Tag Archives: people suck

Anxiety, you bitch

I’ve had glimmers of this bubble bursting before but it was a false positive. Now that it has been shattered I’d like to say that the nearly 3.5 years I had in this country without feeling like I did not want to be in a room with a specific person were great. I loved moving completely without fear through my life because I had no worries about who I’d encounter.

Now it’s official. I don’t like someone. I don’t like the way they assume control over other people without properly negotiating. I don’t like the way they informed me that we would not work together I would be working under them because they were the one who was in control.

Oh, oh no. I am not playing that game with you. You do not get to assume that I will submit to your whims. Go fuck yourself with a spork.

I am very unhappy about feeling like I am about to throw up. I don’t want to go hang out with this group anymore because of one person. I feel like I would cheerfully sacrifice my entire social life to get away from this feeling. Fuck anxiety.

Judgement and progress report

Why do I have such an intense horror of being judgmental? I don’t fully understand that horror in myself. I’ve been judging intensely lately. I backed out of an online social community because of one person. Because I judge her like fuck and I can’t be part of a group that tolerates that kind of behavior. In this case she spends a lot of time being a judgy bitch and bragging about all that she does for other people… but in reality she sits in her apartment with her cats on the internet most of the time doing nothing. I don’t think I would care so much about her bullshit only she spends a tremendous amount of time talking about how much she does for her niblings, who are in a highly abusive situation in another country. Only when she has the opportunity to do something for them… she picks her holidays to Asia (and the Olympics!) and tickets to Hamilton over staying with the kids and helping them deal with nightmarishly hard problems. Now she wants lots of sympathy because Hamilton and the Olympics were cancelled and it isn’t fair that she doesn’t get to go. Oh and she wants to be told how sad it is for her that the kids call her crying because they wish she was there helping them.

I can’t say a single nice thing to her so… I’m saying nothing at all anywhere that she hangs out.

She was the last person to tell me that I am fucking up my kids. Her reasoning? Because I don’t guilt trip them enough for normal kid behavior so they are going to have terrible lives and it will be all my fault.

Every single person who has told me that I am going to fuck up my kids, wreck their lives, or retard them has been spectacularly unqualified to evaluate such a metric and the people who are qualified to evaluate children think my kids are having a charmed, fabulous life.

It’s not just that my friends tell me what I want to hear. Professionals who spend their lives evaluating children think my kids are doing well. Judgy non-professionals who don’t know what they are talking about like to tell me how shitty I’m doing. Awesome.

Is that about me or them?

The school started off telling me that my kids weren’t doing so hot academically. Then it turned out that they have shitty handwriting but they are otherwise doing well. Do they handle other children hitting them well? No, they don’t. I’m not sure that is a bad sign about them. I cannot count how many people are traumatized by the school experience. It’s not that my kids suck. It’s that schools are brutal and unhelpful about bullying.

The home education movement here in Scotland is growing by leaps and bounds. The two primary reasons people pull their kids out of school: the schools won’t help children with special needs or bullying. It’s not just my family thank you very much.

But sure, the problem is that I’m wrecking my kids by not just putting them in school and telling them to figure it out on their own.

K.

Yesterday the kids and I walked in the woods for three hours. It was really cool. The only downside? We should be wearing fucking hiking boots, not Wellies.

Oh! Yesterday was a milestone day! The cats were outside for a long time. The cat who is very people-attached was very scared and did not stay out long. The cat who is less people-attached had a great time and was out for hours and hours. I don’t think she went farther than our garden but it was cute watching her out the window.

The kids made cupcakes on their own. They also made a pretty good ganache to go on top.

I have gained 20 lbs since arriving in Scotland. That was not the direction I intended to go with that. Hahahaha. Even with all this exercise. I am now well above my previous lifetime maximum, even while pregnant. I think maybe I could do with less sugar. Maybe it is the calories from alcohol. Who knows.

My alcohol consumption still feels high to me and it still falls well below the line where my doctor would be concerned. Perspective is a funny thing.

My kids now think 17 degrees is oppressively hot. That’s 62F. We have acclimated.

Still not sleeping well.

Today’s garden task is apparently to work on constructing the stairs up to the front garden area next to the driveway. The kids are feeling a wee bit bored of working on digging the pond. I’ve started a bunch of seeds, we’ll see how they go. I should probably take stuff from the house to the polytunnel. At this point I think the tunnel is hotter than the house. I have high hopes for my tomatoes.

I think my watch has charged enough. I am out of excuses for sitting still. Blurgh. I’m sore. I’m tired. I don’t really want to be productive. But I want these things done and if I don’t move… no one else in the house will. Sigh. I feel like I am the motor.

Reevaluate everything

I don’t really know what I’m doing as a parent. I read things, lots of things. There are so many opposing opinions on literally everything. So I try shit out and then I talk to my kids about how it is going. In the long run their opinion of my parenting is the only metric I care about.

I asked them last night if they think getting paid for chores is motivating them or taking away motivation. EC eloquently said, “Well, on weeks when I don’t need any money I don’t see any reason to do chores.” So that’s not super helpful. I asked if they think paying for their own stuff is helping them feel like they are more responsible with how they use up products. They said that part is working well.

We also renegotiated their pay for babysitting because that’s different from sweeping and tidying. They did some practice on how to state how they have increased their responsibility (closer to babysitting rather than just being a good playmate who distracts YC while I have to do all the ‘work’ stuff) but they still aren’t ready to be fully independent about it. We talked about what adults/older teens get paid and what sorts of qualifications those people have that my kids lack. I did this same sort of process with their former babysitter. How do you negotiate for pay increases, how do you talk about your increasing level of responsibility?

It was interesting listening to how they have no real interest in renegotiating what they get paid for chores because that has an opposite effect on their motivation to do the work, but babysitting is different. If I were to guess about why these things are different (I don’t know for a fact I can only use conjecture) chores are things they are doing in preparation for being an adult and it’s part of being a citizen of the household. Babysitting is different from just playing with their sister and being part of a family. It’s exhausting in a different way and they are doing this training partially so that when they get older they know how to advertise their services to other people. Neither of them anticipate a career in janitorial services, those are skills they are learning for themselves.

That’s my guess. But I could be wrong.

So we are going back to a flat allowance for most chores with the exception of babysitting. The first five hours/week of babysitting is payment for their cats since they don’t want me to feel like I own the cats. They get paid over that threshold. So technically their pay can still be variable, but frankly most weeks I doubt they will do more babysitting time than the basic hours.

It means that each big kid will do a couple of hours on a weekend day with their sister and then an hour most week days. I will get to rest more.

I’ve tried creating this with adults for pay. I signed back up with Care.com and the like here in Scotland. I have ads. I’m looking for support! I’ve sent messages! No bites. I’m not sure what it is about how I advertise that makes people have so little interest in working with us. Ah well.

I might get to actually date my husband again one of these years. Woo.

MC’s “babysitting” is still at the level where I have to be available to provide food and nappy changing services but she’s getting really good at playing with YC for a while if I have chores I want to do. I think EC is at the point where Noah and I could disappear down to the apartment for a few hours. I still wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving them alone in the house as a regular thing.

EC did take care of things when my wound popped open. Getting a taxi for 5 is… hit or miss. Sometimes they send an adequate vehicle and sometimes we have to send back a smaller car and wait for a bigger one. So she stayed here for two hours with YC while I got stitched up. I am grateful that we now have that level of assistance, but I don’t really think EC feels ready to take on that level of babysitting on a regular basis.

Babysitting usually means Noah and I get to be in our bedrooms with the door shut for a little while. So we have half an ear out for stuff we need to mediate, but we get to do something without toddler “help” for an hour or so. It’s a work in progress.

We are all just works in progress.

I do these kinds of negotiations with my kids partially to model for them that relationships are not static. You try something and if it isn’t working you can change it. Just because you agree to try something that doesn’t mean you are stuck doing it forever. You are allowed to grow and change. You really should change over time. And it’s hard to figure out what should change when things aren’t working; sometimes you need to throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks.

We are talking a lot about what we want from home schooling going forward. I’m doing more research because that’s my place of comfort. I’m looking into what the exams are like in secondary school. When do they happen, what do they mean? How do we prepare for them in a home schooling environment?

Well, me screaming about them not working hard enough… that needs to not be part of it. MC is just to the age where I started sitting on EC really hard to force her to “catch up” in a few subjects. Turns out I didn’t make her catch up to grade level I made her get way above grade level but I did it at the cost of both of us being miserable for a long time. I need to learn from that mistake.

Why is it that people who beat the “handwriting is important” drum think they are being the voice of dissent and advocating for The Most Important Life Skill? You aren’t the voice of dissent. You are literally parroting The Man and being as fucking basic as possible.

But the exams here all handwritten. So my kids need to practice for that. I get it. Just, ugh. Don’t act like handwriting is the measure of the anything other than the ability to jump through an arbitrary stupid hoop. It is not the measure of intelligence or knowledge or wisdom.

My mother’s handwriting is exquisite. That hasn’t helped the woman get a good job, ever. My handwriting is shit and the only thing it ever cost me was a masters degree. I still got the pay raise associated with the masters degree in my career of choice. I still have never had difficulty applying for any work I’ve ever wanted to do. I didn’t want the career that a masters would enable. I wanted the knowledge so I could be better at the career I was in without having it at all.

Just… ugh. Why in the fuck do handwriting advocates think they are so… revolutionary? “I’m going to be the voice of dissent that happens to agree with every bureaucrat in existence.”

Like, really? Voice of dissent here? Come on now.

Oh… you were just trying to say that if there are disability related reasons that handwriting is a problem I should not seek out accommodations because who gives a fuck about those disabled kids. Right. How very ableist of you. One of the fucking diagnostic tools for EDS is difficulty/pain in holding a pencil. Our god damn joints don’t stay in place to hold the pencil the way it works for other bodies and we can end up with permanent fucking pain.

That’s not the “voice of dissent”. People have been telling folks with disabilities to suck it up since forever. But sure. Keep feeling superior over there. What was that you said? You don’t have a job and you need to go back for extensive training to get another one because your qualifications lapsed? I guess all that fucking handwriting you did wasn’t enough to save your ass?

Sure. Keep telling me about how handwriting is The Way, The Truth, and The Light.

I’m clearly frustrated with someone. But yes, I know my kids have to work on handwriting. Even if it wrecks ECs hands she has to do it anyway.

THE FUCKING VOICE OF DISSENT HAS SPOKEN.

“It is no sign of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” – Krishnamurti

Sigh.

If you look up recommended accommodations for children with EDS, “eliminate handwriting grade and substitute grades for content and effort” is on the list.

Sigh.

We’ll figure it out. I’m just frustrated. People are challenging.

Ahh, I love sneering.

Today as I was walking into Costco some woman stopped right in front of me and looked me up and down. She apparently didn't approve of what she saw because she sneered. It was remarkable. Yes, I was dressed down. Yes, you could see my fat belly. GET OVER IT. Yes, my hair was sticking out in a few thousand directions; I have curly hair. It does that.

I really and truly feel like people believe there is some social expectation of people being at least a certain degree of attractive. Or at least dressed in a certain fashion. I wasn't dressed skimpily. I was wearing gaucho style pants and a Victorian undershirt that buttons just over the breast area so there is a little gap where my belly button shows. I thought I was cute. People suck. 

The funny thing is I don't get those reactions when I'm out with Noah. People just ignore us. We match. When I am out by myself I think I look like a trashy single mom with two very loud kids. I'm always tempted to flip them off with my left ring finger. I may be white trash but I married above my station, asshole. Stop looking at me that way.

My response to such behavior at this point in my life is to stare at them really hard with the teacher face. The "you are being an asshole" face. I like it when they flinch. The one today didn't flinch. She got her back up higher. It was awesome. I then smiled at her. Shanna yelled, "Have a nice day!" She's like that. Then the woman flinched. Then she went blank. Then she smiled in a kind of painful way at Shanna and waved.

Shanna is one of my very favorite people to hang out with. I find her inspiring.

rbus, if you follow  I may stop posting here all together. I'm just sayin'.

{heavily filtered} Triggers

Can I say that I'm getting fucking sick to death of how the word triggers is used?  Mostly I hear it mean: 'So this person is crazy and reacting to ghosts… it's not my problem that they are over-sensitive but I guess I can give a lame-ass "I'll try to respect your 'triggers'" line.'  Fuck you all.  No really.

I'm kind of tired of having people throw it in my face that they are trying to be "sensitive" to my "triggers".  Bitch you don't even know what the fuck that means.  By the way, I'm kind of angry.  Apparently having a trigger means that someone does the same asshole thing to you that someone else has already done.  Or at least caused you to think hard about the previous time and consider how you want to react this time.  People are so dismissive of "triggers" because it is a good way of saying, "You were already hurt here so it's not my fault you are hurting now."

Actually, an asshole act is an asshole act.  Lying is lying.  When you negotiate extensively for activity A and you instead engage in activity B… that's not a miscommunication and that's not about me being triggered.  

You want to know the "trigger" part?  My gut-level response to this behavior is to go sleep in a different bed and cry and assume there is nothing in the world that will change it.  Because that kind of lying is something that people just do.  I should stop listening to what people tell me.  There isn't a point.

Things that were effective coping mechanisms during your childhood are hard to abandon as an adult.  When someone lies to me, I have to withdraw trust.  Fast.  I have to shut down affection towards that person.  I have to stop being vulnerable because if they smell blood… I'm dead.

I suppose that triggering me means acting like my family.  So that I have to act like I do with my family.  It's not about a set word or phrase or experience.  If you act like my family… I have nothing for you.  

My family would set terms on who you can know.  If you had the audacity to want to be friends with someone they didn't like… well… that's going to result in nastiness, name calling, threats of abandonment (that aren't followed up on because the piece of shit bully is dependent on having you around to kick), and of course threats of suicide.  

Wow.  That all sounds like what I say and do when I tell Noah that I don't like him dating.  Ironic.  No wonder I feel like I shouldn't be saying no, no matter what.  Because I have this gut reaction of not wanting to be like them.  It's bad to say, "Actually this behavior is toxic to our marriage for 'x, y, and z reasons.'"  Because then I'm trying to control him inappropriately.  My adult spin on not wanting to be this person is to think that I should start shutting my mouth and putting my head down.

My family would rewrite history.  Oh, it's not that anyone lied.  We just miscommunicated, that's all.  No one ever has to be accountable for their actions.  That's why I have a scorched earth policy.  Someone who is going to lie to my face and then go behind my back and do something else all the while maintaining a dialogue with someone else that perpetuates a lie… wow.  I need to run, not walk away from that.  You want to know what a trigger is?

It's the sure knowledge that a liar is poison.  Someone who will lie to me… I can't know.  I can't be vulnerable with.  I can't pay attention to them.  I can't worry about what they want.  I know it will be a facade and I'll never know them anyway.  As soon as you lie to me, and then tell someone else that we "miscommunicated" well…  Yeah.  Ok.  The solution to this "miscommunication" is for me to assume you are lying going forward.  Sounds great.

I lie too.  I lie compulsively sometimes.  I say things in the heat of an argument that aren't true no matter how you look at them.  And I hate myself for it.  That makes me want to run too.  Because these topics are things that I can't be honest about.  So I'd rather not discuss them.

At any other point in my life this kind of behavior would be cue for an abrupt turn on my heel and exiting the premises permanently.  I would much rather leave than try to fix something like this.  My life is complicated now.

I understand a lot of things differently as life goes by.  I think about why women stay in domestic violence situations.  I think about why my mother and my sister are the way they are.  Why do they lie compulsively all the time?  They were taught to.  That's what hanging out with liars will do.  It teaches you to lie.  

The problem with being married to a sociopath is I am never sure if his vision of enlightened self-interest lines up with mine.  My best-interest is considered to the extent that he wants to manipulate the correct
behavior out of me, preferably while volunteering as little as possible.  Because the less he volunteers, the more control and power he has.  There are cracks in my Stockholm Syndrome.

It's hard having such extreme opinions about Noah.  Mostly I feel better about/toward/with him than anyone else on the planet.  And then sometimes I don't.

(ETA: the formatting is weird and I don't know why.)

Paying for college

This is f-locked in case someone in my family is paying attention. I doubt it, but there is a slight possibility. So we are paying for my niece to go to college. This is something that I have always said I was happy to do for my niece and nephew to help them get the fuck out of the shitty life our family has. My nephew wanted to do this intensive program on learning how to install solar panels… sure! I’ll pay for that! That would be a great career! After doing alright in the program he decided he didn’t want to do it as a career. His skin is too sensitive to be outside that much. . . . Maybe you could have thought about this a bit earlier sensitive boy? (Oh, he works at Shoreline every summer as a parking attendant because it is ‘cool’. At least he has done it for two years in a row. So much for the sensitive skin.)

Now my niece is taking classes at the local JC. Though she wants to transfer because the one she is going to has “too many Asians”. I’m not entirely sure what that means as a criticism, but ok. She gave me her login information to the webportal program the school uses so I can pay her fees. She thinks I am not able to check her grades. I’m not sure why she is stupid enough to think that, but ok. Last term she withdrew from the PE class she insisted that she wanted to take (I told her it was a bad idea) and she got a C in the Intro to Business class (she wants to be a Business major) and a D in the basic level accounting class. So her GPA is a 1.5. No one is perfect, I get that. But uhm… a free ride to college is not exactly a god given right.

Right now I’m feeling pretty fussy. If I sit her down and explain, “These D’s won’t even transfer. So I’m paying for you to *say* you are in college but this isn’t actually making any progress towards your supposed future goals.” I will be the bitch. I will be the bad person who is pressuring her. In paying for her college we are directly taking money we would be investing on Shanna and Calli’s education and using it on my niece instead. I’m not sure how willing I am to do that while my niece is much more interested in partying than in going to school. But if I cut her off I am probably cutting off my last real tie to my family. I will have proven that I am a terrible person.

I love how no matter what *I* am the bad guy.

EDIT: Noah points out that this post doesn’t convey a lot of why I am pissy. She posts constantly on facebook about partying. She will only take night classes because she is completely unwilling to get up at a reasonable hour (I mean getting up before noon, not 6 am). I would have more sympathy if I thought she was trying and just not getting it right. She skips classes to go to parties. Yeah… it’s not just that she is trying and not figuring things out.

Edited again:
I just went and looked. She hasn’t bothered to submit any financial aid paperwork whatsoever. Given that her mother hasn’t worked in the past couple of years (I’m not sure how Denise is going to increase her drug dealing enough to stay afloat once she stops getting unemployment) I bet that I shouldn’t have to pay almost anything at all for my niece’s education. But she can’t be bothered. Oh I’m getting pissier by the minute.

An illustration

So I keep saying that people suck and then other people feel defensive. In the past six days (or five, depending on how you count) I’ve had four people no-show on plans. Just not show up. Not say anything about canceling in any way. I’ve heard from one of those people since saying, “Oops. I fell asleep. I’m sorry.” But the other three? Complete silence. For some reason it seems to be bad form to point out that people are behaving like total assholes. You are supposed to just suck it up or shrug or something. Fuck it.

So this is why I’m pretty hostile about people.

I’m starting to hate Dell

There is this one customer service guy who keeps calling to check up on the computer. The computer that isn’t here. When I tell him it isn’t here he is really snotty and asks when it will be here. When I tell him I don’t know he scoffs. You know that scoffing noise in the back of the throat? I’m really tempted to tell him he is a fucking asshole and I want to talk to his manager. Part of the problem is he is calling from India and I can’t understand him. The problem isn’t his accent, the problem is the quality of the phone call. I can barely hear him and when I ask him to speak up he gets really rude. He has called three times. I think I hate him.

{filtered} drama

So I’m having a hard time figuring out what is a reasonable and appropriate response to a situation in my life. This is a request for advice. 🙂

There are two couples we have been dealing with lately. Couple A involves a chick Noah has been friends with since college. Couple B involves a chick I have known since high school. The husbands in both couples are folks neither of us know as well.

Basically the first time chick in Couple A impacted my life was when she asked Noah to buy her $75 worth of vitamins a few years ago and then mail them to her. I thought this was rather bizarre and inappropriate. She was married and making ends meet–this was crossing a boundary. Noah and I went round and round about this but she never had any idea I was upset. I figured that she was across the country so I sorta let it go but if the topic came up I got pissy again.

Then Couple A moved to the bay area. Our interactions with them have been kind of weird. They both have geek social issues but they have them in a more extreme way than almost anyone I’ve ever met. They just don’t seem to be able to interact with people who are not geeks. Most of the meetups haven’t been fun for me but they haven’t really done anything wrong. But they keep doing things that set me off.

They have no respect for other peoples time. They asked us to babysit quite a while ago so they could go to a time share presentation. They said it would be a couple of hours. It turned into six hours.

I went to the museum with the moms from Couple A and Couple B and the mom from Couple A didn’t show up for 3.5 hours after she said she would be there. There was a weird amount of communication between the mom in Couple B and the dad in Couple A but no one talked to me. I wasn’t thrilled by this but I let it go. Then both members of Couple A showed up but the mom stayed in the museum and the dad was just there to pick up the mom in Couple B and they left the museum to go shopping. The only reason this was a big deal is mom from Couple B had come to the museum in my car and didn’t tell me she wasn’t leaving with me. She just up and disappeared while I was off doing a diaper change. She said, “I couldn’t find you and I had to leave.” I felt like this was pretty rude and I told her so when I talked to her later. I feel like I get to be mad when someone does that kind of thing to me. The guy in Couple A (so not the husband of the chick I am mad at) writes Noah an email asking him how is best to approach me so that he can explain that I shouldn’t be mad at my friend but instead him because she did nothing wrong and it was his fault. Noah being the smart fellow he is forwarded me the email and I took it from there. I emailed this guy and told him that when my friend is rude I get to be upset about it. He doesn’t get to get in the middle of that. But if he wants I can think he is rude too.

Couple A has asked Noah to come help them move with almost no notice and he showed up and they hadn’t packed. They expected him to basically come do all of the work for them regardless of the fact that he has a family he really ought to be spending his weekends with.

Couple A have both started talking to Noah about stuff in their lives that really aren’t that big of a deal but they make a big production about how he shouldn’t tell me anything about them. They are essentially telling him to lie to me. They are doing this about stuff that there is no way to really keep it from me forever and they really don’t matter.

We have been ostensibly going to exchange babysitting back and forth between the three families (both couples have kids) but at this point I don’t think I have any interest in doing that. If they are telling my husband to lie to me I would put money on it that they wouldn’t hesitate to tell my kid to lie to me. Granted she isn’t yet at that level of speech but it’s not far away.

I feel like the amount of drama these people have generated is pretty ridiculous given how rarely we actually interact with them. I’m feeling pretty done. But I know it isn’t exactly polite for me to tell Noah to ditch them. Can I have some advice about this? I’m really frustrated and angry.

Feeling cranky

1) I don’t appreciate the people who are telling Noah to take a huge pay cut or work nights/weekends so that he can change careers. Yes, I do support him in moving in a different direction. I do want him to be happy. Doing so at the complete expense of our family is not an option I’m really thrilled about. (For the record: Noah isn’t agreeing with them. I just want to tell them to take a flying leap.)

2) I don’t appreciate the recruiters who wake Shanna up from a nap at least three days a week. Today she got about 20 minutes of sleep and now won’t go down again despite crying and being very upset about being awake. God fucking damnit.

3) The cat keeps scratching Shanna in the face. I wish they could leave one another alone.

4) I really should get more housework done today but I’m feeling very fussy about doing it with Shanna hanging on me and crying. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

5) I didn’t sleep much last night. I just couldn’t fall asleep. This makes it much harder for me to be patient.

6) I still don’t know if I am in the ASL class. *sigh*

Other than that my life is good. All of this would be less cranky making if I had gotten sleep last night.

Hilarious

I just got a message on okcupid:
Heya,

I recognize you from the dancing community. It’s fun hearing about the ways your life has been evolving lately. Let me know if you’d like to meet one another in person to get to know one another more.

J.
PS I’m good with you being into country :o)

Wow. I don’t think he has any idea who I am. Or that we have been on more than one date.

up

It’s to the point where I get really excited about waking up in the middle of the night if Shanna stays asleep. This is the most consistent ‘alone time’ I get.

I haven’t written about the Oklahoma trip. It was… interesting. I think I had forgotten or been unaware of just how closed minded the family is. I almost turned to my mom’s friend and said, “Have I mentioned that I’m queer. I’ve probably fucked more girls than both of your sons combined.” I wanted to do this because they had multiple books on their coffee table about the homosexual agenda and how homosexuals are ruining this great country. Great. I was asked if I was going back to work when Shanna goes to school and the response when I said I would be homeschooling was, “Well, that’s a choice.” Yup. It is. And fuck you very much as well Mr. Sunshine.

Oh, and when Shanna fell out of the bathtub and hit her head I talked to her about why I was asking her to sit down. My mom listened in and then said, “I told you too but you see how that turned out.” ?? In general as a mom you told me to do stuff and I didn’t listen? “I told you not to do things as a teenager but you didn’t listen to me and you got raped. See what happens when you don’t listen to me?” ?!?!?!?! WHAT?! Oh my fucking god. She said she didn’t understand why her comment was different than me telling a ten month old, “See honey, that is why I asked you to sit down. I’m sorry you hurt your head.” Though she did apologize the next morning–I guess that is progress.

I hate doing that quantity of driving sans cruise control. It’s crummy.

I realized recently that most of the people I’ve been spending time with are female and close to my age. This is such a bizarre change compared to the rest of my life. But you know what? I can’t complain. I really appreciate the friendships that have deepened in the past year and some. It’s really good to learn more about the people who think I’m worth going out of their way for.

not good

Shanna is sick. She has a fever and she is lethargic and tired. This isn’t great but it pales next to being told that someone I love tremendously was raped. I don’t know how to adequately help him. Yes, him. I feel terrible because I didn’t try harder to help him when/before it happened.

Sometimes I feel like I could joyfully take on all the suffering in the world just to protect my loved ones. I’m very strong; I know I could handle it. I don’t really know how he will truly heal.

The Kool Aid

Mid-way through writing this it occurred to me that I have multiple friends who are in OA and for whom this might be triggering. This is a lot of talk about food, weight, and body image. Feel free to skip this if you might have issues with those topics. 🙂 You don’t even have to be in OA to not want to read about my weight issues. 🙂
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That bloody figures.

So we go to Urgent Care and the only doctor available is… the one I didn’t want to see. Farking great.

Shanna’s fine, of course. I got to answer a bunch of insulting questions about whether or not I’m letting Shanna play with bleach.

edited to add:

She didn’t literally ask if let her play with bleach. She was just really persistent in asking over and over about every single cleaning product in the house and whether or not they are locked up.

*grrr* stupid PAMF

I just called trying to get an appointment for Shanna. She yanks on her ears enough that I have a very small amount of concern about an ear infection. Not a huge concern, but enough that I’m willing to go have her checked out as a basic preventative thing. So I called for an appointment. I was first told that I can’t have a well child check up if I think there is maybe anything wrong with her, I have to have a sick baby visit. When I told her I didn’t really think the baby was sick she got snippy and said, “Well what is it you want?” I said I wanted an appointment with a doctor. Then she told me to call Dr. x (my primary doctor)’s office and talk to them about what kind of visit to schedule. I told her I would like to see a different doctor and she asked me why. I told her I didn’t like the way Dr. x interacted with my daughter on the first visit and I would like to see a pediatrician. She told me to go online and browse profiles of doctors and call back and see if I can get an appointment with the one I select. Uhm, I’m going to be changing insurance plans soon so I don’t feel a need to spend a bunch of time searching for the “right” doctor, can I have an appointment with anyone who has an opening in the next day or so? She told me that I should just go to urgent care then. Goodbye and have a nice day.

WTF! Bitch!

Folsom

So we went. Ten or Fifteen minutes in we were stopped by a very earnest woman with a clipboard from the NCSF. She proceeded to lecture us on how people on the religious right are trying to shut down Folsom and I am a terrible person for bringing in my baby and giving them more ammunition. There were very thin hints that if Folsom shuts down I will be at least partially responsible for taking it away from the 400,000 people there. When I relayed this story to a friend at the fair his response was, “And did you tell her to go fuck herself?” I kind of wish I had said that. We were at the fair for less than an hour and I felt pretty shamed and dirty the whole time and not in a good way. My daughter is four months old. She won’t remember this. I won’t be bringing her ever again because she might remember and that’s crossing a line.

And you know what? If Folsom shuts down it won’t be because of my four month old. And despite her scare tactics, I don’t believe that my child is going to be taken away by CPS now. Our house may be mildly cluttered, but it’s cluttered primarily with books that I am reading for a graduate degree and baby gear. Our daughter is huge and healthy and extremely happy. And it’s not as if she is using a dildo for a teething device. Give me a break.

dance scene

I would really like to post to some of the conversations about the sexism in the dance scene with some inflammatory stuff. Maybe something to the effect of: “Those of you who are saying, ‘Well the dance scene is so much safer than other communities’ are stupid!” BULLSHIT. I know more girls/women who have been raped by other dancers than I know people who have been raped in the bdsm scene. I find that fascinating. I know of FAR more ‘mild’ boundary violations in the dance scene than in the bdsm scene. It is worth pointing out that in my mind the ‘dance community’ sort of loosely enfolds Dickens and Faire as well.

The idea that just because the dancers are a “community” women are safer makes me want to puke.