Nineteen

Why do we all have two faces, the one we see in our own mind, and the one we share with the public? Is it just that we've been raised to be polite while out in society, or all the "to do unto others" bullshit we learned growing up? Why do we all rarely say or do what we're actually thinking? Why do we wear fake smiles when we're at the counter at McDonald's ordering a number one? Why is it inappropriate to say move your slow ass you stupid bitch and get me my fries now! When we meet a super hot guy why don't we look at him and say wow, let's have some sexy time right now- why do we coyly wait until the tenth date to say what we really felt on that first night? I know some people never learn to behave properly, that little switch inside of them never fully engages to the on position, and they grow up to be serial killers, or Republicans. We've all heard that phrase, children say the darnedest things, and when your three-year-old tells you, Mommy you stink, you think it's cute and you smile and laugh. But let your husband say the same thing to you, you get hysterical and want to slap him. Why is that? Why is it cute when a kid says something that is completely inappropriate for an adult to say? At a recent family gathering, we were playing a board game where we had to shout out words to fit into a story. The youngest child there shouted out "rectum!" and we all howled with laughter, but had one of the adults said that word there would have been outraged gasps and they would have been shunned for life. Why is being obviously truthful with people sometimes the most painful choice? Once a friend of mine and her small daughter were out, and they ran into another mutual friend of ours. The daughter looked at the other woman and said loudly "Wow lady, you are SO fat!" Both women were stunned, and my girlfriend wanted to die of embarrassment. But it was true, our friend was around 400 pounds. Surely she knew she was fat, no skinny jeans in this gal's closet. But for obvious reasons the mother was horrified and apologized and reprimanded her small child. As for me, I laughed my ass off when I heard the story, because I could just imagine the three of them all standing there on the sidewalk outside of K-Mart, where this happened. Film that scene and throw it on a hidden camera show or reality TV, and everyone else out there would have busted a gut laughing too. But it wasn't polite, and it wasn't appropriate, and it was very hurtful to the person it was said to. My girlfriend wasn't a horrible mother, she just hadn't gotten around to explaining the ways of the world to her little girl. That same child would one day grow up and learn that is wasn't okay to say things like that to people, and that "the truth hurts". Why is that? And why can't most of us take it? Most of us eventually start to understand exactly what "those things" are, we know what to say and what not to, in order to keep the peace with those around us. With X, I eventually started saying what was really on my mind, and where did it get me? In huge fights, in a courtroom getting divorced. Is that because I would raise my voice back at him, or because whenever he called me a stupid whore I would scream back at him he was a worthless bastard? With A things are so different, he is so different, he thinks deeply before he speaks, he's never hurtful to anyone. Is this the real him? Or is he just holding it all in, not wanting to be truthful because he knows it would upset me if he really told me how he felt when he comes home at night and I still haven't folded the pile of laundry sitting in the basket? But I am the same way with him. Whenever he gently teases me about something I make sure I laugh appropriately, when inside I'm wondering oh my god does my hair really look that frizzy today or is he just picking at me? Whenever A leaves in the morning to go to work and tells me to have a nice day, I always answer with a smile plastered on my face, not because that's how I'm feeling but because I know that's what he really wants to see, that's what will make him feel better about me. He doesn't see the real me, just my false face, the one I reserve for him. I make certain to remain in happy mode, because if he sees one slight slump of the shoulders, he'll suddenly feel bad because he upset me, and I don't want to make him feel bad, so the cycle just plays itself out. Now that I'm middle-aged in my 40's, I recognize that it's not cute for me to say, you are so stupid to someone, even though that's what I feel. A lot of us also hide our beliefs from others, or we talk around certain subjects, for fear of hurting or insulting the other person. When we do voice our true feelings, it oftentimes can lead to horrible fights or worse, we are misunderstood. In conversations with my mother on the phone, I hold back about 80% of what I really want to say to her, because she can sense the slightest of sarcasm or anger in my voice, and she gets her nose bent out of shape. So our conversations are very shallow and to me, wasteful. How do I tell her that I hate talking to her on the phone, that I think her life is boring and I don't want to spend 30 minutes listening about it, that I really don't want to know about her friends' whatever whatever, that whenever she talks to me I am actually holding the phone away from my ear and listening to Law and Order instead of her blah blah blah? But I remain polite and say un-huh in the right places, because I don't want to hurt her feelings by telling her that I'm really not interested and I have to hang up now. Hell, I'm even polite to those asshole telemarketers, because that's how I was raised when I really want to say fuck no I don't want to enroll in free credit card fraud protection for my Visa. Instead I say no thank you. My parents are devoted Christians, so we never talk about my atheism, even though my father's father was one as well all of his life. All the years I was married to X, I never once even hinted to family or friends that he smoked pot and stayed high. Only once we were getting a divorce did I tell everyone, always ashamed to before- afraid of their reactions that I would stay married to him. I gave his pot smoking as the reason for the divorce, and everyone nodded their heads in strong agreement. The real reason was I had stopped loving him and that I despised him for a whole host of wrongs, but trying to make others understand it would have been too burdensome. It was easier for me to say, and for them to hear, it's because he's a drug addict. I worked with a woman who had an enormous ass, just disproportionally so, and she would wear tight shiny silver pants or camouflage jeans to work, and everyone in the office wanted to say, what the fuck are you wearing, do you know how awful you look? But not one of us ever did, to her face of course, because we talked about it like crazy behind her back. That brings up the subject of gossip. Why do we say to others stuff about someone, that we won't say straight out to that other person's face? Why did I listen to one girlfriend natter away about how she was spending her son's child support check on the Margarita mixes and decorations for their weekend party, sit and grin and nod politely and say sure I understand, when inside I was burning with disgust and as soon as possible I would run to my best friend down the hall and spill the story, saying can you believe she is so fucked up and crazy? Why didn't I say that to the girl telling me the story? Why didn't I say, damn woman you are insane, listen to yourself! It was how I felt, but it would have hurt her, even pissed her off. And I didn't want to do that. Why? Maybe it's because that, no matter how much we deny it to ourselves, we really do worry about what others think of us, that we want to be seen as a likable person? That we really want the girl taking our McDonald's order to think, wow, what a nice lady? We don't know her, and by next week she'll have moved on and up to working at Wal-Mart, so we probably will never see her again. Why do we care what she thinks of us? And those that don't care, the ones who do show their real faces in public, are seen as rude or messed up or lacking the proper social skills. When in fact, they are just being authentic. What if we were all authentic? It would be World War III.

Eighteen

Loving A has been one of my greatest joys, but it also came at a time when I was entering a new phase in my life so to speak. He came along at the right time and I was in the right place to meet him when I did. I met him as my marriage to X was coming, thankfully, to its bitter end. I was only waiting out my separation so the divorce proceedings could finally take place. A was very cautious when we first started dating, since we worked together and technically, legally, I was still married (not to mention he was management and I was not). In the beginning, neither of us had expectations as to where this relationship was going. I, of course, fell instantly in love with him because after such a horrendous marriage and lack of a sex life with X, anything else seemed magical. At first it was only for sex, I think for him as much as me, because he wasn't seeing anyone at the time we met and hadn't been for awhile. And X and I had stopped having sex long ago, since we could barely tolerate speaking to one another. A and I were very careful not to be seen out in public together, and at the office we pretended that we barely knew each other, except when work dictated that we meet for official reasons. But I had desire for this man that I'd never felt before, not for anyone or anything in my entire life. For awhile it was fun and daring, to keep the secret of an office affair locked away in my heart, to have a younger man take an interest in me, to see a potential new future on my horizon that would be life after X. But then the secrecy started to get old, at least for me, and I wanted to be able to share our relationship with my girlfriends at work, with my family, with everyone. A would never come to my home to see me, even though X had long long ago moved out. X still lived in the same city, and A was always worried that X might drive by and see his car, and want to start something. A was better safe than sorry. I always drove to where A lived, which was in another city, another county, and I would spend every weekend at his house. I wondered, what if X drives by my house and sees my car gone at 2am on Saturday night, what will he think then? Sometimes I worried, because since we'd gotten separated X was very angry about my throwing him out of the house and disrupting his "life" (I say it that way because his entire life consisted of a crummy manual labor job and smoking pot), and he called me to make threatening phone calls every now and again, and at one point had started to demand money from me- alimony because I'd been the one who asked for the divorce, not him. What a complete shit!! But things rolled along, time passed, my divorce date with X grew closer, and my time with A, my love for A, was all that kept me going, it was all that I had to look forward to every day. Only A was holding back, not letting me in too deep, and not giving as much of himself as I wanted. When I finally confessed how much I loved him, that I wanted to be with him, he gave me nothing back in return but mere affection. I thought I saw an expression of love on his face, in his eyes, when he looked at me but nothing of the sort ever came out of his mouth. When I would say how much I loved him, he would just look at me sadly and say I'm sorry. Was he sorry because I loved him, and he didn't love me back? He said he wasn't going to give his heart to a woman, a married woman, who could toss him aside and go back to her husband at any minute. I said, are you joking? Do you know what a fucking asshole X is? It left A unmoved, and unwavering in his refusal to share his true feelings with me. But I persisted, and I stayed with him, because I felt in my heart that he loved me, that he was just afraid of being hurt because he had confessed his last girlfriend, who he loved and was going to propose to, had suddenly and without warning left him for another man. The previous woman in his life had also suddenly left him, after he decided to take on a different career challenge and was overnight making a third of his previous salary- she ran up his credit cards then moved away to another state- leaving him alone to try to heal while he had to file bankruptcy. A was not wanting to go through the hurt again, I realized. This man had terrible luck with picking the wrong woman. He was a nice guy, I'm sure there were women out there who could zero in on such a man, and for whatever reason, take advantage of him. That's not true love, to get upset about a job change and ruin someone's credit then run away. As A and I continued to date, I did everything I could to prove to him my worth, that I was not going to hurt him, that I was not out for his money, or trying to find someone to take care of me once I was single. I already owned my own house, owned my own car, when we went to dinner I demanded to pay the bill on many occasions, I bought him gifts and showered him with physical affection- I'd had years of it stored up since X was such a dreg and didn't deserve it. I even once completely paid for one of our weekends out of town, had even planned the whole trip, to show him that I didn't "need" him but that I truly "wanted" him, such a huge difference! I wanted to be his partner, not his dependent. He always showed me tenderness and was sweet, but still no promises for the future, no outbursts about his love for me. And still I was legally married to X, although I had limited to no contact with him. Things looked brighter to me when A sold his large two-story home so far away, the one he'd bought with the long ago ex-wife, and he moved into an upscale apartment over towards a famous golf community, only 20 miles from my house now, instead of 50. I loved going to see him there, was finally feeling like the pampered girlfriend to a rich man, as he wined and dined me in the expensive restaurants in the area. He bought a new convertible sports car, and we toodled around the city on sunny Saturdays with the top down, and I felt glamorous sitting beside him, my dark sunglasses on, holding hands with him as he shifted gears. But still no talks about our relationship. His apartment complex was gated, and it took him a long time to finally give me a key to the apartment, then an opener for the large wrought-iron gate. I finally felt like we were progressing into a new stage. Finally, finally, X and I met in court and after what seemed like forever, I walked away from the building a divorced and free woman, legally back to my maiden name. I was rid of X in every way possible. I had visions in my head of A dropping to his knees that night and proposing to me. A and I had been dating 1 1/2 years at this point, surely long enough for him to decide. We were in our late 30's, not kids, not immature, not out sowing our wild oats. But A remained mute on any commitment. Months went by, we continued dating, we continued our routine, took another cruise to the tropics, vacationed to see my family, to see his. As always, I stayed with him on the weekends, going with him as he ran his errands of grocery shopping, getting new tires for his old truck, his hair cut, shopping at Sam's. He used this as his excuse for never coming to stay at my house for the weekend- it was the only time he had to get all of his personal things done. Even back then he worked until 6 or 7 at night. I continued to try and show him I wasn't after his money- the first year we were dating was the first year he made it to a six figure income- but in the meantime I was running up the balance on my Visa by offering to pay for the occasional dinner out. I was trying to show him my independence by not paying off my credit card, how intelligent! Finally, after months went by after my divorce, and still A did not make a commitment to me, I truly started to become weary of it all. One night at his place I started to cry- very unlike me- and I grew angry when he still wouldn't admit that he loved me (which at this point I was sure he did) and I was beyond frustrated. I loved him, true, but I did not want to forever be a 39-year-old divorcee with a younger boyfriend, how cliche was that? At this point, after dating for almost two years now, he still wouldn't even go out to lunch with me for fear one of our co-workers would see- I didn't care, I was divorced now, and many people now knew we were dating. But as upper management, he always had to be careful of what others might see and think. I thought about it for some time, and knew I was putting the entire pleasant arrangement at risk, but I was prepared for the consequences. I was prepared to break up with him, to even leave our shared place of employment, and if it came to it I was prepared to sell my house and move back to my hometown if I had to. X and I were divorced, the only thing that kept me from going home was my relationship with A- without that, there was nothing left for me in my adopted city. One night on the phone, I told A that I was not coming over for the weekend, that I was tired of packing a bag every Friday and coming to stay with him, coming home exhausted either late on Sunday night or creeping out of his apartment in the darkness of Monday morning. It wasn't fair to me, and I felt like I was living with him part time, that I was a part time wife because when I came over I did his laundry, cleaned his apartment, we cooked meals and shopped together, we had passionate sex, we took vacations together. I was done with it, I wanted more, I wanted everything and I wanted the title of Mrs A to go along with it. And unless he wanted more as well, then it had to be over for us. He listened carefully to me on the phone, but I couldn't gauge how he was feeling, because he barely responded and when he did, it wasn't the way I had hoped- oh I love you so much!! It was only a simple yes or no or I see, as though this were one of his business meetings. After the conversation was over, I felt I had said everything I needed to say, I was drained, and it was up to him now. He knew how I felt about him, he'd always known that, and now he knew what it was I wanted from him. I was true to my word, and for the first time since we'd started dating, I did not pack my bag on Friday and I did not go to his home for the weekend.

Seventeen

It seems I've always had violence in my heart, in my head. But not really in real life. I love violent movies, I read violent books, I listen to violent music, I have violent fantasies. Maybe that is completely abnormal and I'm a freak, and that doesn't surprise me. For a woman, I probably shouldn't feel that way. I've never laid violent hands on another human being, except for a boyfriend in high school, who I once punched in the balls one day when I overheard him talking to a friend about screwing his ex over the weekend. He's lucky that's all I did to him, because this jerk used to slap me across the face whenever I annoyed him. He's the only one that ever did that, but because I was 16 and "in love" I didn't know that was the wrong way to be with someone. Towards the end of my marriage to X, he had started grabbing my arms and shoving me around, pushing me down, throwing his fists into the wall or charging towards me like he wanted to hit me, and once overturned a TV set he was so pissed at me about something. But never a slap, never a punch in the face, never a bruise. But it was still wrong. I think all the pot made him basically lazy, and if not for him being so high all of the time, he probably would have physically abused me a great deal, if only to relieve his frustrations with me. But I was violent in the relationship, too, throwing dishes and screaming obscenities at him and slamming things around and putting my fist through a door and even once upending a table to send it crashing over and breaking. For thirteen years I was that way with him, I thought that was just me, just my personality, I had a hot temper. But there is not an ounce of that in my marriage to A, and throughout all our years together we barely even raise our voices to one another, even during a disagreement- when we do have one it is minor and easily fixable. A is a very calm, thoughtful, insightful man and has no need of raising his voice, or pounding home his point, or even of winning the argument. And so I have become the same. While married to X, because he was always temperamental and angry and paranoid and disillusioned, I also mirrored his behavior and his moods, and we clashed almost daily for over a decade, when I just became too tired to fight the fight any longer. With A my spirit has calmed, my demeanor is mild, my voice is quiet. Probably the worst thing I've done lately is spank one of my cats in frustration, for escaping outside and making me chase after him. (Who spanks a cat, now really?!) I now mirror A's personality, and we get along every day, and we don't spend our energy battling each other. Although there is no longer a hint of violence in my relationship with this tender, genuine man, I do still harbor violence inside. Okay, maybe it's just my "tastes". Everyone has a favorite genre of movie or music, maybe my tastes just happen to be violent. I love gory, sickening movies like Seven. I listen to Disturbed and Tool and Slipknot. I read true crime novels, the more disturbing and twisted the better I like them. The only TV shows I watch are the crime dramas or American Justice and City Confidential, or documentaries about murders or life behind bars. I don't know why, I don't know where that comes from, or why these are my tendencies. Maybe I am just fascinated with that side of human behavior, because it is so far removed from what I know in my own world, and I am strangely compelled to take a peek at it, like looking at bloody limbs hanging out of a wrecked car. We all do that, we can't help ourselves, we all slow to look over at the mangled vehicles to the side of the road as we pass by, safe and secure and whole in our own air-conditioned, plush-seated cars. We may reach out to touch our husband lightly on the hand, and say oh my goodness I hope everyone is okay, but we still stare hard and long and secretly hope to witness something gross, out of the ordinary, something we can talk about at work on Monday morning. Come on, admit it, you do it. So why do I read books about rapists and men who torture and women who poison, then write my husband a sweet love note on soft pink paper with heart stickers and leave it on his desk here at home for him to find in the evening? Why do I listen to head-banging music on my iPod while I'm pounding away on the treadmill, then email my family back home to say what a beautiful day it is here and oh we're having spaghetti for dinner tonight? I have such an overwhelming love for animals that I spend a fortune on feeding the wildlife in the yard, I take in stray animals, and I can't even stand the thought of killing a wasp who slips into the house. But later on when I'm sitting silently out on the back deck staring out into the lush green woods, full of life, I'm having wild daydreams about being a famous hired killer and taking strange men, forcing my passion on them. Weird? I don't know. Are there other women out there who have fantasies about being a pirate captain, instead of a fashion model? Call me a crazy person, that's fine. I am not acting out on my fantasies of being a rich, government assassin with many lovers all over the world. And I can say with 100% surety that I never will. One day I may sell a novel, or a painting. But I will always be a boring housewife, who may have a few disturbing and odd thoughts throughout the day while she listens to the laundry spinning in its final cycle. I do not know any serial killers, and I pray to the universe I never meet one, but I am extremely absorbed when I am reading about them and their exploits. I watch Criminal Minds and wish I had chosen the FBI for a career. I watch CSI and wish I had become a forensic scientist in real life. But I didn't, and I won't. I do not plan on ever killing anyone, but I certainly fantasize about it. In my fantasies I am not torturing little children, but killing the bad guy, assassinating terrorists or drug lords. You know, a female version of Miami Vice I suppose, only darker and more violent. I'm not certain what that says about me, if that means my disturbing thoughts show that I'm a disturbing individual. I started reading Stephen King back in the 1970's when Carrie came out. Back then I also listened to Black Sabbath, read comic books about dark and deadly villains, loved shoot-em-up Westerns and slice-em-up horror movies. So have I always had a leaning towards violence? Or does it simply mean I have bad taste in music and literature?

Sixteen

Saying something out loud does not necessarily make it so. When A comes home from work and asks me if I had a good day, and I say yes, who is it really hurting that I've lied to him? Me? A? Would it be more hurtful to A if I told him the truth? That I sat around the house all day with a miserable empty brain, wondering what I should be doing, wondering why I did not go back to bed the minute he left for work that morning, with not enough energy or desire to even turn on the TV? Does he really need to know that I sat for hours, sulking in unprovoked and unsubstantiated anger, at my past, at life, at fate, at the happiness gods who forgot about me long ago? Yesterday found me spinning my wheels, as always, and accomplishing nothing. Running household errands gets me out of my prison long enough to pick up A's dress shirts and pants from the dry cleaner because I am so useless I can't iron them properly, to pick up more food for the cats because I'm so self-centered I've let them almost run out of it, but then it's back to the dungeon. More hours of staring at the wall, trying to decide what to do because there is so much that needs to be done, but never doing anything because I can never decide where to begin. I started taking St. John's Wort a few days ago, because I've always read it's for "mild" depression, which I'm self-diagnosing for myself. Add that to the mix of pain medication and sleeping pills I take every day, and we'll see how or if it helps any. I don't want to be deliriously, bounce-off-the-walls happy, I just want to feel normal and balanced. I try to do all the things I read in the health magazines to combat mild depression- exercise, get enough sleep, get outside for sunshine, take vitamins, stroke the pets. Some days I think it's working, and I feel better, but some days I just want to mentally check out. A is out of town on business today, and he said he will be home later than usual. I feel almost relieved, as I did last night when he said he was going to hang out with his buddy after work for an hour or so, since we are leaving for vacation soon and they won't see each other again for a bit. Maybe he avoids coming home lately, I don't know, I hope not and yet I wouldn't blame him. He's always worked long days, 12 hours, but it seems since we moved here last year and he started his new position, he works even longer days. And I don't understand, because now he's an even bigger boss with more people under him. Why can't he delegate, and come home to me? Why do I whine about him not coming home early, yet say I feel relieved when he comes home late? It doesn't make any sense. I miss him during the day and want him home, but when he's not here I'm super okay with it, or do I just convince myself of that in order to fight against the loneliness? Vacation starts in a little over 48 hours, and I will be surrounded by A and family for five days and five nights. I am not sure I will survive, but on the outside everyone will just see me having a nice time, relaxing on the beach, engaging with relatives, shopping for clothes, going out to eat, hanging out at the BBQ's, going out on the boat. All the things a normal person would do on vacation, all the things that are expected out of me, but for much of that time there will be no great, true happiness behind the motions and the smiles and the laughs. But not one of them will know it, so what does it matter? Isn't it more important that the family thinks I'm happy, than for me to actually be happy? Only A will know it, recognize it, later on at night when we're finally alone in our own bedroom at the beach house, when I can sigh deeply and let down my guard and allow the smile to finally fade from my face. He will know it then, and ask me what's wrong, and I will answer nothing I'm just tired. It's sometimes difficult for me to go back and forth between my two blogs, because they are so different. My other blog, which I've been writing for some time now, presents me as the epitome of excitement and happiness and shows me as the joyful wife and homemaker, and blogger friend who posts lots of fun photos and has tons of cute widgets with bright colors all over my page, and I leave encouraging and humorous comments on all my blog friends' posts. Then I come over here and post what is really on my mind, and I've left this blog plain and unassuming for a reason. Complete anonymity and freedom. I am following a few blogs here, but I don't intend to ever leave comments, and I don't intend to respond if I ever get comments on this page. I'm not looking to engage in conversation with friends on this blog. I'm not even hoping to get comments, because I'm not wanting moral support or understanding. If you read me, that is okay, I wouldn't be writing it here instead of the pages of a spiral notebook journal if I didn't have expectations that someone might read it. But I am only here to work things out for myself, to put in writing what's in my head, so I can go back and look at it a few days or weeks later, and to maybe one day figure it all out, to have that light bulb go off suddenly over my aching head. I can't put a finger on when I started feeling this way, unhappy, loss of emotions, loss of interest. Was it when I married X, or when I started to gain monumental weight and felt gross about myself, or when I hurt my back and started down the dark road of chronic pain, or when I gave up my job and moved away with A to this hick town where I now spend my days all alone? I don't know. It may be that all of these things have slowly compounded throughout the years, to lead me to this point in my life. How does a wife tell a husband that she is so bad off in her head that on some days she doesn't even take a shower until an hour before he comes home for the evening? That she doesn't even care when he comes home, that he IS home? How do I tell A that the real reason I didn't clean the house is not because of my back pain, but because I just really don't care that the carpet is dirty? That the real reason I overspend is because I feel dead inside and that each time I'm hoping that the next new pair of earrings or the $300 purse will make me feel better about myself? That the hundreds of dollars worth of flowers I insisted on planting in the garden when we moved here are now a laborious chore to tend to that I have come to hate and don't care if they die? I started a gratitude journal some time back, I know it is hokey but I thought it could help me. Five things a day, that's all I made myself write. Number one on my list every day was that A came home to me. I used to write it thinking I meant that he wasn't killed in a car crash, or didn't have a heart attack at work, that he came home to me alive. Now I am starting to think I mean I am grateful he just came home to me at all, that he didn't finally say to hell with it, that he didn't give up on me quite yet, that he decided I was worth loving and living with. I am tinkering with the idea of trying to start another novel. I've written so many of them, but they were all back when I was in my 20's and still living at home. I got rejection letters from many publishers, but at least I tried to get them published. Maybe now, over 20 years later, my inner voice has changed and I can write something more meaningful than the fluffy historical romances I tried to write back then. It seems as though people are now more accepting of dark or sad, truthful stories about women, about life. Wish I could pen a best-selling spy thriller about a manly secret agent and get rich from it, but that's just not what I'm about. They say write what you know best. For me, it's the secret painful life of a housewife stuck out in the country alone. Don't know if anyone would want to read that. But maybe it would be therapeutic for me to write it all out in novel format, instead of daily posts on this blog, where my readership seems to be zero so far.

Fifteen

I got pregnant twice with X. The first time was early in our relationship before we were married and still just shacking up. It was a stupid accident, it happened one night while we were out of town visiting his college buddy, and it was a holiday and he was drunk and we just didn't use protection. I was terrified when my period was so so so late, and the little stick showed me the sign I did not want to see. He told me, I don't want any children, if you keep this baby I am out of here. If you want to be with me, you are going to have to make a choice between me or having the baby. Well, he couldn't have laid it out more plainly than that. So, at almost three months pregnant, I allowed him to take me to another city to secure our secrecy, and I had an abortion. He was such a caring guy that after the procedure instead of taking me straight home to bed, while I was still groggy and in pain, he left me splayed out across the back seat of the car while he stopped here and there around town to run errands, pick up dinner for himself. No one even knew I was pregnant, although I missed a great deal of work due to horrible 24-hour "morning" sickness, and lost my job over it. But I couldn't keep it to myself and told several friends and family members I'd been pregnant, and had a terrible miscarriage. I got a great deal of sympathy and all the cliches like it wasn't meant to be or don't worry you're still young enough to try again. My no nonsense sibling said, well good, you aren't married to him, you have no business having a baby with the man. To this day, only A knows that it was an abortion and not a miscarriage, not even my best friend in the whole world, or even my one sibling, knows that I had an abortion. I don't feel evil or ashamed for doing it, and I believe that every woman has the right to make that choice and to have that option available to her. I just feel it's not necessary for others to know, not even now. But at the time I didn't feel it had been my decision or my choice, I felt as though X had forced me into it, had cheated me out of experiencing pregnancy and giving birth. It's me or the baby, that's what he had said. His loving gift to me was the choice of an abortion and a continued relationship with him, or life as a single, unwed mother without him. Oh, afterward I cried and cried about that for months, even years, would sob until I thought my heart would explode with the grief and anger and emptiness- maybe even now I still hate X for it, still harbor serious thoughts of bodily harm against him in retaliation. Here, let me rip your balls off, see how much you like that- oh sorry, does that hurt, do you miss them?? And back then X would have the nerve to try to comfort me whenever I saw a cute little baby and I would bust out into tears, sad and longing for the child he'd manipulated me into destroying. Maybe I made the right decision, maybe I made the wrong decision. I don't know, I will never know. I say now that I don't like kids, but if I'd had that one, would I have changed? Would I now be a completely different and happy person, or would my depression be even deeper with more things to worry over? Would I have suddenly been filled with the sweet and caring maternal instinct I now lack? Or would I have given birth to a child and grown to be indifferent, or resentful because the child belonged to X and I hated him? Would I have even had another one? Would having children change our marriage, and I would still be- suddenly happily- married to X?? All I know is that I would now have a child who was about to enter college, possibly marriage, and even possibly with a child of their own- a grandchild for ME. On one hand, I'm glad I did not have this child, because I would forever be bound to the asshole known as X, and fuck it all but I can't even imagine that right now because he was such a bastard, and GOOD RIDDANCE. And since he did drugs, I could have ended up with a child who had health problems, or special needs, because his spunk was loaded with pot-filled DNA. The second time I got pregnant by X was later on, after we were married and older, and I did not and never did tell him I was pregnant, even after I lost it. What was the point? He wouldn't have cared, he probably would have said something super comforting like whew, we missed a bullet with that one. It happened quickly and quietly, as one day I was headed out to an evening college course I was taking, and I was running late. I was trying to swing a backpack over my shoulder as I ran across the deck of the house, and I tripped. I fell down the entire flight of steps in one long cartwheel, landing hard enough on my back that I got the wind knocked out of me and actually blacked out for a second or two. As I was on the ground in the driveway, staring up at the sky, I screamed for X over and over and over again, but he never came out of the house and I would like to believe he simply did not hear me and just wasn't ignoring me. After I could breathe properly again, I got up, brushed off my clothes, and went on my way. The next day I bled just a little bit, and then that was it, I was no longer pregnant. I don't know what would have happened had I not miscarried, perhaps X would have been a different man by that point in our life together. I do know I would not have had another abortion, not for him, not for anyone, whether or not he "wanted" me to, whether or not he threatened me again with abandoning me. We were married, much older, renting a house and not an apartment, although he was still smoking pot like it was free, and his job situation was shaky, as it always was. But perhaps he would have accepted a pregnancy, been happy about it, maybe a child would have changed his life around. But I doubt it, he was always the most self-centered man I'd ever met, even to this day. I can't imagine he would have been a good father, in fact I picture him as that man who runs around all night long while the frazzled wife is at home doing all of the child rearing. X refused to ever change for me, for our marriage, so I don't believe he would have changed for a baby either. Years later, when A and I started dating, one of the issues in our relationship was having children. I was already in my late 30's, he was slightly younger, but not much. He didn't have children either. In fact, I used the idea of having children together to convince him to marry me, although I would hope he would have made that decision on his own after 2 1/2 years of dating. I was going to be 40 the year we got married, so we knew our window was short for getting pregnant, and I used it against him, so to speak. And at that point, for an extremely short little time, I loved A enough that I also convinced myself I wanted children, with him, because he is such a beautiful and loving man, and I knew he would be a magnificent father. I told him if he wanted even a small chance at having a family, we'd better get married asap and start trying right away. I admit in the first few months, maybe the first year, I was very hopeful and I did everything I could to help us get pregnant and have a healthy baby- I gave up caffeine and soft cheeses and lunch meats and took folic acid, we used an ovulation kit to time our sex perfectly, I would even stay there for an extra twenty minutes in bed with my hips raised up (that's supposed to help the little spermies get to where they're going). He even gave up smoking and drinking while we were trying to conceive- wow, what a man!! After the first few years passed by and we didn't get pregnant, I grew more and more content with the idea of no children, and I think so did A. Now, at our age, we are both glad we didn't have children, both for the financial strains, the time constraints, and the carefree comfortable life we now lead. Life with children would be extremely different- no more jet-setting or packing bags for a quick weekend getaway, or spontaneous dinners out, or doing whatever the hell we want when we want, sleeping in on the weekends, having sex whenever the mood strikes and not worrying about being loud or worrying about the kids hearing daddy spanking mommy, cussing at the dinner table, watching porn right there in the living room. You can tell me about all the joys of raising children that I'm missing out on, how children would complete me, how children would make me happy and make my marriage stronger. Blah, don't care, don't want to hear it. A and I have no regrets, and instead of putting all our extra money into a college savings account for a child who may turn out to be an ungrateful unemployed dope fiend (like X) or a mass murderer, we put it all into stocks and 401K's and savings for OUR retirement, our life together, our future. Ours. Call me selfish, but if I'm happy about anything in life, it's that I do not have kids.

Fourteen

Since this is anonymous, I am going to say this phrase, which has always been buried deep inside of me but never uttered to anyone: I hate kids. Well, I don't hate them, but I don't like them. Well, maybe not the kids themselves, but I don't want to spend even one minute of my day talking about or listening to anything about your kids. I don't like hearing stories about how they are learning to pee pee in the big potty, or how they won their last soccer game, or what they are wearing to their first big dance with the boy from next door. I don't care about looking at their latest school photos, or hearing details of their upcoming field trip to the state capitol. I don't want to be invited to their birthdays, or graduations, or weddings, and not only do I not want invites, but I don't want to feel obligated to buy them gifts or see all the pictures you took of the party at the skating rink. I don't want to buy gift wrap or popcorn tins or cookies to support their team/marching band/scout troop. And please, don't email me with some kind of school project they are doing where I have to fill in the answers to twenty questions, then forward it back to you and ten of my friends- oh, this is fun and please keep it going, yadda yadda. No, I do not think it's sooooo cute when your baby spits up on my blouse or makes a stinky in his pants or throws his toy at my face. I find most children and stories/photos of them very boring, and I can't relate, and just because I'm a woman does not mean I can instantly fall into a stupor of joy while you show me what your child is going to wear for his first Halloween. Just because I am a woman does not mean I want to cradle your newborn baby in my arms or coo about how cute she is, and please do not invite me to any baby showers, I loathe them and everything about them- the gifts of baby clothes or breast pumps or teething rings, all the talk about being pregnant and what to expect, the oh-so-cutesy cake with pink and blue booties made from butter cream frosting, and the moronic games that get played at these shindigs- it's like nails on a chalkboard to me. And BORING!!!! I am offended by other women who believe that all women should love babies and toddlers, women who think there is something wrong with me when I say no thanks to offers of holding their child. Saying that, I'm glad I don't have children, and no I am NOT just saying this out of jealousy because I don't have kids and you do. I went back and forth all of my life with wanting to have a child, but fate pretty much decided it for me, and I'm good with scratching off a losing ticket on that lottery. Even when I was younger, I think I knew I didn't want kids. I never babysat, even as a teenager, because I didn't like kids even back then- while all my friends were racking up the cash with babysitting every summer. I tried it once, for a neighbor kid, and ended up calling my mom to come get me because I hated it and didn't want to do it, so she finished the chore for me. Now, I do love and adore all the nieces and nephews, and love to buy them gifts, get emails about them, and I even love to take my own photos of them during visits. Family is different, and we have a total of six kids on both sides of the family, to enjoy. But as far as friends' kids go, and even grandkids, I really could not care less. At my age, most of friends have grown children, so there isn't much to talk about. Some of my friends have grandchildren already, and when I would meet them for coffee or dinner, I really didn't want to spend the time talking about little kids I've never met and never will. But I would listen as politely as I could, and act interested, all for the sake of not coming off like a bitch to my dearest of girlfriends. One acquaintance always always brought me photos of her two boys, and talked my head off about them- all I could see were two very overweight redneck children who did poorly in school but were spoiled with every toy in the world, and I would listen to extremely odd stories about how her oldest son (in his early teens) would get in bed naked with her and she was perfectly fine with that, even thought it was cute and sweet. Oooh-kaaay, that's TMI for me, and a little on the fucked up side of creepy. I've found that people will say almost anything about their kids, like nothing is off limits, as though you're commenting about an object and not another human being. They talk about their damn bowel movements, for the love of Pete!! I do not want to know that your kid made a giant poop in his diaper just that morning. Hey, I took a dump in the ladies' room earlier, but I'm not talking about it over coffee in the break room!! I guess saying I don't like kids is a bit strong, what I should say is that when I'm with adults, wanting adult time, in adult locations like a nice steak house or Starbucks, I do not want to see or hear anything that has to do with your kids or anyone else's. And I sure as hell do not want to hear your kid screaming in the restaurant or see your kid running up and down the aisles at the movies on Friday night. Hey, have some respect and dignity, or get the hell out!! You do NOT have the right to fuck up my evening with your out of control kid- it's a public place that everyone is supposed to enjoy and if you can't keep your child quiet at 10pm in an R-rated movie, you really have no business being there in the first place. I have NO patience for that kind of crap, and I will despise you on sight if you allow your kid to act like a delinquent in public and expect everyone to just accept it and think they are cute when they are crying bloody murder. I don't want to cut into my fillet Mignon to the sounds of your child wailing and crushing packs of crackers on the table and throwing silverware- go to McDonald's if your cranky five-year-old can't behave properly, and you yourself don't belong in an establishment if you won't discipline your child, because you are a moron too. Kids are cute and say funny things, and your kid is on the honor roll or in the school pageant, I get it, I get it. Everyone's kids are! So when we get together to go out to dinner, let's just assume your kid has done something wonderfully clever lately, skip the details and photos, and get on with grownup talk like griping about our jobs and our husbands.

Thirteen

Today my brain feels empty, I feel empty. I feel like I just want to sit back and do nothing and not take any shit from myself for it. I have days where I force myself to do things- laundry, read, garden- when I am actually hating every minute of it. I don't know why. I don't have to do anything disgusting, except clean cat litter boxes, and even that is part of the joyful duties of rescuing stray cats. I don't have to do anything difficult, I don't have to do anything perverted or creepy or illegal, I really don't have to do anything I don't want to. I am talking about the every day mundane aspects of life, like weeding the flower bed or filling the bird feeders or making the bed or wiping down the stove from last night's dinner or fluffing the pillows on the couch. Oh fuck, I hate all of it today, I hate it, and I have NO REASON TO, and I have no reason to gripe or complain or be such a stupid cow. This is my day, this is my lot in life, to be married to a wonderful man who takes good care of me and loves me- I don't know why he does, but he does. Go figure. Today is one of those days where I just don't want to think about anything, I want to say screw it all, go away, leave me alone. I want to tell A don't come home tonight! But I am alone, there is no one else here but me, and I gripe about being lonely! So what exactly am I wanting out of life, what do I think I would do differently, if I could do it all over again? I don't know. Would I have been a wild child instead of a good girl? Would I have travelled the world, doing whatever or whoever I wanted to? Would I have not had that abortion and instead kicked X out of my life, keeping his baby? Would I have done crack to numb my revulsion for this world, full of idiots, racists, rednecks, morons, zealots, the self-righteous bigots? I hate most people, I really do, because most of the people I've met in my life fall into one of those categories, and maybe that's because I have lived my entire life in the south, where people are generally dumbasses from birth on. Like a woman I knew for years who befriended the black girls in our office, would go out to lunch and shopping with them, coo over their babies, yet called people fuckin' n*ggers behind their backs. See, I can't even type that word anonymously, I hate it so much. The same woman who would drive by Goodwill while they were closed, and steal things people had dropped off out front for donations, yet didn't think there was anything wrong with it- they're just going to sell it anyhow, she justified. The same woman who would go to church every Sunday and talk about what a good Christian she was, when she was just pure white trailer trash and didn't even recognize it. I know so many people like that, it makes me angry at the whole human race. There are decent people out there, I know. Like my parents, or A, whose only flaw is that they love me, unconditionally. They are few and far between. Even my best friend, a sweet and tender woman in her 50's, is such a doormat, is so blind, I want to slap her. She lets her husband, her grown sons, treat her and talk to her the way X used to do me. And for that, she is stupid, as stupid as I used to be. And for such a smart woman, it makes me salivate with anger at her, to stand by and listen to her stories of how her husband drove off and left her at a restaurant, because their to-go order was taking so long and he was tired of waiting in the car for her- and how she had to call one of her sons to come and pick her up, while her husband was already relaxing back at home with his feet up in the recliner. Oh that's just horrifying in so many ways. Not because her husband did that, because I've met him and he's a huge fuckwad and it doesn't surprise me when he acts like that. But because he is STILL her husband, and she is still with him. She was such a gentle woman, I couldn't even offer my advice, because she would fall away into tears at even the merest hint of sympathy from me. But she was also a foolish, dense woman. My life is so simple, wake up, get A off to work, be there when he comes home, hopefully with a smile on my face. I fake my way through it, at least through the parts where he is at home. The rest of the hours are grim, I'm grim, and I have grim thoughts. People may read this blog and say, you're rich, you have no responsibilities, you have no job, you have no worries and nothing to complain about. What the hell does that have to do with how I'm feeling? Just because I have no fear of the power being shut off, that doesn't mean I can't be unhappy. That doesn't mean that I don't have the right to be unhappy, to bitch, to hate my life on certain days. That doesn't mean that I can't find a reason to be pissed off with the world. Who said only poor people, or the struggling, or the abused or homeless, or the sick and diseased or addicted, or the old, have dibs on being miserable? Maybe you can't understand me, or my life, and that's fine because I don't understand it half the time, and I'm not writing this blog for you to understand me, or even like me. Don't resent me because I have material possessions. What's in my brain, in my heart, pumping through my veins- that has nothing to do with what kind of car I drive. I am not taking this out on you, if you are reading this, I don't know you. And since I am posting anonymously, I don't want to know you. I don't care if you want to know me. I am just in a pissy mood today, and I don't know why. Life is good today, it's sunny and beautiful outside, I am preparing to leave on a weekend family getaway, tomorrow I go to my support meeting, next week I leave for a tropical vacation on the beaches of Florida with A. What's to complain about? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know!

Twelve

I don't know if what I have is considered depression or not. Is there a definite line between depression, or being in a bad mood, or just feeling blue, or being lonely or unhappy, or "going through a spell"? Or are the borders blurred? I've never once considered suicide, have never even thought about it. I've never thought about hurting myself or anyone else, I don't fantasize about jumping off a bridge or driving my car into the oncoming lane. I don't sit around my house crying. I am definitely not trying to escape life, I am trying to feel better emotionally and find my place in the world. A is the only person who knows the depths of my unhappiness, and I'm not sure that even he knows just how deeply those feelings run. One thing I did used to love, was my job, and for the first time in my career I really DID love my job and I felt like I belonged and I felt like this was the place I was always meant to be, the place I had been searching for my entire working life. My job was nothing spectacular, my college degree was in computer programming (from back in the 1980's), and my job was a simple one, in a simple office, and I was only a data entry operator. I was there for nearly a decade, and I was THE person in the office to come to for an answer, for information, for assistance, for advice. I scored the highest every year on evaluations, and I got the biggest raises each year. I was excellent at my job, and took a great deal of pride in it, and in fact I was quite arrogant about it. The position was originally three people doing the work, then two, then just me because one by one I absorbed their work and they were let go. I was that good, that quick, that accurate. I knew everything about the system, I knew everyone in all the departments, and if I didn't know the answer I was not shy about going to whatever lengths I had to in order to get a response. But, that's gone now, and am I bitter? Has it led to this angry, overwhelming sense of nothingness I feel about myself now? I'm sure it has. But I can't be bitter, I have no right to feel so indignant, because I left my job willingly, to support A's promotion at his company, where he is now the director, and soon in line for vice president. He could have turned the promotion down, if I'd said no don't take it, I want to stay here at my job, in this town, in our home. But I said go for it, I'll give up my job, we'll sell this house, I'll go wherever you have to go. And so here I am, unemployed since last year, alone in a beautiful house, a kept princess if you will, a lady of leisure- while A goes off to his career every day, happy, fulfilled, a needed man with a mission, with goals, with projects, with co-workers. I have nothing of that anymore, and every day my sense of loss gets worse. I know there are millions of people in this country without a job, and most of them had their jobs taken away from them without warning, against their will. They teeter on the brink of poverty, of losing it all, of their family's destruction. I gave up a job that was secure, that fulfilled me, that gave me a purpose and friendships and praise from others, that gave me my own money to spend as I wished because A has always paid all the bills from his salary. I gave it up, and I don't have to worry about a financial crisis, or losing health insurance, or my house going into foreclosure. Sure, something drastic could happen, and A could lose his job suddenly, and he tells me all the time not to worry about it because if it happens, it happens, and it will be out of our control. But we won't fall, and we won't fail. I know this. Although I think of myself as sullen, antisocial, cynical, sad, lazy, judgmental, hateful, angry, conceited- for some reason none of that comes across to the outside world. Friends would say I am cheerful, sweet, funny, happy, helpful, loyal, smart, pretty, lucky, stylish, clever, industrious. People at work would always say to me- you are always smiling and laughing, you are always so chipper. Does that mean they don't really know me? Or is THAT the real me, and I just see myself differently with my fucked up perception? Am I a big fake, a phony- and if so, which is the real me, and which is the impostor? I can't even answer that. Even A, knowing that I feel unhappy, will tell me I'm loving and sexy and intelligent and thoughtful- when all I feel like is a dried up dog turd. My best friend of many years, the one who knows all my dirty laundry, thinks I'm the nicest and funniest and warmest, most caring, confident person she's ever met. She knew me back when I was married to X, and she's been with me all through my life with A. And she loves me and thinks I'm charming, witty, comforting, unerringly delightful, pleasant, and a gem to be around. Why does everyone I know, think of me this way? Am I that good of an actress? Do I have everyone fooled? Or am I fooling myself? Am I trying to convince myself I am miserable and depressed, to give myself license to be lazy, or selfish, or unproductive? I don't know, but it bugs me. I go through that with A, and I tell him thanks for being so nice to me, and he responds that he is not a nice person, when I know he is the most generous and kind man in the world. So, maybe we all have misconceptions about ourselves, maybe we are not as horrible as we think we are, maybe we are all a little too hard on ourselves. I don't know. I do know that I feel insignificant and lost without a job, even though financially I don't "have" to work. Emotionally I feel as though I must. Without a job, a career, I don't know how to define myself, my day, my life. And what do you do deary? Oh, nothing. All day, nothing. Every day, every week, every month, nothing. Is this black hole I've been in for so long now, because I don't have a job to go to every day, because I don't have a meaningful purpose in life? A would say my purpose in life is to be happy. That may be a goal, but that is not a purpose. I want a job, but we live in the middle of the countryside, and the nearest town is small and redneck and full of fast food places and gas stations and Wal-Mart, and even those places aren't hiring right now. As soon as we moved here, I put my resume in with staffing agency after staffing agency, hoping to find something in the much large metropolis thirty minutes up the road. I got smiles, and impressed nods of the head, and assurances that if the economy was better they could place me right now in a job, but right now they had nothing to offer me. Lots of people out there need jobs, to support families, to save their homes from going back to the bank, to keep their car from getting repossessed. I don't want to take a job away from someone like that, someone who HAS to have it, to survive, to avoid homelessness. But I want to start waking up in the morning, with more on my schedule than making A a pot of coffee and a bowl of oatmeal, and packing his lunch for him so he can drive off towards the big city and enjoy his purpose. Where is my purpose? I want one again.

Eleven

I used to consider myself an artist. I painted, all the time, everything. I set up at street fairs, art shows, flea markets, and later on started selling on eBay, on Etsy, won awards on EBSQ. It was my great aspiration- or my grand illusion- that I could paint for a living. That I could actually make money at it, in order to buy more supplies, in order to keep painting. Which used to make me happy. I haven't painted since last year, and even what I was doing back then I'm not sure if I would call painting, or even art. I've been painting forever it seems, and selling my work for 25 years, but lately my head is void of any ideas and my heart is void of creative desire. And frankly, I'm void of any talent, and I know it. I don't kid myself, I am an amateur even on my best day, whether I'm painting with acrylics or making pottery or sewing quilt pieces together or creating handmade greeting cards. I am mediocre at many things, but talented at none. I've never found my place in the art world, I've tried it all from woodworking to sculpting to stamping, you name it I've done it. They all turn out to be phases, just like everything else I go through in life. I get super excited, buy all the instructional books, invest in the tools of the craft, and sometimes even take classes. I give it a few months, sometimes a year, then the interest fizzles. Just as I do with every undertaking. I have no excuses, I'm home all day long with no obligations other than having dinner ready when A comes home from work late in the evening. I am home alone for at least twelve hours a day, my hours are free to be selfish with anything I want. A even created a fantastic studio for me here at the new house, he made certain that I would be able to paint, in comfort and style- as he does for me in all things in life. I have 500 square feet, a bathroom, air and heat, an enormous sunny window facing the woods behind the house, a work table, shelves to display my collections and a bookcase for all my art books and cabinets to organize my supplies, lamps and curtains and rugs and TV and radio. Even a cushioned rocking chair by the window, on days where I just need to relax in my own space. A thought of everything for me. The studio, it's all mine, and A gladly gave me the private space with love in his heart. A spared no expense for my studio, because I said I'd always wanted one, because I said that's what I needed to get the creative juices flowing again, because I said that would make me happy. His next plans are to create yet another private room for me down in the basement, to buy me a kiln so I can take up pottery again, something that I constantly complain that I miss since I gave it up last year. But I know it won't matter, as the studio doesn't matter. I'm not creating, I'm not painting, I'm not happy. Even with all of that. No wonder A is sometimes at his wit's end with me. He's given me everything a woman could ever want, and still I am unhappy, still I rage against the black hole growing inside of me, where all of the joy and sunshine seem to fall into. He gives me everything and asks nothing of me in return, other than to please start feeling better again and to please be happy. He's happy, with his work and our new house and with me, and he doesn't understand why I'm not playing ball on the same field as he is. Depression runs in his family, not mine- his sister, his brother, his mother. But he's the balanced, joyful, positive one. I'm the dark, mean, unsatisfied one. He doesn't understand it, and frankly neither do I. Sometimes I wonder where it all comes from, the ugliness inside of me. I used to paint beautiful landscapes, of the mountains, of the tropical beaches. How can I paint such sunny, bright, colorful pieces when inside I feel brown, black, lumpy? I don't know. I tell myself if I would just sit down, pick up a brush, put a canvas in front of me- it would all come back to me again. I would feel productive, proud, excited. And in turn, I might feel happy? I can't say for sure. I don't know what it will take for me to pick my head up and look at the sky again. Right now I can't even look at myself in the mirror without feeling shame, pity, anger at the reflection of this fat, lazy, pathetic middle-aged woman looking back at me. Who the hell is she? Is that really me? Is this really what my life is going to be like from here on out, or do I have the power to change it?

Ten

I hate being fat. I really do. What I hate more than being fat, is constantly pissing and moaning about being fat, and never doing anything about it. There are so many things going on with me right now that are out of my control- being unemployed, having a pinched nerve in my back- that you would think I would get off my ass and take care of something that I actually have the power to correct! I am not going to sit here and write that I have the fat gene, or a thyroid problem, or an emotional eating disorder, or whine whine whine. No, I eat TOO much, and I sit around TOO much. Any moron that can watch Oprah or read Prevention knows that this equals = being a lard ass! And that is what I am. Maybe I am being a bit too cruel, calling myself names. Whatever. I don't buy into that stuff, I should beat myself up about it because I keep screwing up and engaging in the same old behavior that is keeping me fat. I know well and good how to count calories, how to read nutrition labels, how to measure out portions, how to buy skim milk and whole wheat bread and high fiber cereals and journal my food and drink water. Groan. So I know all that, but do I do it? Sometimes. But sometimes isn't good enough, and sometimes isn't going to get the fat rolls off my belly and thighs. Duh. So what if I eat All Bran for breakfast and have a Lean Cuisine for lunch? If dinner is a double bacon cheeseburger with fries and a Coke, hell no the "diet" isn't going to work. And I'm not one of those idiots who says gosh, I just don't know why I'm not losing any weight?? Yeah I've got a treadmill, but using it once a week isn't good enough, when I know I can and should do better. So maybe I use my back pain as an excuse to not exercise. But what is my excuse to stuff my face with fatty foods? Because I'm lonely, I'm depressed, I'm angry, I have no willpower? That's all bullshit, I don't believe any of that stuff about myself. I order that big calzone with extra cheese because that's what I want to eat, and it tastes great, and so that's what I'm going to order. There's no loneliness involved in making that decision, my happy hubby is right there with me, and we're out having a fantastic time together. Want to order dessert? Sure honey!! I'm not depressed when he's smiling over at me, reading out the description of the creme brulee cheesecake off the menu to me. So what gives Dr. Phil? Tell me why, when I know damn well that I should be getting a salad with fat free dressing on the side, that I order the fettuccine alfredo instead, and enjoy, love, slurp up every last bite of it? I don't order the steak and cheese sandwich with extra mayo because I'm angry at life. I'm angry because I ate the sandwich and I know it's not the right choice, and it's unhealthy. I don't indulge in any other destructive behaviors- I don't smoke, I don't drink, I don't do drugs, I don't go to sex clubs or hook on the side, I don't beat my husband, I don't cut myself. I just eat a lot. Destructive, yes, to me physically and probably to my self-esteem a little bit because I can't wear cute clothes or sexy lingerie these days. But there are no underlying emotional traumas that make me eat uncontrollably. I am in total control of what I choose to put in my mouth, and how much of it. I used to overeat even as a kid, so this isn't something X caused. My weight has always gone up and down, up and down. My current husband (that's a lot to keep typing, from now on let's call him A for adorable, amazing, attractive, ambitious, appealing- and it IS the first and number one letter)- so anyhow A has seen me 50 pounds heavier and 50 pounds lighter than what I weigh right now. He's never said a single word to me about my weight. But he worries about my health, my flagging self-confidence. He's very overweight as well, and I think in the beginning of our relationship (when I was 50 pounds lighter), I gave myself permission to relax a little, cut loose, enjoy being with him and being out on dates again, with someone who treated me like a queen and who had the money to take me to the finest restaurants around. Of course I was going to enjoy myself, eat everything good and tasty and wonderful at these places where I'd never been before, and may not ever go to again. I started to gain weight as soon as we started dating, and at first it was only five, then ten pounds, and I could shrug it off because it wasn't too noticeable. Then by the time we were married, it was an extra forty pounds. Then a few years later it was suddenly almost a hundred pounds extra. We ate out all the time, we ate a great amount of food (he's a big man) and he never once made me feel bad or wrong for wanting to order an appetizer, or asking for extra cheese on my pizza. We've always taken lavish vacations, on cruises and to casinos, where the food was free and we lived it up and experienced it all. I packed on the pounds faster than Secretariat ran the Derby. So now here I sit at an in between weight for our relationship, slowly working my way back down to my lightest weight. But struggling along the way, as most of us do. Even though I make more right decisions than wrong ones lately, I do still make bad choices when it comes to eating and exercising. And yes, I still hate being fat. I always will.

Nine

When I was growing up, all I ever wanted to be was a writer, a published author, and there was no other dream for me. I always wanted children but not a husband, and I got just the opposite. And when I got married to X, I stopped writing. He quickly sucked so much joy out of me, that I was no longer creative in any way. I stopped writing, I stopped painting, I stopped sewing, I stopped loving, I stopped feeling. Everything that I once loved doing, I lost my desire for. I literally did not have the capacity to feel any real happiness towards the end. But now X is out of my life, and I have not seen him since the day of our divorce. Nor will I ever see him again. I'm remarried, I'm in another state. There is no reason to expect I will ever lay eyes on him ever again. We did not have children, our parents only met each other once, our dog is long dead, we do not have friends in common, we had no properties or businesses together. Nothing, no ties, he is 100% completely out of my life, forever. Except I still carry around this anger and bitterness and loathing and hatred for him, and I've yet to let it go. And I don't know why, I can't figure out why I would even give him a moment of thought. He used to tell me I was evil. Whenever I didn't agree with him, or do things his way, or see things the same as he did, he would look at me and say, you are just evil. Evil evil evil. Yes folks, he did say that. What a complete dick, that's all I can say about it now. What man looks at his wife and calls her evil, just because she disagrees with him on some minor point? But that wasn't the worst of it. He called me fat lazy whore, worthless bitch, stupid. Those are the nicer ones, the names that I fondly remember. He would tell me he couldn't believe that I could hold down a job, I was so stupid. Now that I type these words, I am still in utter shock that I ever let anyone, especially a man, especially my husband, talk to me that way. But I stood there and took it, because he was my husband. And I thought, he's right. I am fat, I am lazy, I do feel worthless and stupid. I couldn't survive on my own, without him here. Gag!!!! I actively despise this man even though I haven't seen him in years, and I can't get it out of my head. I even Google him every so often, to see what I can find on him. Do I really need to see that he's started his own business, that he was listed in the local paper to report for jury duty? Does any of that really have anything to do with my life today? I guess maybe it does, because the anger I have for him for the way he treated me for years, the disgust I have for myself about staying with him during all of it, obviously affects the way I feel about myself even now. My current husband says to let it all go- I've already told him all of the horror stories about X- he says to see a therapist if I need to resolve it, but to stop dwelling on the past. He had a terrible marriage himself, and he's completely blocked it out, he's never mentioned it unless I bring it up and then he says, why do you want to ask me about something that happened twenty years ago? Maybe it's a guy thing, they live in the moment, they don't hold grudges, they just forget about it and move on. I'm not sure why I can't stop stewing in my own juices over X, when he is ancient history. Maybe I just feel he molded me, shaped me into my current personality. On the days I feel like a useless slob, is that really true? Or do I just remember X saying that to me, and I still believe it? Am I really a horrible monster for not cleaning the toilets often enough? Or am I just remembering the days when X would stand over my shoulder as I mopped the floors and tell me I was incompetent and that I needed to get down on my hands and knees and scrub? I think on some days his voice does echo in my head, I can still see his pot-blurred eyes squinting at me, as he poked a finger in my face and called me a stupid fucking bitch. My current husband is so different from X, they are really truly day and night. The current husband never calls me anything but baby or sweetheart or honey, and wouldn't raise his voice to me even on a dare, and the only time his hand ever gets near me is to pinch my butt playfully or hug me goodbye every morning as he leaves for work. I know what love is, and I know what a good man is, and I know what a strong marriage is. I know all of that now, finally. Why can't I forget the old bullshit I went through and the masochist who put me through it?

Eight

I am an adulterer, in the legal sense. I met a new man while I was still married to X. It was at the end of our marriage, I was miserable, I hated him, we didn't eat meals together, we slept in different beds, we barely spoke except to have screaming matches, he wouldn't give me any money from his paychecks to pay the bills, I couldn't even stand the sight of him. But we were still living under the same roof. I would come home from work and if he was there, I would go straight to the bedroom, put on headphones, dive into a book, walk on the treadmill, watch TV- whatever it took to avoid looking at him, talking to him, acknowledging him. X equally made no effort to connect with me, and that was fine as far as I was concerned. I was SO unhappy and anxious and upset, that for the first time in my life I had to go on high blood pressure medication because my body was severely out of whack. It was his fault. No, it was my fault for still being married to the creep. I wanted out, and many times in the last few years I had screamed at him that I hated him, that I wanted him to leave right now, that I wanted a divorce. Nothing ever came of it, he never even once headed for the door, because he didn't give a damn and he knew I wasn't serious. Maybe I wasn't on those other occasions. But then I met a new guy, and it was, shoot me for saying this, it was love at first sight. I didn't even know his name, but I loved him and it was strong, and the girl who sat in the cube beside me watched me looking at him at that first meeting, and she said you are going to have an affair with that man. I said, oh shut up, I'm married and I've never seen this guy before and I don't even know his name!! He just happened to come to my desk to give me some paperwork. But it was true, and three months after the first time I saw him, I started down a road in which there was no turning back. We started emailing, then flirting, and my friend teased him and would say she knew someone who had a crush on him and wanted to get together with him, and he knew it was me. At that point, I didn't know what I wanted, but there was something about this guy, who I barely knew and was so nervous to talk to that I would get sick to my stomach with anxiety at just the thought of walking over to his office. We made plans to get together, and then he said he couldn't do it, I was married and he didn't want to go through with it. He'd been married a long time ago, and he'd been cheated on and it broke up the marriage, and he didn't want to do that to another man. I was destroyed, I was half in love with this stranger, and I gathered up all my courage and marched to his office. What if I told you I was getting separated, I said to him. Well, that's a different story, he said. It was Christmas, he was going to be out of town for the holidays visiting family, I would be at home with X and my parents, who instantly knew something was wrong when they arrived for their visit. At this point, I had not told X that I wanted a divorce, for real this time, not just angry words shouted during a heated argument. But the thought of losing out on a chance with the new guy won out, and on Christmas morning, while X was still lounging in bed and rudely refusing to come be part of the festivities with my family, I went into the room and whispered in his ear- I want a divorce, and I mean it, and I want you out of the house by the first of the year. Sadly we lived in an ass-backwards state that required a year of separation before a spouse could file for a divorce. And what the hell is that all about, anyhow? Was the state government hoping that X and I would reconcile? They didn't know us, what the fuck did they care?? Didn't they want me to be happy? Didn't they want me to be rid of this jerk once and for all? Apparently the state did not care if I had to go through one more year of agony being married to X before I could finally cut him loose. But I meant it this time, and the thoughts of the new guy and new hope and new confidence- and a new future- finally gave me the backbone I needed to break away from X.

Seven

Even though I am now very outgoing and outspoken, very confident, as a teen I was extremely shy. Once approached, I made fast and easy friends, but I never initiated contact with new people. So when I met my first husband (I'm going to call him X from now on- as in "the ex") where I was a temp at his office, I was 25, still living at home with my parents, plus I had never learned to drive a car. I had screwed up self-confidence issues back then, and was scared about getting behind the wheel, so I just didn't want to drive. Mind you, I owned a car, because my parents bought me one when I was 18- a cute little silver sports car with a hatchback and a turbo engine- hoping I would be motivated to learn to drive. As it was, I didn't learn to drive it until I was 30, and my mom would just use it on occasion in the meantime. So when I met X, I was not an independent woman at all. Had never lived alone, never gone on vacation with girlfriends, never spent the whole night at a guy's place, and daddy had to drive me to work. I had just finished going to college, which happened to be in our hometown and I was able to ride the bus there while I lived at home, which foolishly made me feel "independent" in my own way. When I met X, I hadn't dated anyone seriously in about two years, and I think in meeting him I was overly needy and immature and latched onto him because he was interested in me. I had been engaged once before, and after three years I called it off because I didn't want to get married so young. And I had an ex-boyfriend from high school who I would see off and on, whenever he came back to town. But I had never had a serious "adult relationship" in the truest sense. It was not love at first sight with X, and I am not sure I ever really loved him, now that I am married to a wonderful man and actually know what real love is like. X and I only knew each other for a few weeks before we started dating, and only a few weeks of dating led to us moving in together. To this day my mother swears, and she firmly believes, that I did not love him, I was only using him as a stepping stone to leave my parents' house, and that I was scared to live alone so chose to live with him instead. Maybe she is right, and I can say for sure, I didn't know any better back then. He treated me like shit from almost the beginning, leaving me home alone so he could go get high and party all night long, and then expecting me to shut up about it and not nag him or complain. This was right away, from the first few months. I was not used to behavior like that, my dad came home from the office and was always home with the family every night, that was the only thing that I knew. I can remember one Friday night, when X was out and hadn't come home, and it was after midnight already, I was hysterical with crying and certain that he had to be dead somewhere. I called all his friends, the ones he was supposed to be with, but no one had seen him. I started to call hospitals, the sheriff's office, the highway patrol trying to find out if he'd been in an accident. I called my parents, overwrought with fear. But he came sauntering in hours later, and I vented my worries and told him of my visions of his car in a ditch, of him dead. He only grew angry with me for checking on him and calling his party buddies, telling me I was acting stupid. This was how our new home life as a couple started out, and I should have gone running back to mom and dad, but I accepted this as part of growing up and learning to be in a relationship with a man. If I'd had better self-esteem, if I'd been more mature and independent, if I'd had a fucking brain in my head- I would have thrown his junk out the window and told him to go party but he was no longer welcomed to live with me. The townhouse was entirely in my name, he was actually living there illegally anyhow. My parents and their friends helped move me into the place, and he never showed up until three days later when everything was done. All he brought with him was his clothes and a few towels. It would have been so easy back then to kick him out, to send him back home to live with his mother, and at this point I was even working somewhere else so I wouldn't have had to see him ever again. My townhouse was only a few miles from my parents' house, I actually walked there on occasion since I still wasn't driving and X never wanted to see my parents (or his own for that matter). The relationship was a disaster from day one, and it only got worse when we moved three states away, then got married. I was really stuck at that point.

Six

Everyone has their weird habits, or their dark secrets. Everyone. I do, and I'll be putting them out here on this blog for anyone who gives a crap to read this. But, people do things that defy explanation, and I'm talking about normal people. Not the crazy person who hears voices and shoots up a church. And yet, even with those morons, their friends and neighbors feign disbelief because he was always such a nice, quiet guy who grew roses and raised puppies and loved his mother. I'm talking about the every day person, who sits beside you on the bus, or works in the cubicle next to you, or smiles at you every morning at Starbucks. One person I knew would frequently go to the coffee station at work and take a dozen tubs of liquid creamer, pour them all in one cup, and drink it- she was a Type I diabetic and was trying to purposely make herself sick so she could go home. Another woman I worked with would sit in her very public cubicle and take her shoes off, picking at her toenails and throwing whatever she found right out onto the carpeted aisle for all to see. A very quiet lady at work shocked us all when she was arrested because she had two foster children (we didn't even know about them) and neighbors turned her in for locking the kids outside of the house while she was at work, and keeping a chain on her refrigerator so they couldn't get to "her" food- which in turn uncovered a previous case of foster child abuse for making a girl sleep in the bathtub some years back. One very good friend of mine, who was demure and sweet and shy, lived at home with her mom and collected teddy bears, was suddenly arrested for embezzling a half million dollars from her office and was sent to jail. I have family members who one day heard a man speaking on the radio and decided to convert to his made-up religion, and are extremely devout followers in the "church"- a religion I have never heard of, and neither has anyone else I've asked- but they are devoted to it proudly and don't care that they've ostracized their children or anyone else in the family. I dated a really nice, humble country guy from work who one day attacked and stabbed to death a friend's landlord because the man was hassling his friend for the rent money. In my hometown, a very well-respected and handsome, wealthy pediatrician with a stunningly gorgeous wife, was picked up for soliciting skanky, nasty prostitutes in the downtown area. I had a very dear girlfriend who forced her suspicious husband to go on Prozac so he would stay doped up, while she carried on an affair. I knew a woman who had quit smoking, but would secretly pick up discarded cigarette butts from the ground and eat them. I knew a guy who was in his 40's, and going to his 7th college and working on his 3rd degree, because he still wanted his rich parents to support him so he didn't have to work for a living. These are just very common but odd instances I've seen in otherwise very normal everyday people I've known in my very ordinary life. My point is, you never know what is going on with someone, what's in their head, what they are capable of feeling or thinking or doing. You don't know what will suddenly make someone snap. You don't know when a quiet co-worker who is a perfect employee, is breaking the law during their off hours. I have my own issues, some that are very obvious to anyone who looks at me (I overeat a great deal), and some that are hidden away so deep that not even my husband knows (I am obsessive-compulsive, and have very violent daydreams). There are the secrets that you share with your closest girlfriends, and then there are the ones you want to take to your grave. For some of us, those dark secrets or strange behaviors end up getting exposed. For me, I am using this anonymous blog to expose my own.

Five

I had the perfect childhood. We were middle class, and later on upper middle class. My father was a very important person in town, in politics. Everyone knew him, and he knew everyone important. He'd lived there since he was a teenager, and many of the people he went to school with and was friends with back then, also rose in local politics. Even now, when I go home to visit, we can't go ANYWHERE without someone coming up to my dad to shake his hand and say hi, or stop my mom in the store to say nice to see you. My dad was and still is very influential, and is still in politics there. So I grew up with everyone knowing who I was. I also grew up with very involved parents. It didn't matter what we kids were doing at the time, my parents were in the PTA, or coaching our teams, they chaperoned on field trips, volunteered in the school office, even ran the sports boosters' club. As a teen, it was annoying, because I never got away from them. I can remember in high school, trying to make out with a boy in the back of a school bus on a class trip, and having my mom catch me. They knew every move I made, even if it was at school itself and they weren't there, somehow everything I did always got back to them, whether it was good or bad. My parents were and still are overprotective, and I even complain that my mom treats me like I'm still five, and my dad treats me like a fragile princess. I think my first husband took after my mom, but the second time around I got it right and married a man just like daddy, who puts me up on a pedestal and bends over backwards for me. I could not have asked for more loving, sacrificing, caring, respectful parents. They raised us well, to say yes ma'am and thank you, to reach for the stars, to always do the right thing, to never give up and never give in, to be happy and healthy and balanced. Lately I feel like a fraud, because inside I am none of those things, and I'm not sure I ever was 100%. Although I am in my mid-40's, my parents are still overcome with worry with my health or finances or day to day well-being. I love them for it, and I appreciate my upbringing, I appreciate the fact that my dad would work two, sometimes three jobs so my mom could stay home with us, to make our breakfasts every morning and then be there when we got home from school. We celebrated all the holidays, had big birthday bashes, decorated the house for everything including Easter and Halloween and even Valentine's Day. Mom would stay up until midnight typing our term papers so we could get plenty of sleep. They bought us our first cars, they sent us to college, they gave us wonderful weddings, they gave each of us $20,000 as downpayments for our first homes. My mom gave up a lot so that we children could have everything when we were teens. She would buy cheap K-Mart shoes so we could wear Nike and Reebok, she would wear old ragged pants so we could have Sassoon and Gloria V jeans, she used a fanny pack so we could carry Liz Claiborne purses. My mom is still like that today. She grew up extremely, desperately poor and even though she and my father have well over a million bucks sitting in the bank, she still buys and wears the cheapest clothes she can find. It seems like my sibling and I are always giving her clothes for her birthday, or Mother's Day, because we know she won't buy it for herself. My dad is the opposite, he grew up very middle class, very comfortably, and he likes to spend money on the two of them- vacations, new cars, new boats. My mom is very humble, and so is my father but he worked very hard all of his life for that money, and he is not afraid to spend a little on them here and there. My mother refuses to allow him to buy things like flowers or jewelry for her, she's actually made him return diamonds to the store because she won't take something like that for herself. I know my parents are the reason I am the person I am today, besides all the depressing bullshit. I've never been arrested, I've never done drugs, I've never had alcohol, I've never allowed a man to abuse me physically, I graduated from college, I've walked the straight and narrow my whole life. I know they are proud of me, they adore my current husband (hated the first one), they feel secure about my future, and they still want what's best for me in every aspect of my life. To this day, they still encourage me, they still support me, they still accept me, they still love me. For that, I am truly grateful. On some days, they might annoy me, because my mom is a little nosey on the phone, but I know it is always out of concern. If anyone could ever be loved too much, it is probably me. Between my outstanding parents and my indulging husband, I am indeed a lucky lady.

Four

I call this blog "My Life Is Okay Now" because this marriage is a thousand times better than the first one, and as a woman in my 40's I am so different, and more in tune with myself, than I ever was in my 20's and even my 30's. I believe my unhappiness is all an illusion, and all in my head, and if I could fight through it I would come out on the other side as the woman I am supposed to be at this point in my life. Instead I feel like an immature, sullen, lazy, spiteful teenager who puts their fingers in their ears and goes la-la-la-la-la whenever a parent is talking to them. I don't know what that means in relation to my life, but that's how I feel right now. Just leave me alone, get out of my room, I don't want to deal with it, you don't understand me, I don't wanna do that....all that stupid crap. I believe that much of it is caused by the chronic, unyielding, numbing physical pain I am normally in. Today, for instance, the pain is so bad I literally can't think about anything else, I can't feel anything else. I can't pay attention to the TV show I'm trying to watch, I can't think about what I want to make for dinner tonight, I can't worry about the load of laundry I left sitting in the washer yesterday, I can't think at all. The pain makes me feel like a failure. I can't clean my house, I don't ever want to have sex, I struggle with my weight, I am constantly in an ill mood, I never smile anymore, I rarely get a good night's sleep, it even hurts to drive my car. It took a long time to figure out what was wrong with me, and now that we know, the treatments seem to be useless and even the pain medication only- sometimes- temporarily makes me feel normal. My husband seems sad when he tells me I'm not the same person since we got married, that I changed completely, but what he fails to understand- or won't believe when I tell him- is that the pain started three months after we got married and that's why I suddenly became a "different person". I read a lot, and an article I stumbled across recently said that people in chronic pain tend to suffer from depression. Makes sense to me, although I'm not sure why it took me so long to put two and two together. My pain is a common one- sciatica- and I hurt my back one day in a very common way- housework. Since that particular day, I've been in extreme and constant pain, despite pain medication, despite lumbar injections, despite physical therapy, you name it. And ever since that day, my feelings of failure and worthlessness and surrendering to the dark hole keep growing. The pain won't go away. I have days where it may be less, but never a day of zero pain. On the "good" days I usually become manic and do too much and bounce around from project to project, trying to catch up. Because of that, a good day is almost always followed by a bad day, and I blame myself because I feel as though I overdid it. On some days, I feel like the pain is simply an excuse not to clean the toilets or walk on the treadmill, and I just tell my husband I don't feel well. He doesn't question it, and he expects it. He's even told me to my face he's just come to expect that out of me now- he doesn't love me any less for it, but I know deep deep down inside of himself he HAS to be full of regrets for being married to me, whether or not he wants to admit it. And I feel disgusting and I feel like a damn pig because it hurts so much to vacuum that I just don't do it, and I don't mop my gorgeous wood floors or wipe down my beautiful granite countertops that I picked out myself. And I'm pissed that I live in an almost half-million dollar house and it's so filthy that I wouldn't let my pet sitter come in without enough advance notice for me to quickly clean the living room and close the bedroom and bathroom doors. My husband has offered to get a cleaning service for me, once a month, once a week, whatever I want. But I'm stubborn and in denial and I've refused because for me that just brings home the point of what a loser I've become. Nothing hurts me more than the evenings where I can't get my fat ass off the couch, and I hear my husband unloading the dishwasher himself- after I've been home all day and he's worked for 12 hours. I do love my husband, I really really do, and I hate myself because I am such a terrible wife and partner for him. He gives me everything under the sun, and not only do I not take care of it all, I am usually in a sour mood when I'm with him. What is wrong with me, why can't I get through this?