Sugared Harpy

The site is super hacked….I’m working on things. Sorry!

Sara has passed away.

I never met her in person, but she would have got a hug whether she wanted one or not had I did meet her. As it was, I was lucky to email with her, talk to her on the phone, and get promised a painting that never got mailed. It was an honor to have her even think of me, she was a smart smart happy woman.

And she will be very missed.

So sorry for leaving such a sad note up for so long. But you know, this week has been sad. I won’t even get into the abyss we saw when we realized that they had unearthed their stillborn son’s sarcophagus, two police officers held the tiny marble object and were getting ready to place it in with his father. After being at the funeral home for many hours, we all had to flee at this. Unbearable.

At the very least of this terrible event, my eldest cousin’s funeral did some of what they are supposed to do. It brought us closer to Grant’s siblings, and hopefully we spend more time with them than we had been. But Grant, hey, um, we didn’t need it to happen like this, okay?

In brighter notes, my younger son will be playing his trombone tonight the way he is meant to play it. Out on a football half time field with that brass shining high. I can’t wait to watch his joy!

And it is odd to see a lot of people you never see who have your features.

St. Charles policeman killed in crash

He had two very young children, a six year old daughter, a younger boy with autism. His wife is a few weeks pregnant. We weren’t as close as we should have been, but he made me smile a lot when I was little. My ex husband is a policeman in the area and called me early this morning, they don’t know what happened. He never hit the brakes.

He’s really, really going to be missed.

Thank you for all your kindness. Really, it’s just amazing. You people in the computer, some of you I’ve actually hugged and most of you not. I want to hug you now.

I have a post in the works about dissociation. Because BORKblergUGH, I dissociate and I knew that but you know, I didn’t really know. I’ve read two books. Will be sharing. But damn it if work isn’t in my way.

I once said in a post somewhere that I know my own crazy. And I do, I meant that. I know when I’m getting more and more anxious and I can’t logically put things together like normal people. I know I am a champion at dissociating but I’ve noticed that as I’ve been working on that, and being more present in my own life, I find I’m frantic about it. Frantic about my own life, that is.

Turns out, my dissociating has sort of maybe gotten in the way of me living it completely. With my divorce I said I would never allow myself to just float in a less than prime situation again, much less another shitty one where I am hurt. I called it floating; it was me really removing myself mentally.

I’ve worked really, really hard to not do that these past few years. Staying present. Being aware of situations and emotions. Etc.

Except I think I’ve just turned it into anxiety. SCORE! I may now have a better handle on my crazy, really knowing when I’m doing something nutty. But the thing I DON’T know is how to turn off my own crazy. I can’t make it stop when I am in the middle of it. I can look back but I have a really hard time making my brain SHUSH already and calm down.

I’m freaked out now that I know I truly love NB and want a future with him. I want happiness. He wants the same things. And I’m shooting myself in the foot about it. He feels like I’m not happy. And I actually am very happy. My fears are getting in my way, though. I worry so much that he will just leave, or worse, stick with me even though he’s not happy, that I have found myself reading into every little thing he does.

Every slightly NEGATIVE thing. Oh, I note the positives and absolutely love them but girlplease, I more easily focus on any perceived negative.

Because I fear him up and leaving, I want to feel important to him. Apparently REALLY OBSESSIVELY important (and I really don’t want that, I just think I do at that crazy moment).

I fear that he’s going to use me for sex, and I don’t mean it in the usual way of describing casual sex. I mean used in the sense of “Hey honey, I’ve been looking at porn for the last fifteen minutes and I’m now going to need your vagina for a moment.” (Note: he does NOT do this nor does he stare at porn before bed or anything like that). I’ve been used this way before. I will not be used that way again. I have a great need to want to be wanted because he thinks I’m sexy, I’m what he wants, and I want and need to know it. He’s not great at the “You are pretty” comments, it’s just not his nature and right now, I need that. We’re trying to figure out a solution that works for both of us. But it feeds my crazy a bit, lucky guy. Anytime I fear that he doesn’t find me sexy but does indeed find women sexy, because it makes me wonder if I’m being used-literally, I get a bit hella crazy.

Because I fear emotionally charged changes (i.e., living together, marriage, work stuff not even related to NB, kidskidskids, house: buy house now, wait buy house with him?), I get anxious to have a plan. I mean, who doesn’t want a loose plan, right? Except I need a loose plan. It doesn’t need to be set in stone, but I’m having a really hard time not having one.

Because he was a widower I find myself worrying that his former marriage was THE love for him and I’m the runner up. I have no evidence for this. He’s doing well in helping with this. I’m reading the experiences of other women in this situation (hello, Internets!) and find that he’s such a good man it’s ridiculous. He’s totally living in his present and living life with me, and listening to my issues. He’s not making me feel this way, in fact he’s doing lovely things on his own probably without even realizing it, but my own head has its own moments.

I can’t turn this off right now. I’m trying, and failing, and before I know it I’ve had three meltdowns in three days and NB is trying to coax me back to bed from the couch wondering what the fuck happened? I’m trying to read about the effects of an unhealthy childhood (turns out, they’re not good effects, huh) and prior abuse. My reactions certainly fit and instead of wallowing in it, or removing myself from it, like I have for so many years, I’m trying to get the hell OVER it enough to just live mostly normally.

I don’t mind have a little anxiety, or a little dysfunction, who doesn’t have that? But I don’t want it to endanger my chances for happiness anymore. I need to get better.

I think the reason birthday gifts, thoughtful and heartfelt, mean a lot to me…and why the lack thereof hurts greatly and will hurt for an entire goddamn year…is because my parents are also kind of crappy about that.

Mom recycles the first thing she sees in her house, wraps it up last minute and hands it over.

So, birthday gifts aren’t about the object to me.

Dad doesn’t tell you Happy Birthday until wayyy past your birthday and then several months later shoves some money at you.

So, birthday gifts aren’t about the money to me.

I’m sensitive about gifts, I think because of them. I think a personal effort from one person to another is meaningful, is lovely, and says you care. Not a penny has to be spent, but some thought does. It kills me when that doesn’t happen (see last post: rejected, unwanted; further, not important enough to bother with the effort).

And I’m realizing that I’m just not letting it go from this birthday in February.

Why yes, I probably do need to continue therapy. No, it’s not covered in my insurance anymore.

If you want a happy Easter greeting, here it is:

Happy Easter!

Now, if you’re in a foul mood and want miserable company, stay with me. I’m spending another holiday alone.

I’m alone today because of several factors. Some of these factors I didn’t really get until Saturday night when I was being a crybaby to my boyfriend. The gist of my huffiness being that I tend to feel rejected and unwanted at the holidays and he wasn’t helping for Easter.

He wasn’t doing anything wrong, but I definitely have needs he wasn’t tending to. Uh, mainly because he didn’t know about them. Whatever. We talked. He does now. He’s good with the talking and listening.

Part of why he doesn’t know is that I don’t specify what I need until it’s far too late, when I’m already upset and withdrawn. Fetal position, quiet, staring away in the bed. He doesn’t know what’s wrong or what to do with me. He’s trying to learn how to deal with this woman he cares about.

I was getting upset at the boyfriend about a particular issue and long after I’ve gotten upset at him, talked, and calmed down, I realized that a lot of WHY this holiday and the others this year is such an issue with me is that my family can be pretty crappy at holidays.

Which now, paired with my children usually being gone to other family and a divorce, means I’m alone. Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthday, Easter, junk like that.

I’m alone because my father has NEVER invited my sister and me to a family function unless he felt he had to or we were useful. We were in my stepsister’s wedding as bridesmaids because as she put it, “she doesn’t talk to her friends anymore.”

Meaning we wouldn’t have been even invited otherwise, and are only bridesmaids because she needed some. That was the last family gathering my sister and I went to, and it was several years ago. I’ve never even seen her toddler son. Before that wedding, I couldn’t tell you the last thing we went to with him. We weren’t even told when our grandfather died. We are standing orders of not invited, not wanted. Only invite with guilt or need.

I am now quite touchy about WHY someone invites me somewhere, I only want to go if I am wanted there by someone.

My mother spent several years leaving on the holidays. And still does. We just don’t know when, is the problem. There was one Christmas my sister and I actually showed up to her house on Christmas morning to find out she was gone. To Mexico with her boyfriend. She often leaves to spend holidays away from us, I know she loves us and is there 99% of the time, but it’s still hard to take.

At other times, she does holidays on alternate days…which can be quite helpful but also leaves the actual holiday with nothing. I’ve found it difficult to be alone on a day when you know so many others are getting together with someone who wants to spend that time with them.

So, no dad, no mom, my family isn’t big enough to just go to an auntie or cousins’ house. No kids, because either their dad or Mike will take them. And it’s just me. I feel that harsh, sinking feeling of being unwanted, of not being invited, of no one taking the time to ask. And it hurts to ask to be included, because I think that I’m being invited belatedly out of guilt or obligation.

I want to be wanted, invited. And I want to be invited because someone WANTS me there.

Some info:

Sara is having surgery tomorrow, her outlook is supposed to be very very good. Life, and hopefully her own personality along with function. She hopes for “thinking and reading.”

At the moment, she said steroids are helping her read but she is losing memories and words at times. Her doctors think she’s had this tumor for one to two years.

If you are emailing Sara, please for the love of god do not send her an ecard or other spammy-inducing thing.

She seems to feel awful for seemingly falling of the face of the internet, but she loves you. And she shouldn’t feel that way, of course.

I am, naturally, leaving out a hell of a lot but I really don’t want to put out more of their story than I feel comfortable with. It’s her story, I want her to tell it when she can.

I finally talked on the phone with her for the first time, ever. And lo, Sara is every bit as fabulous as I knew her to be. Please pray, wish on a star, send love…