Four Week Breaks from My Therapist.....yikes

So Ashley, that is my therapist's name, has suggested that I was on the right path and could go a little longer between appointments. Who does she think she is? Just kidding, I think she was ok to suggest that. I do have an earful for her. And I need to unload it on someone, but right now though, I have to let it swim in my head and it's hard. I told J and he told me to just let it go. Anyway, I do feel like Ashley has taught me a few tricks to get my head straight, and I also think my age is coming into play with the anxious feelings. Stupid hormones! That's it! We are on Spring Break, so back to my kiddos.....

On a Every two-weeks Schedule...

So, I am still making progress. Granted I wish I was completely "cured", I am getting a grip on my feelings and thankfully I have been sharing what is recommended with my husband, who holds me accountable for my missteps...

My missteps are simple avoidable ones, but I am trying to undo a lifetime of damage... I have trouble with those dang "boundaries". I lend my ear too long sometimes, I worry about too much after these long "listening sessions" and I have that problem saying "no".... so, when I complain, J says, you were on the phone way too long, or why do you now have this new task, etc... it's funny when he reminds me, but frustrating that I let it happen.

I am still worried about my grandma, and am working toward letting my fear go. I am trying to tell myself, that "she is 90, she has had a great life, and that when it is her time, it's ok, to be sad, but she will be better and whole in heaven and I can't cure her and keep her forever, or control her health, but I can control my mind and how I deal with things".

I go back tomorrow and will report my latest progress, because I do believe I am making small strides...

Still Making Progress

So, I have been a little off my schedule, but I am still working on getting my mind in order. I saw my therapist again that would be three weeks in a row and this time felt like I didn't need as much time as usual. The other two sessions, I felt like I was being rushed, but this last time I felt like I was rushing her. Haha! I am still working on setting boundaries and following through. Here's to small steps toward a stronger me!

So I got a lot of time on my hands, and this may be a factor.....

Went to my second session with my new pal.... um, therapist.

This visit was a little more laid back, I wasn't so guarded and it made it easier to chat. She and I talked a bit about what went on after our last session and when we spoke about my grandma's health and how I feel after I hear about her day to day suffering, she cold sense that I was in fact becoming fearful. She suggested and providing me with a book, by a Buddhist Monk called Fear, and it has actually been pretty interesting. A couple of chapters have really resonated with my feelings, which makes me feel like the therapist has been listening.

We also chatted a bit about my everyday life and she suggested that maybe I have a lot of time on my hands and that this time gives my mind an opportunity to really lose control. She suggested a hobby, or yoga. And does believe that the meditation is really important and it might be working. I haven't had a chance to do a yoga class, but I have tried to stay a bit more busy and I did sleep more this week. More than normal. And I think it helped!

I am meeting with her tomorrow and I will give updates about what goes on, but I do feel like I am heading in the right direction....

Adjustment Disorder... what???

So, I went for my first session with a therapist and felt great afterwards. I had emailed her a link to this blog, just to gain a little insight into what I was actually stressing about. I also had a chance to share with her that I also had some acupuncture done, to maybe try to alleviate some of anxiety. I am not sure if it was supposed to work instantly, but i slept better that night. I'll give it a go again next month. I also have another session scheduled on Wednesday with the therapist.

Here's the deal, I went to my appointment on Tuesday and she just dove right in and we started discussing all of the recent events that I thought were responsible for my feelings. And I forgot to mention that since Sunday, when I posted my first entry, my family had another death. He was a great cousin, he was almost 55, and although I am not sure of his actual cause of death, he was having serious complications from a UTI, also he had down syndrome and his mind was showing signs of dementia. I was very sad for my Aunt, she was the wife of my uncle who committed suicide, and the mother of this sweet cousin. And my mom came to Texas for the funeral and a quick pop over to see me and the kids. She didn't stay with me, so my diarrhea and period didn't make an appearance. Also, my grandma had a very rough week, she ended up needing a blood transfusion, developed maybe a UTI, the doctor made her finish her radiation (which was a short-lived celebration) and today was told she has contracted C Diff. But, she felt well enough for French Fries, today. So, I am confused.

Now that we are up to speed with the goings-on, we can talk about what was discussed at my appointment. We dove right in, in order, my extended family.... She asked me how close I am to "these people", (she let me call them that, too), and I told her that I had moved away at 11, so not very close, but they have very strong personalities, she asked me if my kids knew off the top of their heads who some of them were, I said no, there's too many, she then said, it sounds like a boundary problem. Apparently, it's the way they operate and I don't play that way and have to learn to not turn into them and their reactive ways. She assured me that she was going to teach me how to effectively set the said boundaries and ultimately not react to their ways of doing things. Super, right?

Then we talked about my mother, and after talking about her family, she knew what I was dealing with. She said that she believed that how my mom acts is not genetic, it is a "learned behavior" and that I can rest easy that I will not turn into her, obviously, because it irritated me enough to seek help. I'm not sure if she exactly said that, but that's how I took it. Bear with me.

She asked me about my dad and how he is, which he's a solid guy, nice, steady, but she asked me how he deals with my mother, and I had to tell her that he really let's her get away with too much and it makes me crazy. She asked me if I have tried to say something and I said yes, but there were no changes. Again, she said it wasn't his job to set boundaries, it was mine to set my own, since her quirks bother me.

We discussed my feelings about me hating Texas and missing Virginia, and she thinks with all the family adjustments, my mom visiting so much, and the new area, I didn't have anxiety, I have adjustment disorder. I think she is right! It's definition says, it's when an individual is unable to adjust to or cope with a particular stress or major life event. Well, I went from foot loose and fancy free, no one extra to worry about in Virginia to this beastly family in Texas and it is kicking my ass! She is going to teach me how to cope and set those boundaries and I can not wait!

So, where have I been?

It’s been quite a while and I can’t believe I remembered the password to this little blog....



I’ll jump right into the grit about why I am blowing the dust off.... I’m older now and feel like I need an outlet to share what’s going on in the noggin. When I started this blog I only had one kid and that was 12 years ago. It doesn’t t seem like that long, but I guess it has been. I’ve been living the mom life, full of dates on the calendar, carpools, to-do lists, moving into great neighborhoods in two different states, kissing boo boos, planning birthdays, family trips, taking pictures, studying spelling, math facts, etc....


And here I am, wrestling with all sorts of thoughts, stress, and anxiety, here’s the grit:

1) my mother’s overwhelming family
2) my mother’s overwhelming self
3) my grandma is fighting cancer
4) my mother-in-law could be developing Dementia
5) our “forever home” won’t be a self-decision
6) I hate that my kids miss their friends in Virginia
7) I hate that I have to spend so much time in the car
8) I miss my kids old school
9) I miss the trees of the East Coast
10) I’m growing tired of my husband’s traveling and schedule
11) and I am tired of feeling like the other shoe is going to drop....



(1)Let’s start with number one, the overwhelming family.... I have lived in a few states in my life, but my life started in Texas, and who would’ve ever thought that I’d end up back here, 30 years later. I thought about how awesome it would be to move to a place that had family “built in”, so holidays would be less lonely and we wouldn’t have to travel. Boy, was I a fool. I forgot that moving here was not going to be just Holidays, but EVERYDAY. Highs and lows. I guess it started in September, I had a dear uncle attempt suicide, it didn’t instantly take effect, it took almost two weeks for him to pass and this is when the family had its core shattered! It was awful. This uncle was everyone’s buddy. And the mystery of his suicide, like any suicide will haunt a lot of people, especially the elders who don’t think much of mental illness or believe that “one of them” would ever feel the need to end their life. Also, in this family it is expected to visit everyone in their time of need, even if they blow a hole in their head. I didn’t visit my uncle in this condition and could barely muster up the courage to attend his open casket funeral. Maybe it’s me, but I was a wreck heading into this. Only to hear my cousin say in the receiving line, “finally, you chicken”. Who says that. Who has time to think of that. Fuck you! Then in November, just after Thanksgiving, another family member passed away suddenly in her home, she was a dear aunt. Her death was sad and sudden, but not like the suicide. A week after my aunt’s death, we were shocked to hear that another uncle passed away, this time a heart attack while driving. Luckily, no one else was hurt, but this one was very sad all the same. A little sadder because this uncle had no money or even insurance to give him a funeral, so everyone was asked to chip in. This family was offered money to cover the cost of a very modest funeral, but his family refused and chose to take out a loan and to cover the 10K service. See what I mean by overwhelming. So, just after my first year of living in Texas, can you see why I am starting to hate it here? It’s depressing. Family around will be fun? Not this family, they all act the same, reactive and sad.



(2)Now that we have a bit of the background of my overwhelming family, let’s talk about who my main connection is: my mother. She is the youngest of the family of eight children and hasn’t lived in Texas in 30 years, but when she comes into town, I’m surprised that the Weather Channel doesn’t send out alerts. In the past few months, she has come for funerals, and uses my house as her own personal hotel. She barely spends time here, but disrupts just enough with her family baggage to make me hate the smell of her perfume. Her personality is kind and likable to strangers and people who don’t know her, but to me, and I only speak for me, she is very difficult. She actually makes me have gastrointestinal issues and menstrual issues when she comes into my orbit. She puts me down, points out cobwebs, dust, and dirt in my house and tells me when I look fat in clothes. I have always known she was difficult, but I didn’t figure it out until I moved away from her and saw that I was was feeling better about myself. I think she needs mental help and can see a lot of narcissistic traits in her. I have noticed them more with all the loss she is experiencing in her own family, and how she is dealing with it, or not dealing with it. I can really see it by the way she talks about my grandma’s cancer treatment and the poor old lady's behavior. She complains that my grandma doesn’t do this or that, goodness mom, Grandma is 90 and going through “cancer treatment hell”, give her a break and pray for her, she may be being stubborn, but she is so full of medicine and pain, I think she deserves a little love! But, I see the narcissism and it makes me sick!



(3)About my grandma and her cancer, God please have mercy on her! She is a good lady, never smoked, but somehow ended up with a curable Stage 2B cancer. She had 5 chemo sessions, and completed them, and now has 3 radiation treatments left to go and her spirit is gone, I pray constantly for her to have the strength to keep fighting and to drink the damn water to wash that chemo out of her body and drink two Ensures a day, but my prayers are falling on deaf ears. She is hurting and refuses to drink the water or Ensures. I have secretly been remotely praying the prayers of “anointing of the sick”, when I am at church on Wednesdays and lay my hands out like I am touching her and I am starting to think that maybe I want healing for her more than she wants it for herself. I love her, can you tell?

(4)Moving on to my fourth concern, my dear mother in-law, the lady is a kind old fashioned Southern woman. Since 2016, she has been slowly losing her mind supposedly to dementia, however it concerns me that she has never been diagnosed by a specialist. I have seen her spirit plummet and I often wonder if she suffers from debilitating clinical depression. I feel like when she is around happiness, her “symptoms “ disappear and her light shines, but when she is alone with my father in-law, it is very dark. I worry about her and what it’s doing to her family dynamic, but at the same time, I feel like I can't say much because she is not my mother and her boys don't want anyone else's opinion.

(5)What the heck do I mean when I say I am worried about not being able to choose our “forever home”? I mean that exactly, my husband’s job isn't exactly the most traditional job, so what I mean is this, while most people already have settled into there “forever homes” the minute they decided to have kids, me and my family choose to pick different cities to live in and move a few times in his career. It’s not like they are terrible cities, but I have trouble with the uncertainty and lack of control of the list we get to choose from. I have no desire to move to California, NY, Ohio, Miami, or remote places like Amarillo, Spokane.... I thought when we moved to Virginia, life was over, but I ended up loving it more than I thought I would. And now we are in Texas and I just don’t think it’s a good fit for forever. Georgia is nice, but will it be good one more time? See, the uncertainty is awful! Uncertainty and no control of our destiny is not fun!



(6)Virginia, where do I begin? Ya know, I ended up in a therapist’s office over our move to Virginia. And then fell in love with this place, only to prompt a breakup with our sweet Virginia life and head to Texas to be near family. And now as I sit here in Texas, I am pretty sure I am ready to get the hell out again. I hated moving when I was young, we moved twice, once to Illinois, I was 11 and again to Georgia at 18, both were very hard on me. I look back and think, the move to Illinois was hard because it was clearly hard on my mom, first time away from Texas, but the move to Georgia was awful, mainly because I was aware of what was going on, and of my age and social life, it's also because my parents forced me to move, like ugly threats and hurtful words. I hated them for a while about the move and clearly haven’t gotten over it. Haha! But, back to why I miss Virginia, it’s because my boys miss their friends. They were the cutest bunch of kids. They played well together and I feel these are lifelong friends and it kills me that they can’t see them more often. I miss them, even though they annoyed me sometimes. I don’t like to wish for money, but I wish I could fly the kids to Virginia whenever they wanted...



(7)Speaking of flying, I hate that I have to drive so much! We chose a great community that is a little quieter than what we were used to and I miss living near the retail and lacrosse hustle. The roads here in Texas are flat and boring. I just hate spending so much time in the car, but it’s lonely at home and I don’t enjoy sitting here looking at the walls, so I feel the need to get out and see people so I don’t turn myself into a hermit, which means I get in the car and drive. the scenery is less than peaceful, it's dull.



Number eight, I miss my kids’ old school. I loved that place! I subbed there, volunteered, and really enjoyed my time there. I felt like my kids were really part of something special there. I like the middle school here and know that my oldest was finished at the old elementary school, but I feel like my little guy really thrived there and I feel guilty for making him go to our current school. Last year, though he was blessed with the best 2nd grade teacher, so the transition was a little less painful! I just miss the old place...



(9)I am not a nature person, but I miss the trees and the landscape of the East. The Georgia mountains, the Shenandoah Valley, hell the Potomac. I miss it! Texas is so flat and boring. It is so dry and dirty in the summer and in the winter everything is dead! Why the hell do people think Texas is so special.... even my middle school student says that Texas History is so boring! There’s no character in this state, just ego that it was once it's own country.... more like it's own planet. who gives a shit?


I am to number 10 in my head analysis and it’s a tough one. I am a stay at home mom, by choice, nobody forces me to do this thankless job, but I also know that my boys need some stability in their lives. And by stability, I mean they need a living and loving person at home consistently. My husband’s job is stable in income, but availability is not one of its perks. He travels a lot! And his shift schedule is almost worse than the travel. I hate it! I don't think we have ever been a 9 to 5 couple, ever, but I am growing tired of the solo parenting. 12 years is tough. And with two kids it's tougher. I am blessed with a wonderful hardworking husband who provides us with love and support, but I often crave a reliable partner who can sneak out of work early to catch a practice or a game or help with bus pickup or dinner, but I am grateful for what we have! I love my husband and know that he is not his work, I just get frustrated with things sometimes. That’s all I can say about that.



(11)Finally, with all the death and illness and sleepless nights and gloom and doom texts I get about crappy things happening in the lives of people who are close to me, and the phone calls about all the people who died and who are sick and who is "letting themselves go", I am sick of feeling like the walls are caving in on me and yearn for the old carefree me! I can pinpoint the moment I started worrying and losing sleep. It was the day I found out my uncle shot himself. That day I was getting in the shower and got a text from my dad to "call him and that grandma was fine". We had found out about her cancer at that time, too. Anyway, I called him and he was so upset telling me, sadder than when they told us about the cancer. I actually hate reading my texts now, I’m afraid that they will all be bad news. I need to stop being like this and on Tuesday I plan on seeing a therapist to start my journey to mental healing.



Please forgive me for the ramble, it feels good to get this off my chest. I plan on blogging more during my journey and hope I can help at least one person! xoxoxo

Test Test...

Hello Bloggers... I was just checking out my old blog and I am sad to report that it is still here. Empty and boring. I am so busy that I never have the time or energy to blog or even share my wit with anyone who checks this. I am well and the boys and warden are well, too.