Breaking the silence

I’m going to take a risk, even if it might not seem like a risk at all. I’m going to post what I’ve been writing about, therapy wise. The little girl has been running things a lot lately. That makes reaching out even scarier for me. Anyway. It’s a lot of posts, but I’ve decided to just post them all at one time in order. It’s a lot to read, so I don’t expect anyone to read all of it. The last post is where the little girl tells the secret with the painful truth. So……yeah. Okay then. And, I’m thankful you guys are all still here. 💟

I’ve missed it here

Can I come back to the blog world? Will you all take me back, even though I’ve been gone forever and I’m behind on everyone’s blogs? I’ve really missed the friendship and support I found here. I’ve wondered how everyone is, and I have meant to come read and comment and write this blog post but time keeps getting away from me. 
This summer has been interesting. It’s been both really, really good and crazy making difficult. Early on in the summer, Kat and I developed a schedule and our days and weeks ran really smooth. So my days have typically gone like this: 

–Early morning get up and clean house

–yoga on my deck outside, surrounded by trees, blue sky, and the water

–wake kiddo, and after breakfast (yeah, i eat breakfast now!) head off to the gym for a swim with Kat and yoga class on my own while she plays with other kids 

–home and lunch break, pack for the beach and spend the rest of the day at the beach 

–dinner and then snuggles with Kat while we watch a show or movie, then bedtime yoga

–actually fall asleep before midnight 

So. The summer started out wonderfully. I’ve been feeling more grounded in myself and present in my days and I’ve been able to be calmer and control my emotions. Things have been good for me. I’ve felt much more in control of all of me and all of my life, and much more authentic and real. 

The struggle has been when hubby is around, I’m on edge. Being more grounded in my body means that I am so very aware of the little touches on my shoulder, hugs, a kiss….it means that I am so aware of how close hubby is to me. It puts me on edge and sends me into this hyper aware crazy place. 

The struggle has been that my mother planned family events every weekend in July. I skipped the first and last events, but spending two long weekends in a row with her was stressful and difficult. She is so incredibly focused on things being picture perfect and I really had been so focused on living authentically that being around my mother and her need for the fake me caused a lot of panic and anxiety. 

Now that it’s August, I’m working hard to get back to our routine from the beginning of summer but it’s been hard. I had a trauma memory get dredged up from the depths of my crazy head, and I have been up and down ever since. My brother is also getting married in six weeks, and HE will be at the wedding. The parts have been worried and scared and sick over that little fact. 

So…..there’s a very short update of how things have been. I’ll dive deeper into how things have been, what’s going on with therapy, with relationships, with the little girl next time. 

I hope everyone is well and has been able to enjoy the summer. 

Choices and perspectives

I wanted to thank all of you for your supportive words these last few days. I feel like so many of you have been very protective of me and my feelings and reactions to this situation. It is such a warm and fuzzy feeling. That being said, I didn’t realize there would be so many strong opinions and feelings over this. I appreciate everyone’s perspective, and– maybe for the first time in my life– have seen how it is okay for people to see things differently, and discuss it in a kind manner. I truly hope that when I have disagreed with anyone on this that I have done the same, and that everyone can continue to disagree in a respectful and kind way. 

I wanted to explain my perspective on things, where I stand as of now. I have been emailing with Bea this weekend, and it has helped a lot. I still feel very shaky where she is concerned, and hurt, betrayed, angry, sad. Even with all that, I do get the sense she is still here and not going anywhere. This sucks, and I wish it hadn’t happened, I wish I could erase it all. Or at least, erase knowing what happened. But I can’t do that, and either can Bea. 

The way I see it, I have four choices:

One–I can pretend everything is fine, and continue in therapy as if nothing happened. That is an old response; one I have used often, if I didn’t want to lose the person who hurt my feelings, and it is something I learned in childhood, but it is not healthy. 

Two— I can throw my hands up, run away and never look back. This, too, is an old response. I run from conflict, and I run from tough feelings in relationships. I don’t want to do this anymore. A while ago, I said I wanted to work on understanding relationships and not being so frightened of them. 

Three— I can talk to her, confront her, face it and then leave, having had some closure. This wouldn’t be an unhealthy choice, by any means. But it doesn’t feel right to me, at this moment. 

And finally, there is option number Four— I can confront her, talk it through and hope that things can be repaired. This is where I am at. It feels healthy to me, and as if there is a lot of potential for growth. I have never– honestly never– told someone they have hurt my feelings and then saw it through. Last year, in October, Bea hurt my feelings. I never directly told her, but she knew, by the things I said. She attempted to discuss it with me, and I refused. I completely shut her down. I pretended I wasn’t hurt, and that hurt was buried fairly easily. That is how I have always dealt with conflict and hurt feelings if I still wanted that person in my life. This, now, is an opportunity to do something different. It’s a chance to confront the hurt feelings, the person who hurt them, and allow that person to repair it. And, it’s a chance to do so with a safe person. Because even though I don’t feel like she is really safe right now, in this moment, a part of me recognizes that she hasn’t changed, and somewhere, deep down, I still believe she is safe. 

It’s extremely vulnerable making to do this, and so much harder than I ever would have thought. There are a lot of old feelings coming up, a lot of old fears. I grew up in a household where conflict was avoided at all costs, and if not avoided apologies were accepted no matter what your feelings really were, and the issue never brought up again. The idea that it is okay to bring this up again and again, week after week, in session or email or a phone call, is overwhelming to me. It feels like it can not be true. It’s not something I have experienced, and a big part of me wants to experience being able to talk about the same thing as many times as I need to.  

I know at some point, I am will need to talk about hubby’s words. Right now, I’m too shamed by them and hurt. I’m not sure what to believe about him anymore, and I feel very lost and out to sea without an anchor. I am confused and hurt. The things he wrote are so different from the things he says to me. I don’t know what is the real hubby anymore, or where my marriage really stands. There is obviously work to do there, in my own therapy to work through my feelings about this and maybe in therapy with him, at some point. I just don’t know right now. The only thing I can do right now, is to have perfect Alice run the ship when it comes to my marriage. There is a distance between us, and I’m not sure if it is me, or him, but it makes me very sad. 

I know many of my readers disagree with me, and see things from a different perspective. That is okay, and in my opinion it is a good thing. We need other’s perspectives. It’s part of what allows us to see all sides of an issue and make informed choices. I know many of you would make a different choice than I am, and that’s okay, too. I don’t think there is a right or wrong choice in this situation. 

Unfiltered Parts of me

I have a post about Monday and Thursday’s sessions all ready. I’m just afraid to post it. I feel like something has shifted in my attempt to be unfiltered with Bea, hubby, and Kay. In being way more unfiltered with Bea, it seems she is understanding how my mind works even better than she has before. But that is so very vulnerable making and scary. 

We’ve talked about “parts” before; the little girl, the teenager, the perfect one. And those parts are very apparent to me. The summer before I started seeing Bea, things got very messy. My nightmares and “scary daydreams”, the “picture snaps” (what Bea has now taught me are flashbacks) came back. My moods were all over the place. I didn’t feel like myself, I didn’t always like how I was acting, or understand my reactions, but I couldn’t control it, either. Now, looking back, I can see that the teenager and the little girl were running the show a lot of the time. 

Bea introduced the idea of parts very carefully. I don’t remember when she brought up the idea, but it was in an email. I’d written that I felt like a scared child pretending to be a grownup. She wrote back that when people experience trauma, there can be parts stuck in the past. She suggested that there was a part of me who felt like a little girl, but there was a grown up part, too, who ran the ship. The idea of parts made me feel crazy, but the more Bea talked about it, the more she pointed out that she was sensing the little girl, the more I accepted this idea and began to clearly see when I was sounding, feeling, or behaving like the little girl. The teenager showed up, too, although I spent more time trying to shut her down and send her away than acknowledging her presence. 

And, I read your blogs, and saw that a lot of you identified parts of yourselves as a little girl. Some of you had parts that were more separated, more defined, but you all had parts. Suddenly, I wasn’t so crazy. This idea of parts became much more normalized. It was okay. 

Until Thursday. I have spent the last two weeks being unfiltered with Bea. I think it really started when she went on vacation, and spent her vacation emailing with me, and accepting the fact that her learning something new felt like she was changing everything. It started when she admitted that I was right about some things, even though she had previously said otherwise (just not in so many words). It started when I started having breakdowns in therapy about her changing everything and not being safe anymore. It started when the teenager wrote a snarky email, and I allowed it to be sent. It started because Bea responded to the email, and wasn’t upset. She responded to the teenager, but it was more than that. Her email read like she liked and respected the teenager. So, living a life unfiltered started there. But then, maybe because I was explaining much more openly what my experience was growing up, what it was like in my head, how separate things were, how I hid things from myself, she said something. She said, “a separate personality you created in order to function. To survive.” 

What does that mean? I’m freaking out over here. A separate personality I created to function, to survive. Is this why I don’t remember large parts of my life? Why there are parts of my life that feel like a movie I watched, or a book I read? Why sometimes I “know” something I previously didn’t know, why I remember things I forgot that I forgot? Is this why some things that are in the past feel as if they are happening right now, in my present? Why things can feel so confusing, messy, and chaotic? I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what she meant. I won’t ask her, because I am too afraid right now. I don’t want to know her answer. But I need to talk this out with someone, with people who understand. That’s you, my bloggy friends. So, as scared as I am to post this, I’m going to. Because everytime I have ever posted anything scary, or needed support, you have all been there, and normalized it all. I trust you guys. Even if you aren’t “real life” friends, you are very real friends. 

When replies to comments turn into a novel…..

I got some replies to my last post that really made me think. And my replies turned into a novel. The first is from Cat, and the second is from Sirena. All of you give me so much support, and often you give me a lot to think through, I am very grateful for my bloggy friends.💟xx

I don’t know if this will help the little girl at all or not, but this is what helped me to understand that being more present while doing therapy work was in the best interest of the young traumatized parts… If I don’t keep part of me in the here and now while doing the work, then all of me keeps on reliving the trauma. When I keep some of me here, then the young traumatized parts slowly start to learn that today is different, they aren’t being abused even when there are memories of abuse. It is so important for them to learn that what is going on on the inside is a memory, not a current event, because there is a positive change in brain function when that happens. Even the over the top, crazy powerful emotions are memories. Nothing in your current life is making you feel that terrified, that ashamed, that (fill in the blank).

This makes sense. It really does. It just doesn’t feel safe. And I don’t know how to convince myself that it is safe enough to try this. There is this big huge disconnect between what the grownup part of me thinks and the little girl feels. I don’t know. But I am glad you put this all into words, explained it….kind of humanized it. Maybe if I read it enough the little girl will start to internalize it. Bea says the little girl needs to observe the grown up’s process and the way it works so that she can trust the grown up to make good choices for the whole of me. 

We started out in tiny doses. Feel the feelings for a minute. Then it on it’s own stretched longer and longer. Learning to tolerate the feelings is incredible hard. As you say, you dissociate them because you cannot bear to experience them. But there are rewards. Feeling really present and going for a walk outside and feeling like you are really seeing the world for the first time can create such feelings of overwhelming joy that you are alive. Being able to be more present with your daughter, both for the good times and the difficult times.

But….if I can name my feelings now, when before I had no idea if I was feeling anything, and I can cry and be aware I am crying, isn’t that something? You are saying the same things Bea is saying, but I don’t understand! I’m more present and aware than I was a year ago– than I was even 6 months ago. Why isn’t that enough? 

There is a book that I would love to recommend, but I fear that you would find it too “shrinky”. I didn’t find it too technical and distancing, but it is about dissociation, how it works, and ways to deal with it so life is more livable.

You can recommend shrinky books. Oddly enough, I actually love shrinky, technical books. It’s only when my therapist behaves in a shrinky way that I get panicked. But, thank you (so much, you have no idea how touched I am that you were aware and respected my fears around shrinky) for being careful with shrinky. 

Alice, I know that you are angry at Bea for changing things and that change is incredibly scary for you. She is asking you to mess with what may have been your primary coping mechanism for most of your life. “Don’t feel”. The thing is that she wouldn’t be responsible if she didn’t try to help you start to move forward in this area because you could be doing things in a way that is reinforcing rather than weakening the trauma response.

I know. I really do know. And I don’t want to be angry with her. I hate that I am angry with her. It scares me, as much as the idea of changing things does, maybe more so. She says this isn’t about change, but about the most effective help she can give me. But the bratty part of me just wants to retort back “how effective is it if I am afraid to say or do anything because I don’t trust you anymore because you changed everything?!?” I won’t say that, because I’m too afraid od what will happen. But….well. You know. 

I have been through this a lot with my therapist, myself. The problem is that if you talk about the trauma or some part of it while you are only in a trauma state, it is reinforcing the wiring in the brain that everything about it is dangerous. I know that for me it was that the emotions were dangerous, the body sensations were dangerous, talking, breathing, connecting, just simply connecting when it was really bad.

Yes. It all feels scary. It makes me want to camp out in my closet forever. But I can’t do that because of Kat. If not for her, I would. But I’m sort of in that place of desperately searching for my bubble because I am afraid of all of this….. 

But when I started to do the dual awareness thing in session, all of that started to shift. It can sound really cold to take out all of the human stuff and reduce it down to what is going on neurologically, but when brains are put in traumatic situations over and over, particularly starting when they are young, it the right sort of convincing to get them to stop responding as if the trauma is happening in the present.

Maybe I need the human stuff taken out to make it feel safer. I don’t know. I don’t know what I need. I keep thinking dual awareness, isn’t that why she sent me to yoga? Why isn’t that enough? I don’t understand why everything I have already worked so hard to be able to do isn’t enough. 

It hadn’t occurred to me before, but I’m sure that it isn’t a coincidence that the frequency and intensity of the flashbacks drastically reduced, starting around the time I started to be able to get the dual awareness thing to work.

This is something to think about. You have a point, and I am really glad the intensity of your flashbacks reduced, because you don’t deserve to keep reliving those awful things. 

I hope that I haven’t gone on too much. 

You gave me a lot to think about. It’s why this reply turned into a post! 

I’m sorry that some of what I said probably is pretty uncomfortable for you. I’m sorry that your little girl has good reason to be suspicious of change and to fear being silenced or abandoned in some way. (The best thing that I can suggest for that is to talk about it with Bea as much as you need to and maybe even to just acknowledge it whenever it comes up. There is a lot of power in having your fears heard and respected.)

I am always so afraid to bring the same things up again and again. I have this belief that if it has been discussed once, it can not be discussed again. I feel like Bea and I have been working with that this week, because I’m not done talking about the changes she wants to make. And I am so not done talking about the changes my mom has made. But I feel like I am breaking a rule by bringing it up again and again. Bea says she isn’t upset at me bringing it up again and again, that it feels like part of the process. But writing this out, I just realized how much of a belief I hold in not bringing things up more than once, and how hubby reinforces that, and how I probably need to tell Bea about this “rule” in my head. 

Sometimes I seriously hate the little girl and all her fears. But I think you are right. I probably need to talk about them. She makes me feel silly– like grown ups should not be afraid of these things, or feel this way, the things the little girl does, but I feel them, and that seems shameful or embarrassing to me. And extremely hard to admit those feelings. 

Many, many, many good thoughts of comfort, courage, and a sense of connection with caring others from someone who has been there all too often herself. (Cat)
Thank you. I know you have been here far too often. It is amazing to me how connected and supported and understood I feel from people in bloggy land. It’s not what I expected, but I am really grateful for everyone who gets it.  

It’s not all or nothing though. 

Intellectually, I know this. But I have this problem with everything being very split in my world– black or white, good or bad, all or nothing. I KNOW and understand it on a cognitive level, it just isn’t something I have managed to integrate to the feelings level, I guess. 

You’re not a failure if you’re not ready for it and a success if you do try it. 

I think it’s more that it feels like Bea wants this for me, so I “should” do it. I think it’s sort of like when I was growing up, if my parents wanted something for me, I did it so I could be the good daughter and remain loved and accepted. A part of me is afraid if I don’t do this, then I will be a “bad client” and Bea will fire me. I get that this logic sounds insane and isn’t logic at all, really. But that is how my mind works. 

Your success in healing has nothing to do with that particular method, there’s more than one way to heal. You’ll heal because you want to not because of a technique .

Thank you for saying this. I want to heal. I really do. I am afraid sometimes, but I want it. 

What I will say is that when I first started with somatic bodywork it was threatening to me too. 

Would you be willing to tell me about what it was like at first? I feel a little less crazy hearing that it was threatening to you, too. I don’t want to trigger anyone (or myself right now) so I can’t fully explain, but there is a particular experience that being asked to pay attention to my body, or having someone point out things they are noticing, triggers for me. It is why we quit trying to focus on body sensations last year, and why Bea decided yoga would be good for me. 

I hated it. But I very soon realised that I didn’t recognise what was going on in my body that I’d numbed it so much and I didn’t even have the vocabulary for what I was feeling. 

This is me. I have no words, and don’t usually feel much anyways. 

I quickly started noticing what my body was feeling and it was like having a whole new language and it gave me more control over my body. 
I am afraid that noticing what my body is feeling will send me into this spiral of being out of control. I don’t understand how it makes for more control. Bea says the same thing, but it feels like that is at such odds with what I have experienced in the past. 

I’ve been able to talk myself down more, it’s helped me stop full on panic attacks and sometimes stops the dissociation. It’s helped me stay grounded in the present and in my adult. And once you master that everything else feels more manageable. I’m glad I learned it. But I appreciate it’s not for everyone. (Sirena) 
All of that sounds good. It’s just hard for me to match the two– feeling my body and stopping panic attacks– together. And I think the whole being more present thing really frightens me. Because I have this dissociated state I refer to as Ms. Perfect. And I like that state. I function very well in that state, things get done and I seem normal. I don’t know. I need that state. Blah. 
Anyway, you both gave me a whole lot to think about– hence the post. I hope you don’t mind I turned your comments into a post, it just felt like the replies were too long. Xx

Feeling contrary…..

Things feel really bad right now. I feel like I am living in limbo, disconnected from everyone. I don’t know. My old “story” and deep seated beliefs aren’t true anymore, but I haven’t exactly replaced them with anything. So, I am in limbo. 

I have managed to catch up on almost all household chores, and then some. I’m totally, completely in control of it all. I’m fine. Everything is okay. I’ve found a rhythm, a routine, a schedule to follow. So I force everything way, way down, turn off my feelings and let Ms. Perfect run the show. 

But underneath it all is this chaos and confusion and anger and sadness and fear. It all comes down to fear. Everything and everyone is changing. I can’t do anything right. I am afraid I am chasing Bea away. On top of everything else– the time of year with all the ugly anniversaries and the all alone feeling, my parents changing, hubby being so distant and gone– Bea is changing things. And I hate it. I have told her I don’t like it, but the truth is, I HATE it. It’s not fair. She is the shrink. She is supposed to be stable and reliable. She is NOT supposed to change. 

She is taking this class on somatic (i think that is the word) trauma work. She felt like she wanted to have more knowledge on working with the feelings and sensations in the body, on using movement in therapy. She wanted that for her trauma clients. And I know I am lucky to have a therapist who is always looking for ways to help me. But I do not like this. I do not feel lucky. They– the class teachers– have taught her that I go too far away during therapy. So now she wants to keep me more present when I talk. I can not do that. I am capable of talking BECAUSE I go away. I am terrified of the thought of being present when I talk. I can’t even talk about feelings and be present. 

She says the idea is that I talk about whatever I want and she will check in more often, or I can say that I am too far away and need to stop talking (yeah right, that is never going to happen), or she can stop me and we will do some grounding to adjust things and bring me back. Just the idea of being paused, stopped from talking feels like rejection to the little girl. I HATE this. 

Why is she changing everything?!!? I was already like my whole world has shifted and the ground has been ripped out from under me. I was already feeling alone and shaky and not very okay. I was trying to work through the whole email fiasco and feeling very disconnected from Bea. I was just beginning to feel like she is the same Bea, it was okay, I could trust her. And she goes and changes everything. It’s not fair!!!! 

I emailed her– we have been emailing this week– and I told her I hate grounding because being truly present is very uncomfortable. I told her that I do not want to talk and be present. And she is going to say that being present is safe, nothing bad is happening in the present. But it’s not freaking true! If I am present and talking about all the hard things, then all the feelings are in the present. And it is overwhelming and scary. So no, being present is not safer. 

I told her I feel like a 5 year old throwing a temper tantrum, refusing to try the new vegetables on my dinner plate– even if eating them is in my best interest, they are new and different, so they are not okay. I can see Bea’s view point, intellectually I can even agree with her. But the little girl feels differently. She hates this, and is afraid. She feels all alone and like she has no control at all. Everyone else is bigger, smarter, stronger, faster, better. She can’t do anything to stop the changes. She wants to run and hide. 

I’m both frozen and panicked. I’ve jumped at every little noise outside tonight, feel on edge and scared, but I have also zoned out enough that a 1/2 hour passed by in what seemed like a minute. I don’t even know what happened to that time. I hate blanking out like that. It makes me more panicky and jumpy which makes me more frozen and dissociated. Stupid freaking crazy making cycle. I’m hiding in the closet. Nothing feels okay right now. 

I’m still here…

I wanted to tell you all that I’m still here. I know I haven’t posted anything lately, but I’m here. 

October is a hard month. I have been stuck in my head, numb, gone. Somehow most of October is gone. 

I know some of you have commented on my last post, and I have meant to reply……just somehow time went by before I realized. 

I have been reading your posts, too. I just haven’t been in a head space to comment on anything. 

Anyway, I’m back. And I will write an update soon. 

Xoxo💟

Daily updates: lost, foggy day

Today was one of those foggy, floaty, yet functioning when I need to days. I haven’t had many days like this as of late, and it definitely threw me for a loop. 
I drove right past the road Kat’s school is on this morning. I made it a good 1/4 mile or more past the road, the whole time Kat saying, “Mom. Mom you missed the road. Mom turn around. Mom. Mom.” I finally had that experience of literally snapping out of it– kind of like when you are nodding off to sleep and jerk awake for no reason, feeling as though you could have been asleep for hours but somehow knowing it was really only seconds? Yeah, that’s how it felt. I turned around, and got her to school on time. No problem. Except I had 3 conversations with 3 teachers, and it all has a very dream like quality. I almost had the feeling that I could say or do anything because this wasn’t real. Except, I logically knew it was, and I did my best to let Miss Perfect run things. 
It actually scared me quite a bit, how much I zoned out in the car. If I’d been alone, it wouldn’t have mattered much, but Kat was with me. I usually always drive with the GPS on, and directions set, even if I know where I am going. Now I remember why. 
After I dropped Kat off at school, I drove to the grocery store. I didn’t really want to shop, but I needed to go and knew I wouldn’t want to go tomorrow or the next day, either. I managed to pay better attention, and had the GPS going, so I made it there with no problem. 
Shopping… It was fine. There were a few times where I completely lost my place. The first time was when I was in the pet isle. I was supposed to get dog treats and kitty litter. I got a little distracted and lost some time sorting through different dog treats and trying to pick the best ones for my dogs. When I had picked them, I looked up and started walking before I really realized what I was doing. So I stopped walking, feeling lost. I don’t know how to explain it. I knew I had gone shopping, I knew I was at the grocery store, but it’s like for a split second, I forgot where I was and couldn’t place myself in time or space. It’s like walking down a flight of stairs, and going to take a step down, only to find that you had already gone down all the steps. Then I realized my cart was behind me, and I had been walking away from it. I turned around, feeling embarrassed and stupid, looking around to thankfully find myself alone in the isle. I lost myself again in the cereal isle, but this was partly because I was reading the caloric information on the cereal I buy for myself, and then checking food labels to make sure they are allergy free for Kat. But still. I either don’t zone out to this extent very often, or because I was in my coping state all summer and this wasn’t happening, I’m able to better notice it. 
The rest of the day was that blurry, sort of fuzzy and then slightly more clear, just that wall-of-glass-surrounding-me-nothing-is-quite-real feeling when I was with Kat and forcing myself to function better. One thing we did today that I am very excited about was go to the bookstore. Kat has the kindle app on her iPad and we buy her books for it, but we also like to buy real books. As someone who loves to read, and who took a lot of comfort in reading, it always made me sad that Kat had no interest in books. The last few months, she has become very interested in books, and loves to be read to. So, we went to the bookstore, and came home with two mini American girl dolls– Rebecca (because she looks like Kat and is wearing purple which is Kat’s favorite color) and Mary Ellen (because she looks like me, and I love 50’s style clothing and she has a dachshund for a pet….she is me, lol). We also got the “journey” books that go along with each doll. The journey books are like the choose your own adventure books I remember reading when I was a kid. I remember liking the idea of controlling the story, but getting annoyed that I would have to read some of what I already read to get a new story. That should work out well for Kat, though, as she likes to read the same books and watch the same shows or movies until they are comfortable and she knows what will happen next. She also likes routines and rituals, so I plan to read a little bit of the story to her each night once she is tucked into bed. We read tonight, and it was lovely. Just simple, but sweet. I love to read, and I love sharing that with my daughter. I loved my American girl dolls well past the age most girls play with dolls, and I’m glad I can share that with my daughter, too. Those 20 minutes felt real to me, I felt solid and like I was connected to the earth.     
While I wouldn’t call today a great day, I think it was better than it could have been; I’d call it a win. I functioned. I didn’t snap at Kat, and I got one errand for this week taken care of. I also started a new bedtime ritual with my daughter that is as much for her as it is for me. 

I’m just a kid pretending to be a grown up…….

Today is my daughters IEP meeting. Hubby has to work, and I feel like he isn’t really interested in  helping anyway– although he will be the first to point out all the things he does not like.  I have our BCBA going with us, and she is smart, well spoken, confident and strong. I feel very supported by her, and Bea is waiting to hear afterwards how it went, so I feel Bea’s support, too. The thing is, this is a big deal, and I’m feeling like a child playing at being a grown up. Keep your fingers crossed for me and Kat today, please? Because it is Kat’s life, I’ll ask for and take all the support I can get. 

Thank you

I just wanted to write a quick post to thank all of you for you well wishes and support. I really felt so supported and cared about, reading the comments on my last post. It helped, to see that I have this place with my wordpress friends, and to remember I am not alone in how I have been feeling– you all have experienced something similar at one point or another. While that breaks my heart, and I wish I could take away the things that made you understand my pain, as always, I am so grateful to everyone who shares their stories, who doesn’t hide away the ugly parts of their life. That’s one of the wonderful and unexpected gifts that blogging has given me– a community, a group of friends who get it. So thank you. Xoxo