I’m a couple days over 2 months being anti depressant free.  It’s been interesting and a learning experience these last couple of months.  I find myself with feelings and emotions I haven’t felt in many years.  I’m having a difficult time expressing what I’m really feeling…unless I’m happy and laughing, I know I’m shutting down.  When I’m angry or stressed or hurt I’m feeling it and going into silent mode…I know when it is happening but I can’t seem to pull myself out of the plastic bag….I withdraw.  After some complete shutdown periods last week, I realize that I need to figure out how to express myself appropriately.  I know this has been  difficult for him but  it is something he is going to have to deal with.  I don’t mean that to sound insensitive or bitchy…it just means that I’m struggling to figure this out and he’s  going to have to have faith that it is going to work out.  It is a learning experience for us both.  I’m actually feeling kind of good about these emotional swings because I’m feeling SOMETHING!

There have been some good things too.  I did it today.  After a haircut, I drove through Blue Springs with the windows down and my radio cranked.  I was listening to talk radio so I wasn’t singing and popping eardrums but I felt good…so good.

Because of my age and genetics, I’ve decided to let my hair grow its natural color…which happens to,be white and gray.  My color goddess, Nikki has helped it along a bit so it isnt completely white yet but I’ll get there. 

I also ordered a hippie fringe purse from Amazon last night…lots of jewelry and large flowered shirts with bell bottoms will be next.

Until next time…..

My daughter told me straight out the other night that we are going to have a talk about my inability to recognize people who are wearing signs that say toxic!  Over the years, I’ve given a lot of people the benefit of the doubt and been bitten!  I’ve tried to figure out what causes me to be trust who they say they are and actually enable the behavior with my friendship….because I make excuses for them in my mind.  I’m becoming more aware or maybe I have a different guard up because I don’t socialize much.  At any rate….for me….the best way to keep myself safe is to completely remove them from my life..  Or maybe I’m just starting to feel it…I’m more aware of how I feel when I’m around them and if I feel I need to make excuses for them …. I recognize the behaviors.  No doubt I have had a lot of trial and errors!

My mother told me a long time ago that if someone is talking about others behind their back then you can bet they are talking about you behind your back.  She also told me that women’s restrooms were dirtier then men’s restrooms and that woman bosses were petty and jealous and that it was much better to work for men.  Sometimes it takes awhile…even years…..to figure things out for ourselves….politics, religion and relationships to name a few more.

I’ve been in a men’s restroom a couple of times….at concerts….I do have a rebel streak.  I cannot verify the dirty restroom fact.

Until next time……

Mentally I’m finding myself in a different place.  I’ve not been one of those people who has REALLY been bothered by my age.  Every Birthday since probably 45, I’ve thought I can’t believe I’m fill in the blank  years old….and then I move on.  Until I turned   60.  (And that was before my birthday this past March).  I’m not sure what happened.  I’ve never felt old…I’m a pretty young looking 61 year old thanks to good genetics…not because I’ve taken care of myself.  Mortality frequently creeps into my thinking. Mortality as in wasting a lot of time wondering when I’m going to die.  It could be the fact that I know that the dreaded cancer has been in my body.  More to the point I had kidney cancer and had no idea it was growing in there.  No symptoms just BOOM and by the way, we found a mass on your kidney.  I guess I’m more aware of the fact that I can be rolling along thinking I’m healthy and young at heart and the find out it’s gotcha.  I’ve read several articles explaining that it takes a cancer survivor several years to heal from the mental agony.

Watching the Stayin’ Alive Bee Gees tribute tonight I wanted to dance…I wondered how I could learn to move and dance the modern way and not the 70s way.  I want to dance and go to concerts and let my hair down.  I want to get something pierced, I want to do something a little daring, I want to drive with the window down and annoy someone at a stop light with my loud music, I want to wear glitter and bling.  I can do it because I don’t care what strangers think but I do keep myself in check because I do care what those who know me think.  Every day I get closer to being bolder…mentally……closer to just being who I want to be…and then there is that reality check with my age…I’ve always been reasonably predictable and responsible…if I’m going to break the rules I’d better be doing it pretty soon or time may run out and I’ll die never having been wild and crazy and flamboyant.

Until next time…..

I have a part time job…I started it on Tuesday.  It is very part time…max of 15 hours a week.  I’m working at a salon/spa…doing reception, cleaning, laundry and tanning beds.  Compared to working 911 for 30 years, it is like mentally taking a nap.  Physically?  I spent two days off trying to recover from hip pain because the muscles used to clean tanning beds are not necessarily muscles I use on a daily basis.  It’s going to be fine although I hope today, I will be able to master the computer software and procedures.  It’s not really complicated but Tuesday I had a lot of cleaning lessons and not enough computer instruction,,,,this left me frustrated.  I trust today will be different!  I’m second guessing everything and doing what I always do…expecting perfection from myself.  I’m also doing a dear diary blog in order to work this out in my mind and calm the anxiety I seem to be wearing.

This is the time I should be meditating…don’t want to.  Working in my craft room seems like a good idea to distract me…don’t want to.  Reading might be a good idea for distraction but I can’t concentrate….so I turned on the TV and now thinking why am I wasting my time watching TV.  This is anxiety.  I’m all up into living in the moment when things are already calm and even….but I need to start working on living in the moment when there is something hanging over my head.  Learning never stops!

Until next time….

After dad died in 01 and mom in 09, I figured out that I am going to have a good Christmas cry close to the holiday…I never really know when it is coming….it is just triggered.  At first I would have a weepy day…all day…but then figured out that if I just give into it and have a good sob, it seemed to help.

I do the same thing in April.  April 12 of 2010, my soul mate, Brett passed after a long fight with lymphoma.  We met in 94 or 95.  He was may daughters’ band director and I was his Band Parents Association President.   One of those connections that has no real beginning….there was no romantic connection…although early on, I remember a band trip where I asked HIM to reload my brunch buffet plate because I didn’t want Brett to know how much I ate. Our families started camping together in 2000 at Bennett Spring  near Lebanon, MO. Brett’s fly fishing technique was beautiful…he tried to teach me, he tried to teach my daughters and he did teach HIM.  We fished, we smoked, we ate tomatoes, we fried fish, we tarped around our campsites and over the fire during late October trips, we moved our pop up trailer from one campsite to another without putting it down, HE and I bought his older camper only to find out later that it had a new fridge because Brett forgot to take the fish out of it the previous fall ….we giggled, we were not afraid of being emotional together, I was pissed when he was pissed about something, we cried together and we loved unconditionally. It’s been building all week.  I need to have my April sob.  Until his last days we still called each other Mr Hall and Ms Brown.  After 7 years, I still occasionally wonder what Mr Hall would think about this or that.  I am very lucky!

His mom and dad

My friends are like a variety pack of snack chips.  They come in all sizes, age, ethnicity, gay, straight, conservative, liberal, atheist, spiritual and  “religious” and gender.  The friends that make up my short list…will call them the besties…for the most part, have similar beliefs that I do.  I think it would be safe to say that the besties would not be on that list if we didn’t co-exist in the same galaxy.  As the list lengthens out, friends tend to fall into other categories.  For instance, friends that have different political views, or religious/spiritual views.  If I know that we have differences of opinion, I avoid conversations that may migrate into these differences of opinion.  I respect the fact that we are going to disagree and a war is not going to be won during one of these conversations.

Then there are the friends that I know superficially.  Basically, I like something about them and enjoy their company for what ever reason…similar interest, good personality, nice teeth…and then they blow it up with a comment that tells me who they are….it can be an aggressive political or religious belief or I immediately label them as bigots.  I generally back off from these people…I am still friendly in a social situation…but I avoid being in a social situation with them.  WIth that being said.  I also do not call them out or tell them I disagree with them.  I’ve never had one of these confrontations work out well.  I’ve found when it gets to this level of the relationship, I usually end up putting my anger in Drive and the rest is history.  I’m a lot more articulate when I’m pissed!

I’ve recently been confronted with one of these people.  I did not express my opinion other than to let them know I’m on the other side of the coin.  But, I did not defend my position or defend the person(s) they were making fun of.  And I feel guilty.  Does my silence on the matter equal acceptance…or does every one of these conversations demand a response.  Confrontation makes me uncomfortable in the negative/positive part of my soul so I normally just back away.

Is my inner dialogue of detesting what this person stands for enough?  I really want to know what you think!

Until next time!