Feeling jealous?

I’m sitting down to write this in the hope that writing it out helps me to release the feelings a bit and to see if I can make some sense of what I am feeling.

I woke up with a headache again today, this has happened rather a lot the last few days and I think is the result of all the dreams I’ve been having.  I can’t remember a lot of last night’s dreams now but one of them was me and my husband getting married and him giving a speech about me (hugely narcissistic dream to be fair!). He said nice things about me and it was a pleasant dream, but I think there was probably other dreams in the mix before that one.

Yesterday morning I woke up with a headache and the dream I had been having was me visiting an old house of mine, in the dream I looked at the house and thought how I remembered it looking so different.  It looked much worse than I had remembered it looking and when I went inside, it was being either demolished or done up – it had building works going on and all the walls were stripped down to the concrete.  The house was being totally stripped out.  I thought to myself when I woke up that it was pretty symbolic really, the fact that the house “didn’t look like I had remembered” I think is quite relevant for my mother and indeed my entire life really not looking the way it really had been.  Seeing something different from the truth/the facts.  Seeing it all stripped down to the bare concrete walls – all the illusion gone perhaps?

Anyway…. we woke up today at my in law’s house because we stayed there last night after having a meal out to celebrate my mother in law’s birthday.  We had spent the day with them and the kids and then gone out for a meal in the evening. We had a nice day and a nice evening and aside from not having any time to myself to think since Friday (which I do struggle with), it was all very nice.

Last night on the way home from this meal I text my sister asking how her meal had gone. I knew that her and her boyfriend were going out for dinner with our mother and her husband.  It was quite late when I text her, gone eleven.  She replied all happy saying that the meal was lovely and that they were now at a pub and our step brother was there and his girlfriend was on her way.  She then told me that her other step brother (her dad’s bio son who she’s never really had anything to do with) had messaged her earlier in the evening and invited her to his wedding (and that she had already booked the fights).

I said that was lovely for her etc and then went to bed.

And then I woke up with the headache and feeling a bit… something I wasn’t sure what.  I had an urge to look on Facebook to see what shit my mother had posted and to see if there were photos on there of them all out enjoying her birthday but I managed to stop myself merely by telling myself it was self harm because the only thing to come from it would be me feeling pissed off or upset.  I haven’t looked but I am still tempted.

I went downstairs and was sitting with my husband and father in law and all of a sudden I was dying for some air. I keep getting this feeling, I told T about it the other day and said to her that it feels like I am suffocating or something.  Like I need to breathe in some cold, fresh air immediately or I will die or something.  I went into the kitchen and couldn’t find the back door key so shouted to my husband to find it for me and then I just pushed my way out there for a few minutes and breathed in the air.  I don’t know what that is about or why it keeps happening. It’s very weird.

Anyway, we have just got home and in 2 hours we will be leaving again to go to my sister’s flat for dinner.  I should be looking forward to seeing her and I should be looking forward to going there for dinner as we haven’t done this before. However….. I am not.

I am trying to be brutally honest here and not play down my feelings because that won’t help me at all and yet I feel ashamed and stupid for the true feelings because I know they ae unfair.

I feel angry with my sister and that is why I don’t want to go.

I feel resentful, bitter, angry, frustrated… left out maybe? I don’t know but I definitely feel something negative.

I know these feelings aren’t justified.  She hasn’t done anything wrong.  All she has done is gone out for an evening with my mother and that lot and I didn’t even want to go.  Not only that, I would have HATED it.  My mother and stepfather would have been drunk, my mother would have been dancing and flirting around the place dressed like a 21-year-old.  She would have been ordering him around to get everyone’s drinks, hold the table etc.  She would have been plying me with more alcohol than I wanted, and more than I could handle, she would have wanted people to stay out until the early hours and then possibly carry on at her house afterwards and I would have had to see her husband who I hate…. yuck. Nothing there to envy whatsoever.

And so why do I feel the way I do?

Why, when I spent a nice, normal, enjoyable evening with my in-laws would I feel jealous of that toxic environment with people who hurt me and leave me feeling so badly? Why would I feel jealous when I would much rather be with people who are kind and soft and who’s house I can be in and feel relaxed? Who’s house I woke up in this morning and felt cosy?

I’m dreading my sister relaying stories from last night to me when I get there today because I know it will just fuel this anger in me which I am trying to fight down.  I don’t want to hear how funny it was, how drunk they were, how late they got to bed… I don’t want to hear her say that my mother said this or that about me – or, more likely, that I wasn’t mentioned AT ALL.

It is weird and it is confusing.  I am choosing not to see her and them. I am choosing to remove myself and yet I feel this way. I don’t get it.

I can kind of see that it could be the fantasy I am missing or perhaps that I feel left out of the fantasy of the evening.. or the fantasy mother or whatever but I am very clear in knowing what the reality would have been.  Is that the difference between the logical and the emotional brain? The adult and the child perhaps?

It’s like when I was younger and my mother used to go out all the time to pubs and clubs and with her friends and I would be left behind on my own and I would feel so jealous and wish so badly I could be there too… and then I got a bit older and I did go and I hated it (but I still went).

I hated her flirting constantly and I hated her saying to men “this is my daughter, Twink” and then the men would fatter her by saying there was noooo way she was old enough to have a daughter my age (17) and that we looked more like sisters. It was weird because I got something from her showing me off back then… and now it just annoys me because I see it wasn’t about her being proud of me at all – it was just about how young SHE looked.  Bleugh. I hated her trying to set me up with the old(er) men. I hated watching her drape herself all over men, snog them, bring them home etc.  Yuck, yuck, yuck.  NONE of that was what I wanted. What I wanted was a normal bit of bonding and connection with my mother like everyone else had.  But that is what I had to settle for.

Perhaps it is another emotional flashback.  Perhaps it is my body’s way of showing me what I used to feel when she went out and it is alerting me to those repressed feelings of anger and resentment and frustration and jealousy.  Perhaps it is the little me just bringing my attention to those feelings as I have been desperately trying to find some of my hidden anger about her leaving me.  Maybe.

Falling out with my sister over my angry feelings would be exactly what my mother would like.  That is what used to happen the other way around, it used to be me going out to pubs with her and my sister feeling left out – and now it’s me.  How ironic.  Now I can understand why my sister hated me so much.  Perhaps it’s easier to feel the anger towards your sister than the mother.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My Email to T (TW)

Shorty after I wrote my previous blog, I was sitting at the kitchen table crying a lot and feeling very angry. I send an email to T which read:

I am sending you this email because I am feeling a mixture of a lot of anger, sadness and a bit of old fear and I decided that I should reach out to you because I know that you will be able to steady me a bit even by just reading it. 

I won’t go into the details over email because they are not nice but I wanted to say that after our session yesterday I was thinking about sexual experience that I have had in the past and I wrote some things down and realised quite how sad it was that I had done certain things, with certain people and that I shouldn’t have (sometimes didn’t even want) and that the reasons I did were all wrong.  I didn’t feel any shame about it like I used to, I just saw how sad it was that I felt badly enough to do those things.  

Today I remembered another memory which I had remembered a year ago, wrote about on my blog but then clearly forgotten about again.  I re-read that blog a while ago and instantly felt it all in my body again. I was scared, angry, crying.  I wrote another short blog and just found myself (despite crying) being so angry.  The main feeling was “why didn’t anyone fucking protect me?” and “why didn’t someone love me enough in the first fucking place so I didn’t put myself into these dangerous situations!”. 

I don’t feel ashamed today. I really don’t which is a nice change. But instead I do feel very angry and very protective(?) of myself – if that is even a thing when it’s in the past.. hard to explain. It’s no wonder I’ve found what my mother’s ex boyfriend did so traumatising, he was just one of many, it’s just that him being someone I trusted, in my own house and my mother’s boyfriend made it scarier. He just did what so many others had done – and I had let them all. Because I didn’t know how to say no. I must have wrapped every single experience and memory up into that one event that evening and that’s why it carries so much weight even now, 15/16 years later. UGH. 

Either way, I now feel like I have this energy pulsing around me and I’m not quite sure what to do with it. I might go and punch some pillows like you once suggested. I can’t exercise as I did too much yesterday and today I’m aching too much! 

I think about all these various situations and experiences and they don’t even feel like me – actual me. I don’t even know who that girl was looking back. I’ve never thought of myself as being a slag or being easy and yet there are all these memories of me just letting people take what they wanted.  Like my body wasn’t even my own.  Like I didn’t have my own brain or mouth.  It makes me want to scream. I shouldn’t have ever been in those situations to begin with. I should have been at home like a normal teenage girl. Like I wanted to be. 

I’m going to stop typing now as winding myself up more.  Sorry to send this, before these memories came flooding back to me I felt great after our second session of the week – it truly helped so much and I came home feeling so happy.  [Husband] said the sparkle was back in my eyes.  

I am so thankful that I can share these thoughts with you because I can’t talk to anyone else about them, not even [husband].  I wouldn’t want him to think of me differently which I am sure he would, naturally. 

Ugh. Thanks for reading.  

Once I had sent it, the energy was coursing through my legs, making them shake. I knew I had to do something with it before it took over and ruined my mood for the rest of the day, weekend – or the kids saw me acting oddly.

I had an idea, I grabbed some paper and a pen (which helpfully was red!) and I just scribbled. I scribbled names of the boys/men. I called them lots of abusive things, I swore, I scribbled and scribbled I wrote the words “NO, NO NO” and “DO NOT TOUCH MEEEEEEEEEEE” and similar things and once I had finished, I tore the paper up into lots of tiny pieces.  I then stretched my body out a bit, shoved the pieces into an envelope and hid it away in my bedroom and then I felt better.

Just like that!!! Who knew?

I’ve since finished off my mother-in-law’s birthday cake, made a cup of tea and put some make up on.  I feel a little delicate under the surface, but the anger has gone and I’m left with some weird sense of pride that the anger was at someone other than myself.

I also realised quite how important T is in situations like this. You need just one person in life to be able to tell everything to and right now, she is that person.  I don’t want my husband to hear these types of memories because then I will feel ashamed and I don’t need that.  T is safer for this stuff.  I hope she sends a reply at some point, but I hope it doesn’t send me back to that angry or sad place now that I’ve recovered a little.

Another memory… another Steve (TW sex, anger, swearing)

Huge TW for this one.  Both about sex and anger and swearing.

I was sitting in the hairdressers today waiting for my colour to take and I was going over the things I wrote about yesterday afternoon, about the sex stuff in my head.  I was thinking about Steve and about Glen.

I thought to myself that in a way I was glad I had made some sense of these memories and that I could now understand how they happened in the first place and how they have affected me.  I thought that it is sad and I realised that the shame I used to feel has gone and now I just felt sad.

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, I remembered “the other Steve”. The Steve I had forgotten again.  The Steve I wrote about last year in the blog Protected: Date Rape Drug / Memory Loss.

I replayed the memory and the feelings which go with that memory and it is hard to say what body reactions I have other than it makes me want to cry and it makes my heart beat funny and my stomach flip.

I don’t know if now, a year since writing that blog, I believe I was date raped.  I don’t know what I believe.  Perhaps I really did just get too drunk – perhaps I did.  What I don’t like, what makes me upset and scared and sick is the way I feel and the way my body feels when I think back to that following morning and the fact that my memory NEVER did come back.  I have never remembered what happened after going into his house.

Part of me thinks that it is okay because I am safe now and even if something did happen, I am okay now and that I shouldn’t be freaking out so much and part of me wonders why it is that even now as I am typing this, I am crying. A lot.

Part of me wishes I knew. Part of me is glad I don’t.

And most of me just feels incredibly sad for the me back then that got herself into these situations.  Losing my virginity to Reece.  The scary experience with Glen.  Nearly sleeping with the other Steve who I didn’t even fancy.  This one… and then the sexual abuse from my mother’s boyfriend.

None of these things should have happened.

Excuse my anger and my language but WHAT THE FUCK???!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! These things shouldn’t have happened.  Why wasn’t someone looking out for me?? Why wasn’t someone checking I was okay? WHY didn’t someone love me enough in the fucking first place so I didn’t turn to these men and let myself be touched or shagged or used in the first place?

God I am so angry. I am so fucking angry.  Is that a normal reaction?

It is no wonder I had that dream last weekend about feeling like I had been sexually abused and having no memory of it.  I have memories, to an extent, mostly, but I had never written it out like this. I had never pieced together these different situations to make sense of why they happened and how I felt about them both then and now.

We shouldn’t feel guilty for pulling away

I have just been reading some stuff about childhood emotional neglect and about the long-term effects of a lack of attachment with a caregiver etc and came across this sentence:

Estranging yourself from (or neglecting) your children rarely goes unpunished.  They sometimes kick back and make their parents pay!

Now, I’m not advocating acting out anger in a destructive way – NOR am I saying that we should do things in order to “punish” our parents, in fact I am a firm believer that when we have healed (at least party) our reactions should be about protecting ourselves rather than punishing our parents, BUTTTTTTT I just wanted to relay this sentence here for anyone struggling to deal with guilt.

I am a sucker for the guilt attacks and often fall into a horrible shame cycle for how I am treating my “poor mother” – and this sentence really helped me to put it into perspective.  No act goes unpunished.  If we were neglected or abused then honestly what do they expect? Loyalty and love despite them not having given us any? We were innocent children who genuinely NEEDED things from them for our survival and they are adults who can look after themselves.

The only person/people we deserve to honour, love and respect are ourselves.

YAAASSSS!!

An extra session and another piece of the puzzle (Trigger Warning)

It’s 23 hours since my last post, if nothing else this time off work is allowing me to write a lot and I LOVE to write so I am really enjoying that but also I am attempting being creative in other ways.

Yesterday, as I’ve already said, I made 2 lasagnes, a fruit cake and some scones.  The scones didn’t rise and so were more like rock cakes but hey, at least I had tried and I did have fun making them.

Today I got up with my husband and had a cup of tea with him before he went off to work.  He does this cute thing where he puts on his pants, socks and trousers and then lies on the sofa, propped up by one of the cushions and covers his bare chest up with a blanket and watches tele whilst he eats his cereal and drinks his tea.  As I watch him do that it really makes me think of the young boy in him and the young child he once was – I am sure he is just a bigger version now. He may as well be watching cartoons.  My heart literally swells up with the love I feel for him and I sometimes get this weird feeling that I wish I had known him as “little him” as well as adult him.  The good thing is that he isn’t shut off against his young self and he is often silly and mischievous – in fact he does this thing where he does a giant smile and makes his eyes really big and “naughty” and says “it isn’t me, it’s little [name]”.  Bless him, he is such a good egg.

Anyway, so once he had left for work, I decided to get my gym clothes on and do some exercise. I debated for a while about whether to drive to the gym and do some cardio, or whether to do one of the YouTube videos I like.  I couldn’t decide so (shamefully) Googled it.  I am a serial Googler it is true… anyway, Google put forward a fight for both gym AND home workouts which wasn’t helpful at all but I decided as I hadn’t done any exercise for weeks, starting off at home might be a good idea and it saved me having to drive there and back.

I found a 30 minute full body dumbbell workout which I like, I like ones by “Bodyfit By Amy” so I found one that was for strength and conditioning rather than HIT and managed to get through it – though it was TOUGH! I was a hot, red, sweating mess by the end but felt good that I had finally got back to it.  I have no doubt whatsoever that I won’t be able to walk properly tomorrow, the aches are definitely going to get me!!

After that, I did some yoga to cool down which was nice.  It’s been such a long time since I did any yoga and I found some of the moves quite difficult which is a bit annoying as I used to go frequently.  I found myself getting a bit impatient when the gaps between each movement were too long and so decided I wasn’t really feeling settled or calm enough right now so turned it off intending to go back to it when the time was better.

After that I decided to start cooking a beef stew in the slow cooker – you may notice a bit of theme with my cooking these past few days, all wintery, stodgy, comfort food dinners.  I browned off the meat and then slung it all in the slow cooker – DONE!

Next I decided to make some more scones and try to get them to rise.  I followed a different recipe this time, this one added 2 eggs into the mixture which was different from yesterday’s and I had Googled and learnt not to handle the dough too much as it can push the air out, which stops them rising.  This batch went much better although my ability not to mess up the entire kitchen still needs improving!!

Once they were done, I went to shower, do my hair etc and then it was time to leave to drive to T’s for my extra session.  It was really nice knowing I could see T again today.  Older readers may remember that for an entire year I had two sessions a week, Tuesday evenings and Thursday afternoons, so going today was a reminder of that and it felt nice.

I decided to take T a couple of today’s scones.  I wasn’t sure why, other than the fact that it is nice to share these homemade things with people who don’t mock you and who encourage you, and T would never mock me. Unlike someone…

I got to T’s and she opened the door in her usual smiling way and the first thing I noticed was that we were wearing very similar tops, I think they call them flannel shirts? You know the kinda stripey shirts with long sleeves? Mine today is red and blue and her’s was dark blue with light blue stripes. I found that quite amusing but didn’t say anything. I started straight away by saying “Ooh I have something for you” and pulled out the two scones I had made which were in a freezer bag.  She said “Oohh how lovely! Scones!” and then I told her about yesterday’s scones and about the lasagne incident and then we spoke about baking for a bit.  She told me that she had baked cheese scones in the break and then we spoke about the fact I was going to make my mother-in-law a cake for her birthday and which type of cake etc.  It was nice.  Nice, normal, motherly kind of chat I assume and it feels nice.  I like that we have that common interest.

T remarked on the fact I had been busy making things and I said yes! A shepherd’s pie, 2 lasagnes, scones, a fruit cake, a stew, more scones… I said that I was aware that perhaps I was keeping myself a bit distracted because I had barely stopped but she said not to over think it too much and to just enjoy it because it is obviously what I need right now.  I told T that I liked the fact that when I am cooking and baking, it is MY thing.  My mother didn’t teach me how do cook or bake, I’ve just taught myself and so it feels nobody can claim it.  T said that she understood that and also said that you can just “lose yourself” when you are baking.  She said sometimes she can just bake all day long and I smiled at that image and enjoyed that thought.  It plays right into my fantasy mother figure I guess doesn’t it? The stereotypical kind, loving mum wearing an apron cooking dinners and baking cakes…. LOL.

We spoke about various other things, my stepdaughter’s birthday and how upset she had got when her mother text her saying she had brought her the same thing as us… and her sadness and anger at how her mother keeps sending her and her brothers upstairs out-of-the-way when her new boyfriend is over.  We discussed the similarities between the things my stepdaughter was dealing with that I also dealt with and I said how differently I could see it now that I was older and that she was my stepdaughter (and therefore someone I love dearly and feel protective over).  I told T that I had empathised with her and said that the only good thing was now that her mother was so interested in her new bloke, she was letting us have the kids as much as we liked because it suited her – hence camping etc.

Somehow we got onto the subject of love and sex (I can’t remember how) and I said that I was listening to Lily Allen’s autobiography at the moment and this morning she was saying how growing up feeling invisible had meant that she became hugely co-dependent and that he fell in love with anyone that fancied her because she needed to be loved, approved of and looked after. I said that I felt the same applied to me and T nodded and said that yes, it would have.  (Ah I’ve just remembered how this came about – I told T it is my mother’s birthday today, T asked how old she was and I said she was 51.  She had said that there would be an envy in there that she was 51 and I was 30 and I said that I can still remember her 30th birthday and that she had a stripper which I watched and was disturbed by – T was shocked that I had seen that and said about how she is surprised it didn’t affect me more, sexually speaking)…

[TW: Below contains stories of sexual nature – some unpleasant and could be triggering so please take care if you could be triggered]

I told T that on that note, when I took the kids camping, we were in the entertainment hall in the evening when I saw my first serious boyfriend (read the boy I lost my virginity to).  T was shocked and said what a small world etc and I told her that my reaction had surprised me. I told her that when I saw him, I went into panic, my heart started to beat really, really fast and I had to excuse myself to the bathroom to try to calm down.  I remember sitting on the toilet thinking “Calm down! You are 30 now – married! Here with your stepchildren.  You are a capable adult doing well for herself“.

I told her that as soon as I saw him I could almost smell him and that it made me feel sick. I said the smell was sweat and fags and my whole body kind of shook and shrugged as if to get the smell away from myself.  T said I was probably too young for it all and I said I was 15 – she seemed shocked and asked if I had lost my virginity to him at 15 and I said yes.  She said she wasn’t surprised given my upbringing.

I told T that the night I had slept with him for the first time, with anyone for the first time, we were at his aunt and uncle’s house and he had got me drunk on gin or rum ( I can’t remember which) and orange juice to the point where I had been physically sick in the toilet, and then his aunt and uncle went out and we did it on their front room floor.  I told her I was watching tele over his shoulder and that the whole thing was nothing special at all.

T said what a shame it was that my first experience with sex was like that and I said I just didn’t get what the fuss was about.  I told her that he had been 19 at the time and she said he could have been arrested  and I told her that he used to swear me to secrecy for that reason!

I told T that looking back, I was very insecure, needy and hugely co-dependent and I was so desperate to be loved that I attached myself to any man who looked my way.  I realise now that this is why I used to find myself dating boys I never had any previous interest in, or men I didn’t even particularly like or fancy (at first).  It was like the second they looked my way and didn’t instantly disapprove – I needed to be with them.  It makes me embarrassed to admit that now, but I can understand it and see that actually it is sad and just demonstrates how much love and nurturing I was missing which should have come from healthier sources – such as my mother.

I said to T that whilst I absolutely did consent to everything we did, it was all for the wrong reasons and looking back now makes me feel sick and wish it had never happened.  Not just with him either.

I look back at my sexual experiences now as an adult and it makes me cringe (and feel sad) when I think of some of the sex I had.  I gave myself and my body away so freely and yet I’ve never been a slag in the way that I’ve never thought a lot of myself, never found myself sexy, never been sexually confident etc… I just used to throw myself at someone who showed me interest and, as Lily Allen says in her book, “let them take what they wanted from me”.  Sex was certainly not an act of love. Not at all.

I once went to a club with some friends and there was this guy there called Steve.  He was not an attractive guy but he fancied me and so hey, as I’ve said, I was all his for the taking…. except I wasn’t really. I kind of wanted to like him but couldn’t quite do it.  For example, if I was drunk enough I might snog him – I may exchange lots of text messages with him and happily hang out with him in a group but then when I was on my own with him, I just felt uncomfortable and a bit scared really.  Not scared of him in that he would do something nasty, just that I didn’t want to have to do anything in the first place and being on my own with him made me feel that I did have to.

There were plenty of times when I would have everyone back to my flat because I lived alone – and then everyone would leave and Steve would lag behind and then not go and I would try to make it obvious I wanted him to go too but Steve clearly wanted to stay… god I hated those times.  I really did.  I wasn’t strong enough to just ask him to go! God forbid I would upset him – I would clearly rather have upset myself!

Another night we were all at a club and I found myself drunkenly kissing Steve and we shared a taxi home together – except he managed to persuade me to go to his house and so I got out of the taxi with him, went upstairs with him to his bedroom and we got into his bed, started kissing etc and then got naked and (sorry but TMI warning) as he went under the covers to .. do some things to me, I had a giant freak out and told him to stop – grabbed my clothes, cried and asked him to get me a taxi. I freaked out so bad. I scared him, I scared myself. I just couldn’t do it.  It wasn’t right and I didn’t like him and it didn’t feel good. EUGH just stop!!!

Poor Steve was shocked and clearly felt rejected and confused.  I had to get away as quickly as possible.  I don’t remember quite what happened after that but he obviously told his friends as it got back to me quick enough that I was a “prick tease” and one of my friends phoned me up to ask what had happened and why I had run out of his house………..

Another incident that has jumped into my brain, and the last one before this becomes a huge long blog about my sexual experiences, is that I went to the pub one night on my way back from drinking in the City after work, it was late, about 11pm and I got chatting to two guys at the bar.  One guy, his name was Glen, was a tall, broad black guy and we flirted with each other and drank until closing.  Glen ended up back at my flat and in my bed and, again, sorry for TMI, as we started to have sex (or try at least), it hurt me so much because he was far too, ahem… big for me.  He didn’t seem to care and just carried on forcing his way in and out despite me telling him to stop – he didn’t stop for a while and I tried to push him off but he was far too big and heavy and I was paralysed and stuck under him.  Eventually he did get off me and he ran out of my flat but swore and shouted at me first.  I was PETRIFIED.  Absolutely petrified and I had some kind of panic attack where I didn’t feel safe in that flat on my own.  He had left the downstairs main door open but I was too scared to go down there to close it in case … I don’t know why, in my head then, he might have been hiding and jumped out at me, hurt me somehow or got back into my flat.

I was left a mess in that flat.  I was in shock, petrified, questioning if he had half raped me, scared to be alone, scared to sleep, wanting to be drunk.  I couldn’t handle it.  I was very lost.  It wasn’t long after this incident that I finally told my mother about the sexual abuse I had encountered at the hands of her ex boyfriend.  I have never pieced these two/three things together before now – but perhaps I finally had enough of feeling violated and physically invaded.

I’m really surprised that just came out – I wasn’t even planning to write any of that.  It just flew out of me and onto the screen……….. wow. That actually feels quite important, particularly because I have had dreams which leave me petrified that I’ve forgotten something awful and horrific like a rape and most recently the dream I woke from Sunday left me shaken to my core about having repressed a physical body violation.  It feels like perhaps I’ve just pieced some of that narrative together which I hadn’t previously really understood.

People DID take advantage of my body and it probably felt like a form of rape, an invasion, because I didn’t understand what I was doing or why. I was just laying there and letting these people do what they wanted to me and I just switched off and let them do it even though I didn’t want that at all.  I guess it wasn’t really their fault – they thought I wanted to have sex with them but I had no sense of self, no idea of what I did and didn’t want, I lived purely to please other people and to try to get love and approval and acceptance to the extent that I allowed myself to be used and then was left feeling depleted, empty and scared afterwards.  Not to mention ashamed.

I am going to leave that there for a while to digest it a bit.

 

And changing the subject again, there is something I really, really miss about seeing T twice a week, even though for the most part of the last nearly year that I’ve been going only once a week, I have been fine and found it enough, today was lovely.  I enjoyed the feeling of knowing I was seeing here again this week, of not having to wait a whole week.  I liked the fact that I could get up, do some exercise, bake and then see her and then come home for the remainder of the afternoon and have some time to myself to do this – write it up and make some links and piece things together.  In the ideal world I would only work 4 days a week and I would have every Thursday off to do that.  I wonder if there is even the slightest possibility of me doing that?  I wonder if my work would even consider it?  I wonder how much it would affect me financially and if it would be affordable -taking into account that I would lose 4 days’ salary each month AND then pay an extra 4 sessions on top.  I wonder if there are other sacrifices I could make to make that possible?

Something to think about I suppose even if it is just a fantasy.

 

 

 

Disappointed

I’m sitting at my laptop at the kitchen table to write this. It’s just after half past 3 in the afternoon and I am feeling gutted.

After writing my previous post this morning, I jumped up to shower, got ready and went to the supermarket.  I wrote out a big list of things I needed to buy and decided I was going to cook my dad a lasagne and a cake and drop it over to him as a surprise.  1 because it would just be nice and 2 because my stepmum is really stressed at work at the moment and so I knew it would save her having to worry about cooking when she came home from work.

So off I went to the supermarket and whist I was there I thought about various other meals I was going to cook whilst I am off work. A stew in my slow cooker and attempting to make scones and starting off my Christmas cake. Lovely.

I was rather energised by these things and flew around the supermarket feeling quite positive and excited.  I came home, unpacked the shopping and started making 2 lasagnes. One for my dad and stepmum and one for me and my husband.  Then I started getting out the ingredients for the cake and text my dad to ask what time they usually had dinner. He replied to say about 7pm and I asked “have you already got dinner sorted?” to which, sadly, he said yes. He said he had already prepared dinner for tonight as he had been off work today

GOD DAMNIT. 

I literally burst into tears. What a shame. What a total fucking waste of time. I’ve spent my entire day driving to the supermarket, coming home, cooking lasagnes and he has his dinner done already. Why didn’t I just check this morning? Why doe s everything have to be a surprise.

So I now have 2 lasagnes sitting on the side and a cake baking but the cake isn’t a problem as me and my husband can eat that.

My Dad text back to ask why I was asking and I casually replied to say I had a spare lasagne and was just wondering if he might want it (true) –  I just left off the part about how I had made it myself, especially for him. Because I feel like a dick.

And now it’s getting on for 4pm and all I’ve done all day is cook things that nobody is now going to eat and it feels like a HUGE waste of time and I can feel that my mood has completely plummeted.

I wish I had never got the idea and I could have spent my day doing something else that wouldn’t feel like such a complete waste of time and energy. I know it’s not in any way a big deal, but I feel so disappointed and now I feel like I’ve lost my good mood too.

 

Denied Anger?

Morning WP guys,

I was woken up with a shock this morning as my husband shouted and flew out of bed.  Turns out he snoozed his alarm and it was 8.10am instead of his usual get out of bed time of 7.00am.  I panicked with him and started rushing around to get his clothes out, got his shoes, bag and jumper together, made him some toast and a cup of tea etc.  It’s these silly things which make me realise how much I feel other people’s feelings and how much I HATE it when someone around me is angry or stressed.  My husband is truly the loveliest, calmest man ever and on the very rare occasion he is angry or stressed, I panic SO much.  We actually have a bit of a joke about it where he says “You don’t know what angry is! You’ve been wrapped in cotton wall you entire life”.  Clearly he is playing and we both laugh when he says it. I remember literally maybe two or three occasions in the last 4 or so years where he has shouted at one of the kids for misbehaving, I find myself sitting there wide eyed and solemn like I am one of them.  He has often asked me why I get so scared and awkward and I’ve never known the answer other than I guess my fear and panic gets triggered from when I really was a child.  Anyway, back to the point…

It is now 8.50am and I went to sleep by about 10.45 last night so I’ve had plenty of sleep. I often sleep well after my therapy session, usually deeper than normal which I think was the case last night as I have a dull kind of headache which I sometimes get after a deep sleep. On the flip side, I came on my period yesterday afternoon and I have woken up to a ginormous spot on the side of my nose (not a good look!) and stomach cramps. Isn’t being a woman just wonderful? On the more serious side, that does indicate another month of unsuccessful conception.  Possibly not a bad thing considering my emotional state, but very disappointing.  Last month I fell about crying when I came on but this month I feel I have so much on my plate that it is probably for the best.  As much as I hate to admit it.

So, I am waffling. The point of writing this morning is meant to be about my session last night.  My first session back after 3 weeks.

I felt anxious all day about my session last night. Nervous even.  I didn’t want to go on one hand and yet I was desperate to go on the other.  I was in touch with feelings of shame, I felt weak and embarrassed for having fallen apart these past few weeks.  I kept myself very busy yesterday, going to the shops, going to the sea, driving a lot, car wash, cooking, yoga. I even watched an episode of something on tele which took me up literally until the minute I had to leave to drive to T’s. I think in hindsight, that was avoidance of the feelings about going.  I knew I had to go, needed to go and partly, wanted to go.  So best I just get there and deal with the feelings after right?

As I parked up outside her house, I had about 5 minutes to spare. I sent my friend a voice note telling her I was feeling sick with nerves. I acknowledged that I knew I would have no reason to feel like that, and that I would come out feeling a hundred times better than when I went in, but right then, I felt sick with nerves and embarrassment.  As I told her at the time, sometimes I feel that T is so strong and tough and well put together that she makes me feel inferior and stupid.  Now obviously I know that they are meant to be those things and that if we were getting therapy from someone we perceived to be weak and not well held together, then that wouldn’t be very helpful and that therapy wouldn’t work. I also understand that in attachment work like this, she has to take on the role of my mother figure and so I guess naturally that means she is going to seem stronger, wiser, tougher etc AND obviously she is a professional therapist so that is natural right? But I think clearly it does tap into some older feelings for me of being shamed by my mother for having needs – this is not a new realisation but times like this I guess it is made all the more obvious.  I don’t know if everyone feels this way when going to see their therapist?

I went and knocked on the door when it turned half past seven and kind of dreaded her opening the door (LOL).  She opened it and smiled at me in her usual way, I felt awkward and said hello, how are you and asked if she had a nice break.  I ALWAYS feel awkward those first few minutes. Always.  I hate that first part still now, 4 years later. I find it uncomfortable the way she watches me walk in, sit down and then wait for her to ask “How’s Twink?”.  I don’t know why I find this so awkward really… anyway she asked how I was and I just pulled a face of “pffttt.. meh… ” (the globally recognised face, right?). T asked if I had been to the doctor and if I had been signed off etc and I filled her in on the practical stuff.  She said it was good that I had been signed off as it would give me a bit of space. She then asked if I wanted to come twice this week which I said I did, she offered me a slot on Thursday afternoon which I took immediately and said I was going to ask for an extra session.  She asked how it felt that SHE had asked me and I said that I was relieved.  I wonder now why she asked that?

T started pretty instantly by telling me what she thinks happened, can you guess?  She said it was the break that had “really got you in touch with the feelings”.  I have said this lots of times before but it really does make my eyes roll.  Whyyyyyy does she always think it’s about the blinking breakkkkkk??? It kind of irritates me when she says this but because I love her I just try and smile obediently and agree that hmmm possibly.

T said that it was no coincidence that I woke up the very next morning after our last session feeling such anger.  (I admit I hadn’t thought of this link) and that she thought I’ve been trying to hold it all in for the last 3 weeks and it again, was no coincidence that I fell apart exhausted from it all at the weekend, Sunday in particular, knowing she was back at work the following day.

Hmm.

The more she spoke about it being the break, the more I find myself thinking “it’s not” and so I try to smile and nod and accept that hmm yes, it could be possible I suppose.  I found myself telling her “possibly but not consciously”.

At one point she said, lovingly but sarcastically to prove a point “Twink, it isn’t just a huge coincidence that the day after you realised it was a break you woke up feeing fucking furious, that you then spent 3 weeks feeling shit and you’ve collapsed with it all the day before I am back!“. We both burst out laughing and she laughed “God I love you Twink but come on!” (me thinking OMG she said she loves me! LOL). I laughed with her and said “It is. It’s a giant coincidence” but I was laughing too.

T started to say that I was feeling FURIOUS that she went away and not only did she go away, but that I felt she hadn’t even warned me! that she was just suddenly not coming back for 3 weeks.  She said that not only was I dealing with all the shit with my mother, but that my mother was going away and so was T and that T was leaving me there to cope with all that shit on my own.  She said how it would be perfectly understandable for me to feel angry with her.

I just smiled… nope…

She asked me about the dream which triggered me on Sunday and I told her.  She said that she thinks the dream was trying to tell me something and trying to get me to piece something together BUT that she did not think it was an actual physical event in the way she thought I did.  I told her that was my worry and that since that dream, my heart had been beating so quickly, that everything was making me jump, that I kept getting these sudden hot flashes and that the overwhelming thought was “I can’t cope with any more pain, I can’t handle anything else”.  T said we had already uncovered the horrific thing and the horrific thing was my mother’s neglect and abuse.  She said something along the lines of “throw another incident of abuse in there and it wouldn’t make any real difference – the real damage was done by your mother“.  I note that T has always maintained that stance, I have often felt I put more weight on the physical sexual abuse than she ever did – perhaps she is right or perhaps it is her style as a therapist, she is very pro attachment and so I guess that would make sense.  Even I can see that whilst the sexual abuse was physically awful, the emotional side effects from a lifetime of neglect, abuse, boundary invasion etc is longer-lasting and yet it remains in my head that the physical is worse somehow.  T has said before that she thinks that I think that way to keep myself safer, put the blame on him rather than my mother.  I don’t know.

Either way, hearing T say that she didn’t think I had another abuse situation to uncover helped me to relax a little. Thank Fuck For That.

T said that she does think the dream is trying to tell me something (heartbeat starts to elevate again) but not in the way I think.  She said she thinks the dream is indicating I haven’t quite made a link, uncovered something that I need to and that she thinks that link is that I am feeling so much anger towards her.  She thinks that it is so terrifying for me to “turn her bad” that I am totally and utterly denying those feelings and dream is telling me I need to uncover it.

T said that it is imperative I can access those angry feelings towards her and that we can deal with them.  She said that it is my chance to get out all the angry feelings from when I was young in a safe place.  She said that all that anger had nowhere to go when I was young as my mother could not handle it, as it was terrifying as a child to feel anger towards her because she was dangerous and that I had to push it away to keep her good – to survive. She said that now, if I can direct all those feelings to T, they will be released and I will get great healing from that.  She said that she is safe and that she won’t turn on me, won’t abandon me etc.

T said that “it’s all there in your writing! you’ve told me it all, cleverly” meaning my anger and that she thinks I’ve directed it all towards my mother because that is safer now than directing it towards T, particularly when she isn’t there.  She said it is very scary to admit to yourself how much you need me.  I agreed with her, yes it is.  She said that because of how important to me she is, it makes sense that it would be terrifying to risk being angry with her, because I would naturally assume she would leave and that is the very worst thing that could happen.  I agreed with her and said that I knew that because last Christmas when we had that awful rupture over her sending me that text message which was meant for someone else, that one incident caused me SO much pain that I made it mean she didn’t care for me AT ALL, that it was all fake, all a lie, that she never cared and honestly I felt absolutely horrific.  So yeah, it makes sense that I wouldn’t want to revisit that place. Being angry with T is not something I am comfortable with. Being angry in general isn’t something that I am comfortable with.

She said when I said in my email at the very beginning of the break that I couldn’t let my mother have my anger because it was pointless, that I couldn’t “sock it to my mother OR to her”.  LOL at the word “sock”. 

Anyway I think that I’ve written out the gist of the session and I don’t think there is much need for any more she said and I said’s, so what am I thinking today having slept on the session?

Well.. the thing is, I can quite clearly see that her theory makes sense AND I can see why accessing anger and directing it so her as a safer environment would be helpful.  I hope that hearing her say this, AGAIN, will give me permission somewhere if it is needed but I also find it frustrating that she is so convinced I am angry and that I cannot feel that in  myself at all. I almost wish I could!

I can see that I’ve always been a people-pleaser and a “good girl” and so it makes sense that anger isn’t really something I’ve ever allowed myself to feel and as I said at the beginning of this post, I’ve seen a lot of destructive anger and violence and so it makes sense that I’ve learnt to deny those type of feelings, particularly towards someone who is kind to me – why would I want to take the risk of pushing her away when I need her so much? I guess the feelings will come if and when they want to/need to… I am almost willing them to come now because the idea that at the end of them is some relief, is very appealing.  My husband suggested I go in there and “fake it out” he said you know if you pretend to be in a mood with someone, sometimes it can end up actually making you moody!” he was joking but I have even thought about trying to write a pretend letter to T telling her how angry with her I am for leaving me and seeing if that unlocks it…. seems a bit fruitless but you never know.

Has anyone felt anger at their therapist for breaks before? Have you told your T and was it helpful? I would love to know.

 

 

 

 

 

From the sea

I am typing this whilst I am sat cross legged on the sea wall. I’ve brought myself a cup of tea and I’ve just eaten a slice of fruit cake . To my right hand side is about 50 school children, infants, about 6 years old or so. They are all sitting on the sand and pebbles eating packed lunches and look really cute. When I first arrived and walked past them all my eyes stung. I’m not sure why really, just their innocence and happiness. I’m hearing a lot of “my mummy said” and it makes me smile but it’s kinda sad for me too. It makes me feel a bit sorry for the child in me who I think probably sat at these school trips with her mind elsewhere. And now the adult me is sitting here watching, still with her mind elsewhere and that’s shit isn’t it? I realise this is “forever thinking” but I just want to wake up one day and have no emotional pain or anxiety. I want to not have any feelings to sort through, no guilt or anger, no sorrow – I want to feel only happiness in the present and that feels like it may never happen. It feels as though it’s a life sentence sometimes, like there’s no escaping it and it makes me angry because I didn’t do anything to deserve the punishment.

Anyway, the mood today is kinda flat. I just feel a bit “meh”. I’m not falling apart crying like Sunday or yesterday but I’m not happy either. I’m finding it difficult to know what I want to do, decisions feel far too difficult, even simple ones.

I knew I didn’t want to sit on my sofa all day again because it made me feel bored and depressed (lol the irony), so I got ready and drove to the shops to buy my mother in law’s birthday present. Whilst I was there I binge-brought a load of winter jumpers (half of which I’ll probably take back). Funnily as I’m sat here on the sea wall the sun is shining bright and is quite hot! No need for my new jumpers.

I know I would benefit from some exercise but I just can’t find the energy. I know it would help so that seems counterproductive but there we are.

I have therapy tonight for the first time in about three weeks and I feel anxious about it. I emailed T yesterday to tell her that I wasn’t doing well and that I was going to see if I could get signed off. I told her I was feeling very embarrassed and she said she wants to understand that feeling so she can help. I’m not really sure if I can help her to understand as I’m not sure I can understand it myself to be honest. It’s shame based I think. I feel like I should be able to cope much better than I am. I feel like I have no reason to be feeling the way I do. I feel that she must think I’m stupid. I feel stupid.

“Stop crying or i’ll give you some to cry about” just popped into my head. Something my mother used to say, no surprises there. That’s in there somewhere.

I visualise our conversation tonight and all I can come up with is “I just want it all to stop”. I’ve had enough. It sounds so melodramatic.

[I’m writing the rest of this about two hours after I wrote the first part]

Some writing the first half of this, my husband phoned me and I told him what I said above about just wanting it to stop. I said I just feel that this recovery stuff, trauma stuff, healing – whatever you want to call it feels like it’s taking up too much of my mental energy and time and that 4 years on, I’m still having bouts of this sadness and anxiety and it feels unfair and drawn out. My husband said that he thinks it’s because I’m coming closer and closer to cutting my mother out of my life and that it’s playing on my mind and the worry of it all is there constantly draining me. I shrugged to myself as he said that, maybe.

He said that visually, it’s like knowing I’ve got to rip a plaster off and knowing it’s going to hurt. He said something about how the cut would heal and that so will I (or something to that effect LOL). My eyes watered as he said this stuff, mainly because of his kindness.

He said that it’s playing on my mind now more than ever before because of the acceptance being so much stronger now. He said I’m no longer waiting or hoping for her to change and now I know the only change can come from me. I guess it’s like I’ve put pressure on myself or something. He also said that I’ve had her birthday playing on my mind and I’m already worrying about Christmas, both seeing her and giving her gifts and what to do about that. My mind often skips straight to next year and Mother’s Day – which there really is no need to do but alas! That’s where it takes me.

[another hour later]

I wrote that last part in the car wash and I’ve since come home and started to cook a shepherd’s pie. It’s cooking at the moment so I’m taking this opportunity to try and actually finish this blog, I can’t believe I started it so many hours ago!

I think perhaps I’m a bit inpatient. I want the whole thing “fixed”. I want to live every day purely focussing on and enjoy the amazing things I have in the present without any triggers, without any sadness or anxiety, without worrying about her or what I need to do or say to her, without therapy and without books and googling things, without physical symptoms, without needing to be signed off. I just wish I could magic it all away and it would be gone! Somewhere far away.

And yet being realistic, I know it doesn’t work like that and I know that over tome things heal and I’ll get stronger and I’ll become used to the current situation so it will feel less forced and less scary. I’m sure the guilt will settle and the fear too…. I know this stuff on one level, sometimes it just feels too hard you know?

I’ll finish up with this thought: I used to feel faulty and unloveable and stupid and overly sensitive and too needy. I still feel those things sometimes, maybe times like this when I AM feeling needy and sensitive and therefore stupid because of it…. but I can also see, sometimes, that the little me, the child in me deserved SO much better.

Knowing the child deserved so much more than she got is heartbreaking. It’s why seeing children play innocently triggers a grief of a lost childhood. It’s why taking my stepchildren out does the same, it’s why the love I have for them triggers such sadness and such anger at what I lost.

And I know that because I know this, I need to look after myself now. In these times I mustn’t become my mother and I mustn’t call myself those names. It’s why it’s important I wrap myself up in a blanket when I’m desperate for nurturing, it’s why cooking this shepherds pie is a good thing. Why walking in the sea air is good self-care.

But when does the grief end? When does “childhood” finally stop being a trigger? When will I finally feel like the adult I am and not some misunderstood and half-child half adult?

I’m not waiting for my mother to come and love me up anymore but I feel like I’m stuck somewhere…

Been to the Dr.

I’ve just got back from the doctors and he has signed me off work for two weeks, given me some “B-blockers” for the anxiety, fast heartbeat and general nervousness and suggested a blood test to check my thyroid. Has anyone had those before? Apparently they won’t affect me psychologically at all and are purely for my PTSD like symptoms.

He was a very nice and kind doctor, which was a huge relief as I was a nervous wreck in the waiting room watching my heartbeat on my Fitbit going up and up… rather unnerving!

I thought I would feel a huge relief but I don’t feel much at all at the moment. I feel like a bit of a fraud and a bit of a letdown to my colleagues and I’m already nervous about returning to work and people asking me why I was off for so long. Clearly I’m not off with an upset stomach or a cold.

On the plus side, I now have a bit of space and I know deep down I need it. I may ask T if she has any extra appointments I can have – may as well make the most of any support that she can offer me.

I will force myself to go to the gym because I know that will help. I don’t want to be sitting on the sofa every day because I’ll just make myself feel worse – although when signed off sick clearly I can’t be off galavanting either can I – tricky!

Anyway that’s that. My hubby should be home in twenty minutes or so which I’ll be glad of. It’s been a very long day.

Too Much

TW: Please don’t read this if you are feeling very depressed or down or triggered any way today. 

That sodding dream Saturday night has really thrown me into a shit place.  I wrote yesterday about how much I cried, how young and desperate I felt and how my body was extremely anxious and my heart was beating so fast – everything was making me jump and how I needed to cling physically to my husband.  Well today is no better. In fact, in a way today is now worse.

I got up this morning and got showered and ready for work.  The longer I was awake, the worse I felt and I kept thinking “I cant do this, I just can’t go”.  I hate myself for this, I really do.  It makes me feel ridiculous and pathetic and like a drama queen.  Everyone goes to work. Lots of people have bad days, everyone has their own issues and yet here I am, thinking I’m some kind of special case and going to work is just too much for me.  I hate myself for this.

I left the house on the verge of tears.  I felt like I could explode in rage or tears over the smallest things. My work trousers felt too tight around my stomach and that made me feel not only fat, but seriously claustrophobic somehow.  Everything was too tight to my skin, too close, not enough room to breathe.  I changed into a looser skirt.

I got to the station constantly debating whether I should just turn around. I kept thinking I wasn’t fit for this.  But I got to the station. I then decided I couldn’t keep it in any longer and text my team leader (who is also a friend) and told her the truth. I told her that sometimes I find things overwhelming. I told her that I had been crying for the last few days, that I didn’t think I could deal with work today.  She sent me some nice messages but the general gist was “get to work and see how you feel”.  I actually got on the train for about twenty minutes and I had tears pouring down my face the entire time.  The more I thought about work and the people there, the more my heart beat faster and faster and before I knew it I couldn’t breathe and I had to get off the train.

I text her and said I was really sorry but I just can’t do it. I told her I needed to take a few days off. I needed to go to the doctors. I might need some antidepressants or to be signed off or both but that right now, I just can’t push through.

I got off the train and the cold air hit me and was such a relief. Then I noticed that my entire body was shaking. My legs were kind of buzzing.  My entire body was going crazy. It felt a bit like adrenaline or something.

I crossed over the bridge to the platform for trains going back towards home and I phoned the doctors.  It took me ages to get through and when I eventually did, they said they had no appointments today.  I just went silent on the phone. I didn’t really know what to do or say.  Finally the woman offered me 6pm. Thank god.

My team leader kept telling me to phone her but I just couldn’t do it. I was a wreck enough without trying to talk to her and I knew I would cry even more.  I just couldn’t do it.

I phoned my husband and told him what was going on.  He sounded concerned. Long story short, he is going to phone her for me and try to explain it to her a bit more.  He is so good. I could not ask for a more supportive husband.

But then I feel SO much guilt.

I can’t imagine how draining it is living with someone like me.  How does he cope? I start to panic that he will reach the stage where he just cannot do it. I worry that he will think my feelings are a reflection on him, even though they are not in any way.   It is his love and support that enable me to feel the feelings and I couldn’t be happier in the relationship me and him share – truly I couldn’t. But I wonder if he finds that hard to believe when I am in such a state.

I finally got home and fell apart crying on the bed. So many tears. Where do they all come from?

Jesus – the postman just put something through my letterbox and my heart nearly jumped out of my chest. I am sooooo anxious today!!! What is wrong with me?

I am back now home, in my onesie with a blanket and a cup of tea – just like yesterday and whilst I am hugely relieved not to be at work.. I do wonder what now?

I wonder what the GP will say. I wonder what I need to feel better. I wonder why I am so weak and why everyone else copes so much better than me.  I wonder “why now?” – why now am I finding myself back in such a bleak and depressing place?  I wonder what my team leader will say, what the rest of my colleagues will think of me as they don’t know the truth.  They will think I am faking illness and lazy.  I think I’m lazy too.

So here I am. It’s 9.15am and all of that has already happened.

I keep thinking that I might email T and tell her and then I think I won’t…. I worry she will say it’s some kind of “punishment” to her for having had a beak. It isn’t, it really isn’t but I don’t have the energy to argue with her and I don’t want her to disappoint me whilst I am feeling so low so that is preventing me sending anything…… also, it’s her first day back “at work” and the last thing she needs is this at 9am on a Monday morning.

Oh I don’t know. I don’t know what the hell is going on.  I know I sound like a lazy drama queen but I just want to hide away from the world for about a week. Maybe two weeks. I just can’t “do” life right now.  I hope the GP isn’t useless.