You’re gonna need a”Safe Place”

I f*cking swear to the all mighty Gods if one more person calls me “hateful” or tells me “I’m so full of hate” because I protest racism, Trumpism , or “Insert hate group of the week”, I am going to get nuclear. If protesting misogyny, White supremacy views, ableists, LGBTQIA-phobia, and anti-immigrant is hateful to you, its time for you to do some deep soul searching.  From my point of view it looks as if you’re an advocate for a very dark heinous group of people who are actually hateful. 

So, nearly 3 or 4 people from my very white high school have said, “This isn’t who I remember you as…you’ve become so hateful”. Then they really didn’t know me. Because I was FULL OF FIRE AND HATE in high school.  There were a couple of young women who I used to day dream of tripping them and watching them fall down our very long cafeteria steps because of how unfairly they treated me.   I am actually a much more loving and forgiving person than I was in high school. I love deeply. Mostly, I kept quiet in school because if I were more vocal, it’d been just a constant fight against the sexist bigoted bullshit coming out of teacher’s and kid’s mouths.

Often, I was so full of nerves from the social shunning I experienced daily, I’d puke before the day began. I would puke or gag on my empty stomach acid. So, don’t pretend you thought you knew me in high school.  Yes, this white liberal snowflake really does need a safe place because I’m triggered. Yeah, I said triggered by my past.  I do truly wish I had had my anti-depressants and anxiety meds back in high school so I could’ve coped better.  But it seems odd that I still today take meds to cope with a harsh world, instead of the world working to be kinder and gentler. All in all, I feel I was born with a higher frequency of sensitivity than most, so it might not have mattered what people were doing around me. Or maybe it does?  Fitting in was hard as hell.

I don’t know who will read this. I am making it public. If it makes any difference, I’ve been a liberal since about age 10 when I sat with my dad and watched “Gone with the Wind”.  He explained slavery to me and something inside me changed.  After this point, I sought out friends who had alternative thought if it was possible.  As I grew older it was easier and easier to find people like myself.  I have made mistakes and pissed people off of all types.  Even so, I apologized and tried to learn from my ignorance and to the people who I angered, I didn’t call them hateful.  I tried my best to see their pain.

Is there this bit of guilt about choosing to be willfully ignorant? Is that why people unlike me think I hate them? I don’t hate (or love) easily, but I do dislike narrow minded crap. There’s a difference.

Nevertheless, I am never going to  understand the cult of Trump, the KKK, the white people who believe in “White genocide”. That side of thinking will never be mine.  I hold my open mind strongly and am proud to accept many cultures and religions, but I am not going to pretend things that aren’t harmful to millions aren’t harmful. If it offends you, than really its your battle to fight in your psyche, not mine.

My anger is mine. Anger is not hate. Anger is the reaction to injustice.

20 year old open letter to an ex-best friend.

I’ve seen few “open letters to my x best friend” thingies. One I started reading and thought, “Wow. I relate” and then the last half lost me. This was written by some one significantly younger than myself. The other one wasn’t even close. I did write her letters. Probably 5 or 6 I never sent. I sent one. It wasn’t asking her to be my friend again. It was mostly about my mom dying and I’m sure there was a sorry in there somewhere. But How sorry am I really? Yeah, about somethings. Other things? Not really. And for that, I’ll always be that person she never acknowledged or talked about again.

Dearest Old Friend,

It’s me. The person you dropped like a bowling ball into Lake Superior all those years ago. My ego says I am sad for you because I’ve evolved into a pretty cool person. Sad for you because I still love you even though I don’t have a lot of reasons to hold on. Oh, who am I kidding? I have some great reasons to hold on. Even though, I have had great wonderful friends other than you that I’ve shared equally wonderful moments. Your’s will always be the ones I treasure because you were the first best friend I ever had. In your family, I wasn’t called names, left out of birthday parties, nor did you ever make up reasons to get off the phone with me. You always made room for me. It would seem, I am mostly sad for myself.

Later, I changed. My priorities changed. I started making new friends that weren’t “our” friends. I started to also sleep more and my scatter brain, scattered more.

I still called you once or twice a week to let you know I wanted to be in your life, but I think you started to not answer the phone. At least, I knew you stopped calling me to do stuff. Like the others who lost interest in me in jr. high and high school. If you asked directly, I would’ve done anything for you at that time. But I didn’t always remember dates anymore and my world was spinning. Sometimes out of control.

You told me I was selfish and only cared about myself. If you’d known how much that was never intentional and how big a piece of my heart you still occupied, maybe we could’ve talked it out. None of my offences towards you were done out of any ill will. But after sitting in my bathroom screaming and crying for an hour, I knew it was over. Later, I found there was no convincing you that we would ever be friends again.

That same school year, I already lost some friends behaving in clueless ways. Many people were tired of my depression, my inability to keep my mouth shut, and I was quickly becoming a drama addict. As soon as, my therapist told me I had some real problems that required a psychiatrist and constant therapy, it was way to late. After the great friend switch-a-roo of 1997, I was pretty aware I was in for a long interesting life journey.  On the other hand, I was more than willing to try and change.  I’d be damned if I lost these new friends to my “drama” again.

Almost 20 years later, I still mourn you. I still have these awesome dreams that you your husband, and our old college friends are still hanging out. In my dreams we’re aware that at once we weren’t talking but in these dreams we’re trying. Often your mom and dad are in the dreams too and we’re laughing and enjoying events together. Nevertheless, It’s all dreams and everything is so different now.

Time and time again, I am thankful for the lessons I’ve learned about friendship. I try my hardest not ever take anyone for granted again. I still screw up. I probably still ask too much of people and don’t give enough in return. At least not as much as I want to give. Will I ever learn? Yes, I will keep on learning. And I’ll keep messing up, and I’m still going to have times where I cry for loss, and will still be excited to meet new people. They will never be as awesome as the first real friendship, but the lessons I learned from us, will be just as great as “us”.

Sincerely,

Dawn

updates on the beany-boo and mommy

My little Claire Bear-Sue isn’t really so little.  Because the summer was hell I had her on too much Risperidone to keep her agitation at bay.  She has gained too much weight. This is where I really regret not calling the doctor. I guess I have a thousand excuses, but he cut her dose and gave her Trazadone at night to get her anxiety down instead of heaping on the risperidone.

I am grateful for her doctor. He validated my suspicion that artificial coloring was causing extreme behaviors. I thought it was just red, but cutting out blue and yellow was causing her ill behavior to dissipate by 65-70%.  Also he suggested magnesium to help other problems she was having. I told him we’d already bought CALM powder and he said giving her that was going to help.  So, at least I am doing that correctly.

I spoke to the PCA company we’re currently wait listing with for a few months.  They’ve been interviewing about 4 people a week and not all the people they interview are getting hired.  Claire is about 6th on the list so she told me to call back in 2 weeks and find out where we are on the list.

Me?  Pain is better except in the head. Sinus pressure and my jaw are dreadful.

I’ve been to the dentist. Found out how much my dental work is going to cost.  I’m feeling deep guilt about money. My dad had given me some money but we’re so behind on bills, that money went to not getting heat, telephone, electricity, and water not shut off.  I often think our lives as they are, are not sustainable.

I know my writing isn’t informative or interesting enough to make money blogging. But maybe, even with teeth issues, I could find some one to hire me for holiday work.  I can’t see myself working more than 25 hours a week. Especially without a PCA who cannot start earlier than 4:30 or 5 in the meanwhile.

I know I am not a complete failure. I am doing the best I can, but something tells me I can do better.  I HAVE to do better. “This is not sustainable” as a dear friend told me.  Its time to take a look at my coping mechanisms and find better ones.

So much…So much…

Source: So much…So much…

So much pain I could …#*$%&?!

Blood family pain is worse than any pain.  I’d rather be in back labor again. At least I’d know I had a beautiful child on the way.  At least there’s an epidural for labor pain and Percoset for physical pains. 

I just want to slap something or someone.  And there isn’t a fucking thing I can do.   Well, there things I want to do would only make shit worse.  So, I just need to work through this myself.

They judge me so harshly.  So much  misunderstanding and rudeness.  They must not know any better.  I still hear how they have laughed at and mocked other relatives with physical and mental health issues. I’m guess I have been put in the fuck up basket.

Well, fuck it.

Oh my gosh! Close Call! aka, We Survived!!

I really thought School started the 8th of September. Mainly because I couldn’t find a darn thing about what day school started on the Minneapolis Public Schools website.  Of course, I could’ve called them the old fashioned way and asked.  Too easy!  Anyway! The Darling Spouse tells me that Claire has school starting tomorrow.  He said, “Minneapolis Public Schools start tomorrow”.  I believe him but I still go and look at her bus arrival schedule.  Yep. Whaddyaknow??!

Other than me not being ready at all, is that telling Claire there was school tomorrow set her in a great mood.  She was all about taking her bath, getting her hair trimmed-Looking way cute and better now-, and even going to bed.  After night after night of fighting her to bed, knowing she had school tomorrow made her jump into bed delightedly.  She laid there, wiggled around, and probably even giggled.  So, Claire decided to come out of her room for a while. I let her listen to and watch the neighborhood through the window. She played on her yoga ball. For a little while she even sat with me on the sofa.  All smiles.

The photo of Claire in the dark, if you can see it, is one of the few times she’s actually posed for the camera.  She was so silly. Also the flash on the phone is very intriguing to children on the spectrum.

To conclude!! I’m just happy it only took her an hour to finally give into sleep.  I’m so happy for her and me that we survived summer break.  HUZZAH!

Lucky Day

Although My dreams were as mangled as my c-pap mask when I found it next to me in my bed when I awoke to my Stepson, Wesley, when he got home.

“Dawn, I’m home and Claire’s up”.

“What Time is it, ” I croaked.

“3:30”

“Oh, wow. ”

Normally When Claire gets up from a nap the first thing she does is find me up in my bed.  Today she took advantage of having the couch all to herself and just decided to lie there waiting for me.  Heh. That’s kind of new.

No yelling, that I know of, and no living room destruction.  Miracles happen.

Since Wesley was home, I went and took a hot bath in baking soda, a little apple cider vinegar, lavender essential oil, and Epsom salts for my aching feet.  It’s 45 minutes later and I’m still undressed on the couch under my favorite quilt.

Believe me, this isn’t sexy. It’s just lazy.

I gotta hold on to little moments like this.

Off with her Hair!

My daughter loves to use her hair as a stim toy. Especially when she’s upset she scrunches her hair in her fingers.. It had gotten pretty long, but tonight I chopped it. The snarls my Claire-bear created were unforgiving.  At the moment its uneven and doesn’t look great, but hairdressers rarely make house calls.  So, I’ve had to use my creativeness and pretend to be a hair stylist.

Which reminds me, I need to make an appointment to get my hair done soon.  It is hard without someone to watch Claire while she’s out of school.  I’m looking forward to less hair to muck with as well.

My girl’s behavior has been better day by day. I almost cried when she went to bed before midnight tonight.  Everything is just so different lately. Its so hard on her and becomes hard on us as a family.  I have just had to remind myself that its all going to happen minute by minute and so on and so on.

My husband’s pain from surgery will fade a little more everyday. My Claire does eventually get used to changes. My stepson is a rock star that has been a huge help. And we will figure this out.

Sometimes we patiently comb through a head of snarls, and sometimes we just lop them off.  Maybe not the most patient and beautiful of solutions, but its that of least pain.  And when there’s a lot of pain already…its best to avoid more if it doesn’t damage the foundation upon which we constantly balance.

Heeps and heeps

Almost got to sleep.  Claire woke up crying. She was actually saying, Hurting! She banged on her leg…leg hurting.  Damn those growing pains!   😥 When a basically nonverbal child says something hurts, she means it. 

She got, ibuprofen, milk, and lotion. Well, lotion on arms, and one leg.  She wouldn’t let me touch the left leg. 

I think if life stopped being stressful, I would believe I may well be dead. That was just a splinter of my August hell so far. 

I’m nodding off just as

I was thinking of some cool stuff to say. Go figure.

My skin hurts. 

Claire got the phone

She is allowed to play with my phone if it’s on kids mode.  Today, she got a hold of it on mom-mode.

She tweeted this picture

Of Keith Campbell at Lammas.  His last Bluestar ritual.  He put on g+ that he had a lovely time.   The sparkle in his eyes says so. 

She also messaged a friend a series of zzzzzZzzzzzz  s.  

Another friend got a voice message on FB but it was empty of any noise.

I made it to Target and Walmart with the assistance of my mother-in-law.  When I got home, made simple dinners.  I say plural because one was vegan and the other was made with smoked sausage stuff. 

My husband had a migraine, so he went to hide.  I eventually made him a hot chocolate because we’ve found that the caffeine from chocolate helps his headaches the best.   Hubby seems to be feeling better.

Claire got hot chocolate too because her sleep needed to be happening BEFORE 2 a.m.. She was the lucky recipient of Valerian!!  It worked and she was sleeping by 10pm. Hallelujah! 

By 10pm I could barely lift my arms. Of course at 12:33, I feel pretty good. But I might need Valerian too so I can be up with my girl.  I blame Fred Armison for coming back to Late Night with Seth Meyers.  I love the stupid story he tells at the beginning of the show.  Then I changed to The Late Late Show with James Corden.  I wasn’t in the mood for Winona Ryder on “Seth” . Looking Forward to Stephen Colbert in a month.  #latenighttvjunky 

Trying to find joy in the little things in life. 

My Claire in her pretty dress! 😻💓💞💗💙❤💜💛💚💞💟💝💘👐