as clear as i can be ..

I am letting myself down. My life could be much better. Has been better. I want better again.

Kate will be alright. She is healing. I can see that. It has been a very good Xmas. Having Kate here has been so wonderful. I appreciate that she made the drive to come here. She gave me a beautiful new purse that I will treasure. It's perfect for me.

Mag seems unhappy, tired  and uncommunicative.  She's tense and quietly angry. Makes me uncomfortable and tense. She gave me great Xmas gifts..fitbit and a large Frida Kahlo print that is too big to hang on any wall in this apartment.  It's beautiful but I seem ungrateful because I'm not wowed by it. It's too big. Over the top. Kate loved it. I opened it and thought ... way too big. But then I thought about Mag's thoughtfulness and how she tried to find a gift for me that she thought I would love. Very sweet.  I feel like Peg she always complained about her gifts and my dad tired of shopping for her. I think she felt no one was paying attention to her needs or to who she was. This from a woman shut off by alcohol and pills...how could we know her. She was there but away in her own world of hurt. Like me now.

That hurts me and makes me laugh at the irony of it.


We spent Xmas day with Carmen and Sarah. It was wonderful. Everyone together was love. Just that unconditional love we all need. More of that today. Good for us.

months lost

It is being posted today but I wrote it on December 16. Meaning I have embraced failure for 10 more days.



my life as it was.....The one I worked hard to make..make over. The healthy one. Now I am distracted by Mag. I'm living with someone. With Mag.

It is what I am not doing. I'm not counting calories. I'm  not testing my sugar. I'm not writing down what I eat. And I am not exercising. What I do is eat what I want, I'm binge eating and drinking wine and smoking pot. I'm rebelling.  My sugars are up, I'm forgetful, I'm sleeping, I'm not engaging I'm happily absent having abandoned my new life.

I've put on weight and am having trouble fitting into my clothes. I don't want to go out anywhere. I keep leaving work early.  My work is behind.

I'm afraid. I'm feeling threatened in big ways. I've allowed Mag in. Is that it?

I've been caring for Kate who is now divorced. Poor Kate. She has been put through the ringer and suffered a great loss. But I see her gain ground for herself everyday.

I think I pulled off energy from myself for Kate and Mag at the sacrifice of myself. Or maybe I was missing my old self and anxiety.

Vulnerable. Vulnerability. Difficult if not impossible for me to feel vulnerable. Adults survivors of child sexual abused do not often ever maintain healthy intimate adult relationships. I have had sex partners more than healthy adult intimate relationships.

Now I am trying. To have intimacy on an emotional and physical level...to experience both.

And exit stage left. Fight or flight. All day, every day. Exhausted.

visiting the present

I am feeling tectonic shifts in my gut. My walk is different. Feels like I am finally pushing the ass end of that elephant through the eye of the needle known as my life. The absence of the elephant will be a liberation from shame and self hate. A 50 plus year old elephant that has kept me from myself and the present.

Can't breathe

I cannot breathe. I keep having trouble catching my breath and not feeling panicked. Unfamiliar that is how I feel to myself. Unfamiliar. I am tired and have low energy. After work and workouts I have nothing left to do anything else.

If they only knew

Forever

For all the therapy over all the years, starting in my 20s and continuing until now at age 60 I have avoided the most painful part of my life. Yesterday I said the words I have been too ashamed to say. Said them out loud to my therapist. And nothing bad happened. And then the other words came at me from across the room. Words that were painful to hear. Analysis of why I did what I did and why I had never spoken of it.

He was in some ways the person who taught me about pleasure. Taught me about my own body.

Stay present
Do not abandon this long struggled for opportunity to be well and to be at peace with myself
I can work through this

It was closure
It was a moment to find resolution at last
It was a search for identity
a return to what was familiar
was this me?
I went there to find out

Not uncommon as most experiences are
I am not the only person who has ever made that choice

The pleasure part
I do not remember ever experiencing any pleasure
I remember pretending to be asleep
I remember feeling chocked and gagged
Felling bad

Jimmy I could not trust
Jimmy embarrassed me publicly
In front of his friends he humiliated me
He was an embarrassment to the family, in my mind
His elaborate lies and fantasies
I only have memories of being with him and being embarrassed

I am present
I am not discharging
I am exploring the new information in sisterhood with kindness and compassion

crickets

I love the sound of crickets,  it comforts me.

Looking for comfort because of so much discomfort. Dealing with my anger, of externalizing it. MY work with the new therapist has been good, very good. But it is hard work. It makes me tired and sometimes makes me scared.

Landlady threatening 20% rent increase. An email, she sent me an email. We are in the same house and she chose email. I was insulted. The idea of moving and losing my nest is upsetting. I am quite worried about it.

Work.
Overloaded. Overwhelmed. Exhausted. Overstimulated. Burn out coming I can feel it.

In July I have to buy my car and hold Dingell event. August is michfest. September is Suds.

I know that Maggie issues continue to hurt me deeply. I remain angry hurt and v sad about all of it. No doubt the experience has slowed me down and opened me up.

 Being present with the pain is difficult, I would rather disassociate and be gone ... getting smaller and getting better means doing all the work all the time and it is rewarding and exhausting. Nothing tastes as good as healthy feels. getting smaller and feeling physically safe are highly relative.

Feeling very threatened at a basic level because of challenge of losing my home and healing from the rejection. My home is part of my healing so to loose it would be devastating to me.

The therapist is modeling positive affirmations for me. Saying very positive affirming things about me trying to get me to feel that about myself. Has every therapist done that or is it because it is a butch lesbian saying it I am hearing it? .. Allowing and feeling an impact.

It is painful Practicing the experience of presence. But often the feeling of goodness also takes over and I am happier. Staying present with that will help my healing so I am focused there. Gratitude. Presence. Strength.

I am safe and nothing bad is going to happen.
I deserve happiness.

Coffee is improved with the sound of crickets...as is presence.

good news

I have learned something new about myself.

I am trying to be present with it, but it is unfamiliar to me, and my challenge now is to become familiar and comfortable with it.

I couldn't figure out what is was I was saying to myself that was so negative, and then I realized....
It is not so much what I am saying to myself but what I am NOT saying to myself....what affirmations am I not saying. I am not saying to myself Margaret you deserve a good life. Margaret you deserve to have someone who loves. Margaret you are worthy of having what you want.

I have never said that to myself. Omission of desire.

Choosing instead from what was available,  not saying what I want, but choosing and going for it. Marilyn, Maggie, jobs, places to live, more like what is offered. Never me saying This or that is what I want and going for that. Except once. HAG.

......and now saying those things to myself and more affirmations. Changing my perspective. Feel physically different. I am thinking=feeling-looking- differently and it feels unfamiliar.

Forgiving ..Dalton said I was a very forgiving person of people I love. I saw my forgiveness as a weakness but it is a strength. And if I forgive others, I can forgive myself. That's the final step. Forgive me.

That is what I am doing now. Telling myself I deserve to have what I want, I am worthy and now I am angry at Maggie and Bobby. It is so curious to me. If I am worthy, then I give myself permission to be angry at those who hurt me. Reversal of feeling ...forgiveness and now anger.

cold weather influence

This cold weather is depressing and oppressive. It takes up my time. It takes up a lot of thought space, we are always thinking about the snow...and we are putting out more physical effort too to shovel the snow and salt the ice and push the car. Parking is insane because the ice is taking up paring spaces everywhere. ...so much more physical efforts. I am now afraid of ice. I have arrived in that AARP house and understand. The other day I actually walked in my stocking feet to get to my car because it was safer. At work I dried my socks by my office space heater. My office space heater is on every day. The car is cold, the office, my desk is cold, the basement is cold, it is really cold outside and it has been for weeks now. Ice everywhere. And many days of snow falling and driving in slow traffic and brushing off my car not once but three or four times a day. All this drives me inside. I go to work and to buy groceries and gas. I hate going out in it any more. I just want to hibernate and stay inside where it is warm. and stay inside where it is warm and quiet. Lovely silence. No one asking anything of me. No expectations to be somewhere doing something that I do not want to be doing. I like the alone quiet. it feels safe.

episode 661

I am in the middle of an episode, a ptsd episode. I have had too many emotions in too short a period of time. The visit of Kate, Erin and Tee, the show, visit ends and meeting with Maggie.  It all came together and threw me down. I wrote a brave and pre-mature text to Trish saying "I am better she is not worthy of me" and the next day I was crashing. The meeting has become surreal to me as a memory. So unfamiliar and non emotional. I was all business. Nothing personal and she was the same. All too much emotion.  I wanted to change my mood so I have been smoking and eating. But I have come to the end of it now and am getting back to presence...but with a little less pain. Number 661 is an arbitrary number I am sure it is in the thousands...but 661 is one episode a month for 55 years. My physical pain has increased too. My shoulders, both sides are painful to lay on and my right shoulder has shooting pain and weakness. Pain in my left hip has returned. The toll on my physical and emotional well being is significant. I think about that a lot and what I can do to counter that with healing. That is why I am in therapy, to heal myself. I need to be compassionate to my self and go back to eating healthy and exercising every day and I will feel better. Get strong again and stay strong longer.

Therapist number ? Let me count them starting with Myron, Paul, Danny, Gerry, Tom, the woman who's name I never remember, Sharon, Alice, the emdr specialist, and the woman in Baltimore Alice Miller, Susie and now Dalton. 11. Alice had the greatest positive impact and Susie helped me too. Each one did....Danny I think was able to break through great big brick walls that I had built around me. Alice put me back in my body and then I left Buffalo. I think I could not be present in  my body in Buffalo because it would always feel unsafe.

Every move was because I did not feel safe so I moved. Age 12 I moved to Grier. That is where I began to heal, and I was in the company of girls and it felt so safe. That is the safe I want to feel again but now the safe has to be me, myself and I. I can be safe in situations by protecting myself. I was safe in my meeting with Maggie because I kept it all business.

I have created a new sanctuary. the apartment looks brand new as if I moved in place. Change. Something I hope I can continue to embrace.

Pulp Fiction

It has been a dense time in my life and one with many changes. Maggie is out of my life completely. The big fall from diet and exercise has been corrected and life is restored with healthier choices again. I am in therapy, and have had three sessions so far. I am very pleased with the therapist I identified.  Oddly I used the internet to find her, and my health care insurance is paying for half of it. I have completely remodeled my apartment. Bought a new couch, threw  out Chuck's chair, and my mother's china and anything else that a SAD memory attached to it. I am trying to create a place with fewer triggers. That means an updating of my environment and what I see when I come home, My friends helped me. I moved everything into the basement. I had couch and chair taken away. We painted the entire place, every wall ceiling trim...all of it. I have learned that I am making it safe at home by changing it al fro  when Maggie was here, when I was that person. I am a new person from then I am changing for the better ...I am letting go of a lot of weight I have been carrying....as I lose body weight I gain emotional knowledge of my self. And I let go of emotional weight that I no longer carry because I am letting it go.... It has been a great process in that way. And the letting go of the shame, guilt, feeling bad and scared all at the same time...letting go of that makes room for gratitude, healing, wellness and love.

I have a new friend named Jackie. She is very butch harley dyke pot grower. I met her online. She has been very kind and helpful. She cant do enough for me. She helped pick up the Ikea run and she helped put everything together, she hung all my art and bought me a pound of my favorite coffee. I am not attracted to her and she is a dangerous choice in that she has a never ending supply of something I want to stay away from.

I like how the "place" is coming together. This process is replicate of when back in the day I would move and move again to feel safe. Something would trigger the flight. Because back then I had two channels. Fight or flight. Here I have stayed in place, and I have calmed down and I am now more present because I feel safer here. I feel safer here than I have anywhere else except when in a theater or the woods. 

Took my first yoga class on Wednesday, 4 days ago, and I can still feel the "results" and I swam 30 mins this past week and got to the gym  4 times last week...aiming for 5 times this week.

I have a new therapist, we have had three sessions.She is a butch lesbian and we have connected and she is helping me. I can feel the difference. I look forward to the sessions.

and this I now believe and know about Maggie. I really loved her, I loved her in a way I have NOT been capable of loving before. I was present. I was vulnerable. I was willing to compromise. I did compromise. And I loved her unconditionally. Between Caroline's recurrence and Maggie's own belief system....she walked away without even saying goodbye. Hurts a lot. But I picked her because I loved her and wanted a big open out there relationship. She was not ready for that. She wanted to be but alas she was guilty of no ability or skill on that score and I am only guilty of reasonable expectations. 

dusted for a fresh coat

I bet if you dusted her heart for fingerprints you would only find hers.

Thank you. Laura B wrote that on her fb post so I am quoting. But it is perfect for what I am experiencing now and feeling. I have found my anger on the subject and I am expressing it by completely cleaning dusting and painting my entire home environment. My version of a complete purging and acceptance of the next phase of my life. .. and good bye to Maggie. A wake and a funeral with one in attendance, me.

My body hurts from head to toe and I look to returning to my regular routine of swimming and working out. This physical work is stressing my body...moving pushing lifting climbing ladders is a lot even in small doses.

I sprinkled florida water yesterday after I got it cleared out and ready I swept and swept and I splashed  every corner ...and I am getting rid of stuff....a couch and hideabed and Maggie...clothes books papers microwave rug and chuck's chair. I finally let go of a chair I can afford to keep. Less and less I need the objects to remember my past so I am getting rid of my mother's china...sounds terrible..it does not hold good memories of mom for me...she was always stressed when we used this china....meant holidays and stress for her...

Once the painting is done and I start bringing articles and items back into my living space...the criteria will be do I need it? Less is more. And I can get new if I want to let go of what you want to let go of...

I have found my anger and she is motivating me into an agent of change. That is what we do in my family. My dad lived that life .. agent of change as a union organizer. My mother as a church organizer.,,she took a small Parrish meeting in a fire hall to a k-8 school, convent, rectory and church.

Both created safe space for people to survive in. As have I. With Ujima and HAG I created safe space for people to experience freedom in...to be creative and expressive and free..

I have participated as an activist in the women's rights movement, specifically single moms, victims sexual assault, child care, AIDS, queer rights, artistic freedom of expression, and now working in the environment, a return to my father's love of Rachel Carson...and the 18 mile reek of my childhood. So  I am bringing that with me. My red jacket and the 18 mile creek can come along wit the surrounding woods. Happy memories there. Duke at my side.

Maggie is not the girl for me. I deserve to be with someone who is accepting, tolerant, open and willing to be present. Maggie although she desires that as well, she fails epically, ...and in the end I was left alone without a goodbye or an explanation or a good well wishes to you...just blank empty air... So I am left to make up an explanation myself.  I am trying to find an ending that is compassionate to both of us. Treats as us both well..

Meanwhile I am creating a safe space for me now...as a way of taking care of myself for my future self.

a rare rant

maybe I should allow a rant maybe I should give voice to my feelings and talk about what makes me angry.
Broken promises.
Ignoring texts
Ignoring emails
Not accepting my help with anything
being vey nice and romantic and then taking it away
on again off again
locking the door
being there and then going away
I gave a lot of energy and time to the relationship
that was a big crash and burn
I am letting go
I have been in much distress
but now have discharged a lot so feel a little less burdened....
kate says she is junky
that seems a funny word
but not inaccurate

she was not available. she wasn't there when I needed her
I could not depend on her to be kind
she could be gruff

but she is out
she is not good for me
and I have left her
I have left her to my history to my past
and do not vision her in my future

Plan

practice gratitude
practice presence
go back to gym
write down what I eat
and do not go back to Maggie
Let go of her .. finish and no new beginning
I deserve better
return self to me
take care of my self

Solstice musings and a new beginning

FROM DEC 21
Maggie has not spoken to me in more than a week. This after a romantic weekend away in Saugatuck. We had a wonderful weekend, and now she is absent. I have made a decision that I will not go back this time. I have been letting go. I still obsessively scan the phone but less so and I was able to stay away from Jolly all week, and the last time I texted her no response. It feels different this time.

And I am not blaming her. I blame myself.

After Saugatuck I had a pretty serious ptsd episode and at that point we were communicating. This fucked up...have a romantic weekend and I curl under it as if I did not deserve it.

what do I do with all these feelings? How does one stop thinking about her? How does one replace the loss of affection? This hurts more than I can say.

Jan 1 2014

New year.....a year of becoming my self..a year of health and gratitude and happiness and peace of mind and continued self discovery. There is fresh snow on the ground and I need to take a fresh look at my life and deal with the grief that blankets my spirit. I need to care for my physical self and repair my emotional life.