Life As an Afterschool Special

It went welll

Thank you guys for all your prayers and support..

Thank you for calling me me and texting me and askin how it went…

I just didnt feel like talking much.

But for thoes of you who wanted to know, it went well.

It was really hard, and I cried before and after I testified, but I didnt cry on the stand.

And the judge granted me a five year CPO.

So the good news is if he ever breaks it, he will be arrested.

The bad news is he will bail out and there will be a trail and I will have to do this all over again.

So while I am relieved to know the law is on my side, that I was believed, and that what he did last month is now a “finding of fact”, I dont really have colsure, or feel any resolution.

But it was important to stand up for myself.

And I am so glad I did.

It just doesnt really make me feel less afraid if that makes sense….

COURAGE

Tommorow is my court date….

and I am terrified.

But I have been holding tight to a quote I read once,

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.”
– Ambrose Redmoon

And this is important.

Even when I have to push to see how far you’d go

Its been a really really long and hard month.

I am a mess.

And I am pushing everyone who loves me away.

I hate how my life feels upside down and out of control.

I hate that I cant stay at my house alone, that I am always afraid, that I feel so so needy.

I hate how much I want to be loved, and I hate how hard I am becoming to love.

Amy, Erica, Lisa, and Katie have all gotten mad at me this week… And told me nothing they do is good enough and I am pushing them away. They have all said that they don’t know what I want.

How could they? I don’t know what I want.

I am angry and hurt and overwhelmed and confused.

I feel like glass inside.

I need constant reassurace that I am loved, that they aren’t going anywhere. I feel alone.

I am difficult to love right now, and I know it. And that makes me petrified that people are going to walk away and then I really WILL be alone.

And sometimes I want to be consoled and comforted, and other times the attempts at comforting me just make me angry. Because in a lot of ways, there really is no comfort.

I want them to tell me they know how hard it is for me, and then I get mad because they don’t know how hard it is because its not happening to them.

I want to be distracted and I want to not worry, and then I get mad when they tell me not to worry because this is all very real to me, and very fresh, and I cant just not worry about it.

I am a walking contradiction of needs.

And I am so so needy. And so so demanding.

And they have all been there for me in so many ways.

Katie has spent countless nights on the phone listening to me cry, letting me be silent, waiting for me to finally fall asleep. She came to stay with me when everyone else went out of town, and held me when I broke down.

Lisa has let me yell and scream about how frustrated I am. She has let me cry. She and her husband drive by my house, check on me, offer to let me stay at their house, and even spent the night on my livingroom floor last week because Matt had come over and the police had let him go and I was terrified that he would come back.

Erica has gone out of her way to spend time with me, serve me, and understand. She sat with me in the hospital, has gotten out of bed in the middle of the night because I was a mess and afraid I would hurt myself, and she has tried to be patient. She has driven me to our parents house and stayed with me so I didn’t have to be alone.

Amy has held my hand when I am afraid, held me close when I cried, listened to me yell, and let me talk. She has taken measures to make sure I am ok, and that I don’t hurt myself.

All four of them have loved me through the hardest time in my life… And all I do is push them away.

I wish I could tell them in a way that they understood how incredibly grateful I am for all of them… How much I adore them… How much I need them.

I wish they understood that I couldn’t get though this without them.

I wish they knew hoe sorry I was….

I wish I was easier to love right now.

I just wish everything was different.

and since I always say it better in a song

For Katie, Lisa, Erica, and Amy…

SARAH McLACHLAN

Your love is just the antidote when nothing else will cure me
There are times I cant decide when I cant tell up from down
You make me feel less crazy when otherwise I’d drown
But you pick me up and brush me off and tell me I’m OK
Sometimes thats just what we need to get us through the day

The saga continues

Today I had the day off work, so I went with my sister and spent the day lounging by her dads pool.

I decided to take the back way home from Grove City to Galloway.

As I was driving down the back roads, I heard a loud pop and then steam began pouring out of my car.

When I got out to look I discovered the radiator has busted and I lost a belt (how proud are you of me that I figured it out all by my self!)

The major problem was I was literally in the middle of nowhere. Cornfields as far as I could see.

And no one would answer their phone.

Well Kim and Dena answered their phones, but they don’t even live in this state.

I was outside, in 93 degree weather, wearing a bathing suit and a towel, and I couldn’t get anyone on the phone to come get me.

At which point I did have a complete meltdown, and sobbed.

I cried for a good 45 minutes sitting on the hood of my car wearing a bathing suit, surrounded by cornfields.

Its just been a really really really hard day… Hard week… Hard month.

Finally after waiting just over two hours my stepmom showed up, took me to go get a belt for my car, and then we met my dad back at my car.

They used my dads truck to tow me back to my dads house…

My step mom poured us a glass of tequila.

And I know its just a little thing… But all the little things are starting to add up…

worst day ever

I hope this post makes sense.

I am heavily medicated.

As I have mentioned before I have had trouble sleeping. I have been stressed out and emotional. I have been emotionally, physically, and mentally drained.

And yesterday it caught up with me.

I passed out on the pool deck.

One minute I am yelling at a kid for dunking, the next I am on the ground with my lifeguards above me.

I had fainted on the deck and hit my head really hard on the concrete… I don’t remember any of this but the knot on the back of my head tells me its true.

They called 911, strapped me to a backboard, and sent me to mount carmel west.

Where I spent the next 4 hours getting Xrays and CAT scans and blood tests. Apparently everything was just a little off. My sugar was only an 89. My potassium was 3. My blood pressure was low…

All of that together combined with the fact that it was 90 degrees outside and I had only slept 6 hours in three days and I have been stressed out of my mind was apparently just too much for my body.

It decided it needed a break right then. On the concrete.

On the plus side, I did get both pain killers AND sleeping pills.

I got out of the hospital, had dinner with my dad, and then went to our neighbor Brian and Lisa’s house.

While I was there I got a call from my sister, who was alone at our house.

My ex fiancee had come over and would not leave. He was pounding on the doors and calling for me. I had a protection order so called she the police. They caught him as he was pulling away from our house.

The police however, could not find my protection order in the system, and had to let him go.

I cried and yelled, but it didn’t help.

Steve, Lisa and Brian all slept in my livingroom because we were afraid he would come back.

and today I spent all day first at the police department, then at the prosecutors office, then in domestic court trying to figure out what happened and to keep it from happening again.

And now I have a trail next tuesday.

See kids, THIS is why my life is an afterschool special.

Just some thought since I havent worote in so long….

• Kathy and Tim made me cry last night. I talked to kathy on the phone last night… told her about what was happening in my life and how I am handling it and how hard everything is, and Tim asked if I needed them to come get me and bring me “home” to Minneaota. kathy said “we are serious.. we will get in the car and come get you” I love them so deeply and I am so so so blessed by the way they love me.

• I need a new battery for my car. I was going to get one for free and the FBI came and arrested the man who was going to give me one… I hope he gets out soon… I hate not having a car. Such is like in the bottoms….

• I really really really love my job. I think it is the one thing that keeps me sane right now. It is good for me to be outside everyday.. in the sunshine.. and to be able to swim. There is something so therepudic about water.

• My favorite cover band.. bad little monkies.. is breaking up. That makes me sad, because my roomates and I love to go watch them play. They are totally danceable, even when you are sober. So if anyone knows any guitarist that live in Columbus let me know.

• Katie gave me a baseball bat when she was here. We named it Rawly. I sleep with it every night. I find it very comforting… People sleep with teddy bears or extra pillows or even blankies…. but I have a bat. I think thats perfectly normal, perfectly heathly.

• Speaking of perfectly normal… my friend Joshewah left me a message last night and told me my answering machine message sounded depressing and if I didnt change it he would kick my ass. It made me laugh and Amy decide I should marry him. And then I didnt call him back. He loves that about me.

• Seriously.. I need some sleep. I think I have slept 5 hours in the past 72.

• Call me… write me… email me… I miss you all… and I need some love.

I have been horrible updating my blog… I have been horrible at communication in general.

I noticed yesterday that all my recent posts have involved someone elses words… and I know I need courage to find my own words…

This is my attempt.

My roommate Amy gave me a journal last night.

It is just a yellow notebook… and on the front in white writing is a single word… courage.

Courage… both appropiate and ironic.

I sat last night in the darkness of my room and watched my clock change numbers. Finally at two am I got up and wrote.

I need to write, to see my life in black and white, to organize the thoughts in my head into words and sentences, to bring some sense of order to the chaos.

I dont sleep anymore. I cant make the thoughts stop long enough to find some sense of peace. When I close my eyes I see him, somehow etched into the blackness of my mind.

I see his eyes, both angry and pleading, wanting me to love him back. Every angry touch and wispered word floods my mind and fills the emptiness with a life all its own.

And last night in desperation to fill the darkness I found the courage to write.

I am angry.

And I am afraid.

Not just of him, although every noise and every shadow takes on new meaning now… but I am afraid of myself.

I cant do this much longer. And while time should make things easier, heal wounds, and allow me to forget it does not.

I feel like i am drowning.

And I want to scream at everyone who knows me “cant you see… can’t you see me standing in front of you… dont you see me drowning”

But the reality is I dont scream…. I get up and force myself out of bed. And I smile at everyone who loves me and I tell them I am fine and I angrily push away their love and their desire to help. And then I feel alone.

Then I feel like I am drowning.

“Too drama, too high maitnence, and so not worth it…” That is what an old friend said once after coming to visit me..

Thoes words roll around in my head now as people I I love drift away, take breaks, and struggle with loving me.

I know it would be easier if I was honest. And I hate myself for pretending… for laughing like I am not dying inside. But I do laugh, and I get up and I go to work and sit in the sunshine and and go to the store and live my life like it hasnt been stolen from me. And with every concearned question and look and touch my answer is always the same…

but the truth is no matter how many times a day I tell myself and others that I am fine, it is still a lie… because I am not fine at all… and part of me doubts I ever will have the courage to be again.

So there you have it. In my own words… I feel like I am drowning..

and I just need to make sense of that chaos that is in my mind…

I need to write.

…so this is what it feels like to drown.
to just give into the pain…
to give into the night…
to let you win…

do you know how long the night is…
do you know that my life was changed
forever
with the touch of your hand.

do you know that I still feel you…
that every sound
movement
unexpected touch
is a child’s “bump in the night,”
reminders of you.
reminders of how quickly things change.

do you know I still see your face above mine….
I still see the look in your eyes as you took what wasn’t yours
and called it love.

do you know that I don’t sleep anymore…
that any attempt to close my eyes,
to force myself into oblivion,
to shroud myself in silence
is weak and pathetic,
and always haunted by the memory of what you did.

do you know that you won…
you didn’t have to kill me…
you just had to hurt me..
hard enough
long enough
deep enough
for me to give into the pain…
give into the night…

this is what it feels like to drown.

Tornado

I have been talking Matt lately a lot more then makes me comfortable. I much perfer to be “fine”. But he is a tornado in my life…

Sara Groves… Tornado

And every time I find healing you’re making a new mess,
And I am learning the real meaning of forgiveness.
And I could move and never send you a forwarding address,
Or I could learn the real meaning of forgiveness.-

Best day ever

I spent last night at my parents house, and I actually slept for the first time in a while. I laid in the darkest room in the basement and just enjoyed the quiet. It was so nice to not worry and not listen for every little noise wondering if it was Matt. It was so nice to exhale.

And today, instead of getting overwhelmed, I just allowed myself to breathe.

I got fired this morning from the portrait studio.

Which, given the rest of the drama in my life, should have been enough to set me over the edge.

But instead it gave me an opportunity to exhale.

Which was so needed.

I made a decision to just to be fully in the moment today.

And in the process of breathing and taking it one moment at a time, I had the most amazing day.

I spent time with some of favorite people, and I truly got to relax.

My roommates and I spent the morning at a picnic for Youth for Christ volunteers. I laughed with my friends, ate steak, and enjoyed the sunshine.

I even joined a game of Chicago softball. I was really good (I even slid into second).

Ok maybe I wasn’t REALLY good. Luckily I am cute enough to not have to rely entirely on my athletic skills.

After the picnic, Erica, Amy, and I went to starbucks and then we drove to Ericas dads and layed out by the swimming pool and read gossip magazines and paperback novels. It was so nice to just lay around in comfortable silence (except when I read to Amy and she talked about how hot Ericas dad was. Neither of us will ever look at white rain the same way again)

Then we came home and got ready for our friend Jess wedding. Sassy heels and flair always puts me in a good mood. The wedding was beautiful, the bride looked incredible, and it was fun just to hang out with my sister Erica and my parents.

Then I came home, threw on some jeans and flip flops, and went with my friends Brian, Lisa, and Felicia to see the new star wars movie.

And now I am back at Lisa and Brians house with Amy and Steve and we are eating McDonald and having a good time.

So today I allowed myself to exhale. And to be truly in the moment. And I had the one of the best days I have had in a long long time in the process.