Pain

Image courtesy of reasonstobefit.tumblr.com

There are two kinds of pain:  physical and emotional.  For the longest time, I have felt emotional pain.  It’s something I welcomed. Welcomed isn’t correct, in fact it’s very  wrong and not even close to the truth.  Emotional pain is something I am used to.  It’s something I know how to deal with.  If I feel emotional pain, I eat.  I hide behind books, stories, tv shows.  Anything that is not reality.  Anything that hide the pain.

In all my years of therapy, I know hiding isn’t dealing, it’s avoiding.  It’s making something worse instead of making it better.  It’s taking a grain of sand and turning it into a beach.  I can’t keep pushing it aside, avoiding it.  Not only does it not help but I am much worse off than I was before. I now know that in order to heal the emotional pain, I’m going to have to feel a lot of physical pain.    

It’s that physical pain that heals.  It’s that pain the gathers all those grains of sand.  That pain is the lightning that turns the sand into a beautiful glass sculpture.   I hurt anyway, so why can’t I change the way I hurt.   Now is the time to take on a whole different kind of hurt.  The hurt of screaming muscles, growing stronger.  The hurt of a heart beating fast and hard, growing stronger.  The hurt of physical exhaustion because I did the absolute best I could do for thirty minutes on the elliptical’s lowest setting.  And that is a hurt I will truly welcome.

"Because if I’m going to hurt I’d rather it be from building myself up rather than tearing myself down."

Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes

I need to make some changes.  Some seriously changes.  On a scale of one to happy, I'm about a negative 3.  I don't have a lot to complain about.  I'm in a loving relationship with someone who makes me laugh and appreciates me.  My home life is good.  I've reconnect with BH.  We're spending more time together and enjoying our friendship again.  I'm mostly satisfied at work.  Although it's not my life's ambition, it's a job that pays the bills.  What I am unhappy about it my shape, but more importantly my lack of physical abilities.

I am the heaviest I have ever been in my life.  Yesterday I was talking to my good friend Ma.  I told her about my inability to move.  That I need to get to the gym and start exercising however I don't want to do that.  Why not?  Why would I intentionally go someplace where withing 5 minutes on the elliptical in the lowest setting possible, my heart is hurting.  Like I think I'm having a heart attach hurting.  And I'm sweating.  It's dripping down my face, into my eyes.  My hands are all sweaty. My arms, legs and back are burning.  Screaming at me to stop.  I just want to die because death has to feel better than this.  And this is just the warm up. Why would I want to subject myself to that when I could be home?  On the couch.  Eating a cookie.  Yeah, because that is so helpful.

So how do I go from being unhappy, unhealthy to accepting the fact that the gym is my friend.  That it's something that can be done.  Even by me.  I read that it takes 1 month to see the changes in yourself, 2 months for your family & friends to notice the changes, and 3 months for strangers to notice.  I would be happy with just sticking with it for a month.  At this point, that is my first goal.

Goal:  Go to the gym 3 times a week for on month.  Easy enough, eh? 

What is my motivation?  How about this, a truth I am ashamed actually happened.  I want to walk up a flight of stairs without having my friend ask me if I’m okay because my breathing is so labored she was afraid I was going to pass out.  It was very embarrassing the first time.

I may as well start today because it's as good a day as any.  After all one month from now, I'm going to wish I started a month ago.

Alone

I'm not alone, I'm with You.

Solo

Harrison Ford as Han Solo (Star Wars)

Something made me incredibly sad yesterday.  I realized that a single, childless woman is one of the worst things to be.  If you are part of a couple, someone may bestow on you flowers or chocolates, dinner or a card for Valentine's Day. Someone will celebrate you for being part of something.  If you are a mother, someone may bestow you will a meal you hopefully didn't have to cook, flowers and homemade cards for Mother's Day.  Someone will celebrate you for being part of something.

Where is the holiday for the single ladies out there who don't have children?  There are quite a few out there. There isn't a holiday that makes them raise their glasses to their freedom, to the fact that they have sole possession of the remote control, and can keep the toilet seat anyway they want.

I'm surprised Hallmark hasn't capitalized on this.  When is Singles Day?  Where is the holiday where we buy cards and send them to our singles friends.  Cards with messages like "Congrats on being single.  I'm sure dinner for one every night is awesome!"  Or "It could be worse, you could be married to my douchebag husband."  "Kids:  Ruining stuff every day of your life."  The inside of that card would read, "Lucky you."

Like all things, there are several ways to look at it.  I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who enjoy their solitude.  Who live complete lives with friends and family, who don't see the fact they are childless and single a curse.  There are also the people who only see the emptiness in being single.  They focus more on what they don't have than what they do.

Where do I fall?  I'm not exactly single but I'm far from married.  I like my relationship with J.  I love being part of us. Our lives are starting to intertwine, orbit around each other in decisions we make.  I like my life as it is.  Right now.  I know I'm not ready for anything more serious than what we have.  I also know that I am going to stick around and see where this goes.  I don't have a timeline, I'm just following my heart.

I'm fine with not having children of my own.  Motherhood is a big responsibility and I am amazed anyone is willing to take a stab at it.  Good moms are selfless, they put their children first.  I don't have that in me.  I'm pretty sure I wasn't born with a biological clock.  I don't have a maternal bone in my body.  I love J's kid.  I think she's great but she has a mother and that ain't me.  I am perfectly happy in the role of Dad's (self-proclaimed) cool girlfriend.

What strikes me as crazy is that in all the years I was with the man, I struggled to feel part of something.  Even when we were engaged, I felt alone.  Single.  Solo.  Just me against the world.  With J, the feeling is completely different.  I'm actually having a hard time remembering single.  I feel more a part of J in the short time I have known him that I ever felt with the man.  And that means something.  I think I'm stepping further and further away with solo each and every day.

Happy Mother's Day

I have had people say this to me and unless asked if I actually have children, I simply say thank you. Sometimes it makes me sad that I will never be a mother. In my heart I know that my not being one is exactly how it should be.

I am very thankful I have a good mother. She's funny, loving, honest. She drives me batshit crazy, as she should.  So here's to you, Mae.  I love you.  I am becoming you.  I am so thankful you are mine.

Lonely

“And Max, the king of all wild things, was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.” Maurice Sendak (God rest his soul.)

I think it might be the weather.  It's raining.  It has been raining for days now.  I need the sun.  

I think it might be that I found the perfect little house.  A townhouse with two bedrooms, one bathroom, a great stove and built-ins.  It really is perfect except for two things.  The first is no garage.  I'm garage spoiled.  Heck, I'd settle for a driveway or carport.  Anything but street parking.  This house has street parking.  Boo.  The second thing is it will take me over 2 hours each way to commute to work.  Not good.  A long commute means no dog.  I really want a dog.  

I think it might be my job.  I am bored, unstimulated.  It's a paycheck.  It has no meaning.  I want a job that means something.

I think it might be that I'm feeling emotional, clingy and moody.  I'm taking it out on J.  He's a smart cookie.  He says quiet, out of my way until I figure it out.  He doesn't egg me on or call me crazy.  I'm annoyed at myself for feeling this way.

I think it might be because I saw this quote on someone else's blog and it immediately made my stomach tighten with understanding.  I feel so lonely today.  What's interesting is that I am loved, I know I'm loved, yet I still feel lonely.  I want to be where someone loves me the best of all.  But I have to be at work.  To pay the bills. To save money for a house with no driveway, no garage, no dog.  

Back to work.  Blah.

Love's First Rose

I am not the kind of woman that likes receiving flowers.  They die, it makes me sad.  Yet I was over the moon Tuesday night when J presented me with this lovely rose picked from his garden.  He said it was the first perfect bloom of the season.  I think he's right.