Once upon a time I met a very nice, funny, smart man (bonus points for his English/Australian accent). We argued from the third date forward, bickered, drove each other mad... but persevered and fell in love. I married this man who fit into my family like a hand into glove, who had all the markers of a happy and successful life about him.
And then it disintegrated beneath our feet. We didn't do the work, we stopped appreciating, admiring and respecting one another and it all went to shit.
For the 18 months we have been separated he has been angry. His contempt for me and the choice I made came off of him in waves. This contempt kept me safe, kept me from really remembering who he is, and how good a person he really is.
On Fathers Day we took the kids out to lunch, and we had a very nice time all around. Grief did wash over me on the subway ride home when I looked across at my daughter sitting on her Daddy's lap, my son on the seat beside them legs tucked beneath him. It is another moment for me of the family portrait that I wanted so badly. I swallowed my grief, we got of the train and came home.
Yesterday, I got an email from him that I wish so much he had sent two years ago. The email that said, I see you, I miss you, and I love you. We have hurled too many poison darts, laid to many traps for the other, for us to even have a chance of a second chance. I do not love him like a husband, and I never will again, but I sobbed all night, and sobbed sporadically throughout the day, and my chest aches... and it feels like we are breaking up for the first time all over again.
I need to know, will this ever feel better?
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Monday, September 13, 2010
My Atlas
My son is a challenging kid. He is strong willed, opinionated, anxious, sensitive, and at the moment, very angry and very confused. It is too easy to turn this all on myself, to flog myself for the failings that have led us here. I am frayed, I cannot fight with another person that I love like this. Everything sets him off, and I can't figure out how to get my boy back.
If you were to ask me when I had my most grown up moment, I would tell you without hesistation, that it was the day we finally found a doctor who looked us square in the eye and said "He is definitely apraxic". The relief that washed up and over me, that this thing has a name, and now we can DO something about it, was cleansing. I had walked around for a year sure that something was not right, and I knew he wasn't autistic, no matter how many times that was suggested, I knew that wasn't my son. So to have someone look me in the eye and say "This is rare, but it is true," well suffice to say she is still my beacon in the fog.
My son has to work ten times harder then your kid just to tell me what he wants for a snack, my kid has to remember how to pedal a bike everytime he sits on one, and my kid knows that he sounds different from the other kids when he talks, but he keeps trying. He is tenacious, he is brave, he pushes the same damn boulder up that fucking hill everyday and I am endlessly enraptured by his progress, and how he fights for every inch that he gains. I am profoundly grateful that I have a son who is so easy to respect.
But, he fights for those inches, and more often then not, I am the one who gets all his frustration. It is hard to remember and stay calm when he is lashing out at me. All I want is for him to understand that I am walking beside him, helping when I can, but ultimately, it is his hard work that will get us to the top of this mountain. He is the toughest, smartest person I know and sometimes I can't show him that, because I can't fight through his defenses. He is almost 5 years old, and sometimes I am scared that he will always hate me because I refuse to underestimate him, I refuse to let him get away with less then he is, and I refuse to let the exhaustion win. (OK, well... sometimes the exhaustion defintely wins, we are both only human after all.)
Today, and a lot of other days I feel like I lost. I hope that tomorrow cna be better, and I hope I can forgive myself for all the times I've lost my temper and been less than the mother I always wanted to be.
If you were to ask me when I had my most grown up moment, I would tell you without hesistation, that it was the day we finally found a doctor who looked us square in the eye and said "He is definitely apraxic". The relief that washed up and over me, that this thing has a name, and now we can DO something about it, was cleansing. I had walked around for a year sure that something was not right, and I knew he wasn't autistic, no matter how many times that was suggested, I knew that wasn't my son. So to have someone look me in the eye and say "This is rare, but it is true," well suffice to say she is still my beacon in the fog.
My son has to work ten times harder then your kid just to tell me what he wants for a snack, my kid has to remember how to pedal a bike everytime he sits on one, and my kid knows that he sounds different from the other kids when he talks, but he keeps trying. He is tenacious, he is brave, he pushes the same damn boulder up that fucking hill everyday and I am endlessly enraptured by his progress, and how he fights for every inch that he gains. I am profoundly grateful that I have a son who is so easy to respect.
But, he fights for those inches, and more often then not, I am the one who gets all his frustration. It is hard to remember and stay calm when he is lashing out at me. All I want is for him to understand that I am walking beside him, helping when I can, but ultimately, it is his hard work that will get us to the top of this mountain. He is the toughest, smartest person I know and sometimes I can't show him that, because I can't fight through his defenses. He is almost 5 years old, and sometimes I am scared that he will always hate me because I refuse to underestimate him, I refuse to let him get away with less then he is, and I refuse to let the exhaustion win. (OK, well... sometimes the exhaustion defintely wins, we are both only human after all.)
Today, and a lot of other days I feel like I lost. I hope that tomorrow cna be better, and I hope I can forgive myself for all the times I've lost my temper and been less than the mother I always wanted to be.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Begin Again....
Well, hello bicycle... how does this thing work again?
My two babies are sleeping upstairs, boychild will turn 5 in October, and my little girlfriend turned 2 in May, my husband is sleeping in our rental apartment downstairs because we are getting a divorce. This past year has absolutely kicked my ass on every level, the highest of highs (bringing Girlfriend home last July from Moscow), and the lowest of low (see bombshell above).
My husband is a nice, good, and decent man, and I think that I am all of these things as well, (except for the man bit). There is no simple explanation, it wasn't cheating, beating, or stealing, it was more gradual, and excruciating. We became two laborers working in the field beside one another, not looking each other in the eye, not appreciating the load the other was carrying. The earth shifted beneath my feet, and I looked up and said I can't do this anymore. I was numb to everything, except my kids, and that is not the way I want my life to go. I tried to fix it, but we were already too far apart, and I couldn't stand the thought that my kids would think that this resentful person was their mother.
On a purely selfish level, one of the hardest things to face is the dissolution of a perfect (to me) family portrait, a nice looking man and woman and their gorgeous children standing on the steps of the house that they own. We were going to have 4 children, and I am devastated that I might not have any more children. I wanted so desperately to be his wife, but we shattered, and the shards are impossible to clean up in one go.
So, the upshot is that I am absolutely paralyzed. I need to get a job, and I need to figure out daycare (oh, look at me sob now).... I need to move forward. Dear Internet, maybe you can scare my feet into walking?
My two babies are sleeping upstairs, boychild will turn 5 in October, and my little girlfriend turned 2 in May, my husband is sleeping in our rental apartment downstairs because we are getting a divorce. This past year has absolutely kicked my ass on every level, the highest of highs (bringing Girlfriend home last July from Moscow), and the lowest of low (see bombshell above).
My husband is a nice, good, and decent man, and I think that I am all of these things as well, (except for the man bit). There is no simple explanation, it wasn't cheating, beating, or stealing, it was more gradual, and excruciating. We became two laborers working in the field beside one another, not looking each other in the eye, not appreciating the load the other was carrying. The earth shifted beneath my feet, and I looked up and said I can't do this anymore. I was numb to everything, except my kids, and that is not the way I want my life to go. I tried to fix it, but we were already too far apart, and I couldn't stand the thought that my kids would think that this resentful person was their mother.
On a purely selfish level, one of the hardest things to face is the dissolution of a perfect (to me) family portrait, a nice looking man and woman and their gorgeous children standing on the steps of the house that they own. We were going to have 4 children, and I am devastated that I might not have any more children. I wanted so desperately to be his wife, but we shattered, and the shards are impossible to clean up in one go.
So, the upshot is that I am absolutely paralyzed. I need to get a job, and I need to figure out daycare (oh, look at me sob now).... I need to move forward. Dear Internet, maybe you can scare my feet into walking?
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Blog as a mix tape.
I miss the very tactile experience of making a mix tape. Digging through your tapes and Cd's, organizing a playlist that fits whatever mood you're trying to convey, the rewind and fast forward. (Oh, and naming them, I loved that. A personal favorite of mine is "Piercing it won't make it bigger" a break-up mix tape.)
I love my Ipod (which is dying a slow and martyred death), seriously, that thing got run over by a car and worked for the next year and a half like normal. The whole ITunes, MP3 thing is easy and cool, convenient, but not as thoughtful a process. So, I've decided to play lets pretend. Lets pretend that I am going through the deliberate process of making a mix tape. Lets pretend that I have the time to do this. Lets pretend that I don't spend most of my time listening to The Doodlebops, and Baby Einstein.
I will be building and editing this list on the sidebar, since I do want this to be a good list, not just a mish-mash of everything I am listening to right now. When its done I'll burn a disc (because a mix tape, is really a mix Cd these days) and see if I can re-create a high school and college past time.**
** edited to add: If anyone likes the look of the CD that I do make, let me know and I'll send you one!
I love my Ipod (which is dying a slow and martyred death), seriously, that thing got run over by a car and worked for the next year and a half like normal. The whole ITunes, MP3 thing is easy and cool, convenient, but not as thoughtful a process. So, I've decided to play lets pretend. Lets pretend that I am going through the deliberate process of making a mix tape. Lets pretend that I have the time to do this. Lets pretend that I don't spend most of my time listening to The Doodlebops, and Baby Einstein.
I will be building and editing this list on the sidebar, since I do want this to be a good list, not just a mish-mash of everything I am listening to right now. When its done I'll burn a disc (because a mix tape, is really a mix Cd these days) and see if I can re-create a high school and college past time.**
** edited to add: If anyone likes the look of the CD that I do make, let me know and I'll send you one!
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Open and Honest
I'm having a hard time actually writing about something that is really bothering me. I read all of these other blogs, and these kids are talking up a storm after just a few months home, or at least have a few words. To date, the monkey still has no words. Don't get me wrong, his receptive language has improved considerably, he understands almost everything we ask him, he communicates with signs and pointing, he is starting to make very important connections with his language, but no words. He mumbles Mama alot, but it isn't me, he kind of yells eh-oh when he sees Elmo. Here is what bothers me. I think it must be something I am doing wrong. I feel like I am failing him. Maybe I don't talk enough? I feel like I label everything, I feel like I have nothing else that I could be saying to him, but maybe I'm just wrong?
This is really difficult. I always joke that motherhood is really guilthood, but seriously.
We have two early intervention people come twice a week, one is for language, the other is an occupational therapist. They have been very encouraging to me (because clearly I wear my feelings on my sleeve). They are very sure that there is no cognitive delay here, that he is simply learning, and that he is doing well at that. (I should add here that in my eyes he is brilliant, and his only downfall is me).
Part of all of this is how tired I am. My depression, that I've been dealing with for the past 13 years worsens with the staying inside and shorter days of winter. In the past, I've just trudged through from November to May, waiting for the sun and not getting much done-- but it is really unfair to inflict this on Monkey. My biggest fear about becoming a mother was that I would be the Mommy who took a lot of naps, and cried all the time. I am holding steady away from that, but I am exhausted. I am still the happiest I have ever been, but my patience is much shorter, and my wits end always seems much closer. I am avoiding medication, I have done them all-- and Ritalin actually worked for me, but I am too paranoid about our future adoptions and having to get a "She's not THAT crazy" letter from a doctor, which I know people do, and are successful in their adoptions. However, did I mention my feelings of deep shame that I feel like this? That I feel like I should be able to fix this? That I have always fought this privately, and that when you adopt everything that was once private becomes public? I never want to have look at a Judge and listen to a translation of "No, really, I'm fine, it's all good now." I am achy and I have odd pains (Like today my eyeball hurts. Hello?! My eyeball, are you kidding me? How do you even convey to your eyeball to get the fuck over it?), it makes it harder to exercise, to eat right, to make an effort.
So maybe I don't talk enough. About anything. In the meantime I will listen to my parents as they insist that The Boy just explained The Oprah Factor in Obama's Campaign, and give all of us some more time.
This is really difficult. I always joke that motherhood is really guilthood, but seriously.
We have two early intervention people come twice a week, one is for language, the other is an occupational therapist. They have been very encouraging to me (because clearly I wear my feelings on my sleeve). They are very sure that there is no cognitive delay here, that he is simply learning, and that he is doing well at that. (I should add here that in my eyes he is brilliant, and his only downfall is me).
Part of all of this is how tired I am. My depression, that I've been dealing with for the past 13 years worsens with the staying inside and shorter days of winter. In the past, I've just trudged through from November to May, waiting for the sun and not getting much done-- but it is really unfair to inflict this on Monkey. My biggest fear about becoming a mother was that I would be the Mommy who took a lot of naps, and cried all the time. I am holding steady away from that, but I am exhausted. I am still the happiest I have ever been, but my patience is much shorter, and my wits end always seems much closer. I am avoiding medication, I have done them all-- and Ritalin actually worked for me, but I am too paranoid about our future adoptions and having to get a "She's not THAT crazy" letter from a doctor, which I know people do, and are successful in their adoptions. However, did I mention my feelings of deep shame that I feel like this? That I feel like I should be able to fix this? That I have always fought this privately, and that when you adopt everything that was once private becomes public? I never want to have look at a Judge and listen to a translation of "No, really, I'm fine, it's all good now." I am achy and I have odd pains (Like today my eyeball hurts. Hello?! My eyeball, are you kidding me? How do you even convey to your eyeball to get the fuck over it?), it makes it harder to exercise, to eat right, to make an effort.
So maybe I don't talk enough. About anything. In the meantime I will listen to my parents as they insist that The Boy just explained The Oprah Factor in Obama's Campaign, and give all of us some more time.
Monday, January 7, 2008
Friday, January 4, 2008
A Quick One.
If our President is named Huckabee I will move to England on November 5, 2008. This is not a joke.
(However, YAY Obama!)
Christmas went pretty well, the boy was overwhelmed by all the gifts, and the attention but overall, he managed it. Santa only bought 2 gifts plus a stocking, but we had tons of presents from Husband's family overseas, and my family-- he liked everything, but in one day it just about blew a fuse in his head.
New Years was an unexpected success. WE drove 4 hours to Husband's best friends house and stayed overnight. They have twins that are 6 months younger then Monkey-- so it is easier for us to make the drive. I was a wreck about it, I was sure he wouldn't sleep, that he would just freak right out. Well, I was wrong, he thought it was great-- exhausting, but great. He loved the twins, and had a great time. Also he slept from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.!!! Happy New Years to me!
(However, YAY Obama!)
Christmas went pretty well, the boy was overwhelmed by all the gifts, and the attention but overall, he managed it. Santa only bought 2 gifts plus a stocking, but we had tons of presents from Husband's family overseas, and my family-- he liked everything, but in one day it just about blew a fuse in his head.
New Years was an unexpected success. WE drove 4 hours to Husband's best friends house and stayed overnight. They have twins that are 6 months younger then Monkey-- so it is easier for us to make the drive. I was a wreck about it, I was sure he wouldn't sleep, that he would just freak right out. Well, I was wrong, he thought it was great-- exhausting, but great. He loved the twins, and had a great time. Also he slept from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.!!! Happy New Years to me!
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