It’s 3:40. I’d love to be asleep. I got 2.5 hours of sleep. I went to bed at fucking 8pm. It’s been a long night.

I didn’t manage to talk to my family about the phone call yesterday. I will when they wake up. I heard back from the therapist we met with last week. This person seems to ‘get’ how I do therapy. They are encouraging us to set up relationships with therapists for most of my family members and a family therapist. In their opinion it would be good to have an intensive 2-3 months for “getting to know one another” then back burnering the relationships until a crisis hits.

I love this therapist. I think that is precisely the correct way for someone with my problems to do therapy. I need help sometimes. I can’t figure out what to do on my own. But if you try to meet someone during a crises… that doesn’t work well. You need to establish contact during a time of relative calm and get to know one another and establish trust. I can’t establish trust if I’m hysterical. I don’t trust anyone then.

This is going to be expensive. But it will help me get where I want to be in 20 years.

The family therapist will work with all four of us sometimes and hopefully sometimes just me and Noah.

All four of us get to spaces in an argument where we have trouble listening and hearing someone else’s point of view. Outside intervention helps that process.

I’m happy that this therapist is very concerned that Eldest Child not is acting like Future Middle Child is The Problem. That’s not true. Ok, so FMC (how’s that for a new nickname?) is very explosive and has anger issues that need to be worked on so they stop hitting their sister… but that’s not the same thing as being The Problem.

It’s more complicated than that. It always is.

They are recommending somatic work for me. I’ve done primarily talk therapy my entire life. I have never worked with a somatic therapist. I think that it is a good suggestion to focus on what is going on in my body with my emotions in the moment instead of always trying to talk/process old trauma. That seems like it might have some genuine value. Especially while I’m pregnant and having ALL THE EMOTIONS right now. This embryo, soon to be fetus, needs me to calm the fuck down.

I’m thinking a lot about my brother Tommy. My mom cautioned me against a third child because… look at my brother. Tommy was born after 45 minutes of labor and he didn’t stop running until he was hit by a car at 12. He was an alcoholic and drug addict. Yes, by 12. He was sensory seeking to a degree that my mother truly could not cope with. Given how I’m physically feeling since this pregnancy started (I mean for fuck’s sake… it’s been like 2 weeks and my body has EXPLODED with energy) I am already thinking ahead to a highly sensory seeking child. Given that I’m god damn tired already from dealing with children for 9 years… oh goody. I see why Tommy threw my mom for a loop. She was tired too. Tommy and Sissy are about as far apart as EC and Lightning will be. And my mom started at 19, not 27.

I keep feeling like we should move away from a city. I feel constant anxiety about all the things I could/maybe should be doing. I should find a way to fit in more cultural experiences. More activities. More socializing.

But I’d kinda like to be boring as fuck and live my life as a home body in the woods. I went back and forth from cities to the woods as a kid. I always liked the woods better. I like people in cities… but I get so overwhelmed. Too many options. Too many decisions to make. I’m too exhausted to face my social calendar by the time I’ve made all the decisions I have to make in order to decide what things to do.

Wouldn’t it be nice to come “into town” a few times a year and have a lot of experiences then and go home and… just live.

I really like being outside and exercising with the kids. We are getting seriously into our bike rides. Yesterday the kids and I did 6.3 miles. We are prepping for this summer when we will ride our bikes 3 miles each way to the water park. (I love our tiny, dinky little water park. Two big slides. One circular/lazy river thing. One pool. One toddler splash zone. It’s small and usually not crowded.) In order to handle the 6 mile ride round trip, plus swimming, plus their daily PE classes… we have to work up to that before we get started. That’s going to be a lot of damn work.

But it feels so good.

I’d love to take my kids hiking in the woods more. But the drive to get to woods kills me.

I like how when you live in the woods it is a lot easier to get up and just do your thing. There are fewer bright, shiny distractions. I’m a reader. I like making shit. I never run out of things I want to do. I don’t get bored.

Only boring people get bored.

Sometimes I get restless and that’s a cue I need to switch activities… but that isn’t truly boredom. Boredom is forcing yourself to not pursue change.

I’m never going to stop having friends. No matter where I live. I spend most of my time with my friends on the internet anyway. This week I had a Skype date with my Sarah and we both cooked dinner at the same time. It felt *wonderful*. It felt loving and tender and fun. We got to talk about what we were separately making and everything else in life. It felt validating and inspiring. I love my Sarah so much. I’m so glad she likes talking to me and helping me puzzle through life.

I’ve been talking to my Jenny weekly on Skype. I’m getting to see my newest niece a lot, granted slightly pixelated but whatever. That feels really nice too. We are so different in personality but we like each other. It feels like family. This relationship feels like, “Even though you get on my nerves I still love you.” Specifically I usually feel like I get on every nerve Jenny has. I’m way too fucking argumentative. But she loves me anyway. Even though I’m difficult and irritating. She’s loved me for almost 24 years and counting. Only 6 years to go before she is the longest relationship of my life.

My Pam is checking in on Skype as she can. I find it funny that one of the things Pam believes is most true about her is that she’s a bad listener. But she’s one of the best listeners I know. She is so curious. She is so interested in finding out about why things work the way they do. She is absolutely determined to be part of change in this lifetime. I respect her so much. I love her. I love how she laughs and the stories she tells. I am endlessly grateful that she shares her family with me. Her sister is a delight and a joy and I’m glad I get to adopt her too. Pam’s mom is really awesome too. She used to bring my kids over to hang out with her grandmother before her grandmother moved back to Taiwan.

My children are very blessed.

Many other people are checking in on IM services. I’m having long conversations with many people who love me and whom I love.

My existential loneliness shit is… not because I’m actually unloved or abandoned or ignored. It is about brain chemistry.

I miss Twitter. But I’m going to get over it.

I think that if I moved to the woods, where it was cheaper, I’d fly to visit friends a few times a year and otherwise be ok.

I don’t know about my family for sure, but I think they’d adapt.

Do I want to leave my bathroom? No. But if I could sell this house for serious bank I could move somewhere else and build an entire house to my specifications. I have ideas. I have stuff in my head. I should start sketching just because.

Since I won’t be traveling the world with my family… what should we do instead?

My real dream is to buy a piece of land that is zoned for multiple houses and build a main house and a bunch of smaller houses so my friends could follow me if they wanted to. Or I could find people who are local to whatever area and make connections. I’m adaptable as fuck.

I would seriously love to be responsible for essentially a whole housing development of weird houses. Because you know that my designs are going to be wacky.

And by housing development I’m thinking 5-10 houses.

But that was yesterday’s random fantasy. Who knows what will happen.

I feel less self hating today than I did for several days. That’s good.