well...i caved...

the plan was to refrain from alcohol at the house and only have a drink on the very rare occasion that i'm out of the house and feel like a glass of wine or a shot of jack daniel's.  tonight, though, i caved and bought a bottle of wine.  i haven't had a drink since new years eve but on my way home from the hospital tonight (my little brother had surgery today) i just couldn't help but stop at the liquor store.

i decided that i would have this bottle and then maybe buy a bottle before the beginning of lent. i've observed lent the last 2 years and never cheated so i'll give up alcohol this year.  (2 years ago it was chocolate and last year it was carbonated drinks.)

i spent all day today with my mother, dad, ex-step-mother, and future sister-in-law.  that was stressful enough but i have another 5-6 days of the same as my little brother has to have another surgery on monday.  it just seemed like wine was in order.  while i have never had a drinking problem, alcoholism runs in my family, so i am always conscious of my intake.  i am trying really hard to lose weight and the red wine doesn't help but i figure a glass tonight won't derail me.  i'll run tomorrow...

i bought this bottle in honor of my best friend whose favorite literary device is "irony."

grace and peace and pinot





TV-less land

today has been a frustrating day!  it's a hard day to NOT have a television.  i wanted badly to watch football and then to watch the golden globes.  i have also been craving pizza for weeks but was not in shape to go meet a friend for dinner (the prospect of having to pump gas kept me home along with severe anxiety in general.)  

i am also partially regretting my decision to give up alcohol for the foreseeable future.  since i couldn't get pizza i made myself cook a wonderful dinner of whole wheat pasta with asparagus, baby portabella mushrooms and red onion sauteed in olive oil and garlic served with tomato sauce and [red wine]--NO--diet root beer.  it was a travesty! 

since my money is a major concern and i am in earnest trying to lose weight i have given up alcohol (my normal consumption was a bottle of wine a week, basically one glass with dinner 3 or 4 nights a week.)  it hasn't bothered me until tonight (not to mention that it's sunday so i couldn't even buy wine today if i wanted to!)  of course i realize that even if we were able to buy wine in the grocery stores in tennessee that i would be unable to actually go in anywhere to make such a purchase.  not with today's level of anxiety anyway.

all in all a less than productive day.  i've not written a word.  winston and i did take a long walk and i did spend a little while catching up with a friend on the phone.  other than that i've been on the couch with my book and my pug. 

grace and peace

the numbers game

17:  months since the flood, (all these are "since the flood"),

25:  pounds gained,

30:  pounds i need to lose,

1:   toe i expect to explode,

27:  age of my little sister tomorrow,

4:   age of my niece tomorrow (daughter of said little sister),

98:  books read,

4:   closet doors left to hang,

153: pages written on my new book,

1:   family funeral attended,

5:   "disorders" diagnosed by my psychiatrist(!),

17:  estimated age of my sweet dog, sage, who died in march,

48:  lowe's receipts (at least 3 times that many lowe's visits),

10:  average purchases per lowe's receipt,

??:  afraid to even estimate the bottles of wine consumed,

2.6: miles strolled at a local lake today with a dear friend and her 2 precious sons,

24:  teeth i expect to fall out (i'm down 8 to begin with - 4 pulled prior to braces and wisdom teeth also extracted),

23,373:  miles on my new car in less than 15 months (compared to the normal 10,000 a year pre-flood),

1,000:  cups of coffee (probably a low estimate),

34,000: dollars spent on the rebuild of house and life (ballpark),

1 billion:  prayers said on my behalf (definitely a low estimate).

just some of the figures i've been thinking about today.  since the flood was on a sunday i seem to be thinking about the event itself more today than normal.  i left the house about this time of night.  some time between 8:00 and 9:00 if i remember correctly.  i just know it was may and it was already dark; it was late. 

it's funny (not funny ha-ha) that these 17 months feel simultaneously like an instant and like 17 years but not in any way like months.  less than a year and a half.  it's like i'm a toddler and still measure my age in months.  i'm not a year old and not 2 years old - i'm 17 months old.  and i'm tired.

grace and peace     



"should" be damned!

"a "should" is a "have to" with no teeth; it is dead energy." -ruth ross

my therapist says that i need to stop "shoulding" myself.  i am overwhelmed with that thought tonight.  i feel that there are a hundred "shoulds" and shouldn'ts" rolling around in my brain and i'm unable to decipher them. 

should:  buy cards for my little sister and her daughter who share a birthday next week, wash a load of clothes, make plans for tomorrow night to prove to myself and others that i can, write, get more exercise (starting tomorrow), walk winston one more time tonight, pay some bills, answer the phone when it rings, make a grocery list and stick to it, unload my car of all the booty from my mother's house, write, come to terms with the fact that i may have a job soon, call my little brother, read my lesson for church, drink less wine, lose weight (directly related to aforementioned wine consumption and minimal exercise), write and dare i say it, etc., etc....

shouldn't:  drink so much coffee, spend so much time alone, buy any more books,  be so self-involved, define myself as "crazy" because i have PTSD, avoid the remaining work to be done on the house, continue to rely on "i can't face it" as an excuse, drink wine at 11:00 pm while listening to willie nelson, etc., etc....

the truth of the matter is, though i feel all these things non-stop, i am doing all i can to merely survive.  some of the above-mentioned things won't get done because i don't feel safe going to most places alone so i avoid stores, exercise and even leaving the house most days.  some won't get done because i am tired of asking people to accompany me.  that's on me and not them, i have plenty of willing people around but i'm too tired to coordinate it;  it's easier to do without.  i may have solved my wine conundrum because i opened my last bottle a couple of days ago and i'm not going out to buy any when it's gone...

though i've been smack-dab in the middle of this PTSD for almost a year it all feels fresh and new.  the edges have yet to be dulled by time; they are as sharp as freshly broken glass.  the pieces cut me even as i try to dispose of them shard by tiny shard. 

the job interview went well today.  i feel physically sick at the thought of having to hold down a job.  my panic attacks are so debilitating that i'm afraid i won't be able to function.  i'm nearly paralyzed with the fear that i will lose another job.  as i believe i've mentioned, i live in fear of the one remaining thing that will break me...though i guess you wouldn't really call that "living" would you?

grace and peace



enter (lowe's) at your own risk

i think i just swallowed a fucking bug.  pardon my language but i'm sure that i just swallowed a fucking bug!!!  after a miserable trip to lowe's where i suffered a debilitating panic attack in the parking lot (crying, hyperventilating, etc.) i poured myself a glass of wine to drink with my leftover pasta.  there are these annoying little gnats or the like that swarm this house because when i'm here i leave the french doors open all day long for the animals to come and go as they please.  these little bastards are attracted to something in wine and i am constantly battling them for sole possession of my wine goblet.  tonight i picked up the glass and took a swallow without inspecting its contents and i'm sure that i got a bug for my trouble.  that was just the last thing that i needed.  i've been in a panic all day about the lowe's trip (which was planned in advance, and with reinforcements.)  i did not need this added stress.

i made it through the second interview yesterday.  i just remember that i sped to the house afterward and spent the rest of the day lying prone on the couch or sitting in the sun on the patio trying unsucessfully to remember anything that happened or what i may have said.  i have another interview tomorrow with an friend of a friend who just started his own law firm.  i washed a load of clothes today in preparation and that's all that i can manage.  i will go and do my best but i can't promise to remember enough of it to fill you in.

i bought the last of the major purchases for the house today at lowe's:  the closet doors.  last fall i ran out of money, volunteers and energy at the same time, and other that just a few small cosmetic things, the closet doors (both bedrooms, linen closet and pantry) have remained the elusive last purchase.  as of this afternoon they are bought and paid far, now i just have to find someone to go pick them up and bring them here.  they would be more than welcome to hang them, too, if they would like.  

now i have to find the energy and strength to take the remaining receipts to my local government in hopes of receiving reimbursements for some of these final things.  it's amazing the way they split hairs; they will cover building materials inside the house but not outside, they will cover appliances but not furniture.  as if a house can ever be a home with a stove but not a bed!!!  as if it doesn't kill me every day to see my fence that is about to fall but know that since it is "not technically a part of the house" it's not "essential."  that means that i am faced with the still visible water line across my back fence every time i step foot outside; reminding me how high the water was in my yard, my house, my life.

the lady who helped me at lowe's today (the store is 2-3 miles from my house-on the other side of the DAMN RIVER) said she still has customers in every day who are rebuilding from the flood.  16 months later and so many people act as if it's a part of the town's "history" but for those of us who are recovering, we live with it as our "present" day after day. 

i wish i could think of one thing that would calm me down but i have yet to do so.  i've paced a good deal and walked winston until he vehemently protested.  i had to carry him the last block - all 26 pounds of him!  poor, fat pug!  maeve sensed my unease (worst than the unease of a "normal" day) today and has stayed close by.  maybe i can persuade her up on the couch with the rest of the family this evening.

grace and peace          

do we still need the postal service?

today my copy of "PTSD for dummies" arrived.  luckily for me it fit into my still mud-encrusted mailbox so i was able to avoid the dreaded knock at the door by my mail woman.  i've been looking for the book in actual bookstores for months to no avail.  i've been afraid to order it on-line for fear it would have to be delivered to my door and i live in near-constant agony that a knock on the door will stop my heart cold.  i finally spent the whopping $7.98 to order it from amazon and began the mailbox watch in earnest.  now that it's here, and i've dodged the door-knocking bullet, i'm consumed with a real fear of reading the damn thing.  could it possibly make me worse?  will i develop a new symptom (one that has nothing to do with the now almost comfortable toenail and/or rubberband debacles?)  could additional information get me one step closer to a new understanding or cause me to revert two steps and draw a line in the sand?  if only i could be sure of anything!

i had a job interview today with a local animal hospital.  it was last minute--which was good as i didn't have time to obsess over it--but it was a nightmare for me.  i was a wreck.  i have no idea if i spoke even one intelligible sentence.  the place is under construction and my anxiety soared when i saw all the building materials and tools laying around.  i couldn't get out of there fast enough.  6 hours and a midday xanax later and it's all a big blur.

i managed to cook supper and eat a bite but otherwise the night has been spent in a long mental wrestling match with myself over this PTSD book.  i think i'm going to have to be content that i ordered it, paid for it and got it inside.  the reading of it will have to wait until i'm stronger. 

the only pleasant part of my day was that i made myself go in and allowed myself to buy a bottle of my favorite wine from one of my favorite shops.  i couldn't afford it and i didn't need it but i wanted it and bought it.  i opened it and had a glass with dinner.  it was very nice.  www.broadsidewines.com

grace and peace