*Jazz Hands* Mom

Last night an amazing thing happened in my world…at one of my low points…when I was feeling most lost and alone…most confused about whether I am the person I want to be…the person I’ve always been proud to be…my friends rallied.

Let me explain the background on that before I go into detail.

I’m pretty open here…so it’s no secret that for the past little bit I’ve been making a conscious effort to face my own trauma…my own toxicity…my own…well…deepest fears and what they are doing to my life.

Here’s the thing about finally dealing with things. You guys…IT. IS. MESSY.

Some days I’m a ray of sunshine. Other days…I’m a shaker of salt. Just call me the Morton’s Girl, cause I’ve got salt for you! Some days I’m on top of the world. Some days I’m carrying the weight of the same world on my shoulders…and NOT gracefully.

Scabs and scars and layers of bandages…they all have to be ripped up…and you finally have to bleed until the poison exits your bloodstream.

The poison hasn’t left mine yet.

So…I’m still bleeding. Sometimes alone…sometimes *waving vaguely* E’erywhere…

I’ve lost people because of it. That just is what it is. While I don’t like seeing people I ever cared about physically bleed, I’ll be the first to sit there and help them through emotional bleeding. On the flip side of that, some people can staunch the physical wound of anyone, but they can’t handle the emotional flow of blood. And that’s ok.

On the other end of the spectrum…I’ve lost people who were never really there. They could only love me and consider me wise and good if I was of benefit to them. Bleeding and broken…I’m really no good to them. This is also ok…although less likely to be allowed near me when I LEVEL UP! to my healthy happy version of me. 🤷‍♀️

The problem is…because MY particular trauma is very rooted in a history of not being considered worthy or loveable by the important people…I tend to lose myself in the disapproval of others. I start thinking, “Wow…they must be right…I suck…I don’t deserve any better…I should just be grateful for whatever I’m handed…I. Am. Unlovable.” (Honestly…I think we all get drawn to those people who help us recreate our trauma that is still unfaced.)

After kinda making myself bleed with my own blog post yesterday…followed with therapy…and in conjunction with my heart hurting over some of the people I’ve lost…I WAS BLEEDING ALL OVER MYSELF and I couldn’t remember a damn thing that anyone could ever possibly love about me.

So…first I wallowed.  And then…I decided to be vulnerable…and I posted on my Facebook page…

“Full disclosure…I just flat out need a pick-me-up tonight. So…tell me one positive of having me in your world? Even if it’s just comedic relief. Lol“

Part of me expected to be ignored altogether. I mean…kind of attention-whoreish, if we’re being honest. 🤷‍♀️😆 But mostly…I already mostly knew who wouldn’t respond…because they’re not social media addicts like some of us, or because they didn’t really have anything nice to say and would choose nothing at all, or because they legit don’t like me and sure as hell aren’t going to help me. So, yeah, I was pretty secure in who wouldn’t answer. For those that I figured WOULD answer, I figured it would be mostly laughs and jokes because that’s often the reaction my posts are going for.

I was caught off guard on both parts.

Some people that I never would have expected a response from came out of the woodwork. And almost everyone took my request quite seriously.

Rather than jokes or backhanded compliments, what I received was heartfelt sincerity. People reminisced about times I had made them feel important at low times in their lives. People said I make them think. People brought back WAAAY BACK examples of ways I showed them kindness. I was told that I make some smile on days when smiling doesn’t come easy. I was told that it’s my mixture of realness and humor that brings something special to their world. I was told that I’m someone who has made them feel like someone relates to who THEY are. Even the ones who commented on how I bring nerdiness and jokes…they meant that as a heartfelt compliment. (Seriously, I am a loud and proud nerd!)

I woke up this morning…I saw the outpouring of love…the sincere desire to show me that I make their world a better place…and I felt…more light…more loved (other than by my boyfriend who always reminds me how much he loves me ❤️)…more seen…more ME…than I have in quite a long time.

The only response I could even come up with was this:

“So, what I’ve gotten from this is that what I bring to people is true friendship, kindness, love, hilarious/snarky humor, nerdiness and math. In short, to the people who matter, I am exactly who I want to be. This makes my heart happy and is honestly exactly what I needed. I’m struggling wayyyyy too much lately with feeling like I’m failing, but I’m not failing the people who love me. Thank you, guys. ❤️“

So, yeah…thank you. Thank you for reminding me that I’m still me. Thank you for showing me that the people who love me see ME… not their own version of me…but the ME that I’m proud to be.

Really, I think we all need that sometimes. ❤️

A very, very…very, very…VERY long time ago (shut up, I’m old!), there was a little 10 year old girl. She hadn’t had a very exceptional life up to that point…positively or negatively. She had a daddy who the world revolved around, so she was mostly able to ignore the fact that her mother didn’t really want her. She had an older brother who picked on her mercilessly…and a younger brother to whom she passed on that favor. She loved to read…she loved music and dreamed of being a concert pianist one day…she had so much love inside of her to give, she would often find herself sitting on her hands at school because she knew she couldn’t just get up and hug people. She had friends…she had bullies…neither left school with her as she wasn’t allowed friends at home…she had no telephone…she had no real life past home, but she didn’t know that was weird. She was…in short…a reasonably happy child so long as she had books and music to hide in when things got bad.

And then…one night…it was all taken away. In the blink of an eye…the police were there…so, so many police. Her daddy tried to run as they drove up to a house covered in flashing blue…but he knew it was done. He pulled over about a mile down that dark Georgia road…turned around….and told the little girl, “I’m not your father”. (Side note: Holy shit, I’m the anti Luke!!) Anyways…) The police caught up. Her daddy and mother were put in cop cars as the police tried to explain that she and her older brother had been kidnapped…all while her mother screamed, “He’s in the mafia! He bought off a judge! He’s going to kill you!!” And then…they were gone. She and her brothers were sent to the police station. And then…her little brother was gone.  They tried to explain to her that her name was not her real name…and her identity was gone. A few days later a strange man came and was introduced as her real father. He took them to their school to get their records…and then her school and friends were gone. He took them to an airport to go “home”…and then the only world she’d ever known was gone. She sat on that plane…her whole life gone in a matter of days…she had already figured out she was supposed to be grateful and happy…so she played her part…but she was gone.

Fast Forward about 17 years…the little girl has grown up….she’s married…she’s moved on…even if she was never really able to move on on the inside…This grown version of the little girl found herself on a plane once more.

As she sits on this plane, with her husband on one side…and an empty seat on the other…a little girl about 10 years old gets on the plane. The little girl is sobbing…she is followed by a man…in handcuffs…restrained by the police…and a flight attendant. The little girl, sobbing all the while, is saying goodbye to the man and begging him not to go…and then he’s gone. Before this little girl took the empty seat next to the now grown woman…the woman asked the flight attendant if the little girl was ok. The flight attendant (more than happily, which the woman contacted the airline about later) didn’t just say yes or no…she went into full detail. “Oh…no…that was her dad…he’s going to jail for a long time…so they let them say goodbye….but she’s flying to Georgia now to be with her mom whom she’s never met.”

You guys…this story probably sounds made up. It should be. This shouldn’t be the world we live in…and yet… 🤷‍♀️

The woman knew that…out of all the seats either of them could have been in… she had been placed next to this little girl because she was needed…she was needed to be the person she’d needed those many, many years before. She knew she couldn’t take away the pain that was coming to this little girl…but she could be her friend for the next few hours. She saw the little had a doll, so she asked her the dolls name. Tearfully, the little girl talked about her doll…she pulled out more dolls at the woman’s request…and, for a few hours (next to a thoroughly ignored husband lol) the woman and the little girl played and laughed and managed to find some joy amidst the pain. By the time the plane landed, the little girl was laughing and happy…even if only for a few blessed moments.

And the woman? She learned a valuable lesson that day.

Everything…ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING…happens for a reason.

She was where she was that day because her past was what was needed. She could wallow in the pain of what had happened to the little girl still crying inside of her…or she could own its purpose…and help others through her own experiences.

This…is my reason.

This is why I STILL believe that everything happens for a reason…no matter how long it takes to find it…no matter how much I wallow before I get there (I AM human, after all lol).

This is why I share.

This is why I write.

At times, I feel like I’m speaking into a vacuum. At times, my openness is seen as “attention seeking and dramatic”. At times I almost quit as I fear being annoying or misunderstood.

And then…someone will tell me that my openness helped them face something they’d been avoiding…someone will tell me that I’ve given them strength…someone will tell me that my words made them realize they’re not alone…someone will tell me that I made a difference for them.

Maybe it’s naive…this belief that everything has a purpose…that God puts us through tribulations for a reason that will not become clear until much later…when you’re sitting on a plane next to your inner child…when your words give someone a reason to keep going.

Yes…maybe it is naive…maybe it can be “annoying”…maybe not forgetting where I’ve come from can make me seem negative.

I don’t care.

This is my reason why.

Letting Go has been the theme of my year. But…my view on it has been evolving over that time.

In my life, I have usually been guilty of holding on for too long. Not for myself always, though. The usual reason for my monster grip on things (especially people) was that I didn’t want to be wrong about them and hurt them by letting go. So…I would try and and try and try and try…and try and try and try and try…and then…I would do the ever famous “INFJ DOOR SLAM”.

What’s the INFJ Door Slam? It’s a specialty of my personality type…we keep trying until we’re so defeated…we slam the door and there’s no coming back. The relationship is dead, buried, and…to be honest…mourned before we ever even got to that point. It’s done.

So…WHY? Well…I can only speak for myself here, but it may resonate with others. I was taught to doubt any of my own feelings or instincts that MIGHT cause me to hurt someone. It didn’t matter how much I was hurting…if it was a choice between ME hurting or someone else hurting…I was taught that I should be the one to suffer the pain.

WTF, right?? Lol

So, I would hold on and hold on and hold on and hold on…and suffer…and suffer…and suffer…and then…BAM! FUCK THIS SHIT, I’M OUT!

Door slammed.

But…what if…

What if it didn’t have to be that way?

What if my holding on was hurting someone else, too?

What if I had let go gracefully and naturally…and it saved BOTH parties from hurting?

This is the epiphany that I have had.

I’ve always thought I feared abandonment more than anything, but…

The reality that I’m finding through finding myself and facing things this year…

I don’t fear being disliked. I don’t fear being unpopular. I’m actually quite ok with both. I don’t have to be loved by all…or even most.

What sends me into a spiral is when words and actions don’t match…when someone says they love me but I don’t feel love…when someone says they’re there, but it feels like I’m alone…

When people hold on when they should let go.

That’s it. That’s the base root of my anxiety. Knowing in my gut that someone doesn’t want to be there, but stays anyway and swears it’s because they love me.

That dichotomy of words and actions. I can’t handle it.

And yet…aren’t I guilty of the same?

By holding on, in fear of being wrong, I am the person in someone’s life who stays…long after it becomes apparent that I don’t want to be there.

In an effort to never accidentally hurt someone…am I actually causing more damage?

They say that people come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. We can’t keep everyone forever. That’s not the way its supposed to be. (And holy shit, can you even IMAGINE trying to maintain strong relationships for a lifetime with EVERY PERSON YOU’VE EVER KNOWN? My introvert side shudders at this thought.)

Friends (even the best of friends)…lovers…whatever…maybe they’re forever…or maybe they’re for a season…where you each gain something from knowing and loving each other…but then it’s time to find out what else is out there.

Letting go doesn’t mean you didn’t love them…it means that you DID and you’re now allowing each other to fly.

Maybe one day that flight will bring you back…maybe it won’t…but letting go before the door slams is what allows you to hold onto that love and those happy memories.

So yeah…it’s ok to let go…it’s ok to fly away…and, sometimes, the kindest thing you can do is release someone before you hurt them by holding on too tight.

And now I leave you with the quotes I DID find that I loved even if they weren’t quite what I wanted to say. ❤️

/scene *Jazz hands*

Preface to say, I’m going to start using this place to write out some of my musings regarding therapy. It helps me to write it out. Some things I’ll share beyond here. Others I won’t.

Second Preface, this entry isn’t about my boyfriend. The first little bit is just to communicate how I got from point A to point B.

So…I started back to therapy. I’m honestly not sure I ever had any intention of trying THAT again…but I met someone who makes me feel so loved…so cherished…so accepted…so…safe. And I want to be the best version of me so that I can come even close to deserving everything he’s brought into my life.

It’s funny. It’s one of the very few people who has ALWAYS made me feel deserving, even at my worst moments…also gave me the courage to face my past so I could be better…I guess that old adage, “If you can’t love me at my worst, then you don’t deserve me at my best” works the opposite way, too.

“If you never stop loving me even at my worst, then I will face fire…or even therapy…because you deserve my best.”

ANYWAY, because of all of this, I started on the road back to therapy. And…so far…I like the one I found.

She calls me on my shit and tells me to stop being a paranoid doormat.

I call her on her shit when she tells me there’s no such thing as crazy, only misunderstood…and I tell her I hope Dahmer’s snacks agreed.

I need that in therapy. The ability to be real….and someone who will say, “Look, bitch…” when I’m being ridiculous.

But today she was getting onto me because I allow fear of being wrong to put me in some shitty personal places.

Today was mostly about my daughter…how I’ve allowed an environment where my hands feel bondage style tied when it comes to parenting her. Because…no matter what I do…it’s wrong…and certain people will basically tell her it’s ok to not listen to me. No one can parent a child like that…ABSOLUTELY no one can parent a teenager like that. So why have I allowed it? Because…what if I’m wrong? What if I’m wrong in how I parent? What if I’m wrong in how I feel about their judgment? What if I’m wrong…and I’m the problem…and I ruin everything?

But what she’s trying to get me to see is that my judgment is rarely wrong. Dude…my gut instincts saved me in the midst of some serious shit in life…it helped protect me…it helped keep me safe when those who “loved me” did not. But…after years of gaslighting…I was taught not to trust my gut.

You’re hurting me and I feel like this isn’t ok… “You’re just being sensitive.”

I’m anxious and scared because this doesn’t feel right. “Oh stop it. You’re always so dramatic.”

You’re going into rages that scare me. “Stop acting like everything is about you.”

You’re making me feel TERRIBLE about myself and unsafe. “How can you say this to me?! We’re like family!!” (To be fair…those weren’t wrong…the people who pull the, “You’re hurting me! We’re like family!!” really were treating me like some of my relations…lol)

I stopped even letting my gut keep me safe.

Here’s the thing I’m realizing. By doing that…by letting EVERYONE stay, no matter what my gut said, I was now the one taking away my own safety.

It doesn’t matter how many safe and truly loving people are around you…if you allow people who are unsafe to stay, then those people become all you can see.

As I’m writing this…I’m envisioning the Titanic. You’re on a sinking ship. You’re surrounded by people who love you. But that ship is still going to sink. You are still going to be unsafe…and probably won’t even see their love as you sink, because…I mean…YOU’RE SINKING!

I’ve been on the Titanic for a very, very long time and I wasn’t even trying to get off.

I allowed myself to stay on a sinking ship…feeling like I was steerage class with no access to lifeboats…because…the ones who loved me and would have moved heaven and earth to get me on a lifeboat were drowned out by the elite who made sure I knew that I’d only be hurting them if I tried to save myself.

Seems a bit dramatic, right? Lol But how else do you describe when you won’t remove yourself from something harming you because you don’t want to hurt someone who doesn’t care if you live? What else do you call it when you surround yourself with such LOUD danger that you can’t hear those trying to keep you safe?

I call it, “Come on, Sheri! WTF! You’re smarter than that!!”

Is it always that dramatic? No. Let’s say I’m surrounded by 20 people. 3 love me. 7 dislike me. 10 probably don’t think one way or the other about me. The 7 that dislike me…that I allow to continue to stay in my space…drown out the love of 3. While this is bad enough…for those who have suffered serious trauma at the hands of those who were supposed to keep us safe…those other 10? Those other 10 would be a blip on the radar of someone with healthy boundaries and self preservation skills. We are SUPPOSED to be, at least partially, surrounded by more people who are…ambivalent than those who love us. It’s what adds even more beauty to the love of the ones who choose us every day. But…again…for a trauma survivor…its very difficult to draw a line between those who we’re just background noise for…and those who actively set off our alarms. So…now we’re at a 17 to 3 ratio of who safe vs nonsafe people. The odds aren’t good that we can hear the love of the 3 over the gut wrenching sirens of the others. But…we’ve been trained…to know that we’re dramatic…we’re stupid…we’re sensitive…and we are responsible for not hurting those other 17 people by being wrong about them. So we let them stay.

And we continue to sink.

I don’t want to sink anymore. That is NOT the best version of me. That is NOT going to help me gain “intimacy tolerance” as I’ve been given a goal to build. Lol I will continue to feel unsafe, even when dragged kicking and screaming onto a lifeboat by the 3 who love me.

So I’m changing the narrative. (Sounds official and therapy like, right?)

Changes will be made. The 7 have to go. Even if they’re good people (which most people are), just as not everyone has to love me…I don’t have to allow them access to my life when they make me feel unsafe, for WHATEVER reason. So…the 7 go. From there we see if the 3 can be heard over the 10. If not, the 10 go. So I am only surrounded by love (not blind acceptance…big difference…I see love in the acts of calling me out when I’m being a dumbbitch. Lol But for my growth, not to tear me down.)

Again…it may seem extreme. And I TRULY hope that I don’t accidentally misjudge and hurt someone. But…if I’m ever going to be able to believe the loving sounds of, “It’s ok. You’re safe now.” I have to be able to hear them first.

I didn’t cause my trauma. I didn’t choose it. Who would? But it’s up to me to learn how to build back the life I should have had without it. I am a baby in this way. You don’t leave a baby alone with 100 people and expect them to just recognize safety. They build up to that. And so will I.

And, for the first time in my life, my heart and mind and emotions are enough in sync that I actually believe I can have that future.

You know those motivational books about chicken soup for the soul? This is like that. Except not. This is MY version of Snarky-Ass-Motivation.

There are a few things I know to be true in life (really…only a few…most of life confuses the fuck out of me). Let me put this into SAT prep kind of language for you.

• All humans have moments of being toxic as fuck.
• Sheri is a human.
• Therefore, Sheri has moments of being toxic as fuck.

Seriously…don’t we all?

The one thing I will say for myself, though…one of my BEST traits…is that I am ridiculously self-aware. I will usually listen to my own little mental/emotional spiral and think, “DAMN, BITCH! Do you need to get laid or something?!?!” (No. And this is not an invitation. I’ve got a man. We coo’. It’s a joke. PUT AWAY YOUR PENISES, DUDES! Damn.)

ANYWAY.

Lately, I’ve been toxic as fuck. Mostly in my own head. But still…toxic as fuck.

Are there reasons for it? Sure. There are people who rub me the wrong way (did I mention I’m human?). There are situations that it makes me anxious to watch. And…gosh darn it…sometimes I just like to hyperfocus on that shit rather than on the dumbass shit that is happening in my life! lol

Mostly…it’s tax season…I’m an accountant…and I’m too freaking exhausted to stop my own toxic thoughts in their tracks.

So…instead…I remove myself from the people/situations that I’m hyperfocusing on. Because…guess what?

They’re not the problem.

They’re not thinking about what I’m doing 24/7. (OR ARE THEY?!?!?! Stalkers!)

They’re not purposely trying to annoy the fuck out of me. (Right? Maybe?)

They’re not making me think petty thoughts. (Ok, this part I actually am sure of.)

So…this is my toxic shit.

Toxic Waste Colored Pea Soup For the Snarky Ass Soul.

Thank you for coming to my SelfInducedSociallyIncarceraTED Talk.

/scene

*jazz hands*

I was driving to work this morning…which is when I do my best thinking…and I started thinking about my penchant for fear.

Growing up, fear saved me. There’s no two ways about it. When you live a tumultuous life…surrounded by unhealthy people…there is very real danger to both your emotional and physical safety.

I learned to fear abandonment. I learned to fear anger. I learned to fear disapproval. I learned to fear failure. I learned that anything I said or did could inadvertently be turned to make me unsafe…

To make me unlovable…

To make me alone.

But…I’m not that kid anymore. I’m not that teenager anymore. I’m not that young woman anymore.

A healthy level of fear is a good thing. Especially when you’re a person who draws in unhealthy people because they’re what you know.

But that same fear is what keeps me drawing in those unhealthy people. Because the known fear is less scary than the unknown. I know I have and can survive what I’ve already been through…I know what to expect from the unhealthy…but…what if I surround myself with HEALTHY people and find out I’m actually the problem…

What if I find out I’m honestly unlovable?

So, because of this, I go into things ready for the other shoe to drop…I go in partially expecting that people will realize that I’m not worthy…that I’m unlovable…that I’m broken.

Because of fear I ruin any chance of my own happiness.

And I don’t want to do that anymore.

So…I’m not stupid enough to believe I’ll turn it right off…as a therapist told me once, “The thing about fear rooted in PTSD is that it’s not irrational…it’s already happened…”. But…I’m going to battle the fuck out of it.

Every time I feel that niggling voice saying, “This won’t last”…every time my brain tells me, “They’re already sick of you”…every time my heart says, “You’re not lovable, protect yourself now”.

No. Just…NO.

I’ve said that 2022 is the year of letting go of what is not meant for me.

That includes fear.

So, Dear Fear, You can go now. I don’t need you anymore. I’m safe now.

It’s been awhile since I wrote anything here. Life has been…strange.

I almost lost my daughter to suicide on Christmas Eve. Obviously this changed a lot about our lives. There’s no way it couldn’t. Something like that brings a lot into focus that needs to be focused on. She is growing and facing things…and happier than I’ve seen her in years. I am scared…and yet hopeful for a future that she tried to erase. We both are appreciating more about the relationship we have with each other. There’s nothing about what happened with her that I would want either of us to live through again, but…somehow…I was blessed enough that she realized that I’m her safe place. She realized there’s nothing she can’t talk to me about…she realized there’s nothing I won’t support her through…and she realized that she has reason to keep going.

But it changed something in my own head that I never could have foreseen. Mostly that I want so much good for her…I want her to know that she matters…that her thoughts and feelings matter…and that, as her mother, she will not learn from me until I learn…and live…the truth that…

I MATTER.

I have spent my life…literally…AGONIZING over what other people wanted and what would make them happy. I have spent my life heartbroken over not being enough to be loved…not being what people wanted me to be. I have spent my life going out of my way to put myself last because, as I often said. “If someone has to be unhappy…why shouldn’t it be me? It would be selfish to choose my own happiness first.”

Every. Single. Life. Decision. I made was agonized over in fear that I was being selfish or unfair.

Don’t get me wrong. That is something we should consider. Are we hurting someone? Are we being needlessly selfish? Are we seeing things clearly or in the wrong. It should all be considered. But, not at the expense of recognizing…

I MATTER. YOU MATTER. WE ALL MATTER. EQUALLY.

And…if we don’t, as parents, teach this…what are we teaching our children? We’re teaching them to have the same pain we have. So…I started focusing on this…this new idea of…

I MATTER.

In a fight with a loved one…I must face the facts, accept my own culpability (if there is culpability to be had)…and then…remember that I matter, too.

In a romantic relationship, I must look at what they want…I must look at what I want…I must remind myself that we BOTH deserve happiness…remember that my wants and needs are as valid as theirs…because I matter.

In all relationships…I must know my own worth…I must know what I want…I must know what I don’t want…I must always strive to be fair…but, in the end, if I don’t fight for me, who will? I have to be the one to remember…I matter.

I do not matter more than the rest of the world, but my happiness DOES matter AS MUCH as the rest of the world.

And, so…I’m learning to walk away from what doesn’t work…I’m learning to let go of things that are not meant for me…I’m learning to fight for what I want and what I need…and it is HARD, because I’m fighting a lifetime of habit of putting myself last…I’m fighting a lifetime of telling myself I deserved less…and because…just because you have to let go of things, doesn’t erase the pain of doing so.

But if I don’t fight to remember that

I MATTER…

If I don’t lead by example and show my daughter that I strive to remember that

I MATTER…

Then how will I ever teach her to live a full and happy life….always knowing that..

SHE MATTERS.

Christmas Eve. Approximately 10:30 pm. That’s when I heard the words that no parent ever wants to hear. “Mom, I need to go to the hospital.” My beautiful, hilarious, outrageous…sad, angry, scared, anxious…15 year old daughter had swallowed a bottle of pills.

It’s a fear I’ve carried with me for a very long time. She’s had more grief in her 15 years than I ever wanted for her. The very battles that I fought for her not to have to fight…I failed.

That’s the majority of what I keep thinking. I failed. I failed my daughter. She, even momentarily, thought that death was the only way to stop the pain.

Everyone keeps telling me I haven’t failed her. They tell me I’m this great mom…that I have done and continue to do what is best for her. But I couldn’t stop this. I couldn’t make it all ok.

I’m lucky. Luckier than some. She came to me within 10 minutes because I CAN say that the kid tells me everything. She was out of the ER within 14 hours. She’s been in another hospital since then, though. She’s where she needs to be. She’s getting the help she needs. She’ll be home soon.

All of the things that I keep telling myself. She’s medically stable. She’s getting help. She’ll be ok. She’ll be home soon.

And none of that takes away the fear I will continue to have until my child is back home where she’s supposed to be. None of that takes away the panic of trying to do everything in my power so it never happens again. None of it takes away the fact that I can’t hug my daughter. I can’t listen to her yell at me for being annoying. I can’t roll my eyes as she barges into my room unannounced.

None of it takes away the fear that next time she won’t come to me.

None of it takes away the fact that her childhood ended the moment she felt so low that death seemed to be the only way out. And I can never give her that childhood back again.

Many many moons ago I spent Christmas in Mobile, Alabama with a friend. While we were there we went to a club. For the life of me I don’t remember the name of it. What I DO remember is that we WANTED to go into a club called The World…but it was closed. So, we went on to the next club. Fast forward to later that night…we were leaving the club and we see that The World is now open and there’s a line outside. I started joking about how our hippie friend Charlie…aka Trippy McTripFace…would have said something like, “So I wanted to go to the world, man…but the world was closed…and then the world said, “Come in”…and I said, “No, World…I do not want to come in anymore…”. (If you didn’t read that in the ultimate stoner voice, go back.)

I am reminded of that club lately. I so desperately wanted to join the world in the past few years. I wanted to stop being a hermit…I wanted to let people in…I wanted to belong. I tried to go into the world, but…the world is closed to me. I’m not wanted there. There’s a huge line outside…of all the cool people will get to be a part of the world…but I get to the bouncer and he knows I don’t belong and turns me away. I can hear the laughter…I can feel the beat of the music…I can see the inhabitants…but I will never get in.

To say I don’t want to be in the world, would be a lie. We never get over wanting to belong.

So…instead…I try to convince myself that I don’t want a world that doesn’t want me.

And maybe one day I’ll believe it.

I counted this morning. I moved 13 times between the ages of 10 and 25. 13 times in 15 years. I’ve been in the same place now for almost 18 years…but, if I’m being honest, I’ve been feeling that tug for many, many years…it’s just harder to pick up and go when you have a child.

So…WHY? Why have I moved so much? A couple of them were normal moves, but mostly…I’ve always been searching for home.

I want to say that I thought I had it until I was 10. My childhood vision thought I did…I thought that was what home just looked like. My mother’s mental illness aside, my stepfather (who I thought was my daddy) treated me like a princess and my brothers were the pains in the ass they were supposed to be. Now I know that wasn’t a home…it was a mirage and a lie…but I think it warped my view of what home should look like. Not because I had the things I should, but because if that HUGE of a lie could exist…then the TV realities could, too, right?

I could have parents who loved me. I could have siblings that were my best friends. I could be teased and picked on, but still be enough to be loved.

I searched for that home. But…I never fit. I was too much a girl. I was not enough like others. I was too heavy. I wasn’t pretty. I was smart, but that wasn’t exactly something that made people want me around. I was too responsible. I became funny as hell…but that only gets you so far. I was simultaneously too much and not enough.

So…I searched. And searched and searched and searched.

I searched for a place that felt like home, but places aren’t home.

I searched for family that made me feel like home, but sometimes you’ll never fit no matter how much any of you want it to happen.

I searched in relationships…which is about the dumbest move a person can make.

I searched in large groups. If others could find home there, why couldn’t I? But I couldn’t.

Why? What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I be enough? Why am I always too much?

There was a cycle that I recognized fully this morning.  I search for home…I think I found it…I jump in…I embrace it…I start to feel like I’m the only one embracing it…so I leave. I may look back, but I leave.

I try to leave this feeling behind.

And therein lies the rub. You can’t leave yourself behind. I am the common denominator of the places I don’t fit. Not just in a way of I must really be too much and not enough (I vascillate on whether these things are true about me). In the way that…

I’m always ready to run.

That’s not anything anyone else is doing. That’s not the decision that anyone else is making.

They stay where they are.

I am the one who runs away.

Am I running from them? Or am I running away from myself?

I believe I’m running to find a home…but, in reality, I am an eternal Toby Tyler…running away to join the circus…

Who else moves that many times? Lol

I’m fair enough to myself to know that the homes I’ve run from really were not meant for me. That wasn’t in my imagination.

But…I’m hoping I’ve reached a place inside of myself where I can recognize home when I finally find it…and be willing to stay still and fight for it.