agreed, the harder its been for me to hold on to my faith. People who are convicted into faith and belief in God have a lot in common with people who grew up in it and leave it. They are both unsatisfied with the meaning we are told to find in life. We are frustrated about the ways you're supposed to pursue it. And we turn from what we have known to something new at some point. 

    Construction and deconstruction are the same at their core. It's just people living meaninglessly finding meaning in nothing. There is no point, we all die. We all end up returning to the earth. One promises life after death. One promises eternal rest. Both can't be proven and neither have witnesses. Black nothingness, or everything forever with no connection to anything of the earth. 

    You aren't married in heaven. You aren't related to your family. There is an argument for whether those who never heard the story of Jesus's sacrifice never being in heaven. So the babies we've lost before conversation, tribes in the middle of nowhere... cavemen who lived hundreds of thousands of years before Jesus was even born... None of them will be there. Break a rule and you're not allowed.

    He could be bigger than that. He could want more of us than we as "Christians" ever give welcome or acceptance to, and I want to believe in that version of spirituality. But Religion hangs around me like a toxic ex. I don't want to be associated with the tribalism, hatred, and bigotry of anyone who claims to be Christian. 

    Life giving faith, like the faith of Bob Goff or C.S. Lewis, to live whimsically and joyously outside of society's norms. To give so generously there is nothing left but pure love and acceptance, That makes sense to me. I don't know anyone personally that does that. And I don't know that I could either. It's scary to force yourself out of the norm and pursue a life of absolute service. Most Christians don't. So how can we see ourselves as Christ-Like? It's just hypocrisy and self-congratulations that you live in the time and place that HAPPENED to end up with you being religious. 

All the Reindeers Were Female

 Male reindeers lose their antlers in the winter, but females don't. So, at NO ONE'S SURPRISE, it was women pulling the load of Christmas.

    I'm exhausted. Gifts. Mental Load. Baking. Cleaning. Decorating. Planning trips. Managing the big feelings of the kids by themselves. It's all just wearing me out. I know it's worth it and I know someone has to be the magic behind Christmas, but I wish it was a little more evenly split. My hubby is also wonderful and tries to be there for as much as he can... but he hasn't been so ingrained with the idea that all the magic comes from US and not from the season itself. So it requires a lot more delegation on my part. 

    We're also trying to keep things simpler than most other years. The individual piles of gifts for the kids are rather pathetic compared to past years and not buying anyone outside of our little family anything. I feel bad about it because I would love to get my mili-besty and her son something. But I'm also terrible at buying gifts. They're always too much money for something no one likes. My mili-besty is always so generous. I don't know what to do. I know she already got me something. Why is this eating at me so bad?? I don't know how to show someone I love them through gifts. Its never been my thing. But I can see my deficit.