Worry

distractions

/ Outrunning my demons / 2 Comments

“There’s a difference between being happy and being distracted from sadness.”

I recently saw the above quote on Facebook and loved it. Lately close friends and family have been making happiness statements to me. Are you having fun? Did that make you happy? I’ll do whatever makes you happy. Would it make you happy if… It’s so good to see you smile and have fun.

I understand they want me to be happy and don’t want to see me suffer. The best I can ask for right now are distractions from sadness. The stress is really starting to get to me. It’s affecting my health. It’s wearing me down. I don’t think I can handle much more.

Happiness seems unattainable. It’s for other people. Peace and joy are glimpsed at illusions.

I have little control over the events taking place. I just want the suffering to end.

Most people don’t know what to say. That’s okay. There is really nothing anyone can do about it. I understand that.

Just be a friend. Don’t walk away. That hurts more than saying the wrong thing.

I don’t want to be a burden. I don’t want to play the victim. It’s just what is happening in my life. I don’t want to talk about it all the time.

But I am open to distractions…

Recently when my good friend Lisa was over it was eye opening to me. She has experienced a great level of pain and suffering. I didn’t know what to say to her. Offering up thoughts and prayers seemed absolutely meaningless. I just wanted her to be happy. I wanted her to think life is enjoyable and worth living. Maybe her suffering has some sort of purpose or meaning and she can take something bad and make it good somehow. I could feel her pain. Through my worry about the wellbeing of my friend I was able to see how others view me. I finally understood.

Solving communication issues

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Last week Paul and I had our couples therapy appointment. I think we had a breakthrough regarding some of the communication issues we have been having.

What I need from Paul is to be relational. I want to know he feels the same way or has some of the same worries so I don’t feel alone in my suffering. Paul wants me to give him hope by telling him everything is going to be okay and offer encouragement. For the longest time, we have been giving each other what we would want for ourselves. That has proved to be a frustrating experience all around.

The second time Arabella went to jail I felt very fearful for her future. There is a myriad of feelings involved when your child is incarcerated. I have been feeling despair, hopelessness, anger, guilt, anxiety, uncertainty, shame, and fear. Nothing really associated with ‘positive’ feelings about any of this. Now I usually keep these feelings to myself and go into a nice dark corner to lick my wounds. But my husband has been rather distraught by my isolation so through therapy I resolved to tell him how I feel instead. He found he didn’t really like what I was feeling.

When I am feeling despair, his response is to trust in God and everything will be okay which usually makes me quite angry. What is wrong with me? Why does he seem to have this faith that I don’t? How am I supposed to get out of survival mode if all I am doing is trying to survive? Who is the person I was supposed to be if I didn’t have childhood trauma? Trusting? Trusting in God? How do I have faith when I feel if God exists he doesn’t really care about me? Maybe he doesn’t exist at all. Why does he allow so much suffering? Why do my prayers go unanswered? If I have already given control over to God, why is he choosing this for my life?

In therapy, I told Paul I really wanted him to try to be relational, like talking to a best friend. I don’t want him to fix, solve, or tell me everything is going to be okay. I want him to commiserate with me that sometimes life really fucking sucks. He has been making the effort. He said he also has doubts about God, feels despair about our daughter’s future, and questions why there is so much unnecessary suffering in this world. It made me feel like I wasn’t alone.

Paul wants me to give him hope and tell him everything will be okay. This has been a struggle for me because it doesn’t feel authentic. I don’t know if everything is going to be okay. Arabella might end up killing herself, hurting someone else, and being in and out of jail or mental health treatment centers the rest of her life. It’s very likely the life she will end up living. I think I will outlive my daughter. Where is the hope in that? I have been trying to offer up hope and encouragement even if I don’t believe it because that is what my husband needs.

So I guess in some ways it has been beneficial to have our lives fall apart so we are able to rebuild it into something better. There really hasn’t been much Paul and I haven’t been through in life and if we survive it, maybe we can help others.

I didn’t sign up for this..

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My daughter is still in jail. I think I am finally getting used to living in a constant state of uncertainty. I’m not sure when she is getting out. It could be next week. It could be a couple months.

This week Paul and I went to a support group for families who are dealing with family members with mental illness. Every single family there who has a mentally ill child Arabella’s age or older have or have had an incarcerated child. I found this to be shocking. We weren’t the only ones. Which makes me wonder how many mentally ill people are in the criminal justice system. And, how messed up is that? Because our child (and many others) is an adult, we could not get treatment for her unless she was a threat to herself or others. What a joke! And then, even if they hurt themselves or someone else, it is still hard to find treatment. Poor ratings from me for the broken mental health system.

My teenage adult daughter has been sitting in jail facing 3 felonies for the last couple weeks. Nothing new is happening with her case. She is just sitting there so she can’t come home and screw up her life some more. We got her a lawyer. We don’t want our daughter to be a convicted felon, we don’t want prison, we want mental health treatment. But her meds aren’t right. Although some are better than none, I guess. Both times she ended up in jail she was off her meds because she felt like she didn’t need them.

Talking to the other parents in the support group, I wonder if jail is just going to be a part of her life now. If it is, this will be the last time we get her a lawyer. We have spent so much money on her treatment already. Her two month stint in a residential treatment facility almost cost as much as a 4 year college. We’ve already paid the lawyer over $1,000. It isn’t fair to our other children and it isn’t fair to us because it is eating away from our retirement. Plus life goes on. We are paying her half of rent. We just found out she owes a lot of money for taxes because her online ‘modeling’ job didn’t take any money out.

I think my daughter is going to fail on probation. She is going to have to take her meds, be on time, have no contact with Will, and observe absolute sobriety. I would be a fool to think her prognosis is anything but poor. Plus, in the state she is in, she could harm herself or someone else all of which she has done before.

After she gets out of jail, Arabella is moving back home. It’s that or be homeless as she has nowhere else to go. We need to develop a safety plan because I’m not sure if I’m safe. My daughter is twice my size. She tried to strangle her boyfriend. What if she does that to me? I have to come to terms that my life could be in danger. Am I willing to risk that? I think I am prepared to die. I will probably have to keep my phone on me at all times and lock my bedroom door while I sleep at night. I will have to be aware at all times. Some of the parents in the support group got large dogs to alert and protect them.

My husband is gone a lot for work in the summer. At times he mentioned quitting his job so I’m not home alone. But I don’t want him to do that. Maybe we are worried for nothing. Maybe everything will be just fine. But we have to think about these things now. I don’t know if I will be able to call the police unless it is really bad. Growing up my mom tried to protect my autistic/schizophrenic brother at all costs. We had to protect Matt from the police when he attacked us or others. I grew up thinking calling the police was wrong. I just don’t know if I can do it. But I also think my mom didn’t handle things correctly. This has been triggering in so many ways.

I wish I could say I have been able to get it off my mind, but I can’t. If it is not front and center, it’s still percolating on the back burner. Some days are better than others. I’m starting to get used to it.

Gone

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The first indication there was something really wrong was when she came over in the middle of the night on Tuesday and knocked on our bedroom door waking us up. Arabella yelled outside the door that she needed to go to the ER. She was terrified she was starving to death. Her body was eating itself. Arabella is obese. No one in their right mind would think she was starving to death. She went to the ER. We tried to go back to sleep but didn’t have much luck.

Arabella came over very early Thursday morning because she had to tell me something. She told me that an old friend of ours who we haven’t seen in over 10 years raped her psychically while she was unconscious as a child. She could tell he was also raping his daughter (someone she never met) from looking at his Facebook pictures. She was ready to call CPS. She told her sister this and her sister said it wasn’t true and that she couldn’t ruin this nice man’s life by making false accusations.

Arabella then said that Angel was controlling everyone. Angel turned everyone against her except for the other family she moved in with for awhile. We were all deceived. But she also loves Angel because she has Stockholm Syndrome towards her. Angel could force her to laugh and smile. She could cause other people to hurt her.

Arabella told us she has Multiple Personality Disorder. She also has PTSD and when she does she has the ability to go into other people’s bodies and think their thoughts and feel their emotions. Through this she can understand other people’s lives.

Friday morning Arabella came over very early once again and excitedly stated she decoded the Bible. She understands it now. She talked animatedly about complex theological concepts sometimes hitting the mark, sometimes not so much. She said that Mary was raped. She would not allow us to speak. She said she was born again and is a new person. She didn’t feel like she was herself anymore.

Besides being out of touch with reality, I was very concerned at this point she was not sleeping or taking care of herself. She said sleep was something that mortals like me needed. My daughter was gone and there didn’t seem to be a single thing we could do about it because she is an adult. She is finally trusting me again and I was afraid any efforts on my part would break that trust and I would once again be a threat. Everything felt surreal. I can’t believe this is happening and I keep second guessing myself.

Later that afternoon, I just happened to look at my find friends to see when my husband was coming back for lunch. I noticed Arabella was at CPS. I tried to talk her out of reporting our old friend. I panicked and called their office. Angel also called their office several days before warning them that her mentally ill sister believes someone has been sexually assaulted but was not. She was also accusing other people of sexual assault whom she has never met because of her ability to go into the minds of others.

I think my daughter is schizophrenic. My brother is schizophrenic. My cousin is schizophrenic. Little did I know the worst was yet to come…

Diversion

/ Outrunning my demons / 4 Comments

My daughter was offered a diversion program that would dismiss her criminal charges if she complies with the program. She was charged with 3 misdemeanors. Compliance with the program includes 6 months of absolute sobriety, random drug tests, 20 hours of community service, staying out of trouble, meeting with the program director, and following all doctor’s orders regarding mental health treatment. If there is a positive drug test, she would have to go to an AODA treatment program.

Today my daughter decided to opt out of the program even though we told her multiple times it would be in her best interest to take it. She wants to get a public defender and face her charges. What she doesn’t seem to understand is that if she faces her charges and is convicted, she will have a criminal record where she will have a hard time in the future finding employment and housing. If found guilty, she will most likely face a hefty fine. She may go back to jail. If on probation, she will probably face years of absolute sobriety. If she doesn’t comply, it will most likely be jail time versus a treatment program. My daughter is addicted to weed and says it stops her from self-harming. In all of our neighboring states, she probably could get a prescription for it but not ours. Six months seems like a short time compared to all of that.

Arabella still wants to sue the police and bring down the whole police department for how they treated her in jail. They restrained her in a chair. Before her arrest she was self-harming, physically assaulted her boyfriend, and was making suicidal threats. The police put her on suicide watch and bruised her arms while trying to restrain her. So far no lawyer has wanted to take on her case. I’m not surprised, nor am I paying for a lawyer for something she has no chance of winning. She says she has PTSD and needs treatment because she was never treated worse in her whole entire life. I personally didn’t think it was the worst thing to happen because I want her to be afraid to go back to jail. It’s not a nice place. The only complaint I have is that they wouldn’t allow her to take her medication and that all got messed up while in jail which probably didn’t help.

Arabella also admitted on a recorded line to me that she beat up her boyfriend. I sure as hell hope I don’t have to testify against my own daughter. Her boyfriend wasn’t innocent in this either and is facing a felony and misdemeanor. But he opted to take the diversion program.

My daughter has been spiraling since her and her boyfriend broke up. One night she showed up late wanting to move some stuff back home. My husband and daughter got into a fight about her moving back home since my husband does not agree with some of her destructive life choices. I’m not going to get into that right now. Let’s just say there have been a lot of sleepless nights as of late and it is running me down physically. I’ve been on antibiotics the last couple days and I’m still not feeling good. It’s hard to think right now so I hope this isn’t just one big jumbled up mess.

We don’t want our daughter to move back home. I’m afraid of what is going to happen to me, to us. It was so hard to go through the first time. But we weren’t expecting it then. We feel like we have to at least try to help her.

One week after the police came over from the bogus call someone made on my son’s roommate, I got a call repeatedly from an unknown number. After a couple calls, I decided to answer it. The police were calling. A call from the police is not a good sign. Once again my daughter was on suicide watch and wanted a ride to her friend’s house. Paul and I were disagreeing about what to do. Paul wanted to bring her home and I wanted her to go to her friend’s house. I was almost ready for bed and I wasn’t going to be staying up with her all night but her friend would because they all tend to stay up all night and sleep all day. My husband picked her up and took her to her friend’s so she wasn’t alone for the next 24 hours. This all happened during a snowstorm with really bad road conditions. Because, why not?? At least it gave Paul and Arabella a chance to talk about their fight.

I am very sad my daughter decided not to take the diversion program despite all the advice to the contrary. I don’t know what is going to happen to her now. I don’t foresee this ending well. It is incredibly stressful and I don’t have any control over what she does because she is an adult. I just have a front show seat to a show I don’t really want to go to. I don’t ever see it changing either. It’s been really hard to handle. I don’t know what to do. I didn’t sign up for this. I’m fearful with every phone call and ring of the doorbell. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.

Doing time

/ Outrunning my demons / 5 Comments

It’s been a very long and stressful weekend. My daughter ended up getting arrested. It was bad timing because I had to work a trade show all weekend. But when is it ever a good time to have a child arrested??

My husband was supposed to work the trade show with me but had a conflict. He had an ice fishing trip planned before we knew the dates of the trade show. My husband has been going with the same group of guys for the past 10 to 15 years. I told him to go ahead, that I could handle the trade show with the help of James our previous employee who still works for the business we sold. He does some very part-time work for us with our new business.

Paul left early Thursday morning. The day started out fine. I ended up getting my nails done and visiting my daughter Angel for supper. After lunch it started snowing and we ended up getting more snow than was predicted. The roads were very slippery. My son ended up getting called in to work. He wasn’t home when I went to bed that night, nor was he back home at 4 in the morning when I got up to go to the bathroom. I checked my phone just in case my son texted since at that time he would’ve been working 12 hours and I thought he would be home. When I checked my phone, I noticed a missed call and multiple texts from Arabella. She said that her and Will got in a fight and she wanted to move back home. It was hard to go back to sleep after that.

I tried calling my daughter in the morning but she was sleeping and didn’t answer. I decided to go outside and start shoveling. We have a huge driveway and my husband took the 4-wheeler we use to plow the driveway. I was pretty annoyed at this point. I didn’t sleep well. I wasn’t expecting to have to worry about the driveway and my daughter. And I didn’t want to go to the trade show. Trade shows aren’t really my thing. I’m not a people person. Talking to people and selling a product to me is a form of torture.

Ten minutes before the trade show started I got a text from my daughter saying that her boyfriend and her were fighting again and she called 911. After an hour, they both were carted off to jail. Meanwhile, I was at the trade show having to smile and pretend everything was okay. Clients asked how my kids were doing. Great, just great! Smile, smile, smile. It was miserable.

The next morning my daughter called from jail. She had about 3 minutes on a recorded line. She basically told me that her and Will got into a fight. She left for awhile. When she came back, he had another girl with him at the apartment. She flipped out and beat him up. She weighs around 100 lbs. more than he does. In the process she got a black eye and bruised face. They both got arrested. She was charged with 3 misdemeanors, one being battery. He was charged with a misdemeanor and a felony. I was really worried because she admitted to what she did wrong on a recorded call. I didn’t have much time to think about it because I was off to a 10 hour day at the trade show.

The night before I talked to Paul and my other kids until 2 AM about what happened. I didn’t sleep well and was really exhausted. Paul was really upset and was going to cancel the rest of his trip. We were debating about bailing our daughter out. I convinced Paul we should continue on with our plans. The main feelings we felt were sadness and anger. Anger at Will and our daughter for getting physical in their fight. Sadness that the relationship they had was now over. Most people were angry with Will. But we didn’t think he deserved a felony. My daughter was at least 50% of the problem. It was very hard to see her mug shot.

Saturday was an exhausting day. Sunday was not much better. I was having insomnia and nightmares. At least it was going to be a shorter day at the trade show and Paul was coming home. Thankfully this morning we had an appointment with our couples counselor. I was worried about a lot of things. I was worried about my daughter’s pets in her apartment. They didn’t give her any of her medications at jail. She was off her meds for 5 days. We are leaving on vacation on Wednesday. Should we still go? The make matters worse, we are expecting a blizzard on Wednesday. My daughter had her hearing today. Would we bail her out or leave her in jail while we are gone? Did we need to get a lawyer? What was going to happen next? Could I get her key to check on her pets? Could I get her meds to her? One medication she wasn’t supposed to stop abruptly.

I felt like I had to put all my feelings on a shelf over the weekend. But maybe that was a good thing. The trade show was very distracting. Every evening James and I went out afterwards for drinks. I ran into some friends of mine which was nice. I didn’t have time to worry as much as I would’ve sitting home alone.

Right after we got out of our appointment with the counselor, we got a call from Arabella that both her and Will were out of jail. If they do certain things, their charges will be dismissed. They went back to their apartment. We sat down and talked to them for an hour to see if they would be safe. We came up with a safety plan. There was relief in knowing we didn’t have to make some hard choices such as if we needed to bail her out or keep her in jail while we were gone.

I was worried my daughter would be suicidal. She was on suicide watch at jail. Apparently they stripped her down and strapped her to a chair. In doing so they bruised up her arms. Her body was a big massive bruise. She was also self-harming in this whole process. Will said Arabella was banging her head against the wall and burning herself. He was trying to stop her. I was worried they might be suicidal or harm each other again. If they do, they will both be in jail for awhile.

I’ve come to the conclusion that this is the way my life is going to be. There will always be problems it will be hard to catch a break from. We are still planning on going on our trip. We might have to leave a day early because of the blizzard to make the drive down to Chicago to catch our flight. There is not much I can do right now. My daughter is an adult and my hands are tied. I don’t have much control over what happens or winter storms. But as of right now I think everything is okay and that is all I can ask for.

The little things…

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Sometimes the little things add up and just snowball. The last several days my anxiety and depression has been quite high and that has been making me crabby.

I think it started on Christmas Eve when my son Alex and his girlfriend were in a car accident after someone blew a red light. I am very grateful no one was hurt in the accident. But I am worried that his car may be totaled. He’s only had the car for a month. Finally he has a reliable vehicle to drive to work and then this happens. It’s just so frustrating. The collision center is closed this week…so we have to wait another week until we find anything out.

Meanwhile, we are getting antsy to get Alex’s old car out of our driveway. It has not been up and running since this summer. It’s not worth fixing but my son’s friend wants to buy it from us. I will be seeing him tonight and am going to try to set up a time for him to get it out of here. I’m not even sure it’s possible.

Arabella and Will still don’t have a car. I’m thinking of letting my daughter borrow my car over the holiday weekend so she can make some money doing deliveries to pay her rent. Between Arabella and Will, they totaled three cars since May. I’m a little worried about them borrowing my car, but it has full coverage if they total it. It’s been hard to find a reliable affordable car anywhere.

Christmas day all my kids came home for Christmas. Arabella came home sick with a fever and now Angel is sick. I can’t remember a time when everyone with the exception of my husband has been so sick. It’s been almost a constant thing for my friend and family circle over the last two months.

The day after Christmas my mom came over to do some volunteer work with Angel and I. It was very tense because my mom attacked my daughter via text. She said my brother Luke and I texted her merry Christmas and my brother Mark called. But Arabella was the only grandchild who called her on Christmas day. None of her other grandchildren care about her. When I texted my mom or anyone to wish them a happy holiday, that counts for my whole family. Part of the reason she feels this way is her own fault. None of her five grandchildren besides Arabella even go visit her at her house because of my dad and she chose to stay with him.

My mom likes to play the victim. When she started to play the victim with me, I called her out on it. I told her the phone works both ways. She said she didn’t want to bother anyone since she knew all of her grandchildren were celebrating on Christmas day with other family. I also said that my children and their significant others spent two weekend celebrating with her taking off work and getting gifts. Doesn’t that count? The time together was tense.

When my mom was here we stopped for lunch at Qdoba. My mom asked for a small amount of rice on her burrito. She told the guy he put too much rice on it and had to put some back. Then she also gave too much money to pay for the meal by a dollar. I think the guy thought she was giving him a tip but she asked for the money back. Sometimes my mom is rude to service people and I find it embarrassing. I’m not sure why she is acting the way she is and I find it to be stressful. I hate confronting my mom, but I’m not going to allow her to attack my kids.

Then yesterday my son said he was having problems with the bathroom in the garage apartment next door. With all the cold temperatures the water pipes froze and water from the toilet and shower are backing up from the drain on the floor. My husband has been trying to pour some warm water down the drain and it seems to trickle through. The problems with a large old house seem to be endless.

Last night the nightmares started up again and I was on an endless loop. If I left the house I was trapped in, I would be murdered. Everyone on the outside thought I was fine which made it impossible to leave because no one could see I needed help so I was stuck.

Nothing major is happening. It’s all these little things starting to snowball. It also seems I get triggered more during the holiday season. I’m not sure what to do about it. My parents and daughter Arabella are toxic people, and I just can’t seem to cut them out of my life. Sometimes their negative energy rubs off on me.

I’ve also been struggling more with aging. I don’t feel young, attractive, or energetic anymore. Yesterday I went snowshoeing and couldn’t get the clasps open on the snowshoes or tighten the poles. I struggled to get them on. My range of motion has diminished considerably. Afterwards I felt stiff and sore doing something I did easily before. I have problems opening jars and now I even struggle opening the child resistant medicine cap for my pills. My husband has been trying to talk me into a gym membership again. But I’ve been responding negatively to the idea. I don’t want to go to the gym and watch other people run when that is all I want to be able to do again. No thank you. I don’t even want to exercise anymore. It’s painful emotionally and physically.

I even got scammed by an ad on Facebook. I bought a jumbo sized mystery box that was supposed to be full of electronics. I was excited because the items in the box were going to be extra Christmas gifts for my family. I ended up getting a small box with a massage gun in it. Nothing says old like falling for scams.

Tomorrow I will try to be less crabby. #goals

Christmas Eve Eve

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Season’s greetings from blustery Wisconsin. We will surely have a white Christmas this year. It’s been snowing off and on for the last couple of days. It’s been windy and cold with sustained winds of 25mph and gusts up to 50mph bringing the wind chill between 25 and 35 below zero. This is our second named winter storm of the season. Last year apparently we only had one named winter storm. This is the third day this week my son has been doing snow removal. He has been gone for almost 12 hours now and I worry with the brutal cold. The wind is whistling through all the cracks in our house.

I like winter storms but I don’t like the thought of my son and other people working outside in these harsh conditions. I don’t like slippery roads. I don’t like the livestock and animals facing the cold. We are used to it though and life does not come to a grinding halt like you might think it would. If it did we wouldn’t get anything done in the winter. Paul is going to take Will to work tonight. It is too blustery to bike and he doesn’t have a car. He works second shift and I’m not sure how he is going to get back home. I’m trying not to worry too much.

Other than that, we have plans tonight. One of our employees from our previous company and who currently works with us on a limited basis now is coming over tonight. We are going to do some shop talk and then we will do some beer tasting, order pizza, and watch the Bucks game. Angel and Dan will be joining us.

The winter storm is supposed to end by tomorrow evening and we have plans to spend Christmas Eve with my best friend Cindy and her family. We started spending Christmas Eve with them a few years back. Then in the evening we will go to their church’s candlelight Christmas Eve service.

We will be spending Christmas day with our kids and their significant others. I’m starting to bake and prepare for that. Decades ago my MIL got me an ice cream maker. I haven’t used it in years and decided to dig it out and make some homemade ice cream. Today I made molasses cookies. There will be a lot of feasting over the next couple of days. I sure hope we don’t end up losing power with this storm. But the good news is that our freezer food should be just fine this time. We’ll have a lot of roaring fires in the fireplace. ‘Tis the season for dark, cold, and snowy days.

Warm wishes of a merry Christmas to you and yours. Yeah, my son just made it safely home from work!

Late night calls

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It sure has been a week. I received several late night calls and texts from my kids. I wish I could tell you that the worrying stops once they become adults, but I’m afraid the worrying never ends. I spent a good part of my week doing just that…worrying.

It started on Monday night when I got a call from Arabella. Will got pulled over for speeding and their car got searched. Now my daughter has possession of marijuana charges and a hefty fine. I didn’t sleep too well Monday night.

Wednesday night we had our first named snow storm. It started out as rain for most of the day. Then switched to a sleet/freezing rain mix before turning to snow. Usually I like storms if I know everyone is safe and sound. But I was worried and had a hard time sleeping because I know my son would be leaving in the middle of the night to do snow removal. I worried about him driving in bad road conditions. I wouldn’t have worried so much if it was just snow, but the layer of ice really had me worried. I shouldn’t have been worried about him because he was fine. I ended up getting a text from Arabella in the middle of the night saying that Will drove home from work too fast for conditions and damaged the car.

Thursday evening I picked up Will and Arabella after they dropped off the car to be fixed. It was a stressful evening because we talked a lot about problems. They were late for rent this month and now Will also has several thousands of dollars of medical bills he thought would be covered by insurance but apparently were not. Arabella also thought her best friend or his love interest may have stolen her ADHD meds because she can’t find her medicine. We also talked about charges and fines.

Then that evening after 10 I got a message from Angel saying she thought they had a gas leak in their house. They had been sick for the past several weeks with headaches, nausea, and vomiting. They ended up calling the gas company and waited outside in their car until they came out to their house around midnight. I did feel a little better sleeping that night because I knew they called someone and weren’t just going to sleep. What if something would’ve happened to them and I did nothing? I don’t think I could live with that.

Then Friday afternoon while I was originally in the middle of writing this post, I got the call that Arabella’s car was totaled. It was another stressful evening because I worried about what they were going to do. They no longer have a vehicle and my daughter is paying her rent by doing food delivery. As of right now, I’m not sure what is going to happen. I told my daughter I would drive her around to do her deliveries tonight.

As I worried about all my kids this week, I had to remind myself how much they have grown and matured over this past year alone. I so much want to just go in and fix everything for them. What parent doesn’t want that? It’s stressful to see them hurting or thinking about them dying. I worried maybe Arabella and Will would be suicidal. I worried about car accidents and gas leaks. Being a worry warrior is my super power. The sleepless nights and anxiety doesn’t serve me well though. I have to remind myself they are alright right now and hope for a better week ahead.

Gratitude tomorrow…

/ Outrunning my demons / 2 Comments

Yesterday I found out one of my blogging friends passed away after a long battle with depression. I wish I could’ve done something to help her. A couple weeks back I noticed her blogging patterns were off. She posted one day like normal and then she just disappeared. She no longer liked or commented on my posts either. A week went by, then another week. I was really getting worried. What if something happened to her? I decided to do a little poking around. I had her name and a general location so I started scouring the obituaries. Nothing…

For awhile I had a sense of false hope. Maybe she was in the hospital and couldn’t update her blog. Maybe she got in a car accident. Maybe she was taking a break on the beach of some nice resort. Maybe she was sick with a fever. The nagging voice in my head said maybe she was dead. Nope, couldn’t be that because I didn’t find an obituary. Maybe, maybe, maybe…until one day I saw a post from her family with her obituary.

Did she know the last time she posted it would be her last? She never said good-bye.

It hurts. Even though we never met in person, I felt like she was a good friend. On a hard day, she often would write an encouraging comment. I just can’t believe it. She was an inspiration to many, especially those struggling with mental health issues. Maybe some day I will go back and re-read some of the things she wrote but as of now I just can’t. Good bye Ashley, you will be greatly missed.