The clock keeps on ticking and time seems to fly by. Today is Arabella’s birthday and I have the day off of work. We’re planning on getting our nails done and going out to eat.

Life has been eventful as of late. I ran into an old friend of Arabella and they reconnected which lead to a whole bunch of excitement. Let’s just say that several nights were spent drinking. Literally whole nights where I woke up in the morning and they were still up. Arabella’s friend was doling out shots the whole night and come morning she was totally wasted along with my son. Through their intoxication, they realized they were totally in love. Arabella and her boyfriend were trying to talk both of them to go to sleep and figure things out later when they were sober. I awoke to Arabella’s boyfriend yelling at Alex.

Alex could barely walk as I walked with him to his room. I’ve never seen him so drunk. He had to perform in his band later that evening. By this time I was fed up with the whole lot of them. That evening was more of the same. Arabella’s friend was flirting with much older strangers talking them into giving her cigarettes and buying her shots. Paul had enough of it and ended up confronting the girl and telling her she was no longer welcome at our house unless she got her drinking under control. She already has been cut off by her family and has an ignition interlock device on her car from drunk driving. I hope she gets some help and figures her life out.

This was the first time Paul told someone they were not welcome here due to their drinking. Believe me when I say her drinking was pretty out of control for Paul to say that being a drinker himself. We were both afraid it would jeopardize Arabella’s recovery and if she started dating Alex the relationship would be toxic to say the least. They probably would both take their drinking to new heights.

We were sad to see Arabella’s friend go. Arabella doesn’t have many friends and this girl has been a good friend to her in the past. The rest of the weekend was pretty mild compared to this. Mother’s Day was almost uneventful. Paul and I took my mom and Matt to her church. My mom and brother displayed inappropriate behavior both passing gas several times in the pew. My mom was very confused. She couldn’t seem to reason that she needed enough room for 4 people to sit. But in some ways I enjoyed going to my childhood church. One member said I look more and more like my grandma the older I get. It made me feel good to receive that compliment and to be around people that remembered family long dead.

The rest of the time with my mom was stressful and I couldn’t wait to leave. She was confused about her medication. Earlier in the week I received a call from my dad who said that she took too many pills and ran out. She gets angry and emotional easily. Her food hoarding has gotten out of control. She wanted me to reimburse her out of Matt’s account (I am now his guardian) for over $200 worth of food which included 8 bags of gluten free flour and a dozen containers of breading.

Some good things did happen so far this week. I met with my therapist who said I am in a good spot and after almost a decade said I didn’t need therapy anymore. I saw a quote recently I thought applied to this which said that as someone with Complex PTSD we don’t need to know how to survive trauma and pain. This is something we are used to dealing with skillfully. What we need is to know how to handle joy and happiness, something I never learned how to do. It really resonated with me.

Over the next couple of days, I am looking forward to spending some time with Arabella for her birthday. Alex’s band is playing outdoors this weekend. Early next week Angel and her husband will be back home for a couple weeks.