Tag: family

Dear Dad

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Been walking on a tightrope, juggling high hopes and reality
Just trying not to mess up, tryna keep my head up, fighting gravity
I can’t outrun growing up, I still feel like a kid


Quick to judge the ones we love
Sometimes I forget


It’s your first time on Earth too
And I hope that you know that I don’t blame you
It’s just pain that you were passing down
I’m older, and I see it now
It’s your first time on Earth too

Back then, I didn’t get that you gave me the best that you knew how to do
You were far from done growing up when you had a kid


Quick to judge the ones we love
Sometimes I forget


It’s your first time on Earth too
And I hope that you know that I don’t blame you
It’s just pain that you were passing down
I’m older, and I see it now
It’s your first time on Earth too

My Five Whys

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Why does his drinking bother me?

Because it impacts the weekend and causes me to feel alone in my own mind as he escapes through it.

Why does this bother me?

Because I feel like he doesn’t want to be here.

Why does this bother me?

Because I used to feel like I was what made his life better.. a light in it. Now I feel like just another one of his problems.

Why does this bother me?

Because if he thinks I am part of the problem, maybe I AM just another part of the problem.

Why does this bother me?

Because if I AM a part of the problem, that means I have failed as a wife and partner.

Lost

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If I am entirely honest, this past weekend was probably the most challenging one that I have had in some time. Pushing aside the standard procurement of beautiful weekend family images, I come to you with a little bit of what is also real life today. That is not to say that those beautiful moments are not real life. They are– but I think it’s tough because it is necessary to discuss the bad along with the good in order to understand what a full life is made of. No life is perfect, and the good moments are a heck of a lot easier to talk about.

Driving myself to work this morning included a lot of introspection- and faith-based radio- and I wish I could say that it all brought me clarity but as I arrived at my destination at 7:15am, I felt no clearer than I did on Friday… or yesterday… or at 4:30am this morning as I stood in front of my bathroom mirror. So much of my life since it became my own has been about regaining and holding onto control around the things that I can but there are some things that I just can’t control because they aren’t mine and I am not meant to be the keeper of them. And so, I am in the mud. I am down in it and as of this morning, I find myself unable to climb out just yet.

I think the hardest part of feeling lost today is the lack of emotion that I am feeling around it. The standard for me has always been an ability to feel the emotions– all of them– no matter how ugly and exhausting they are, and it is in the confrontation that I find healing and move forward. Right now, I just feel- nothing. I am separated from my emotions which I can’t help but notice must be some sort of defense mechanism. The dreaded wall is up.

I did have a brief moment last night where everything just came out. In the lateness of the evening, the exhaustion of barely sleeping all weekend… I couldn’t keep it buried just then. My little guy next to me in bed, watching his ipad. I just let it silently flow for a moment and turned to lay down. He switched off his ipad and turned to me, hugging me through the overwhelming feeling of loneliness. I can’t explain the feeling of it, like the transfer of strength from this little amazing human and he didn’t even realize the power of it. God knew what he was doing when he gave me this one.

Now I just ask myself– where do I go from here?

Time to Recharge

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I took some time to pause with family for a few days and we took our first flight as a family to Colorado for a couple of relaxing days in the mountains followed by a fun supercross event in Denver! The weather was all sorts of all over with temps in the 30’s at times and highs in Denver near 80. It was truly tough to pack for this trip, but it was amazing.

I was a bit terrified of getting around airports with a 4-year-old but watching his excitement during that first ascent into the sky was well worth any difficulty. I took my first flight well into my 20’s so this was truly special to see him get this chance at such a young age– to be able to comfortably provide and afford these opportunities. I don’t take them for granted.

We took a 4-mile hike as a family and did a lot of walking around in general. It’s one of the things I love about CO and in particular, something I found amazing now during this healthier moment that I am having in life. Coffee on the deck was spectacular when it wasn’t too cold! There was a dusting of snow each morning but our final one there was just beautiful, so we ate breakfast outside.

The trip back was tough because I think we all wished we had a bit more time but coming home is always bittersweet and we missed our fur– and feather– kiddos when we were away. Travel back went very smoothly and we didn’t lose Marty along the way (our son’s favorite stuffy). Our son is already asking when we will go back. We will get there some day but for now, will hold onto some pretty amazing memories created there.

68

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On the 24th, she turned 68 and it came and went quietly. Every year comes with the question– will this one be the last? It’s been about 10 years now since it became so absolutely apparent that something was wrong, and for women diagnosed with dementia around the age of 60, the average lifespan is an additional 8.9 years.

I so often wonder what she would think if she could see me today. I have no real good reason for it given our past and the damage done but that doesn’t matter. I will always wonder what she would think. It comes up most on the typical days– her birthday and Mother’s Day. On Mother’s Day I do have a new focus on how does my son see me? It’s a nice shift but that old question is still burried somewhere underneath.

For years, everyone told me I looked like her and for some time, I hated it. I now embrace it and share it with others. I do carry her in some small way with me, always. In that way, she is still here and always will be.

“I am tied by truth like an anchor
Anchored to a bottomless sea
I am floating freely in the heavens
Held in by your heart’s gravity

All because of love
All because of love
Even though sometimes you don’t know who I am

I am you, everything you do
Anything you say, you want me to be
You and me are charms on a chain
Linked eternally in what we can’t undo
And I am you”

The Turning Point

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It has been 104 days since I took my starting photo as I began my workout journey. I can’t be sure of when my diet changes preceded it to be honest, but I can guess that it was about 2-3 weeks before that photo. I am still going strong. It’s strange to think about the number of times over the past couple of years that I promised myself that I was going to make changes– I was going to start prioritizing myself– and I failed every single time. What changed? When I look back over it all, it’s not what happened to me but what happened to him.

Ever since I picked this blog back up, I have struggled with what all to share here as I have navigated some significant personal challenges. Back in 2022, I went through a health journey that lingers with me today but in a way that I have learned to manage. The biggest change coming out of that is one in which I found myself in a place mentally where I had not been for some time in my life. I was frustrated with our medical system, with lack of care, little answers, and the expense of it all. Not to mention the ways in which it impacted my life for some time. In short, I became ungrateful and a little bit angry. I could no longer see some of the beauty around me.

Back in December, my little brother went through a psychotic break and in some strange way, I found that instead of dragging me further down, it somehow managed to wake me up. What was I doing? Why was I hiding from the life around me? I had no excuse. The tools were in my hands. I had all of these things that I could only dream about ten years ago, all that I hoped and dreamed about, and yet I was as unhappy as I had ever been. I was so far down in the mud; I had no idea how to claw back out. And as I watched my little brother’s life implode, I chose to save myself.

It hasn’t gotten easier. He is now out on the streets as he has chosen to do. I have worried and researched, googled, looked at all of the updates in the courts, jail roster, google, etc. I still do this every day. Where is he? I don’t know.. and I live with that every day. But, I live. I am so grateful for this life, our home, my son, and the support system that I have created around me over the past 18 years.

I have this one body and mind to take care of as I navigate more of what life throws my way. I think about the years ahead in my marriage. This year, we will celebrate 7 years of marriage and 10 years together. Our son will start school later this year. Our dogs are both 11 years old and we will have to go through their passing at some point and explain this to our son. My husband’s grandparents are getting older, and my own father is now 71. The economic climate is challenging and who knows if we will deal with job loss between the two of us at some point. We will face these things ahead and I hope to continue to head towards a stronger version of myself as we push through.

If I have learned anything, it’s that I can’t hide away. It feels awful and lonely and it’s not how I want my son to view the approach. More than anything though, I found that I needed to make changes and recenter myself not for him but for me. Growing up, I could never understand why my mom chose a drink over me every single day and I verbally asked her on multiple occasions to choose me. She never could and I now understand that what she needed to do was choose herself before she could even begin to choose me. And.. I do choose me. I choose this life. I choose to face it head on with a mind and body that is getting stronger every day. All I needed to do, was wake up.

The List

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I used to start out a new year by looking at the prior year’s bucket list, crossing things off and adding new ideas. It has probably been over a decade now since I’ve given this activity a shot and I find myself itching to make some changes or try something new– more than ever before.

I started my latest list yesterday and it’s interesting to find myself jotting down some things that I know were on my list all those years ago. It’s likely that I have also crossed a whole bunch of things off but I have so far unfortunately been unable to track down what would have been my most recent one given the demise of Facebook notes. So here I am, starting new.

This all started early this week when I found myself contemplating ideas for entirely new hobbies that I could potentially try out. To be honest, this is a drive that I have not felt in years. Am I going through a crisis? This is something that I began to wonder as I was writing down ideas such as– learning to play guitar (used to be on the old bucket list).. or maybe piano since our son is asking for a keyboard. The last time I felt this way was at 25 when I looked around and realized I was not even close to where I wanted to be in life when it came to work, home, my personal life– all of it. I will turn 38 later this year and I can at least say that my view is much different now. I am exactly where I want and need to be in work and at home. I have my own little family and a very good life where we are comfortable, and I have more of the means to actually try new things.

When I looked ahead at my ideas (some of them grand) all of those years ago, I felt uncertainty and unsure of how to get there. Today, I feel excitement and okay that some of these goals are within view while others may be far up ahead just yet. A few of these can and will be crossed off this year and I can’t wait to dive in!

The less I understand her..

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One of my favorite things about mornings is packing his lunch for the day.

The more time that I give to my son, the less I understand her. I just saw a video on this topic but in the opposite breadth– understanding a mother’s love as you yourself become one. My mom was so often annoyed by hugs, wouldn’t keep me home with her even on the one occasion that I cried for it (she was stay at home but we went to the babysitter every day while my dad worked), and used being her daughter- or rather not getting to be her daughter– as a form of punishment. It’s kind of crazy to think about now, as I continue this dive into what it is now to be a mother to my own son. I’m actually blown away by how quicky those memories and normalcies for me at that time all feel so foreign and unbelievable now. There is no stronger, no bigger, no more beautiful a love and I am embracing it with everything I have until that inevitable day when I am no longer the coolest and bestest in his world. He will always be in mine.

The Box: Day 1

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Now I remember why– when I acquired three boxes of my mom’s “important papers” from her old storage unit in 2017– I went fully through one of them and pushed the others aside, mentally exhausted and telling myself that I would tackle them in the future. I never did. I have skimmed just the top of this one box and already, I find myself wondering if I should put it away again or burn it in some sort of ceremonial letting go bonfire. In the hope of finding just one thing of potential importance, I suppose I will attempt to keep going, at least for now.

Day 1 Discoveries:

I made the honor roll in my final year of high school complete with letter from Pat Murphy, who was the Iowa House of Representatives minority leader at the time.

My mom created and saved “demerits” that she gave out to my brothers and I for various grievances. There were 9 demerits total between my brothers for things such as being “disrespectful,” didn’t do as what told,” and my personal favorite given to my little brother– “throwing demerits at me.” There was just 1 demerit for me which entailed my having made a terrible salad because I “was very lazy and didn’t care how I made it.”

My mom very briefly kept a prayer journal in 1995 in which she details what she feels is my older brother’s stepping away from a relationship with God after which she then writes of me positively. “Cub is really blossoming into a very nice girl. I am getting closer to her more and more every day.” I would have been 8 years old during this entry and I don’t feel like a child she birthed reading it.

The hardest thing to find and read was a letter my little brother wrote to her. I have no idea when he wrote it but it is clearly from when we all still lived under the same roof. He tells her of how depressed he is feeling and at one point writes “I love you and I need you to love me.”

Day 1 Conclusion:

Do I continue this journey? What am I getting out of this? These are just a couple of thoughts I find myself having. It feels early to push this one away, this may just take me longer than I anticipated.