(A)part of the family

/ Outrunning my demons / 3 Comments

I feel like I don’t belong to my family of origin anymore. I can’t say I remember ever feeling that way before.

It started when I went up north to spend time with my brother Luke, his daughter Gracie, and my mom Saturday morning. I’d driven several hours after spending the night on the boat with Paul. I didn’t sleep well the night before, actually several nights before. I’ve been feeling fatigued for awhile now. I don’t have the energy I had before. I think it’s a normal part of aging. Other than that I was feeling like my normal self.

My brother Luke asked me what my story was. I asked him what he meant. He asked why I seemed so quiet and sad. I assured him I was fine. Yes, I am tired, quiet, and sad. That is my normal state. I was not feeling troubled in any way. There really wasn’t much to say. He almost seemed offended I didn’t have much to talk about. He accused me of being hungover from the night before. I was offended by his statement. Did he not know me? I told him I have not been puking drunk since 1995 when I was 21 and some old guy kept buying me shots at the bar. I was so sick I missed class the next morning. I told myself that day it wouldn’t happen again and it didn’t. I drink, but I don’t get drunk to the point where I am puking and hungover.

I felt judged by my brother the whole time I was there and it was miserable. I didn’t do anything to deserve being treated that way. He and his daughter Gracie pretty much judged me and everyone in my family except my son Alex.

Luke said someone he knew died the day after he retired because he got in a car accident from a teenager that was texting. My mom told everyone that my daughter Arabella texts while she drives. Then everyone launched into how bad Arabella is. I don’t even know if it is true. My mom just likes to add fuel to the fire. I’ve never seen my daughter text while driving. Yes, she probably uses her phone to play music and navigate. Who doesn’t? Why would my daughter tell my mom anyway? If it was really true and my mom was concerned, why didn’t she tell me in private? Now I am worried that my brother and niece will confront her about it during her graduation party this weekend.

Then my brother found some cigars in the back of the cupboard. My niece confronted me asking if I was a smoker. I told them they belonged to my husband. On special occasion he will have a cigar, like once every couple of years. There was a four pack of little cigars with one missing. I believe my husband smoked that cigar at least 7 years ago. I don’t know why they were making a big deal out of it. He wasn’t breaking any law.

Then my brother told me that he didn’t feel like his daughters would be welcome at my daughter’s wedding because of the music she was planning on playing at the reception. My daughter as a music major picked out her whole playlist of songs already. From 6 to 8, it will be jazzy dinner music like Frank Sinatra. Then from 8 to 10 she picked family friendly dance music like Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. Then from 10 to 12 she wants to play club music. Some of the music may not be appropriate for younger kids. But usually by later in the night the little ones go home anyway. I listened to the music and I don’t think it is anything out of the norm for a wedding. My nieces will be 13 and 15 when my daughter gets married so I think they can handle it. If not, I can remind him of the music he listened to at their age.

Then he also was judgmental that my daughter Angel went to the bar up north for her birthday. She is 23. We walked to the bar, had one drink, and played a round of darts. He was upset at the neighbors for drinking and swearing. I just can’t relax around him. I can’t crack open a beer and listen to the music I like. Everything I do, don’t do, or even think about doing is wrong to him. He is not much fun to be around. He expects everyone to be perfect, especially his kids.

We couldn’t even play a game and have fun. My mom had a really bad hand and said oh shit. He launched into her about her language.

I felt attacked and judged by my brother the whole time. I hope this is just a one off thing. Maybe he is just really stressed out or something. Everyone in my family is so dysfunctional and negative that I feel really down after a visit. I am considering not even hosting the holidays this year. Maybe I need to say no more for my own mental health. It’s really hurtful to be attacked and have my husband and/or kids attacked when I am hanging out with family. We didn’t do anything to deserve to be treated this way. Not only that but my brother has not even seen or talked to some of my kids in over a year. He doesn’t even know us.

The funny thing is my brother Luke was one of the wildest people I knew. He was wilder as a teenager than probably all three of my kids put together. He treats me like I am a bad person and parent. He is really strict with his kids. I actually was angry at first but now I feel sorry for him because he seems absolutely miserable.

We’ll see what the weekend brings and go from there.

Gratitude week 83

/ Outrunning my demons / 3 Comments
  1. Remember last week how I said that Arabella’s boyfriend broke up with her? Well…I found out about the break up on a Friday night and hung out with her until I went to bed around 11 PM. Arabella said she was going to be okay because her friend Kami was going to come over and hang out after I went to bed. I just found out a couple days ago that on the way home from our house that night, Kami fell asleep and totaled her car. I am grateful that Kami is okay after the accident. The last teenager I knew who fell asleep driving died.
  2. I’m grateful for more time with my cat. He was sick the past couple of weeks and I thought I might have to put him down. He is also 15 years old. But it turns out he has an eye infection and will be okay. I do think he used up one more of his 9 lives over this. He is one of my all time favorite cats.
  3. My daughter Angel and her fiancé have a wedding date picked out. They have an appointment with a wedding chapel this week and if all goes well I think they will be ready to book the hall.
  4. Tomorrow Paul and I will be celebrating our 24th wedding anniversary.
  5. Paul has been working out of town the last couple of days and sleeping on our boat. He forgot his medicine at home so I went and surprised him after work. He was really happy that I thought to bring his pills to him and to see me unexpectedly.
  6. Since I went to the boat Friday night, we were able to play cards with out boat neighbors and it was a lot of fun.
  7. Paul had to work again early Saturday morning, so I drove back home, fed the pets, took a shower, and headed up north. I was able to visit my mom, brother Luke, niece Gracie, and my aunt Jan and her husband. Then this morning I headed back home and will be heading back to the boat to spend a couple days with Paul for our anniversary. I’m grateful that for the most part I’ve overcome my fear of long distance driving. I don’t think I could’ve done all of this otherwise.
  8. Yesterday up north we were able to find a new hiking place. I’m grateful that it was on the water and the bugs weren’t bad. It was nice to spend time with family.
  9. My mom bought me some blueberries for my birthday and Dan brought over some zucchini from his garden. So I made blueberry muffins and chocolate chip zucchini cake which everyone loved.
  10. Summer! It’s cooled off considerably around here. I turned off the A/C. It almost feels fall like, but it is very comfortable because the humidity is gone.

Special treasures

/ Outrunning my demons / 7 Comments

The washcloth I used to wipe the tears from her eyes last week was the same one I used to wash off the makeup from my face last night.

It was a wedding gift; a peach towel set. So special that it was rarely used for the first fifteen years. Why do we do that? Set aside clothes too special to wear until they no longer fit, or are out of style. The crystal wine goblets, the fancy china, the expensive dry clean only clothes, the silverware set from great-grandma… Why do we wait for a tomorrow that never comes today? Why are the best things just uselessly taking up space? What would happen if we used it? Are we so afraid that which was once special will become ordinary?

Who even gave us the wedding gift anyway? That memory long forgotten. Even our wedding attendants long gone, dead or otherwise. At the time it seemed like our friendship would last forever. Once it also seemed that our love would always stay young just like we were.

But now I use that washcloth to wipe the tears off my daughter’s face. Tears from love that was there for but a moment and is gone. Tears on a washcloth given to us by a guest long forgotten. If I don’t remember who gave the gift, do they ever give it a thought?

I thought I would remember every detail of our wedding day forever. But everything not written down gets washed away from our memory by time. Even as I write this, will this post be remembered? It’s nothing special. Will anyone even care that once I received a wedding gift that I thought was too special to use everyday? It was waiting for over a decade in the back of the closet for that perfect guest who never showed up.

Time stops for no one. It doesn’t even slow down to let us savor our best moments a few minutes longer. Sometimes we don’t even realize they were our best days until they are gone. If only I’d known that would be the last good visit before grandma died. I would have enjoyed it more. We would have eaten off of the fancy china and I would’ve worn my dry clean only dress.

Someday I should pull out the fancy china and crystal wine glasses that have been on display but never once been used.

Who cares if the special washcloth is used for makeup and tears? Life is meant to be lived today not just in wait for a tomorrow which might never show up.

Gratitude week 82

/ Outrunning my demons / Leave a comment
  1. Today I had my upper endoscopy re-check. Everything looked normal, so I’m grateful for that. I still feel a little doped up so bear with me if I start cracking bad jokes.
  2. Angel, Dan, and I got massages for Angel’s birthday.
  3. Since my massage was way earlier than theirs, I hung around until they were done and then they followed me to the restaurant. Why I’m grateful for this is because apparently both blinkers and break lights weren’t working. I didn’t even know it. I’m grateful that I didn’t get into an accident while my rear lights were out.
  4. Arabella’s boyfriend broke up with her. You might have been wondering if I thought he was a jerk or something to be grateful for this. I am not that mean. What I am grateful for is that her response was appropriate. She was sad and crying, but she wasn’t depressed and didn’t self-harm. She said that she knew she wouldn’t feel this way forever and that she was okay. I truly felt she handled it well. Her boyfriend is leaving for college soon and that is apparently why they broke up. I am truly grateful she is handling the break up better than I expected she would.
  5. Summer!! Oh my gosh, the weather was perfect this past weekend. We spent the weekend up north for Angel’s birthday and had a lot of fun.
  6. I achieved my sailing certification. Although sailing is my husband’s passion a lot more than mine, I wanted to know what to do in case there was an emergency.
  7. Now that I finished reading my sailing certification book, I started reading the book Educated and it is really good. I really want to dig into some really good memoirs as I want to edit and rewrite my own book soon. Wow, I really used the word really a real lot.
  8. My mom is making supper tonight.
  9. I’m grateful that my husband took me to my appointment today.
  10. I’m grateful that my daughter might have a wedding date picked out this week. Then the real fun starts…the wedding dress shopping will be so much fun!

Spending my birthday with my (fake) dad

/ Outrunning my demons / Leave a comment

It was Paul’s fault really. I told him not to tell anyone that it was going to be my birthday, but he did anyway.

We needed to sail our boat back to her home port after some routine maintenance. We made plans to sail the boat back with Harv and Kate. It was meant to be a fun little trip until we heard about the high chance of severe weather. I was almost happy when Kate cancelled coming on the trip because of back problems. I probably mentioned this quite awhile back, but our good friends are in their upper 80’s. I was afraid if we hit stormy weather that Kate would get hurt as she is rather small and frail.

Harv asked if another buddy of his could go instead which was fine. I dragged myself out of bed at 5 AM on my birthday so we could try to make the trip before the storms hit. It was going to be an adventure everyone was up for. Harv and his buddy were probably sailing before I was born. Along with my husband, I thought there was no group of experienced sailors that I would rather risk a storm with. The weather was perfect that morning. It was warm with a brisk breeze. We caught the wind and were able to sail back with an hour and a half to spare before the storms hit.

We made it back to the marina at lunch time. Harv treated us to lunch. But that wasn’t all. He surprised me by making me a cake. Instead of frosting, he covered it with tapioca pudding. They sang happy birthday to me. Harv only put 8 candles on the cake so it was a little short. But they were trick candles. Every time I blew them out, they relit. After we enjoyed his cake, he pulled confetti poppers out of his bag. When you pulled on the string confetti would pop out. Harv and I had a confetti fight until there was confetti everywhere. We all laughed and had a good time.

Harv (and Paul) worked really hard to make my day special.

I felt happy that Harv took the time to think of me and make me a cake. But underneath it all was a whole mess of hurt and sadness. My own dad didn’t acknowledge my birthday in any way. He didn’t call or send a card. He never did. He never bought me a birthday gift much less bake me a box cake. In that one act of kindness, Harv was more of a dad towards me then my dad will ever be and that hurt.

I thanked Harv and gave him a hug. Harv’s friend joked and said that Kate would be jealous. I told him that I didn’t need another husband. I already have a wonderful husband. What I really needed was a dad. On that day, Harv was my fake dad and it really was a great birthday.

After Harv and his buddy left, the storms came rolling in. I always love a good (not damaging) storm. It’s the way my birthday is the majority of the time, stormy.

Gratitude week 81

/ Outrunning my demons / 1 Comment
  1. We made it across the bay back to our home port before the storm hit on my birthday.
  2. It seemed like absolutely everybody at the marina knew it was my birthday (even people I didn’t know). It’s probably the first time since I turned 40 that I am all birthdayed out. It was too much attention for this introvert.
  3. I met my son’s new girlfriend at my birthday party. She is really quiet and that is nice.
  4. Today I met my daughter Arabella’s new boyfriend. I did meet him briefly before when he came over at night and I was sleeping on the couch. I told him it was nice to finally meet him when I was dressed. Well that was awkward. I meant to say it was nice to meet him when I was awake (not sleeping on the couch in my pajamas).
  5. Summer!! After the storms on my birthday I couldn’t ask for better weather.
  6. I am planning Arabella’s graduation party. I am grateful to plan her party. As I looked at all of her pictures throughout the years I found myself really grateful that I am planning her graduation party and not a funeral. Worrying about death is one of the hardest parts of being a parent of a child with serious mental health issues. Graduating was a milestone worth celebrating, even if she is not heading to college like all of my friend’s kids.
  7. Over the weekend I went out to eat at the restaurant Arabella works at. I felt grateful that she has a job she really loves.
  8. I also went to a wedding show over the weekend with Angel, Dan, and his mom. I think within the next week or so we should have a date. I still cannot believe my daughter is getting married!
  9. Although I slept better on the sailboat, it is really wonderful to sleep in my own bed again.
  10. I am grateful for Angel’s birthday this week. We are planning massages and going out to eat at our favorite pizza place.

Distant shores

/ Outrunning my demons / 6 Comments

I promised I would share some of the pictures I took from our last sailing trip.

We ended up delaying our trip by a day due to storms. The following day the water was still choppy at first.

(Apparently I haven’t shared a lot of pictures lately because WP changed everything again so bear with me.)

A distant lighthouse located somewhere between Wisconsin and Upper Michigan.

We visited a new to me marina. On the water life isn’t too busy. It’s nice to get away from all the noise.

Sometimes all we see is a distant sailboat on the endless water.

On the water I can experience peace mixed with adventure. The next evening we anchored out.

We made our way up to Chamber’s Island where we took our kayaks to land and explored a lighthouse.

We jumped into the ice cold waters to cool off on a warm enough day.

It’s really neat to see huge cargo ships on a voyage. I wonder if they think it is cool to see us too…

One of my biggest passions in life is photography and travelling to places I’ve never been to before. This was the first time I visited these places. I love being on the water. I’m not sure why it brings me calm and peace while in many others it would cause fear. Tomorrow, for my birthday, we are going to brave possible stormy weather and go on another adventure.

Triggered

/ Outrunning my demons / Leave a comment

Maybe my expectations were too high. I thought that my dysfunctional family of origin could handle being functional for a couple days. Is that too much to ask for? Apparently so.

It started out okay. I headed up north with Angel after she was done working on the Thursday before the 4th. We were jamming to our favorite tunes that were cranked. A couple people waved as they passed us on the highway. People everywhere were excited to celebrate the first big holiday after COVID. The weather was going to be absolutely perfect. Who could ask for more?

Thursday went well. Angel and I opened up the cabin. A couple hours later my brother Luke joined us with his family. But after that pretty much everything went downhill. I couldn’t for the life of me understand why. I had a plan for everything. The plan was if my mom slept well, she would drive up with my brother Matt. If she didn’t sleep well, they would hitch a ride with my husband Paul.

It looked like my mom left the house, so I got my nieces all psyched up for her to visit when my mom called me and said she wasn’t coming up. My brother Luke and his family were leaving later that afternoon for family camp which meant my mom wasn’t going to see them since she was feeling tired and anxious. This was really triggering since a couple weeks before my mom left my brother’s house right before my niece had her dance concert. Now everyone was angry and hurt. My nieces were so incredibly sad saying that grandma didn’t care about them. I was furious because I already had contingency plans A through F in place in case something like this would happen.

The new plan was that my brother Mark and his wife would pick up my mom after driving 5 hours. They were going to spend some time with my dad because Angel and Luke did not want to see him. Luke ended up going to pick up my mom instead. Everything got all messed up and everyone was upset.

Eventually on Friday afternoon almost everyone was up north. I thought the problems would end there, they didn’t. Arabella called to tell me that her car wouldn’t start and how was she going to make it to work the whole weekend. I told her she could use my car. Another problem solved.

My husband decided to help out by mowing the lawn since my dad doesn’t do anything to get the cabin ready for us. He is terribly lazy and now that he has this new heart condition he does absolutely nothing. He won’t even take out the trash now. He expects everyone to take care of him. But I digress. Since my dad didn’t mow the lawn, Paul did. The grass was so high that Paul did not see the metal line that the dog was tied up to and hit it. It got all twisted up in the lawnmower. Worse yet, it yanked the dog so hard that his collar broke. Originally Paul had him chained to his choke chain and I put him on his collar. Good thing because it probably would’ve killed him otherwise. I was very angry that my dog could’ve died.

That evening my brother Luke and my daughter Angel left. Angel was very upset before leaving. My brother Mark’s wife Carla did not congratulate her on her engagement. She made passive aggressive comments about Angel sleeping in their bedroom. She also said how she couldn’t wait to have steak with my dad. Angel took this as an attack. My brother Luke does not want his daughters around my dad nor does my daughter Angel after she found child porn on my dad’s computer and turned him in to the police. Angel felt like Carla was blaming her for this. After Luke and Angel left, my dad showed up which is another stressor. Matt and my dad are very difficult people to be around.

Carla screamed at my brother Mark the whole weekend. She yelled at him for everything like eating his cheese separately from the burger she cut the cheese for. She is incredibly controlling and verbally abusive. At one point she yelled at him so much that I was even shaking. It triggered my husband because his mom was the same way. He wanted to tell her off but we didn’t want to make things worse for Mark. Carla offered to take care of my dad and Matt so my mom didn’t have to. She was taking it out on Mark.

Paul and I tried to spend as much time outdoors away from everyone as we could. Sunday morning I suggested to Paul that we go kayaking. Then everyone wanted to go kayaking. Carla yelled at Mark that she wanted to go and why didn’t he plan that for her. Since the kayaks were Mark and Carla’s, we decided to pull the canoe out of the garage. My mom wanted to go too. We didn’t get far before she wanted us to turn around since she can’t swim and is afraid of water. Then she wanted us to take Matt so he wouldn’t be left out. Matt is worse on the water than she is so we said maybe later.

There were some good things that happened over the 4th. The fireworks over the lake were absolutely awesome. My aunt Jan came out with her husband and my son came up for the fireworks. But for the most part, I found the weekend with family to be very triggering. My anxiety was through the roof. I fell into a deep depression that took almost a week to pull myself out of. I felt like I was a child trapped in despair. It dragged me back to that feeling again. It was hard to see others triggered by the events too. I always liked being up north. As a child, it seemed like a safe and special place. But then I started to remember times when it wasn’t that way. It ruined my memory that there was any safe or happy place in childhood. The things I clung to were remarkably but unbeknownst flawed.

I really think that I need to limit how much time I spend with my family of origin. I didn’t realize how much it would negatively impact my current state of mental health.

Gratitude week 80

/ Outrunning my demons / Leave a comment
  1. I have been having a lot of computer issues as of late. Thankfully my future son-in-law Dan was able to fix my computer so I didn’t have to buy a new one. It is so incredibly fast now that I don’t even have to take a nap while it loads.
  2. Tonight we are going out to celebrate Dan and Angel’s engagement at a new restaurant I’ve never been to before. Dan’s parents will also be there.
  3. Summer! The weather has been perfect the last couple of days. Dry, breezy, and upper 70’s. It really doesn’t get a lot better than that!
  4. The weather was cool and rainy mid-week which delayed our sailing trip that we planned, but we were still able to go.
  5. I was able to spend the night on the boat at a beautiful marina I’ve never been to before. One night we anchored out with friends near an island I’ve also never been to. We were able to go to shore and tour a lighthouse. I live in such a beautiful area. I can’t wait to share the pictures.
  6. I went out to eat Indian food with my best friend one evening.
  7. Oh my gosh, my son has a new girlfriend. He has been single for over two years. I will be meeting her this week.
  8. My birthday week has officially started!!
  9. I got my hair cut and colored today. A little pampering is a good way to start the birthday week.
  10. I’m grateful I was able to write about some really difficult things and close the book on the last series.

Gratitude week 79

/ Outrunning my demons / Leave a comment
  1. Arabella was the only server that showed up to work on the 4th of July. So, yeah, I think they forgot about the day she slept through her whole shift.
  2. The fireworks were absolutely amazing over the lake.
  3. Summer! I was able to spend a lot of time on the water over the holiday weekend. The weather has been crazy this year. It has been extremely hot, in the 90’s, for the last couple of days. Later this week it’s supposed to be in the 60’s with rain. It’s either been incredibly hot or cool and rainy.
  4. I saw all three of my brothers this past weekend, one of my brothers I haven’t seen since before COVID.
  5. I put on my new boxing gloves for the first time this past week. My son is teaching me how to box. I gotta have nice looking arms for the wedding.
  6. It’s my birthday month. I can’t believe my birthday is next week already. I’m thankful for another year of life.
  7. I’m grateful that my husband was able to buy a new battery for Arabella’s car when it died.
  8. I’m grateful that he was also able to take our son in to get a new phone when it died.
  9. I’m grateful for the family that sent my daughter engagement gifts. It was very thoughtful of them.
  10. I was finally able to spend time with my nieces for the first time this year.