When you need a train it never comes

Included for dramatic effect or something

I don't have a plan, and though I have a propensity to blurt out awkward little statements every once in a while, I'm not actually an impulsive person.

I always save dessert for last. Or for tomorrow.

Even as a kid I'd have waited on that marshmallow forever if I needed to.

I'm not even good at planning. So I guess that helps, too.

But sometimes, like today, I think things like: what if I just tripped in front of that huge, heavy truck? 

Sometimes, like today, I think it would be a relief to not be here anymore.

I know for a fact that it wouldn't be better for my family. I have been in spaces before where I didn't know that, and this right now space is not like that. I would be crushed to never see my kids again. 

I have also in other times been in a space where I didn't believe it would ruin there lives if I were no longer here. Not today; I know it would ruin their lives.

I yelled at my daugher after she spent 38 minutes, beginning the second she woke up, scream-crying about the Mondayness of Monday and also everything else. With two minutes left to go, two minutes till we were meeting her friend, she decided to change her outfit.

I'd been so good at sympathy and empathy for 38 screaming minutes, and then I lost it.

We put on her shoes and hustled her down the block, wailing like a banshee all the way.

I hate myself when I yell.

Sometimes I hate myself even when I don't yell.

Today is not one of those days. I don't hate myself.

Everything just feels very heavy and impossible.

Our house is such a mess. 

I think I killed or at least severely damaged my succulent by leaving it out in the sun.

There is so much laundry. So much. So much that I could probably burrow into it and fall asleep and it would be hard to find me.

There is so much everything. And it's all hard.

How come nothing is ever easy?

And then I feel like an asshole, because there are real people with real problems. Not that I'm not a real person. But my god, compared to so many people, my life is so easy.

It's not like it's a fucking tragedy to have housecleaning and too many dirty clothes to deal with.

It's more that I just...think it could be peaceful. Not to be here anymore, I mean. Not to be me anymore.

Like I said, I don't have a plan, and I don't lack impulse control. 

I know bad place this is brain chemicals, and this is temporary. I felt joy this weekend and I know I will again. It's not one of those dark empty places with no hope in sight.

I want to take my mom to the doctor and hug my kids after school and kiss my husband when he gets home. Oh, and walk Wanda.

I don't want to not be here to do these things. Or anyway, not all of me wants to not be here.

So really, I have a great grip on that stupid fucking marshmallow. Although I guess that makes it sound like suicide would be gratification. Which of course it's not.

Maybe I just needed to say all of this out loud. To acknowledge these feelings and remind myself of what they are. And to try to let them go.

This isn't a cry for help. Truly. 

I'm so solidly here, buried under the laundry.

Comme il pleut sur la ville...

Every grey day, of which I believe we've lately had more than our share, I feel like I've never seen the sun. 

It's been raining my entire life.

Intellectually, I understand this is not the case. I have photo documentation. It was sunny on Monday. Maybe even Tuesday. Whichever day India and I did this fun photoshoot with my in my pink supersuit.

And incidentally, there is a photo of my butt that India took either before I jumped or after I landed, and she thinks it's so funny she wants me to put it on her birthday card. No lie.

Anyway.

I can't exactly remember if there was sun on Tuesday, because as I said, it's been grey my entire life.

When the sun is out, it's the best day ever. I feel like this is a childish response, but it is mine. The world is full of hope and I have energy. I'm filled with joy.

I can smile and leap. I know that I radiate happiness, and in the moment, it is true. I beam and it is genuine.

And when there is no sun, it takes all my willpower to get out of bed. Willpower and Nick saying, "Lisa. I need you to. Get. Up."

He has a tone. Nick, who is never affected by the vicissitudes of weather, never pulled up or bogged down by light or lack thereof.

He strides steadily forward in life, accomplishing all he needs to accomplish, never pausing to lament the cloud cover.

Nick has said before that he doesn't envy my lows, but he also doesn't experience the joy of my highs.

So it's been rainy and grey for at least two days or my entire life.

Unless you're with me, you don't know. I still post funny memes and use exclamation points and laugh emojis. (I also wear skinny jeans and have a side part, but that's a whole nother things.)

Yesterday, I turned on the car in the garage before I opened the garage door. Because we live in a place where things disappear quickly if the door is left open, we have it close automatically on a one-minute timer.

And even though we have a sensor, I have this fear that the door will come down on the car if I don't get out in time. So I get in, turn it on, adjust the seat and other bits to my size, start Waze, and generally do all the whatevers necessary to get myself to where I need to go prior to pressing the open button.

As I sat there organizing, I wondered briefly if our garage could fill with carbon monoxide, even though there's a large opening where we come in from the deck.

Would it be possible to sit in there and fall asleep forever?

It wasn't a plan, or even a wish, just a brief wonder.

These are the "just quit" whispers that I know not everyone has. Nick doesn't have a line he needs to keep from crossing, a bridge he sometimes sees.

I thank god that he doesn't. And I know my kids are more likely to.

This isn't any kind of cry for help. I'm fine. I know I've shared this essay before, but I just think it's such a good way of explaining how things are for some of us.

On Wednesday my son said he was absolutely not going to school in the rain.

He's back in a classroom. They're still doing school online, but they have someone in the room to help keep them on track. They get to see friends. They go outside for lunch and recess.

It has changed the state of his mental health.

This is currently only available to the kids who were in the most difficult situations, or who were struggling most online--and still, many turned it down. But we got to a point where it seemed worth the risk with Jordan.  

But Wednesday, with more rain, he was all, "This is the worst day ever. I'm NOT going to school!"

And I understood, oh, I understood. Every rainy day is the worst day ever, unless the sun is also shining, which almost never happens.

We cajoled him out the door, teeth unbrushed, because we could only choose between him brushing his teeth and putting on his shoes, and shoes seemed more critical for walking to and attending school.

He voices the extremes in my head. THE WORST DAY EVER.

Obviously, it's not the worst day ever. Hell, I know my worst day ever, and a plain old rainy day will never come close. But in the moment, I get it, I really do.

I think Tuesday might in fact have been sunny, because I think Nick woke me up and said, "It's sunny!" And I said, "Oh, thank God." And Nick said, "I know you mean that."

Sometimes I think about the spring my dad killed himself. It was a relentlessly grey spring. There was no sun.

They went to Hawaii to visit a friend, and it was unseasonably grey there, as well. 

The day Dad disappeared was sunny and spectacular, but I think by then he'd hit his limit. I know medication, or lack thereof, was the main problem. But I can't help but think that if it had been a glorious spring, he'd have held on longer.

I don't know. What do I know?

I mean, here's what I know: sun lamps are helpful for me, and so is medication. Getting outside always helps, even if it seems like the stinkiest idea ever. Fish oil is good for your brain. 

Wine is a false friend. So is sugar.

I didn't set out to have tea and Cadbury eggs for breakfast this morning, but sometimes that's how it shakes out.

And apparently the sun will come out tomorrow.

I mean really. Not because I'm trying to be all Orphan Annie about it.

There is no pain you are receding...

I'm someone who generally feels a lot. Or anyway, rarely feels nothing, or very little. Which is to say, I tend to feel strongly one way or another about everything.

Not like about whether we have chicken for dinner--I rarely have strong feelings about food.

But about emotional stuff, and about people, I FEEL a lot. And travel. And clothing.

OK, I feel very strongly about many things. I guess I even feel strongly about dinner, in that I am fucking sick of making it.

But anyway.

Nick says that he's glad he doesn't have my lows, but he doesn't think he feels as much joy as I do in my highs. I also don't think he connects with people with the intensity that I do.

Which is why he can be indifferent to people. Whereas I'm rarely indifferent.

But for some time now I am kind of...indifferent to most things. Numb, maybe? Numb with bursts of outrage and anxiety.

And still, somehow, I want to be number.

If I were inclined to start my day with alcohol and then just keep going, this is what I'd be doing right now.

I had an aunt who did this, and she was really, really fun. Except when she wasn't.

But I don't want to be out of it. I just want to feel closer to nothing.

I bought some CBD gummies from Martha Stewart, of all people, because I read this charming New York Times article about how she got high with Snoop Dogg and how her delicious fruity CBD gummies were helping her maintain a sense of calm.

This past Sunday or maybe the one prior I saw in Parade that Martha has been baking a lot of cakes and I was all, hell yeah no surprise there. She's been smoking all that pot with Snoop Dogg.

Anyway, her spendy little fruit gummies do nothing to take the edge off. (She did say in her article that she only takes two of them, where as some of her friends take 20. Let me tell you, 20 is most of the jar. That would be an expensive damn gummy habit.)

Now, you might think that because I'm numb I'm not anxious. That seems to have stuck around.

I'm incredibly fucking anxious.

I have this Russian friend who always has these fabulous home remedies like mustard plaster to loosen chest congestion. Anyway, she told me about Motherwort drops, which you can order on Amazon, and so I did.

You put a dropperful in a couple ounces of water and tastes kind of like freshly cut grass, which makes me feel better about it. Like, if it tastes bad, it's probably going to work. You drink it in the morning and the evening. It's supposed to calm your nervous system so you can sleep.

Oh, because that's another thing. I haven't been sleeping.

It's not anxiety. It's just not sleeping. It's awakeness when it should be asleepness.

And then sometimes I'm so tired it hurts, and I lie down in the afternoon and sleep like I am dead.

I don't think I'm depressed. I have given this a lot of thought, honestly.

I think it's pandemic life coupled with a hugely anxiety provoking election and the inability to make any future plans because god knows.

It's the absence of hope.

And also I cannot fucking figure out 6th grade distance learning. And there is no end in sight on this.

Maybe we will fail 6th grade.

Although, you know, when I was in 6th grade, my dad attempted suicide, and we didn't tell anyone. And then he told us we were all fine. So we believed we were, of course, totally fine. 

And being totally fine, I forgot to do my homework every single day. Until my teacher made me write it down in a notebook and bring it home for my mom to sign to say I'd done it.

But because my mom was also totally and completely fine, she would forget to make me do my homework and also forget to sign it every single day as well.

And somehow I still made it to 7th grade. 

So maybe Jordan and I will, too.

I'm grateful, of course I am. We are all healthy. Nick is super busy with work. We have a comfortable house and plenty of food and I feel guilty that we are totally fine when so many are not.

It's not that I don't feel guilt or sorrow. And Schitt's Creek has even made me laugh recently. I feel these things. But at kind of a removal.

Like they're happening to someone else. Someone to whom everything matters less.

But that person is also super anxious. And doesn't really sleep.

And she also just got a prescription for antibiotics for the Lyme disease that doctors kept saying she probably didn't have, despite tests saying oh, hey, look, here's some Lyme!

Maybe doxycycline will help. Pray the doxycycline helps.

And she should maybe start ordering Martha Stewart fancy cake instead of those little poseur gummies.

 By she of course I mean me. Cripes. Imagine. That's all I need.

She turns herself 'round and she smiles and she says "This is it, that's the end of the joke"

As it turns out, I've spent much of my life growing out my hair.

I mean, obviously I'm living my life forward while the hair growing is just happening, but it's this annoying cycle where I grow it and then I think I just really need a change and cut it all of and often dye it as well and then spend the next year or two growing it out again.

I have had a bob, on and off, since I think the end of 10th grade.

Some people live their whole lives just having nice hair and living with it day to day and not fucking with it on a regular basis and perhaps you are one of those people, and why can't I be you?

At any rate, the growing it out is tedious and grim and I never know what to do with it to make it look cute in the in between times. And as Fleabag said, "HAIR IS EVERYTHING. ANTONY."

As such, I decided I needed something fun to make it feel less tedious and grim.

I also decided last time was the LAST time I'm lopping it all off, so I might as well take advantage of the short short and do something extreme.

So I bought a tube of Joico semi-permanent magenta dye, which a woman at the gym who has lovely purple streaks recommended.

And then I asked Nick if he would put it on for me.

I showed him some YouTube videos of people applying hair dye with a dye brush.

Because I like to have ideas but then fall down on the planning, I had to borrow a dye brush from a friend, because I couldn't find one for purchase without buying a box of dye.

Additionally, the only gloves we had that Nick could even squeeze his giant baseball-mitt sized hands into were dish gloves that as it turned out practically cut off his circulation.

Then yesterday morning I wondered if the color I'd chosen might be too strong, and Nick was all, "If you're going to do this, you might as well be really bold."

So then I asked him if he thought maybe he could just do the roots magenta, so my hair looked like it had dark pink roots and then the ends were white.

And he was like, "Uh, I don't think I have that level of skill."

So he put it on and when I voiced concern that he might not be getting it all he very firmly reminded me that he is rather detail oriented.

And this is true. RATHER. DETAIL. ORIENTED.

I learned years ago that any man I would ever love would be detail oriented and that detail oriented people do not like being called anal retentive.

So.
 
So I tried to just keep my mouth shut and then India took a picture of me so I could have some idea what it looked like. And then I washed it and was like holy cow is that, uh, bold!

I am not going to lie; I was wondering if I'd made a mistake in color and taken on more than I can carry off.

Although the fact is that with each wash more will come out. I don't know if it will get stuck in the bleached parts or not, but they'll have to be cut off eventually anyway.


India was like, "I love it so much, Mama. You look like Mal."

This warmed my heart. She loves Descendants.

But every time I catch my reflection in the mirror I'm a little surprised.

In any case, this morning I went to a core class. I love the instructor, who makes us do terrible, terrible things. It's amazing.

This is the class where I met the woman with the purple streaks. When I first asked her about the purple in her hair, she showed me a photo of her hair when she'd gotten it professionally done all pink and platinum and it was fabulous. (It had also taken 12 hours and cost $900, which made her sit down and cry. Or maybe she was already sitting. Anyway.)

I was stretching and chatting with another woman at the end of class and she told me she loved my hair, and the instructor agreed. I thanked them and said I was still getting used to it.

I said, "My husband did it for me yesterday!"

One of them said, "Wow! Is he a hairdresser?"

And I was all, "No, a lawyer. Very detail oriented."

Yah, so I might order some XL gloves and some purple dye and maybe next time he can just do the roots?

I wanna glide down over Mulholland

Now that last week is over, I'm going to tell you it was one of those weeks where I felt less attached to life than I otherwise might.

I was not in crisis.

More like I was exhausted, demoralized, and really not excited about being in this particular body in this particular life.

I understand very well the repercussions of exiting life the way my dad did. I know, I really do know how much it would devastate my family, and screw up my children forever.

Though my dad attempted suicide the first time when I was 11, I didn't really understand that it was an option until I myself hit a low, low point in my 30s. My entire world felt pointless. Both pointless and devastating.

I was alone, and would be alone forever.

I didn't make a plan, but I had an idea. If, in fact, everyone on the planet except me coupled up, and I was the only one still single, then, when my parents died, I could opt for suicide.

I couldn't do it before that, because it would be too cruel. But at that point, it was an option.

This thought soothed me. I had a solution. An out.

Now I don't have those thoughts in that way, because, god willing, my kids will outlive me, and I would never do to them what my dad did to us.

That's the rational part of me.

The irrational part of me sometimes crooks a finger and whispers that it would be so easy. The line between here and not here is a fine one, and sliding over it would be so quick, so painless.

Like I said, I'm not in crisis, and I wasn't last week, even though I was at a pretty low point for a sustained amount of time.

What I'm saying, I guess, is that I'm here, and I'm glad I'm here, but sometimes it's very hard. And I appreciate knowing I have a community that will support me if I reach out and ask.

Sometimes I ask. Sometimes I free fall. I am just lucky, so lucky there are people to catch me.

Big hugs and much love to all of you.

Morning smiles like the face of a newborn child

"Mama," my son said, as we lay side by side in his bed before sleep, "are you afraid of anything?"

The room was dark and quiet, and as I thought about my response, I said, "Am I afraid of anything? Hmm."

I'm terrified of somehow losing my kids, like in a car or plane crash, and having to face life without them. I'm scared something will happen to Nick. I know one day my mom will die and I worry about it. I'll be so devastated, I'll fall apart completely.

I'm scared to look in the mirror in the dark. I have been since second grade, when we played Bloody Mary at my house in Bangladesh. If I have to use the bathroom at night, I hurry in and out, looking straight ahead, making sure I don't glance in the mirror.

The other night it occurred to me vampires don't have a reflection. So looking in the mirror, you wouldn't even if know one were behind you.

Clowns, clowns frighten me, ever since Poltergeist. I read Steven King's It years and years ago, and that added to my clown terror. I couldn't watch the movie trailers.

I'm afraid of turbulence, I'm afraid my plane will crash. I worry about not having enough time with connections, and missing my next flight.

The idea of sink holes makes me anxious, although Nick has assured me that DC is built on rock.

I'm scared of accidentally backing into a geyser, although I've never yet been to Yellowstone. I'm scared of tsunamis and super volcanoes and being in the Pacific Northwest when that one giant tsunami earthquake liquefies the entire area.

At night, in the living room, when I'm the last one to bed, I fear a hand will reach out from under the couch as I walk by.

Also, rabies. Good lord, the rabies.

I'm afraid I'm not special. That actually, I'm just plain ordinary.

"Sharks," I said. I'm pretty scared of sharks. What about you?"

And signs that might be omens say I'm going, I'm going I'm gone to Carolina in my mind

Have you gone to a high school or college reunion? Were you nervous?

I'm going to go ahead and say that this post is possibly me at my most vulnerable.

This past weekend, I overheard my friend Leigh saying that I am good at vulnerability. I don't know if this is the case, because it scares me to open myself up to criticism. But I do open myself up. The act of writing all of this down, recognizing the feelings, and releasing them into the universe somehow  lightens me.

So I do it.

Almost every other person I've ever met who went to Chapel Hill loved it, and waxes nostalgic. They go back for football games, root for the Tarheels, and post pictures of the Old Well. Their college years were among the best of their lives.

This is how I feel about high school.You've seen my Delhi high school reunions and my myriad of love letters to those friends.

I almost never talk about college.

In July, a friend sent me details about a Kappa Kappa Gamma reunion. I was a Kappa. Do you know this? Perhaps not. It doesn't really come up in conversation.

After we graduated from college, my boyfriend and I went back to visit once that fall. I can't remember why. Maybe a party at his fraternity house? I went once again looking at grad schools, and once after a dear friend's wedding in Raleigh.

That's it, in 26 years.

I don't talk about my college years because I don't think about them. In fact, I barely remember them. They're kind of a dark spot of time for me, with sparks of memories.

We moved to the US from India the summer before I started college. In September, my dad attempted suicide, though my mom didn't tell me until October.

This was back when we didn't talk about it, so I swore my roommate Lesley to secrecy, and I told her. I had to tell someone. I was already in crisis, so Dad didn't trigger it, but it wasn't, to say the least, helpful.

But this was also back when we all insisted we were fine. My parents had no idea why my brother was so angry. No explanation for why I cried so much.

I literally--and when I say literally, I do mean actually physically--spent hours a day sitting on the floor of my dorm room crying and eating chocolate covered peanuts. I gained 40 pounds that year, much of it by Christmas.

Lesley got really sick first semester and missed weeks of class. Years later she told me the only reason she came back was because she was so worried about me.

I knew I cried a lot, but I didn't understand that I was depressed. And nobody in my family recognized that I was depressed. Now I suppose this was because all the focus was on my dad. Who was, of course, fine.

If someone had handed me Prozac and told me to take one every day, I am absolutely certain those years would've been dramatically better.

But then, if you asked me, I'd say I was fine. This was how my family operated. We were always fine.

I did my best to blend. I kept gaining weight, so I kept having to buy new clothes. I bought Laura Ashley and bucks and rugby shirts. I cultivated a Southern accent that I later worked to get rid of. For years after, when I drank, the drawl would come out. I still slide into it very easily.

I would've gone home and never returned, but my parents were living in Virginia, so their house wasn't home. Because I spent so much time crying and not going to class, my grades were appalling. So I couldn't transfer anywhere comparable.

Anyway, I wouldn't have had the wherewithal to transfer. Most days, getting through the day was as much as I could manage.

This is not to say I didn't ever go out, and didn't have fun; I did. It's also not to say that I didn't make friends, because Lesley was one of my best friends, and one of my closest friends to this day, Ann, lived down the hall freshman year. We all laughed a lot together. Now I wonder if it was that verge of hysteria laughter. I genuinely don't know.

Anyway, I did have fun, and did have friends. I just spent a lot more time crying and pretending than actually being joyful.

Joining a sorority sophomore year, though, was terrific. Most of the friends I've made since college weren't in sororities, and raise an eyebrow when I say I was. And I say, "But it wasn't like you're thinking!" The Kappa House had the highest sorority GPA on campus. It was full of really smart, interesting women. Lots of campus leaders.

I chose Kappa after becoming friends with a couple amazing women freshman year. Fortunately, though I had a terrible GPA, and wasn't a campus leader, Kappa chose me as well.

Once I was on the sorority side of rush, I was astounded I'd made it.

My college experience improved dramatically once I joined. I wasn't quite so lost. I had a group that I belonged to, some wonderful friends, and a place to go that I felt comfortable. I went to mixers and events. I spent a lot of time at the house, and with my sorority sisters.

The summer after sophomore year, I lived with a high school friend's family in Rome. Her dad got us summer jobs at the embassy. In Italy, I finally felt like myself again. I worked it out to spend half of my junior year in Rome as well. I lost all the weight I'd gained. I loved Rome, loved my life there.

I returned to Carolina with just one year to get through, and lucked into living with dear friends in the sorority house. The first week of class I met a very cute, very southern guy who actually, shockingly,  wanted to be my boyfriend. Goal achieved.

By senior year, with the countdown to leave, I finally felt like I actually fit in. I remember, at graduation, being sad to leave.

This brings me to the Kappa reunion.

I got the information, and I was intrigued. What a great idea! How fun to see friends I haven't seen in decades! I should go!

I had some deep and very meaningful friendships, but lost touch with all my sorority sisters within a year of graduating.

But in the past several years, I've reconnected with a number of these friends over Facebook, and gotten to spend time with a few. My friend Eileen, creator of Super Sikh, among other things, came to visit when I was pregnant with Jordan. Being together after all those years fed my soul.

In fact, all of these reconnections have been wonderful. But a lot of those in-person reconnection friends aren't able to make the reunion.

So time passed, and I clicked on the invitation over and over. And every time I thought about it, I got anxious.

Two months went by. The organizers sent out a couple emails. I said I was going to go, but I didn't put money down. The deadline was approaching. One of the friends I saw in January said she and another friend had gotten a room and invited me to share.

Nick was all, "You should go. Just buy your ticket. Go."

I finally bought the ticket one night right before bedtime. I got in bed and he said, "Did you buy it?"

I said, "Yes. But I don't know if I can go."

"Why?"

"It makes me so nervous."

I didn't exactly know why. I had to think about it. Eventually I whispered, "Because...What if nobody actually liked me?"

I honest to god said this. Here I am, a grown woman, a mother, far, far from college years. And what popped out of my mouth, when I reached down into my feelings, was: what if nobody actually liked me?

I hate how lost and scared and trying-too-hard I was in college. I think about freshman year, and how inferior I felt to people who knew each other from high school, but didn't know where India was and weren't interested.

I didn't know about culture shock and being a third-culture kid. I just knew that I didn't want to be there and couldn't go home.

I'm embarrassed that in those years I just wanted to be skinny and pretty enough and have a boyfriend, and eventually a husband because that meant I was good enough. I didn't know that I was smart or could do great things, because nobody told me so.

I think about who I was, and how I really really didn't want to be that person, but didn't know how not to be.

I don't have a lot of memories from college, but I also avoid them because they're painful.

What it comes down to is this: I hated myself back then. So why would anyone else like me?

Sometimes Nick does the stereotypical male thing and tells me how to fix my problem, which makes me regret saying anything and also want to stab him. But other times he listens and he makes me feel heard and considered. Which is what he did in this case.

He said, "I've learned that people who go to reunions go because they want to see other people. They want to reconnect. Do you fear you'll be excluded?"

I said no, absolutely not. These were kind woman. Funny, smart, interesting, and extraordinary in such a variety of ways.

No, I don't have a fear of being excluded. I just...felt insecure.

And he said, "That's OK."

He talked about how, at both his high school and college reunions, he talked to people he hadn't really known before. About how nice it was to see everyone.

I realized that part of this is fear of returning to a place where I felt small and inferior. Where I felt very much on the outside, and thought everyone but me was on the inside.

I still feel like this in life sometimes, just not at much, and I recognize when it is happening.

I'm the same person, of course, but also so very different. And I haven't revisited those years.

As I've worked through it and named it, I'm still nervous, but mostly very excited. The list of attendees is amazing. 

Now it's only two weeks away.

I may solicit your opinions on outfits.

And there you have it.

Normalcy?

You all, I m not sure what's going on with me but I am starting to suspect that I have become normal.

For years, I mean yeeeeaaaars, I tried to be normal. To be like how I thought everyone else was, or anyway, how most people were. To blend in.

I was sure I was weird. My family was weird.

Nowhere did I try harder than at college. And no matter what I wore or how closely I could get my accent to sound like that of my peers,  I never, ever felt like I fit anywhere.

But I could always kind of stand on the fringe or just stay quiet and not really be noticed.

What I didn't realize was that the people of most interest to me were not the norm. That's what made them appealing.

And after way more years than I like to admit, I realized how not interested I am in normalcy. How ordinary, to me, is an insult. I do not strive to blend.

I think I got to the point where I looked pretty normal, and I often dress kind of conservatively (don't I? I think I kind of do.) But at some point I knew for a fact that I thought differently than most people. And I enjoyed it.

It wasn't an effort to be different. It was just finally accepting who I was and reveling in it.

And now! Now I'm all, shit! I think that maybe I've actually started to...blend.

So then I think, maybe now I'm normal. And I need to stop seeing that as a negative. It just is.

I'm a wife, a mother of two. I unload the dishwasher and reload it and do laundry and get enough exercise and take vitamins and either cook nutritious things for dinner or don't and feel guilty about it. I do so many ordinary things, things that have to be done, and some of which I don't even mind, but don't find particularly interesting.

I'm sitting in the corner muttering "Shit! Shit! Shit!" Seriously, this thought is troubling.

It's not that I need to be some special snowflake. Or one of those carnival people who bites the heads off chickens. But I'm terrified that I've lost the funny. And the weird. I like the weird. I'm afraid that interesting things don't occur to me anymore.

I used to walk around seeing stories everywhere. But now, now I don't. I don't feel sparked.

And not in the terrible flat grey depression kind of way. Because angst is its own driver. This is more like, well, ok. Here's what it's kind of like.

I'm a city person. I joke that I like nature best through a window, and that's not entirely true but it really is some large percentage of the time and depending on the place.

So I like hiking if it's a serious physical challenge or really exotic. But just hiking in nature for hours is not my thing. Because at some point I am all, yes, the nature. It's pretty. It's pleasant. And these trees look like the trees an hour ago. And this tramping around is kind of repetetive.

And when can we bathe and put on cute clothes and find a corner cafe and get a cup of coffee?

That is how I feel. Like inside my head lately is perfectly nice and pleasant--which, don't get me wrong--is a positive in so many ways. But it is not of great interest to me.

Maybe now I've hit normal? Whatever that might be?

SCENE I. A cavern. In the middle, a boiling cauldron.

When we were little our dad used to make up bedtime stories with my brother and me in them.

Often, there were these two witches who would chase us, determined to eat us. They'd catch us, but we'd always get away.

Sometimes Maude was in these stories. Sometimes, when "Lisa was all alone in the middle of a field..." I would beg for Maudie to be there. "No, Daddy! Maudie was there! Lisa wasn't all by herself! Maudie was there!"

"Not this time. Lisa was all...by...herself..."

We always escaped in the nick of time. We came up with ingenious solutions to problems in order to free ourselves. But it was rather stressful.

And now, as an adult, I realize that yes, it was perhaps a little fucked up. Who terrifies their kids right before kissing them goodnight? Of course I was scared of the dark.

But now I wonder if that was how my dad viewed life. He was fast and clever and stayed just ahead of disaster. But barely.

My youth was never dull. We lived in interesting places and traveled extensively. Daily life was fascinating, at base because it was always in another culture. I think often we were happy, but it took me a long time to realize that happiness was not a stated goal.

But at some point I realized that I wanted to be happy. And I didn't know how. I knew how to slog through. Because that's what I thought life was.

Having that epiphany, however, and making the deliberate choice to work towards something good, transformed my view on life.

Now, I try to make my kids happy. I regularly ask them if they're happy. What I've not done for a while, however, is ask myself.

Now, there are times when life is going to suck a bit, like when you have a newborn, whether or not you've had a C-section (but preferably not). You aren't getting enough sleep for waaaay too many months in a row and you're kind of frenzied, and life is hard. You might or might not be desperate or miserable, but you are definitely not at your most joyful.

I'm not saying that every day needs to be rainbows and unicorn kisses and puppy breath and M&Ms. Or even one of those at a time. Sometimes things aren't great, but you don't walk away because you see the larger picture and you believe you can get back to the good.

But sometimes you back up and and you still feel like you're all alone. In the middle of a field.

And if that feeling persists, then you might start to feel like those witches, they're not all that far behind you.

Say my name, say my name

When my mom was learning Spanish, she started saying, "Arroz is arroz is arroz."

Yah, so. When Nick and I were engaged and he asked if I was going to change my name, my initial reaction was something like OH THE HELL NO.

And then I considered changing my name entirely, because I've never liked Lisa. I was going to take his last name and change my name to Jordan Nick'slastname.

But then a good friends of mine gave me a look and said, "Go ahead and do what you want: you'll always be Lisa to me."

And, at the age of 39, it did seem silly.

And then we went ahead and had a kid and named him Jordan and that settled it. Option off the table for me. Plus, I wasn't actually changing my last name.

I knew Nick would love it, but he also understood - there was no way he'd give up his last name for mine. He got it.

But in some ways, it would be easier for us to have the same last name. At Jordan's school, and eventually, India's school. It's not insurmountably complicated. But it would be easier.

And actually, I'd drop my middle name, keep my first and last name and add his to the end. Legally, we'd have the same last name.  How big a deal is that, I decided?

Fast forward to this past March, when, in a fit of folly, I offered to change my name as a gift to Nick for his birthday. Would he like that? In response, he sprinted off to get the key to the safe-deposit box, zoomed to the bank, and returned with our marriage certificate.

In other words, yes.

Right. So. Ready to change my name! What's in a name, right? Arroz by any other name...

But every time I made a move toward doing so, I got all clenchy and twitchy. Change my name? This name I've had for two score and then some?

Every once in a while, Nick would check in on how it was going, and I would respond with a totally involuntary shoulder twitch and say I was working on it...

So now, it's what he would like for Christmas. Would I go ahead and do the paperwork?

But I just read an article in the Sunday Times that was about names and apparently if you don't have your intended last name on your marriage certificate it's all kinds of difficult?

I've been looking on the web but am not clear on it, so I probably need to just go down to the Social Security office and ask for help.

But! If it's going to be all complicated, maybe I will change my entire name! All those names I liked that Nick wasn't OK with for our daughter can now be back on the table!

I could be:

Cleotilde
Emma
Gaia
Odette
Sadie
Willoughby

The idea of which makes me alternately nervous and excited.

Whatcha think?

And I'd be all, "You should know we run a clean dungeon around here..."

What do you imagine you would do if you left your current job?

It used to be that whenever I’d get sick of my office job, I’d think, well, you know, I could always turn to foot prostitution.

Since writing that long-ago post, however, I’ve been informed by a variety of foot fetishists that in fact, I could not. I don’t  have the feet for it.

Seriously.

Which, you know, is kind of like being told that I’d be a bad lesbian. I want to be all, I would so be good at it! But, I’m trying to work more within my limitations. Plus my husband is completely opposed to the idea.

So the other night we were talking about what I might actually do if I weren’t in my current job. I was trying to come up with business ideas. One possibility for me would, of course, be freelance writing and editing. Which Nick suggested.

“What about something totally different?” I asked.

Because, you know, I spend my days writing and editing. And while I like it, I kind of feel like if I’m not writing my own stuff, why would I leave a good job to do the same thing, but without colleagues or benefits? If I do something else, I want to do something completely else.

“Which would be…what?”

(Nick, it must be said, gets a little tired of my existential crises.)

“Maybe I could be a dominatrix! It's not about sex.”

“Huh.” It was one of those, fuck, not this kind of random mental masturbation conversations again huhs.

“Listen! We could stop renting out our basement, and turn it into a dungeon! We could have different theme rooms!”

Nick just looked at me, poured himself more wine, saying nothing.

"Yes! I could be all, 'And here's the laundry room, where we'll be spending our next hour...'"

This intrigued him. "And then you'd make him iron naked!"

"While I stepped on his feet in spiky heels!"

"And then you could start a laundry service..."

Pretty much.

Having it some, doing none of it well

If you're a parent, and you made the choice to stay home with your kid(s), are you glad you did?

I don't have a big important job. I don't have millions of dollars, human life, or grand affairs of state hinging on my actions. I'm not an Anne-Marie Slaughter type; I'm not trying to have it all (whatever that means).

 I'm just trying to have it some.

I'm trying to love my family with my whole being, and spend at least a little quality time with my husband, and get grocery shopping done and keep the clutter piles from overwhelming us. Oh, and get to the office on time. And not take lunch because twice a day I pump as much milk as I can for India to have at day care. Which is not enough, but it's something.

I am currently in the office three days a week. My days at home with my baby are lovely. My office days are rush rush rush - trying to get the bottles together, to get India ready for day care, to get myself into clean and office-y clothes (still a challenge, when many things are still too tight), to focus on work at work, to leave on time to rush to get either one or both kids - depending on Betty's schedule.

My evenings all week, whether home or at the office, are frantic from when I get the kid(s) until about 8:00 pm, when Jordan is tucked in. I get India bathed, nursed, and to bed, Jordan fed, Jordan clean, Jordan to bed.

They're really hard when Betty is gone, because Nick works quite late, and so it's just me with two kids that want ALL my attention. But when Betty is here, which is most of the time, she feeds Jordan while I get India settled. So it's not hard, just kind of full-on until he's off to sleep.

There are parents who have it a lot harder than me, I know. There are single parents, parents with more than two kids, parents with long commutes and no family nearby. There are parents who manage a family and a job and extra activities and bake cakes and have a clean house and do it all very gracefully.

I'm not weak, and I'm not lazy, but I feel like even just doing it some is often more than I can manage.

And I feel like I'm doing a terrible job at all of it.

Five feet high and rising

I've been looking for baby pictures of myself to compare to India, and in the process, I came across these photos - the first taken when I was nine months old; in the second, I'm almost three. I thought you might get a kick out of Betty's 70s outfits and hair.

She had some fabulous dresses, jumpsuits, and shoes. Things I would have quite enjoyed wearing over the last decade, had she kept them through all the moves.

So it kind of struck me this weekend that now I really feel like a mother.

Is this weird?

I mean, I've been a mom for almost three years at this point. And it's not that I haven't felt like Jordan's mother.  It's more that I also felt like I had my own separate identity.

And with India, something shifted. I don't know if it's because now I have two. Or because this birth experience was so positive, and I don't have PPD, and I'm able to nurse without supplementing. I have this immense satisfaction that comes from being able to meet all her needs right now.

With Jordan I was mostly resentful. Doesn't that sound terrible? I feel so guilty when I say it, but it's true.

Everything was so hard, and I felt so stuck, and nursing took forever, and then I'd still have to make him a bottle. Day after day, night after night, I would just sit in the chair and feel like I was suffocating.

The PPD was evil. I wanted to escape from my life so badly. I loathed my husband at least 17 times a day. I mentally divided up the furniture at night. I reveled in my time at the DC DMV. Whenever I left the house alone, I never wanted to go home.

Now I and nurse and look down at my baby and think about how time goes so fast. She's already bigger than she was last week. Pretty soon she'll be heading to college.

I mean, it's not that I don't think of sleep deprivation as torture. It's not that I haven't thought of her as a bamboo shoot. It's more that this time I have perspective. This will pass, and fast. This is not all there is.

And she's my second and my last and I know the time goes.

But back to feeling like a mother. I think that now it's probably the biggest part of what defines me. First and foremost, I'm a mom.

On the one hand, this is who I am and who I have worked very hard to be. I'm so happy to have children. I have my own family, and they're the most important thing in my world. I'd give up anything but my family.

I guess it's caught me off guard, though, to feel like a mom is all of who I am. Which is how I feel right now.

Like, from my current perspective, I cannot imagine ever feeling attractive again. I feel like I have this huge cloud of momishness surrounding me.

Seriously. I feel like I have this big sign above my head that says things like: Here, let me cut your dinner into little tiny pieces for you, to make sure you don't choke. Do you want your milk in a big boy cup or a sippy cup? Uh, oh. Time for a diaper change.

And I'm shlumping around in my maternity pants. I'm wearing a bra night and day. I have two perpetual round milk stains on my shirts. In fact, I smell like milk all the time.

I know this will pass.

But! Now that I have two kids! I have visions of a future filled with sturdy mom jeans, comfortable shoes, practical tops, and judicious behavior.

It's not that I think being a mother means you're unattractive. I know myriad beautiful women who are mothers. Their kids mean the world to them, but they aren't their entire worlds.

So I think that maybe it's that I feel MATRONLY. Matronly! A word that for me conjures up aprons and washtubs and baked puddings and no nonsense.

I think you'll agree that in a Venn diagram, the Attractive circle, the Fun circle, the International Woman of Mystery circle...they have no overlap with the Matronly circle.

You know?

So if any of you have suggestions on how to smother the little voice in your head

I know I'm an ingrate in that you all said such nice things on my last super-angsty post...and I've not yet thanked any of you for it. Thank you. I'll comment back soon, I will.

I mean, not that you're on pins and needles. But I want to. I just...haven't.

It's been one of those crappo weeks that claws at your self-esteem from multiple angles. The kind of weeks were if one weren't pregnant, one might go home at night after work and open a bottle of wine and sit in the corner and swill the whole damn thing. And do it again the next night. Which I don't think I've actually done since I was single, now that I think about it.

It sounds pretty good to me, actually.

Anyway.

Tuesday started with a fight with Nick, and then turned into a day in which my abilities at work were called into question even though it was a misunderstanding and not something I hadn't actually been on top of and I just felt fucking miserable all day long. Even if I don't love my job every minute, I'm a first born rule follower. I get my stuff done. If people think I'm doing a bad job, I feel like shit.

Wednesday began at the midwives with MY WEIGHT. The nurse didn't even have me pee first!

You know how last time I didn't let them tell me how much I weighed? And it was just a big surprise at the end?

This time I thought I'd grown (personally, I mean) and that I could take it. But no matter how many times I tell myself YOU'RE PREGNANT, I still cannot take the numbers in stride.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

I've now hit the weight I was freshman year of college. When I spent most of the time sitting on my dorm room floor, crying, eating chocolate, and not being able to fit into any clothes but sweats.

Weight gain for me is inextricably linked with misery. And panic. And self-flagellation. I cannot handle the numbers. I should never know them.

I emailed Nick while waiting for the midwife to come in. "I'm a big fat cow. Here's proof: LARGE (for me) NUMBER."

And then I was all, "But I had my sneakers on. (It's true - the thought of relacing was just too much.) And I'm wearing a very heavy necklace. Oh, plus, I had rocks in my bra."

Here's what makes me so mad at myself about it. My midwives are totally happy with where I am. I'm doing the things I need to do for my own body and for a healthy baby. I'm eating well. I'm not eating crap. And I'm exercising.

I'm not going to cut down on my food intake, because that's just stupid and unhealthy in pregnancy. I'm so totally within the guidelines. Except by my panicked calculation, at this rate, I'm going to be heavier at the end than I was last time. When I was one week overdue.

Which is fine. It's still within reasonable range. Technically, It's all fine. Really.

And still, there's this little asshole Danger! Danger! Fix it! voice in my head telling me how fat I am.

I'm closing my eyes next time. I totally am.

Midas is king and he holds me so tight and turns me to gold in the sunlight

Sometimes I have to drag my own self down there kicking and screaming, but I'm still working out in our office building's gym at least a couple times a week. You know, the gym with the shiny red button.

So last week it was brought to my attention that my stomach is roughly the same size as the 15-pound medicine ball. Although what it really feels like is this:
Now, I've tried to be a lot more measured in this pregnancy about what I say on LG, partly because I got berated in my Jordan pregnancy for complaining about how fat and gross I felt. I mean, I got a lot of support, too, so it's not just fear of people thinking I'm an asshole that's holding me back.

Although naturally, I'd rather people didn't think I was an asshole, if I had my druthers.

But I've also tempered my complaining nature because fuck, it took so much time, so much work, and so much money to get to this pregnancy. And part of me is scared that if I'm not grateful enough, it'll get taken away.

Don't step on the crack. Don't walk under ladders. Don't break a mirror. That sort of thing.

Thankfully, with Jordan, I didn't realize how fragile it all can be. I'm well fucking aware with this one. And so, at least publicly, I've tried to hold it in. Hey, look at me with the medicine ball belly!

But you guys, I hit a huge wall this weekend.

Sunday morning I was all kinds of mad at Nick for not loving this sweater I'd gotten him. And he kept saying, "Why are you getting so angry?" Which just made me angrier.

And so I snapped, "Because it's so hard to find XXL sweaters that actually fit you and this one actually fits and I AM SO TIRED AND OLD AND HAGGARD AND UGLY AND I HATE MY BODY AND I HATE MY FACE AND I HAAAAAATE BEING PREGNAAAAAAAAANT. I HATE IT I HATE IT I HATE IT."

At which point I just leaned over and started sobbing onto the kitchen counter. Like the snuffling, hiccuping, gasping for breath sobbing of abject despair.

Nick curled me in his arms and said he thinks I'm beautiful, and he patted my just-highlighted hair and said, very sweetly, "I think you're beautiful. And I like your new hair." (He's a good man, that one.)

And Jordan came over and asked me if I wanted to put some animals in his backhoe. Which is pretty much like saying I love you so much.

I'm loved, and I'm lucky. I love the family I have. And I'm lucky to be having another baby. I'm grateful, I am. Really and truly.

I just suck at the pregnant. And the pregnant, coupled with the sped-up aging it seems to be doing to me? Super mindfuck.

I am the opposite of glowy. My skin and my hair and my nails are so dry. I have 500 more wrinkles than when I started. When did I get so old and wrinkly?

It's one thing to feel fat and full and exhausted and achey and uncomfortable all the time. But it just feels so unfair to have to feel so hideous on top of it. And so old. So fucking old. It kills my self-esteem.

I feel all superficial saying that, because I am so much more interested in what people are like than what they look like. But it's true. I need to feel attractive in some way, shape or form. And I don't. I just don't.

I hate it.

She doesn't get eaten by the eels at this time.

I don't know what the descent into depression is like for other people.

I've talked about it like falling into a hole, but lately, I realized that it's not like that for me. I think it would be easier if it were. Like, one day you'd be walking along singing what you think is an upbeat tune that actually turns out to be about a dark teenage mind contemplating a Columbine-like killing spree.And then suddenly, you'd find yourself in the bottom of a hole.The contrast would be so stark, you'd realize immediately, I think.

For me, however, it's more like stepping off the sandy shore and slowly walking further and further into the ocean. The change is incremental. Once the initial shock of getting your feet wet wears off, the downward slope is gradual enough that you don't really realize what's going on.With each step, your footing gets less secure, as the ground shifts beneath your feet. You reflexively readjust.As you get further in, the vicissitudes of currents beyond your control pull at you. And you resist, without consciously doing so. As they get stronger and stronger, it takes more work.

You get a little colder, a little less secure, with each passing day and each step forward and downward. And somehow, somehow still you do not recognize that you have been here before.

You just know that you hate your life and everyone in it. How come people suck so badly? How come you suck so badly?At some point, though, you're in deep enough that you're not only over your head, but you've lost your footing entirely. It's so dark, and so cold, and so very scary.

This is the point at which, finally, finally, you realize that unless you get some help, you are fucked.You push for the surface, and you reach for the strongest hands around. You gasp and you sob, and you choke out, "I'm in a very bad place."

And while they cannot fix you, they can pull you into their laps, and put their arms around you, and say, "We know, and we're here for you."

With the support of those hands, that warm towel of reassurance wrapped around you, you have the impetus and strength to seek out the help you need.

Having hit that point last week, I'm back on the shore. I fully expect to resume singing about pumped up kicks any day now.

But wherefore I know not

So, this thing happened recently. I ran out of funny.

And I haven't been blogging with the fierce urgency of now because really, what do I have to say? Particularly when I'm so not funny?

The concrete realization that the last drop off funny had left my body happened right around the same time that I started hating my life, which was about 8:30 last night.

I mean, the life hating had probably begun slowly, and was in full force during the weekend. But the revelation didn't hit until 8:30 pm.

There's nothing magical about the hour, except that it was just shortly after I'd put Jordan to bed and the approximate time that our sheets were dry and I was pulling them out of the dryer, which coincided with the precise moment that Nick walked in the back door from work.

And said, "How are you?"

To which I replied, "Fine except that I fucking hate my life."

And I know I have a good life, I do. I married a man I love. We live in a house that only gets nicer with each passing day and sweep of construction dust. We have an amazing kid. My mom is moving in, and we have a good little family.

But I couldn't see past the long week, followed by a weekend filled with six loads of laundry and three loads of dishes and the rushing off to do errands or help Betty at her house, and then the rushing back so that Nick could go to work in the afternoons, and then the struggle through dinner, through bath, through getting teeth brushed and jammies on and ready for bed.

And our house is a disaster. There's stuff everywhere. Jordan can destroy a room in three minutes flat. So can Betty, it seems. Plus we lack storage space, and we have a constant influx of stuff. And so the piles grow. And grow.

And when the fuck is one supposed to figure out where to shove the piles? Sometime between cramming the kid in bed and cramming yourself in bed? That time when you're eating dinner and breathing?

It's all just so tedious and exhausting and endless. And when I look down the hallway of tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, it's full of piles of more of the same.

Nick has a better outlook - of course - and it's not like my life is half fuller or half emptier, or more full of tedious tasks than his. He just has, you know, the better outlook. The one I don't have.

Regarding yesterday and who is in charge

So, I want to make sure you know that yesterday I wasn't all, "Oh, I met my warthog and my life is all sparkly and perfect and I'm so awesome and hahaha look at me!"

Although I fear it may have sounded like that. Which is just irritating.

What I really meant was that things had been so NOT good for so very very long.

(Those of you who are long-time readers have heard all of this before. Sorry.)

I'd gotten pretty invested in some extremely manipulative, unkind - even downright mean - men. I'd gone out on dates with scads and scads of Perfectly Nice Human Beings. And some not. I went on a date with a guy who flat-out asked me what was wrong with me, because I'd never been married.

And every time I liked a guy, and I'd held off reallyreally liking him until it seemed like it might work out, and it would get to the point where I was invested, the guy would just...stop being interested.

My self esteem had gotten very very small. And fragile.

And then the spring of the year I met Nick, my dad attempted suicide. Which just made me more fragile.

And then every once in a while, but with enough regularity, these ex-boyfriends, the ones I had fallen hard for, would email or call and ask me out. And I would say yes, because I lack judgment and maybe also because they were really hot.

This kind of thing is a mindfuck-and-a-half.

So by the time I met Nick, I was almost numb.

I won't say that I'd stopped looking, because: 1) I always want to slap people who say they stopped looking and then they met their spouse; and 2) I was on Match. Of course I was fucking looking.

But I was dating very defensively by that point. I was on my guard.

Do you know how exhausting it is to be on your guard all. the. time? And on your guard but hoping for your heart to go pitter-pat or whatever sound it makes? If you know what I mean, well, you know what I mean.

So when I said oh, thank God. That's what I meant.

I meant, thank the powers that be that I'd had enough therapy to let a good one in. Thank the universe for letting me meet one who had had enough experience with Crazy that he could not only deal with my family and me but even really appreciate us. Thank Krishna or whoever you might turn to for lining up our singleness and senses of humor.

Basically, I just wanted to thank whoever is in charge for changing things from so very bad to good, in one moment.

(Also, just to be clear here, by "whoever is in charge," Nick, I don't mean you.)

Cool blue reason I'm just talking to myself

It is a beautiful, beautiful day out, and I am curled up into myself sad.

It's easier to understand the downs in the winter, when the weather is grim and the cold makes me clenchy.

But now?

The weather is spectacular, particularly for DC. It's sunny and gorgeous and not so humid and just basically yellow sparkly and pretty.

It's the start of a long weekend. A long summer weekend! We have a pool party to attend on the 4th of July. Cookout and splashing in the pool with kids and friends. What could be better?

Nick comes back tomorrow. He's been in New Orleans for work. Yes, it is hot as balls. Yes, I believe that's an industry term.

And Jordan, Jordan is adorable. He likes to put things on his head, thus rendering himself invisible, and then if you don't notice immediately, he says, "Jordan! Where are you?" Which he pronounces: Dodan! Wheeaahyo?

It is, without question, the cutest thing I've ever seen. I mean, aside from all the other adorable things he does.

I have all these spectacularly fantasticularly lovely things that I am thankful for.

I'm enumerating them, envisioning all the best, with clear salty teardrops sneaking down my cheeks. I don't understand. And I do.

Sometimes it's just like this, you know? I know. Fuck.

Saddy sad, stabbity stab

I wonder if the reason most people don't talk about infertility is because it makes you feel like there's something wrong with you.

Or maybe it's because it just makes you so fucking sad. All the time.

Except for the cycles that you're taking Clomid. Because during those months you also walk around completely enraged, at everyone at every moment.

For me, anyway, it's like being put in a crazy jar and being able to see yourself in there, bouncing off the walls, thinking and saying angry, mean, hateful things, but not being able to unscrew the lid and let yourself out. Or even put your hand over your mouth to stop yourself.

If you see what I'm saying.

And I'm so sick of this focus on what I don't have. I do it to myself, and it's a crappy way to live. I'm trying, really trying, to focus on what I DO have, which is a great family that includes this delightful gem of a son who just fills my heart so full that sometimes I wonder if it will explode.

I mean, when I'm not feeling hateful towards him due to aforementioned hormones.

But every month that goes by, I just feel worse about myself. And worse about our possibilities. And why, why did I wait to be so OLD?

And then there are those people who, with all good intentions, just tell you to relax, that stress works against you.

It's like when I was single and Internet dating like a fiend and fretting about dying alone. And well-intentioned people were all, "Oh, just relax! You need to stop trying so hard! That's when things happen! I met my husband when I wasn't looking!"

Those suggestions always made me feel like stabbing them. When they weren't looking.