Everybody has one, ri=ght:??? Or is it just us?

I don't want to read it anymore, nor see it, but I want a safe place for it. So here it is. The truth.

Melinda Oliver I was violated on my 18th birthday by a man that I trusted. I felt dirty for years because I didn't shout "NO" loud enough. I went along with what was happening to me because I felt like it was my fault. I let myself be coerced while intoxicated even though I'd been in the bathroom throwing up I assumed it was my fault. It's NEVER your fault when someone abuses you.

To push or not to push

Take a deep breath.  Then another.  It's okay.  Everything will be okay.  I have to remember to breathe sometimes.  I knew myself once.  Once upon a time...  Oh how sweet the stories used to start.  I've forgotten way too much about who I am and who I want to be.  But I do still remember.  I see it distantly like a dream I've woken up from that I'm trying desperately to remember, but I know how this works.  If you look straight at it, it will disappear.  You have to find the wiggle room.  Just around the edges you can see the glimmers and hopes.  The crazy things that seemed so unrealistic and so intangible.  Those things you knew you could only see if you were still there in that perfect crazy land dreaming away. 

But they are there.  They're in that last bit of housework or in my case that giant mountain.  They're there in that little bit of dream left awake in your psyche.  They're there in everything you thought you couldn't accomplish like a new blog post or making a new friend.  Everything you thought you were hiding from and had pushed away is truly right in front of you if you allow yourself to see it.  You just have to push.  Just push a little bit harder than you did yesterday.  Those able-bodied people that don't know about fatigue or depression just call it trying.  For us though, it's pushing. 

You have to keep pushing and pushing yourself.  Trying is easy.  Trying is just that next step when you didn't think you could do something.  Pushing is knowing you can do it, but ignoring the fact that that last bit of energy to try is gone.  Pushing is trusting that you will take a new bit of energy and make it your bitch.  Pushing is saying:  I'm going to do this today no matter what.  If it takes you 3 hours, you're not letting yourself down because you found it and created it right then and there, so be it if it was four hours later.  Love yourself and keep on pushing, keep on trying, because you're worth it and you can do it, if only you believe.

Here I am.  Day two.  I'm writing.  I'm here.  I didn't accomplish much in the way of gardening today.  I got a bag of gardening soil and a bag of mushroom compost out of my car.  I thought ahead and bought them yesterday.  Woohoo!  What a step accomplished.  I shouldn't mock myself.  That's why you're reading this, right?  I covered some seeds and rearranged some pots.  It's cold outside.  I'm sticking with that as to why my accomplishments are so dim.  Let's be real though.  I slept until 3:30pm and then spent an hour on the computer before going outside.  I don't know why I've been sleeping so much.  Hopefully my body is fighting the sickness.  I slept nearly 13 hours again last night.  I didn't have to fight to stay in bed.  I was not sad.  I was eager to get into the daylight, but it was still so dreary and cold.  Sunlight...you know where you are.  I'm coming for you.  Like a turtle.

I've been cooking beans for 24 hours.  They're pretty good.  I'm wishing I had put some brown sugar in them, but I can do that when I open a can and heat them.  I may give some away but mostly it's just for me.  I'm trying to eat more legumes for my blood pressure and cholesterol (even though I did season them with pork).  Making a lot of life choices/changes at one time is not an easy task.  I feel dragged down, but I am still pushing.  I know at the end of it I will feel so much better about myself for having willpower and being strong.  I remember  a time when I could not be swayed.  I always stayed true to myself.  In recent years, I've had a lot more trouble understanding myself and drawing my personal lines (for myself and for others).  I'm not sure what changed, but I am confident that I am changing it for the better now.  I made collards yesterday too.  They only took a couple of hours to cook.  I let them soak in iced water over night.  They were my homegrown organic collards.  I seasoned them with peppered bacon, onion, chicken base, ham stock, ham bits, sriracha, apple cider vinegar and minced garlic.  OMG.  They are so delicious.  I had planned to eat the beans with them, but instead since they weren't ready, I ate two heaping bowls of collards with only a bit of bread.  Needless to say, I received the fiber for which I'd been looking.  If I was doing a comedy bit, I'd expose myself here.  Bigtime.  Instead, I'm rather dull so I'll just say:  Poop.

I'm watching a Lifetime movie right now.  Well, not really.  For some reason, I'm trying to, but it's just making me angry.  I'm going to do something productive like fold clothes and hope that I can cheat and eat Chinese food tonight.  I haven't drank or smoked or even had caffeine in a week.  My blood pressure is already down, but tachycardia is still back and forth.  The echocardiogram went seemingly well yesterday.  I have just recently had these inexplicable heart problems (as in it all started in mid-February).  I had decided to be better to my body by the end of January, though.  Two weeks of cutting way back on drinking and smoking and all of a sudden I'm at the ER hoping that my heart doesn't explode.  We'll get to the bottom of it.  I know my anxiety didn't help it, but I also feel certain that whatever it was had to do with more than anxiety.  I've been dealing with that for almost 18 years.  I know what that feels like and how much it can vary.  A heart rate that's pounding out of my chest with absolutely no other symptoms is a new ballgame.  I'm looking forward to continuing my journey to health and feeling good.  Of course, I'm having some major cravings, but they come and go.  That's why tonight I am going to permit myself to splurge a little.  I've been good all week.  It's time to live a little.  Even if living is just Chinese food and a movie marathon.  Even, just?  Whatever.  That sounds like living to me.

March 1, 2013 Ramblings...

I've been telling myself I'm going to write since last night.  I've been trying not to think about what is on the brink today.  The love and support from FB friends is awesome, but I need more…like reassurance in my heart.  Like I need to remember everything that I said I'd be yesterday, and I need to become it today.  I had so many good ideas last night and I knew that if I didn't write them down I would lose them.  I always tell myself that, but I never get up and do it.  I got up last night, but I just trolled FB and still avoided the task that I really felt I should be doing.  So let's see what we got…

Write a blog daily.  Why not Simelodyence?  Finish it, start it, whatever...

Plant seeds.  Talk about your gardening. Every year I say I'm going to start a gardening blog…  

Realize that no matter what you do it can't be wrong.  It is right because it is your life and your choice.  You can only fuck it up if you do not try.  THAT IS IT.  Effort is all you need.

Randomness and recording it.  Laying in different places.  Observing my own need for change and making it happen in the smallest most random ways in order to inspire myself to write.

Breathe.  Keep mindful of breath and never stop remembering this.

Forgiving is not forgetting.  Let go, but keep your lesson.  Learn.

I was sitting on the sofa thinking, "I never say sofa.  Why did I just say that?"  So I sat on the couch and felt better.  Then I knew I needed a change of scenery.  Suddenly the bathtub sounded awesome.  Only if it was dry though.  Being partially wet is no good.  I am all or nothing or gray on everything, but I'm never in-between on wetness.  Maybe laying on the front porch would be nice.  My back would probably like it for a second.  It would feel cool through my clothing.  The neighbors would think me strange, but I'm sure that's already been achieved.  Being outside was big goal for today.  I have collards in the sink and seeds that need to be planted.  Oh you needy needy seeds.  Why must I love you so?  

A friend told me if I sat down to write for 30 minutes it would turn into 3 hours.  This is a vote of confidence that I greatly appreciate.  But it won't work today.  I only have 28 minutes until I'm supposed to be walking back for my echocardiogram.  I'm trying not to be insanely nervous which well, who knows if it has any actually affect on how I feel.  What I do know is that watching the clock will drive me nuts, I won't get any seeds planted before I leave, I'm going to be early, and I'm going to be very happy once it is over…I think.  This is assuming that the results are fabulously normal.  Either way, I just remembered something I was supposed to write about!  My healthy journey, or my health journey, creating a health journal, the troubles with procrastination and extensive thought, how puppies help mental health, how relationships help and hurt it, how writing is something to be revelled in and not avoided like a plague-ridden sloth that will drag you down slowly until your guts turn to mush and you vomit them up in a cold dark smoothie that only a vampire might want to drink.  

I lay in bed wishing I was in a bathtub.  I lay in a bathtub wishing I was in my front yard.  I had a glass of water wishing it was a beer.  I had a pill wishing my brain could love itself again.  I listened to a poem wishing it didn't repeat itself constantly.  And I wondered, why do I wish so much?  Couldn't I just stop the poem?  Think of something else?  Drink a beer?  Lay in the front yard?  Lay in the bathtub?  Be grateful that I have a bed in which to lay?  Sighing makes an imbearable world feel bearable for a moment.  Scratching my head is a simple delete.  Frozen waffles do not compare to fresh. Friends mean the world to me, and gardening is one dream that will come to fruition.  I have to get soil today and remember how good it feels to put your hands in the dirt, grow and cook your own food, and be somewhat self-sustaining.  I need to gather would and build a new compost bin, but mostly, I need to be ready for whatever life hands me.  By ready, I mean, completely prepared that I have no control.  Being okay with floating is the best gift you can give yourself in the ocean, and life is merely the sea.

Trying to teach myself to write on a daily basis again is proving harder than one would hope.  I feel like such a complete failure in so many aspects of my life it's harder and harder not to fall into deep depression every time I think about my goals.  I said I was staying up late tonight to try and get some writing done.  I trolled Facebook and a couple other sites for nearly 4 hours, and this is all I came up with:  I don't write often enough, I don't work enough to complain about anything, America has a serious cat problem, and Gladwell's 10,000-hour rule makes me feel even more like a loser.  I had a decent amount of hours logged for a few of my favorite things, but that effort and practice has shamefully dwindled.  Well, I'm sick of beating myself up and feeling down.  I'm starting day 5 without cigarettes and alcohol, my first day of food logging, and my first solo yoga workout (I bought the mat yesterday.  I damn well better use it.).  Wish me luck!  I'm ready to have something to talk about instead of why I've been rocking back and forth on my thumbs since August.  Being scared to move and terrified to share is worse than not being here at all.  Someone is going to quit looking out for me if I don't start doing it for myself.  I'm here to take care of myself and better my life.  One day at a time.

Being yourself:  You think it's going to be easy.  You think, me?  I'm honest, open...I can represent and be just who I am whenever I want.  Wrong.  It's not as easy as it sounds or as easy as maybe it even should be.  But what good are "shoulds"?  The only difference you're going to make in this life is through change.  Trying to figure out "if's and should's" is about as fruitful as worrying or eating pizza all day sitting on the couch wishing you weren't fat.  I've had a very busy day as you can tell and am feeling particularly good about myself at the moment.  Fantastic you should drop in to hear me rant.

When do I get to be myself?  At what point do I feel like whatever I do I own?  Anything that is me is okay.  When do I feel this way?  I suppose after the anxiety and depression subsides.  After I work my ass off, and then there is no guarantee.  All you can do is trust yourself and say fuck it.  Why not?  Why am I so fucking worried all the time?  Is there nothing that I can do to free my mind?  How about freedom of speech?  It's saved me so many times before.  Why isn't it my first choice now?  Am I really that afraid of a family member reading what I say and disapproving?  For fuck's sake.  You're almost 30 years old.  Be happy that you're still breathing and maybe just maybe that horrible headache you've been avoiding seeing a doctor about will go away on its on.  Worth a try.  Maybe.

It's Monday.

I have these weird days when I just want to experience everything, and sometimes it's hard not to let sadness creep in.  Why?  I think it's because it's easy to get overwhelmed when your to-do list outgrows the days of experience you've had.  I know that one step, one day, one beginning at a time is all you can do.  I'm working on being okay with that.  I'm pretty freaking happy with my life, even though I may express too much at times.  I want to live and breathe everything that I love each moment of the day.  I want to feel the wind in my hair more often and laugh with friends over coffee instead of beers all of the time.  The universe is shifting.  I can feel it.  It's time to go rake the yard.  Happy Monday to the world.  And Boo, don't worry.  You'll see Prince one way or another.  I promise.