I’m going to send an email to various members of my family and CC Noah’s family. I’m going for tactful. For the record, this is one of those times when I am requesting feedback/advice. (I say that to remind people in general that if I do not specifically do so, I don’t want it.)
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Well, when I went to the door today for the UPS man I knew it was something from Noah’s family because they can’t fucking spell my name. When I open the package what do I find?
A god damn silver spoon.
I’m serious.
From Tiffany’s even. It’s engraved with her name. I…
Well, the in-laws responded. To Noah and not me. And they all want the feet picture, which we got one copy of.
I think I quit.
-I went up and saw my family yesterday. It was extremely low stress. My aunt is kind of afraid of me in weird ways. I’m never sure how to handle it.
-I restated for my niece and nephew that I will pay for college. I think my nephew will take me up on it. I’m glad.
-I also apologized to my nephew for being such a shitty aunt. I need to try harder in both of their directions.
-Shanna doesn’t seem to like anyone else holding her. She cries pretty quickly. This isn’t awesome.
-Other people reread my archives so I started looking too. This December I will have known Ms. Pandora for five years. I think that will deserve some recognition.
-We do a lot of laundry.
-I’m noticing more and more how happy I am that I get to stay with Shanna.
-People on MDC (the mothering website I’ve been reading–you people don’t post enough) are really fucking weird.
-If we want to try for the spacing of kidlets we are talking about I have some work to do. Oy. It’s going to be extra challenging with the munchkin.
So I keep sending out notices of new pictures to family members who aren’t subjected to lj. It seems polite. I’m even sending them to Noah’s parents despite our less than cordial relationship. In this last one I specifically asked them to tell me which pictures they would like to be sent and I asked for the snail mail addresses of relatives that might like to receive pictures. I think I am being bloody good.
I can’t help but wonder if they will bother to acknowledge my questions. I feel so cynical on this topic. His dad might be cool, but I don’t know that his mom will. I guess I’ll find out…
Today we went to a graduation party for some of my kidlets. It was interesting for a variety of reasons. See, they are a couple and they have been dating for more than three years now but I can’t remember for sure exactly how long. So their family’s tend to combine forces and host stuff together as if they are already a long-term couple. They are given as much respect and support in their relationship choice as most adult couples I know and noticeably more than others. Their respective family’s were both extremely polite and friendly to Noah and I. They were curious who we were first, then enthusiastic because obviously I must be pretty amazing if the kids wanted me there. 😀
Watching them all interact was fascinating. They were nice to each other. There were obviously a few places where personalities are not a perfect match but people took a deep breath, looked at the sky, then shook their heads. That was the beginning and end of all the conflict. I don’t believe that they never have conflict at all… but my family has trouble passing up golden opportunities to fight. It was neat to be around. I liked that people made an effort to get along because that’s what you do with family. I liked that by and large everyone seemed to like everyone else.
And I liked finding out that the girl in question has decided to pursue a career in teaching due to my influence. I liked hearing both of the moms tell me how much I mattered to their kids. When I was getting ready to leave ST I commented to my fellow teachers that I was surprised by how many kids said they would keep in touch. I was told not to count on that because kids promise that all the time. Well, I certainly heard that promise from far more kids than have kept in touch; however, I feel like the ones I really want to keep in touch with are doing it.
So for the people who have told me that I am wasting my education by staying home–no I’m not. I did wonderful things with my education. Now I’m doing a different wonderful thing with my education.
Noah’s aunt sent us a baby stuff care package. Receiving blankets, clothes, hats, burping cloths, bibs, bath care items, a rather nice diaper bag, an incredibly sweet home made baby book, and a pile of Thank You cards. It is a rather impressive spread of stuff actually.
🙂 I can take a hint. I will never neglect sending her a thank you card again. 🙂 There was no snark or hostility in the present at all so I feel like this was actually a really awesome way for her to express her preferences. 🙂
Maybe I should meet this relative. She lives in Davis.
Well that went better than expected. Much, much better than expected. In fact, I would go so far as to say that was good.
Awesome.
I was reminded yesterday that I make a lot of references to my background that I don’t explain at the time. Part of the lack of explanation is that I have written about a lot of it in some detail over the years but I suppose it is complete narcissism to assume that people will go back and read my whole archives (not a small task) in order to find out more about me. 🙂 (I actually do that sometimes. Depends on how busy I am when I pick up a new journal.) I’m also spoiled because Noah has read my whole archive two or three times and since I seem to be the center of his universe, of course I must be for other people as well… right? 🙂 So if you have spent years reading me and you don’t want to see this again, or if you just don’t care, feel free to skip the rest of this post.
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So I called my mom and my sister this morning. They have both agreed that it is a good idea for the three of us to sit down with a conflict mediator and get through some of the elephants in the room. I’m more than a little surprised that they both agreed to it. My sister agreed with alacrity and cheer–that was even more shocking. We had a really nice half hour conversation around wanting to deal with stuff. My mom was less immediately interested, but still willing. This is so awesome.
Now I need to find a conflict mediator of some sort for the three of us to talk to. Does anyone have any idea how I would go about finding someone for this? A therapist would probably be decent as well, but I think that someone who is just there to say things like, “So it sounds like you are getting defensive and I don’t think that was meant as an attack” would be awesome. All three of us are oversensitive to feeling attacked and that is part of why things blow up so regularly.
Any suggestions?
Her surgery was postponed so I didn’t get to find out about that. We gabbed about all kinds of baby related stuff. Apparently in several of her pregnancies she only gained 12-15 lbs so I’m feeling a lot more secure in not gaining a lot of weight. 🙂 She had decent sized (all in the 7-8 lb range), healthy babies who were all born on the early-ish side. We discussed her difficulties with breast feeding and how they seem to be really common in the family. Good to be forewarned.
We also talked about some random frustrating things happening in my life and I mentioned that being direct seems to have helped the problem and she said, “Well, it usually does.” I said, “With that as the segue…” Of course she said, “Uh oh, what did I do?” She is very paranoid. I told her that I got very nervous when during the last phone call she mentioned selling her house so she would be able to move. We talked about why she wants to do it. She bought this house so she could be close to Jimmy and his kids. It’s a small town and it is a nightmare commute to where she works. She feels reminded all the time of the loss of the kidlets. She said she has no interest in ever living in a place where it snows. I told her that it is probably for the best. She is kind of sad that I don’t want her to move with me, but she agrees that we get along much better with more distance and that it would probably kill our relationship if she followed me. I don’t think she likes agreeing with that statement, but she knows I am right.
Is good. Now I can stop being nervous about that one. She is going to try and come up here for a visit before her disability leave ends because she would like to see me pregnant. I told her that would be ok. I think it would be ok because she would mostly see Aunt Vonnie and getting a little bit of Mommy-attention is nice.
Much better conversation. Kid in the picture is Jimmy’s oldest son, Koby. I wonder if I will ever see him again.
My baby is curled up on the couch sleeping. He’s got a fever. He is generally feeling poopy. I have a cough. I feel kind of dizzy and out of it. No fever though.
Talked to my mommy. Uhm–can I just say that her dropping in the conversation casually that she is selling her mobile home so that she will have the ability to move “Wherever they transfer her” bothers me? She moved down there to be near my brother and his kids. She’s pretty desolate now that she isn’t allowed contact with them. My aunt told me that me having a child is the reason my mom hasn’t killed herself in the past few months because she really was hitting bottom. Oh god. Our relationship is better than it was, but I think that her following us out of state would harm our relationship and not help it.
Of course, I can’t tell her hell-fucking-no right now because she fell off a ladder at work and shattered her shoulder and fucked up her hand really badly. She’s really loopy and out of it on meds. She is having surgery next week. Not a good time to also destroy her hopes and dreams. I’ll wait till she is feeling better to do that. 🙁
My mother informed me that she would be coming up to stay with us after the baby comes. I told her that she will not. I said that if she wants to stay with Denise (my sister) or Vonnie (her sister) and visit during the day that is fine, but she is not welcome to stay in my house 24 hours a day right after I have had a kid. I told her that if she tried it I am likely to attempt to kill her and there will be a permanent rift in our relationship. Just No. She took it fairly well actually. She laughed when I said, “Do you really think it is a good idea to be in my face constantly after I have been in that much pain with a bunch of sleep deprivation? Do you think I will have any patience or kindness left in me?!”
Boundaries are my friend. Next time I talk to her I will mention that she also isn’t welcome in the first three weeks as I am trying to figure out how to deal with the Lizard. Her telling me what to do with the Lizard at the beginning is not likely to go over well. If I don’t specifically ask for advice my instinct is to do the opposite of whatever I am told to do. This isn’t a good thing when it comes to caring for my infant so I’m going to avoid the person who will give the most unsolicited advice. 🙂
This shit is going way better than it used to.
I’ve been having a really hard time emotionally lately for a variety of oh-my-fucking-god hormone reasons. After the comment from my ‘friend’ I really haven’t felt safe talking to anyone about what is going on with me. I’m not real big on being judged. There have also been some points of friction with Noah that are totally exacerbated by the fact that I am seriously hormonal. I’ve been feeling more and more isolated and lonely and scared as I am shutting down any “real” conversation with people. So I did something crazy. I called my mommy.
The conversation went really well. We talked about a number of things that are going poorly for me (Oh wait–her easy pregnancys involved HUGE amounts of nausea so maybe I’m not breaking the pattern yet.) and ways I’m having a hard time emotionally. We talked about a few of the more hot buttony things from the past and nothing blew up. It was really good. I needed that. She’s nervous about some of the choices I am making (home birth, home schooling) but she is actually listening to my reasons for wanting them and has said that she has a lot of reservations but she can understand why I am making the choices I am making. That is literally the best I could hope for from her. That was supportive and friendly and everything. Especially because a lot of her reservations are from ignorance and her fear that I will get stuck at home with my children and give up my identity the way she did. That’s really not a horrible thing for her to want to spare me from. She did make the suggestion that given how tired and how sick I am that I should probably try to take days off more often. Her comment that my students are better off having subs occasionally than having me just leave work mid-pregnancy because I can’t work anymore is actually a pretty reasonable one. Even if I run out of sick days I can afford it.
Calling her was good. I’m pretty sure that it should continue to be a rare occurance but the calls have picked up in freqency (twice in a month? Holy shit) and it’s still ok.
We talked a little bit about her mother and how a week didn’t go by without her talking to her mother. We very briefly talked about how hard my grandmother’s death was on my mom but she had a hard time talking about it. Then we talked about why she has such a hard time talking about it–if she showed weakness in front of my father he would be nasty and hurtful. He would use it against her for years to come. I’m doing better at seeing how when I am reacting to my baggage she is reacting to hers. My father has been dead for nine years and twelve days (but who’s counting?) and he is still influencing so much of her life. He influenced her from the time she was 19 years old until she was 49. 30 years of hurting her. No wonder she is so fucked up. I’ve never stopped and thought about that before. I’ve always thought about it in terms of “well, she was an adult…” but now that I’ve been an adult for a few years I’m seeing how little that mitigates trauma. For all the things my mother didn’t shield me from she actually kept my father basically out of my life. That was the biggest kindness she could give me. The fact that when he did pop up he hurt me is just a sign that she did a great job of keeping me from even more and worse hurt by keeping him away most of the time.
Maybe I am ready to forgive.
I’ve said it before and I’l say it again. If you are my family you get to ask me to pick you over other people because that is what family means to me. I believe in taking sides. I believe that is what actually loving someone means.
And it is only for family that I will deal with feeling so frustrated and still actually talk to the person I am angry with. Just sayin. Chosen family means I choose you. No buts. No except for.
Ya’ll still piss me the fuck off sometimes.
I slept for just shy of 10 hours last night. That is highly unusual for me. Normally I wake up around 7 1/2 hours. I think I am making up for the school year.
I’m reading a lot, both on the internet and actual books. It feels really nice to not be pressured or on a deadline.
My lovely husband rocks so hard. He came home from work last night and did most of the work to make dinner. Then we had a fabulous date night. I married the best perv ever! (Ok, so there are still a few skillz I would like him to develop but he is coming along nicely…) This “communication” stuff is really handy.
I’ve been talking to Tom more and feeling more comfortable about it. I still feel a bit tense when I watch him playing (I don’t spend much time doing this) but there is less tension and more happiness that he is happy. I really do love him and want him to be happy and I know that he never would have had all that he needed with me. And I really am better off with Noah so it’s a win all the way around. I think I feel so connected to him still because he was the first person to love me so much or so well and I try very hard to appreciate what people do for me. The fact that what he had to give ended up not being enough in the long run is really not his fault.
Alright, I’ll say it. Off birth control. Don’t know when anything more interesting is going to actually happen as I have no control over that. Lots of looking down and chanting “ovulate!!” I amuse me. The first two weeks I was pretty batty and all over the place emotionally but that has passed and I’m feeling generally pretty cheerful. The fact that it coincided with lots of job stress and then no job stress probably helps.
Still having a hard time believing that I am not too difficult to put up with. Noah says I’m ok, but it’s hard. I’m so scared of pushing him away and I know I am tempermental. Gah. Have to just accept that I’ll never be placid or even tempered. Suckful acceptance.
My body is being weird. I think it is mostly that I am sitting on my ass too much. I’m stiff and sore most places most of the time. I’m also a wee bit chunkier than is optimal for normal usage. (My jeans don’t really fit.) Other than that: my hair is freshly red and my jaw hurts all the time. Looks like braces are mandatory. Damnit! I really hate dental stuff.
Family stuff continues to suck. I’m thinking that I should do another six months or so without talking to any of them. My mom recently asked me to have dinner so she could give me my baby pictures because she doesn’t want them. This following on the heels of her telling me that my bio-family isn’t my family, my chosen family is along with her threatening to sue me if I publicly disclose stuff about my life… yeah. I think maybe it’s time for some non-talking. My sister doesn’t even want me to know where she lives–as in she has told her children they are not to give me their address. Awesome. Jimmy still doesn’t want to speak to me and may never again. My aunt doesn’t believe me about the stuff that has been happening because she has never heard about it before from anyone else. Yeah. Just… yeah. That’s ok. I have a Mom who wants to be part of my life. I have a Dad and a Daddy both of whom love me and dote on me and give me the kind of support I need. I have people all over the country who love me and support me. I suppose my mother is right. I do have a family and she isn’t part of it.
Computer woes continue. At least this time I managed to back everything up. Heh. Still thinking about buying an Apple instead of a PC. Luckily, I have my work computer to use over the summer so it isn’t mandatory yet.
Given the impending kidlet situation, having two vehicles that don’t place one of us at serious risk of injury daily is a mandatory situation. I’ve been looking around and I’m pretty sure I want a Mazda 5. (The Prius was supposed to be Noah’s car from the start…) I have wanted an Element for years, but seeing as there could be three booster seats in our future, a four seater vehicle is just not an option. *sigh* There goes that dream. Is ok. Babies are more interesting than a vehicle I can clean with a hose. 🙂 It’s going to be a bit more expensive than we were hoping for, but it will be doable.
My student loan debt will be gone before school starts again. We will have just the mortgage in debt and that is such a nice feeling.
Kids are scheduled to come paint the house when I get back from the honeymoon. I’m actually looking forward to it. 🙂
I leave on Monday to see my friends and Noah is joining me on Thursday. We are going to be backpacking for a week. I’m so excited!
Life… life is not completely 100% perfect, but life is good.
Well, saw my mother yesterday. She looks old and that was kind of weird to me. I realized that she isn’t going to be around much longer and that has made me start wondering what I should do about that if anything. We had dinner. I specifically wanted Noah there and at the last minute she invited my nephew as well. (Nephew in picture is not the same one as who went to dinner) Most of the time was spent with Noah and my nephew talking. I’m ok with that.
Due to aforementioned husband and nephew talking my mom and I didn’t say much to one another. It was sort of stuff and uncomfortable. She gave me a bunch of pictures of me as a baby that she doesn’t want to keep anymore. Wow, uhm, ok. I guess she saved the snapshots and she still has small versions of most of the pictures but she gave me the larger copies. I was an incredibly adorable small child and now I have evidence. I feel like her doing that is cementing her opinion that she and my siblings are not my family, my family consists of the people I have chosen. I’m tempted to bring one or more of the baby pictures to my adopted mom and my adopted dad in some weird symbolic gesture.
I freaked out about the very idea of seeing her before it happened and then it was… very anticlimactic. I suppose that is good. If I treat her with as much familiarity as I do my coworkers we can get through a conversation without fighting. Oh wait, I talk to my coworkers about more personal things than I do her.
Mom mentioned that she would like to come up to see my house but she doesn’t have the money to pay for the gas. She also gave me that very familiar “You want *what* from me?” look when I told her what her half of the bill for dinner was. Given my experience with my mother I believe she expected me to offer to give her gas money and to pay for dinner. After all, hadn’t I mentioned that I could afford to remodel my house because it isn’t big enough? I didn’t go there though. I just told her what she needed to pay and was silently grateful that she isn’t going to ask when she can come see my house.
Boundaries are hard.
Ok, so the icon looks like this will be sexy. It won’t be. I just like the blindfold image.
Processing. I am so sick of processing I could scream. I feel like I am drowning in all the shit from my life. I’m not sure if writing about it is helping or hurting, but I know I need to do it. Things have blown up with my mother again. I think that it may be a long time before I hear from her again. She is coming up in June for my nephew’s high school graduation (which I wasn’t told about) and she said she wants to see my house. I’m not sure that is a good idea. I don’t think I want her to see where I live. I don’t think I want to have pictures in my head of her in my space. I’m so weird about “energy”. Sorry mom–I need to tell.
Noah got home last night. I’m not handling talking about his trip very well. There are things about the trip that upset me just because they upset me and there are things about the trip that upset me because they are shadows of the past. I am not really reacting to now and this problem, I am reacting to years of shit with my family. I am not now nor will I ever be part of Noah’s family, just like I have never really been part of my mother’s extended family or my father’s extended family, or really even my nuclear family. I am too much or too bad or too intense or too wrong or… too something. I feel so broken and defective, like there is nothing in me that is worthwhile. I don’t really believe that it is true, but I’m terrified that it is.
I’ve had problems with Stephen’s family and Tom’s family and Puppy’s family so I feel like the problems with Noah’s family really are my fault. Ok, so maybe the problems are all my fault because they seem to be following me around. They were different problems with each family though. I don’t know. Guilt doesn’t seem to need rationality.
And I keep wondering, given how toxic I seem to be–do I really have the right to bear a child? We are supposed to start trying so soon. I don’t feel like I really know if I should or not. Being broken sucks.
Julia rocks in so many ways. But way high up on the list: she ties me up AND she helps me do yard work. What more could one ask of a girl? Dude. Much rocking.
Today I have: done massive yardwork (including trimming the rose bushes), been to Costco to begin the arduous task of restocking a deep freeze, and had a shitty conversation with my mother. Happy fucking Mothers Day, bitch. I’m so sorry that I am not willing to keep my mouth shut to assuage your guilt. And it must be terribly convenient to be able to forget the horrible things you have said, but I am not so able to forget.
Today I should do: more reading quizzes. I’m having a lot of trouble finding the motivation.
Noah didn’t call today and the phone call yesterday was not all that I could have hoped for. I feel so very lonely.
This weekend has been weird in general. Lots of talking to ex’s…
I woke up at 4:30 this morning. I think I woke up so god-awful-early because I was anxious about Noah leaving. My beloved is on his way to Texas. There he will have a less than fun conversation with his parents about the level of involvement (none) they will be allowed to have with our kids. Given that everytime they call his father asks three or four times, “So! Any big news?” I think they anticipate kidlets about as soon as we do. And uhhh yeah. Unfortunately they won’t be involved and we think it is best that they know that before they find out I am pregnant. Because telling them over the phone, “Yeah–we’re pregnant! Oh, and by the way, my mother is abusive and she isn’t allowed to meet my children” would really suck. I don’t envy him this trip. My mother has already been told that she is not likely to be allowed any contact and if there is any at all it will always be supervised heavily.
This stuff is depressing to think about.
I had to sit in the sun for an hour at a teachers appreciation rally. I now have a nasty headache. Ick.
I am home teaching today from 4:30-7. It’s not exactly my idea of a good time though I guess it could be worse. The kid is ok and I’m enjoying what we are doing for history and English. I even feel smart cause I understand the geometry! 🙂
So it’s not the best day ever. It’s also nowhere near the worst day ever so I’m not *really* complaining. 🙂 As much as I already miss Noah, he is coming back on Monday. He loves me and is doing something that is about us building a life together. I’m a big girl. I can handle it.
AND my Julia is going to be here this weekend. I get to spend time with her. It’s always so wonderful to see her. Maybe this time I can manage to not be a freakin spazz. Sometimes it is hard loving someone when things aren’t equal.