some good news

went to the doctor, and what i thought was true is true: the shoulder really has done a lot of healing. no surgery! so i brought home some flowers for myself, and the cats made themselves available for a photo op. it made me smile. enjoy!

summer always brings the sunshine :)

i'm sorry i've been quiet lately. i've been trying to figure out why i haven't felt the need to come blog about all the feelings that go into my every day life. there's really only two. first, i'm feeling pretty good. and two, i'm trying to avoid getting myself all upset.

the silence from my mother lately has been happily deafening. true to my word in my last post, i have NOT gone to read her blog at all. the simple truth is that i just don't want to know. i don't want to know if she's depressed, or planning on coming down to harass me in person, or if she's in danger. i want to put my trust in everything spiritual to guide her and take care of her without my intervention or interference. i know, in my heart, that she is a capable survivor, and that she will endure anything that comes her with the clever manipulation and resourcefulness she's always had.

in the meantime, my life feels suddenly full of words like "possible", "happy", "content"... my job has become heaven once again. i have an amazing boss and a store that makes me confident in myself, and excited to wake up in the morning. and at the same time, both him and the store staff are intent on keeping my time away from work sacred. no phone calls. no text messages. i don't dread my phone ringing on my weekend anymore. how did i get this lucky? i've been spending my weekends with friends, sightseeing, visiting family, or just spending time with myself. my shoulder seems to be healing.

maybe my heart is healing too. maybe that's what's going on.

in other news, i've met someone i actually feel something for. it's completely in my head, and i'm pretty sure that nothing will ever happen with this guy, but i just have to say that i've missed thinking about someone. there hasn't been a "someone" in a long, long time. the timing is all screwy for the two of us, and i know i'm still a bit of a mess inside.

but still. i like that word. "possible." possibilities and hopes aplenty.

note to self.

stop reading your mother's blog!!!! it's not good for you. it hurts. it worries you. it's not helping anything. just stop it. why do you like this feeling of pain and grief? why do you drink from it, like a parched animal? the crocodile below the surface is going to bite your head off and drown you.

enough already. it's not going to bring her back.

5 years and counting.

this is mother's day #5 without a celebration of my mother. spent it yet again in the company of my grandmother and aunt, who have spent so much of my life trying to fill a gap.

but we existed as a pair at one point, and i'm trying to remember the time that we did have.

my father said goodnight tonight by saying, "happy daughter's day." it was sweet, and i know what he meant. but i think it's ok to say happy mother's day today - because she was my mother at one point, and i am comfortable enough to celebrate that.

five years with her absence, but she's never really gone.

anger and fear.

my support meeting on wednesday was amazing. i left feeling good, empowered, and even relieved. here was one month where i could report i was doing better. it's lasted a few days until i picked my mail out of the mailbox this afternoon to find:

"my dear daughter:

i am worried at your reluctance to continue our family relationship. so i am planning to drive down to your home sometime this month and see for myself how you are doing and whether you are happy. i hope that you will accommodate your mother by permitting me to sleep on the sofa. my needs are simple and i look forward to seeing someone whom i have missed for sometime. regards, mom."

i want to rage at her. scream. throw a fucking lamp at her head. why can't she just leave me ALONE? i don't understand it. i never will. how much clearer do i need to be? so i write all this anger down, in the hopes that i calm myself enough to sleep tonight without nightmares. and then i start with the fear, the anxiety - is she really going to show up? what the hell am i going to do? should i call the police ahead of time? is there anything they can even do about it? is it enough for an order of protection?

and two days before mother's day. i want to punch her in the face.

well, world? what should i do?

soul healing.

i have been trying over the past few weeks to heal, emotionally and physically. i wouldn't say i'm there yet. but i know that i am on my way.

i have been looking forward to may 1st like you wouldn't believe. the beginning of the month means my support group meeting is coming up. i was such a mess at the last one, and i think i'm better now. i'm anxious to see them all and tell them how much better i'm coping.

i spent last night and yesterday alone, but not sitting at home on the couch. i took myself out to dinner, and then spent today wandering around a cute little town up north i had read about. spent the afternoon sitting on the porch of a french bistro, sipping vino verde and inhaling a bowl of mussels with fries on the side. it was beautiful. but still so alone. i don't know what it is that keeps me from calling my friends. sometimes i need the space. but i know today would have been more fun with someone along for the ride.

started to wonder if this is what my mother does all the time too, all alone upstate.

is this really it?

i know, it's dangerous to spy on my mother through her blog. (that's what i'm really doing.) she wrote something yesterday that summed up the harshness of my decision to cut her out of my life. "ah, but i have no loved ones left."

the child in me screamed "yes you do! i'm right here!" in my head immediately after reading this.

the rational adult in me calmly responded "you do, but they cannot be close to you."

all of this brings me back to how i feel at the moment. do i love my mother? this is the question i have felt guilty to even examine. yes, of course i love my mother. yes, it kills me almost every day to know that she is aging, alone, far away, and poor. it kills me to think that she spends her holidays with strangers and the comfort of church groups that are probably just putting up with her out of politeness. it hurts to know that she is having as much a hard time of this as i am. and the guilt - the incredible guilt that i walk around with on my shoulders. where is my compassion? where is my soul?

but this person, far away, aging, alone, and poor, is not the mother i remember from my (happier) childhood. she is the person that has the ability to turn me into jelly. make me hate myself. give me heart palpitations when she has my phone number. harass and stalk strangers. harass and stalk beloved family members. harass and stalk me where i work. this person has no internal point of reference for "crossing the line." she reduces me into a pile of ash. she paralyzes me with fear, anger, and yes, even hatred. even shame.

when i step out of myself - out of my little life, and float above - the weirdness of the relationship between me and my mother seems fictional. who could cut their mother off? why am i doing this? am i just punishing her? i don't think i can rationalize it to anyone, really. it's hard enough sometimes, like tonight, to rationalize it even to myself. what would happen if i contacted her? no, no i can't. i know the implications and the consequences. because as hard as THIS is, having her in my life is even harder.

don't i deserve happiness? don't i deserve a life lived for myself, and not for providing emotional support to a mentally ill woman that refuses to take the medications that could help her? i think i do. i think i'm worth it. damn it to hell, but yes, here i am screaming that i am being selfish. i am trying ever so hard to put myself first - before her, before my family, before my career. this effort goes against everything i've ever known. my entire life has been to care for my brother, my father, and their emotional well-being.

but putting myself first is still proving tricky. the moment i start to succeed, i knock myself down, and the self-hatred begins all over again.

and then i come here, and post all of this, and somehow feel well enough to fall asleep without crying over my mother's lamentation that she has been cut off "like an amputation - a diseased member that has to be cut off to save the body." in her blog, she was describing me and my brother as the diseased part. but i know it's both of us on each side - it's a toxic relationship that won't help either of us heal in the end.