it was a long day
I went to bed at about 4
forgot to say goodnight
going back to sleep
waited for several hours in new favorite place
also
are really good
the place is called
PICNIC
Tuesday, August 30, 2022
Sunday, August 28, 2022
Thursday, August 25, 2022
Dreamed
I got woken up
Because it was a line of people coming for me to make drinks for them
I was in a nightgown
And I don't think I really knew the recipes for the drinks
So I was talking to him and being all friendly and charming and just making them all custom drinks
And really talk into him making it like a personal experience
And it wasn't going fast
And I wasn't doing it right
But they were super into it and didn't seem to care
I was joking with him about having just rolling out of bed and my hair was all like disheveled and whatever
But I didn't care and I wasn't stressed at all
All the customers were being super nice
And then this girl comes in and she's like hey I'm here to help you cuz you seem like you were pretty tired last time I saw you I thought you might need some help
I thought that was a really good dream
One of the last things I said to my mother yesterday
Because she's like going through stuff and she's putting it on to shelves that I've already emptied for me to put into more boxes
And I am just running out of time
And I've got s*** I'm already working on I don't need extra work
So I said you know I'm going to say this in the nicest way I can
But you know if you can have a box with you then as you see the things that you think need to go into a box you could just put them into a box
It's less work for you because you don't have to keep walking back and forth to the bookcase
And it isn't really necessary for me to be the one to fill all the boxes
Sunday, August 21, 2022
Friday, August 19, 2022
Okay
I'm about to look in a box that's marked decks
I don't know why my mom has a bunch of tarot decks or whatever
As far as I know she doesn't read tarot cards or believe in tarot cards
but
My mother helped me move in 2000
And I am still finding things that somehow didn't make it out of her van into my apartment
Which is weird
I mean there was a plate and a cup that I got back a few years ago from her that I had asked her hey you know I'm missing this plate
Have you seen it and then you know I don't know 15 years later or something it shows up
So I don't know whether she just randomly you know pilfers things like a magpie
Or exactly what the deal is
But I have a tarot deck I've been all through my stuff and this tarot deck I bought it in the '90s and it's been missing for some amount of time I did not think it had been missing since 2000 but I can't swear to that
Because I just don't really remember the last time I saw it
But it's out of print
And I've tried to buy another one but I haven't been able to find one for less than $500
And I'm really hoping that it's in this box
So fingers crossed
Wednesday, August 17, 2022
I dreamed I was in college
I don't know why but I was wearing heels
And I was running to catch an elevator
And I was moving quickly and my feet didn't hurt and I didn't see him in any imminent danger of falling
And in the dream I had a lucid moment
About all that and I was like wow that's so much better than test taking
That's almost a flying dream
And then I went to some apartment building
And I don't really remember everything that happened there
She said I was going to meet somebody or really more like find somebody
I think I was trying to find Jessica who used to work for me
Who I kind of thought of as a daughter
And I'm not 100% sure whether I found her or not
But I think I did
Because the next section was about this cafe
It was kind of outside
But it was kind of inside
And the deal was that it was really cozy and you would gather up all these pillows and blankets and stuff
So you're inside and it's covered and you're not going to get wet or anything but it was open to let the cold in
So you could set up all hours of the morning in your cozy little conversation pit
And catch up with old friends
I think it was on the college campus
So somehow there was this whole like
Old friends getting together vibe
But the pillows were all different sizes and had really pretty patterns on them and so there was a whole like picking out your
Designing your space thing
It was a very satisfying dream
I think I'm getting better
I just don't necessarily have a lot to say
I seem to be better able to sleep
I think I slept like 13 hours yesterday and overnight
Anyway I'm running really late today it's already 8:00 and I'm breakfasted and showered but I'm not dressed
Anyway I hope you have a good day
I love you very much 💋
Tuesday, August 16, 2022
Saturday, August 13, 2022
Thursday, August 11, 2022
Wednesday, August 10, 2022
Went to sleep about 2:00 but I seem to have neglected to tell you
I woke up about 7:00
Lots and lots of thunder
They're supposed to be thunderstorms all night and possible flooding
So I'm not going to be driving until it's light probably
Because driving around in the dark when there's possible flooding is a good way to die in Houston
Now if I get up and it stopped raining and it doesn't seem to be flooded then you know I may go earlier I don't know but since I'm kind of uncomfortable with the driving in the dark anyway I think probably waiting until it's actually light out is fine
I have gotten out 68 bags of trash this month
That's including 20 bags of trash that I got out on the 1st because I was trying to make my 156 goal
Which I did not quite make
Today is trash day so I hope I can go a little bit early because I can usually fit six or seven bags of trash into her trash can on top of the lake you know three four bags that she's likely to have put in there
I think I need another week though
I don't think I can have it all done by the 19th
I was thinking about it and if she actually wants me to pack everything up if I have enough time that actually is maybe better because if I pack it I can the things away as I pack it and since she has no sense of how much space anything takes I mean like about a hundred trash bags ago she thought the amount of stuff that was in the house was about 14 boxes
Anyway I was planning to try to sleep through and get up at 12:30 but I decided at 7:00 that I should call my mom and tell her that if she was still working at the house she should go home because there was maybe going to be flooding she wasn't still at the house she was at a restaurant
Anyway I think I'm going to go back to sleep
Maybe plan to get up around 2:00
But you know
I'm not adverse to sleeping more I only got about four and a half or 5 hours of sleep last night and then I slept 5 hours today and woke up and I don't know if that was because my body was like okay 5 hours that's what you do now or if it's because there was a lot of thunder and it woke me up hard to say
I love you sweetheart 💋
goodnight
Round robin didn't work
I think something that I said must have kind of tipped her off or else she took it seriously that I did not believe I could get everything packed up in 10 days 9 days whatever
Because she's been in every area I mean not I don't think she's been in the front bedroom but there were some things I was going to throw away as soon as I came in that are right by the front door they're gone I don't see a box that they're in so maybe she threw them away but I doubt it
There was a box with some nasty old binders in it that didn't have a lid on it and I was going to throw those away and just fill the box with something else but it's gone too
So I'm a little worried that she's been sneaking boxes back to her house filled with metaphorical moldy sandwiches
Now I mean it's her apartment it's her stuff it's her life she doesn't need to sneak them back
She can do whatever she wants
I'm kind of surprised that she would carry boxes out to the car she's got a dolly she can use to get them into her apartment but I mean it seems as though it's hard enough for her to just walk to her apartment so I'm a little worried that she's overextending herself energetically
She's got stuff everywhere that seems as though she thinks it's packed but it like doesn't have a lid on it or it's in a non-standard size box I mean it's pretty c********** looking so I don't know
So I just went into every area that I was thinking that I was going to go into when I got here and stuff was changed and stuff I was going to throw away was gone so I mean I find it very hard to believe she threw that stuff away
So I think she thinks I'm throwing stuff away
Which it's kind of unfair because she wants me to be throwing stuff away she bought me a box of 100 trash bags
No I'm sorry I bought the bag I bought the box of 100 trash bags she bought me one of 120 right and then she has another one of like 100 or 120 that she's been using so I mean she knows things are going to be thrown away
And she said a bunch of times oh the stuff in that front room most of that can go
But then if I ask her about any specific thing that can't go so I've stopped asking her I'm just throwing s*** away
But I think she got paranoid and started taking her moldy sandwiches home
and since she said multiple times that I'm going to have to organize that stuff and put it away and whatever I mean are we going to go over there with the movers and there's not going to be a place for them to put anything because it's all full of stuff already
Hoarder mother one out of 10 do not recommend
Anyway I hope you're doing well
So I've been just for the last couple hours working in that front bedroom and I have continued to fill up a couple of things I have going and I've filled one box with a bunch of little jewelry boxes and the outsides of the many many hideously dirty odd shaped things that they were in said they were ready to sell
I only opened a few of them to verify that
But so far I've got one box of that and I'm going to have I think one more box of that and I've gotten five bags of trash
So I'm not dissatisfied with my work so far
But I may be need a little break from that room so I'm taking a break obviously because I'm talking to you and I'm going to eat a bar and then maybe I'm going to go work in one of the other rooms that has lights for a little while
Once the sun comes up I'll have a little more option in where I can see
I am still maintaining a positive attitude though even though seat I have always been of a mind that you know some people they plan out what they're going to do very carefully you know they're like I'm going to do this and then I'm going to do this and then I'm going to do this and they've got their whole plan or they plan out what somebody they're going to say to somebody and they plan it all out and what I find is that you know it's good to have a plan like that
But often in life for one reason or another you can't actually do the thing you plan to do and so if you get too tightly tied to a plan then if you can't execute your plan you're just kind of stymied and spin in your wheels
And one of the things that I had to kind of you know once I get you know in a some sort of a fugue state which I know I've talked about many many times in our history I'm just now kind of putting it together as to what that all is about but I've certainly talked about them but once I get into that kind of state I'm not very effective and so I have all these kind of workarounds for not getting there and my interactions with other people I tend to be fairly non-emotional I think you've even commented on that before like I can't tell what you're thinking or I can't tell what you're feeling or whatever so I don't tend to get out of control with other people either
Unless something like super triggering happens and then I don't know mostly though I like to do my freak outs without people watching me
Anyway I'm just trying not to let this get me down because it just still seems so heinous
Tuesday, August 9, 2022
Well it took a pretty fair amount of melatonin but I didn't go to sleep until about 7:00 and then I woke up at 11:45 to pee and was wide awake could not go back to sleep so I laid in bed until about 12:30 and then I was like okay f*** it
So I'm up
And I was feeling a little woozy but I had some boiled eggs ready to go and I made toast and had some grapefruit juice
And for some reason lately I have just been wanting to drink the pu ehr tea
Like yesterday I was feeling a little woozy and I made coffee and I was like no I'd really rather have the other I think it's because the t is kind of like tonic
It has caffeine but not so much and I was not wanting the soy milk
But then I didn't want the coffee without the soy milk either cuz it was too better I don't know it's not like a sign I still love coffee
That was a bit of a shock yesterday
She's just not going to help me at all not going to go through any more stuff
But I mean I understand it's been going on for a long time and all
Believe me I know
But I'm kind of ratcheting up my idea of what needs to be thrown away
I mean if I've only got 10 days there's just still so much in the house
So I mean I don't have time to go through things with a fine tooth comb
So
And I was working I could only work like 4 or 5 hours a day which is why I was working the two shifts but I don't want to work two shifts The house is creepy at night and I don't know and just it doesn't work out the way she's working she's going really late and she's working really late and you know I can't go at 8:00 and work for 4 hours and then come home and sleep and go back and work you know I mean it doesn't it doesn't work
So like I'm awake now I'm just going to you know get ready and go although I think that's going to put me now driving at 2:00 or 2:30 well I'm not moving very fast so maybe it'll be closer to 3:00 I don't really want to be out driving around when the drunks are driving around you know I don't enjoy that
I also don't want to be driving around a little bit groggy at the time when the most police are out looking for people you know
But also yesterday it was still very dark when I drove over there and although I've gotten pretty used to driving in the day the night driving is still pretty stressful
So I don't know we shall see but if I've got 10 days
There are seven rooms if you don't count the closets and you do count the garage and only one of them is mostly empty and there are things in the closets and the bathrooms
And I would say you know I just need to finish a room a day except that yesterday kind of proved to me that I don't think starting in a room and trying to finish in the room is the most efficient use of my time I think I get kind of bogged down and stressed out and lose focus
Although I mean I did get a lot done yesterday and I'm not unhappy with what I got done but it's just I don't have time to work at that level it needs to be a lot less care filled
So I think what I'm going to do then try this out today and see how it works I'm just going to rotate through the rooms and not spend more than an hour on any one room unless I you know feel like I'm making really good progress and I just want to but I'm not going to force myself to work in any room for more than an hour
And come to that I'm probably not going to force myself to work in a room for now I'm probably just going to be like do whatever you want
But the idea is round Robin
Well
My mom has set the movers to come the 19th to get the rest of the stuff
So I'm working longer shifts
And she's like I'm just going to be working in the den trying to get all those papers dealt with
And I'm like you know there's only like 10 more days
And she's like well you know you just have to put everything in boxes
And I'm like isn't it a lot easier to just throw all the papers and boxes
And she's like yeah but I would need a 10x10 storage just to put all those boxes in I think the 19th barely gives me enough time to deal with them
But you know I guess no problem for me to do the whole rest of the house
But don't throw anything away
So I'm working in that front bedroom
I've been working in the garage for the last couple of days but now I'm working in the front bedroom because you know I just I need to get it finished
That's the one that was originally so full that you had to move things out in order to move in the room it was like one of those puzzles where you move pieces around anyway
I've gone through and I've gotten rid of lots and lots of stuff but now we're to the stuff that I feel uncomfortable getting rid of
and I mean she said multiple times basically you know all that stuff can go
But I don't know exactly where it's supposed to go if I'm not allowed to throw anything away
So I'm throwing stuff away
But you know we're down to the stuff you know
And I'm also sorting things so they're you know sort of with like things I don't want to just take everything and shove it into boxes and besides where will those boxes go right
So today I found what I think is all the things that belong to her father and her mother that she's just had you know in random places now I may find some more but this is everything I found so far they're glasses and her father's army stuff and whatever and I packed that very neatly and nicely into a box
And then of all the torn out magazine pages and whatnot I packed that with some printed material for collaging that she ordered from Oregon with some remaining books with some decorative like tiles and things so it's you know not exactly all the same thing but it's kind of like all the remaining things that are kind of just rando artsy stuff and I packed that into a box
And then I have a box where I have art tools and it's only about a third full but I have more art tools in another area so I'm going to take that box to where those other art tools are and pack that up
And I had two totes one of them I put the Swarovski crystals and the other one I'm trying to organize all the beads to put in but there are just a f*** ton of beads
So I'm still working on that
Because there's beads and beads and more beads but I just want there to be one container of beads and then what doesn't fit in that container I'm thinking is going because it's not like she's ever going to do any of this you know I mean it's going to be packed up and she's never going to touch it it's been in that room completely untouched for probably 10 years at least
So I packed like 3ish boxes
And I got seven bags of trash
I worked for about 7 hours That's not very good average time on the trash bags but this wasn't like just going around and collecting trash this was having to sort things and make decisions about which things to throw away and which things to keep
Out of stuff that I didn't really feel all that comfortable doing that with because you know none of the stuff that I'm throwing away is actually trash at this point it's like you know I'd been collecting colored pencils from all over every time I find colored pencils I put them in a spot and then I thought I had them all and I packed up a banker box and it's like colored pencils filling almost the entire box with just a few fabric dye paints because that would fill up the extra space but then I found a bunch more I thought I'd been through everything but there were some in a spot that I had been to but just I guess didn't pull them out at the time I must have been there a long time ago and so I was like well are these really nice pencils cuz you know I found a set of pencils after I had done the box and you know I open the box and I put that set in but no these are just you know random loose pencils now you know they're not bad pencils but there's just a limit to how many colored pencils you need if you have like 400 colored pencils you don't need another hundred colored pencils so I threw them away it's that kind of stuff
Because what she does is she buys things and she puts them somewhere and she doesn't know where they are so the next time she's going to use that thing she goes and buys it again and then again and then again and so you know I'm thinking when she's going to if she's going to use these things she's just going to buy them again so why do we need to keep them
So
Anyway I said something about you know having spent the day working in there and she's like well what are you doing and I'm like well I'm going through things and she's like are you sorting things and I'm like well yeah I'm sorting things because I'm trying to put like things together and I'm like and those beads are just really killing me and she's like oh just throw all the beads in boxes there are hardly any beads anyway how many boxes could it be
So at any rate
I guess the 19th gives me an end point although I'll still have to go to her house and organize everything there
And she's decided that she needs a storage they have storages at her apartments and so although the 10 ft by 20 ft storage that I wanted to rent back when they were on sale for like $115 a month was out of the question at that point and then when she said okay we could get a storage because I was hysterical
which probably she would have reneged on that anyway but when she said that and I checked well they were up to like $250 a month so I'm just like okay no storage that's fine you want it to be over you want the stuff to be no storage
I've just been working from that plan since then
But she decided that she's got enough papers that she needs a storage now I don't know what she thinks is in the whole rest of the house
I really just don't know what the f*** she thinks
But now she's decided that she needs one of the storages that they have at her apartment and that is a 30 ft² storage and it's $60 a month
And she was making it sound before like it was on a different level so we'd have to be going up in an elevator and blah blah blah so I don't know I really don't know
But I'm about to go to sleep
goodnight sweetheart I love you very much 💋
Saturday, August 6, 2022
Almost forgot
Last night or today when I woke up I was dreaming that I was in a math class it was the last day the semester and it was a final
And I was trying to go over the book
And I was trying to find
So I could memorize a list of prime numbers
I'm in the book all I could find was these like runes
And I went up to the professor like these prime numbers
Well they're symbols for prime numbers
And I'm like you would accept this on a test
And he's like I don't think you have time to memorize this list before the test
So I was trying to go over prime numbers in the dream
And that was a little easier than trying to read in a dream
But it was like I think I got to like 17 and I couldn't get any further
It was handing out the tests
He looks at me He's like I'm not going to give you yours yet
I don't think you're ready
Been thinking a lot about and then thinking about John prine makes me think about it even more
That girl that I prayed for
The one who was in the hospital with COVID and she was so afraid and she said pray for her
And I did I prayed pretty hard for her
But then I was hesitant to pray hard for John prine because I just kept seeing complications and a life that was really full of pain and hardship and I knew he had already been sick and he was old and I just didn't know if he would want that so I didn't pray hard for him not because I didn't want John prine to live I mean
But you know it's not really cool to force what you want on other people so I phrased it more like you know I don't know what he would want but I would want him to live right
But that girl she was asking she was begging please pray for me I'm so scared and so I prayed really hard for her and she has had cuz I've kept up with her she has had such a hard time
I mean she's been unable to work and she was like a proofreader so it's not like she was a bricklayer or something but she can't work and she applied for disability
And they f****** disallowed it
so now she's like you know if I didn't have my parents I don't know what I would do and she's I don't know how old she is but she's pretty young I mean she might be like 30 maybe I guess she could be a little bit older than that but I don't think she is I think she's probably more like well she's probably 30 now but I think she was more like 27-28 and she's just gotten a service dog so she can try to be a little bit more independent
And I just think about all that premonition of hardship and I just didn't think it was her and I feel kind of conflicted like maybe I shouldn't have prayed so hard for her I don't know that she wants this life
But
I guess the answer to that
Is that I should continue to pray for her
That was kind of a weird where place to go
It's just been on my mind kind of bothering me
I probably should explain my situation more well not my current situation my background situation but I really can't right now
I feel like I spent the first like year of writing to you telling you about all my brokenness and my whole back story but I didn't in a very well I felt like it was kind of a detached dispassionate way so that I wouldn't come across as psychotically broken you know
I don't think I'm psychotically broken
But you know that complex PTSD was not something that I had ever learned about I've just recently started seeing that
Apparently it's in the international but not in the s*** I can't believe I can't remember what's called now The psychological diagnostic blah blah book that gets updated periodically it's like number one number two number three number four I think we might be on five or six or something now maybe even higher and that one doesn't have CPTSD at all it has borderline personality disorder
And when I was going to the psychologist and then I didn't like going to the psychologist I would go and I would talk and I would get very upset and then I was completely non-functional for the rest of the day and it just seemed not very productive you know and then she sent me to a psychiatrist to get antidepressants and I don't think I ever talked to the psychiatrist but there was a I'm not really I don't really remember what her classification was it was somebody who did talk to me who was a physician's assistant or psychiatric nurse or cyclinical psychologist I don't know who she was I think she was a clinical psychologist and she talked to me
You know like enough to confirm the diagnosis of depression so they could write the prescription I think I talk to the psychiatrist once but it was more like he kind of sat there for 10 minutes or so and the clinical psychologist told him stuff and he may be asked me a couple questions I don't know but there was some kind of piece of paper somewhere that I saw that had borderline personality disorder on it
And I pretty much freaked out about that and I talked to her and I'm like I do not think I have borderline personality disorder I do not want that written anywhere in my files are permanent records I do not agree with that diagnosis and she's like oh yeah we didn't really diagnose you with that That's just you know a thing
But I had read about borderline personality disorder and those people are I mean they one of the things that is a core function is that like the people that they're in relationships with they like love them and hate them and love them and hate them and they act all psychotic and they yell at them and push them away and it's just horrible and I don't behave like that have never behaved like that
But when I was younger and some of my earlier relationships I did have some of the milder features of the like extreme fear of abandonment thing and that is one of the things that is a feature of the CPSD
And I know I told you this but it's maybe one of the earlier things I told you and so you know I mean it's I don't know I really long time ago and I don't know that you remember everything I've ever told you I don't know why you would you know but so if you remember and I'm telling you this again I'm sorry I don't like to say things again and again and again
But you know my parents got divorced when I was a year and a half old and my father and I went to live with his parents but it's not like you know he was there with me as much as he could be he would get up in the morning and leave for work and he would come back mostly really really late so he was out you know living his life and my gran gran she was the one who took care of me
And I know I had trauma already from my parents getting divorced because when my father was there and he would go to the bathroom I would sit on the other side of the door and make him talk to me while he was in the bathroom because I thought he was going to jump out the window and run away now I know that isn't very sensical but I remember that
So I was afraid that he was going to abandon me but he didn't take good care of me he you know would take me out at night sometimes and drive me around and I would get sick
He would take me to the park and we would swing and that was fun I enjoyed that I enjoyed driving around but he he didn't take care of me he didn't he was not a caregiver he was not making sure I was safe he was not he was playing with me I was a toy I mean he loved me because you know I would look up at him adoringly and whatever and as soon as I stopped looking up at him adoringly he well let's not get ahead of ourselves
When my mother would come to visit which I don't recall being very often I would run and hide in the closet and say tell her I went to China because I mean I guess I knew that she had left me and I didn't want to see her but they would make me and I don't guess they told her I went to China or had any lack of interest in seeing her but I just really don't remember seeing her very much at all I know she would take me to cholla's, and she would take me with her to the gallery or places like that and say you have to behave like a grown up or I can't bring you
But I don't think those things happened until after my father married Deborah and she sued for custody I think that was when she started actually having an interest in spending any time with me maybe I'm wrong
I mean I was a child and I remember a lot for a small child but I don't remember much from the perspective of a life you know of course you don't as an adult either remember much You just remember high points and low points
So I mean I guess I had the initial childhood trauma of being my parents being divorced and my mother being gone
And perhaps I had other trauma based on the fact that I can't imagine my mother was a very good mother and I don't know that my father was a very good father so they may have not actually seen to my needs adequately before one and a half but I just don't remember that but I at least had that trauma and it was pretty traumatic I think based on the fact that for years and years after that I would make him talk to me through the door and didn't want to talk to her
But I really think that the only thing that saved me if you can say that I would saved is that I did have like that three or three and a half years of gran gran
And I mean I don't know whether you know if you analyzed what she did as a psychologist a child psychologist whatever whether you would say oh she was some kind of stellar parent or not I mean I was in front of the TV most the time and anytime I coughed or seems like I might be even slightly ill she gave me Paragon Coke or honey lemon and paregoric which is an opioid and I still kind of miss it
She let me go to the park by myself you know I mean I'm not saying she was a perfect person but she was there for me and she made sure I had the things I needed and she treated me with unconditional love
And I'm not really sure if anybody else in my entire life has loved me unconditionally
I mean maybe
Maybe you do
Maybe my parents did in their way I don't know it certainly didn't feel unconditional certainly wasn't like You know no matter what you do I will always love you that was not the sentiment that was expressed and that was not how it came across pretty much ever
And I know I've told you more recently about how it was more important for them to fight with each other than it was for them to not upset me even when they had been divorced for you know 7-8 years
And Deborah thought I was uppity I mean they're really just is not a better way to put that she thought I was uppity and her goal was to break me and it was pretty clear
And my father would tell me s*** like how he loved me more than her and he would get me to tell him all these things you know whatever my little 6-year-old secrets might be and then he would tell her and then she would be y'all coming at me and it would be like why do you tell her this it's supposed to be a secret between us but you know he he just came across to me is very I don't know I think I thought that was weak
But he wouldn't let her beat me and she really wanted to beat me it was very clear she really wanted to beat me
And I saw this guy was talking about CPTSD and he was talking about kids just deciding that they had not very many needs because they couldn't get the mat so they just would stop having them and that just rang so true for me it's like I I don't I mean you know I've tried but it's really hard for me to say what my needs are or even to kind of have needs or know what they are you know
But I was saying that having had that time with gran gran is what saved me and what I mean is that I felt like I had had a home where I was love to take care of and VALUED
And I was stolen from that home and treated badly and unfairly and lived under the care of a woman whose goal it was to break me
But I did not believe that that was the way it was supposed to be You know if I had just grown up like that with that being all ahead ever been exposed to then I would have felt like that was just normal and that was how it supposed to be but instead I felt enslaved I felt oppressed I felt like I needed to be emancipated from that situation
And so then my mother who was now having visits was being on her best behavior which I honestly do not know how she maintained throughout summers I mean I know how she could you know behave well for a weekend maybe or for sure a Thursday night visit because that was only from like you know for 4:30 to 9:00 5:00 to 9:00 something like that and we would pretty much just go to memorial City Mall until right before they closed and then I would go home but I never really felt like that was my home
That was Daddy and Deborah's
And my mom's place was my mom's place
The only place that ever was my home was my gran gran's house
Except it wasn't
And even through all the places that I have lived and you know they've not been bad places I've liked them I've liked all of them
My whole life I just have this feeling like I want to go home but they're never is a place that feels like that
But Joan told me at some point when I was a teenager after gran gran was dead
Because she died right before my 15th birthday I think hang on let me check that
Yeah I didn't think I would get that wrong she died on January 3rd 1982 and it's it's funny because I I don't remember the date that my grandfather died or my aunt died or my father died actually I'm not sure I actually know the date my father died but those other people I should know and I don't remember any of them because I don't know I just I don't I remember their birthdays but I don't remember their death days
But my Gran Gran
It is just etched into my heart
And I remember right after she died my mother said something like yeah it's really hard when a grandmother dies but just imagine how much more upset you're going to be when I die because to have a mother die that's the worst thing
And I was like my God
I mean I know my mother is my mother okay I mean I want her not to be but I know that she is and I know that my father is my father and I want for him not to be but he is but there's a very real way in which at least in my heart at least in my psyche
Gran Gran was my mother
And I'm pretty sure she was working up until the point at which I became her responsibility
I'm pretty sure that piano Rama thing was a recital of her students and I'm pretty sure that that was the last of the recitals of her students I don't know that for a fact but she didn't go out to teach people someplace else she was teaching them in her home and she didn't have students coming over while she was taking care of me so I'm pretty sure she ended her career such as it was
I don't think she thought she was taking me on as a temporary thing to help her son out while he got back on his feet I think she thought he was I don't know whether she thought he wasn't going to get back on his feet or whether she just didn't think it through but maybe she thought she could always go back to teaching or maybe she thought I don't know what she thought but
But my aunt Joan told me when I was a teenager after she was dead that basically the lawyers or somebody told gran gran that since she had been taken care of me and was a responsible human unlike my parents that if she wanted custody of me they were pretty sure they could get her custody I don't know who told her that I can't imagine it would have been my father's lawyer or my mother's lawyer so maybe some other lawyer was consulted or maybe the judge was consulted I don't know but somebody told her that and she chose not to pursue that option
And I understand why she wouldn't okay
I mean she had raised her kids she was older and not in great health and my paw paw had been kind of I don't know weird with his kids and maybe he didn't really want to start with raising other kids you know
Maybe she didn't feel up to it
But I think it was because she couldn't do it to her son she couldn't bear the idea of the unpleasantness of that relationship
Maybe that it would hurt him
So you know it wasn't her responsibility
Maybe she didn't feel up to taking on that long-term of a commitment for a variety of reasons
And she didn't want to go
"Against" my dad so to speak
I understand intellectually
And I don't blame her
But I just feel like that all of that was so bad for me and I continued to see her and we would talk about all of it and she was very worried about me and she was very
I mean I think perhaps she thought she had made the wrong decision
I for sure thought she had made the wrong decision only I didn't during any of that time no that she had made that decision and I don't know whether it would have been better to have known that so I could have talked to her about it and gotten her perspective on it I just don't know if that would have been better or not
But the fact that I know that it damaged something
So that the one little bright spot just has a smudge on it you know
And I could have just beaten the crap out of Joan for telling me that because why what was the point of telling me that I did not need to know that nothing was improved by my knowing that and I would just rather have had that one little bit not tainted you know
But you know gran gran died and Papa died and Joan died and I was the first grandchild and so as everybody has died I have had to help clear things out actually know that's slightly misleading it was only after Joan died Edith had me come and help her clean out the house
And I just wanted some pictures of gran gran
Maybe some things of hers but even though Edith wanted me to help and took full advantage of my labor she wouldn't let me have anything she was like no no I need to go through all this stuff and I mean I guess I was helping I don't even remember it's just all a traumatic blur but I had to help clean things out and get rid of things but I couldn't have anything and she said she was going to go through it and she would get me some stuff later
Which is that stuff that I got and my mom's house Edith got it to my mom like 10 or 15 years later and then I got it from my mom 10 or 15 years later I was it was like right around the time that the Berlin Wall fell that Joan died so what was that like November something I think it was right after that that she died so but I don't think it was right after that that we cleaned out the house I think it was after it got hot so probably May or June or July
No that can't be right I went to Germany with my mom in the summer of 90 so maybe it was after we got back maybe it was in the winter before I don't know I don't know it was 89 or 90 that Edith was going to give me some of Gran Gran stuff
And this is 2022 so how many years is that
Oh yeah about the pictures so has everybody died I was the first grandchild everybody took a lot of pictures of me by the time we got around to John there are like almost no pictures of John they were all bored with pictures by then I guess but there are bajillions of pictures of me bajillions
But none of them are with Gran Gran
I can only assume because at that point she was not happy with how she looked I did not particularly want to be photographed
And also that she was probably often the one taking the photographs
So like they're all these pictures of me with my dad All these pictures of me with my mom will not all of them but there are a few of them I guess enough
There are pictures of me with Joan
But I've not had a picture of me with gran gran
And so when I found that diary and I read it it just infuriated me it just I mean cuz I remember all that stuff happening but of course from my perspective and I remember the lawyers asking me do you want to live with your mother or do you want to live with I don't know which lawyer it was maybe it was grain grants lawyer I don't know but I remember some lawyers sitting down with me at grand grand's dining room table and asking me do you want to live with your mother or do you want to live with your father and I'm like I want to live with my gran gran
And I remember that I didn't want to take all the things from her house because that was where they should be that was my house that was my home and that was where those things belonged
And besides if I had nice things and I don't know I may have already seen some inkling of this but if I had nice things Deborah would take them and send them to her family so you know nothing was safe nothing was ever safe
And I found some of those books and my mother's garage
Edith must have brought them
Now my mother has on many occasions brought me boxes full of metaphorical moldy sandwiches like stuff that I don't know why anybody would want I've been like here this is your stuff do you want this
But then she had all this good stuff that she didn't tell me about and I think I remember her saying that Edith had brought by some stuff but when I asked her what it was she made it sound like it was not really anything and it was at a point in time when I when I was under a lot of stress and only seeing my mother like you know as infrequently as I could possibly get away with so I don't know when it was but I mean this wasn't a small amount of stuff this was a lot of stuff
So I mean maybe I bear some responsibility for my not having it but I don't know but at any rate
I thought maybe you wanted to see some more pictures of me with my grand-gran and so I looked through some of the pictures I hadn't really looked through them before because when I found them was sort of when I started working at my mom's and I was still like super freaked out about just the overwhelmingness of it and so I couldn't like really sit down and look at the pictures I could have done that after I came home I guess but I didn't I didn't really look at them and so I sat down and looked at the first little box of pictures and I found those pictures of us and I think I mean I think I had I guess I had looked through the box of pictures before and I had seen the picture of us in bed but I hadn't looked through the photo album pages that had that picture of us standing in front of the tree thing shrubbery flowering shrubbery I don't know but when I saw that you know I had just gotten over the extreme anger extreme anger that I felt over reading the diary
Just the degree to which what she had written matched what I remembered you know and really how surprisingly like something I might have written it sounded you know have a hard time reading her handwriting though she uses that Palmer script and it's hard for me to read so the part that she had printed that was pretty easy but the part that was handwriting was a little harder and I guess part of it was from a letter she had written to eat it in California and I don't think I have the complete letter although maybe it's somewhere else in the boxes I still have some boxes I have to go through
But I was so mad all the time I just really could barely contain it and I had just kind of gotten back to a you know kind of level plateau and then I saw that picture and it was like that's me and my mother
And it was just a bit much
And my mother is not right
I'm not going to be more upset when she dies
I when she was in the hospital and she had to have the pacemaker I was worried
And when she was having the problem with the oxygen and I made her go to the hospital I was worried
There's a way in which I hate her
But there is a way in which I love her also
A very conflicted feelings about her
But I don't actually wish her ill you know I am trying to make her dream come true although
I am trying very hard to distance myself from that you know I got her moved into the nice apartment I got it all set up for her to live there but now she's not going to put the extra crap in a storage it all has to go to the apartment and then you know when we had a big altercation she said okay maybe we could get a storage briefly but by that time there were no more sales on storage it was very expensive and I was like you know it f*** it let's just try to get rid of the stuff so that there's a small enough amount of stuff that it'll fit in the apartment but I'm not certain that that is going to work and so I'm trying to distance myself from this making her dream come true because you know f*** her
I gave her her dream and if she doesn't want to continue to have the dream I don't want my happiness to be tied up in that
I understand she has issues and she's not responsible for her illnesses but I don't want to have to be unhappy because she's crazy so I'm trying to distance myself
I've thrown away like 173 bags of garbage
And now well more than that really because I've only been counting since I've actually been able to start going out garbage without her watching me
But I did though out bags of garbage when she was in the hospital and I have thrown out bags of garbage while she was watching me just not nearly as many so I don't know we've got to be approaching 200 bags of garbage at this point and I'm still looking around and going I think there's too much stuff I think she's going to want to take all this stuff
So whatever I was going to have to do this after she died anyway and so if I can do it in a way where she gets to have a nicer place to live until she dies then I'm happy for that I don't want bad things for her
And I'm not going to like dance around and sing ding dong the witch is dead when she dies you know I'm going to be sad on some levels but
I don't think anything could compare with how distraught I was for years
In fact I have a vague recollection when I was writing to you about my relationship with her and how distraught I was for so long about it and again you may not remember this stuff this was a really long time ago because I really did try at the very beginning when I was telling you about myself I really did try to lay out all my brokenness for you because I mean I never was thinking anything other than that we were soulmates and going to be together
So I wanted you to understand where all my landmines were so you wouldn't accidentally step on them or you know that if they did get triggered it wouldn't seem to not have a reason you know
But I just realized and I really need to be asleep I just realized like I don't know just within the last few days and this seems incredible to me but you know I haven't had that many relationships but with the exception of Nikki and I'm not sure whether you would call that a relationship exactly I guess you would maybe it was certainly not a traditional form of relationship or maybe it was but never anyway with the exception of Nikki who I do not believe had a father and I'm uncertain if she ever had a father maybe she did I just don't know
All the relationships I've had I'm pretty sure have been with people who had parents who were still married to each other
No I think that's pretty remarkable considering I feel like the majority of the people I've known have not had parents who were still married to each other maybe that's not right maybe the majority of people I've known have had parents who were married to each other and just a very large minority of people were from broken homes and I'm not going to say that there weren't some problems in the relationships between the parents of the people that I have been in relationships with but I think I think that's pretty weird and I don't know whether
I don't know whether that's some sort of subconscious protection mechanism like those people are less crazy
Or I don't know I just I don't know and maybe it doesn't mean anything maybe it's purely coincidence but I hadn't snapped to the fact until like just a few days ago so I thought that was interesting
And I mean it's not to say that people whose parents aren't married to each other can't have childhood trauma of course they can have childhood trauma but you know people who are still married at the point when their children are grown
In a culture where divorce is completely acceptable probably are a little more stable they may or may not be happier but they're probably a little more stable
That's not really safe to make generalizations but these people seemed to be more stable
And I'm sure that your parents loved you and took care of you and that you don't have any kind of extreme trauma from your early childhood in fact imagine that you probably have some psychological stuff because your parents for sure had some trauma but I'm guessing that it was a pretty high priority for them to give you a safe stable life so while I'm sure it was shaped in some ways by their trauma I would be very surprised if you had any early childhood trauma
And I could just remember thinking man you know as soon as I turn 18 I am leaving these people because I want to have control over my life that was so important to me I wanted to have control over my life so all these other f****** weren't f****** with me and f****** me up because I knew they were f****** me up but I was very disappointed to learn that there are an awful lot of factors that keep you from having complete control over your life once you don't have other people f****** it up like you know need to earn money and so subsequently having to have jobs that you have to get and what not anyway it's just a much more complicated world than I imagined it was when I was eight
And of course there are some theorists who say that we never really have control over our lives we're programmed early and then everything we do is something that are not really our conscious mind but our monkey brain or our reptile brain or one of those other brains that just responds to things that they make the decisions and then the big brain just makes justifications for why we did the things we did
And I of course think that's an oversimplification but it's not completely wrong unless you're very mindful you will do things that you don't really know why you did and then you will make justifications for why you did them later or you will just very honestly say I really don't know
Anyway I needed to be asleep like I don't know an hour and a bit ago at least and I'm down to single digits on battery so I think we're going to leave it there and hopefully this is information that you wanted
And hopefully it makes you feel loved that I shared it with you because it certainly did make me cry a lot
But I saw a video by the crappy childhood fairy or something like that talking about how CPTSD is mostly neurological and I found that extremely helpful because I really have an understood
I feel like I've had a very hard time handling stuff in my life that other people have less of a hard time handling and stuff that other people have a hard time handling seems well I don't know every way that I say this it sounds kind of conceited and I'm not meaning it to be that way what I'm saying is or what I'm trying to say is I don't really understand
My life
But maybe it's all just been based on avoidance
I never really had anything I wanted that I could identify except you
Everything else was more a series of I don't even know
Anyway I slept like I don't know 18 hours or something last night yesterday
But I haven't really felt right all day either
I just don't really know anything
But it was really really good to see your face and hear your voice that made me really happy
goodnight sweetheart I love you very much 💋
Friday, August 5, 2022
Wednesday, August 3, 2022
Tuesday, August 2, 2022
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