Moved to Substack

Hello!

I've moved my blog to Substack, where it's easy to subscribe to emails. And there's a nice community.

If you'd like to follow me there, I'd be so grateful: https://lisamjordan.substack.com/

Hugs, 

Lisa

When I looked in her eyes, they were blue but nobody home

This is a little story about connection.

I'm an introvert, which sometimes surprises people. Sometimes people tell me I'm wrong. 

But really, all that means is that I need alone time to recharge. When I get over-peopled, I get really crabby and stop functioning.

It doesn't mean I'm shy (although I was for decades). 

It also isn't the reason I go off on a million tangents and inappropriate things sometimes fall out of my mouth. I think those can be attributed to ADHD or some other undiagnosed neurodivergence.  

Anyway, the point I'm making is that I love community, and long before I understood that it was my nature, I've worked to build community.

People are everything to me. I honestly feel there is nothing more important than the people I love who love me.

(Yes, OK, water, food, shelter, healthcare. But for my emotional and physical well-being, I need my people.) 

The reason I'm writing this is that I'm going to leave a really broad community I've been part of for what I realize is about 17 years. 

Time is weird.

I've been blogging longer, but I've been less and less consistent with the blog. Plus FB can be so passive. Writing takes creative thought and energy.

So I've been thinking about it for a while, and it's been hard, because I don't want to lose connection.

When I started blogging—and I'm not quitting—I was single, heartbroken, and in absolute crisis.

Emotional crisis like all of the lies my family kept secret for decades about my dad's suicide attempts, all the lies we told ourselves about being fine, those were absolutely choking me. The family dysfunction, which we didn't recognize as such, had molded me into someone who couldn't sustain a healthy romantic relationship.

And all I wanted was someone to love me. I hated myself. I was convinced that I was unlovable. That nobody would ever love me.

I started blogging, and the only people who knew about it were my closest friends and some family. Back then DC had this wonderful blogger community. We read and commented on each other's blogs.

We were online weirdos with varying degrees of concealed identities who shared our weirdness with the public and we liked each other for it.

Complete strangers started reading my blog. And the ones who liked my weirdness stuck with me.

And some of my invisible friends became in-person friends. Some I've never met, but we've still been friends since before Nick and I even met.

Such is the power of online community.

Late in 2006, when one of my besties moved in with her boyfriend, who it was very clear would become her husband, and another of my besties moved away for an amazing job, I was suddenly all alone.

I wasn't actually alone, because of course we were still friends, and I had other friends. But these were my see-all-the-time-call-in-crisis besties.

This was before I'd gotten very far in therapy. I was still crying all the time. I was still wondering why the boyfriend I'd broken up with didn't love me. I was hoping he'd change his mind and we'd get back together.

But I was frantically doing all this internet dating in case. Because I was terrified of being alone.

Basically, I was fucking insane. 

So at some point that fall, edge of winter, I realized that suicide was an option. For me, I mean.

Even though I was 11 when my dad first attempted suicide, and 18 for his second attempt, I'd never considered it as a personal option. Not through crying every single day and gaining 40 pounds my freshman year of college. Not through my worst breakups. 

But one day I realized: when my parents were gone, because I wouldn't do to them what my dad had done to us, I could leave.

And this idea was such a relief.

The option was there for some future time. I could put it on the shelf, and take it out when I needed it.

I didn't ever have to be completely alone and miserable.

That was incredibly calming. 

Then here's what happened. I progressed in therapy. And I got very into the blogging community.

This combination saved me.

I mean this literally.

The following spring, my dad attempted suicide and very nearly died. 

He wasn't breathing when EMS found him. We had to sign a paper at the ER allowing them to re-intubate him, to change from the emergency intubation to one that could be long-term in the hospital. We had to acknowledge that he might die during this procedure.

And then they told us, should he survive it, he might not ever wake up. If he did, he could be brain dead. We'd just have to wait and see if he woke up.

It took hours and hours to get him into the ICU.

One of my forever besties was with us, and we left at maybe 3:00 am? I can't remember. My mom wanted to stay. We drove to my parents' house to sleep.

I couldn't sleep.

So I got online, and I shared my biggest, worst secret on my blog. I said that it defined me, but was not about me.

I think about that now, and how sad that is. 

It really did define me. My life, and my mom's, were focused on keeping my dad alive. And he kept trying to leave.

I didn't know how people would react. Suicide was even more stigmatized then. 

I just knew I wanted to let it out. To scream it from the rooftop. To find some relief from holding it.

What I got was a tremendous amount of support.

One of my dearest friends became one of my dearest friends precisely because of that post.

I didn't know I needed all that support. But my gosh, I did.

And so, between working with my therapist and pouring my heart out on my blog, I started to heal.

I firmly believe I could not have done this without my online community.

I had and still have amazing in-person friends. But it was different.

And the reason all this is bubbling up is because for the longest time, I loved FB. I reconnected with so many long-lost high school friends, Peace Corps friends, and family friends in far-flung locations. 

Out of nowhere, this site eventually became integral to our lives.

In moments of anger I say I hate people, and India gives me a look and is all, "You love SO MANY people!" She's right.

I love so many people.

But I also, in the current regime, have very high anxiety. And I have never been any good at moderation. I am all or nothing.

It's part of my charm. It's extremely frustrating. I contain multitudes.

It would be one thing if, like a friend of mine, I could log on to post things on my great community Buy Nothing group. And then log off.

Or check in on a few friends, and then be done.

But no. This is not me. If I'm in at all, I'm all in. 

And right now, I'm posting and reading about one political horror after another. And I see very few posts from friends. I mostly see ads and random posts from all kinds of groups I'm not part of.

Recently one of my friends said, "You don't have to do everything. You can do little things that still matter. And removing yourself from apps takes money away from them. And money is all that matters to them."

I thought about this. I thought about the person who paid a lot of money to be at the inauguration. The  person who removed fact-checking from this online community. Who owns so many of the apps I use.

So I'm doing this one small thing, slowly extricating myself.

And in case you're reading this and thinking I'm suggesting you do the same, I'm not. And I'm not judging.

I don't judge people I like. 

I really don't. I have lived through some of the craziest shit. I've done plenty of crazy.

Who am I to judge?

Unless I'm married to you, in which case I want you to eat more vegetables and work out. 

(I do, however, judge the shit out of people I dislike. Let me not pretend I don't.)

But friends? Absolutely no judgment. Make your own choices. I'm here for you. I'm an enabler, not an enforcer.

If you're a bestie and you tell me you're in a Goodbye Earl situation, I will not ask why. I will tell you I have an SUV and I can be there with an old blanket.

This is who I am.

Am I scared of feeling isolated? Of course I am. I love finding commonalities. I love connection.

I guess I'll see how it goes.

And that's where I am with that.

And the waves tell the firm coast: 'Everything will be fulfilled.'

When 2024 began, I said that I didn't want to tempt fate by saying that it had to be better than 2023. It could hardly be worse, right?

I think I'm not superstitious, but I kinda am.

And though I don't always succeed, my inclination is to hope for good, hope for better.

So I was hoping for a good year. 

Hope hope and more hope.

On December 30, 2023, we visited the family of a dear friend of Nick's, who lives just outside of Oxford. In Oxfordshire. (The shire of Oxford!)

I was excited to meet him. I'd heard about him for years.

His family lives in a charming, centuries-old stone house in an ancient, quaint, no-streetlights English village that used to be one massive wealthy family's estate.

Leaving his house in rainy pitch dark, I slipped on one of the large uneven paving stones and landed flat on my shin, splitting the skin in a long line.

Since Nick and I have watched so many British murder shows, the bulk of which seem to be set in and around Oxford, we joked that I was lucky to have escaped with my life.

In retrospect, I maybe should've sought medical attention, or at least gotten butterfly tape. I don't think stitches would've worked as it was directly over bone.

But instead, we got on a flight the next day and came home. Slowly, over months and months (and months), it healed.

First it swelled and turned colors and scabbed massively. It was gruesome. I sent photos to friends who were up for the gore.

I have a big scar. I don't mind scars. I've got a lot of them.

So I began 2024 on the heels of a joyful trip, but felled by some international non-Covid crud, still deep in grief, still healing from a double mastectomy and also suddenly this random murdery British village wound. 

A year ago I was emotionally and physically struggling, with low expectations, but hope.

Last night, as I was reviewing my year, I tiptoed through my memories in the form of photos, and doing so reminded me of how blessed I am. What a lucky year I had.

Genuinely.

Despite grief, despite the leg wound, which hurt to touch for about six months, despite pneumonia in the fall, which took about five weeks to recover from, and despite some months of undiagnosed depression.

It sounds rather terrible when I list all of them. I do realize this.

But so many wonderful things happened. 

And my approach to life, after having such dramatic reminders of the vicissitudes of fate, is now to take the opportunities I can.

There are things I hope to do in this life, places I hope to see, and sooner is closer to guaranteed than later.

I'm not saying we're no longer saving for college or retirement. I'm just saying, if something is accessible, I'm going to do it.

In February, Nicole, my beloved Nicole came to hang out with our kids so Nick and I could go to a fancy dinner at Lincoln College, Oxford, where we took the above photo. Attending the event was both a pleasure and an honor.

I wanted to take a whole lot of photos, but people just ate their multiple course dinner with wine pairings like this was all normal. I didn't want to be a gauche tourist.

And then Maude came to visit. Although actually, she arrived at our house a day before we did because Virgin Atlantic switched our flights to a day earlier but didn't tell us. 

Surprise! You're leaving yesterday!

I was going to include a photo of our faces, so happy to be together. But I think the photo that depicts our friendship more accurately is this one of Maude doing plow pose and me laughing and taking a photo while Wanda takes the opportunity to sniff her butt.

In the spring, the kids and I went to Puerto Rico, which was warm and tropical and so, so beautiful. And I got to reconnect with my high school friend Maria, who I hadn't seen in over 20 years.

And then summer, my favorite season! Summer was filled with truly extraordinary experiences.

Nick joined me for the 30-year reunion of my Peace Corps omnibus. I got to see people I hadn't seen since I left Ecuador. The weekend of reconnection and reminiscence filled my entire heart.

I went to Portugal for the first time, visiting dear old friends who live there. And then Kathy joined me and we headed heading north to Vigo, Spain, to walk 101 kilometers of the Camino de Santiago.

We walked for five days, and some of it was very hard, and I have many thoughts, and our Camino experience merits at least a whole post of its own.

But from that week, strongest in my memory and heart is how much we laughed. Except for using the bathroom, we spent 24/7 together. We had a lot of time and kilometers to talk. And oh my gosh, did we laugh.

Maybe not everyone would find a glass-walled in-bedroom bathroom in a beautiful historic hotel hilarious. But we sure did.

Did I used to laugh more in my day-to-day? I don't know.

Now I realize that belly laughs are treasures. When you have someone with whom you laugh that hard repeatedly, I firmly believe you never let them go.

I don't intend to, anyway.

In August Nick and I headed up to get the kids from camp in Maine, and took the opportunity of being so relatively close to Montreal to visit for a few days.

Oh my gosh, Montreal. What a beautiful city. India was sick, and my family was not in the mood to tourist a whole lot, but we really enjoyed strolling around the city, and we had great food.

We went to a John Fluevog store. What absolute pleasure.

On my birthday, I took a Pilates class taught by Annie, one of my lovely Bali friends.

And added to this was the joy of seeing my high school friend Monique, and getting to meet her lovely daughter.

Also! I learned that all of the Great Lakes connect to each other, and flow to the Atlantic via the St. Lawrence River.

I spent time on Lake Superior every childhood summer, and this blew my mind. Although I recently told this to some friends and they were like, yes, we learned this in school.

Was I taught that? Maybe I was busy seeing if I could hold my breath for a whole minute rather than paying attention. 

That was how I spent much of 7th grade history with a teacher I disliked. Never disruptive. Just quietly timing how long I could hold my breath, over and over.

But was American geography 5th grade? My geography is terrible. I only learned that Virginia borders Tennessee when we got Wanda, and Nick saw the town she was from and said, "That's almost Tennessee."

I actually said, "Virginia borders Tennessee?" This is the kind of thing that makes Nick tut in disappointment. 

Kind of like how I know nothing about our government and so I always ask Nick and he is all, "Didn't you major in Poli Sci at UNC?"

And then I have to remind him that yes, but only because I was a French major and my dad insisted that I add another "more useful" major, so I crammed a whole bunch of Poli Sci classes into my senior year but really didn't care and don't remember anything.

So just tell me again about Congress and the Supreme Court already for Pete's sake.

Anyway.

I learned so much US geography when Maude and I drove cross-country to move from DC to San Diego. We used paper maps, it was so long ago.

I seriously kept being like, wait, this state is next to this state? What's next?

We drove through West Virginia to Kentucky, and as such, I know they're next to each other and I've still never been to Tennessee. Although apparently some of it is right up against Virginia.

Anyway, now I've kind of derailed this with how little I know about where things are in the world.

My main point, I think, is that for me, just about every joy comes down to the people I'm spending time with.

I've left people out. And here is why.

At some point I just started listing names of friends and then I was like, oh my gosh, is this super neurodivergent that I'm about to make you a list of every single friend I spent time with last year? 

And next I'll tell you my top ten favorite birds!

I definitely don't want to be tedious.

So if you're reading this and I saw you and your name is not here, it's not because I don't love you. It's because it started to feel weird.

All this to say:

You know I love travel. Oh my gosh I do. And because of how I grew up, I often feel better out of the country than in. I leave and wish I could stay wherever it is I am.

(Except dinner is too late for me in Spain. But otherwise, absolutely.)

But for me, the most important thing in life is the people you love and who love you.

And lucky, lucky me, in 2024 I got to spend time with so many of them.

Here's hoping for a wonderful 2025 for all of us. 

I said this to myself in January last year, and I'm saying it again: Exercise, bathe. Eat a fucking vegetable. Feel lucky to be alive.

Hope for health, hope for peace, hope for love and joy. For each and every one of you.

Christmas 2024

I don't know who needs to hear this: Holidays can be so hard. 

Maybe yours are easy and fun and there are no dark moments. And if so, I'm genuinely glad for you. 

But I think, what are holidays like Christmas but traditions? Which means they're imbued with all of the emotion and memories of the Christmases that came before.

Nick bought a box of Quality Street, because his grandmother always bought them for Christmas. They're not, we have discovered, all that great.

But I understand the nostalgia that makes you buy chocolates from your childhood. Particularly those associated with a beloved grandmother.

We buy these things and we dip the madeleine in the tisane.

Memories seep from our veins.

The reason I'm writing this is that I've talked to a couple friends who are struggling, too. So I figure if there are three of us, there are more of us.

I'm here to tell you that it is OK to be sad. It's OK to be elated and devastated depending on the moment. 

It's OK to be disappointed, or wistful, or grieving, or whatever it is you may be feeling.

All of your feelings are valid, always. If you don't allow yourself to feel them, they stick around in your cells anyway.

Feel them and free them and free yourself.

We've been in this prolonged very sparkly! Jingle bells! Ho ho ho! Candy canes! Snowflakes! Jolly! season.

Which I think can pressure people into feeling like they need to be all in the Christmas spirit. (I say Christmas because it's my holiday.) 

Whatever Christmas spirit means.

But my gosh, the pressure of the holidays. Gifts to buy, food to make, school performances to attend, last minute this and that and everything else. 

A school Secret Santa gift to buy oh my gosh for tomorrow MAMA! (I have always hated Secret Santa, and the pressure to participate at work and buy random little things for someone you don't really know, things that will ultimately wind up in that giant plastic floating island in the Pacific or wherever it is. The one that's visible from outer space.) 

Anyway.

It's so dark, at least in my hemisphere. So dark so early. 

And there's so much build up.

And now Christmas is here!

Holidays are a genuinely lovely time to gather. Holidays bring families and friends together. Sometimes it's forced, and sometimes that's hard. And sometimes you wish for more togetherness and you don't have it. And that's hard, too.

But then being together can make an absence so notable.

Being together makes it obvious who used to sit in that chair. Who isn't here with us. Whether they're no longer alive or just no longer in our lives.

That is painful.

Until last year, I'd spent exactly one Christmas away from home. 

Home was my parents' house, whichever country that might be. And I always went home for Christmas.

Home was my family. Christmas was the same ornaments we'd been putting on the tree since my childhood. In fact, they'd been putting some of them on their trees since before I was even born.

After my dad died, and family became Betty, Jordan, Nick, and me, Christmas transferred to our house. Even that first year, when we didn't really have a functional ground floor.

We could've done Christmas at my mom's house, where she had a whole working, clean kitchen and no construction dust. But we had it here, on the second floor.

Nick bought a fake tree, and now that tree is as old as Jordan. I assume it'll be our tree till we move out of this house.

My mom was all about Christmas. She made the home, whichever house, beautiful. Her gifts were always exquisitely wrapped.

In fact, I'd often give her my presents to wrap, because she loved doing it, and she make things so pretty.

So last year I said there was no way we were having Christmas at home. We had to go somewhere.

I think, honestly, my family was kind of afraid of the depth of my grief. Anything could make me cry. And I might never stop.

So last year we went to England. It was such a big deal for so many reasons.

It was, of course, still Christmas in the UK, but it wasn't our Christmas. We didn't put up a tree. We didn't wrap presents.

The trip was everyone's gift. And it was magical.

India and I wound up hugging and crying in the middle of Hyde Park on Christmas Day. You can walk, run, fly far away, but grief sticks with you.

I wanted to travel again this year, and the kids said they really wanted Christmas at home.

Of course, I'm so glad they have a strong sense of home, and home is safe and comfortable for them.

We put up the tree—same tree—but this year only lights. Nick and Jordan didn't want the extra work, and I couldn't handle the memories saturated into nearly each and every one of our ornaments.

They put Nick's train around the tree, because we didn't need to worry about Betty tripping or Wanda chewing it. Mostly it freaks her out.

My friend Meg, her mom, and I made Betty's sticky buns. None of us had ever made them before.

I'd never made yeast bread. I was very daunted.

For me, never having made them pulled up the guilt and regret that I never once helped my mom with this annual task. I never asked her if I could learn how to carry on this tradition.

I knew she wouldn't live forever—none of us will—but still, in my mind, she was never not going to be here.

Until suddenly she wasn't.

I'm not saying this Christmas holds no joy. The kids had fun disgorging stockings, which were mainly packed with treats, and opening gifts.

India got me the most amazing pair of pinky-purple Lisa sneakers. 

I made Nick my annual photo calendar. The one I used to make for my mom, who would ooh and ahh over every single photo.

The sticky buns are great, but they're not perfect. Nick and Jordan wanted to know, precisely, what we did that was different.

My mom's recipe is sketchy. She doesn't list all the ingredients up front that wind up being mentioned later. Some are not mentioned at all.

I know this is because she likely wrote it as her mom, my Grandma Lillian, described it. Most of my grandmother's recipes said things like, "Put in oven and bake until done."

And then my mom had made this recipe annually for decades. My whole life and longer. That's a lot of decades.

She tweaked it a little—there's a rewrite that happened somewhere in the aughts, I believe—but still, there was guesswork.

For three people who'd never made them, they turned out really well.

Nick thought I was crying because of how the buns turned out. He wondered if they'd been overly critical.

When really, I was just thinking of how different Christmas is now.

Christmas Day used to be my dad annoying us by making us listen to a record of Dylan Thomas reading A Child's Chrismas in Whales, which is a great story, but we just wanted to play with our new toys. And then when the home video recorder became available in the 80s, he began annoying us by videotaping our every moment.

And then he wasn't around anymore.

My mom just quietly made everything perfect and beautiful, at, as I now know as a mom, a high personal cost.

The magic that everyone thinks of as Christmas?

That's a hell of a lot of invisible Mom work.

And she perpetuated that magic. And now it's on me. And I just don't have any sparkle right now. Maybe I will in future years.

But I deeply felt the absence of sparkle. I missed her excitement at what the kids were unwrapping. Her giggle over her gifts. The kids joining her, piling on and spilling over in the red chair to look at photos.

It's not that we haven't laughed, or enjoyed ourselves. We have.

We have joy ahead this afternoon, with a couple friends coming for Christmas dinner. Small, casual, but still people who don't live with us, which will force us to clean up and use nice plates and actual napkins and sit in the dining room, which honestly, I think is good for us.

Sometimes I admonish myself for being sad when I have so much privilege. When there are so many people who are cold and hungry. So many who literally have only the clothes on their backs.

I've done this a lot in life.

But then I tell myself exactly what I tell my friends, and what I truly believe: your feelings are valid. Your pain is valid.

Other people's situations do not diminish the validity of your feelings.

You can be happy-sad or sad-happy or sad-sad and know that there's a community that feels that same way. You might feel super alone, even surrounded by people, which for me is an extra-hard kind of alone.

But you're not actually alone. We're all made of stardust and we're all connected.

I'm no longer that bitter, bitter Mary in the preschool Christmas pageant in Bangladesh. Upset that I had to wear my PJs and the afghan Grandma Lillian crocheted. Angry that I didn't have a cool costume, like an angel.

I'm no longer her, and yet, I still am and will always be. So many contradictory things can be true at the same time.

I contain multitudes, and so do you.

So, my friends, I am sending you love on this emotion-saturated holiday. 

Big love and big hugs, and hope for love and kindness and peace for all. 

The architects of our own something: a gingerbread bus journey

Last Christmas (I gave you my heart)...

Ha. No. Although I do have a deep and abiding love of Wham!

Last year, Target had some Marks & Spencer items for sale before Christmas.

Ooh! A gingerbread London bus. Look how charming!

The kids and I were all excited. We were going to the UK for Christmas, and ooh, we were going to make an adorable gingerbread bus!

I was excited: something the kids and I could do together. A cute little family project.  

And of course it was going to look just like the picture. We had everything we needed!

The kit had the pieces, and then lumps of colored fondant that you had to roll out and make fit. But, like, you also had to cut the holes out of them for the windows and such.

Do you know how hard it is to roll out fondant and cut it into gingerbread-bus sized pieces?

In case you don't know, I will tell you: very.

It breaks. It's hard to know how much to put on one side and have enough left over for another.

We just cut it into pieces and figured we could smoosh them all smoothly together.

Which. Well. You see.

And then! Then we had to use icing to stick it all together!

It did not stick together.

Nick got involved. He's excellent at carpentry and fixing things. I had high hopes.

He used icing. And more icing. It didn't work.

So then he used glue. It may have been wood glue.

At first I was horrified. But then I realized that each and every piece of gingerbread and icing had been so manhandled, there was no way we were going to eat it.

We just wanted something to show for our many hours of effort.

He set it carefully, and we left it on the counter to dry overnight.

We're just not Christmas bus people.

Good problems

When I think of good problems to have, I think of things like, oh my gosh, we have too much ice cream and not enough room in the freezer.

This blanket is so soft and snuggly it's making it hard to get out of bed.

My pants are uncomfortable because I ate too much pie.

Ooh, the tea is too hot. I have to wait to drink it.

We have too many puppies. (Can you have too many puppies? I want a puppy.)

These are the things that spring to mind with good problems.

I don't know if you ever read, "Where'd You Go, Bernadette," but there's a part where one character calls the brain a "discounting mechanism"—discounting in that you get incrementally less excited about something new, or less upset about something terrible.

They said something about it being a survival mechanism. Humans cannot stay super excited about every new thing because then in the olden (prehistoric?) days you wouldn't process threats, or something like that.

So your brain makes sure it gets less and less shiny and exciting, or less calamitous, as time goes on.

I find this idea soothing. It makes sense to me.

You can get used to anything. 

Anything.

I have known this forever.

The problem is, it can give you a super fucked up worldview, and in the Venn diagram of life, your circle might not even have any overlap with most people's. You could just be your own adjacent circle.

Or anyway, it might feel like that. If you feel like you're always inside outside.

But just about anything can be normalized.

I'd known this for a long time, but hadn't thought about what our brains were doing. 

Discounting! If you act fast, you can have 30% of this emotion. Today only.

So on Monday, Nick went with me to my quarterly oncology checkup.

We passed the Pope, we walked across the walkway, we hung out all masked up in the very full  oncology waiting room.

Friends who'd had breast cancer told me that at first you thought and worried about it all the time. And then after a while, it becomes normal, and you just live. Which makes sense.

Because there are so many other things that require your focus in life. So what else are you going to do?

Anyway, I wanted Nick to come with me, because when I told him I didn't need him to accompany me to my annual visit with my breast surgeon, that's when she found the lump.

I'd rather he were with me than not.

Last time I saw the oncologist, so this time I was seeing Terri, the Nurse Practitioner. She's terrific. She asked me if I'd considered the new medication that she was under the impression the oncologist had suggested to me three months prior.

And I was all, maybe I was too sick to remember? Or maybe she didn't talk to us about it because she was so worried about me having pneumonia?

I couldn't remember any medication discussion, and neither could Nick.

So according to Terri, there's a medication that is not new, but it's newly available to a lower-risk group of people than before. Because I had lymph involvement, I now qualify. And so they wanted to know if I wanted to try.

I know that I had a .3 mm spot in the one lymph node they removed. I know this. And I know I didn't need chemo, and my scores were so good that radiation was optional, so after a second opinion, I decided not to.

Because there might be more in other lymph nodes, but there might not. And radiation has its own complications.

At first I worried about my decision all the time. And then, after a while, I just kind of stopped thinking about it.

I know the facts, but I don't feel them all the time. Sometimes I ruminate. Sometimes I what-if, particularly about my parents.

But I try not to do this, because it doesn't solve the past. It just hurts me now.

You have to live.

But suddenly, there I was, feeling the big anxiety feelings again.

This new medication would be in addition to, rather than replacing, my current medications, and would  further reduce the risk of recurrence.

The risks, because there are always risks, include liver injury and heart problems, so they monitor you carefully in the beginning.

So Nick and I were like, it seems like you think it's a good idea, even though it's adding another medication with possible side effects?

She said yes. If I couldn't tolerate it, then I'd just quit taking it. But no harm in trying.

It takes a while, because it comes from a specialty pharmacy, plus insurance has to approve it, and that is its own process.

So maybe I'd be starting it in the new year.

It felt like something huge, adding another medication. 

And I'm already on medication that makes my joints hurt, and it's aging my skin, and when I look in the mirror, some days I feel like I look like that actor who plays River Cartwright's grandfather. If you've watched Slow Horses.

Although a friend assured me I don't look like River Cartwright's grandfather.

But even if I do, that's just vanity. I want to be around for my kids.

So then I wouldn't want to not have tried, because what if I didn't try, and then down the road it comes back?

And then I'd be all, fuck a duck, I should have added that other medication.

Right?

This news felt so heavy.

Maybe it's because it's winter, or maybe I just got used to things being the way they are, whatever that might be.

We talked about it on the way home. Of course I should try it. Then no regrets.

Then, shortly after we got home, Terri called me. She'd spoken to the oncologist.

As it turns out, the oncologist hadn't offered it to me because I don't qualify. My risk of recurrence isn't high enough for this study. My tumor wasn't big enough in the first place. And I only had a micro-met. 

Metastasis, but super tiny, which they call a micro-met.

Like if you get introduced to someone, but only briefly. Steve? Oh, I micro-met him at a party last year. 

I was like, "Wait, so now I can't have this medication?"

She said, "You're too low risk. It's a good problem to have."

Which is, of course, true. Being too low risk is a good problem to have.

But then suddenly I felt like I had this amazing option taken away. Like, what if this was the solution, the thing that bumped me over into safety from a future problem I might not even have?

When, realistically speaking, it might've given me annoying side effects for three years and not made any difference.

You don't know until you know. Which I guess is true about everything.

But now it's been four days. And the discounting has begun happening. Monday felt like crisis. Tuesday less so. 

It's Friday, and I can talk about it in a more dispassionate way, because I just don't feel it so much.

And plus, now we are in the end-of-year-holidays-are-upon-us frenzy, and there are so many things to do. 

The tree us up, and that's a whole nother thing, and holiday sads do catch me unawares and wallop me every once in a while.

So actually, while I'm thinking about it, I would definitely take a coupon for a massive discount on those feelings.

Neurodivergence, or: We always hang in a Buffalo Stance/We do the dive every time we dance

OK, so, I know you're not supposed to diagnose yourself using social media.

And this is not exactly what I've done.

But I've discovered that one of the best things about memes is that they've helped me learn about my neurodivergence, and they've shown me I'm not alone.

I was diagnosed with ADHD a couple years ago. It was a huge relief. I've been very open about this and written about it a little.

This diagnoses explained so many things about me that were either pieces of me that frustrated me and made me insecure, or were things that made me feel like I was kinda quirky, and if you appreciated quirky, you might appreciate me extra.

Or not. Because it works both ways.

There were things I'd try to hide, because for a long time I wanted to seem normal. Ha. 

And there were lots of things I did that I didn't think about one way or another until someone pointed them out to me.

Now, there are numerous memes about autism and ADHD, and it seems like they share commonalities and maybe even significant overlap. I don't know anything about autism. But a lot of these memes resonate with me.

I don't assume that just because my brain works in a particular way means that someone else's brain works the same way.

But ooh, it's nice to learn that those similar-brain-working-people are out there!

I've delightedly learned that I'm not alone.

There are other people in the world who will choose a song and play it on repeat 372 times. There are people who will go back to the beginning of the song if they dissociated and missed part of it.

I honestly didn't know other people did that.

I also didn't know that other people just checked out for a while and then dropped back in and realized they'd missed a significant part of the song. Or the conversation. Or the lesson.

Whatever might be going on, that continued to go on while my brain went myriad other places. Or not really anywhere, but not here.

So sometimes I learn that all along, I've been approaching things in the same manner as other neurodivergent humans.

And then I sometimes I learn I take a neurodivergent approach from someone telling me not to do what they assume I do, because it's (apparently) what most people do.

Like, my yoga teacher is always making daily tasks into opportunities for strengthening or stretching.

So the other day he was giving us examples like when you soap yourself in the shower, do forward fold. When you're drying off, raise your straight leg up and put your foot on the sink, so you get that strengthening and stretch.

And so on.

He said not to just stand at the sink when you brush your teeth. He, personally, holds horse stance.

Use all the small opportunities.

But I was like, who stands at the sink when they brush their teeth?

(Do you?)

When I brush my teeth, I'm always wandering around trying to do also something else. Like remove or put on my socks with the other hand. Or pull on or take off my pants. Or open a jar.

I  have successfully removed my tee shirt while brushing my teeth, but it's a big hassle and the chances of getting toothpaste on your shirt are high.

The chances of flinging your electric toothbrush through the head hole and across the room are also high.

So it's really not worth it.

But I've always tasked my self with something hard to do one-handed. I guess most things are hard to do one-handed. 

This is never a time-saver, in case you're wondering.

I'm not offering up helpful tips or tricks.

No. 

It's more like it never occurred to me to stand at the sink. Why would I just stand at the sink when I can wander and even mildly complicate my life?

Who, I wondered, stands at the sink the whole time?

My husband. 

My husband stands at the sink the entire time he's brushing his teeth.

He's surely done this throughout our 16 years of marriage, because he's done this every morning and night that I've observed in the last couple weeks.

But I've never noticed, because I'm busy not successfully accomplishing tasks one handed in the next room.

Me, I'm now aiming for horse stance.

(Also, this is really the only way to eat raspberries.)

I see a red door and I want it painted black

You know how people say not to google health stuff because it will lead you to the worst possible scenario? You should just wait and speak to your doctor.

Because if you google you may end up thinking maybe you have, oh, say, liver failure when in fact the likely explanation is hay fever.

So today, at the start of my annual physical, when the nurse asked me the list of mental health questions, I answered honestly.

Have you felt depressed, hopeless, or down in the past month? 

Yes. 

Rarely, often, almost every day? 

Almost every day.

They asked whether I've lost interest in things that usually bring me joy. 

Yes. 

Lost motivation? 

Yes. 

Am I thinking of harming myself?

No.

And then she did an EKG and the doctor came in.

My heart is terrific, apparently.

I had a whole list of questions for my doctor. 

One of them was about the whites of my eyes.

Because the other day in yoga, we were facing the mirror wall, all up close. And I was like, the whites of my eyes are not white.

I didn't think they were yellow, but they were not white.

As soon as I got home I googled and I was all, oh my god, my liver.

I've never had hepatitis, and when we lived in India, we got regular gamma globulin (painful, in the butt muscle) injections to prevent Hep A. In Peace Corps those of us who worked in health had to get Hep B shots.

But I'm on some intense medication. What's it doing to my liver?

So today at the doctor I bugged my eyes out all, "Look! The whites of my eyes are not white!"

And my doctor said, "It looks like either you've been rubbing your eyes a lot or you have allergies. Have you been rubbing your eyes?"

No.

"Do you have allergies?"

Yes.

"Did you google and freak yourself out?"

Oh, absolutely.

She was like, "These look like allergy eyes." Her suggestion is take allergy pills or get allergy eye drops.

So we did the whole physical, and I was about to head off and get blood work when my doctor said, sooooo, about these mental health answers...

At which point I started to cry.

Because that is how I am right now.

And this is what I told her: I know I'm struggling. I just don't know what to do about it.

My favorite antidepressant makes my hips hurt because of whatever the aromatase inhibitor is doing. And it's my favorite after years of trying different ones and titrating up and down and being tired and gaining weight and being all clenchy and angry and whatever else side effects. 

My favorite one is my favorite for many good reasons. Except that now, in conjunction with my aromatase inhibitor, it makes my hips ache quite badly.

And choosing between cancer prevention and mental health, I have to go with the former.

If chronic pain is optional, I choose not to have it.

So I've been doing the following: Using my full-spectrum lamp. Eating really well. Exercising every day. Getting as much sunlight as I can. Seeing my therapist.

I know all the things you're supposed to do.

I think this is seasonal. Though I wasn't diagnosed for years, I've had seasonal depression since high school. 

Sometimes people say things like, but it's so warm! It's not even winter! 

It's true, it's been delightfully and alarmingly warm. But the fact is that I could be 100 degrees, but if it's pitch dark by 5:00 pm, that is hard on people like me. 

Our serotonin gets re-uptaken too easily or something like that.

I know this kind of depression. Hello darkness, my old frenemy.

One of the tip-offs for me is that I'm gravitating to all black. I've forced myself into some of my fun clothing, because I firmly believe in dopamine dressing.

But right now it just feels like I'm in someone else's clothing.

I bought a second pair of black leggings for yoga. Basically all of my yoga wear is brightly colored.

So, yah. (A phrase Nick hates.)

I cry easily. I don't want to do much of anything. I hate most of humanity, although it's hard to know if that's depression or warranted.

I would prefer to never leave my house, but I do, every weekday morning, for yoga. I walk the dog. I bike a couple miles to therapy, and then I bike back.

I feed myself. I feed my family. I bathe pretty regularly. 

I hate my face and I hate my hair but I don't know if that's depression and I'm hoping whether it is or isn't it's not permanent.

But I currently feel kind of like when that bug came to earth in Men in Black and put on a human suit. I'm doing many normal human things, but kind of fakely and somewhat awkwardly.

But things feel kind of pointless. Hopeless. Not completely, but mostly. But again, it's hard to know if that's my depression talking or the way the world is.

I really enjoy my family most of the time. I'd like to spend all my time at home with them. 

I am able to find joy, and sometimes I laugh out loud. I still have my excellent sense of humor.

I'm not contemplating self-harm. I'm nowhere near the bridge.

I want to curl up in a ball and sleep most of the time. I don't. But I want to.

Anyway, I told my doctor, who I love, that I just don't know what to do.

So what do I do?

Do I maybe try Prozac, the OG, which I've never tried, to see if that helps my mood and doesn't cause me physical pain?

My hesitation is that I don't want to further burden my kidneys or liver. And it might make my joints hurt.

Even though I am very happy to know my eye issue is allergies and not my organs failing.

Or do I just keep doing what I'm doing, with the knowledge that in just over a month the days will begin to lengthen again? The sun will return.

The next couple months will be hard, but there is hope on the horizon. Like, maybe March-ish it'll start improving?

She didn't know. I don't know. We'll see how my bloodwork looks. I'm going to discuss it with my therapist.

And then we'll make a plan.

So, yah.

And the days go by, like a strand in the wind

Dear Nick,

Seventeen years ago tonight I walked into the Tabard Inn on what would be my last first date. 

I love this date, and used to document it annually, but I've kind of fallen off on that. But I love the first year post.

We hadn't yet had kids, so I didn't yet know the phrase "warmy-coldy"—but warmy-coldy perfectly describes the November weather that evening. Which I wasn't dressed for when I left for work in the morning.

I'd have been on time if I hadn't gone home to change.

Well, I've contended that for years, but with my current understanding of my ADHD and my fraught relationship with time, and my jaded view of dating, I probably would've been slightly late anyway.

Back then, I didn't wear my glasses all the time, because I could see clearly at distance. And so if men hadn't treated me like I was smart when I wore my glasses, and not so smart when I didn't, I wouldn't have started wearing my glasses out at night.

And then after that one Match guy asked if I wore my glasses to look less pretty, I defiantly always wore them on dates.

But otherwise, I wouldn't have been wearing my glasses, so they wouldn't have fogged up when I arrived, slightly late and slightly blindly flustered, at the Tabard.

And you wouldn't have had something to tease me about immediately, and something to repeat very probably until death us do part when telling people about our first meeting.

Sometimes I think about the what-ifs, and so many of my what-ifs are wishing the past were different. My what-ifs are anxiety driven.

But recently I read this thing that said something like, "What if everything works out?" 

And sometimes, like 17 years ago tonight, when I wasn't exactly on time, but was barely late, and you were already sitting on a sofa drinking a beer—which, let's be honest, is not a hardship at the Tabard Inn—things do in fact work out.

Seventeen years ago tonight, we'd been working in offices about five blocks apart for a couple years, and yet we'd never bumped into each other in a coffee shop or lunch place, or on the street corner waiting for a light. 

In a movie, we'd have done one of those things.

But in real life, we were both on the Internet, and this night, November 13th, worked for both of us. And once my glasses cleared, I spotted you, and you stood up, and I put small hand into your big one, that was that.

And I've never looked back. 

Love,

Lisa

Hallelujah "nothing concerning"

I put that in the title because I hate it when you click on a link thinking you're going to get the number of minutes to cook unsoaked beans in the Instant Pot, and then you have to scroll through many paragraphs of how the blogger backpacked through Albania.

I want to thank all my kind friends who offered words of love and support on FB, in messages, in texts, and on the blog. I'm tremendously grateful for my community. 

And my goodness, I'm so relieved.

At Georgetown, at least from the entrance we use, you have to pass the Pope and photographs of other figures of historical import to get to appointments. The Pope gets his own sort of corner, though, which I think you can see.

I had to turn right at the Pope for surgery. I go straight past him for my regular appointments.

When I sat on the table the radiologist asked if I had any questions. I got all teary and was like, "Well, I guess what I want to know is if it's more cancer."

I don't even know what other question I'd have.

I said, "My tumor was behind my left nipple, and this little bump is under my left nipple."

So it's not an insane leap to imagine both implants removed and going through chemo and radiation.

These are actually possible scenarios with a recurrence.

This is not like envisioning sliding down the inflatable slide onto the life raft, imagining sharks circling just because you hit the kind of turbulence that makes pilots use their stern voice when they tell you to fasten your seat belts.

I told the radiologist that my surgeon thought maybe it was fat necrosis, and he said he couldn't say what it was, but the appearance was consistent with fat necrosis. 

Mostly we talked about the Hinkley Hilton, which he calls the Reagan Hilton (while I don't call anything the Reagan anything), and the Air Florida flight that crashed into the 14th Street bridge (and which, oddly enough, the dad of my friend Debbie had crossed just in time). We lived in the US the first time during both those events.

I also learned that he was born in Georgetown Hospital after his parents immigrated from mainland China. 

I don't know if I should capitalize mainland?

Basically, the radiologist said he saw "nothing concerning" and he had me sign a paper saying he'd given me this information. 

I don't recall having to sign a paper before, but to be honest with you, the other day I couldn't remember the word for dresser. I was talking to Nick and India and I said, "It's like a table with drawers that you put your clothes in."

So maybe I always sign a paper?

The radiologist told me to follow up with my surgeon, and then told me that she'd have ordered a biopsy if she were particularly concerned.

I found that extremely comforting.

So I texted my surgeon to say he found nothing concerning and wants me to follow up with her, and she hearted my message.

I don't know how I would fare with dating in the age of texting and emojis.

I had a flip phone (ooh, and also that wonderful Nokia brick, if any of you remember that) when I was doing all that Internet dating, which only partially explains realizing en route to meet a guy for a Match date that I couldn't remember his name. I had no time to go home and log into my computer. We hadn't talked on the phone.

Anyway, when I checked out I asked if I should make an appointment and they said she'd contact me once she'd seen the scans if she wants me to do anything further.

Phew.

And at least I know that I will see the oncologist in under three months and my surgeon in six, so that's helpful.

But for now, whatever this is is "nothing concerning" and I will take that. 

If I learned anything from Nicole last year, it is to dress up to feel better. So the photo above is what I wore this morning.

It's fall, which is not my favorite, because of course it is a precursor to winter. But at least it's sweater and boot weather, and I love both of those things.

I cannot take my antidepressant in conjunction with my aromatase inhibitor because for whatever reason, it makes my hips hurt like holy hell.

So I need to get out in the sunshine, and use my full spectrum light, and eat well, and exercise, and do all the mental healthcare things.

I know all these things, and I need to do them all consistently.

Yesterday, though, yesterday I ate an entire box of palmiers from Costco, and if you go to Costco, you know they sell everything in packs of five million.

Often when I'm stressed I just don't eat. 

But yesterday I ate one palmier after the other after the other while watching Love is Blind (which Nicole thought was a show about blind people). 

I never watch TV during the daytime. I did laundry concurrently to mitigate daytime TV guilt.

Some days are just like that.

I think despite going to yoga I was basically holding my breath for 10 days. And now I need a big cry. 

I used to cry almost every day. If I felt it welling but not coming out, I'd watch the English Patient. Back then, I had more time to commit to sobbing over a beautifully filmed three-hour romance tragedy. And I knew which scenes were my triggers, if I were short on time.

But I haven't watched it in over a decade. Could I just skip to where he's carrying her to the cave? Would that still work?

I'm so incredibly thankful to currently be in the position to be wondering about this, rather than making all the appointments and plans I was terrified I'd have to start making.

And that's where I am today.

The lump

When Jordan was little, and we couldn't find something, I'd say, "Jordan, where is it?"

I'd shrug my shoulders and put my hands in the air like I just didn't know.

He'd mirror the gesture, looking at me very earnestly. He'd shake his head, and say, "It's SOMEWHERE!"

Which is always true.

Ever since my surgery last September, I've had a checkup with oncology every three months, and with my breast surgeon every six months.

About 10 days ago I had my one-year check with my surgeon.

My last oncology checkup was in September, when I was in the throes of pneumonia, and that's what the oncologist was most concerned about.

I don't have scans, because I have practically no breast tissue. Basically, I get felt up every three months.

Nick took me to the oncology check because I wasn't strong enough to go by myself. Otherwise I'd have gone alone.

I told Nick I didn't need him to come to the appointment with my surgeon, because all the checkups so far have been very routine. 

Everything feels fine, you look good, see you next time.

But of course, everything is fine until it isn't.

Because at this check, my surgeon found a lump.

She immediately said she thought it was nothing to be concerned about. "Fat necrosis" was most likely what it was. Very common, not a big deal.

She was all, "I don't want you to get all anxious. This is going to be nothing."

But of course I started crying. I started listing the choices I made, saying I should've made different ones. 

No, she said. I did everything I should do.

We were at the downtown building rather than the hospital, and she sent me to the radiologist upstairs to see if they could fit me in, because she could then just run up and take a look.

They don't do breasts on Fridays. 

It took me a bit of time to get an appointment. In the meantime, I've googled.

Fat necrosis is common after trauma like surgery. Fat cells die from lack of blood supply. They make a lump.

This makes a lot of sense.

But of course, I've catastrophized. I'm a catastrophizer.

And I work fast.

Way back in my singleness I'd go on first dates and by the time we'd had a glass of wine I'd mentally have married and divorced the guy.

So.

First thing Wendesday morning, I'm going for a scan.

It's either something, or it's nothing. 

I mean, it's something. 

It's just either something no big deal, tantamount to nothing, or it's a really big deal.

Sixteen is wax (and honesty)

Yesterday was our 16th wedding anniversary. 

Weirdly and foreverly, it's also the anniversary of my double mastectomy. Last year I told my surgeon that it was our silicone anniversary. 

In case you're wondering, 15 is crystal. This year is wax.

I'd heard about golden anniversaries and such, but I learned about year-by-year commemorations of anniversaries from The English Patient. Paper for the first anniversary. 

Pretty sure that for me, deep in grief over my father plus undiagnosed post-partum depression, I'd have crumpled that paper, stomped on it, doused it in kerosene, and set it ablaze with an entire box of matches.

I've joked about lying awake at night that year, dividing up the furniture. But that's not really true, because it's so clear what furniture is Nick's, and what's mine. We'd never vie for the other's. 

Until recently, before I felt empowered to voice my actual needs, I'd say things like, oh, look how well our furniture fits together! Because look, Nick, yours is from the colonizers, and mine was all purchased in those colonized countries your ancestors were busy dominating while they were running around wrecking the world.

Instead of just saying: you need to come home from the office and participate nightly in the care of our children. 

To which he could've responded: when the entire world economy collapsed, everyone stopped paying their bills, and I have to work all the time to keep the business afloat.

Me, I had a secure job, but it didn't pay enough to cover our mortgage and expenses. 

And we didn't have that conversation until years and years later.

You cannot expect to have your needs met, or even examined, if you don't voice them.

So over the last maybe year and a half, I realized I had to take responsibility for my actions. I had to look at how my own actions contributed to my happiness or lack thereof in my relationship and in life.

It kind of sucks but is also kind of a relief when you recognize you are your own problem. 

Until recently, I didn't have the ability to confidently and consistently say no in our relationship. No, I don't want to do this. No, this doesn't work for me. 

Or, anyway, the way I said no wasn't the way Nick heard no.

I'd say it in an oblique way, like, well, I don't prefer that. Or, I like this one better. Um, not really.

My concrete and perpetual example is a toilet paper holder.

After seven years in the house, we were going to have a master bathroom. And we got to choose everything.

I said I wanted a particular style of toilet paper holder, the kind where the holding bar flips up. So Nick said to find one. And then he didn't like any of the links I sent him.

Nick wanted, and purchased, a massive monstrosity that would also hold magazines.

I kept saying I didn't think we really needed one that big, how about this one, I prefer this kind, etc. etc.

This was over a number of weeks, as our bathroom was being renovated. And then we stopped talking about it. I didn't see the matter as decided.

And then, on what turned out to be the day of installment, Australian Builder held up Nick's large magazine holder with a bar for toilet paper and said, "Lisa, do you actually like this? Because I'm going to drill a whole lot of holes in your new tile."

And I was all, "Kim, I hate it so much."

He nodded and said, "Yes. I thought I should check." 

But if he hadn't asked me, and had put it up, I'd still be looking at it and feeling bitter every single day. It's not even easy to change the toilet paper. I know, because it's installed in our downstairs bathroom.

(As it is, we never got a wall one in our bathroom. Nick bought a stand, and for the first couple years, without saying anything about it, I wouldn't change the roll when we ran out. I'd just put the new toilet paper on top. My passive-aggressive little fuck you.)

Anyway, when Nick came home that night, I said, "Kim didn't put up your toilet paper holder."

And he said, "Why?"

I said, "Because I fucking hate it."

This was news to Nick. I didn't like it? Why didn't I say anything?

I was raised to say yes. If that's what you want for us, then yes. OK, sure. I mean, not really, but if it's what you want, we can do that.

For him to hear no, I had to explicitly say no. Very strongly, no, absolutely not, I hate it, no. 

I understood this, but I was not equipped to do this. I tried, but I just couldn't. I mean, I could say my sort-of nos, or no-adjacent things. But standing solidly by my no, when Nick wanted me to say yes?

Ha.

Added to this, if Nick doesn't get the answer he wants the first time, he'll ask repeatedly.

Making his viewpoint seem reasonable, and persisting until he gets his desired outcome is his actual job. And he is very good at his job.

So even if I started with no, eventually, I would be worn down enough to agree. And then I'd be pissed.

At some point in my youth I learned to just agree with my dad, and then on the side go ahead and do what I wanted.

This was the easiest approach with my dad and people like my long-ago boss who wanted me to find a way to make Canada look smaller than the US.

Be agreeable and subversive.

Eventually I started doing this with Nick. I recently admitted it to him.

In dysfunction, things get complicated and twisty.

But now, with a tremendous amount of work with my therapist, I can say no. This approach doesn't work for me. I don't want to do that. I will not. No thank you. Absolutely not.

I don't manage it every time, but most of the time.

And then he can say OK, or we can have a conversation. But at least it's starting from an honest place.

This makes things so much better. 

It is awful for everyone if you say yes and then are super crabby about it. Agree, and then resent being stuck somewhere you don't want to be, and pick a fight about something completely different, not realizing why. Say yes and seethe and smile and pretend it's all fine, but with a bitch-faced I fucking hate you smile.

Ooh, I did so much of all those things.

Because I can now say no to things I don't want to do, I can now also be generous with things I don't particularly want to do but I know would make Nick happy or would make for greater family harmony.

And I'm not perpetually angry.

Growing up, I was taught to stuff anger down. Don't make anyone else uncomfortable. Or anyway, don't make men uncomfortable, if you want them to love you. And you want them to love you.

Quietly simmer and seethe and swallow it. Preferably forever, but if not forever, then until you absolutely cannot hold it in any longer.

Nick, on the other hand, was raised wielding anger self-righteously. A useful tool. 

And together, we had so much anger. 

The Anger could be a whole series of posts.

So much anger. And so little emotional regulation.

Part and parcel with saying yes when I wanted to say no, I didn't feel like I had the right to voice my needs.

I didn't really even know how to recognize them to voice them to myself.

All those jokes about stabbing Nick? Hahaha! 

They didn't originate in a place of joy.

Now, as much as I can be, I'm honest. I say: this is what I need. If you want to make me feel like a priority, this is what I need you to do to show me I'm a priority.

Which is not to suggest that Nick hasn't been there for me, because he's been incredibly solid through huge, terrible things. Nick is good people. He's loving and kind and supportive.

We've been there for each other through some very painful events. And being there for those you love is imperative. But the crisis ends, and you still have the day-to-day.

It's true that I'm still quite resentful about the early years with the kids. Even now that I understand how much Nick had to work to keep the business going.

And I understand now that while my mom was helpful, in those young kid years I was also already doing a lot of caretaking of her. 

It was too much for many reasons.

Our new dynamic means that sometimes Nick does not get his way, or we come to a compromise. It also means that I'm not constantly accusing him of having everything his way and resenting him for it. 

It seems so simple, when I think about it now. But those fucked-up learned patterns are powerful.

I mean, how do you communicate in an honest way when you're not even aware of how you're being dishonest?

Gosh, this all took so long to learn.

This isn't a remotely romantic anniversary post, but I don't actually think marriage is all that romantic.

Maybe it's more romantic for other people? I don't know. 

Maybe it's easier for other people? I think, given my family of origin, it was never going to be easy for me or my partner.

Nick and I were old enough when we met that I thought we were grown up. But it turns out we both had so much growing to do.

I know we have more work to do, but 16 years in, I'd say we're in a happier, more solid place than we've ever been.

Ca-caw! Ca-caw!

I'm trying to make some crow friends.

Several people I know are trying to do this. Nicole has been actively working at it in Texas.

Apparently, when crows like you, they start bringing you little gifts, like pebbles and sparkly things.

Obviously, I don't need little gifts, but I love the idea. Also, I feel like I'm kind of like that. If I like you, I'll send you memes and videos and shiny little random stuff. 

Or very dark things. One of my friends and I exchange Goodbye Earl-type memes and videos regularly.

This is love.

Anyway, I didn't know till recently that magpies were in the corvid family along with crows and ravens.

Ever since that magpie stole Bianca Castafiore's emerald, I've been a fan.

Before my newfound interest in corvids in general and crows in particular became a New Topic in our household, I said the following to Nick:

"I really want to make some crow friends."

And he was like, "That's an oddly specific and frankly racist way to try to diversify your friend group."

I was all, crows the birds! Not First Nation. 

Jeez. Who would even think that?

Honk if you love cheese sauce.

Since then, Nick's been trying to help me. He saw a group of crows screaming over a sandwich and called me to come out on the deck. One of them dropped the sandwich and another stole it and the others were outraged.

I went inside and got a couple handfuls of wild rice and spread it on our wall.

Those crows, they were zero percent interested. Clearly these are American crows. I need to try enticing them with Doritos.

And then I had to clean up the uneaten rice because DC has a rat problem. I'm not kidding you. We live near restaurants, and the rats in our neighborhood amble around in broad daylight smoking cigars.

They are not scared and they do not care. And they're too overfed to move very fast.

You don't want to poison them, because then you're poisoning hawks and other birds of prey. It moves up the food chain.

What I want are a group of rat terriers to decimate our rat population. Apparently they run around grabbing rats and snapping their necks and moving on to the next one.

I cannot maintain a rat terrier pack, however. I can barely manage one hound.

I wish crows were ratters.

Also, related but tangential, there is this song that I cannot find and the only word I know is "murder" in the chorus. It's sung like, "muh-huh-huh-huh-erder" and there are lots of murder songs when you google and it is driving me crazy. I think it's 80s with an upbeat tune.

Very superstitious/Writing's on the wall

Are you superstitious?

I have no idea where I fall on the continuum of most to least superstitious.

Here's the genesis of this.

I'd been waiting for a third terrible thing. The first was my mom dying. The second was breast cancer.

As bad luck comes in threes, I figured there would be a third.

And then I got pneumonia. And I was like, OK, this was the third terrible. It's happened. Now the slate is clean.

This is super woo-woo, but yesterday I saw my chiropractor, who is also an energy healer. 

Have I told you about her? She was a medical doctor in Russia, and then became a chiropractor and energy healer when she moved here.

I've never met anyone like her.

Over the last 5-6 months, she's realigned my spine and helped me release childhood trauma.

I started seeing her because I had severe jaw pain after having fillings replaced. And I've had chronic lower back pain. No matter how much yoga I did, no matter how much stretching, I couldn't get rid of it.

But the crisis was my jaw.

My dentist is originally Russian, and she was trying to help me, she did this painful but effective jaw massage technique that she said she learned from her chiropractor. So I was all, I need to go to her!

And she said that she's amazing but you should know she's not a normal chiropractor.

She's not. She's extraordinary.

At my assessment, she showed me the model of the spine and pelvis and explained that my pelvis was tilted ever so slightly. And over years, all my muscles had worked to accommodate. You can go on this way for decades. Your muscles can work and work and work and hold and hold and hold, until finally, they just can't do it anymore.

I had arrived at this point.

She said reason I couldn't take really deep breaths was because my pelvic muscles were in spasm and wouldn't let me.

I knew I couldn't breathe deeply enough but I didn't know why. My yoga teacher was always telling me I was taking two breaths when I should be taking one. I could see this. I could hear it in the final OM, when I would run out of air much faster than others.

But no matter how hard I worked, I couldn't pull the air in deeper. 

She said in the beginning I'd have to see her quite intensely. Because both your muscles and your brain are used to everything in your body being in a certain position, even if it's wrong.

So for a while you have to continuously readjust, because every time, your body tries to go back to what it thinks is normal.

Kind of like growing up in a dysfunctional household and then finding partners who fit your dysfunction. It's not healthy but it feels right.

So.

She does the chiropractic adjustment, and then works with tuning forks. When I'm face down, she has the end of the tuning fork against my spine for the vibration. Face up, she is realigning the vibration of my cells with the pitch.

Nick thinks all of this is bananas. You can, too. It's OK.

And then she started asking me questions about my family. It was like my answers confirmed what she knew.

One day during treatment an image of my brother as a kid, one of his school photos, popped into my mind. And literally one second later she asked if I had a sibling.

She asked about my dad, how he died. About his personality.

Sometimes she would do an adjustment, and I would just start to cry. I once had this sensation, not imagery but intense feeling, of little kid vulnerability and fear.

She gave me homework, specific things to say to offer forgiveness to each member of my family. And then to offer forgiveness to myself. She said she thought this would release some of the muscles that were holding.

It did. 

My back pain decreased until much of the time it was completely gone. My back is completely locked up after being so sick, and I knew it's going to take some time to open up and get back to where I was in August.

I can inhale (OK, not in this moment but in general) as deeply as I want.

I've had to practice deep breathing, because my body was not used to it.

Anyway, yesterday she said that she thinks the pneumonia is the final piece of my body processing trauma and letting go. I couldn't completely let go emotionally, and I had all this toxic stuff I was holding. 

So I got really sick, and my body finally purged it. High fever, night sweats, lots of coughing.

Out out out.

I told you all this was very woo-woo. But it totally makes sense to me. 

Maybe it wasn't the third thing. But I think it was, and since I'm a multidimensional human in the multiverse, I can believe both of these things and so much more.

Then I started thinking about other superstitions.

When I was a kid, if we spilled salt, we'd throw it over our shoulder for the devil.

I hadn't thought about that in decades.

We used to have our salt in little bowls with little spoons. So I think we spilled salt a lot. I don't think I've spilled salt in years. 

But there are others.

Like, I knock wood for luck.

I love the number 13, so for me that's good rather than bad luck. But clearly I still attach luck to it.

I also think that might be it for superstitions.

Because while I don't walk under ladders, that just seems like common sense rather than luck.

I don't believe black cats or broken mirrors bring bad luck.

I don't look in mirrors at night, but that's about me being a chicken and the possibility of Bloody Mary appearing behind me rather than luck. 

I don't know of any others.

What do you believe?