Damn Pianos

I have to be careful listening to piano music. It can make me melancholy.

Then I start to feel things.

I hate feeling things.

Worse. I hate being alone with my feelings.

I have big feelings.

And most days I don’t know what to do with them.

I spend a lot of time ignoring them. Stuffing them down. Attempting to escape them.

I think this is why I eat. Or binge watch TV. Or disappear into the internet.  I think that these are all just attempts to escape being with my feelings. And when I can’t indulge in escapism, I tangle myself in projects or turn on music that I can sing along to.

But tonight, I thought I would set the mood for exploring my thoughts with a little music. I searched Pandora for something that wouldn’t be too distracting. I came across a  station called “piano magic”. It hasn’t disappointed. But it also has taken me to a very emotional state very quickly. I am not sure how long I can listen.

Fortunately, these songs are punctuated by obnoxious commercials. Just as I feel the lump in my throat forming...Pandora saves me with an add blasting New Year’s savings on the latest model of this or that.

(Oh heaven forbid…..someone just added a violin to the piano. I die.)

I carry a lot of baggage. I have a lot of hurt. I have a lot of rejections that I have faced from others and from myself. I have struggled with fear and inadequacy my whole life.

Not many know. I am not one of those women who easily cry at the first sad commercial on TV, or sitting in a ladies bible study, or any other place where someone might see. No…you wouldn’t catch me being vulnerable like that.

In fact, I rarely cry.  I have learned to cope with disappointments and losses by just moving forward. Instead of recognizing, acknowledging or accepting what I am really feeling, I brush off my hurt. Or I swallow my sadness. Or I distract myself with making endless plans for the future which are born of the seeds of hope I always carry in my heart.

But the most effective way I have learned to cope with life is through the ability to forget. In this, forgetfulness has been a best friend to me. True…a lot of times it is also my worst enemy….because I REALLY can’t remember anything. Just ask my family how many times a day I lose something.  But I think that forgetting  is just a skill that I developed a long time ago.

Forgetfulness is just a lack of mindfulness, a lack of paying attention, a lack of wanting to be in painful moments.  As a little girl, I learned that I could escape and go up into my head and live outside of what goes on around me.

As a girl my life was filled with real circumstances that resulted in real grief and real pain. But now, those circumstances no longer exist.  But fear has moved in and filled their place.   I am no longer in danger. I am no longer abandoned. But instead of realizing that I am ok….I have replaced those real circumstances with imaginary ones. The “what if’s” of life.

Tragically what saved me as a girl (using this ability) has hurt me greatly as a mother and an adult. I often tune out. I seek solace and escape. I am almost frantic when I just can’t go away and live inside my head.

When I steal away to that place in my mind, I am calm. I am numb.

I have discovered that I am an addict for this numbness. Every addict has their preferred opiate. The TV, the internet, and food are my drugs of choice.  And combining them is the fastest route to release.

And here is where I feel such regret.

I have been addicted to these things and I have hurt and neglected the ones I love. I have neglected myself. I have hurt myself. And I need help.

I need You Lord to help me. No one else can. I am so beyond the help that another human can offer. All of the solutions that others offer fall so short of healing me from what I am really dealing with. I can’t help myself.  God I need you.

I am broken. I want to be present for my children, for my husband, for my family and friends. I want to feel and remember. I want those memories to be carried in my heart to shape me and make me.

I have lost so much time. I have lost so many things to my addiction. I would give anything to go back. I wish I could do everything over again.  This hurts so bad.

The world offers only superficial solutions. But I can see so clearly tonight that I am outside of the reach of anyone but You.

You made me. So You can fix me. And I believe you have brought me to this moment because You love me. Please fix me.

Oh good grief….Les Miserable is playing….and now I am in a full out sob.

I am feeling things now.

Lies do Desecrate

I don’t think I will ever run out of things to write about.

Tonight….I had many plans for writing. Lots of things from my day that I could have talked about…but the last part of my day led to a discovery that has taken precedent.

I have been lied to.

It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last. I get lied to all the time…I have kids. I also have a husband who often says things that I know are flat out lies to avoid confrontation. The little white lies...  I am used to them. Not that I condone them, rather I find them akin to an irritant. A pebble in the shoe.

This wasn’t that kind of lie.

This was the kind of lie where you discover that someone isn’t who they pretend to be.

This isn’t really a problem for the casual relationship. We all pretend to be someone that we are not sometimes. It just seems to be part of our fallen nature to need to be better than we really are. And we lie to the world and ourselves at times to try to project an image that is different from reality. We suck in our gut when an attractive person walks by. We greet and smile one another as we glide into that church pew pretending the morning went smoothly. We basically paint, spackle, and whitewash all the flaws and cracks in our persona to appeal to the world around us.

But there are those with whom we wear no masks. These are the intimate few that we build our lives with. These are the ones that we really are closest to. These are the ones we love. They know us. They know our ugly sides, our bad moods, our fears, and the things that make us vulnerable. And when someone knows you like this…you believe that you know them too.

And when you realize that one of those people who make up your inner circle is not who they pretend to be with you…it is destructive. The foundation of this relationship is intimacy and honesty. And when you have spent hours, nights and weeks at a time with a person and laid your soul bare, you assume that the other person has done the same.

It wasn’t really an overt lie. It was more of a lie of omission. But it was an omission so great that it showed that our relationship wasn’t built on trust. This person, whom I love didn’t trust me enough to tell the truth.

The discovery of the truth then has revealed more than just the omission. It has put a spotlight on our very relationship. And it has revealed that the love and friendship that I have had with this person is lopsided.

I know this person loves me. And I love this person. But what has come of this is a destruction of our intimacy. This person has robbed our relationship of true intimacy. Will she keep my secrets? I don’t doubt she will. She loves me. But does she trust me with hers? The answer is no.

And this breaks my heart.

She has built a barrier between us, and tonight I discovered that it exists.

This is not the end of our relationship. By far…it would take much more than this. I will always love her.  But sadly the barrier changes the very nature of the relationship that I believed we had.  And that is where the damage has been done. The innocence, the intimacy, and the trust have been replaced with doubt.  

Dishonesty is a thief.

And I feel like a part of me has been stolen.  

The hardest part of all of this is that I love this person too much to make her hurt. So she will not learn the truth. She had a need to hide a part of her life from me. And I will just go on letting her do so.  The reality is that things will go on being the same as they were because for her…nothing has changed.

But for me….things will not be the same.

An Unsettled Night

Don’t even know where to begin….

Well that’s a start anyways.

My husband just rolled over in bed. I was relieved. What I have to say seems private. I am ashamed of my thoughts I guess. Or maybe I am just ashamed of needing the therapy that writing all of this down provides. One thing is for certain…I don’t want him watching me write this down.

He doesn’t get me. He gets me better than anyone on this earth perhaps….and that is a hard thing to do. But I am often frustrated by his assumption that he has me all worked out. I hate that.  It annoys me. He does know me intimately. He has me mostly figured out, but there are definitely some areas which he has me all wrong.

Part of it boils down to his tough love /no excuses approach with me. I am not allowed to make excuses. I am not allowed to feel sorry for myself. I already know these rules. So why the hell did I let my guard down tonight?

 In a rare moment of weakness I cried.

At first he was the compassionate husband. I needed that. It felt really good to connect. But when I started to unpack all of the things that I have been bottling up for weeks, I saw his compassion give way to the need to fix it. And though he wishes to fix it because he loves me…he has wrongly sized up his ability to do so.

Personally, he is motivated by being tough. He is tough with himself and it works for him. It is actually something that impresses me tremendously. He can make up his mind to accomplish a goal, and he will never make an excuse. NEVER. It will be done.

But his mistake is one that men often make…assuming that what works for him works for everyone. So…he got tough with me. Not mean. Just tough.

But I am not one to respond to tough. It has the opposite effect. I just want to give up and cry more.

I am tough enough with myself….actually I am just mean to myself. I have been a big meanie as long as I can remember. I have no compassion where I am concerned. I call myself names and I berate myself for all my failures.

I rely on outsiders to validate me.

That is a real problem. And perhaps it is the reason why I can’t overcome my demons.  

No what I need is compassion. And validation. But I am starting to realize that those things can’t come from anywhere but myself. Because unless I am shutting down the voices, I am simply undoing what anyone else might do or say to offer me the compassion and validation I need.

I am not talking about making excuses for myself. I just need to let go of the shame and the blame.

It’s not to say that I shouldn’t take responsibility for where I have made mistakes….I am just not sure that the blame and shame is productive.

And if I am going to make any lasting changes I know two things are for certain

#1 I have to do this myself. Not necessarily alone. But I am going to have to do this…no one can do it for me. I have to make the difference in my life. No one is coming to my rescue.

#2 I can’t keep getting in my own way. I sabotage myself with my beliefs about myself. I don’t know what I should believe about myself. This is new territory. But I know that I have been very cruel and it is time to put an end to that.

So what is it that I don’t like about my life that needs changing?

In no particular order....

·        Obvious to everyone and the cause of much of my shame is my weight. I weigh close to 250 pounds. For over 15 years I have struggled and yo-yoed with my weight.

·        My relationship with my oldest daughter. I have really made some mistakes.  Sometimes I have no idea what I am doing as a mom. I have lost the part of me that knew how to be a kid and I think we clash because we are so different...yet somehow exactly alike. I know she has a lot of anger with me.

·        My relationship with my youngest daughter. She needs me…and I have not been there for her. 

·        My relationship with God. I need Him. I need to work out my salvation, have assurance, and see evidence of my faith through my sanctification.

·        I need to resolve to fully understand and accept the relationship my parents have created with me. I need to come to terms with what their lives will ultimately produce.

·        I need to devote myself to a more peaceful way of life, one that is washed in prayer, calm, full of laughter, loving relationships, gratefulness, kindness, gentle speech, good food, generosity, and simplicity.

·        I need to walk away from fear for good by placing complete trust in Christ.

·        I need to deeply connect with my husband and enjoy each and every day as a gift…not taking a moment for granted, but not worrying about when those moments may end.

 I don’t need a brand new me. The diamonds are there. They just remain in this dark mine. I need to dig deep, sift out the junk, polish and set these qualities in the finest settings so that at the end of my life I have something of value to leave to those who remain. I want to live a life worthy of producing treasure. I don’t want my life to be a heap of ruins when I am gone.

I am closing in on 40. And perhaps it is this ticking of time that has caused me to be in pain tonight. I feel a sense of foreboding that I am running out of time. Sometimes this leads to a little panic, a little desperation, and even anger.

But I need to see this as a gift instead. Without the ticking of time, without death, without an end, there would be no need to make changes. I would have all the time in the world….and I would never begin. So time and death are a gift. They are a reminder that it is time to begin. How much time I have left to accomplish these things will be God’s gift to me. But I have accepted the gift and I have decided here and now to embrace time and death as a friend who are here to remind me to make the most of LIFE.

A GOAL: Drink more water. Listen to music. Practice soothing your spirit by surrounding yourself in things that calm.

A COMMITMENT: Get off the internet! Your limited time is worth more than the forgettable pages and hours wasted.