So in the past few weeks I have been in a few situations that have been challenging for me. They have been challenging for me because of old baggage and *not* because of the people I have been interacting with–let me make that clear. Ok, on to my babble.

So Jenny stayed with us a lot during her time with the bay. I was really happy to see her and spend time with her because I have missed her a lot while she has been across that really big ass pond. I started getting cranky towards the end and I had trouble figuring out why. Luckily, my wonderful Jenny was happy to put up with me babbling about feeling pissy and explore my feelings around where I thought it was coming from. She was really awesome about not being defensive and not interrupting my ‘process’ so that I had time and support to figure out what was going on. What I kind of figured out after a while was that Jenny was operating in a weird amalgam place where she was not really a guest (after 15 years she’s just not a guest) but she wasn’t acting like a member of the household exactly. Mainly I mean that she added a little bit of work (because extra bodies in the house do that) but she wasn’t doing any work. The main reason she wasn’t doing any work is because I am the biggest, most neurotic control freak in the world and I HATE having anyone do anything in my house because they don’t do it right. So uhm kind of mixed messages for Jenny there. She was being very tactful and trying to not step on my toes, which I appreciate. Once I realized that I was feeling resentful of her not doing stuff (this took three or four conversations to figure out) I asked her if she would be willing to do a couple of chores and she said sure, no problem. Cause my Jenny rocks like that. It was really awesome that I could get through my pissy feelings and come out the other side of them feeling good both about the fact that I did the work to figure out what was really going on and that the other person standing near me loves me enough to help me however she can. It was really wonderful. I’m really glad my Jenny is so awesome to me.

And then I drove out to Arizona (still there) and I’ve been helping my Sarah unpack. Many people helped Sarah pack and some of them… did not do things how I would. I’m going to be very civil and polite and just say that I don’t understand what goes through other peoples head. Why in the hell do you pack boxes of clothes mixed in with half full bags of chips, used facial tissues, used q-tips, candy wrappers, random bathroom stuff, and a few things from the kitchen just for fun. Seriously. WTF. Given that I am well aware that Sarah did very little of this packing it’s just not ok to be irritated with Sarah about this. But that kind of random flotsam and jetsam has been present in more than half of the boxes so far. It’s been frustrating. I started getting to a point today where I was getting seriously angry. So I opened a window (it was getting really hot and stuffy with the drier on), went and got myself a bunch of water and swigged it down fast, went to the bathroom, then was ready to try and talk through what I was feeling. I babbled at Sarah for a while about different sources of irritation for me and how I was processing each of them. Eventually I got to the point in my rambling (in a not great tone of voice but I kept telling her that I wasn’t mad at *her* I was just Having Feelings!) where I realized that I was feeling triggered.

See, when I was a kid–starting around 11ish–my mother would drop me off at my sisters house during school vacations. My sister would then take off to party the whole week leaving me with her kids. For about a month before my vacations my sister would stop doing dishes, cleaning the house, or doing rudimentary garbage pickup. This continued until I moved out and said, “Fuck no.” So I spent a lot of time having to rifle through random debris and clean and clean and clean. Going through Sarah’s stuff was starting to feel like that and I have many many years of anger built up around how my sister behaved in those situations. Thing is, Sarah didn’t do this. And Sarah is not forcing me to be here. I drove 740 miles to volunteer to do this because it is very important to me. For me to turn around and be a nasty bitch as I’m doing it seems… uhm… not useful to her or me. But it was really profound for me to realize just how much anger and bitterness I’m holding on to around this topic. Once I really got to the point where I realized what I was so upset about… it faded. I just wasn’t mad anymore. I wasn’t really reacting to the current situation. The current situation deserves a little irritation, cause dude–used q-tips?! But it doesn’t deserve anger and I certainly don’t need to be treating Sarah badly because of the actions of other people. And I am not being victimized here.

It’s been a really good couple of weeks for me figuring out long-embedded baggage. I’m feeling both kind of raw because of the depth of processing going on and really proud of myself for figuring shit out. I’m also feeling really really good because I am getting to help my friends. Jenny really did need a home base and despite my crankiness I provided that and she felt secure and welcome enough to know that I did really *want* her there. I feel good about that. I am getting to help my Sarah. I am getting to prove myself useful in ways that I can do that will majorly make her life better. That is so very important to me. I want to do whatever I can for the people I love and there isn’t much else I can do for my Sarah at this point. So man am I glad I can do this.

And I miss Noah and his willingness to cook and provide food on request constantly that is exactly what I want because we have long since worked out that process. 😀 Being able to travel is so important to me and Noah supporting me in doing it is really wonderful. I have such a great husband. And going away reminds me intensely of just how much I love him and need him and appreciate him. And he gets some time off from my constant neediness so he’s generally effusive in his attentions for a while after I go and I really love that. 😀