Waiting

Waiting, the prompt given by Jeff Goins yesterday.  I fell asleep writing, so I finished this morning.  If there are errors, please forgive them.  We are supposed to just write & not edit.  

I feel like I have been waiting all of my life.  I grew up waiting to feel like my Mom accepted me and/or loved me.  I grew up longing to feel wanted and cared about.  

Perhaps there was something in my Mom's childhood that prevented her from loving me the way I needed to be loved.  I will never forget my stepdad telling me that I had a roof over my head, food on the table and clothes on my back, so what else could I want?  

My Daddy died the day after my thirteenth birthday.  I remember waiting for the funeral, having no idea how I could make it through it.  I remember when my Mom came to West Monroe Junior High and the intercom came on, asking me to come to the counselor's office.  I remember thinking I was in trouble, but wondering what I could have done.  I was the good, quiet girl, always seeking approval from other people, while waiting and hoping to get it at home.  I remember walking into the counselor's office and seeing my Mom.  I remember being told to sit down and her telling me that my Dad had passed away.  I remember thinking, surely she meant my grandfather.  My Daddy was only 35.  We had just talked that past weekend about me moving in with him, because I was so miserable living with my Mom.  One thought that kept going through my mind was "Why couldn't it have been my stepdad?".  He was verbally abusive and horrible to be around.  Why not take him, instead of the one person that I could trust and I felt like loved me unconditionally.  

My best friend from 6th grade on would come over and my Mom and stepdad would talk to her and act like she was accepted and important.  I waited for them to treat me the same way.  If never happened.  I don't know how many times I thought she should be their daughter, because they loved her more than me.  I waited to get out of that house.  

I am very thankful to have met the man of my dreams in high school.  Once again, I felt loved unconditionally.  I felt like I mattered to him.  I remember watching our the window for him to come pick me up for dates.  I always sat at the window waiting for my Daddy on Saturday evenings.  These are the two guys that I felt like would never leave me.

After we had our first child, the girls of the family started taking a week off in the summer to vacation.  I waited for an invitation to join them.  It never came.  My mother's excuse was that I could not leave my baby and the baby.  Once again, I felt unwanted and unwelcome with my family.  

Waiting to move out of LA, where I felt smothered by family.  My kids were hurting because my Mom doted on them and spent time with them, until her Mom moved to town, then they were on the back burner.  If family called, we knew they had computer problems and wanted hubby to drop everything and come fix their problems.  

Waiting for my Mom to get excited about her 5th grand baby coming.  I called her the day my water broke, only to be told that it was not a good weekend for her, for me to have the baby.  She could not drive 4 hours & spend 1 night, at least, because she was so busy and her volunteer activities are more important than her family.  Waiting for my younger girls to realize how little they mean to her, like my older kids have.  

I am tired of waiting.  Some days I wish I could cut off all ties and be done with wishing she loved me the way she loves my half sister.  One of these days, I may have no choice for my own sanity.  But right now I am waiting, because occasionally visits are great and we seem like a normal family.  

Bipolar 2...

Have you ever heard of it?  I am finding out that a lot of people have never heard of bipolar 2.  I know none of the general practitioners had any knowledge or experience with it.  I asked repeatedly if I could possibly have be bipolar and I was told absolutely not.  It's not possible.  I knew something was wrong with me.  I had known it since I was in my 20s.  

I was diagnosed with depression in my teens, after losing my Dad at 13 and living in an emotionally & verbally abusive home.  I saw a psychiatrist for years and I think the only thing he was interested in was prescribing antidepressants.  I went to tough love for teens where I was surrounded by mostly teens that had either done drugs or had a bracelet on their ankle and were under house arrest.  

I was irritable and my mood could and would change in an instant.  Most of the time when I went looking for help from my general practitioner, it was when I was in a really deep funk.  Anger became a very real part of my life.  I found myself getting angry over the tiniest things and screaming and yelling.  

When I am hypomanic, I do not want help, because I feel happy and smile and laugh a lot.  I am energetic and can get a lot done.  Then come the mixed episodes, where I will be laughing and happy, but feel like crying at the same time.  Those are the hardest emotionally.  

I finally have in and went to a psychiatrist over here when I was feeling absolutely helpless.  After going through the questionnaire, he did not even have to see me before diagnosing me.  

The biggest clue, was that antidepressants do absolutely nothing for me.  Some, like Prozac, make me fight suicidal thoughts.  Lexapro made me want to punch somebody, anybody.  A general practitioner had tried Paxil with me.  I felt so out of it that I could not get out of my recliner.  Not to mention the weight gain.  

Finally, I found a doctor that understood and did not want to just push antidepressants.  He explained that my episodes were not as severe as full blown bipolar, but the depressed side is usually worse.  When I told him one of the worst issues is my moods changing so quickly and randomly and the anger and irritability, he knew exactly what was going on.  He put me on a mood stabilizer and thankfully, it has been a huge help.  There are still some days with super highs and tremendous lows, but I think with a baby and sleep deprivation, it affects it a lot.  Most days, I feel normal, when I remember to take my medication.  

Thankfully he put me back on Xanax, after the baby came.  Most of the time, it does great with keeping me less crazy.  There are still some days when my mind automatically jumps to the worst possible scenario.  But most days I feel like I am functioning much better than I have the past 10-15 years.  I stay sleepy all of the time, probably from the Xanax, but I will take that over panic attacks and chest pains any day.  Maybe one day God will heal me from this, or maybe He chose to use me to speak out and be a help for someone else going through something similar.  Maybe He will do both.  Hopefully I will not have to be medicated the rest of my life.  

Food..

Food... one of my biggest struggles...

Today's topic is brought to you by Jeff Goins and his 500 words a day challenge.  I missed yesterday, but do not think I can stretch a post on food to 1000 words!  

I am very well aware that we are to eat to live and not live to eat.  I know good is only supposed to be fuel for our bodies.  I know I need to cut out all grains, sugars and probably dairy.  I know that nutrition is 80% of the battle, I know that I am one hundred percent responsible for every bite and drink that I put in to my mouth.  I know how to get healthy, but do I do it?  No.  

Food has become an idol for me.  I turn to it when I am tired, sad, lonely, bored, happy.  I turn to food for comfort.  I will go through a drive thru when I am stressed, because I may need to get out of the house.  Or I may feel like junk food will make me feel better.  Or I may be craving salt.  Or I may just be too lazy to cook and have to deal with the clean up.  

I struggle with thinking sugar or junk food will make me feel better.  I grew up being told that I could not have coke, because I was fat.  My stepdad would insist that I drink diet coke over coke.  I was not allowed to choose how I wanted my steak cooked or what I wanted on my hamburger.  Now that I can choose what I eat, I rebelliously choose junk and coke.  It makes absolutely no sense at all!  I think I am letting him win by staying overweight.  

My absolute favorite food is Mexican food.  My favorite meal is chips, queso, carne asada, rice, beans & sopapilla bites with vanilla ice cream.  With a coke, of course and sometimes a margarita.  The majority of that meal is terrible for you, but it is my favorite.  They have a white cheese, spinach queso.  The carne asada is a huge steak, covered with Monterey Jack cheese, over a bed of grilled onions.  It is one of the best meals I have ever had.  I always get it with flour tortillas & love putting queso on top of slices of the meat inside a tortilla.  I never eat the onions, but I love the flavor of them.  It has always been a texture thing with me and onions.  The beans and rice are really just standard Mexican beans & rice.  The sopapilla bites are out of this world.  They remind me of bite sized beignets, if you've ever had beignets in New Orleans.  These are sprinkled with cinnamon & sugar with a little honey drizzled around the bowl and a scoop of vanilla ice cream in the middle.  I think each of my family members could eat one of these desserts on their own, but we split it.  Our favorite Mexican place is a place called Frankie's.  My kids beg to go.  The manager is absolutely wonderful.  My girls call him Uncle Jesse, Full House?  He kind of looks like him, too!  

The Best Day of my Life

August 10, 1996, the day of our wedding.  I was 17, two months before my 18th birthday.  Ernie was 20.  We were just babies.  I am sure quite a few people thought there was no way we would ever make it.  

We were high school sweethearts.  I knew I was crazy about him the first time I met him.  He was so nerdy in high school and I just have a thing for nerds.  I love smart people.  

Mr. Miller, one of my favorite teachers, suggested asking him to help me with math.  That was not just a ploy to get attention, because I really needed help in math.  Ernie did help me during free time during the day.  

My Mom had a rule of absolutely no dating until I was 16.  Ernie was a senior and had asked me to prom.  I was 15.  My Mom would not agree, so one of our teachers, who stayed and supervised those of us that did not have a ride home after school, spoke with my Mom when she picked me up one afternoon.  The teacher sang Ernie's praises.  He was so loved by all of the teachers.  

She agreed to let me go to prom with him.  We were pretty much a couple from then on.  He started college, went with me to my junior prom and we spent most weekends together.  

He proposed to me when I was 17.  I will never forget telling his Mom and being asked if we had to.  She assumed that I was pregnant.  When we told his Dad, he said "big surprise".  Ha!  His Dad was the most laid back and easy going person I have ever known.  

So, the wedding day comes around and Mr. Miller, the same teacher that suggested I ask Ernie for math help, was there, standing at the back of the chairs, with his Bible in his hands, waiting for the cue to walk up to wait on us.  I will never forget the smirk on Mr. Miller's face.  It was so cool to have him be the one to marry us.  The guys walked up and were standing and waiting for the bridesmaids, flower girls and me.  

I will never forget the story of Willie Mae(Ernie's grandmother), trying to get Stinky's(Ernie's Dad) attention to tell him that his fly was down.  Eventually she got his attention and he turned around and fixed it.  It was so extremely hot and humid.  An August day, outside, after it rained, in Louisiana.  Those poor guys in tuxedos were burning up.  

I wi never forget the way Ernie looked at me when I walked down that aisle to him.  My brother and half sister walked me down to him.  Mr. Miller refrained from asking who gives this girl, because my Dad was deceased and he did not ask if anyone objected.  I could just imagine my stepdad objecting out of spite because I did when he married my Mom, even though I was only 8 at the time.  

Our photographer had a little too much beer through the ceremony and reception.  We repeatedly had to search for him for pictures and he even missed the kiss.  

The reception was a blast.  We had a  DJ and had a blast dancing to YMCA and doing the Macarena.  I changed from my muddy heels to my combat boots.  I am a much more combat boot type of person than high heels.  

This was absolutely the best day of my life.  I get to wake up every morning, next to my best friend.  I love this man more than life.  

I am so thankful that God and Mr. Miller brought us together!  Ernie has been the one person since my Dad died that shows me unconditional love.  He is such a blessing to me. 

Addiction and cancer

Do you suffer with an addiction personality?  I used to think I did not have a problem with being addicted to anything, but I am.  If I do not have coke, I lose my mind.  I go through major withdrawals and I am mean!  Thankfully I am not nearly as bad, since I started drinking Spark.  

My phone.  I do not even want to talk about my phone.  I use it to text Ernie, the kids and my family.  I hardly ever talk on the phone these days, unless I have no other option.  I do not hear great, especially with kids in the background that want my attention.  My phone is with me ALL the time.  If I am a passenger in the car, I'm on my phone.  If I am up in the middle of the night with the baby, I am on my phone.  If I am in the bathroom or bathtub, I have my phone with me.  You would think I could not survive without it.  I use it for Facebook, Pinterest, texting. Dictionary, to read e-books, maps, etc.  I have gotten so dependent on it that it is ridiculous!  

Facebook is another addiction.  I am nosy, I am not going to lie.  I like seeing what my friends are doing.  I love to see the pictures.  I love being given the chance to pray for friends that I would never know needed prayer, if it was not for Facebook.  I love the uplifting posts that are shared.  There is so much positive about Facebook, but only if you keep it in balance.  With being a stay at home mom, there's very little adult interaction.  It gets lonely at times, even with 4 kids at home.  Being distracted on Facebook means that I can ignore the fact that I need to clean house and the baby does not want to be out down.  It can also bs a distraction to me when I am worried or anxious by keeping my mind occupied.  I do not have to really think or feel or process things that are bothering me.  Some people choose drugs to help dull pain and hide from their thoughts.  One of the few benefits of Facebook is hearing when we need to pray for someone.  I think I use it a lot so I do not have to think about how my heart has broken over the years and  my heart is breaking now over two people that are bravely fighting cancer.  Both of them have young teenage children and it takes me back to being 13 and losing my Dad.  Knowing the pain and devastation that they are going to face soon is heartbreaking.  Losing a parent as a teenager completely changes you.  I remember hating God for several years, because I just could not understand why he would take my Daddy away from me.  One of my high school teachers told me that he must have completed his purpose here on earth.  I remember ranting that all of the good people die too early and mean people are left here too long.  It was not very logical, but I was 15.  

Please join me in prayer for these two very special people that are fighting for their lives and their families.

Mentally ill and choices

The first time I wondered if my little brother was mentally ill, we were getting off of the school bus and he took off running to the garage.  He said he saw a man standing in the woods across the street with a gun.  Somehow the window in the garage had a hole in it.  I do not know if my brother had shot the window with his BB gun and did not want to get in trouble, so he fabricated this story or what.  I just know that our house was swarmed with police and the searched the woods and found nothing, other than the neighbor's donkeys.  

I remember my Mom taking him to the psychiatrist after that episode. They did not know if he was hallucinating or schizophrenic or just lying for attention.  

I am not sure when things changed with my brother's personality.  I don't know if it's when our parents both remarried and there was no hope of them ever getting back together or if it was after my mom's marriage.  He always seemed to like our stepdad.

I will never forget when we were getting ready to go to Texas for our mom to get married, because in Texas you did not have to wait 3 days after getting a marriage license to marry.  I still have no idea why waiting 3 days when they were already living together was a big deal.  My brother told me to find all of my money and bring it with us, because our Mom and stepdad were taking us to get rid of us.  He had on elastic bans shorts and kept having to pull them up because his pockets were heavy with all of his change.  Just in case we were left.  I have no idea what he thought all of his change would get us.  As I think back, I think he was only 6.  Imagining my almost 6 year old gathering all of her money and thinking we were going to get rid of her wrecks me.  My family thought it was funny.  I cannot imagine that being funny under any circumstances.  Maybe the trying to keep his shorts from falling down, but that is it.  

We went with them on their honeymoon to Florida.  It ended up being my Mom and me in the pool and on the beach most of the trip, while my brother and stepdad played mini golf and did other guy things.  My family loved to pick on me because there was a man in the pool with his two sons, that was actually playing with his sons.  I do not know how many times I tried to set my newly married Mom up with this guy.  I thought he looked like a great stepdad.  He was actually playing with his kids.  

We came back home and the real stepdad emerged.  He was not working at the time.  He worked shut downs at plants on occasion, because it was good money and he could work 1 week a month or 1 month out of 4 and it paid about the same or better than a full time job. So when he was home, he would spend the whole morning drinking his coffee, reading the paper and yelling at us to clean house.  He reminded me of the wicked stepmother.  Mom would get home and the house would be clean and she thought stepdad had done all of the work.  

I am not sure when the shift happened and my brother started looking at my stepdad as his hero and not wanting to see our Dad unless he had to.  I remember he started staying home occasionally on the weekends that we were scheduled to go to Dad's.  My brother had diabetes and one weekend he had to do a 24 hour urine test, because his blood sugars were going crazy.  I was told that the reason he did not want to go was because he did not what to take the jug, because  he was embarrassed by it.  It was not until I was an adult that my brother told me that he told our Dad that he hated him and never wanted to see him again.  I have no idea where that came from.  Our Dad died in his sleep 4 days later.  Those were the last words he said to him.  

I have no idea if he got involved with drugs and alcohol in high school or afterwards.  He got addicted to pain pills.  A couple of days after I had my 13 year old, my Mom brought him & his girlfriend to visit.  I noticed the next day that out of a whole bottle of pain pills, I only had 2 left,  I assumed his girlfriend had taken them, because at the time, I still looked up to my brother, even though he was younger than me.  

I think my family hid a lot of things he did, because denial is much better than facing the fact that he had problems.  Every job he had as a teen and in his early 20s, he would be fired because money would disappear from the register.  Family even gave him chance after chance.  A relative that owned a furniture store hired him to deliver furniture and he tried to keep the delivery truck, along with money. 

He married for about 12 months.  He started stealing pain pills from his mother in law and money, so they divorced.  He spent some time living with friends, then I'm sure something happened there.  

He ended up back at Mom's in his 20s.  Unemployed and bored.  She tried to get him to get help, but he refused.  He stole golf clubs and guns of my stepdad's and hocked them.  My stepdad finally recovered them all.  He knew most of the pawn shop owners in town.  Then, I'm guessing when he needed another fix, he stole my stepdad's identity.  He charged up his credit cards and would check the mail first and when he found checks from credit card companies to get cash advances, he would do that.  Eventually my stepdad pressed charges.  He spent a year or two in jail then was released on probation for good behavior.  He went back to Mom's house and was welcomed in again, this time almost in fear.  Sometime during all of this, he said he was going to kill my mom & stepdad in their sleep.  So, all of the guns were taken out of the house and locked up at family's houses and in the shed.  My teenage sister is living there through all of this and I am terrified he's going to kill them all.  He behaved for a couple of years.  Then stole both my Mom and stepdad's identity.  He opened credit cards in their names and was ordering stuff left and right.  He went to "test" drive a truck and failed to return it.  He went back to jail.  This time with a 7 year sentence.  We went to see him a few times, but not as often as I wish I would have.  We did exchange many letters.  

Three and a half years later, he was released.  My Mom told him that he could not move back in with her.  She offered to get him an apartment on the city bus line so he could come & go.  She even offered to pay for his apartment.  He found a house and lived there for about 6 months.  

Every time we saw him, he looked more & more sick.  Supposedly he fell down & hit his head so hard a month or two before he was released and crushed part of his skull, resulting in epilepsy.  He was complaining about feeling bad and not being able to eat almost constantly.

About a month after he got out of jail, we took our family and moved a state away.  My older two children remembered the chaos and were scared of him stopping by out of the blue.  

He kept complaining about headaches, passing out and vomiting, so my Mom took him to the doctor.  After what he said was a lot of testing, he said they found a brain tumor.  Then he said the doctor wanted to do a full body scan because most brain tumors do not originate in the brain.  He said he had a full body scan done and his pancreas was covered in tumors.  He said the doctor said that would be his last Christmas and he would be lucky to make it 3-6 months.  There was nothing they could do.  

This was September and family was very upset.  We had already lost that time with him in jail and now he was dying.  He moved in with an aunt and uncle, because they did not think he could take care of himself.  We made trips to town at least once a month to see him.  My uncle and cousin took him on a trip to play the two golf courses he had dreamed of playing.  Once he got back home, he spent as much time as he could on the golf course because he said that was where he could clear his mind and relax.  

January rolls around and my mom and uncle started questioning whether or not he really had cancer.  He claimed he had the medical report, but then Mom made him mad, so he shredded it.  My aunt and uncle asked him to go stay at Mom's just on the weekends, so they could have some time alone.  He did that, but hated it, because he said that he had nowhere to call home.  

At times he was starting to feel unwelcome & uncomfortable at our aunt and uncle's.  So he went back to stay with Mom.  We talked or emailed every day and he said that he would not stay at Mom's long, because he just couldn't stand it.  He said if it got too bad, he would go stay at a hotel room to cool off.  

He had a doctor's appointment scheduled a few days after moving in with Mom and told her that she could take him & come back & hear what the doctor said and see his records. He offered that to anyone in the family.  

The day before they were supposed to go to the doctor, he had a friend pick him up and said they were going to lunch and to pick up his medicine.  He was an insulin dependent diabetic.  I texted him and Mom that evening and didn't hear back.  She called me the next day and told me that he had left an did not show up at the doctor.  She went to the appointment, hoping he would show up.  The doctor could not really tell her anything, but when she asked if he had cancer, the doctor shook his head.  

He called everyone the next day and told them he was fine and just needed to get away and spend some time alone.  His voice almost sounded like the old brother I knew, not the slurred speech brother that he had sounded like since he got out of jail.  It sounded like a rehearsed speech.  I think he said the exact same thing to everyone.  

The night before when I found out that no one had heard from him, I remembered that the first time he was in jail, I dreamed that he was going to end his life.  Every time the phone rang & it was my Mom, I was scared that was going to be the call that he had done it.  Ernie and I went for a walk that night and I told him that I really felt like they were going to find him somewhere dead.  He texted and asked for my address.  He did the same thing with s cousin.  I begged and pleaded with him to not do anything stupid.  

Two days later, Ernie came home from work and pulled me into the bedroom and sat me down.  He told me they had found him in a motel room.  He had injected 2 vials of insulin.  He left goodbye notes for my mom, stepdad, uncle & little sister.  Not a word for me.  

The counselor at the church that we had grown up in, that had been trying to counsel him over the phone, told me that he had gotten a call from my brother the night that we had heard from him the last time.  He missed the call & it went to voicemail.  He let me listen to it.  My brother was sobbing and asking him to please pray for him right then.  That message will haunt me the rest of my life.  The brother that I felt like I had helped raise, because Mom worked all of the time, decided that it was easier to end his own life than to go on.  

Victim mentality?

Have you ever had a victim mentality?  Have you ever thought if I had just been born into another family?  If I had different parents, different grandparents, different siblings, then my life would have turned out differently.  If only my parents had not divorced and had modeled what true marriage is supposed to look like.  

If only my Mom had not married a man that was verbally abusive.  If only my Daddy had not died the day after my 13th birthday.  If only I had spent more time with my Daddy, not that the decision was mine.  

If only I had picked better friends in middle school and high school.  If only I had never smoked a cigarette.  If only I had not made the decision to give up and drop out of school in October of my senior year, because we had several English teachers and I was doing horribly in my favorite class.  Thankfully I at least got my GED.  If only I had not given up on college and dropped out.  If only I was not so timid and scared of being myself around other people, because if I did not like myself, how could they?

If only I had not let my brother come live with us for a little after he got out of prison.  If only I had never left my children alone with him.  If only I had known what signs to pick up on.  If only I was not blind to him and his drug, alcohol and cough syrup addiction.  If only I had the chance to put him in jail again for the things he did.  

There are many if onlys that I have lived with for most if my life.  I could blame my parents, my brother, my circumstances, but I am not a victim.  God wants us to live in victory.  I cannot live in victory, as long as I am in bondage to the past.  

I blamed my weight problem on my stepdad for many years.  He called me fat and told me that I had to drink diet coke, instead of coke, because I was fat.  So for years, I have thought that I can drink as much coke as I want because he cannot tell me what I can and cannot drink now.  My rebellion was doing nothing other than hurt me.  A victim may act like a rebellious teenager.  I am no longer a rebellious teenager.  I feel like God wants me to walk in victory in this area of my life.  My body is His temple to take care of, not something for me to destroy.  

I could choose to be a victim and not accept blame in many situations in my life and I have many times.  I am thankful that God has used friends to show me the error of my ways.  I am glad that he uses different people to help me grow.  

So are you a victim?  Or do you walk with God in victory?  Are you living out the victorious life that he has planned for you?  Have you accepted that God allows bad things to happen to us to grow us, teach us lessons and so we will lean on him?  To be honest, God is still working with me on this issue.  I am so thankful for his grace and loving kindness and that he does not hit me upside the head and say, "You are doing it again!".