Category Archives: people hacking

Trying to find the right mirrors.

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I have a lot of people in my life who will tell me what is wrong with me and why I am fucking up. There aren’t very many people who spend enough time with me to be able to give me serious feedback on what I do right.

The mom of our former babysitter is an evangelical Christian. She’s seriously interested in converting people to her version of love and light and all that. She tries really hard to be positive even though she has a lot of anxiety and depression issues too. We’ve seen her a bunch of times already. Every single time we see her she comments on things she sees that are positive. “Wow y’all are really good at compromising and negotiating.” “It’s so nice to see siblings getting along so well and trying to be kind to each other.” “You are all trying so hard to get through work even as you are distracted and tired; that’s not easy and you are doing really well.”

I feel like a plant getting water. And I feel like I am a terrible energy vampire because I want more. More. MORE.

I feel my shoulders coming down. I feel less defensive and sad.

It’s not instant. I’m not going to get over this in a week. It’s been a bad two years for me since they left. I miss this family like an open, bleeding wound. And I feel like I’m starting to get a transfusion.

I love them so much. I am so grateful that they embrace us even though we are not like them and we do not share their values and we do not have the same life goals.

I feel accepted.

This is how all fucking Christians should fucking act.

Growing pains and mistakes

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Many of my friends are traumatized people. When they respond to me or give me feedback… they are not taking careful stock of what I am doing and reacting to my actions. They are responding from a place of wounding. That’s not wrong and it’s not bad and it’s not always irrelevant… but it’s important for me to keep in mind so I don’t flagellate myself to death because they are upset at what I am doing. Their reaction is more about them than me. But I take it hard.

I try hard to ask a lot of different kinds of people about my behavior for that reason. I try to ask people with a wide range of backgrounds and experience. I try hard to regulate myself more strongly off of people who have actual relevant experience in whatever issue I am trying to deal with at the moment.

Sometimes I really fail at that and I spend days raging at myself and feeling like there is absolutely no hope of me ever being better because I have triggered a traumatized person. That’s not very useful for me, my husband, my kids, or even my friends.

I’ve been reading more psych books. Because I’m trying to find the middle path.

No, offering my children a variety of not-so-comfortable inducements that they can try and reject at will is not the same thing as spanking them for being bad. It just isn’t. We are trying things because I am out of cope and some of the things we try are going to be less than optimal and they will fail.

That’s fucking life and it isn’t the same thing as child abuse.

We tried it. The first day they thought it was very useful to them and they wanted to try again. The second day they didn’t like it and they felt kind of bad about it and they said they didn’t want to do that again.

Ok. We won’t do that again. My goal was not to inflict pain or punishment on them. It was to create a less comfortable environment.

The fact that folks would be totally ok with me drugging the shit out of my kids to have a similar kind of behavioral impact is utterly bizarre to me.

I am trying to figure out what lines need to be held. I am going to mess that up sometimes. We renegotiated academic goals about a month ago. We halved the work load. I tried to hold the kids to what they agreed to because that is my job. But it may be that once again the goals we set are not the right ones and we will have to adapt.

I am freaking out partially because I have not stood next to people who did this well. I am faking it. I don’t know what the hell I am doing. All my classroom experience did not prepare me for this part. In a classroom, the standards are arbitrarily set by the state and the students measure up or they fail. I am not setting arbitrary standards for my kids. I don’t have “You must be x proficient” goals for them and thus we are flailing really hard as we figure out what our goals should be and how hard I should insist on meeting the goals the kids claim they want to reach.

This is a process.

But I need to stop screaming.

I don’t have rest. I don’t get much support. Almost everyone who says, “I will help you by doing x” has turned out to be fucking lying and I need to stop allowing anyone to claim they will help me with my kids. It just results in me hating my friends with the fire of a thousand suns because almost no one follows up on what they say they will do.

The people who have absolutely rigorously met the standards they set for me are rare. I can pretty much count them on my fingers. I think that the fact that they go off of one hand is something that I should be celebrating instead of being so upset that the number of people doesn’t reach my toes.

But people keep making promises and not keeping them and that hurts me.

I don’t feel entitled to that hurt and that’s part of the problem. I don’t let myself admit to myself just how much these people are hurting me until I am exploding with rage all over the place because I can’t suppress my feelings anymore. I try hard not to get angry about people saying “I will do x with the kids” and then never doing it because I want to honor that people mean well. They want to be helping me. But the reality is that most of the time they want to feel helpful not be helpful and I need to stop looking to those people. Really almost any people.

We need to find a way to balance this so we can be self sufficient. That is not what I have been trying for…. ever.

The psych book I’m reading right now Born To Be Good talks about how in the US people define themselves as individuals (I’m an artist, a runner, a dancer, a writer) and people in other countries tend to define themselves through their relationships (I’m a daughter, a mother, a wife, a friend, a cousin) and a lot of my problem has been that I have been trying as hard as I can all of my life to define myself through my friendships because the daughter/sister/niece roles failed so abjectly for me.

But my friends have not been able to turn and be stable for me the way that family relationships do for other people and that’s been really destructive to my entire mental health.

Leaning this hard on my friendships for my identity and my self worth has resulted in decades of feeling worthless and like I should kill myself because no one is ever going to prioritize me like I do them. I hurt myself showing up for friendships when I should be selfish and care for myself and that’s stupid.

For the last couple of days I have been trying to process for myself that 50% of all people who hit grade 12 in school are below proficiency. My 5th grader is already writing essays that rival many of the 17 year olds I taught.

Maybe I don’t need to be so worried about them being “at grade level” and doing all the busy work of going through school. My kids have a very solid grasp of grammar and math. They are approximately at grade level. They would probably be B students if they went straight into school right now for the last few months of this school year.

Why am I so freaked out every moment of every day about failing them as a teacher and not preparing them for what they need to know? Because nothing I did was ever good enough to make my friends show up for me in the ways they constantly claimed they would so how can I know if what I am giving my kids will be enough for their future so they can show up and do what they want to do?

Maybe that isn’t entirely my battle to fight.

My kids have been digging in their heels and doing less and less. They were told weeks ago when we reset the metrics that they had to be current in order to go hang out with the babysitter. They then messed around on the boat and did nothing and got a week behind. They have not been interested in catching up since they got here.

Why am I wearing myself out trying to force them through the work necessary to earn the free time they want to have? This is so stupid.

I know that they can get all of their work done in 2 hours a day with time to spare. Maybe I need to give them two hours to do it then kick them out to play outside by themselves while I have down time. If you don’t get your stuff done so you can go with your friend, sucks to be you. Play by yourself and get out of my face. I act like I owe them constant stimulation and entertainment and so do they. And it is turning me into a psycho harpy. This is not working. I can’t be 24/7 stimulation for 3 kids and have anything left for my own health.

I don’t think we should lower the standards to nothing and completely unschool. But I also think that if they want to fail and not earn rewards…. I should let them. I have not been letting them. I have been hurting myself dragging them to their rewards.

Why. What am I teaching them?

That I care way more about their happiness than they have to. I care more about their happiness than my happiness or Noah’s happiness or my health.

Why.

Because I am afraid that if I don’t they will treat me like my friends.

You know what? I am leaving the fucking country because I am so angry about how my friends treat me. I have chased people for years begging for their love. I’m doing the same thing with my kids.

This is stupid.

Mixed feelings

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It may have been the best school day of this school year. Apparently kneeling on rice is a fabulous inducement?

I have so many mixed feelings.

By “best” I mean that we worked together without fussing or yelling or being nasty about anything. Nobody had to be glared at. “Ok, it’s x’o’clock and you haven’t finished, time for 15 minutes of work on rice.” Then all of a sudden they finished SUPER FAST and they weren’t upset and I wasn’t upset and the work got done…

Being mean is being nice. Being nice is being mean.

Parenting is so confusing.

I feel physically better than I have in a while. I didn’t yell today. My body is very happy about that. I am really embarrassed and ashamed of how much I have been yelling. I have been very out of control.

If I tell the truth and set boundaries people will leave me.

Maybe only the people who need to be gone from my life anyway. Even if that hurts. Maybe hurting and setting boundaries is good. How many times do I have to learn this fucking lesson.

Maybe less hysterical, we’ll see.

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This year… the kids don’t want to do academics. But they have lofty goals. If my kids told me they wanted to grow up and be a hair dresser and a mechanic I would not be so obnoxious with them about academics. They want to be engineers and politicians according to their stated goals and that means you fucking have to do academics.

Why am I freaked out all of the time? Because I’m never doing one thing. I’m taking care of a nursing baby (which is a lot of fucking work), cleaning up, helping with homework, being a travel agent, and I’m supposedly disabled and I should be doing many hours a day of body maintenance. Do you know what I haven’t done in a week? Any of my fucking exercises because there is fucking always three things more important. Dealing with rental cars and shopping. More baby care. Big kids refusing to do academics unless I stand over them and scream. I am back up to 121 emails (like half of them are requests for me to review every stupid company I touch. They don’t want my reviews. Y’all suck.)

I feel like I am always a day late and a dollar short.

Like a month ago we negotiated with the kids to slash their workload massively. Much lower daily goals for work. What happened when we negotiated that? They stopped doing absolutely anything and are now three weeks behind again and I want to put my head through a window.

So they don’t get to see their babysitter until they get their shit together. They have already blown 7 possible days with her and they may not bother to work today and miss more days. We are here for 27 days.

I can’t make them care. If they don’t get it in gear by the time we are in Japan, we will have to shorten the trip to Scotland and come back to the US. Our traveling adventures can’t happen if they refuse to make any forward progress. I’m not asking for up to grade level. I’m not asking for a normal “school” work load. But you must do something. If you refuse to do anything productive at all, we are not fucking doing this. We will move somewhere cheap because I am not going to enjoy anywhere we move and it might as well not cost a lot of money. Which means the schools are going to be rough. I’m sure my kids will get the crap beat out of them for being weirdos as is the standard American experience.

Oh well. I can’t save you from you getting consequences and I am tired of trying.

I’ve been talking to a buddy who is a horse trainer. She tells me their lives are too comfortable and I need to start making it very uncomfortable to not comply. Don’t hit them. Don’t abuse them. But… they have a lot of comforts and they don’t need any of them.

She’s not wrong.

I don’t think they need to get so much choice and freedom for a while. They currently think they are the bosses of me and I don’t fucking think so.

If this shit continues I am absolutely going to kick them out at 18 and say “I don’t talk to people who treat me like shit.” And that would suck all the way around. Maybe some soap in the mouth so they realize that dressing me down all day long isn’t ok is the lesser evil.

So yesterday we talked to the kids about how things are going. The kids know they aren’t doing what they say they will do. Like EC didn’t do 1 day of work out of the 10 days we were on the boat despite spending 6+ hours a day “working on homework”. I am infuriated because this shit fucking sucks. Being stuck in the room doesn’t bother her. She has a lot of fun. My buddy suggested kneeling on rice for 15 minutes to keep her from doodling and having fun the whole time.

Today her math is done by 9:45am because I told her at 10 we would start 15 minutes of rice to help her not be distracted.

I don’t want to enact negative consequences. I want them to just want to do the thing. But they don’t. They set up long term goals, and they ask me to help them reach those goals. Then I have to be the heavy being a butthead to drag them kicking and screaming towards their stated goals. This is not fun for me.

I think we should figure out an online math tutor. Maybe if she had outside accountability and someone else saying they are disappointed in her…. she would care more?

MC has been treating me really badly. When the old babysitter arrived for dinner (I barely let the kids talk to her, she was here to visit me not you) she commented on how shocked she is that their behavior has gone down hill so much. They are incredibly rude to me and it’s not ok. The other day I was eating lunch and grading MCs homework and he sat in a chair in front of me and just started kicking me. For entertainment. This shit is his norm right now and I am about to explode and beat him.

Maybe soap in the mouth isn’t so bad.

He says he wants to be respectful, but currently he is not managing that at all. He is too comfortable in his established routines. Something needs to change.

I desperately hope these negative consequences are not going to be long term strategies. I desperately hope we can do this for a few weeks or months and change our patterns of interacting.

We’ll see. If things aren’t different in 6 weeks I’m picking some town in Oregon or Idaho or Washington and we are just moving there. Not into a fun forever home. Into somewhere cheap so they can attend public school for a year and we’ll spend that year figuring out what to do next.

We wanted to spend 2 years traveling so we could find a forever home that feels good. Maybe we can’t get our poop in a group and we don’t get to do that.

Life is complicated.

I can’t help but feel like part of this is fall out from the fact that if I had tried to hold boundaries with Sarah I would have lost her years earlier. I had to accept whatever shitty treatment she felt like giving me or I would have lost what minimal support she gave and that was too painful.

I don’t feel good about myself. But. Time to do more work.

I feel like I’m going to stop breathing

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If you tell me where this post is linked (and I get to go verify it) I will send you $20. Who in the hell is causing me to get so many damn hits on this post?

Holy. Shit. This is the month. 18 days. 13 days till my baby turns 1. We aren’t having a party. I am definitely depressed. I don’t feel able to reach out to anyone if my life depends on it. I am leaving. I never get to ask for anything again.

I get these people and the folks who voluntarily ask to be part of our life. I don’t have the right to keep begging people to be in my life.

I think back to Eldest Child’s huge first birthday ten years ago. I thought we were going to be part of a big community. Well, when I stopped doing all the driving those people dropped me. Ok.

I feel so incredibly hurt by all of the people in the Bay Area who drove past me to help other people but fuck me I should do everything alone.

I am leaving partially because if you asked me for help I would show up. Even though you treat me like shit and I know it. Because that’s who I am. Thus I am moving to get the fuck away from your using ass.

“Aunties”. Fuck it.

I am so bitter.

There are a lot of days I wish that having kids wouldn’t have worked out so I could be dead already. I am so tired of feeling abandoned and unimportant. When I ask you for help and you tell me no but you drive even farther to help someone else you remind me of my mother. Anyone but me deserves help.

Fuck me. Why am I still here? Why haven’t I died already.

Things like: when I used to try hard to be part of the home school group I would find out that all of the major decisions for when and where to schedule big events were made at private “just a couple of friends” off shoots of the main group so that my schedule was never taken into consideration. “Well this is what works for us. You can either come or not come.” *hair flip*

Yeah. I see you there. Why don’t you go do all of your own work from now on.

You have no idea how much satisfaction I get from having over a dozen people tell me that the group sucked after I left. No shit mother fucker. That’s because you all suck and I tried to rescue you from how shitty you are but it was too much work. Go to hell.

I am not willing to invest in the new group at all. It’s too late. Not even in terms of time. I am angry and bitter and I owe none of you a god damn kind word let alone labor.

I feel sick to my stomach thinking about how much damage I have done to my body helping people. I drove to fucking Arizona and caused pre-term labor problems doing manual labor for someone who didn’t really appreciate me.

Because I’m stupid.

Because I don’t value myself.

Because I treat people allowing me to work for them as the same thing as love.

I mean, she did kind of appreciate me. But not enough to talk to me on a vacation I’m paying for when her more interesting boyfriend is present. Not enough to keep her promises. Hell, not enough for her to bother remembering that she made promises! Fuck me.

I really don’t want to feel bitter like this. It really doesn’t help that a lot of this is so old.

It dates back to when all of my siblings were good enough to stay with our parents and I couldn’t. Because I was too much trouble. I needed too much help. So go stay with people who hate you and talk all day long about how much you are shit.

We will never go camping again because how dare I act like able bodied adults showing up and expecting a disabled adult to do everything for them is rude.

How dare I act like I am anything other than a menial serf here to do your labor for you. You are the good one. The one who grew up with a family and parents. You deserve good things. I should wait on you because that is the natural order of things.

Waste people don’t matter. They should serve the people who matter.

Fuck you. And fuck you. And fuck YOU with a chainsaw.

Fuck you and fuck you and fuck you. I am so mad. I am so bitter. I am so angry.

Fuck Marcie. Fuck Chris. Fuck Laura. Fuck Kira. Fuck Deborah. Fuck Alex. Fuck Desiree. Fuck Jen. Fuck fucking Tamy. Even though it hurts so bad I feel like my chest will implode: fuck Sarah.

You treated me badly and I did not deserve that. I can come up with excuses for all of you. Your feelings are so much more important than mine. I can justify you dropping me or ignoring me or lying to me or not keeping your promises or you thinking that everyone else is more important…

BUT FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU.

I get to be mad. I shouldn’t take it out on everyone else in my life but frankly talking about it helps me not do that. It helps me compartmentalize it.

I am angry with these people because they actually did things to hurt me. Maybe if I name them I will stop feeling like I am a monster who is blasting everyone in the world equally even though most people don’t deserve it.

I wanted some people more than others. It wasn’t returned. I feel like the problem came partially from me being stupid and allowing myself to like them so much. I shouldn’t have. They truly weren’t worth it.

That’s the trouble. These people make me feel like I am unworthy of being alive and none of them deserve that power. They aren’t worth me feeling this bad for this many years. I have cried for literal years over every person on that list of names. Because they didn’t love me like I loved them. Maybe the trouble is I pick selfish assholes. Maybe part of the trouble is I know that I have to get very angry with those people; I have to move; I have to create distance or I will be pathetic and crawl back and continue to beg these fuckers to love me.

And they aren’t worth it.

Maybe if I write it down I can put it down.

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I heard the end. I kind of recognized it as it happened and I kind of recognize it in the rear view mirror.

I like doing things for people. I like feeling useful and valuable and like I am of service. It’s a pretty overly core part of my identity. Many of my relationships involve a lot of me doing work for benefit of other peoples lives. I like being a supporting character in your story. I love you and I want you to have a glorious story arc that has nothing to do with me. So I’ll show up and clean your house.

I’ll drive across state lines to unpack and repack you while you are too depressed and in pain to do it for yourself.

I’ll take you with me on major vacations, even to other countries.

I’ll buy a fucking time share so you can have the vacations you want that you can’t afford.

But when you spend a week ignoring me on the week that was supposed to make up for you ignoring me for a year and you turn to me and casually say, “Oh by the way I need to talk to you about using next years points for a trip with my family” that I am clearly not invited on….

I just because an ATM to you.

No. Done. Stop. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

Nobody gets to treat me like an ATM. Especially not a rich white person. I don’t think so.

That right there is my line. I can see it very clearly. You stopped seeing this as a relationship where you have to give back. I’m supposed to keep giving to you no matter how shittily you treat me. No matter how much you cancel plans with me because everyone and everything else is more important.

It was a solid year of you canceling 80%. You wanted me holding time open for you so that you could cancel at the last minute. That makes you feel wanted and loved and connected. You could show up if you felt like it. I feel like you very rarely fucking prioritize me while expecting me to prioritize you greatly physically, spiritually, and financially.

Never make someone your priority when you are their option.

I wanted to be as important to you as you are to me. I was an important source of labor and money. You didn’t show up to be support for me.

You promised me that you would have strong relationships with my kids. I can count how many times you’ve seriously spent time with them in the last three years on my fingers.

Stop acting like I can’t track things and notice patterns. I’m not stupid. You make promises you won’t deliver on and you broke my fucking heart.

And you told me that you dropping me was all my fault because I got too angry. A lot of why I was angry is because you make promises and don’t keep them. So this cycle is all my fault.

Ok. I will step out of it. I don’t need to be in it. Then it won’t continue. Then it won’t be my fault. That is the power I have.

I know. It is never your fault you cancel. You are disabled. Hi. According to the very expensive team of people I pay I am disabled. And I am hurting myself by trying to show up for people who have no regard for me or my limits.

When will I decide that I am worth treating like a person of value? Because as long as I keep getting myself into situations where I believe I must stay in the relationship because I have known them for X time and I need them to stay in my life or it means I am bad and unworthy of having relationships…. that’s not a good dynamic. I should keep people in my life if I feel better about myself with the relationship instead of worse.

I turned hard to her when the cheating debacle went sideways. I was not allowed to pour myself into romantic relationships. I tried to have a major non romantic relationship.

It was never as major on the other end. I am very optional. That’s healthy! I need to… understand that this is very optional.

And stop picking the option that makes me cry. Cause hey dumbass, if you keep doing the same thing over and over hoping that someday someone will finally treat you well… fuck it. Move on with your life. There are 7 billion people. Don’t chase people who are going to treat you like an ATM. That’s not psychologically healthy.

What a day

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Yesterday, for all kinds of reasons, was awesome. Middle Child decided that instead of lots of academics he wanted to clean the whole apartment. He spent an hour and a half on it. I allowed it. He was doing work for the family and it is unusual. I’m not sure why he decided to spend his morning that way but I appreciate him taking the workload off of me. Eldest Child got 18 pages done. That is by far her best day. She’s two days behind now. She’s feeling really excited. She won’t be caught up by the time we go home because we are taking some time off of academics to look around but it’s feeling pretty good.

I feel so much more calm and relaxed about it than I have in a long time.

I’m trying to figure out how to write about something and not be mean because being mean isn’t the point. I don’t want to inflict pain; I want to record my process.

I think this needs to not be a break with Sarah. I think this needs to be the end. Something I have struggled with for years–it was the primary reason living together failed–is that Sarah chronically over promises and under delivers. She always has a good reason for her not doing what she promised. It’s usually health related. And then if I get mad then everything is all my fault and she has to retreat because she is triggered and she drops more promises and she hotly defends herself and blames it all on me.

This relationship is not healthy for either of us. She needs me to never get angry about how she drops things. She needs me to not notice and to just show her a happy face all of the time and I can’t do that. If I get angry she tells me that I am triggering her, which is a reference to her mother.

For the record her mother beat children.

But frankly she is just like my mother. She likes making promises she has no ability to keep just because making the promise is as good as doing the thing in her mind.

We hurt each other so much.

For her, intention is as good as delivering. But I half kill myself keeping my end of bargains because intention is absolutely nothing to me. I get the work done. Even if I’m a nasty bitch in the process.

But then she doesn’t want to be near me because I’m a nasty bitch. Fair. Then her share of the work doesn’t get done and I’m left holding the bag and everyone in my family is left dealing with my hysterical anger.

This is so incredibly unhealthy and I need off this train permanently.

That sucks because I love her so much I feel like I will crumble into a ball of pain without her. But my children need me to be consistent and that’s not possible if I am ever looking to Sarah for anything. Because I don’t have enough spoons in my drawer to cover her just…. not doing what she said she would do and never ever admitting that she didn’t show up.

I can’t.

This sucks. I wish this could be a break. But it can’t be. We can’t be close friends. We hurt each other. I hate having to be an adult. I hate that I have to never come back to this because my children need me to not be on this roller coaster.

I’m glad she has found a partner. I hope it lasts. I hope he meets her needs. I’m glad she has many other friends. I hope they take care of her. She deserves to be taken care of.

But I can’t do it. I hurt myself trying to be dependable for her. I hurt my kids when she doesn’t do what she says she will do.

Neither is ok.

Fuck.

It’s not that she does nothing for me! I’m not claiming that! But she makes a lot of promises and keeps a few of them and that’s not something I cope with well. The complete and utter inability to be honest about it destroys me. I am angry for months. My kids don’t deserve to deal with that.

In order for me to be the person I want to be I have to be honest about my behavior. I am a basket case when I am looking for Sarah and she’s “too busy” and she makes plans and breaks them. When I’m not looking for her, I manage my spoons better.

And frankly in the last year I haven’t seen many friends because I budget most of my friend-time for Sarah and then she frequently cancels and I don’t get to see anyone at all. That has been hurting me a lot and it is good that she sent me a “Fuck you, you can’t fire me; I quit” email. I’m not sure if I could have made the break. I love her so much. I’m ride or die. But if you quit on me I can respect that and stop chasing you.

Now I will never need to show up and do a ton of work for her again. Wow. How many things could I do for myself with the energy I’ve spent on her? Soooooooooooo much.

Much like how the Bonus Mama firing me was a really good thing for my family, we’ve all done so much better without the drama the Bonus Family brought into our lives…. we will be more stable without Sarah. Without her promising things to my kids she won’t deliver on.

My kids already know that when Sarah promises something they have at best a 50/50 chance of getting it and that really sucks.

That’s what I grew up with.

My kids know that if I don’t deliver on a promise I will acknowledge it, apologize, and make it up in some very specifically delineated way.

Sarah doesn’t do that. She can’t. She makes too many promises to too many people and she spreads herself too thin to make it up to anyone. And the apologies? Heh. Ha. Yeah right.

This is a gift of freedom and I need to take it.

It’s time to go.

I think if I am ever going to know in my bones that I deserve better than my mother gave me that I need to stop replacing her with friends who will treat me the same way. It’s not that I don’t love Sarah or my mother. It’s that the way they are in the world hurts me. It doesn’t hurt everyone. Some people are good enough with their boundaries that they don’t believe the promises or leave space for them in their lives and they can do fine with the disappointment.

I don’t do well with disappointment.

And that’s really something I need to be aware of and deal with. I need to insulate my children from that. I need to not invite it into my life constantly. Constantly. CONSTANTLY.

I need people who under promise and over deliver. And I think Sarah was the last person left who is completely the opposite. I loved her too much to do anything about it. I guess I got mad enough that I caused the break up? Was that passive aggressive of me?

I didn’t get mad because I wanted the break up. I got mad because I was promised attention but because I was grumpy she spent the trip in her room and then told me it was all my fault because she was triggered and has to flee my ill temper.

That’s fair. You shouldn’t have to be around an angry person.

But yeah. I’m not an angry person all the time. I have absolutely been grumpy for a while because of math and Eldest Child, but my fury is different.

I take responsibility for my side. The best part about the break up email is that there was only blame. Everything was my fault because I wasn’t cheerful enough.

That’s clear. That’s a pattern I can’t ignore.

I need to take that as the sign it is. And be done.

Intensity balancing

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There is this thing where I am super intense. I wear people out. So I try hard to limit how much people have to put up with me. I carve out chunks of time or small slices of topics that I think are “acceptable” to share with a given person. Something I am noticing more as I get older though… if I very carefully limit what I share with someone… they don’t reserve space for me. Then when I come back to try and get more…

The spot I used to fill in their time/life has been filled and there isn’t really room for my intensity anymore.

Oh, shit.

So it’s like I shoot myself in the foot.

My kids did stupid shit yesterday and risked getting killed. I’m still trying to regulate my body from that. I took two sleeping pills (7 hours apart) last night because I couldn’t stop crying and shaking.

The first thing I want to do is turn to my friends. That’s complicated.

No Pam, you are right, my friends can’t love me enough to make up for me not loving myself. Because my friends are off finding partners (good for all of you) and my friends have big families they are involved with (I’m so fucking glad) and my friends have jobs/vocations (this is mandatory for survival!) and I don’t begrudge anyone any of that. People do think of me.

It’s true.

Ok. I am no longer talking behind anyone’s back if I process this because I have expressed it to the people in question.

I plan things with people because I want to soak in people. Because I want to crawl around in their brains and talk to them for hours and hours and hours. Like Disneyland. I spent… I don’t know how many months planning that. More than six. I wanted Sarah’s juicy brain. She wanted to feel special at the center of all of her people (totally valid!) and that means… there wasn’t much time for me. And the other friend who came said out loud that she wasn’t there for me she was there for Sarah and to read a book.

So I spent a lot of the trip feeling like dog shit. I spent that much time and energy planning to be with people I love very much and uhm…

Yeah. I got to wave at the people I love. I got to have a few meals with them where I could barely fucking understand the conversation because my hearing ability in loud restaurants is so shitty. We had few meals in the room together and I felt awkward and uncomfortable during them because I felt like I was forcing my presence on people who just wanted to use an apartment and not be bothered.

That came hard on the heals of having to surprise go to Texas and deal with the fact that one of my brother in laws is dying and my mother in law was a cunt and I did two weeks of work in one week so I was exhausted and….

I can’t keep pushing myself this hard hoping that I will get jolts of energy from my friends. I won’t. I won’t get these glorious long conversations where I feel good about myself and good about my journey and good about my relationships. Because people are busy and people have filled up the intensity spots in their life. I am someone to stand near sometimes and… yeah.

It was kind of like when I went to Alaska and my friend’s partner refused to let my friend pay attention to me.

My friend’s partner had the right to insist on her husband focusing on her. That’s right and just and appropriate and I don’t get to complain about it. But I can feel sad.

Sarah should focus a lot on her boyfriend. (There were some complicating details there that meant he did need some extra attention and I support that.)

But I can feel sad.

I feel very very sad that I waited all year for this and now my chance is gone and I’m not going to get it back. I need to just keep moving with this hole in my heart.

I feel selfish and horrible. I feel like I am so very very very very bad that I want so much from people and I don’t deserve to get it and I should stop fucking asking for it. Because other people are being just fine. I am the problem.

I am always the fucking problem.

I am so overwhelmed with feelings. I am tired and frustrated and sad and sad and sad and sad. There are so many reasons I’m overwhelmed. Those reasons are valid and it’s ok that I’m having giant feelings.

I can’t keep being unmedicated. This is so brutal. Where can I travel with pot.

Canada is sounding better. Uruguay. Ecuador. Portugal. I could find it in Australia but it is supposed to only be for medical patients. Switzerland. Estonia. Germany at some point. 

I am scared right this minute. It is hard to shake the abject terror I feel right now. I showed up here having big feelings about a lot of people and then I feel like I watched my kids risk their lives and I am a volcano of feelings.

I love my friends so much. I feel so bad about wanting them because I feel like I put inappropriate pressure on them. How dare I be so selfish and want so much of their attention. They are sharing with me what they want to share with me and I am an ungrateful piece of shit.

Then I withdraw and ask for less and I hurt more. And then when I do see them the pit of need is even bigger and the amount they have to share with me feels so much smaller in comparison to the void I have in me.

I understand, Pam, why you are afraid to call me. I am sorry that I am like this. I am sorry I am sorry I am sorry.

I feel like I am doing absolutely everything wrong.

Something needs to change.

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Ok. I’m in a cafe with music I like playing. I have my braces on. I need to be home in 90 minutes. Let’s see if I can defrag my brain.

I had a great therapy session today. We talked about the difference between PTSD and autism and how my various issues are compounding on one another. We went through which of my choices they were responding to last week (yes they were in fact biting their tongue to not say WHY ARE YOU MAKING BAD CHOICES) and why I am making them.

They are worried about Malaysia because a melt down there could have bigger consequences than in many other locations. That is a valid fear. But I have pretty good reason to think that I’m at risk if I melt down in a lot of places and I don’t honestly think Malaysia will be harder than a lot of other places. I believe that I will keep a lot more to myself. I will have to go rest faster because the consequences are extreme for a fuck up.

Why am I going? Because Noah was invited! How often is he going to be invited to a Muslim country? Probably not that often and I want to find out what it feels like in my bones. I want to taste the air and meet all the wonderful people who are living full and complete lives that don’t resemble lives I already know about.

The lack of medication is going to be hard. Sarah says I should get Prilosec and she’s not wrong.

But bigger than that trip is how we live our lives over the next few years. Sarah points out that I’m doing this thing where I completely deprioritize myself and I have done so while breastfeeding before. My shrink was adamant that my experience of decentering myself and my needs is absolutely board standard for breastfeeding parents. This hormonal soup is hard. But this is going to stay true for another few years and I need to manage my big kids. I can’t treat them like they are as important as an infant. Well… importance doesn’t feel like the right word. Their wants aren’t urgent. Their needs can be somewhat delayed without a problem. They are old enough that we should start having times when they come second or third and that’s healthy and appropriate.

It’s not healthy nor appropriate for me to always come in fourth or fifth place.

I am proposing a basic change to our schedule. I want to request that we all have one hour off in the afternoon without screens or the right to ask anyone for anything. No snuggling. No questions. Unless you are bleeding, figure it out for yourself for one hour. My big kids are 8 & 10. This is absolutely appropriate.

Also, we are talking about mixing up the order of our day a bit. Noah is not getting enough uninterrupted time to be creative. That’s a problem. I absolutely understand how hard it is to be creative when you are interrupted every 15 minutes for bullshit. His job requires near constant creativity. It’s not ok that we are acting like we don’t get to set boundaries with the kids. This is an extreme over correction.

I am proposing that I take over breakfast again and Noah work in the evenings after dinner and he gets to sleep in. That after dinner time is a great window for the kids getting predictable screen time (if they get their chores done) in a way that allows me to rest when I’m most tired. Noah is more of a night person and he likes those evening hours for creativity. My best creative hours are 4-8am. We are very different people.

I feel like we have been flailing and failing to create the structure that allows the kids to know what to do and when. I’m tired of having to be a jerk to get them off of the screen in the middle of the day. If they get the screen at 2pm, I am usually getting nasty to get them off for dinner around 6. Sometimes they tell me they don’t need to eat. That’s not good.

I am really struggling with how much my kids blow me off unless I get nasty and throw a tantrum. Everything short of that is worth ignoring.

I am not ok with this dynamic. It means I get to be an abusive bully or I get to be abused. Both suck.

I don’t want to abuse anyone. I need to learn ways to defend myself without being nasty and the last two weeks I have *sucked*

I am having a hard time setting boundaries all over the place and part of it is how worn out I feel. I feel like I’ve been massaged with a cheese grater. That’s not a great feeling. I’m exhausted. Taking care of a baby is draining as fuck. The whole first year is hard. I could seriously use a night of sleep and I am not going to get one for months. That’s hard to contemplate. My body has needs and those needs are not going to be met for months.

How do I find space for that? How do I find space to be gentle with myself as I cope with being pushed well past bearing? How do I find space to be nice to the most important people in my life?

How do I stop feeling hatred because I am so far past capacity I have nothing but hate left. That is the worst feeling.

I never want to hate my loves. But frankly, when I feel like I’m losing my mind… I do. I hate the whole world. I hate every person who wants me to think or interact or work. I get so tired and empty.

And filling my bucket feels so hard these days. I don’t even know what I need. I need time. I need to feel interesting. I need to feel like I have potential and worth and value. Not from working.

That’s so hard.

What kind of worth do I want?

I know I spend so much time on advice forums because I want my shitty ass life to help someone else have a better life. Not that my life is currently shitty. Past tense. I want to feel like the experiences and wisdom I have are valuable. Not because I serve you. Because it is wonderful that people exist who share what they know with the world.

I want to feel like I am more than a mommy/wife appliance. I want to be something that impacts other people. That is a big part of filling my bucket. I adore my family–don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to stop home schooling. I don’t want more space from Noah. I want to have a self outside of them the way Noah gets to but my available hours for such an existence is so small.

I need to take my writing more seriously and I feel like I have danced around that for years. I am so afraid of trying to be an authority about anything. I actively hide from being allowed to be authority.

Sometimes I wonder if my kids are disrespectful in the ways they are because they are learning from me that I’m not really worthy of respect. I sure act like that. But I don’t know. They are their own people and sometimes their behavior really sucks. Because they are people. Because they are kids. I don’t think they suck extra hard or anything. They are very normal. And I need to teach them how to treat me and I’m sucking at that.

This is tied into appearance stuff. I have to care more about how I look because I have to show people how to treat me. That’s so hard. I have been asked to leave businesses because I didn’t look good enough to be a customer. I’ve had the police called on me because I looked like a vagrant on the road trip. I am not imagining it that I ping a lot of “icki person” buttons for people and quite a lot of people are innately programmed to be mean to people they perceive as lower than them. It’s absolutely normal. And hateful. And cruel.

I remember when D told me years ago that if I don’t want people to be mean to me for looking bad then I had better do the work to look better.

The unstated implication there is I deserve the mistreatment if I don’t jump through hoops to be “pretty enough”. That feels degrading. I feel angry about this situation. But my anger doesn’t do me any good and it doesn’t change the fact that the world is full of abusive monsters.

This weekend someone told me that she thinks that something isn’t abuse if it is common/normal. I accept that she has this perspective. I wildly disagree. I used to know a woman who is part of a very specific culture. In her culture people with mental illness are to be entirely shunned so they don’t hurt the rest of the tribe. Guess what? That’s abuse.

If your community thinks it is ok for you to die because you aren’t good enough that’s abuse. Ableism is pretty standard in this country. It’s abusive. It’s normal for doctors to provide shittier health care to black women in this country. It’s abuse.

A great many traditional parenting practices are completely fucked up. I’m not going to get into them. Because shit I don’t want to argue. This is my opinion. You are allowed to have yours.

I need to create more space between me and my family so that I get to exist. Or I am not going to be able to be a healthy member of this family and that will mean that I have to go.

Ok. Time to create space.

The video game stuff. Ugh. Ok. So. When I say that video games are triggering what I mean is that when the topic comes up I am instantly full body flooded with adrenaline. I want to fight. I want to hit. I want to scream. I want you to get the fuck away from me before I hurt you. My early experiences with video games often revolved around people hurting me if I wanted to play. My body learned that this experience, this hobby, are not safe for me. Could I unlearn this reaction? Probably. With time, effort, and a lot of EMDR therapy.

Do you know what I don’t fucking care to pay for a bunch of therapy to fix?

My issues with video games. Therapy is expensive as shit. I can’t manage to fix everything.

When people are sitting around discussing their video games in a completely chill way I spend my time fantasizing about head butting them so that I can break their nose.

It’s not fun to be in my head through this process. Feeling this nasty, this angry, this much need to FIGHT hurts me. I feel sick.

It’s not fair for me to have to go up and down this roller coaster just because someone else wants to have fun. That’s not ok. So I finally said that I need that to be a boundary entirely. The kids are trying. EC asked me if she has done ok in the last few days and I told her yes.

My kids do want to be considerate. They just don’t always succeed. They are kids.

I need to teach them. And being a nasty bully isn’t the way.

And it also isn’t ok for me to have to beat myself in the head in order to accept what is happening me. That is also not ok.

Do you know what else sucks?

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If I am honest and I talk about the fact that I feel like I am out of healthy coping methods and I want to hurt myself…

someone is going to reach out to tell me that they can’t read my blog anymore because they just can’t with that bullshit.

It’s someone different every year.

Dude. You never have to read this. Ever. Ever. Ever. Ever. Ever. Ever. eVar.

You also don’t have to tell me that you are out of patience with me not having the spoons to cope in ways you want to read about.

Everyone has a price.

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I’m pretty sure that everyone who reads this knows I have issues with control. Selling the house is hard on a number of levels. I have put so much physical and emotional labor into this space. It’s complicated because I never wanted to live here… but I grew where I was planted.

I was willing to accept half a million dollars below market value so that I could visit my art in the future and I could feel appreciated for having made these cool things.

My friend came over yesterday and told me that their intention is to paint over the whole house. I think they will keep the tile in the bathroom, but I got the impression that even the trees might be painted over.

I felt like I was punched in the gut.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

I can’t devalue how much of my body and life went into this house. I can’t fuck my family financially so you can erase me.

They are going to paint over it with a nice cream.

A nice cream.

I mean, that’s a lovely thing to want. But you can pay market value for wanting that. Market value in my neighborhood starts at $1.2 million, not $750,000. Shitty condos in my area are selling for more than $750,000.

I am cannot subsidize your dreams at the expense of all of my own. Accepting that much less money means Noah will have to wait longer to retire and one of our biggest stated reasons for selling the house is so that Noah can retire earlier.

No.

I can’t accept that offer. I will hate myself until the day I die for accepting that my work here was worth so little money in the scheme of what things are worth in this valley.

The house was a nice cream when I moved in. (Not really. It was a crappy white. But what-fucking-ever.)

No.

I can’t subsidize that. I can’t. It would be violent erasure of myself for me to accept that. It would be accepting that I only deserve to get the actual money I’ve already paid back and my improvements are worthless.

No.

That’s… no.

Apparently my price to be erased is higher than that.

tracking exercise and baby

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Her sweetness is now three months old. She is smiling way more. I moved the six month clothes out because they are starting to get tight. (We really prefer baby clothing to be slightly baggy for ease of outfit changes.) She’s much more alert and awake. Older siblings are very actively involved with her. They both think she’s great.

According to Fitbit the past 28 days have seen an increase of 74% more miles over the previous 28 days. The fourth trimester is over! Time to move! Now that the fourth is officially over we have a baseline of walking approximately 3 miles a day.

Yes, yes Disneyland.

It was suggested to me that I look a ways out on the Metro line in DC. I found some apartments that seem way more reasonable in price but it’ll mean more walking. If we save about $5,000 over the course of three months on rent but have to walk about 2 miles a day round trip to the station… that’s not all bad. But means we will need to be seriously acclimated to 5+ miles/day in order to have fun and learn well in the museums.

The best day in the past four weeks was 5.5 miles. In that time 86 miles total.

Realistically in DC we will probably go out four days a week and hide at home three days a week cause we are tired. We are like that. I don’t know that we will actually land in the apartment I liked the best today but if I plan around that just a little to mess with math that’s ok. The grocery store is about 3 miles roundtrip. It’s close to the Metro Station. That means that even if we stayed home three days a week…. assuming 5 miles of walking per day is wise. So 35/week and over four weeks that is 140 miles.

Given that I’m going to be doing this with a baby and we don’t use strollers and we are going to be grocery shopping on foot… I’m going to be doing that with 25-40 lbs on my body. Starting this winter.

Noah feels a lot more comfortable with his current fitness level than I do. I’m not ready for that.

Starting this winter. And I haven’t lived in snow since I was seven or eight.

It’ll be an adventure.

I’m getting rid of stuff in batches. Every time it feels shocking because I can get rid of a giant pile and not feel like I’m making a dent. Yet there is more breathing room at the same time. It’s confusing.

I had initially packed all of our fetish clothing. That’s so dumb. Naw. I’ll send it off into the world. Have fun little fetish outfits. Three more boxes to fill instead. That’s better.

How many boxes do I even want? That’s a big question right now…

You need to get over it, for the sake of your children… now.

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I had my first session with my shrink in a while yesterday. We focused on what stuff I need to work on to be a better support to my kids. It all came down to one thing though.

I do not perceive myself as a good person who makes mistakes. I perceive myself as a monster who sometimes does the right thing.

In my shrink’s opinion as long as this is true I will not be able to help my child deal with their overwhelming shame.

They said, “You are a good person who makes mistakes. Until you believe that about yourself you can’t teach it to your child. So you have to learn how to believe it, now.”

Sure. I’ll just do that.

Support is amazing.

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There’s a thing going on with my child that I haven’t written much about because it isn’t my story to tell and I’m worried about their boundaries. But I want to express gratitude for part of it in my records so that in the future when I feel like stuff is hopeless I will have to acknowledge that hope does exist.

That thing that happened last summer. Between my big kids. The thing that wasn’t cool and one kid ended up feeling upset but not permanently wounded and another kid ended up feeling like they are a monster in training.

My child isn’t a monster. But a serious mistake was made and learning from it and growing past it are part of life’s difficult process.

We’ve been struggling a lot with the growing past it part. Kiddo is still feeling like they are bad and there is no redemption for them. Dude. There’s so little in this life that cannot be redeemed. Especially something you do as an under ten year old child. That’s just… life… Just about all of us fuck up. How do you internalize that and integrate it and become a better person?

That’s what life is? I think?

But the support I am giving my kid is insufficient. I reached out. I emailed my shrink, the kid shrink, our family shrink and I said, “I don’t know how to help my kid through this. I am failing them and that means we need to find new tools because it is not ok to fail them on this topic.”

I feel so grateful that we have these folks in our life. Hey L, you recommended a great shrink for me! And they have been able to recommend a whole string of useful people! This has been the best therapy rec of my life! Gosh I owe you for this.

So the three therapists talked to one another. They came up with a couple of layers of strategies and they emailed back. They are going to help us as a family create a ritual to release the shame. We are so woo and this absolutely right up our alley.

I feel overwhelmed with gratitude that I found support folks to help my family learn how to grow together towards health and love without shame.

We are so fucking lucky.

Judgment and internal compass

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I feel like a flaming asshole for comparing the two dudes I saw at the party. I’m doing it less to make any kind of point about them and more to see for myself where my earliest judgments about people are proven true later.

My family is talking about moving constantly. It’s a huge focus of conversation and thought in our house. What is it going to mean to us? How is it going to work? No one thinks this house is long-term appropriate so moving is in the cards…

I am going to move somewhere and not have an entire back story with people. I will go to parties and not have a minimum of two former lovers in each room. It’s going to be… different. I depend a lot on the experiences I’ve had to decide if a person is safe or not. I’m going to throw out all of my hard earned experience and go start over.

Only I’m not really throwing it all away.

I’m thinking about the differences between the two men because I’m thinking about how to look for signals of appropriateness and compatibility in the future. Not for sex necessarily, but for friendship.

I like how God talks to me. Even though I was a very fucked up teenager who totally wanted to go there again after he realized that he didn’t want that kind of relationship with me he proceeded to enact healthy boundaries and stay my friend. He has never spoken to me disrespectfully in over 20 years of knowing one another. He’s not a braggart. He’s humble and giving and compassionate. His wife is a nice lady who has never boundary stomped with me and instead she is excruciatingly polite to me.

How do I look for people more like that in the future?

Well… for one thing when someone wants to sit me down to tell me how life is going and mostly I hear brags about how important they are at work… probably not going to be my kind of person.

It’s not that people are wrong for taking pride in their work. That’s totally ok. But if I’ve known you for a decade and we haven’t really talked in 3+ years and most of what I hear is that you are the only competent person at your job…

Mostly I’m going to hear that you don’t have a lot of respect for the people around you. Because in my experience most people who brag that they are the head of a department because no one else is competent… uhm… Hey… Dunning-Kruger…

I mean. I’m not saying that other dude is actually crappy at his job. I am not evaluating that in any way shape or form. But a complete lack of humility is a sign I probably won’t like someone.

And the fact that other dudes wife walked into the room and yelled, “AGAIN?! Don’t you know what causes that?!!”

Yeah. I know we had to go to the nice doctor who did the original vasectomy and get a reversal and then there was a whole process after that. Yup. I’m totally fucking aware of what causes my current condition.

And go fuck yourself.

Yes yes, you morally superior one and done people. I don’t give a flying fuck.

(I think it is fine for people to have one child. I think that it is obnoxious as fuck for someone to act like their choice is THE moral choice.)

When I had an issue with God’s parents… he stood up for me and did not allow them to verbally be rude to me. When I have issues with other dude’s family/wife… he just kind of looks down. Because he knows better than to sass the Head Bitch In Charge of his family… even as he snarks her and low level disrespects her constantly.

I want more people in my life who are consistent, respectful, and compassionate.

I don’t always pick poorly. Sometimes I manage to stumble across people who give me hope for my species.

It’s like my friend Y. A gal I’ve known since middle school. I visited her in Tennessee and I bought her the car. She’s generous, compassionate, and kind. Absolutely consistently across the board even when it isn’t easy for her.

I do have a good picker. Even though I doubt almost everything about myself and my ability to evaluate if people are good or not.

But then we get into serious asshole territory. I’m not actually evaluating if people are GOOD or BAD. I’m evaluating if they are compatible with me. I’m evaluating if they model the kinds of behavior patterns I want my children watching and emulating. I’m evaluating if they are people who will help me feel like there are people who want me alive and who care about me.

Not that my life should depend on the evaluation of anyone else. I know that’s fucked up.

But can I go find people who will treat me in a way I want to be treated? I’m a picky and demanding bitch. I’m also generous and compassionate and I’m quick to step up if someone needs help.

I like people who want to be the helpers instead of people who want to be told how cool they are.

And that doesn’t really make someone good or bad. But it does decide a lot about how compatible I will be with a given person.

There is a big piece of me that is fairly terrified of trying to build a new community. That sounds hard. But I think back to the people who joined the various communities after me. The people who bravely asserted themselves and created spaces that were uniquely *them* shaped.

I can do that. And if I can do it without feeling constantly haunted by all the rapists from my past… maybe it will even go better. It’s not that I will find a community free of rapists… such a place doesn’t exist… but maybe my avoidance won’t kick in for a while.

I don’t know.

I want to believe that I can go find new good people. I want to believe that I am capable of attracting people who will be good to and for me. Not attracting in the sex sense. Just in the friendship sense. Because in the long run, my friendship with God is what has made him so wonderful in my life. The hour we had sex…. well, it was fun… but that’s not what defines our relationship.

I am so grateful for the lessons I have been able to learn with the people I have been privileged to know.

But maybe it is time for some new lessons.

Trying

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I tried to talk about sex stuff yesterday with Noah. These conversations are harder for me than you might assume based on my willingness to write about sex. I talked about how I have a hard time with the fact that my masturbation must be discussed (I have to get permission to orgasm… at all…) but his is off-screen.

It’s not that I want to control his masturbation. It’s that his desire is off screen.

We’ve had this thing for years where he tries to balance my fucked up “won’t say no” crap with… not initiating sex much. It’s a good way for him to ensure he’s not pushing me into something I don’t want. I respect that. It’s a reasonable plan.

Only it means that 100% of the push for sex in our marriage is supposed to come from me. And that’s not as sexy as it sounds. It winds up with me feeling like I’m supposed to turn myself on and be excited about sex and just show up ready. That’s…. not my favorite. It stopped particularly working a long time ago.

So how do we navigate between the landmines of I’d kind of like to feel like my partner actually wants sex with me enough to bring it up and I’m a fucked up person who doesn’t set healthy boundaries in the moment because I have all kinds of messed up stuff around owing Noah and me not in general having a right to say no to sex and….

So I get that this is shitty for him. It’s not fair. It’s complicated. But it’s also not exactly a walk in the park for me. If I’m expected to just show up turned on… yeah that’s not always going to happen. So if the frequency for sex has to come spontaneously from me without outside influence or turn on… then uhm… don’t be upset if it takes me a while between that being true. And he does get upset. Not like mean to me upset, but it feels bad to him.

So he wants me to spontaneously initiate sex all the damn time because I desire him so much.

But then we run into another issue. I’ve had it programmed into me since I was literally a child that I’m kind of a monster if I push for sex.

“I won’t say no” (on Noah’s end) isn’t the same thing as a partner who feels like they are enthusiastically there for the same thing who also initiates and indicates interest and asks for things.

Let’s talk about bdsm stuff. Noah has long said he’d like to practice rope stuff. This only comes up if I mention it. Which means I end up feeling like this is one more thing I’m pushing and I shut down. Which prompts Noah to feel like I don’t want to do bdsm with him.

And round and round we go.

How to get things started is hard.

We both have different “I won’t say no” responses. For him it means that if sex is brought up he will always say yes because he always wants more than he is getting. He always feels like sexual contact is a good thing. For me, sex has been currency as long as I have been alive. So I feel like saying no to it is doing a bad/wrong thing.

Which is complicated. I am hyper aware that Noah is a better husband than I deserve. It wouldn’t have been possible to observe my sessions with the last therapist I fired and not notice that clearly the perception is that Noah is better than I deserve. She spent a lot of time talking about what I owed Noah for being so nice to me.

That’s the thing. If you are nice to me, I owe you for it because there is no chance I just deserve it. Because I’m hard and not really worth it.

And so if I need more from foreplay I should shut up and suck up that need because I am really not worth more effort than I get. Which makes saying “slow down” or “not yet” almost impossible because I know that doing so is inappropriate because I already ask for too much in a global sense.

So during this pregnancy when Noah has invited me to hang out with him while he was masturbating… that’s probably been some of the most creative sex of our marriage. It doesn’t always result in PiV but occasionally it does. It’s more about being around each other. If I need to just lay there and watch it’s ok. Because he didn’t ask me for sex. I didn’t agree to sex. So I don’t have to feel like I must follow through no matter how I feel. It’s been really nice for me. It’s been a window into his sexuality without me being on the hook for following through on an activity that might literally hurt me.

I’m really sorry that my vagina is broken.

This stuff is really hard to talk about. I feel so much shame for being so broken. It isn’t my fault. I can’t do anything about it. But I inflict it on other people by existing.

So yeah. It’s hard to talk about sex and ask for anything.

Market forces

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There are few phrases that Noah can utter that make me twitch more than “market forces”. I’m not nice to him about this.

Whenever he says this, no matter what the context or conversation, I am instantly in the mindset of “Oh great the rich white man who was set up from birth to be one of the most successful people of his generation is going to lecture the white trash whore on our relative values. Great.”

I don’t think that is what Noah means when he says it. But that’s what my brain does and it makes it very difficult to hear the conversation. I know this is a me problem.

It doesn’t matter how much basic value or truth there might be in the conversation he might be bringing up. It doesn’t matter how neutrally he means it. He might be talking about something 100% removed from me or my life and I’m still… stuck.

This is going to have to move to the “work on it” list but I don’t know how to get past this twitch. I don’t know how to get past the basic fact that I view him as having just about endless value and I am worth nothing.

What does that mean?

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Tonight FMC asked me why I call them “angel”. I asked them if they know what an angel is and they said not really.

I told them that angels are spirits. Mostly they are basically good but some of them are dark. Angels bring gifts like joy and love.

I said that they brought joy and love and happiness into my life. So it’s like they are an angel sent to me.

They asked me, “Am I like a dark angel? Like a demon?”

I asked them what they think. Like I do.

They said, “I don’t know. I do the wrong thing a lot.”

I said, “That’s because there are a whole bunch of things you want to learn and you can’t learn without making mistakes. Wanting to learn doesn’t make you a demon. Trying something that turns out to be the wrong thing doesn’t make you a demon. Setting out to be cruel is different. Setting out to hurt and damage people is different. Purposefully trying to destroy people…. that’s evil.”

“I don’t do that!”

“No. You don’t. You are a kid who is trying to learn who you want to grow up to be and sometimes in that process you make choices that are not like the choices you hope you will make as a grown up… because you have to learn. The fact that you keep trying to be better… sweetheart that is about you reaching for the light. Dark angels don’t do that.”

Their face relaxed and they smiled at me. They told me that they love me.

I love you my baby.

We have to reframe this.

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We are having a problem because EC is pushing for more individual space and boundaries. It isn’t a problem because she wants it. It’s a problem because FMC is uhhhh not interested in allowing their sister any space at all.

We have been talking about this in the house for a while. We keep coming back to “We are not willing to escalate punishments to the point that they are more effective and the ways we have tried to punish for this interruption are failing entirely.”

We need to find a way to incentivize instead of punishing away this behavior. I believe in behavior extinguishment… but it’s complicated. Punishing often makes a behavior more entrenched and resistant. (For one thing our “punishments” are pansy ass and we know it. We are not here to hurt or shame our kids.) We need to find a way to make giving someone else space something that gives FMC more of what they want in life. We have to find a way to frame this/phrase this as “Here let us show you how you will get what you want if you go along with this boundary.”

I know that some people don’t like how manipulative I train my children to be. I respect that opinion. But I think my behavior as a human being improved when I learned how to think about my behavior in terms of “Will this help me meet my goals or will this create problems for me?”

I don’t believe in training children to follow rules because they are rules and you must follow rules. That’s bullshit. Some rules need to be broken. Some rules need to change. Some rules just don’t fucking apply to the situation we are in.

Why does this rule exist?

I’m not saying I have to fully agree with every rule in order to follow them… but I am more likely to follow a rule if I understand why the rule exists and I am at least in agreement that following it is in line with who I want to be in the world.

How do we teach FMC that giving their sister space is going to create the relationship they want in the future?

Punishing is not going to teach this.

Heh. Punishing me is a great way to ensure that I’m going to do what you don’t like….. where you can’t see me.

Enlightened self interest babe, how can we teach this to you.

For EC I have been chanting since they were 2 years old, “If you want to have a good relationship with your sibling when you are an adult you need to think about whether or not this action is likely to make your sibling want to know you.” The same chant really hasn’t worked with FMC. When they look up at their sister they see an unfailing flow of love and support and I think they genuinely don’t believe that their sister would stop providing it. They identify less with the fact that I walked away from my family and rejected everyone. EC knows that I refuse to know my big sister and that haunts her. FMC… doesn’t care?

FMC doesn’t believe they have to earn love in the same way. Uhm… I guess that’s good? It’s mixed. Noah and EC and I all act like we have to do a shit ton of work to earn being loved in the long term. It’s questionably healthy. Near as I can tell FMC is the only person in this house who believes in unconditional love. They think we will love them and take care of them and be with them no matter how big of an asshole they are.

I mean… that’s… good…

I’M SO CONFUSED.

I feel this terrible existential keening because I think I’m too demanding and boring to deserve friends and I feel like I should stop bothering people because I don’t have enough to offer…

And I live with this fucking kid who believes that them existing is their fucking gift to this world and now what does the world have to offer them.

It’s… weird.

Really weird.

Like… WHO THE FUCK MADE YOU weird.

It’s funny how they feel like me and not like me and like my chance to rewrite my history and like an alien and…

I love them so much. I feel bad when I target a specific behavior and assert my will as if I actually know things and I’m right about my judgments. What fucking hubris. Who in the fuck am I to decide that they are not good enough?

I’m their fucking mother and if I say they need to god damn learn how to let their sister have boundaries I’m fucking right and you will motherfucking do as I say.

Only I say it to them with less swearing.

One of the few things my mama said right to me was, “It’s not what you say it’s how you say it.” My mama, for all the bad things I can and do say about her… she only kind of sort of wanted to silence me. She was afraid of me speaking truths that would make her already shitty life harder… but otherwise she encouraged me to speak up. When teachers would complain I was too mouthy my mama would say that they must not be a very good teacher then because I do just fine in a classroom with a good teacher.

My sweet little baby. I don’t want to punish you for crossing boundaries. That makes me feel like shit. It makes you feel like shit. You then proceed to cross the next boundary like clockwork and we start the whole shitty cycle over again.

What can I do to help you believe that following these boundaries is the thing that you want to do?

Because I want to manipulate the shit out of you. I have no pride. I will not dissemble. My sweet love I want to manipulate you until you believe that it is just absolutely the right thing to give people space when they ask.

How can I do this?

This is my next hobby horse to ride. Because if we don’t figure this shit out… I’m afraid you and your sister are going to get into a big bloody fist fight. And frankly… y’all don’t need that.

Even if you might kinda deserve having someone punch you for being so disrespectful of their boundaries. I won’t do it or condone it… but I’m capable of seeing why someone else might think it was the best reaction to your behavior.

God you are so much like me.

I’m sorry kid.

I wish I could have given you easier genetics. Sigh.

How can we teach you without you having to get as many black eyes as I did? Or maybe you just need to get them and I can’t protect you from that. I’ve always needed to learn from experience too.

I hope this hubris I have in believing I know best for you doesn’t fuck up our relationship forever. I try hard to limit my control areas… I know I don’t know best in all areas… just a few.

I love you. I’m trying. I know I’m failing to meet your needs in that way that all mothers fail their children. I hope you can forgive me.

Home. And Petty.

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I’ve spent most of the last week grateful I didn’t have a computer. I would have written some incredibly unkind things. I wanted to stoop to a level of petty that would be darn near epic. Why?

Because people get all twisted up in my head. I’m never responding to one thing at a time.

I’ve spent the last few years in therapy doing a tremendous amount of work around the fact that the Bonus Mama triggered all of my “like my sister” buttons, minus the sexual assaults. She has quite a few of the same problems and in my ridiculous codependency I’ve spent a lot of time and energy trying to fix her problems.

It is a gift from the universe that I am now done with that set of behaviors. I never need go clean her house again. I never need try and help her children emotionally cope with neglect. I never need try and pretend that I am unaffected by the physical violence in her marriage again.

I am free.

I think this is a positive step in my life. I need to stop trying to cover for broken people. It’s a real problem I have.

I need to stop investing my life into trying to make up for people who won’t even admit that I’m doing a back breaking amount of work for them. It’s stupid. It’s self defeating. I have spent a lot of time and energy and money over the past few years trying to do something for the ephemeral child self I still have. Other people helped me so I helped her kids.

But I’ve given what I can and it’s time to move on.

People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. Part of what this relationship came into my life to teach me is that when my children say, “I don’t want to associate with this person because she is mean” I need to never overrule them again. I need to never ignore such a signal again. I feel deeply ashamed of myself for telling my children to cope with behavior that made them feel diminished because I wanted weekend babysitting. That was wrong of me. My behavior was selfish and disgusting.

I was wrong.

I will never deliberately send my children to the home of someone who speaks to them with contempt again. I. Was. Wrong.

Hopefully I have learned the lesson I needed to learn and in the future when someone triggers my “like my sister” buttons I will run like my tampon string is on fire.

No more hoarders. No more people who refuse to acknowledge that they are literally physically, emotionally, and mentally unequipped to take care of their children while they brag about how great they are. No more people who are in a marriage that involves domestic violence, gaslighting, stone walling, and screaming matches that the children can hear only to turn around and tell me that if the marriage is destroyed it’ll be my fault. Sure. Because y’all had none of these problems the day I arrived. Right. Who is the one with the convenient memory? I write down all my bad shit so I can’t claim it didn’t happen. Remember how I’ve begged you to document your DV for 7 years because shit like this comes to a head and you always said, “But I don’t want to remember.”

Sure. If your marriage is destroyed it’ll be my fault. Yup. Right. Because I’m the one sitting there filled with contempt. Yup. That’s me.

Take your guilt trip to someone who is stupid enough to be buying. I’m fresh out of money for such bullshit.

I am free.

Do you know when I freaked out and started demanding that your kids be put in school the fuck away from you? When you took them to Moana and came home crying because you believe your children are incapable of understanding and appreciating the story. Guess what? Your kids are capable of understanding. You are incapable of teaching and your children need to spend time with competent teachers who can teach them. Stop fucking over your children because you are fucking broken and you want your children to be as limited as you are so you feel comfortable. Your children have more potential than you do. Let them go be taught by someone with actual ability to teach and they’ll be ok.

The worst thing that ever happened to you was someone telling you that your IQ is high. You use that number as an excuse for why you are better than people as you cannot fulfill basic life functions. It’s sad and pathetic and your fucking children need to be educated by people who have the humility to say, “I don’t know everything so I’d better study.” You think that if you buy all the books and don’t read them it’s just as good.

Your children deserve better than to be locked in your company all the time.

And after this I need to never ever write about your family again.

I’m done.