Something bad happened this week that has tied into the idea of my dad dying and my mom's death.
I had the worst fever I've ever in my life had (which is impressive - I've been hospitalized twice in my adult life for scary infections). Hallucinations, convulsions, chills, lasting for hours. No apparent reason.
And then my period started.
That's so not normal. I've been Googling stuff ever since, and I'm half-convinced I have cancer. At the very least fibroids. SOMETHING ISN'T RIGHT.
Guess who has two ovaries and hasn't scheduled a doctor's appointment.
There's something comforting in the ignorance. While I know something isn't right, I don't KNOW something is wrong. I'm housing Schrodinger's uterus.
While I was squeezing 10 more minutes of bed time out of the morning, I realized I'm going to be 37 soon. Then 40. At some near future, people will stop thinking I'm in my twenties. I should dye the blue out of my hair because it might be ridiculous at my age. My face won't be oily forever. My skin won't always be soft.
Or maybe it will. Maybe I was off by a decade when I thought I'd be dead by 30. Maybe it's 40 I'll never see, and won't have to worry about old age.
I don't have a will; I need to make a will. I need to get out of debt so I have something to have a will about. At least I have life insurance. Does my father have life insurance? I guess it doesn't matter because he's a veteran. I have life insurance for Jon, too. He's going to outlive me. I hope he gets over the idea that he'll never love anyone else.
So, of course that ruined the last ten minutes of almost-sleep that's better than the entire six hours before.
Does anyone have a life-changing eye cream to help prevent wrinkles? I don't want to look old.
I thought I came to terms with getting older.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Tuesday, June 16, 2015
My Dad is Dying
On a good day, I call myself introspective. On a bad day, I'm self-centered.
Regardless, even through my empathy toward my father and imagining what it must feel like to be facing his own mortality at only 64 (the thought of it takes my breath away, it's so incompressible), it's all getting filtered through my own mind and experiences and how I feel about it.
I met my dad about a year and a half ago. So, I already have many years of abandonment issues after my mother died of cancer when I was 13 and I became a ward of the state. I have issues and issues and issues, that I felt like I had come to terms with and was able to recognize and work around in my day to day life.
Meeting him was total fantasy fulfillment. My dad was a race car driver and a soldier and cerebral. He'd used his time to become some big-shot chemical engineer project manager, traveling the world setting up power plants for different governments.
He also gave me insights into myself - my tendency to disconnect with people who I don't have enough contact with, the low desire to build a family unit or traditional life, being almost sociopathic in my ability to read and manipulate, my avoidance of that label because of my empathy. Basically, meeting him made me understand why I was an alien in my family. Because he was a cuckoo who laid his egg and flew.
Since meeting, we've spoken a handful of times, texted, and done some emailing. We had plans to meet up once he was fully retired and settled into North Carolina. He was going to get a house in the woods and have my husband, dog, and I for a long visit.
We were supposed to have years to know each other.
But instead, my father is dying of cancer and has months. And he doesn't want me to visit. And I'm 13 again.
It's weird, because I can see myself so clearly now. I can see the ways I deal with this and how it's been programmed into me by my previous experiences with trauma. I have friends and an aunt and a husband who want to talk to me and be here for me. Instead, I don't want to talk about it at all. I have this little ball of sad/rage rolling through my body and occasionally finding its way out through my eyes. Normally, though, it's just something I bat away. I don't want to talk about it because I'm not a sad-girl.
My sad/rage ball keeps bouncing around, and the outside world is irritating it. I feel like I just need a respite, but work needs doing and I don't want to tell my boss I need a personal day to get my head together because I don't want to be seen as anything other than together. Together-girl doesn't need a personal day to get her head together. She works through it, makes a delicious dinner, and has many laughs after a hard day at the office.
But I am sad-girl. I'm pretending to be together-girl, and if I act like together-girl, and if everyone thinks I'm together-girl, does that make me together-girl? Is this imposter syndrome?
Regardless, my dad is dying of cancer. In the future-perfect tense, both of my parents will have died of cancer. My dad is dying of lung cancer, my mother died of uterine cancer (though it made its way to her lung, and half of one was removed). I need to schedule an appointment with a gynecologist because now I have cancer trickling its tendrils into me from both sides of the family tree.
I'm going to be an orphan again. Makes sense, since I was one for so long. Things return to their natural state of being.
Regardless, even through my empathy toward my father and imagining what it must feel like to be facing his own mortality at only 64 (the thought of it takes my breath away, it's so incompressible), it's all getting filtered through my own mind and experiences and how I feel about it.
I met my dad about a year and a half ago. So, I already have many years of abandonment issues after my mother died of cancer when I was 13 and I became a ward of the state. I have issues and issues and issues, that I felt like I had come to terms with and was able to recognize and work around in my day to day life.
Meeting him was total fantasy fulfillment. My dad was a race car driver and a soldier and cerebral. He'd used his time to become some big-shot chemical engineer project manager, traveling the world setting up power plants for different governments.
He also gave me insights into myself - my tendency to disconnect with people who I don't have enough contact with, the low desire to build a family unit or traditional life, being almost sociopathic in my ability to read and manipulate, my avoidance of that label because of my empathy. Basically, meeting him made me understand why I was an alien in my family. Because he was a cuckoo who laid his egg and flew.
Since meeting, we've spoken a handful of times, texted, and done some emailing. We had plans to meet up once he was fully retired and settled into North Carolina. He was going to get a house in the woods and have my husband, dog, and I for a long visit.
We were supposed to have years to know each other.
But instead, my father is dying of cancer and has months. And he doesn't want me to visit. And I'm 13 again.
It's weird, because I can see myself so clearly now. I can see the ways I deal with this and how it's been programmed into me by my previous experiences with trauma. I have friends and an aunt and a husband who want to talk to me and be here for me. Instead, I don't want to talk about it at all. I have this little ball of sad/rage rolling through my body and occasionally finding its way out through my eyes. Normally, though, it's just something I bat away. I don't want to talk about it because I'm not a sad-girl.
My sad/rage ball keeps bouncing around, and the outside world is irritating it. I feel like I just need a respite, but work needs doing and I don't want to tell my boss I need a personal day to get my head together because I don't want to be seen as anything other than together. Together-girl doesn't need a personal day to get her head together. She works through it, makes a delicious dinner, and has many laughs after a hard day at the office.
But I am sad-girl. I'm pretending to be together-girl, and if I act like together-girl, and if everyone thinks I'm together-girl, does that make me together-girl? Is this imposter syndrome?
Regardless, my dad is dying of cancer. In the future-perfect tense, both of my parents will have died of cancer. My dad is dying of lung cancer, my mother died of uterine cancer (though it made its way to her lung, and half of one was removed). I need to schedule an appointment with a gynecologist because now I have cancer trickling its tendrils into me from both sides of the family tree.
I'm going to be an orphan again. Makes sense, since I was one for so long. Things return to their natural state of being.
Thursday, May 14, 2015
Things I Am
(I wrote this a while ago and never published it. Probably because I wrote it when I was feeling mopey.)
Fat
Smart
Sexy
Pretty
Funny
Stylish
Wicked
Decisive
Controlling
Creative
Insecure
Caring
Loved
There's tons more, but those are the things that come easily to mind. Only the first item is something most people see when they look at me.
Fat
Smart
Sexy
Pretty
Funny
Stylish
Wicked
Decisive
Controlling
Creative
Insecure
Caring
Loved
There's tons more, but those are the things that come easily to mind. Only the first item is something most people see when they look at me.
Oh, It's Been a While
So, so, so much life has happened since I last blogged.
1. I moved to Atlanta, and that's been... It's been. Remind me to tell you what the first day was like and all of the other bad omens we've had since being here. I don't normally believe in that kind of stuff, but geez - I've been pummeled over the head with it.
2. I met the girl I gave up for adoption, and we correspond. She's amazing and like me and different and it's so weird. She's pretty much everything I wanted to be when I was her age, which is so strange. And dear lord, she's beautiful!!! How did genetics do that crazy shit?
3. I met my father. What?!? Like, I met him, we went out for multiple dinners, we have a picture together, I have his chin, he called me on my birthday. So weird. So much of my identity for all these years has been tied into being an orphan.
4. My father is still a deadbeat dad. He makes promises to see each other and avoids talking to me when he hits the deadline. I have to start most of the conversations with him. My husband is angry about it, but I'm actually not. I don't think I expected much when I initially contacted him, considering he'd already served a 30-some odd year hiatus. At least I know where I get my out-of-sight-out-of-mindness from.
5. Diabetes. I'm still on medication. My sugar is under control, but I eat what I want - which means my life is out of control. This is probably it's own post.
6. I still work from home, only now for one of the biggest electronics companies in the world. My weirdness is saluted and my boss's boss says fuck. I found my tribe.
6. Expect more product reviews!!! Ipsy is a really cool service that sends you multiple products (deluxe samples and full size) that you probably haven't tried. I've found a bunch of really awesome products through this. Also, clothes!!!
So, I'm back from my vacation, and ready to get back out here.
1. I moved to Atlanta, and that's been... It's been. Remind me to tell you what the first day was like and all of the other bad omens we've had since being here. I don't normally believe in that kind of stuff, but geez - I've been pummeled over the head with it.
2. I met the girl I gave up for adoption, and we correspond. She's amazing and like me and different and it's so weird. She's pretty much everything I wanted to be when I was her age, which is so strange. And dear lord, she's beautiful!!! How did genetics do that crazy shit?
3. I met my father. What?!? Like, I met him, we went out for multiple dinners, we have a picture together, I have his chin, he called me on my birthday. So weird. So much of my identity for all these years has been tied into being an orphan.
4. My father is still a deadbeat dad. He makes promises to see each other and avoids talking to me when he hits the deadline. I have to start most of the conversations with him. My husband is angry about it, but I'm actually not. I don't think I expected much when I initially contacted him, considering he'd already served a 30-some odd year hiatus. At least I know where I get my out-of-sight-out-of-mindness from.
5. Diabetes. I'm still on medication. My sugar is under control, but I eat what I want - which means my life is out of control. This is probably it's own post.
6. I still work from home, only now for one of the biggest electronics companies in the world. My weirdness is saluted and my boss's boss says fuck. I found my tribe.
6. Expect more product reviews!!! Ipsy is a really cool service that sends you multiple products (deluxe samples and full size) that you probably haven't tried. I've found a bunch of really awesome products through this. Also, clothes!!!
So, I'm back from my vacation, and ready to get back out here.
Say Hello to My Big F***ing Buns!
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