Excuses, Excuses

This amateur blogger has some. And I have spent the better part of the past 2 months scolding myself for them.

• Lost my job - check
• Lost the only man I cared about in over a decade - check (or more like he 'checked out')
• (Almost) lost life in car accident - check (but thank God we didn't)
• Lost a little bit of my mind watching a car come at us and wondering for a split second how to save my son - check
• Lost car - check
• Identity stolen and used to purchase almost $2400 of electronics
• ID thief requested credit increase in my name (was denied, thank God!)
• Lost sleep - check
• Lost peace of mind - check
• Lost confidence - check

I'm all checked out and wondering how to get it back because there is a part of me that believes that this isn't the end. I can get a job, get a bigger more comfortable place to live, have the creative life I crave, maybe even find love again and (gasp) get married and have at least another child, sleep peacefully, eat food without immediately feeling the intense need to puke it up, and more.

On the flip side, there is that louder, annoying, screechy shrew of a voice that says 'your done... just be glad to find a job doing anything and forget about whatever extra you had planned for your life.' I hate that bitch. And it is that hate for that shrew that pushes me to not fully check out. But I have been left to wonder what is going on with me that I have such a difficult time pulling it together? Surely, I've been through upheavals before - some pretty bad shit too. Sure, I'm older and maybe a little bit slower, but still... my resolve shouldn't be slower. What's up with that? I truly had no idea, and so I hid in a cave, communicating with only a few people while I tried to sort it all out. I came out of my cave a bit this week and reconnected with friends (brief chats) and something one woman said to me clicked when I tried to explain why I couldn't handle engaging with everyone, and why driving scares me so much now, and why I can't eat without getting a stomach ache, or why I'm just so damn tired all the time.

She said "you've experienced trauma, it's going to take time to get over all of the things that have happened over the past 5 months."

Ok, I already knew I'd been through a lot these past few months, but in my mind I immediately went into fix-mode, not allowing myself to really digest the impact of the things that have happened. I even remember saying to myself "take it on the chin and keep going." And while that sounds great for Rocky in part 9 of the movie series, for real people, that's not necessarily a good thing.

Trauma.

Why haven't I been able allow myself to accept that I experienced one trauma after another?

I have this habit of thinking that as long as you don't stop moving, the enemy hasn't won. Interestingly, I don't even have to wait for the enemy to take me out since I manage to do it to myself by literally running myself into the ground. And let me tell you, there is no glory in that. Putting "she worked herself to death" on my tombstone is not cute. And so here I am now, with at least 10 drafts of blog entries I've yet to publish, a website that I stopped building right after the car accident, now almost 2 months ago... walking in constant fear of rejection from a job... not even wanting to put myself in a situation where I could be rejected by a man...this ole girl is exhausted. And I surrender. The mask is gone... the act is over. Make no mistake, I'm not sad, just utterly confused and exhausted. I see the good for other people, and need to get back to seeing and believing it for myself.

Someone called me a 'worker bee' yesterday. Worker bee for someone else's goals, someone else's needs. That didn't make me feel good, but it did spark a little rebellious something in me, and so here I sit with my hands cradling that spark against the harsh cold wind out there, trying to keep it going, and GROWING so that it returns to the blaze it once was. Wish me luck... and don't blow on my flame, lol!