Would You Like Fries With That?

Okay, so I was all happy-happy high on life when I wrote that last post. I've said that I won't be afraid to be honest when I write now. But I've got a confession to make. I was afraid to publish that feel-good post. Afraid that by declaring my happiness, the universe would surely strike me down with immediate and epic misery.

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So, on Friday, I had a crappy day at work. I had to do a software upgrade which requires all employees be out of the system for a period of time. I will spare you all the boring details but absolutely nothing about it went as planned and what was supposed to be a 20 minute process took me 6 1/2 hours. During which time, everyone was "shooting the messenger" (me) and basically not following my instructions which caused extra delays. I had a personal errand I needed to run during the day to prepare for weekend plans and I was not able to do that. I was grumpy. And I was struggling with keeping it all in perspective. And, I can admit, I was being a martyr about it. I could not let it go. I allowed it to ruin my night.

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I went to therapy on Saturday. First time in a month. I was telling my T all about how good I'm doing and how happy I'm feeling. I was telling her about my weight loss and how I have all this energy and blah blah. And then I talked about Friday and my crappy day. And I talked about the father & family thoughts that were plaguing me earlier in the month. She goes "Look, you just went out and binged on emotional fast food!" She pointed out what talking about the negative did to my mood, energy and aura.

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This is what Eckhart Tolle refers to as "the pain body." It is something that needs to be fed. I made a statement in my last post that I have not always believed that I have the strength to heal emotionally but that I'm going to choose to believe it. With this choice, I need to also choose not to feed the pain body. And I also need to roll with the fact that I'm going to have bad days, disappointments, things that don't go as planned. But they need not rock my world. I can still choose my positive energy. This is somewhat unfamiliar territory and the pain body wants to go back to the accustomed misery. But I'm so done with that.

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So here is my work in this phase. Finding balance. Not allowing my pain body to demand fodder. Not allowing a bad day to make me believe I was falsely happy before. Not to allow fear of happiness to stop me from moving ahead. Susan, my T, says FEAR = False Evidence Appearing Real. My fears are that I can't heal, I can't be strong enough, I don't deserve happiness and that any happiness I do muster up is a temporary illusion. Those beliefs are indeed false and they serve me no more.

Believe

I've gotta tell you I'm in an amazing place lately.

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I have been on a health journey since November. I've lost 42 pounds. It has not been particularly fun or easy. But every time that scale moves down again, it's worth it. It seems slow but I've hit a number now that feels significant to me and I'm definitely seeing the change in my appearance and in the clothes I can wear. I feel like "myself" again. I have some confidence back. I've dumped the frump and I got me some swagger. :o)

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Beyond that, I had a makeup consultation with a professional and learned some things about how to wear makeup more flattering for my age. And I got my hair colored and cut. And I whitened my teeth. And I bought a few new outfits.

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I remember this "me." This is the girl who, 8 years ago, tackled some shit and came out strong. This is the girl who went hard core on assertiveness training and left her abusive ex-husband. This is the girl who spoke her mind, who felt like she deserved some good things and wasn't afraid to say so. This is the girl who represented herself in court and kicked ass. I LIKE this girl.

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Last night I was at acupuncture. My doc was preparing for a lecture and was compiling notes/data about some of his cases. He told me he found a common theme among his patients when comparing people with dramatic results and those with mediocre results. Attitude. Belief. There are some who do not believe in the process. They do not believe they can get well. He said some people want to "own" their disease.

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Well, as far as the physical, I don't feel that way. I fully believe in chinese medicine. I wholeheartedly believe in the mind body connection. Acupuncture has been a God-send for me and it's helped me far beyond anything western medicine was ever able to accomplish. And I believe it will continue to get better.

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But I realize, I do NOT have that same belief when it comes to my emotional healing. I do not always believe that I can beat those demons. I don't always have faith in my strength. And you know what? I hate that. I want to own that part of my life....and I don't mean "own" it in the way that I'm identified with it. I mean, I want to OWN it like I want to make it my bitch!! Why not? Why can't I heal? Because I continue to identify with that broken part of me. This is MY time. The rest of me is so full of life, joy, confidence right now. This is the time for new beliefs and new revelations. This is my time to believe in me and all that I can do.

HEALING

Yesterday's post forced me to take a fresh look at healing.
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Starting with the literal, here is what M-W has to say about the word "Heal": 1: to make sound or whole, 2 a : to cause (an undesirable condition) to be overcome, 3: to restore to original purity or integrity.
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HealING....it's an action word. It implies an ongoing process. Am I still healing? I guess the question to ask first would be "Am I still in pain?" Most of the time, no. I feel more like I'm growing as opposed to healing which makes me believe the healing is largely done for me. And then I have questions like yesterday....why would I be stuck with thoughts of something so foolish and potentially harmful if I was truly healed?
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The thing is, depending on the wound, healing can be finite or subjective. A physical wound has a beginning, middle and end. Let's take my finger, for example. Twelve years ago, I put my hand accidentally through a glass pane and cut my finger down to the bone:Beginning. ER visit, stitches, follow up visits, stitches out, butterfly bandages applied:Middle. Skin fuses back together, redness and scar tissue diminish over time, no more pain:End. Yes, there is a faded scar but it's healed. That scar is part of me but does not affect my life in any way.

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An emotional wound is impossible to quantify. Healed implies back to normal and we all know that "normal" loses all application in the life of a victim. Healed implies perfection and we as humans are inherently imperfect. So waiting to feel healed may, in fact, be setting us up to constantly feel like a failure or as if we're hopelessly, helplessly scarred. I think when the pain is largely gone we're about as healed as we can hope to be. It doesn't mean the experience is gone and it doesn't mean we don't still have growing to do. But when an instance that would have brought pain or panic instead brings reflection, conscious connection and growth, we are healed.
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I have long believed I am toward the end of my healing journey. But still on an exciting path of growth. I am often able to identify triggers and feelings though my struggle sometimes is expressing those feelings. This experience is shaking my confidence and I'm not sure what it all means. But I can tell you I don't like it.
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Maybe healing, for me, means learning to accept that I still have feelings, maybe will always have feelings, of loss when it comes to my family. And that's just how it is. I think it makes me feel weak that I'm not "over it."

These Wounds Won't Seem To Heal

What is it inside of me that drives me to consider getting back in touch with the people who have been the most hurtful, hateful people of my past?
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I have started this post at least a half dozen times over the past two weeks. I get about this far....a line or two. And then I bail on it. I'm not doing that today. I just said that this blog will be nothing if not fully honest from now on. Obviously, this is something I want to talk about or need to work out. I get a line into it and I think it's stupid...it's pointless. And I can't write it well enough to do justice to the feelings inside me.
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WOW. How utterly poetic....as I sit here trying to figure out where to go next, this song comes on Pandora: ("My Immortal" by Evanescence)
I'm so tired of being here, suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave, I wish that you would just leave
Your presence still lingers here and it won't leave me alone
These wounds won't seem to heal, this pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
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I have been stalking Bianca's father's profile on Facebook. Which naturally causes me to link out to his son's profile, his wife's profile. I found a picture of Bianca's half sister. I ache for the family that is there...but not really there. She has a father, a half-brother and two half-sisters. I want those "for her" but really it must mean that I want them for me. Right? I am trying to give her what I didn't have. In one respect, she does have what I didn't have. She has a Mom who is at least somewhat aware and present. But the flip side is that she pretty much has exactly what I had. It comes in a different package but she has a father who is a piece of garbage. What in God's name would possess me to even consider for a nanosecond opening the door for this man to come into her life?
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This is a man who lied to me about every fundamental thing about himself and schmoozed himself into my life, charmed his way into my bed. And that was all he wanted. But he said whatever he had to say to get there....talked of feelings and a future and wanting marriage and family. Neglecting to tell me he was already married with kids. When I told him I was pregnant, he told me in no uncertain terms "I will help you pay for an abortion but as far as being a father to this child, I have nothing to offer." He disappeared on me through the pregnancy, lied to me at every turn, dodged requests for pertinent information: things I needed to know for the sake of the baby. It's hard to hold your head high in a doctors appointment having to answer "I don't know" when asked about the father's medical & family history. On the day Bianca was born, he shut off his cell phone after I called him. He promised to come sign the birth certificate but didn't. He promised to pay child support but didn't. He lied at every turn, avoided me whenever possible and made life as difficult for me as he could. He has never once made an inquiry about my daughter's life or made an attempt to see her. He is a lying, cheating, dirty, deadbeat rat bastard who will never change. And so I want to reach out to him.........why?
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I don't feel like the pain from my own father is still so great that I would consider such stupidity. Maybe it is. "These wounds won't seem to heal, this pain is just too real." How do I heal? Especially when I feel like I have already healed? Am I fooling myself?

So where have I been for 8 months? I made the jump to a more lighthearted, mom-themed blog. It was nice at first to escape the heaviness of this blog. But I found myself often not feeling free to talk about the topic on my mind. I've certainly learned that a lot of my issues raising Bianca tie in closely with my own childhood experience. I didn't want to get "heavy" on my lighthearted blog. And so I stopped blogging altogether.
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I have a problem. I write for my "audience" which is pretty humorous since I'm a small potato blog with very few followers. I'm like the tater tot of blogs, LOL. That's actually not THE problem; that's just the result of it. My real issue is that I have a tendency to write too much from my head and not enough from my heart. Sometimes I can bridge the gap but I am more comfortable thinking through a post than feeling through a post. It's a struggle to stay honest with myself. That ends today. If a post is not heartfelt, I will not post it. If I'm more worried about how someone will perceive the post than about being real, then I won't post it. And if I have to make my blog private in order to stop thinking about who is reading, then so be it. For now, I'm going to leave it public because, let's face it, it's healing to feel the connection to others and to hope that a single sentence or thought of mine could possibly, hopefully help another survivor.
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One of the biggest things that has gone on in the past months is that I've confirmed Bianca has a severe dopamine imbalance. She also has many food allergies/sensitivities that are causing health and behavioral problems. In layman's terms, you could say she has ADD. This is how it presents and this is how she would be diagnosed. I have chosen a natural course of treatment including NAET (mentioned in my last post) for allergy elimination, diet modification and herbal supplements. The diet modification is HARD. She is for all intents & purposes, not allowed to have sugar, corn syrup, corn starches, salt, artificial color, dairy or msg/gluten. It. Is. So. Hard.
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She is really struggling in school. It's been TOUGH for everyone, for her, for me, for her teacher. She is smart. And that's not just me as her Mom talking. She's really smart and it's carried her this far because she can take in minimal information and still know what she needs to know to get by. It's only going to get harder as she gets older and she won't be able to survive forever on this technique. Her school is ....I don't know.....I want to say not being helpful but that's not true. They have made concessions for her and have met with me several times. I just feel like I have to stay on top of them ALL the time and I have to educate myself so that I can ask for the right things for her. It's a little exhausting. It's unfamiliar territory and that makes me want to run away. Which is not an option right now and that causes me anxiety.
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I see the continuing struggle in school and I want to say it's not getting any better. But that is definitely not the case. When I consider other factors, her mood, how she reacts to discipline, her interactions with me, her general health....she IS improving. One of the downsides of going the natural route is that results can take a long time to evolve. When she reads at home, it's typical that she will only get through one, maybe two, pages before she totally loses focus and spirals downhill. Tonight she read me more than half of a book before she lost concentration. That is major progress and it deserves celebration. I have a hard time celebrating the small successes. The same way I don't cut myself slack for anything less than perfect. I have a hard time not seeing her issues as a reflection of poor parenting on my part even though I have scientific evidence that her brain chemicals are all out of whack. Yet, still, I want to beat myself up for everything. Get over it!! I need to get out of my own way to continue helping my child.

Failure, Disgust, Frustration,

Decision Making, Faithless.
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Hello friends. It's been a while since I've been here. I felt like I needed to go in a different direction with my writing but, funny, it quickly began to lead me back here. I'm going to start with a post about what is going on today and then I'll fill in the missing time as I go forward. For right now, I need to process some things.
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I still see my acupuncturist and am doing well, healthwise. He has introduced me to something called NAET which is a natural method of treating allergies. It is used to change the body's energy reaction to certain elements. I know it works for food and environmental allergies. I didn't realize, at first, it also works for emotional issues.
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A few months back, I was suffering from nonstop obsessive fear of dying. I could not make it stop. I could not sleep, could not relax, could not stop the thoughts. I went to the doctor and asked him to help me with the anxiety. I explained the thoughts and he suggested NAET. With one treatment, the thoughts were gone. GONE. And have not come back again.
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Lately, I have been consumed with negative thoughts. Everything I do is not good enough. All I see is what I've not accomplished, what is wrong, what is bad, where I'm behind, where I've dropped the ball. I will not recognize any positive thing I've done. It's immediately overtaken by the other thoughts. "Oh, you accomplished that? Well, take a look at that, that, that and that which you have not done. Loser! Don't pat yourself on the back for that piddly accomplishment when you know you're a complete failure at everything else." I don't want to live in this space and so I went to my doc and asked if he could hit me up with some NAET to clear these thoughts out.
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He asked if I could put a name to the feelings. Corresponding emotions. I was not sure....frustration maybe? So he tested me with certain elements, through neuromuscular reaction, to see what was going on. And the things I tested positive for are: Failure. Disgust. Frustration. Decision Making. Faithless. Yeah, that sounds about right. I talked to my T about the session and she asked me to write about each of those very powerful feelings and see if I can help identify the thoughts around each of them. And so, here I am.
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Failure. As the title and opening of my blog tells, I expect perfection of myself. And frankly there is NO better way to feel like a total failure than to expect the impossible of yourself. Yet I still do it. I know, in my head, that this is a losing battle. I can tell you all the "right" things that I should be thinking, feeling, setting my sights on. And, I believe all those things. For everyone except me. I still cling to the notion that somehow, someway I can do it all and do it perfectly. I live in my head with no connection to my heart, to reality. And no interest in cutting myself a break and saying it's okay to be human. You know what this is right here....this is me taking over for my abusers. This is me absolutely denying myself the right to be free. This is me being terrified of what freedom might feel like, of what loving myself might look like and of who I will be if I'm not this slave to my own fears.

Disgust. I suppose goes hand in hand, right? I am constantly disgusted with my inability to get it right, to do it all. Further, I am disgusted with the state of my home, my office, my finances. I am disgusted at myself for not keeping up with my blog, for "failing" at my other attempt, for not being a perfect mom. I am disgusted with other people and the choices they make. Things that have nothing to do with me. But I sit in judgment on others because I so harshly judge myself. And I'm disgusted with myself for being so self righteous and judgmental. It's not who I want to be. So naturally, I'm disgusted with myself for being who I don't want to be.
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Frustration. Comes in because I am in this place of emotional purgatory. I intellectualize everything and I see it, I get it. I could be a therapist for someone else and say all the right things. But there is no emotional connection to that within me. What I know in my head is blocked off by the brick wall surrounding my heart. It was sometimes better to not know. Ignorance is bliss....sometimes it's entirely too true.
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Decision Making. Well, sure. How am I supposed to make decisions when I wallow in the fear of failure day in and out? I have been having some major struggles with Bianca, issues that require me to be on my game and to make decisions about what is best for her. I have felt paralyzed. Decisions at work. Decisions about what to do with my house. Whether I should move. Decisions about what to do with my time. Soooo....for the most part, I avoid the choices. (Except for Bianca....that required action) But if I can get out of making a decision, I will. Because I'm too scared. And for some reason, I don't feel equipped to make good choices. Why? Because I've made bad ones in the past? Who hasn't? Oooohhhh, right.....it's because I was not supposed to make bad choices because I am supposed to be perfect and so avoiding new decisions takes away the chance of making a mistake. Yep, got it.
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Faithless. I am not sure in exactly which context this is meant but I took it literal. As in God - faith. And no, I am ashamed to say, I don't have faith in God. It literally pains me to say that because I know it's "wrong" and honestly, I don't want to feel that way. But it's another area in which I live in my head. There is no letting God into my heart right now. He's been there. It didn't save me. Well, maybe it did save me but not in the way I wanted to be saved. It's too hard for me to accept things on faith right now. I believe in Him; that is without question. But putting my faith out there.....it's more than I am capable of right now. Faith and vulnerability go hand in hand and it's just not a leap I'm prepared for today.
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I hope to soften. I hope that the work I am doing now will allow me to break the wall between head and heart, so that I can begin to change all of these things. Maybe this is a step in the right direction. It feels so right to be back here.