How to Lose Your Faith, Or Find It

Many of you know that I started this blog after Kate died. This will be my last post on here.

Today I sat in a room full of chairs, across from a counselor, answering questions about why I need help.  And as I spoke, I heard my voice saying all the answers and I felt my body and I saw myself clearly for the first time in a long time.

We discussed some dates and she said, so you feel worse around the anniversary.  And I knew that was true.

She didn't die in March, but March is an anniversary of sorts.  Two years ago, my sister-in-law Pamela, Kate and I drove out to a clinic in Indiana.   By that point, Kate could walk but a few feet at a time due to intense pain, she weighed only 90 pounds, couldn't control her bodily functions and had an unnatural thirst that was never quenched.
She asked me to drive her out to a place that had promised to treat the cancer in her lungs, while claiming that her pain was caused by a broken tailbone, not the cancer that the recent MRI had shown spreading throughout her pelvis and femur.
Then when I refused,

"You don't want to drive me because you want me to die."

~~~~~
Probably wondering why I'm writing these deep personal things.   Out there into some place, maybe I can try to make sense of loss.  Even though loss doesn't make sense.

~~~~~

So, we drove out to Indiana, in the snow, in fear, trepidation...while she just got worse.  And she wanted me to leave her out there in the hands of people who were charging thousands of dollars to shoot I still-don't-know-what into her veins.
Within two weeks of returning home, she went into the hospital and was told affirmatively that the cancer was throughout her entire body, brain, legs, lungs, hips...


But those months, weeks, days, minutes that she wouldn't leave the house except to go to a clinic pumping poison into her body  haunt me everyday.  Even though I know there was nothing I could do to change the outcome, I still wonder if only...then maybe.

And those thoughts and those words, "because you want me to die" can eat a person up inside.
I am empty.
I look into the mirror and I don't know who I am.
 I push away people that I love, because why would anyone love someone who could make her mother think that she wanted her to die.

Since March of two years ago, I've wondered who I am.  Where I am going and I wonder, did I want her to die.

And rationally, I know she didn't really think that.  But I will always wonder...
There were questions about how spirituality fitted into my life, but I lost my faith a long time ago.



I felt it today though.  As though there may be light, there may be a way for me to find some peace, or else learn coping mechanisms so I'm not some walking festering wound of a person, who cries everyday and sobs after leaving Target.  And I want to hold onto my Mom as I remember her when she wasn't sick. And I need to learn how to block out those visions of her body as it slipped away, because that is stuck in my brain and I am stuck in life.


I hope that I can learn a new way to live and I can find my faith again.

Kate loved Aretha and wherever she may be, I hope that my she says Prayers for me. 

Little Darlin' It's Been A Long Cold Lonely Winter

THERE I was starting to write this:

 "The saddest songs, the ones that never should have been written...but were.

There are certain songs in the world that just bring those tears out.  They are the ones that say everything that a person can feel in a moment.

Cat Stevens wrote, Trouble while he was in the hospital near death at nineteen.  Nineteen. So friggin young to write something so moving.

"Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe."

 James Taylor was only 21 when he wrote, Fire and Rain.  Now, I can NOT listen to that song without a tear in my eye.  But to think of these people so young, writing such incredibly moving lyrics AND music?"

~~~~~~~

 

...and I'm listening to Pandora(Joni Mitchell station of course) and it starts....

Richie Havens version of Here Comes the Sun.....

SUN SUN SUN Here it comes....

Raise your hand if you're sick of Winter!!!  Don't know 'bout you but this weather's gotta change soon. 

But hey, we've all got the Spring left to kill ourselves!  I read somewhere that more people do it in Spring when things don't get any better.

I'm thinking about those bulbs we plant in September and October, how they take root and by April there they are full of fragrant blooms.  I guess I've been thinking a whole bunch about fertility and gardens and getting the ground ready to plant.  As much as I can't stand the cold, the ice, the shoveling, the breaking and destruction of everything, I know that the ground needs a fallow time.  

Don't kill yourselves kids(unless that's your thing) and I feel that the warm weather is coming soon....then the floods...but then the flowers....and love.

"Leave 'em laughing when you go and if you care don't let them know...don't give yourself away, I've looked at love that way."

What happens when people fall in love?  I'm still wondering about all of it.  But I suppose that's a topic for another day.  

"It's Life's illusions I recall...I really don't know life at all."

Yes, I'm Jealous of Everyone Whose Mom Is Still Alive...

And I know that this is an immature emotion/sentiment to have
....but it is how I feel.

I'm jealous of:

every woman whose Mom will kiss her on her wedding day.

my Father, because his Mother is still here.

the people who get to introduce their children to "Grandma".

anyone who can get a hug and an "I love you" from their Mom.

every single person who gets to celebrate baby showers, bridal showers, weddings, Christmas, Mother's Days and birthdays with their Moms.

And the thing is, I'm happy for people, but it doesn't mean that I'm not sad for myself.  This strange dichotomy of emotion is draining and difficult to explain.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-How are you? They ask.

-I'm doing okay.   Because I'm too proud, too stubborn to say,

                I am not okay.  I will never be okay.  

The thing is, I want to be okay.

I want to wake up and not feel dread at another day full of reminders of what was and what will never be.

I want to know that someday I will be enjoying life again and not merely surviving.

I want to not take my boyfriend for granted, because I'm so depressed that all I want to do is sleep, even when we are together.


But, I've been hiding out.  Fooling myself that no one will notice how I am really doing, how I can't get through a day without crying or being sad.  How I lash out at the people I love the most and isolate myself from them. How I'm risking losing someone I truly love...

I've been lying to myself and everyone else, petrified that someone may know that I'm not strong and capable of getting through a shit ton of bad situations by myself, that maybe if they notice...they might not love me anymore since the one person I knew would love me unconditionally forever is gone...
And others might realize how broken I am inside, but
 I'm not fooling anyone.
                  not even me...

And I'm just so sick of this stigmata of pain that I've been carrying around for so long.   

~~~~~~~~~~

Someday, I hope that I won't be jealous anymore.  That I will be able to experience JOY in life, and stop waiting for everything to end badly.  I've been so used to fixating on others and their troubles, or replacing drama for what I really need help with and that is grieving.
 

There have been moments when I wished I could be even more depressed and could attempt suicide, not to kill myself but to be able to hit that rock-bottom place, like an alcoholic or any addict.  But I've been on maintenance, where I come up a bit then go back down.  Admitting this has not been an easy thing, I've been ignorant about my own needs.

I need professional help.

 And I am going to get it...if I don't, I may just disappear one day and never return.
You can't be twenty on Sugar Mountain...even though you're thinking that you're leaving there too soon... ain't it funny how it feels when you're finding out it's real?

My Karma, My Judgement, My Life

Going to the doctor tonight for this cold that just won't quit.  I think I've gone into bronchitis.  When I'm sick, I spend too much time musing over things and...


I've been thinking about something my father told me about a year or so ago.

I had been talking about how I was afraid that I would die, like my Mom at 60 and it meant that I've already lived half my life.  He told me that I was going to live to be very old because I had honored him and my mother.

Funny thing though, I don't really feel as though I have.  I mean we can only do our best right?  Most days I don't feel like a "good person".  I am just an inherently flawed person who is seeking change.

Strict rules dictated most of my years so far, and while some of them have been beneficial many have created a certain fear within me.  I have a strong sense about how life should be lived, and I know I write a whole bunch about my Mom(who was NOT a saint) but she showed me how to live a clean life, how to be a mother someday, how to do the right thing and not lie.

Losing her is the most tragic thing that has happened to me so far.  But I remember her with LOVE.  I remember the things she taught me about God. Even as I grew older and decided to make my own rules about life, those initial character building lessons have stuck with me and hopefully will stick with me forever.

My mother never drank, smoked or did drugs.  She just wasn't into any of that.  She ate potato chips.  But my father was an alcoholic, weed and tobacco smoker.  Two extremes in life, and I've always feared of becoming one or the other.  My father was "more fun" at times than my Mom, but that was only because he didn't really care if other people picked up his slack.  He needed my Mom's straight edge ways to help keep his shit together.  He was more fun, but he had a problem.  And I've learned that life isn't just about having fun and laughs.

I also wonder if most addicts/alcoholics are just deeply wounded people who don't really like themselves or are just seriously depressed.

I've found that when people are living a deceptive way, they will do their best to over justify their actions.  They try to make it seem as though the person calling unsavory behavior to light is the one doing something wrong.   My father did this to my mother for years.  Told her that she didn't know how to have fun or let loose in life because she wasn't into drinking or smoking weed like he was.   He told her that she was judgmental too. 

I remember hearing these conversations(arguments) and thinking maybe they are both wrong.  Maybe she did need to let go and maybe he needed to accept that certain things bothered her conscience.

How often do we just assume someone is being judgmental when actually they just are afraid for us?

I know that I've experienced that with some people.   My father knew exactly how to deflect my Mom's concerns, and that is by turning it around and making it about her flaws. 

This weekend I realized how similar I am to my Mom.  For the past ten years, I've tried to NOT be similar to her.  To change my life in ways not to be alike...but I think I know why when she was dying she told people to talk to me, to ask Sarah because I knew what she wanted.

For a few years I felt as though I had failed my Mom, by not following in her footsteps.  She once said to me before I turned thirty, that she thought by now I would be married and have had a couple grandkids for her to enjoy.  When I was twenty-five she bought me a Norwegian sweater, she said that she pictured me drinking coffee in that sweater with two little ones.  Even though she knew that I probably can't have babies because of my PCOS, she always talked about it.  This broke my heart a bit.  When I found out that my brother and Pam were having Beatrix, I breathed a sigh of relief.  It took pressure off of me to give her a grandbaby.

And now I picture something that will never be.  My Mom wearing her Norwegian sweater with Beatrix or Crosby on her lap, reading a Jan Brett book to them.

Before she died, she told me that her saddest moment was knowing she wouldn't meet them and she said that she was sad knowing that she wasn't going to see what I would become.  She supported my dreams of being a writer.  But I hope that if someday, I do have babies(adopted or from my own body) that I will take all the things I learned by her mothering example and be that way for my own kids.

Extremely Honest

Why are we all dishonest?

Honesty is a rare commodity.  I think that I've worked for some of the biggest liars in the state of NJ.  That's right, I'm not afraid to say it.
My experience working in the corporate world has not been positive.  I've been lied too, told to lie, cajoled into fudging the truth, expected to accept lies...

I don't have a whole ton of faith in people.  The thing is these aren't "evil" people.  No,  these folks are affluent upstanding citizens.
In sending out my resume, I've been thinking about my past work experiences.  Yeah, I've worked for a whole bunch of dishonest assholes.  It's enough to make me lose faith in human beings. 

Five years ago, after getting laid off by a dishonest businessman, I swore that I would never again work in an office.  I had done what I had to do to support myself, but I always felt that I was not contributing anything of value to society.`

Do we all have to just come to the conclusion that in order to live, we have to compromise our own morals?  When does that happen? 

 Last night I think we hit negative temperatures here in Kinnelon. 

It was so cold in my house that there was frost on the inside of my front windows.  Yeah, I can't afford heat.

At first I was horrified to be so poor that I can't plunk down the money for oil(even though it's cheaper than last year), but now I just think if only I can make it through to March everything will be fine. 
My boyfriend gave me an electric heater, I've got an electric blanket and four cats and a dog who sleep next to me at night...and on nights he's here James the human furnace keeps me warm. (Thanks baby, I wish you were next to me every night!)

But I don't really know.  In fact I really don't know anything these days. 

I always feel the need to explain my actions to people, like if I don't they won't like me or something, or worse yet they might even(gasp) judge me.  I've never been good at accepting help at all either.  People think that maybe I'm too prideful to accept help, but it's not that.  It's more that I don't like feeling that anyone has control over me except myself.  Strings are always attached to any help that I've received.  Maybe I just look at the world in a fucked up way, who knows.

So, I prefer to manage my life on my own. 

What is the hardest for me is glimpsing into other people's lives and seeing their fabulous lives played out online.  Okay, the thing is we all seem to try to spin our lives to impress these days.  I don't get it. 

Is it competition?  Is it insecurity?  I would really like to know. 
Me?  Well I'm just trying to stay alive.

In a little while, I'm going to my current job taking care of an elderly man.  I love my job, the only problem is I don't make enough money at all.  Hence the NO heat situation.

The strange thing is that I know someday, I will look back on this time, not with fondness, but with an appreciation for others. 

We never know what other people are experiencing on a day to day basis. 

~~~~~~~
I've been thinking about my Mom a lot.  How this time two years ago, she started to really go downhill. 

How I've always worried that I would become like Little Edie from Grey Gardens.
In fact this summer I was following the "Grey Gardens Guide to Landscaping." 

 

I think that it's hard for people to understand the loss of a parent in a brutal way.  The twisted mother/daughter symbiosis that occurs.  The regrets, longing, unspoken words, changed futures...but maybe I'm just a morbid person who doesn't deserve certain things in life.

I was reading Brooke Shield's memoir about her mother and herself.  Even though my  Mom was not an alcoholic or anything close to that, our relationship was fraught with very similar issues.   She also references Grey Gardens.  I found it to be hilarious.  I was living the same way, Brooke.  The same freaking way.

Being an only child for five years, I was all parts of my Mom's world.  Our lives were so intertwined that when it came time for me to go to Kindergarten I used to cry that I wouldn't be home with my Mommy.   I always loved the story of my birth, how she would tell me that I slept right next to her, or how she wanted a daughter so much, but was too afraid to hope for one.

My father worked nights when I was little, so I slept in my Mom's bed next to her for years.   Up until I was about twelve, I would wake up with bad dreams and crawl into bed with my Mom. 

In her last months, when she couldn't get out of her bed, I slept beside her again.  There was something comforting in knowing that she was near me.  I've been longing to sleep next to my Mom again, to feel safe and whole.  To have her kiss me goodnight and touch my hair, call me "Sari".    We fought so much at times.  The last few months of her life, we had disagreements and her fear pervaded my own existence.  Yet, she always asked, "Where is Sarah?" if I wasn't around, or "Sarah will take care of such and such."   

And I don't care if people think I should be over this loss by now.  Can you ever really get over losing your Mother???

This is just me, being honest.

There are days, when I can't get out of my bed(her bed) because I miss her so very much.  There are days when I curse her and am angry at things she did or didn't do.  But mostly I remember her with love.  Sometimes I wish that she'd been a "Mommy Dearest" so I wouldn't miss her soo much.

What wouldn't I give to hear her sing, "Summertime and the livin' is easy...hush little baby don't you cry?"