I am becoming increasingly frustrated with the school district.  First off they do not have all of the “half day/out of school ” days posted on the calender parents were given at the begining of the year.  Thursday this week the kids get out at noon, was not on the calender.  Friday there is no school due to parent teacher confrences  that was not posted on the calender.  Last week or maybe it was the week before they had an early dismissal day again, not posted. How in the world do these schools expect parents to be able to make arrangments if there is just no notice as to when there will be early dismissal days or school’s out days.

Now there is another rule that sticks in my head that I find stupid as can be.  These kids are allowed to miss 10 days a year that is it. What school does not get is that kids get sick, this is cold and flu season and according to our doctor’s nurse there are 135 kids out sick currently at the middle school.   Also doctors, dentists, and mental health service places cannot make every appointment for “after school”   I typically try to do before or after school or I try to make them for days  when there is no school but then some things are not open then either like if there is a holiday. 

Now the other thing is that if you’re on a medicaid card then you go to doctors etc when they tell you to otherwise you may not get to go for 6 months!!  Even though K is now on her dad’s insurance I still have medicaid as secondary so I still need to go when the doctor etc says so.   To me if school lets them out for things such as Cashimer Polasky day ( what signifagance he plays to the US I don’t know) and teacher confrences  then they can excuse illness and doctor appointments.   I do get very very vocal with the school as well when they mention something about her being out sick  or missing school like she did today  due to back to back doctor appoinments.   I don’t know about anyone else, but Im 36 we didn’t get to miss school for parent teacher cnofrences much, maybe towards the end of the year, heck your teacher met with your mom n dad after school or you had a substitute teacher and your teacher met with parents in another room.  It would be nice if the school district was organized better than they are.

Yah yah, I know that line is so vintage “The Rock” but I love my WWE.  I was talking to K earlier and we were talking about how some of her freinds have ran up huge huge cell phone bills on their phones that are on their parents lines.  I am so glad that she obeys my rules with her cell phone. She’s great at taking care of it and not loosing it, paying attention to her minutes used not downloading things etc.. Probaly because I scared her a little, on purpose..

We bond watching Wrestling togther 4 nites a week. I told her you  sass me and act up the cell phone goes for one day at a time, and we go from there. You break any of the cell phone rules.. I will do a little ” 5 knuckle shuffle” ( John Cena’s finishing move) on you, and there will be no more phone till you are 18.  Now she knows I’d never do the ” U can’t see me” thing on her cuz I’d never hurt her but I think the fact that she would never have a phone until she had a job and could pay for it and put it in her name legally was enough to scare her.  I think one of the best things about being a mom is what Roseanne says ” you have all these little people and you can really mess up their heads forever.. because only mom say things like didn’t I tell you not to talk with your mouth full answer me. “

I found out today that  a freind of two of my buddies ( we’ve been freinds since high school) passed away  recently. They belive it was an overdose but aren’t sure.  This week marked the fourth year my dad has been gone.  I still miss him a lot.  My mom really pissed  me off this week, I reminded her about it on Wednesday ( the 14th)  and she had the nerve to tell me  “Maria I just don’t want to talk about it or even think about it because of how much he hurt me” ok I could have understood that, but then she went way way over the top and had the nerve to “glorify” my a**hole ex hubby because he was nice enough ( for a change) to help my brother n his fiancee move into their new house.  She had the gall to tell me that “maybe he isn’t as bad as you make him out to be”   What??!!! Seriously??!!!!  I had to hang up with her I was so upset.  I rarely get mad, but I was in such a rage I was phsyically shaking.

I mean he abused me in every possible way, I still have severe emotional scars from the stuff he did to me, and forget me , lets focus on what is more important, that he never was much of a dad when we were married and he’s even less of one now.  I get that he and his wife live 3 hours away, but he never even calls the kids.  How hard is it to call your kids???  Once every 3-6 months doesn’t cut it daddy dearest.  I just don’t think you can play parent when you feel like it, you either do it or you don’t.  Ever since I had my son nearly 15 years ago, my life has been all about my children. Hell I moved 3 hours away from everyone I know to be with my son and I go everday to visit him.  Even when I’m so depressive I don’t want to get out of bed I go because I know N is depending on me to be there to see him.

I talked to my therapist about the thing with my mom and she told me she thinks I handled it well, I really wanted to tear into my mom because I can’t fathom why she’d say what she did about my ex hubby.  She has never met P but, I keep on telling her that he treats me the way I deserve to be treated.  Hell he is a better dad to my kids than their biological dad is hell for that matter so is my brother  T and he’s locked up in prison!!!

My mind is all over the place atm, but I have been thinking a lot about the things I did in the past.  I would never change having my kids, but I would change a lot of other things.  I know that it would be easy as could be to slide back into my self-destructive negative behaviors but I’m choosing not to indulge that.  I know that my sponsor is right in that I need to get back to a meeting where there is more than just the two of us, ( you can have a meeting with two addicts/alcoholics)  I told him I’m not naive enough to belive that drowning my feelings in a bottle of anything is going to make anything better so I won’t do that no matter what.  But I was honest with him in that sometimes that is all I want to do. Run for the alcohol.  Not the other stuff I used to do, but certainly the booze.   I just don’t feel like feeling all this pent up frustration and stuff that I have. 

The truth of everything is  this; I feel 100% screwed up and I am ready to give up.   Give up on thinking good things will happen to me, give up on that will feel the way I did before I allowed Jason to come into my life full force, use me, manipulate me and abuse me, breaking my trust in humanity so completly that I have a hard time opening up to anyone or trusting anyone.  A lot of not wanting to open up to people is that I am afraid of what they will say if I tell them the truth about me. 

My “Burg” people love me regardless but they are my family ( that means mostly my friends not just my blood relatives) but what about people I meet where I’m living at now?  I am honest with some people about my addiction history but not with many because I am afraid of their judgments.  I remember last time I got really depressive like this and A asked me if I was “back on the sh**” of course I wasn’t and I told her so. ( all my feelings about her is a whole other can of worms) there are times and days that I just don’t feel as though I have that once strong and firm grip on sanity.  But if I let go what lies beneath is scary. I don’t have it in me to go to the hosptial one more time, not only because of the consequences to my kids (which is my most important reason) but because I’m not sure I can come back from another time of being in that very very dark place.

I feel guilty complaing too. I mean really guitly.  There are people fighting cancer, fighting for their lives , my big brother T is locked up in prison has been since like 1993 and will be till like 2020 or something like that. He and I write faithfully though and he has been a great source of support for me and I for him which I am grateful for.  For his Bday I sent him a picture of our dad and he was so happy to have it since he didn’t have any.  He said that he loves getting letters from me and his beautiful neice because just when he feels that everyone has forgotten him, he gets a letter from us or my bff  Dar who I asked to write to him as well.

Maybe I should blog more than I have been, getting this stuff out of my head so it stops eating away at my heart. I know one thing for certain though,  I am tired of living my life consumed by fears.

So first things first, I can tackle how I feel about this freind of my freinds passing away:  it breaks my heart. I didn’t know Damon well, but I had met him a couple of times, he was friends with my freinds MN and DB and now Damon is gone.  It made me think of how many times I have not gotten to say goodbye to those I love that have passed away; Donnie, Grandma, Dad, Grandpa.  I did get to see my Uncle Albert before he passed away, actually went to see him at the nursing home when I went back home for my Grandpa’s funeral.  I was happy to see him and he me. He told K that she looks like I did at her age and she laughed.  He was getting teased by his nurse because of having so many  “pretty girls” in his room.  It was; me, my mom, K, my cousin Kelly, her two daughters, and then my brother with his two daughters.  I am so grateful I went because when he passed away in August at least I had the chance for once to say goodbye.  There is something about goodbye for me…  Now I know most people hate goodbyes, I don’t.  I treasure them for one reason; if I never have another day with them, another moment with them then at least I got that last moment  with them.

I think that is why a lot of what happend with A hurt me so much,  she stopped being my friend out of nowhere, never gave me a reason for taking her freindship from me, just took it and left.  Maybe for her what I thought was a freindship and a deep meaningful one at that didn’t mean as much to her, or maybe it was all an illusion.  I like illusions on tv, and for magic tricks just not in my life!!!  I don’t like that feeling when something shatters to peices all around me.  I hate it when I think I can feel safe and secure and that I have something or somone, and then its just dust in my hands.

I often have refered to myself as a broken doll. See in the olden days dolls had soft bodies and china faces, hands, legs and feet. I think of myself that way many times.  Like a doll, I feel that sometimes some people in my life play with me until they grow bored then they just toss me to the floor and I lie there broken until somone else comes along to pick me up.  Then I am restored once more, the broken peices mended and healed and then it happens all over again.

I am stronger ( most of the time) than people give me credit for, but yet there is that part of my soul that is still fragile. It still has cracks all over it that have been mended many times over but the cracks are there just the same.

I have for no apparent reason been really depressive again, I hate my bipolar disorder sometimes.  On top of that I have Seasonal Affective Disorder so when I see my physchatrist later in the month ( or next month I forget which) it will be time once again to up the antidepressants.  The thing is Im finding myself once again in a place where I just don’t want to feel anything at all.   I love to meditate to the Korn song “Alone I Break” and when I feel like this the lyrics seem to fit my mood pefectly.  Sometimes I just don’t want to think about what I’m feeling.  I certainly have plenty of wonderful people to talk to, but I don’t feel like talking about what Im feeling either.. the truth is I really don’t know what I’m feeling,  I just know I hate the way I feel.  “Morbid Tearz”  has always told me that  “everyone has their dark side” I normally don’t even acknowledge mine or at least not as much as I did when I was younger ( before 31) but today I feel as though that darkness is imprisioning me. ( yes I stole that from a Metallica song)  I don’t want to do anything stupid so no one needs to worry, and yesterday my therapist and I talked about it, I talked to my sponsor for something like 2 hours about it late last nite, I’ve prayed about it, heck I even got angry and started yelling at God to ” just fix me already dammit , stop testing me  cuz I’m starting to feel like Job here and its annyoning”

The thing is I feel as though once again I am loosing whatever firm grip I thought I had on sanity, once again that grip is feeling fragile.  I feel as though my feelings are a tangled up ball of knots and I don’t know where to start unraveling them.  I do feel guilty for complaing, I know so many people who really have reason to be upset, or depressed like my good freind R whose 10 year old has cancer, like the lady at my church who has cancer. Those people have every right and reason to complain but me ?  not so much…

I just hate the depressive side of bipolar I hate it I hate it I hate it.

I haven’t blogged in a while.. I haven’t felt like it.  Have you ever had so much stuff running through your mind, so many things you wanted to say but didn’t have the words for ??  I feel like that.  I sometimes feel as though I’m looking at myself from the outside and I am not liking what I see.  I feel at times, as though I am a prisoner in my own body, as though I should rip away every shred of my “shell” my outer self, my outer persona and just start over fresh.

I find myself being so angry far too often. I never used to get mad easily these days everything seems to set me off.  I sometimes don’t feel like talking to anyone, not being around anyone, so I isolate and that seems to make me feel better, then things really get worse because I start to feel alone.  Fear has crippled me this time, not my depression, but fear.  Its not a fear I want to give voice to, not one I want to acknowledge.  Its not to a point I never want to leave my house its not like that, but it is a fear of people in the sense of letting people know the real me.  So many parts of myself, so many things I keep hidden away from the world. Its like that song.. ” I don’t want the world to see me, cuz I don’t think that they’d understand, when everythings made to be broken, I just want you to know who I am.”  I just want to know who I am.  I don’t think I even know anymore.   I know people are supposed to grow and change but lately I feel like a plant that has been closed off from the sun, given too little water, and too little love.  I feel stagnant.  I feel stuck.  I have no other words for this feeling.  Im just stuck, afraid to move back, afraid to go forward so I’ll just plop down where Im at and just sit for a while.

It takes real talent to do what I did, trip over air ( literally) and sprain the 2 middle toes on your right foot!  Man does that hurt like hell!!!!! I tripped over nothing Wednesday and when I did so my toes bent back but underneath of my foot. Ow  Ow Ow! It hurt for a second n stopped so I thought nothing of it. Yesterday it hurt a little all day nothing major tylenol fixed it, then when I go to lay down for bed, I could not sleep due to the pain.  I was up till 6 am this morning because I couldn’t sleep. When I went to get out of bed this morning, I couldn’t put pressure on my foot at all.

So I decided to head to the ER at noon today at 5 pm I got to go home from there. ( eesh)  They did take x-rays and nothing looked broken but I do have a sprain. Have to be on crutches for 5 days wear this ugly shoe called a reese shoe.  This just sucks. I don’t do well with pain, have a low pain tolerance and I can’t stand to not be able to do things.  ugh!!

When I’m bored like a minute ago, I read stuff on Yahoo Shine.  There was a post on there asking for advice for a lady who broke up with her boyfreind because he cheated on her. Now she’s pregnant with his kid and “is confused because he makes it clear they won’t be toghter ever again, but he lets her touch him and have sex with him when he’s in the mood and sleeps on her couch.”  Now call me jaded , cynical , smart whatever but I want to yell “wake up you dummy he’s using you!!” Why would you subject yourself to accepting crumbs from some guy in order to have somone in your life?  You can allow him in your child’s life without being his “fuck buddy” or providing him a place to sleep.

Then I got to thinking about how so many of us do things just like that, I know I have in the past and I know several freinds that have as well.  Its not just with our partners that we date, but freinds as well. ( first prince not so charming then the friends)  Society feeds all of us especially us girls this myth  that in order to be  happy and fullfilled we need Prince Charming to come in on his white horse to rescue us.  We need to meet him, fall in love, get married and live happily ever after.  Society will not say one negative thing about a 40 year old man who is single and does not work or at least work steadily, they are bachelor’s or playboys.  But let a woman be 40 years old have a job and her own apartment or house and shes “lonely, a spinster, or unlovable.”

So what is a girl to do?  We put up with complete and utter crap from a man in order to have one.  We don’t want to be “that girl” the one  who never has a date on Friday or Saturday night, the one that has to take her cousin or gay male friend to prom or a friend’s wedding because we don’t have a boyfreind.  We don’t want to be the only bridesmaid at our freinds wedding trying to catch her bouquet because we are the only one there that is single.  We don’t want to watch all of our freinds get married and start families while we are still the “singleton” at all of their dinner parties.

So we compromise our standards, we settle for less in order to have anything or anyone,  even if that means being a doormat for some guy allowing him to live off of us, or sleep with us when he feels like it.  We think that people still don’t buy into those old stereotypes of a girl being a “tramp or a slut” but sadly they still do.  Im not condeming hooking up, or one night stands but  Ive never once heard of a guy getting called terrible names because he has them but women?  People will still say things about you, or some men will take you less seriously if you hop into bed on a first date.  ( stupid people and stupid men I say, what applies to us should apply to men as well)

As to the freinds, why is it that people think if you don’t have freinds or a lot of freinds that something is wrong with you?  Why can’t we be ok with our own company?  I know a lot of people but I’d consider most of them aquantences , I wouldn’t trust them to house sit or babysit, my friends on the other hand  if I found out I had cancer and was dying they’d be the people I’d be calling and making a “get me through this stuff plan”.  Sad thing is I’ve been burned by people I have thought were freinds.  Sometimes  I can’t see the forest for the trees, other times I think Im just being paranoid as hell and should let things that upset or bother me just go.  When I do get to the point I feel as though I can’t take whatever it is anymore and say something, then I end up being told that Im   the one thats wrong, or am called names ( selfish, bitch etc) or worse yet they do what has happend the last two times and the other person stops calling or coming over and just takes away their freindship without talking to me about anything.

I mean at least if I am told what I do wrong, then I know not to do it.  Part of my problem is that Im a “wear my heart on my sleeve ” kinda girl. I have a heart the size of Texas and I love to help others when I can. But there are times I can’t and I have to say no. I feel that we should all be able to say no without being made to feel like crap about it. We shouldn’t have to worry that our freind will snap at us, or get angry at us or act as though we don’t do anything for them or don’t do enough for them even though we do things for them all the time.

I remember an instance where A had asked me to babysit and I couldn’t.   Now not only did she call me an hour before she had to be at work, but it was late at night and I was already tired and had already put my kid to bed for the night.  Rather than saying to me “hey its ok, thanks anyway, or I understand no worries” I get this :  ” well thats fine I’ll just call in and get fired, thanks for nothing.” ( said in a rude snotty tone of voice ) and then get hung up on.

When I decided to say something the next day and told her “look I can understand you were upset or whatever but I don’t feel as though its fair to take that out on me” I get this half ass apology of “well I was frustrated and mad and I didn’t mean to take it out on you “  Wth is  that???  You are rude for no reason then make excuses for your behavior??

She had also fallen into a habit of asking last minute even when she knew ahead of time she’d need a sitter for a specific day of the week. The last time it was her regular sitter had an appointment on Friday and had told her all week, does she ask me on a Monday or even a Wednesday to watch the kids? No. She calls at 10 pm on Thursday and asks.  Well sorry but I have things to do and Im not changing all of my appointments and such.  Rather than the usual attitude I get, I get all nice and polite and she says “ok no problem thanks though” and she hasn’t called me since.

Have I called her or made the move?  No, not this time.  Because that is all I’ve ever done not only with her but with other people to. I am always so willing to take the blame, to take on the responsibility, suck everything up and apologize  even when I’ve done nothing wrong.  Not this time, never again actually.  Because those are not the kinds of relationships that I want to have not with anyone.  I’ve spent so much of my time and my life people pleasing to have friends or relationships or whatever.  But rather than it working out in my favor I end up being the one that gets burned or gets hurt.   I don’t want to put up a lot of walls and keep people out, nor do I want to be the kind of person that never wants to help anyone else because that is not who I am.

No matter how bad other people may treat me I cannot bring myself to act like they do.  I cannot bring myself to be all about me, not to think of others, never to help somone in need.  As much as I may long for that its not who I am and I feel that being true to myself is more important. 

This thing with her didn’t happen overnight, it had been going on for a while only I either didn’t see it, didn’t let it affect me, or never thought that if I told her no one too many times that she’d just end the friendship. It wasn’t just the 100’s of times I’d babysit for her to work, but the asking at the last minute, or asking me to come over and help her clean the house if she fed us dinner and then we’d hang out afterwards, the not picking the kids up on time or  never returning the favor by having my kid stay the night or picking her up from school. I can’t tell you how many times I waited with her daughter after school even when I had things to do because she was running late picking her up.  Asking me to go out to lunch with her only to end up making me chase her younger kids so she could sit and enjoy her dinner. Asking me to do things with her like shopping for her wedding stuff when she got married,  saying its just going to be us then bringing her kids and expecting me  to chase them around the stores so she can do what she needed to get done.  Critizing me about how I dress myself or my kids because I don’t buy name brands and expensive things for us.  Taking shots at me about not caring about myself because I don’t spend money getting pedicures or manicures since Id rather save the money and do those things at home on my own.  I always just politely told her that it hurt my feelings when she said those things because those are my choices to make and I didn’t see any reason for anyone to criticize them. Then I’d add “you wouldn’t like it if someone did that to you, so please don’t do that to me.”  Then there was always something I couldn’t understand with her, she had everything the kind of life everyone would want, the kind of life I’d want for myself:  a great husband, great kids, great job that payed well enough to buy everything her family  needed and some things they wanted, nice cars, nice home, money for things , a big family that lives close by that are willing to help her anytime she needs it, lots of friends, she’s pretty , smart , funny, fun to be with , an excellent cook and yet even with all of that she always seemed to find reasons to be unhappy all of the time, angry all of the time. When anyone her mom or me or anyone would suggest going to therapy to figure out if she was depressed or something, she’d blow up and say she didnt belive in all that pshycho babble crap and taking meds for things. Her choice of course but I couldn’t help wonder if she was depressed in some way, I mean how can you have everything anyone could want and still be angry and upset all of the time?

  It hurts and I am angry and even bitter , not just at her or her actions but at myself.   I am questioning my own judgement, my own feelings and thoughts, and what was real and what was just for show. Im kicking myself for once again being a doormat , and Im also angry that there are people in the world that think its ok to take advantage of people, or just to abuse the privalages of freindship or the fact that so many times people just place expectations of you based on their own assumptions or perceptions.

Like the thing with being a stay at home mom, I can’t tell you how many times people think Im just supposed to be the neighborhood day care because Im home and my job is within the house not outside of it.  Parents have sent their kids over at 7 am on a Saturday, dropped off kids and asked me to run them to school when I take my kid and run out the door before I can say no, and when I try to tell them that its not ok they get huffy and mad with me and say things like “well you’re home and I have to work so I didn’t think you’d mind.”  or they assume their kids can come over after school like I don’t have anything else going on, or if the kid is too sick for daycare that I’ll happily babysit.

Well I do mind and when somone says ” I dont mind watching them if they’re sick” they don’t mean that literally they  are trying to be polite rather than saying what they are thinking “why would you think I’d want to watch your sick child so you can still go to work?   I don’t want to get sick, I don’t want my kids sick, call your mom or their dad or take  the day off work and stay home and take care of them yourself.”   Yes maybe I sound bitchy or cold, but thing is I don’t ever ask any one of my freinds  to watch my kids when they are too sick for daycare or school when I worked outside the house, they had a dad and grandparents for that and even if they said no I said no problem I didn’t get mad or cop an attitude or get upset with them.

I never get angry at anyone when they say they can’t help me, I don’t ask often but when I do I understand and accpet their answer of “no “without any hard feelings.   So where does all of this leave me?  Well truth be told even though I’ve lived in this town for about 6 years I really don’t have freinds, lots of aquantences yes freinds no, those are all back in Gburg and one in Lima.  I moved to this town to be with my son, since he went into a group home for Developmentally Disabled persons ( due to his constant running off , he has autisim and mental retardation)  but since I do school online ( so I don’t have to worry about finding or paying for daycare or missing classes when my daughter is sick) and I don’t work outside of the house I don’t meet many people.  The church we started going to a few months ago has been providing me opprotunties to make new friends which is good.   While sometimes Im ok with not having the freinds like I do and did in the burg sometimes, most times Im ok with it just being me and my kids. Keeping busy with school and my own intrests and such.   So why do people feel the need to fix me, or ask me if Im lonely and why I don’t have freinds?

Sometimes I am a lot happier on my own for the simple fact that I don’t get treated like crap by anyone that way. Yes one could argue that it also closes the doors on opprotuntiies and not everyone is like that, but my luck seems to prove that theory wrong more often than not.

I so loved Dr Phil today. I don’t always watch his shows but I love his frankness and his its like this attitude.

Today’s topic was kids and money the show featured a teenage girl (15) who is spending something like 300 bucks a month on clothes. She runs out of money and her parents hand her more. She won’t work, she won’t wear anything but brand names she won’t buy anything on sale. Her parents have told her they will match her 1,000 dollars for every 1000 she earns towards a car on top of giving her a 2000 dollar down payment. She has no concept of money.  She wants a car that is going to cost 30,000 dollars and mom said they wanted to spend 12000 . My car which I paid for did not cost 12000 bucks! I paid exactly 3200 dollars for a 1997 Ford Taurus that runs great and is in mint condition.  No 16 year old needs a 12000 dollar car!!  Nothing is wrong with getting your teenager a car that is 3000 dollars or less that will last them and teach them to do the maintence on the car.  K and I have already talked about that she has time though she’ll be 12 next month but I told her I will match you dollar for dollar but your limit is 3200 dollars.  And you will pay for the insurance, the maintence on your car and your gas.  Thats what my parents did with me and my brothers.

Dr Phil talked to the parents and mom said that she feels guilty if she doesn’t give her daughter everything.  I know people that are like this and I feel sad for them as well as their kids. My parents never taught me about money, how to manage it what bills should be priorities none of that.  I feel as though if we give our kids everything, teach them that they have to have ” brand names” or are “too good to use generics” then they will continue that as adults. Dr Phil had a class of kids ranging in ages from  6 -12think and asked them how much they thought things cost then showed them the real cost.  He asked them do you think that you could spend as much on an ipod as you could on 2 weeks of groceries?  They were surprised when he showed them how much food that one ipod could buy.

He had them on the show and asked them what they learned and they said things like:  I need to work for things I want by doing extra chores or mowing lawns, I need to appriciate what I have not to keep nagging for more things, I need to understand that food is more important than a video game.  Lastly he said for parents not to feel guilty if they can’t give their kids everything they want. I don’t let myself do that. I’ve show K with her allowence ( 10 bucks a month) that she can buy twice as much at a thrift store than at walmart. Sometimes you can find name brands at the thrift stores and you can buy just plain, basic things and jazz them up with accesories.  Belts, shoes, purses, and jewlery are a lot cheaper than designer clothes.  If you buy basic things jeans, t-shirts, dressy pants long sleeve tops, hooded sweatshirts etc in neutral colors you can really build on those items.  Buying a new thing each season one thing not 50 lets you keep up with trends without breaking the bank.  A good tailor can help your clothes last longer too, you can have things taken in or hemmed up.  ( K got me hooked on watching   TLC’s what not to wear with her)  but those things are really true. 

I know my little girl feels pressure to dress like the other kids but as I told her when you look at how much money things cost at the thrift stores and  how much they cost at other stores like the Gap you really get a sense of what gives you more bang for your buck.  It really helps when she wants something over budget and I tell her she has to pay the diffrence.  I give her a set price limit when we shop ” we can spend x amount on your clothes and such” she’s really good at sticking to it without tantrums.  I’ve had people try to make me feel like a bad mom telling me negative things about how I dress my kids but they have clothes and more importanlty they have power, a place to live, and food to eat.  I loved Dr Phil today because it helped me to feel vindicated like see I am right  or at least right for me lol

I woke up this morning just feeling blah with my body image, the thoughts kept rushing at me like a tidal wave so I let them come and go then realized what is wrong with me.  I have skinny fat-itis.  We all know people like this, my mom is like this and its most likely where I learned it from.  You’re not techincally “overweight” everyone tells you that you’re thin  but you think you’re fat.  Your arms have so much flab that you think you have wings, you think your belly makes you look about 6 months pregant, your hips and thighs are so big that you feel as though you should never wear anything but pants.

I have this “sickness” in abundance!  I mean we have a pool at our apartment complex and I’m hardly ever in it, not because I don’t like to swim because I do even though I’m not a great swimmer.  But the reason Im not in the pool is because I think Im too fat to be in a swimsuit.  Seriously I have a one piece suit and I hate having to take off my t-shirt because I think I look huge and unhealthy.  Does not matter that there are women at the pool who are a lot more “fuller figured” than I am and they are out there in 2 piece bikinis.  I sit there envying them and their confidence their great self-esteem because Im all hunched up with my feet in the chair knees near my chest so that I can hide my body.

I never used to be this way I mean sure, I had my ” I feel bloated and fat days” but never to the point that I allowed those feelings to control my life.  Until I had my first child I weighed 110 lbs.  I worked out 5 days a week for at least 45 minutes each time I didn’t watch what I ate as much because my metabolism was great from all the exercise I got.

While most people would think that its great being really thin it did have its downfall. Most men don’t want to get to know you they only see a “hot body” most girls don’t want to be freinds with you because they think you’re a “skinny bitch that would steal my boyfreind” even if you would never ever do such a thing. 

I never let myself be too bothered by all that though, but after I had my  first kid, my then hubby ( ex hubby for 7 years now thank God)  used to tell me how I was fat.  It was his fault he cheated on me because I was fat. ( that was the excuse he gave me even though he slept with women  3 times bigger than I was)  that’s when the body image issues really started to get bad.

The thing is too I used to be a stripper ( there is no glamorous way to say that) and I was skinny not only because of the exercise I got at work, ( its harder than it looks espcially in 5 inch heels) but all the drugs I did made me not want to eat.  My body always got me attention, not only as a stripper but in high school, when going out to bars with freinds. No the attention wasn’t always positive but it was attention and it felt better than being ignored all of the time.

The thing I’ve learned about body image issues and eating disorders is that its rarely about the outside of you, but about the inside of you meaning your emotions.  We can feel out of control but think our body is one thing we can control we all say to ourselves ” I won’t be fat like my aunt so and so” or “I don’t have to have cellulite because my mom does”  So we seek to control our eating and exercise habits. 

Another reason is the pressure we may feel from society.  Im all for some airbrushing on magazines and such, but they really go overboard.  We rarely see models or celebrities that look “normal” they have all of the fat, stretch marks, wrinkles and cellulite airbrushed off. They are photoshopped to look teeny tiny and how the hell is a normal woman supposed to feel when somone who’s not fat like Jessica Simpson or Britney Spears is being called a cow?

I think that Victoria Beckham, Hedi Klum and Lindsay Lohan are all pretty girls but they need to gain some weight!  Do we really think its healthy to be as thin as Amy Winehouse is??  She is postivily a stick figure she’s so little but many people think she’s pretty.  Victoria Beckham while I love her to bits is too thin for having had 3 kids. I watched her show Coming to America she doesn’t eat!!  When she does eat its only fruit, sparkling water and champaign thats it!!

Jessica Simpson love her body even with her curves when she was in the Dukes of Hazards movie she said she worked out 2 hours every day to look like she did!! Who the hell wants to do that?? Certainly not me.

There are nights I cannot sleep like now, and I sat one weekend and counted how many informercials were on for diet and exericise products between Friday at midnight and Saturday at 3 am I counted 48!  48 that is a lot!!   Exericise and proper diet can change your body for the better yes that is true, but  what no one tells you is that those changes take time and continous effort.  You can’t spend a year on the sofa or in front of your computer eating every fattenting food that comes across your plate , never work out at least 3 days a week for 30 minutes and expect to be a size 4 unless you’re some genetic mutant.  ( I think Heidi Klum is one of those, no one looks the way she did at that Victoria’s Secret  4 weeks after giving birth!)  You can’t eat whatever you want simply because you exercise though many people will tell you that you can.  You work out to burn off 300 calories only to ingest 500 post workout and expect anything to be diffrent.

I am learning through therapy and reading that its a lot of behavior modifactation.  It really is, and this time Im trying to do things the healthy way, I want to learn to eat like a normal person not maintain the lousy habits I’ve had my whole life.   The thing is its confusing,  there is so much conflicting information out there! I recently took a nutrition class for school and one week we had to find three diffrent “diets” then write a paragraph on each on and tell if they were practical for most people.

Most arent’ I mean don’t eat fat, eat some fat, don’t eat carbs, eat the right carbs, no meat, lots of meat , low on fruits n veggies high on fruits n veggies on and on.  Half of these diets weren’t realistic Im not somone that can not eat my bread, cheese, cereal or fruits or an occasional cookie or peice of cake.  Very few of them promoted exercise of any kind.

There were two diets I found that were more realistic , Richard Simmons and Denise Austin.  They both lay it out like eat right about 90% of the time treat yourself 10%. They focus on exercise preferably every day for 30 minutes but at least 3 days a week, they both say even 10 minutes is better than doing nothing at all. They both advocate watching high intakes of salt , and sugar. They both want you to read labels to pay attention to what is in your food and the things you drink. Both advocate drinking water and working on your self esteem and telling yourself that you’re worth the effort to look and feel your very best. Both also tell you that it will take time and to be paitent with yourself.

But see for the most part we don’t hear that advice. If you look at magazines they tell you how to “loose 10 lbs in 10 days,” “beat the blubber  in a week follow our easy plan” ” slim thighs, hips and butts in only 14 days see how” none of that is realistic.  The diet pill commericals they promise rapid weight loss and sure they may deliver but at what cost?  Dizziness, excessive sweating, shaking, rapid breathing or heart beat, feeling nausecous after taking them, blinding skull crushing headaches? Making you have  uncontrollable bowel movments ( that’s been reported with Ali, you eat too much grease or fat and you’re needing a depends)

Ive also noticed a disturbing trend two magazines that I loved and subscribed to BBW ( big beautiful woman) and Figure have went out of publication. The reason?  Not enough advertiser revenue to keep them going. If you look at other magazines they have tons of ads that is what keeps the magazines costs down the income from the ads. Its like the beauty industry doesn’t want to think that any BBW can want to look good.  Hell I say that your size does not determine how well you take care of yourself at all.  I’ve known many BBW’s that are really into high fashion they always look amazing!! Nails done, hair done,  stunningly beautiful accesories they look good!  Ive known skinny girls that while pretty that don’t do anything with their nails or their hair and never put on any makeup! 

Then there is the aging thing.  Its ok for men to age but not us girls which is a load of bull!  Twiggy recently was photoshopped to look as though she didn’t have one line at 60+ years of age using Olay products. Later that day she was snapped out and about and she looked wrinkled like a prune!  Now call me crazy but if some older gal looks young ( like Barbra Eden or Cindy Crawford or Jane Seymour) I wanna know what the hell they are using so I can buy it!   ( though if its botox forget it, I don’t like needles nor do I want to look frozen in time) but what I am thinking and trying to say is that how are we supposed to have a good body image , a good self image when all around us we are told that if we are ; not thin, not young, not 5′6  tan, and no fat, flab, stretch marks or cellulite anyplace that we aren’t good enough?? 

Just for everyone’s info : according to the centers for disease control the average woman is 5′4 or shorter weighs about 140 -160 pounds and wears a size 16/18.   That sure sounds real and correct ( my nutrition teacher put that out there for class one day) but that’s not what we see in the magazines and on tv. 

It also seems like they make shoes and clothes and things smaller than they used to as well.  Hell I can remember weighing 98 lbs and wearing a kids size 16. My daughter weighs 98 lbs and wears a women’s size 2!  My mom who is tiny enough to fall through large gaps in sidewalks ( she probaly could) wear a  size 8 womens when before she was never bigger than a 4 or a 6.  Ive seen plenty of women on tv for the infomerical saying they weigh 130/140 and wear a size 4 hell when I weigh 140 I wear a size 12!  At 130 a size 1o!  I haven’t been able to wear a size 4 since about 9th grade!!    The media wonders why women think they’re in diet hell?? I think all of that just explained it.

I must say that right now at the time of posting this I am feeling a mixture of emotions damn the bi-polar roller coaster >_< so if this doesn’t make sense to anyone but me that is probaly why.

I watched Bride Wars which I got from the libary with my daughter, she told me that I am just like Anne Hathaway’s character of Emma.   In the movie Kate Hudson’s character Liv accuses Emma of being a people pleaser at one point during an argument.  The thing is, most of us “people pleasers” don’t have ulterior or bad motives for being this way.

We genuienly love to help others and we love to give to others because it makes us feel good. We also don’t feel the need to be competitive with others nor do we feel the need to control and dominate other people or every situation.  We may seem as though we just “fade into the background” but the truth is we are the “behind the scenes people” the ones that do all of the hard work to make things happen.  We don’t always think everything has to be about us, we don’t always care if we get credit for all of our good ideas because we are just happy to help.  We also don’t realize how much someone is taking us for granted until its sometimes too late, not because we are ; gulliable, or naive, or stupid, or want to please people so they will like us.  Its because for most of us like me, we have a heart the size of Texas and we want to help others and be good to people. We don’t look for people to hurt us, or use us because we don’t do things like that.  We don’t set out to do something for somone else in order to keep score and beat them over the head with it later.  We don’t do something for someone else thinking that they will owe us or that we will get something out of them sooner or later. We do things because we want to, because we think we are being a good freind to someone.

When we get to a point that we feel we are being taken advatage of , or taken for granted we feel hurt yes but we also feel angry at the person doing it to us as well as at ourselves. That old adage of ” no one can take advantage of you without your permission” really stings yes it may be true, but when you’re not the kind of person who sets out to hurt others, to take advantage of others you don’t expect people to do it to you.

So when we get hurt, we just want to put up walls, to keep people out and away from us, because when we keep people at arm’s length and no one is around us, no one can hurt us when they leave.  It does hurt to be treated as though you’re an “option” rather than somone’s priority.  To be “good enough” when somone needs something from you, but not to be “good enough” to call up just to hang out with.  It hurts when you tell somone “no I can’t help you” and they get angry at you , blow up at you then say “oh I wasn’t trying to be mean I was just upset or frustrated” thing is, I have the right to tell somone no and not have to feel bad for that.  I’ve had the misfortune of people thinking that because I’m a stay at home mom that I have no life, that I can just watch their kids at the drop of a hat, that I can come over and help them clean their house, or run their errands with them so that I can chase their kids around while they go about their business at the store or sit down and enjoy their dinner while you chase their kids around the resturant or  walmart.  Of course when they ask you to go with them they don’t tell you that you’ll be playing babysitter.  They say “hey want to go out to eat with me I’ll pay” They don’t say oh come over and help me clean they say “come over for dinner”  They wait and drop that on you once you’re with them.  Im not someone that can stand watching little kids run around resturants and stores, mainly because of the risk to them people carrying hot food n drinks or the chance somone can take them if they are in the store.  So then I end up feeling angry at them for pulling that stuff on me and mad at myself for being dumb enough to fall for it.

So while I’ve been thinking about this for a while because its been happening with somone I loved as a sister and I was so quick to blame myself  for things going to pot.  I thought that it was because of me, because I was doing something wrong, then I realized the fault for once wasn’t with me but with her.  I remember the things she’d say to me then blow it off as though she was kidding around.  I’m all for constructive criticism things like “oh i’ve done that it works better if you do xyz” but saying things like ” you and your daughter dress like hobos you need to stop being so cheap” or blowing up when I’ve said I can’t babysit by saying things like “well thats fine I’ll just get fired then thanks” and hanging up on me.  Diminishing what I do for her like “oh I gave you this bunkbed from my kids and you helped me clean a little for it” when I freaking babysat her kids for about 5 hours so her and her hubby could move  and then went over and cleaned the house they were leaving for 2 hours with her.   Constantly “reminding me” how much she “does for me” and making it sound like to everyone else she’s always doing things for me when the truth is Im doing more for her than she ever does for me, and I don’t ask her to do one damn thing for me, where as she asks all of the time.  Or the one timesI’ve asked for something ( like picking my daugther up from school one time when I was babysitting for a neighbor n the baby started puking everywhere not spitting up  but throwing up,)  she acts  like its a major inconvience  even though countless number of times I have sat and waitied with her daughter since she or her hubbywere running 5 -15 minutes late to pick her up, and one time told her she had girl scouts when she didn’t then didn’t pick up the phone when we called and I ended up 15 minutes late for an appoinement I had scheculed. Or “come over and I’ll make dinner and you can help me clean” I go over thinking she’s joking about the cleaning part then to find out she’s not kidding around so I help to be nice then talk to her the next day only to find that all the work I did (a few hours of it  )  has been destroyed by her sloppy habits and the sloppy habits she teaches her kids. Things like you come in and toss your coat, backpack, purse and shoes wherever rather than putting things away. Having 5 or 6 pairs of shoes for each person out rather than one pair at a time, tossing dirty clothes and wet towels all over rather than putting things in a laundry basket or hanging up the towels, letting the garbage can spill over rather than take it out when its full then complaing how the house is always such a disaster zone. I have OCD so Im complusivly clean and I have found its easier to clean a little every day and “deep clean” ( mop dust vaccum) one or two days a week rather than to let everything pile up  until it takes you 2 hours to clean a couple of rooms.  Not to mention with her wedding I did more to help her than any of the girls in her damned wedding party did yet when she gave her toast at dinner she didn’t say “hey thanks for all your help” to me but thanked each one of them for their help even though only two of the 5 or 6 she had did anything.

Well what happend is that one day she called at 10 pm no less, and gave me some story that sounded like total B.S to me, and asked me to babysit  the next day. Well I said I couldn’t because I had a mental health appointment and I don’t give up my therapy appointments if I can help it because they are so hard to get, and if I miss one too many I go on a waiting list.  So I said no and for the first time she didn’t get mad and blow up at me the way she normally does, no snide comments nothing just said “ok no worries thanks” she hasn’t called me since.  ( over a month now its like 2 or 3 maybe) I haven’t called her either because I knew then  that I wasn’t being “parinoid” I had been right.  She had been taking advantage of me, taking me for granted and I was only good enough to her when she needed or wanted something from me.   I had this illusion of freindship and yah maybe I was stupid for not seeing it sooner, but as I said I don’t look for people to do things like that to me because I don’t do that to people and I love to help others.

I know people get busy kids, work, school etc, but to only call someone when you need something or to make somone you call your freind feel as though they are dispensible, that’s just wrong.  I know Im not always the easiest person to be friends with, I can  be and sometimes am an emotional mess. But I also always give and give and give to others.  I am the type of person that if somone needs something I try to give it to them. You need  a place to stay while your apartment is fumagated, sleep on my couch, your car is broke down, I’ll take you to do your errands and such, you need  a winter coat, I’ll give you one of my extra ones ( I try to have 2 in case a zipper breaks or something) or I’ll go to the thrift store to buy you one.  My gburg friends are like this the only thing is with the excpetion of 2 or 3 the other ones are like me, they just can’t seem to get to a point where they say “Im not going to help other people anymore fuck it”  We don’t seem to know when enough is or should be enough.  I have to work on getting to that point I really think that is a goal to work towards.

Thing is I’ve gotten to a point that I don’t really care if I don’t have freinds to hang out with and such.  I’ve had so many people tell me that its not healthy to be that way but I just don’t feel like I can afford to care as deeply as I have anymore.  My kiddo had a good suggestion which my therapist said is a good idea as well, give my help and my time to things like the animal shelter or church projects.  Those people and the animals will appriciate it and they won’t keep expecting me to do more and more everytime rather than thinking “I’m putting her out  too often or expecting to much from her.”

The thing that I think really irks me is that those people like the one I described don’t seem to know when enough is enough. You do things for them they expect more like nothing you do is ever enough for them.  Or they have to take digs at your self esteem make little comments or everything has to always be about them and when you try to talk about yourself or your life they revert everything back to them.  How the hell do people get that self absorbed??  I want to know because if I could be that way ( and trust me I don’t think I want to be) maybe my self esteem wouldn’t be so crappy.