Bubbles, what do you want me to put there? I'm confused.

Maybe sharing the hope that things CAN get better if one starts speaking up and standing up?

Yes what J said! I hope you dont mind, I moved it to his post!!!!

OMG, my freakin' head is spinning! I have spent the entire day - the entire day! - getting D18 ready for prom! They just left - a limo full of kids. They spent 2 hours here, with the teacher in charge of the school yearbook (D18's best friend's stepfather) taking pictures of all the couples, individually, in the limo, in front of the limo...

Of course it's the one weekend I haven't had 10 minutes to shake together to clean my house, pull the weeds leading up to my front door...

The one thing that matters most to me - people respecting me for how I keep my house - and I just had 20 adults hanging around in my house, asking to use my bedroom to get their daughters' dress fixed (when the bedroom was piled high with my junk, cos I've been working an extra job every night to earn money and I hid all our junk in my bedroom)...

Anyway, I'm exhausted. Nail spa, boutineer (sp ?) search, jewlelry search, hair appointment, boyfriend forgetting tickets at his house so I had to take him to get them, ...

And most of all, I'm sensing a huge emotional overload coming.

You all know how I've been holding off making any decisions until D18 is out of school and gone. Well, this is the next to last milestone. This, then graduation. That's it. Then I can't bury myself in her life any more. Just me, my life, my life with H. Holy cow, I never expected this overload of emotions!

And I had minor surgery yesterday, and all I really want is to say leave me alone, I just need a rest, but I've been promising H all week that we would go to a movie tonight after we got D18 off to the prom. I did take a rest last night, when H met us at the mall while we were shopping for jewelry, and there was one more place to look. I told H to take D18, after we met for dinner, to finish shopping, cos I needed to go home, and I did, and went to bed, to catch a breath. So I feel guilty asking for another 'breath.'

Sorry, just feeling overwhelmed today and needed a place to vent. H has been fine; this is about me.

I do have to add D18 picked the sweetest guy on the planet for a boyfriend. He was embarrassed even to kiss in front of H. Even if it was for taking prom pictures. I'm glad she has better taste than me. I shouldn't say that. My H is a good man. Just a bad combination.

(((Cat)))

Take a rest. Do not go anywhere. Assert yourself, value yourself, care for your precious self and rest.

Anyone who's spouse had surgery would insist on them resting! What is with your husband??!!!

HOLY COW, cat!!!

You just made me very thankful that I've got boys.

*hugs* Yes, do something for yourself. Let Calgon take you away or something.

How are you feeling since your surgery? Are you doing okay?

Just to let you know, you've been a great help to me during my recovery. I really value what you have to say. I wanted to make sure that YOU know that. :-)

I think that you are a very, very intelligent woman.

Cat - You're getting a little ahead of yourself, aren't you? Take a deep breath. Recover from your surgery. Enjoy the pictures when they come back. Leisurely buy what remains of your daughter's needs for college over the next several weeks, and enJOY her! Take her out to lunch when you can. Take her shopping. Have some fun. Maybe even stay overnight at a hotel nearby with a pool with her and just get away - just you and her.

"Life's about changes; nothing ever stays the same." Isn't that what Bonnie Raitt sings? ((((Cat))))

This begins a new chapter in your lives. There is nothing cut in stone saying you have to decide anything by a certain date. Acclimate to the changes and then make a decision.

Thanks, everyone. Verve, you are very sweet, thanks. It means a lot.

It was very minor minor surgery - just a couple of cysts cut out of my scalp. I'm really fine. But I appreciate all the support.

We are now at our time share for the night (about an hour from our house). The kids get Senior Skip Day tomorrow, so I booked 2 cabins one for girls and one for girls. We're trying to stay out of their hair, but a couple of the parents wouldn't let their kids come if we didn't stay over. So we're making dinner and then going to a movie. So I'm claiming a mini-vacation!

Sooly, I just want to say a special thank you for bringing me back down to earth. I've gotten too much wrapped into her leaving, but I know she's close enough to us that she'll be coming home a LOT, and we have time shares up by her college, so it's not 'the end of an era' or anything.

Thanks for reminding me. And the ideas.

Cat,

I just wanted to share a few words of encouragement.

My oldest daughter is 20 and living on her own... college and full time work. We live about 2 hours away. Our relationship has become deeper and much more fulfilling since she went off to college a couple of years ago. We were close when she lived at home, but it's even better now. It's not a dependent love...it's one of mutual respect and care.

You know, Cat...getting any kind of surgery - minor or not is stressful. It takes a lot of energy to focus on just that one thing for that one hour or so. You simply can't multitask while you're under the knife, and I think that can be a blow to anyone who is used to multitasking! lol

I can remember getting a cap put on a molar. I hadn't had anything that invasive done in my mouth for probably 30 decades, and I went home, whined a whole lot to my husband, and took a long nap. It was just too much 'invasiveness'. I remember just wanting to be left alone at that time, so I can appreciate your angst having that much company at a time when you probably would have so preferred to be left to yourself for a while.

Hang in there. She'll always be your daughter, no matter where she lives. (((Cat)))

Thanks, guys. I'm better today.

The Burden of Bad Promises...

Bad promises can look like healthy boundary enforcements...

they are not.

We can live on promises made to self "Oh, after DD graduates, I can leave." For all the years we promised that to ourself, we essentially were saying, "I will permit you to AO, DJ, SD, lie, verbally and emotionally abuse me...but you just wait until our kids leave home, then I will, too."

Worst abuse we do is to ourselves in these permissions.

It's human to make bad promises to ourselves...it's divine to NOT keep them.

If you have fourteen progressive, predetermined boundary enforcements, and your deepest promise to yourself is that you stay vigilant in keeping them, then you don't sacrifice, let your Giver run riot over your Taker (setting up your Taker to do the same); you stop building resentment into entitlement...you do that which you truly believe in.

Cat...tough to NOT hold yourself to a 15-year mantra...from habit alone, your perpsective is set from habit...and you have new experiences, a new perspective...when you made that promise to yourself, you were in the all or nothing...now where are you? Where will you be after graduation?

You had 20 adults in your house...that's wow to me. You were in the thick of your DD18's big day, her crew, involved, aware and present...with a lot of your fears (old and new) hopping around you...

Heck of a weekend...

Kinda like your marriage...wonderful, stressful, fearful, beautiful, tender, remarkable, poignant and exhausting...especially when someone's been under your scalp.

This is the father of your DD...this is the man who really did light you up and can again...this is the one person, above all others, who knows, accepts and adores you...and who chooses to go through it with you (the dull and the amazing) together.

Makes sense to me that when you change, then you choose different goals, and dates to achieve them by...

and I'm trying to remember if you told your H of the deadline?

LA

Very wise as usual, LA.

I have a question, though. When you talk about how I 'used' to feel about him...what if I really didn't feel that way? I have found in therapy that my wall is so high that I have been numb most of my life, out of protection. And I distinctly remember, on the most important days, wondering what was wrong with me, because I wasn't really feeling anything. Even when D18 was born, it was like I was outside my body, watching myself, detached mentally. Observing. Clinical.

And I remember, when H proposed, thinking 'why not?' Literally. Because I had no self-worth, and I thought that I was supposed to get married, so I kind of just took the logical steps to arrive at that.

Honestly, I'm not sure if I ever really did love him. Or anyone else. D18 is the closest I've ever felt like I'd do anything for them. The rest of the time, I'm just numb.

I think that's one of the reasons I've never really worked that hard for IC, I don't think I'm going to like what I find.

Sounds like a lot of hidden shoulds in there...

like you should have felt when...proposed to, gave birth...

from the very fear of choosing to believe you won't like what you find.

Instead of what is...has been...will be.

Falling in love with yourself is hard...no more reasonable to believe you've been loving your H and your DD with all your being for decades...than to believe you haven't.

In between is reality.

I don't believe in numb...because no matter how high you build walls, your feelings come from the inside...and if you are all about emotional management...then your choices pivot upon what you think you'll feel when...lots of hidden shoulds and shouldn'ts.

And it seems to work and work until it doesn't work anymore.

You can choose to believe you have loved and acted from love...and NOT been intimate...in your marriage. Then you act intimately...with awareness...which is what I've seen you change the most...stayed aware and appreciative that these two other human beings, who, no matter what you did or didn't do, choose to LOVE you...you let your shock, joy and acceptance show.

When you realized the lie that you earn them around you, stay for what you do, not who you are, not within your control...well, that's a big ol' lie to deal with. Could take years for that kind of self-betrayal to heal enough to trust yourself.

Did your mother or father teach you how to be crazy about yourself?

Shoulds aren't real...they are fantasy...and you feel. I've seen you. Right now, you see the summary of your life as numb...and it's had numb and not numb...fierce resentment, anger, passion, delight and joy...in flashes...heart-wrenching tenderness. You've felt. You'll feel again. This wall keeps you from others...a deprivation...a reinforcement that containment means safety...figure out if that means you're making those you love safe from you...or you from them.

Then realize, you're safe anyway.

And when we condition ourselves to feeling shame/guilt...working our lives, choosing our actions, to control our own response (dodging shame/guilt), then numb is welcome...it is a relief...for awhile...when in between, we feel 15 other emotions, going unnoticed.

Trust yourself more...and do the ten minute challenge three times a day...where you stop and lay down on the couch, with nothing on (no tv or radio) and feel your body's sensations (not to fix, to note), hear your thoughts (and see if there is a smile in there or a should), feel your feelings, and your spiritual connection to God...

see if you're shaming/guilting...and ask him to help you stop...

see if you're looking through others' eyes back at yourself...and ask him to help you look through your own...just as you are...

and ask if he could help you be crazy about yourself, his own dear creation...precious and priceless...and if you would do this laydown whether you believe in yourself or not...

to do it, anyway...without having to guess, know or predict your response.

To know you IS to love you...begin today...without shoulds (they are in you for a reason)...for all your endeavors, your research, in undertanding other humans...remember this act was for you, too...as if you could know you through others.

In part, we can...and in part, we cannot. Just like we're all one and all separate. Be available to know you better...

and then share with your H. He's been waiting for you.

LA

LA, my life is full of shoulds. Probably why I'm so terrified of doing anything for myself - I grew up believing it was my job to make everyone else happy, and anything I do for myself is selfish. I'm sure my mom never realized. But even today, I can't even fix my makeup in front of another woman in a bathroom - I feel like I don't have as much right to be taking up the mirror space, and nothing I do will make me look good, anyway.

If I try to work on this stuff, it's going to be a long and tortuous path. *sigh*

Ayup...long path, torture is optional...

And you don't walk it alone.

Do you remember a comic strip, Ziggy, by Tom Wilson? Ziggy pondered and wondered...and I remember one Sunday, he asked..."If we're here on earth to help others...

what are the others here for?"


I bet I've said that before...how astonishing that was to me...because I really did divide in my head two groups...us and them...and it's not real or true. Old from young thoughts...and this is what came through my mind, reading your posts.

I remember. You've done for yourself for decades...and not realized it. Now, you're aware, alive...focused and open...new eyes...new experience...go to your post and see those beliefs.

Here's the beliefs I heard:

I work to make others happy.
My role in life is to make others happy.
If I make myself happy, I am selfish.
I am to only feel happy while pleasing others.
I have no beauty. Others have beauty, there is beauty and I do not fit.

To focus on myself is to take away from others.
To be kind to myself is selfish.
To be real with myself is selfish.

I believe mothers teach daughters how to be comfortable and to thrive in their own skin.

I believe that acts of service make others happy.
If they do less for themselves, they will be happy.
If I do more for them than for myself, I will be happy.
If I am doing, I am safe.
If I am being, not doing, then I am vulnerable.
Others must be doing, also. Being is lazy and selfish.

Would be really hard to take up mirror space when you have hurt yourself for a very long time. And you hold the answer in the palm of your hand...

be kind to yourself as you would be kind to others...

be loving to yourself as you would be loving to others...

and realize

being kind and loving to yourself as you ARE to others...because that's been your boundary your whole life...and you've been crossing it.

Great boundary, no enforcement. Prepare to soar.

Look with love at yourself and do not compare.

For you are incomparable.

Look with appreciation at yourself and do not discount...

for you are valuable.

Look with kindness, which is when acceptance meets the unexpected, and know you are already kind.

Look at you through the eyes of God, and know he sees you, delights in you as you are, and loved you before you had a face or body, passionately.

These are not acts of selfishness...they are welcoming home all the parts of you that you callousness threw away to perfect, to make others make you happy, loved, secure, belong and earn your place...

where you already had one.

Self-love is a commandment we break every day.

LA

I kind of messed up last night, but I tried to make up for it today. We were watching DVR'd shows in bed and one ended, and MrCat asked what time it was, and I said a little after 12. So he rolls over and hugs me and says 'Happy Mother's Day!' It just came out of my mouth. I said 'uh, duh, Mother's Day is on Sunday...but thank you for saying it!'

Ouch.

This morning he came outside where I was gardening and the first thing I said was 'Thank you for wishing me Happy Mother's Day last night, that was really special.' He looked skeptical, and I said 'I'm serious! It really meant a lot to me that you were just waiting for midnight so you could say it!'

That seemed to make him feel better.