Drowning

I'm drowning and it'd be a lot easier to just go under rather than keep fighting to stay afloat. Unfortunately, no matter how many times I take a breath in, it's always air that hits my lungs instead of liquid. It's that dream that you can't wake up from. And death by water is my biggest fear.

I'm trapped in limbo, every moment reliving the same thing over and over and over again. My lungs burning for oxygen, me taking a breath and relaxing at the thought of knowing I'll be able to rest in just a moment, and then realizing that it's air and not water and that no, relaxation isn't coming.

Sometimes, I notice something beautiful under the water, or my head breaks through the silence and I'm dazzled by the sunlight sending crystals everywhere. In these moments, I blissfully forget about drowning, and I laugh and smile as I enjoy the radiance of the world around me.

But mostly, I just want to drown. I am sick of fighting and never getting ahead. I am tired. My lungs hurt. And I am surrounded by darkness. No matter how many times I breathe under water though, nothing happens.

Please God, wake me up from this dream.

...it's beating again.

It's the moment when your heart starts beating on it's own again after having CPR done on it. You hurt from the efforts to save your life; after all, having to save your life did involve you dying. Now you have a chance at a new life...but you still have the same body...with the same problems...you're in the same location, with the same people, and the same past. But somehow, in some tiny way, it's different. And your heart is beating again.

Maybe you got lost in the abyss of time when your heart wasn't beating, or maybe you got so used to someone else mechanically depolarizing your cardiac cells that you forgot what it's like to have them depolarize themselves because of something in you that's intrinsic, automatic, and independent of anyone else. Either way, you are so aware now of the thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump that's going on. Your hand covers half of your neck, captivated by the warm pulsation of life.You lay in the stillness of that moment, no one else able to hear the beating, no one else able to feel the movement.

You're breathing again, and it's awe inspiring and terrifying at the same time. You don't know if you should feel this. And though you're elated at the freedom and rest it brings, you don't know where to go from here. So you don't go. You lay there, listening to your heart beat its own joyous rhythm, feeling your blood dance beneath your fingers...strong, steadfast, and independent of anyone else.

Fears

I wonder what I'm giving up. It's part of what keeps me back.

Will I be loved again? Never feel the pain of birth again? Listen to my own laughter beat against the walls? Admire my own accomplishments? Always rent movies because I am afraid to sit alone?

...am I afraid to be alone?

What if no one is there to hold me when I die and I'm the person that the paramedic gets excited to "work," only to find that I've been laying there for three days already?

I didn't want to be a statistic.

I didn't want any of this.

...and I am afraid.

you told me to write...

Sometimes loving someone means you sacrifice yourself for that person. I'm not talking about letting him have the last cookie or running outside when it's -15 to turn the car on. I mean the gut wrenching soul bearing moment when you give up what you both want because it's what right for the other person.

Sometimes loving someone means saying no instead of yes. I can only wish that I had known that years ago, that someone had taught me along the way and before we got to this point. But I have learned now. And I love you. And I will love you even if what you want is for me to be selfish and you hate what I am doing to you.

Funny, when two people truly love each other, they will only agree to things if it's in the other person's best interest--never if it's in their own. So I will tell you that I need to stop, when really, I am talking about you. I will tell you that I need space and time to figure things out when really, really what I want is to crawl onto your lap and have you hold me and kiss me and never, ever let go of me.

You are like a piercing to me. You own a part of me, and even if I remove you, the scar is still there, reminding me that it's yours. Others may not see it...but I will know it's there, and I will subconsciously think about it every time I run my hand over my skin, caressing the scar without even realizing I'm doing it. Other times, I may purposely trace the outline with my finger, willing myself to feel the pain again because feeling the love again is worth the pain.

I cherish being loved by you. I have fallen in love with being loved with no strings attached and no expectations. To let go of that is to cut one of my jugular veins...no matter how delicate of an instrument I use, no matter how much cleaning I do before hand or how careful I am, the result will be the same and I may bleed to death in the process.

But that's a risk I am willing to take. Because I love you, too.

I want something different. Something that in many ways might be easier. But...I love you, and I am going to stand for you even when you aren't standing for yourself right now. I will carry you, even if it's something you won't be able to see by me doing by this. I will fight myself from clinging to you, and you will let me go because you will think it's what I need.

Know that you are loved. You always will be. Forever, and ever, and ever. No matter what, I never stop loving.

I promise. I do.

"For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." 

(Jeremiah 29:11-13)

THAT sort of day.

It's one of those days. You know, the one where you put on your sexiest bra and wear a thong just because some part of your life, no matter how minuscule or private, needs to feel good about itself.

I am a grouch. I don't want to be a mean mom because of it, so I'm going to do my complaining here and then pick myself up and move on.

First off, I'm freakin' tired. Really, does a person need to stay up until 1am? Especially if she is going to get up with her kids multiple times a night and then be up for the day by 0730? I am thinking not so much unless she's doing CPR on her neighbor. That's the main thing. If I wasn't so tired, I could handle life a lot better.

Somehow, being tired and not having life go the way you actually want it to go makes all of the little things seem like big things. Like the fact that I don't own a pair of jeans that look cute on me. Good heavens, why is it so hard to find a pair of pants that fit a ghetto booty and smaller waist? Impossible around Upstate NY, apparently. So then one could deduce that I need to lose weight. Well, that's obvious. But instead of doing what I need to do to accomplish that (which I really do want to do), I am eating cold, leftover pizza with my 2-year-old for breakfast. Yes, mommy is on a roll today.

Speaking of Upstate NY, why do we even live here? It's dark, freezing, has the worst tax rates in the COUNTRY, and one of the highest (if not the highest) depression rates.

Depression reminds me that all of the people I know are depressed. I want to help them but can't. I hate having my hands tied.

At least now that I'm on the topic of other people, I can get the focus off of myself.

So dear depressed people in the world, I am going to work on saving you today. All while wearing my sexy bra and a thong.

32 Weeks

At my 32-week appointment, I discussed with Deb the fact that I needed to go off work. I was having contractions constantly, was out of breath all the time, and would black out if I stood up, bent down, etc.. Not good. She agreed without hesitation and I didn't go to work the next day.

Thank God.

My last day working (Monday), my boss called me in and told me that I was the only employee to ever talk to HR about problems (which I know for a fact is untrue). I had recently just sent an honest "is it legal for me to have to take sick or vacation time for a Dr.'s appointment as a salaried employee" email to our HR guy. The reason? I was singled out and asked to do that when no one else was. Just a questions. Seriously.

Anyway, the whole conversation with my boss was really overwhelming to me. He brought up the whole issue surrounding the symposium last year that I presented at (the one that my boss' boss told me that I didn't need to bring my baby to the three day event because nursing was "neither important or necessarry." Oh YES she did.), and made it clear that they were still holding it against me. WOW. Especially when they were legally and ethically wrong with that incident.

Well, as soon as I was taken off of work, my contractions stopped. I thought it might be coincidental until I saw my boss while I was driving about a week later. As soon as I realized it was him, I began having big contractions again. I'm thinking I was stressed out a bit at that job.

The shortness of breath and blacking out continued until a few weeks later when we realized my iron was at a dangerously low level. Once I began an iron supplement that got a WHOLE lot better, too.

After all of that drama, I spent my days finally preparing for my son to arrive and finally got to experience being a stay-at-home mom. Sick, ridiculously pregnant or not, I got to raise my daughter. Finally.

I will write...

It's been so long that I have reguarly kept up either of my blogs, but particularly this one. The reason for that is threefold: 1) I was taken off of work when I was 32-weeks pregnant with Timothy and thus lost my Internet connection. 2) After he was born and we got the Internet at our house, my life was so ridiculously, insanely, crazy with a 20-month-old and newborn that taking 3 minutes to sit down at the computer was out of the question. 3) life has been very tumultuous the last few months and making myself process it with words is a lot harder than ignoring it altogether.

But I'm going to begin writing again.

It will take me a while to catch up, but I am going to push through the past as quickly as possible so I can being writing about today again.

I need it. Writing is cathartic for me.