Truth

Here's the raw truth: I'm not taking a blogging break to pursue any other projects other than myself.

If you read my other blog, you're well aware of the laundry list of things that need to get done around here but none are more important than job of "cleaning up my act" and taking some much-needed time to fully absorb what that means.

And here's where it starts.

I'm seeing a phenomenal therapist who has encouraged (mandated?) that I spend one hour each day with a journal and a pen. And a whole lot of quiet. Journaling is not the same as blogging and that's why I have to step back from the blogs for awhile.

I found this out the hard way. On my first night of the "journaling job," I dimmed the lights, lit a candle, opened my new and beautiful journal and stared at it. For about 30 minutes. Then I wrote:

I don't want to fucking do this.

But I did and I am and what's coming forth is gut-wrenching and it's insightful and it's powerful and it scares me and it makes me believe that I can be a better, more kinder person - to myself - first, and to my child, my family and my friends.

I have about three weeks into the journal. I write a lot. Some times, I sit for hours on end with the journal and the black pen I've come to love. I've cried a lot. I've dug deep into the corners of my heart and into the dark spaces of my memory to find remnants, pieces of what I believe to be true, to be relevant, to be helpful in this process.

There are so many events that have occurred over this last year that have made me pause and think, even plead, "I need help!"

No one ever taught me how to deal with rejection. Especially with men. No one could tell me what to do when my ex showed up so many times with promises, only to circle around mere weeks, days later with a "serious" girlfriend. Someone who will likely move in with my ex and my son. Soon.

No one ever suggested how I might feel with another maternal figure in Ben's life.

No one ever told me how to handle my father. I never knew how to be his daughter and as the years have gone by, we've gotten better - he and I - but I still feel like I walk a football field of eggshells - always - and I'll never understand why a daughter must have zero expectations of her father so as not to be disappointed.

No one ever said to me that my own mother may never relate to me. That despite living together for nearly a year and a half, we would be complete strangers.

No one thought Florida was a good idea. No one ever encouraged me to date as much as I do. No one ever said to me, "You don't need validation from men. You will always have validation from the one boy who means the most: Ben, and that is all that matters. At least for now."

No one promised that a career would be easy or that faith in God would not waver.

No one showed me a healthy way to eat, without the influences of emotions, guilt and torture.

No one gently hugged me and said, "Your family history is so warped. No wonder you can't sleep. It's not your fault."

No one gave me an identity other than, "single mom" and sometimes, "struggling, sleep-deprived single mom."

And I never had a reason to believe that I was much more than that.

Until now.

I'm investing a good deal of my free time into this process and there are days that I feel so much more free and days that I wonder why I waited 39 years to begin and days that I think that there is such an enormous elephant in front of me and how will I ever even begin to move this giant and stinky creature out of my space?

One inch, one word, one breath, one promise at a time.

That's all I have. For now.

And I have a journal full of amazing thoughts - my very first journal - something that has become my lifeline, my anchor, my home. (Michelle M, are you reading this???)

"Home to me is reality and all I need is something real."
O.A.R.