My Ahhh-ha Moment

After my last blog I believe that I learned allot about myself through my own words.  It's amazing how much you can realize about how you treat yourself and others after verbalizing it aloud or writing about yourself.  I have spent more time keeping these walls around myself to try and block others from getting in that I wasn't able to make that connection about myself until now.  Talk about a wow moment. 

I have believed before that I was in love.  I believed that if someone loved me that he would change to be with me.  Yet I would somehow find it so unbelievably surprising when they let me down in some way.  I always seem so surprised when someone doesn't live up to the standards that I in fact have place on them, not those that they have placed on themselves.  I believe it is human nature to place goals for ourselves, so in turn we will work to achieve those goals.  However, when I place a expectation or goal for someone else and assume that they will honor it if they want to be with me I must have been delirious to believe that I'd get the same result.  What, you mean throwing ultimatums out at someone is not the way to true love and happiness in any relationship????  And there you have my ahhh-ha moment!!!  I realize that I have been so busy working on everyone else to mold them I wish that they would be that I wasn't working on myself.  I was more neglecting myself and in fact altering myself to mold the other people as best as I could.  I wouldn't "allow" drug use, I wouldn't "allow" illegal behavior, yet I'd "allow" myself to be mistreated and compromise my own well being because in my skewed view he had "changed" so much already for me. 

I have a man that loves me and tries to show me everyday his devotion and love for me. I close emotional doors in his face whenever he tries to love me more.  He accepts me as I am and my children as they are.  He has chosen to change certain aspects in his life because he knows how I feel about them.  I played the "if you want to be with me" card initially.  Yet he's the only man that challenged me with expressing his desire to be with me but challenging me to be accepting of some things about him as he is accepting of some things about me.  WOW!!  I showed minimal flexibility, minimal willingness to listen and accept, yet he showed stubbornness and no desire to give up.  Looking deep into myself and my own flaws and voids within me and my own life, allowed me to see that I was pushing away, walling up, and risking loosing someone that has chosen to love me in a way that I have never experienced.  Maybe this is also why it is so scary for me.  This unknown, unconditional acceptance, genuine calmness and gratitude for me as I am, flaws and all.  I realized I must stop working so hard to replace what is missing, but instead fill it with new memories, new kinds of experiences, and new loves. 

Today is the day that I say to him, welcome.  Welcome in to my heart, mind, and soul.  Buckle up and hold on my love!!!

Past vs. Present

I wonder all of the time how the events of my past have effected my present.  I wonder the impact on my decisions, relationships, parenting skills, and overall well being.  My life changed dramatically when my dad died 8 days before my 15th birthday.  Since then I feel like my life has been spinning out of control.  I now realize that I continue to try to fill the voids in my life with allot of things and people, whether they are good for me or not.  Then I question, what are these "voids" I talk about in my life.  The void of unconditional love?  The void of security and safety?  The void of success and happiness?  What is it?  I try to soul search and look deep inside as far back as I can go but I mostly see darkness with little memories of childhood.  A therapist once told me that I can't remember these things because I blocked them after my dad died.  The theory was that if I don't remember things with him in it then it will make it more like he didn't exist, then it will hurt less.....Poor decision on my part, now I can't remember and it still hurts the same.  The love between a parent and child should be filled with compassion, empathy, kindness, as well as frustrations and anger at times.  However that anger should never overpower the love. That's how it was for me and my dad.  Even when he was mad at me or I at him I knew he would never stop loving me.  I knew I could go to him for any reason and at the end he wouldn't let me fall on my face (or at least he'd pick me up after I fell).  In his mind falling was sometimes a lesson of life in itself. The day that my anger got the best of me was the day that I lost myself and my father.  You don't realize how powerful the words you say to others are until they aren't there for you to say I'm sorry.  Is this the "void" that I am missing?  That unconditional type of love and support from a parent that I missed after his death?  The need to be accepted by my parents even when I fall on my face?  Who am I missing this from, my dad, my mom?  Yes my mom is still here, yet I'm still missing this in my life......that may be enough said there. 

I tell my children everyday that I love them.  Even if they push me over the edge I find myself empathizing for them and how they are feeling or what they are going through.  This allows for forgiveness and allows us to move on.  I try remember my dad telling me that he loved me and that's about all I can try to remember, as he was the only one that ever told me.  Is this another void for me?  The desire to love others as I wished that I was at one time loved or as I wished another might have loved me as he did?  Is this the drive for many of the decisions that I've made about others that I have allowed in to my life?  Accepting others flaws and thinking if I love them enough that they will want to change.  Boy was I misdirected in that belief. 

My past is full of loss, heartache, anger, remorse, pain, hurt, some happiness, and some sadness. However the negatives listed overpower the positives significantly.  The lost of my father and my first husband put the dent in my heart, soul, and mind about love, men, and loss.  The continued abuse by men in my life as a teenager and as an adult has continued to evolve into a fire that has gotten out of control.  Settling and believing that I can't do any better, or believing that it wouldn't happen again or he didn't mean it.  I took the passion that I wished I was strong enough to make changes in my life and made it into a passion to help others and educate woman about how to find healthy love and relationships.  Could I be anymore of a hypocrite?  Educating people how to work with challenging situations in their lives or how to parent to the best of their ability....again what a hypocrite.  When my life got the most difficult and dangerous I hid behind my work instead of facing it head on.  What made me see all of this?  Not counseling that's for sure.  Time? Hitting rock bottom?  Loosing my livelihood again? I would say all of the above.  Trying to replace my father and first true love and husband for years in unhealthy and abusive relationships.  Allowing myself to be abused physically, emotionally, and , mentally for years.  Hiding behind my work and loosing the strong relationship that I held so dearly with my children.  These are the things that I allowed my past to haunt and impact my present.  These are the things I have grabbed a hold of and am working so hard to take control.  My first priority of course is rebuilding my relationship with my children.  I also believe this to be my biggest challenge. Yet I also know that if I don't change myself inside that my relationship with my children won't be as strong as it could be. 

I also know that my past made me strong in other ways.  It gave me the ability to help others through my own life experiences.  Through the traumas in my life I was able to empower others to find their way out of their unsafe or unhealthy lives.  saddness.  Take my life from here on out one day at a time and focus on the overall goal, which is peace within myself and within my life that I hope to live for a very long time.  Pain, heartache, anger, and death are no longer an option.   

Today (12/5/11)

Today has been a decent day.  It's a day that I would be ok with repeating more than once.  Some days are not even worth finishing so it is nice having a uneventful day.  Today I took Zach and Izaiah to the dentist.  However, upon Izaiah's arrival home from school his upper lip was the size of his nose (and no I am not exaggerating.)  Poor kid...I guess he's had some sort of reaction to the numbing medicine that they gave him. My poor Izaiah still has more to be done. See there's a story behind Izaiah's dental work. Izaiah is adopted. His biological mother did a variety of drugs during and after her pregnancy. Izaiah was born addicted to these drugs and went through withdraw for months. She didn't loose Izaiah to CPS until he was about a week old. She was actually breast feeding him while continuing to use drugs........nothing like some cocaine breast milk to start your day with. Ridiculous!!! I still get fired up about it all. Due to the drug use during the entire pregnancy Izaiah's teeth and gums during development were compromised and were not able to build the calcium and other stuff that make them form and make them strong. His teeth are weak, smaller than usual, and very at risk for dental problems. How frustrated he will be when he gets older to know that his continued battle with his teeth is because his biological mother wasn't willing to put his health in front of her drug use.  Anyways, he is a trooper about it all and continues to do very well at the dentist.
Zacharia did great!!  He usually struggles and has serious sensory overload at the dentist but he did a great job and got everything done without a fight.  I'm so proud of them both.   

Rick got off work early today due to the weather.  He came home as a walking mud man.  We were able to spend some time together getting groceries and Christmas lights.  It's not often that we are able to have some time alone with each other anymore.  It was nice to just relax and work together to get the items we needed with an occasional acting like a teenager in the store to see who could embarrass the other one more.  It's funny how frugal we both are becoming, including making a grocery list :-).  He is pretty impressed with the "house wife" role I have taken on.  However, I am not.  I have worked since I was 15 years old, so to not work is a different way of life for me.

Today I pondered about................

I thought allot today about my life, where it is, and where I want it to be.  I'm getting frustrated about not working and not having any job leads that pay enought.  I am pending financial aide to start my Masters program and have confirmed my acceptance in to ISU, even though the thought of going back to school sends a chill down my spine.  Right now I feel like I'm sitting around gaining weight and being lonely while everyone is at work and school.  But, I'm working on coming up with a plan to address both issues.  I wonder everyday if I made the right decision to move here.  We have been able to make a place for us here and it is starting to feel like home to us.  Just a few days ago Izaiah was eating his breakfast and turned around and said "I like it here but I'm still not sure about the school."  I find that to be a small success!!  He's slowly making friends and enjoying being at home.  Zach's school transition is taken a day at a time.  Some days are good, some days are not so good, some days are like he needs an exorcism.  He tends to validate his anger towards his new peers as "well he's annoying."  Zach isn't use to being in a classroom with so many verbal kids....he's use to being the most verbal and capable in his classroom, so to have competition in these areas is a bit of a challenge for him.  He misses his old teacher Ms. Julie.  One day when I had to pick him up early he said that he hoped if he was bad enough that he would be able to go back to Ms. Julie's room.  That was a day that we cried together and agreed that he's come to terms with accepting the move and new school and I would come to terms and accept my current role at home.  He looked up at me and told me I should be happy because I'm really good at it.  Yep, the crying continued.   
So the things I pondered today are about whether or not I've made the right decision starting fresh here at a new place and new town, what am I going to do to keep myself busy until I find out about school, coming up with an exercise plan of some sort to loose the extra weight I've gained being a flippin "house wife", and what should I make for dinner :-)  These are my thoughts for today.

Extrodinairy

Today I told my best friend that she is one of the most extrodinairy people I know.  I decided to talk about what extrodinairy means to me because it is such as powerful word.  I decribe my best friend using that powerful word for a variety of reasons.  I share that description with a few others that I have been lucky to also share my life with.  My best friend is a person of eligance, gracefulness, power, kindness, and love.  She is able to take each step in her life and continue forward no matter who or what tries to push her backwards.  She is willing to share her life and passion with others.  Yet even though she has a business to run she hasn't lost her sense of compassion for the people and the animals that she works with and is willing to put herself out to help another person or animal.  She is a beautiful and talented woman.  She is educated with knowledge of multiple skills, business, but also of life and love.
I also share my life with another extrodianary woman.  She is a woman of eligence, laughter, faith, and love.  She shadows her own pain with making others feel good and helps them find laughter during their times of struggle.  She is a mother and friend to her children.  When her family found themselves in one of the hardest struggles that they have seen, they were also hit by a terrible accident and her son was hurt badly.  She was able to turn to her faith, which many of us have not been able to hold on too.  When most of us would have thrown our hands up and wanted to give up, she held her hands up to her God and thanked him for the miracle of saving her son.  When those of us that love her where worried and thinking "wow can she do this and stay in school" she was worried and thinking "I know this is going to be hard but I will prevail."  She is a well educated woman who has taken on the educational challenge of her life and has continued to prove exactly how extrodinary she truly is. 

These two ladies are my friends, no they are a part of my family.  They are the epitomy of what I consider to be extrodinary.  That powerful word is not one that describes objects of expense, but decribes people and what they do in their lives that positively impacts other's lives.  Their unconditional willingness to give of themselves even when they aren't sure that they have much left to give.   This is what it means to me to be extrodianary. 

God

Over the past year or more and other times throughout my life I have heard a lot about my need to turn to God to help me through tough times.  I'm pretty open about my relationship with God.  Do I believe in him?  I think I do.  This last year has defianetly made me do alot of questioning though as to what's real and what's not.  If there is a God then I ask him why.  I have asked that question alot over the last year.  Why have things that have happened to me, us, happened???  I always say that the saying God never gives you more than you can handle doesn't make sense to me because if the were the case God must think I'm superwoman plus superman plus whatever other super person there is out there because the level of traumatic events and stress that I have experiences is huge over the past year.  You know its bad when your best friends is concerned that you can't take one more thing or you might just snap.  So if there is a God then why I ask.  Why do people like me have to experience all of the things I have had to go through.  Why do my children have to experience things that they have gone through?  I get that he gave humans the ability to choose and all of my choices have been far from amazing.  Yet in the past when I've turned to him during good and bad times my life got worse, more stressful, more traumatic, and more devistating.  Is there a God?  I don't know and I don't know that I ever will.  That's my preception at least.  If there is a God I hope he does have a "plan" for us because so far this one is more than questionable. 

12/1/11

Life since last night has been eventful to say the least.  I'm asking myself since last night what is the definition of family.  To me it is anyone in your life that you love, they don't have to be blood relatives either.  My best friend is my family, my boyfriend is my family, my Momma K is my family, and my brothers, sisters, and children are my family.  To me I am lucky to be surrounded by such a diverse and amazing group of family members.  To others in my life I have turned my back on them by adding more people to my "family."  I feel sad that some don't see the positives about allowing your "family" to grow and to know the great feeling of being loved by many. 

Yesterday Zach had a bad reaction to a new medication.  It was a scary and somewhat humurous situation in the end.  He was sort of like a 14 year old Purdue student right after breakfast club.  He was actig loopy and pretty out there.  We were able to get him settled and is doing fine now.  Since the move he has not adjusted very well to changing schools.  I knew that he would have some challenges but truly didn't exspect it to be this rough.  Raising a child like Zach is like playing Russian Rullett some days.  You live day by day and are never really