With Rain Comes Cleansing

Today I am 31 years old.  It's raining and dreary outside, but my 1 year old is at last asleep and my bathroom and kitchen floor are finally clean, so I feel pretty good for the moment.  And every moment really matters in my world.  One moment I can feel like my world is going to crumble right beneath my feet, and the next moment I'll remember my "oo-ja-ee" breath and smile a little smile.  So as I sit here at my dining room table, "Sex in the City" on the TV and drizzle singing behind my back, I am asking myself, "What do I really hope this 31st year of life will be like?"  Not, "What do I hope it does for me, or has for me?".... But, "What's it gonna be like?  What are some lasting changes that I hope to see in myself?"  Well, for one, I hope that my hormones will balance out so that I can feel like a normal human being again.  I'd like to be a woman who knows how to genuinely laugh.  I'd like to heal my adrenals so that I can actually stay up past 10 PM.  Enjoying sex again would be a nice goal.  And oh how I would love to be someone who can let the little things go!  Gosh, I hope to enjoy my daughter more, and resent her less!  I hope to feel married again.  The list of hopeful transformations is endless.  But I guess the most important hope I hold for this next year is to maybe learn to love and accept myself for real.  I know that's such a cliche thing to say, but it really is something I need to do for myself.  I need to learn to extend myself some grace now and then and say, "It's okay that you're feeling this way, Emily."  I need to let go of the past - good and not so good memories - and grasp the present.  I need to slow down and enjoy where I am at in the moment.  Can I do this?  Seriously, this is a really, really difficult goal for me.  But yeah, of course I can do it.  Practice makes perfect... And although I don't want perfection to be a goal of mine, I don't ever want to give up practicing.    

I'm Just High on Caffeine

Sneaking into the local coffee shop with my Starbuck's Venti Anniversary Blend this morning, I thought, "Ahhh.... This is good."  I had left my 10 month old daughter with my husband at home and trenched the mile down here in the snow, ready to meet with my new girlfriends to talk about writing.  Writing.  I love to write.  I don't think that I'm good at it at all, but I believe that someday I will be.  I love smooth, black, ballpoint pens, thin, narrow-lined sheets of paper, keyboards that make that clickity-click sound.... I love putting random words down in front of me and then closing my eyes, taking a deep breath, and rereading what I just wrote.  And for now, that's all that really matters when I begin to write.  Sometimes I roll my eyes, sometimes I laugh, sometimes I scowl, and sometimes I just shrug my shoulders and go at it again.  Everybody is a writer.... It's just that not everyone makes their words visible.  If you can think, you can write.  I didn't say speak, because look at Helen Keller.  One of the most beautiful writers of all times could not speak or hear.  But goodness could she think!  So I'm thinking, or wondering, rather.... What is worth sharing on this blog at this moment?  Does anybody even care?  Hmmm.... I guess right now, I don't really care whether anybody cares or not!  And this is supposed to be about "mothering," I suppose... But I don't really feel like talking about that.  My mind is on how yummy my coffee was, and how I wish I could drink Starbuck's coffee all day long, and how excited I am to travel to L.A. in two weeks to visit my sister.  I'm thinking about how amazing God's love is.  I'm thinking about the cute outfits that Jennifer Aniston was wearing in "Marley and Me," and how I want to go seek out the same brown leather boots, plaid and denim skirts, tank tops and jean jacket.  I'm thinking that tomorrow morning, when I go out for coffee with my husband and friends, I'm going to have a slice of chocolate cake with my French Roast.  Ahhhh..... I love to think.  And therefore, I love to write.  But for now, I have to lift my thoughts off of this screen and carry them into the day with me - a Valentine's Day of playing in Boulder with my husband and daughter - a day of speaking, eating, laughing, hearing and thinking.... What could be more fun than that???  Until next time, Happy Writing! :-) xoxo Em

Will Power

Identity

I dent if I

I doubt if I....

Can I? - Doesn't matter

I will.

Me, Mom and Ed

I only have happy memories of my mother.  There was a lot of cuddling.  There was a lot of shopping.  There was a lot of baking, cooking, and lunching.  There was a lot of dancing in the living room and being goofy together.  She literally planned a party for all of my friends at every holiday, be it Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, even the occasional President's Day.  And with each party came decorations, a homemade cake, videos, forts and sleeping bags.  She was everyone's favorite mom.  She was my mom.  And so, I watched her like a hawk, as if I could protect her and make her happy.  I watched her do her 5 AM aerobics in the living room.  I watched her swim her laps at the YMCA.  I watched her talk on the phone to her girlfriends.  I watched her water the plants in the backyard.   I watched her sunbathe on the back porch.  And yes, I watched her call herself "fat" in front of the mirror, even though she was probably a healthy 130 lbs. at 5'4".  I thought she was most beautiful at night after washing all of her makeup off.  I'd sit on the toilet, while she scrubbed her face pure, and say, "Mommy, you don't need makeup."  I wished that she loved herself as much as I loved her.  My mother was my entire life.  I always thought that losing her would be the absolute worst thing that could ever happen to me.  I rarely left her side, unless I had to in order to attend school, or what not.  But most of the time, I was her shadow.

Still to this day, the biggest mystery that my mind, soul and spirit struggles with is why, having been so loved as a child, did I decide to stop eating at the innocent age of 11?  What was I needing, seeking, hiding from, fearful of?  For a month I was able to pull off eating an apple, banana, and bits of dinner each day, until I dwindled down to 70 lbs.  The day I was discovered, I was shopping in Marshall Field's with mom, trying on some clothes, when she walked in on me in the dressing room.  She about lost it, seeing my frail, little body, and from there brought me straight to the Lake Forest Hospital, where I heard the word "anorexia" for the first time in my life.  They told me all the horrible things that could happen to me:  heart failure, kidney failure, etc.  So I went home that day and ate like I'd never eaten before.  However, those threats didn't stick, and I soon went back into starvation mode.  From then on, I became obsessed with food and exercise, calories and fat grams, skin and bones.  People talked, all scared for my life, and I devoured the attention.  I took up running and found that I was really good at it.  So those two things - being skinny and running - became my identity.  Depression and anxiety set in, isolation resulted.  Eventually OCD entered my world, as well.  The endless scouring of my hands and countertops calmed me down, momentarily.  I became phobic of other people touching me, even brushing up against me in the school hallways.  Each utensil I used counted as 10 calories.  A dab of toothpaste counted as 100.  Year after year this continued.  Therapy didn't help.  My period never came.  I was essentially preventing myself from growing up.  What was I so afraid of? 

During the summer right before my senior year of high school, we all thought it would be a healthy idea for me to spend some time away in Colorado with my aunt and uncle.  Even though my mom and I had remained best friends over the years, we had a huge blow out right before I left.  I don't remember what it was about, but I can assure you that it had to do with the eating disorder.  What didn't?

While away, I managed to eat as little as possible and run as much as possible during the day, when everyone was off to work and school.  "ED," as I called the eating disorder, packed up and came with me.  There was no chance of him staying behind or even backing off on my vacation.  But unfortunately for us, our vacation got cut short.  As I entered my aunt and uncle's house after a long, hard run one afternoon, the phone rang and so I picked it up.  It was mom.  It was so good to hear her voice.  I had really been missing her, and still had a few weeks left of my time away.... so I thought.  There was a quivering in her voice.  And then she shared with me what I had known would happen since my earliest years, since my obsession with her began, at birth.  She was dying of brain cancer.  I wasn't surprised.  Somehow I had already known.  I think I had always known that I would lose her.  Maybe that was why I never left her side growing up.  I knew that my time with her would be cut short.  That night, after just a few weeks away, I flew home to be with my mother; although, she was no longer there.  The brain tumor replaced my mother with a woman whom none of us knew.  But that woman was only around for 90 days.  She couldn't have left soon enough.  I wanted nothing to do with this other woman.

So at the age of 17, I was on my own.  Well, ED and I were on our own.  I had my dad, but since he and my mom had divorced when I was 8, he had his own life going on with my stepmom and their two little ones.  Don't get me wrong.... my dad and I were always close, as well.  But he couldn't be there like I needed him to be there.  I also had my stepdad... but he didn't know how to nurture a 17 year old woman.  And my older sister, well, she had to finish up college.  So after a year, I moved to Colorado and decided to attempt a new chapter in my so-called life.  I entered college at CSU and made fabulous friends, but ED never left my side.  Year after year, he stayed.  I found Jesus, and hoped that maybe He'd replace ED.  Nope.  ED was a persistent and stubborn presence.  Well, is.

I am now 30 years old, married, and mother of a 10 month old daughter.... and yes, ED is still in my life.  I hate him.  He is my worst enemy.  But I have no idea how to make him go.  I am getting stronger, however.  I am learning to love and accept myself.  I am learning to forgive myself.  And as the mother of a girl - a beautiful, precious, special, little girl - I have a huge responsibility.  She has to witness me loving and accepting myself.  She has to see me enjoy food, smile at myself in the mirror, go about my day with no makeup on my pale skin.  I don't fully believe that my mother is responsible for ED, but I sure don't want to take the chance of being responsible for him entering my daughter's life.

This essay isn't over yet.  I have a whole new chapter to write about, just as soon as ED has left for good, and exciting new adventures begin.    

Disobedience

met with God this morning

said, take the bread

i said no

tired now

alone

Where do I go from here?

The Wife

Husband and I fight again

Too much time at the sink

Too much time on line with other moms

Always doing this and that

If I don't though

He will suffer 

Even more

Won't he?

Morning Mom

Sitting here in the Bean Cycle 

empty cup of coffee

  Fiona next to me - restless

- sucking on my cell phone.... 

Wishing that mornings never ended  

Decisions need to show face - 

thoughts need to be pondered 

Fatigue sets in.... 

Sometimes you just need to not say anything              I am going to stop trying so hard 

for a bit 

Starting with this moment.....

  I am going to just love.