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I Got Me Some

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 4 Comments

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Last month I bought a SEX calendar. No, not one with one position for each day of the year but one to keep track of just how much sex we were having after a not so great comment from B about “slipping back” where sex was concerned. I was pissed as it appeared that the blame was being leveled at me and I was determined to do something about it if only to prove a point. This calendar now hangs on the bathroom wall for easy access so no one “forgets” when we did the dirty deed. Problem is with three teens in the house one just can’t be writing SEX all over the place especially special days like their birthdays. So I have had to become inventive in order to keep track of who did what to whom.

My first entry “B fixed the closet” was a little farfetched but I figured it would work until I wrote it a second time and Gracie said, “What is wrong with your closet and why is dad always having to fix it?”

So I then went to a capital S with circle around it. Andre asked me why I was marking Superman on my calendar. Although it may fit B in the bedroom I quickly got the point that I needed to change my records keeping ways.

Paul asked with the star was about and if it had anything to do with the cycles of the moon.

Frankly, all this calendar watching by the kids was  getting to be a tad annoying. I mean can’t we have any privacy even if it is just on paper?

So I have had to invent a series of codes

IDIOT-I did it on top

GHO- Got him off meaning there was nothing in it for me

GMO- The crops have come in and it was all about me

FTD- F***** twice in a day (we have yet to need this one yet)

BS-B was sick (yeah I am not taking the rap for not having sex when you have a fever and fall asleep at 2 pm

CASS-I was sick.

And so it goes.

Unfortunately, we have not had much chance to use these secret sex codes as of late. Between freezing in Tibet, me in Chicago for a week, Nicole with grand babies here necessitating Gracie sleeping in our room, B being sick, me being sick…well, let’s just say the odds have been stacked against us. But yesterday Nicole left, Gracie returned to her own room and late at night we had sex. Finally. Happy, Joyous, Lovely. SEX.

Let’s just say the earth moved and the richter scale said it was a 5.0  which was not bad for two old folks with kids in the house.

Onto my calendar went GRITS

But in morning after taking the kids to school as I was cleaning my bathroom  I noticed handwriting scrawled on the calendar other than my own. It read “Can you keep it down please some of us are trying to get some sleep!”

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How embarrassing! I think we will buy the little dears ear muffs for Christmas next year!

 

 

 

 

Falling Spirits And Falling Faces

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 5 Comments

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My face is falling as are my spirits

My life in free fall too

The jowls of my life crammed and swollen full of life’s misery

While the jowls of my face sag and slide into other parts of my body

Lines like jump ropes criss cross my life

Over which I play an endless game of jump rope

The beat as they interrupt my life kerplop, kerplop, kerplop

In rhythm with my teardrops falling

While my heart goes into an arrhythmia making up its own disorganized beats

The lines around my eyes crinkle

Belting out a song sounding like an opera of sadness and worry

Madame Butterfly perhaps

These lines now permanent reminders of times gone by

And things yet to come

Scary things, sad things, worrisome things

Over which I have little to no control

Will I find joy with the hand I have been dealt?

Or must you look for it under rocks and in deep dark forests?

Elusive joy. Elusive happiness. Elusive everything

My eyes are closing through no fault of their own

Loose skin moving like an avalanche

And weighing them down

The suddenness of this onset surprising me

Taking me down

Down further than I have ever been

I hate it down here

In this sad and lonely place

I have given myself a week to digest this doctor’s news

Give myself a pity party

And then I shall climb back up

Plaster a smile upon my face

And find some sort of life

With the new knowledge at hand

What it will look like

I have no clue

Do we ever?

Copyright 2016 as are all writings put onto this blog

 

 

 

 

I’m Confused…Can Confusion Increase Creativity?

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / Leave a comment

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I’m confused. Most of my life I have been confused about one or two areas of my life at a time. Now I am confused about everything. My marriage, my children, how to plan for the future, how to sit with the silence and how to live in the now. Everything is confusing and I DON’T LIKE IT…one single bit.

One of the major issues I have with being confused is that often you cannot see the forest through the trees. This confusion often leads to living in limbo, a state I consider akin to having a gas mask at hand with a limited time sensitive filter. Knowing you cannot see, smell or watch the gas coming, do you put the mask on now and risk using up a filter that will protect you for a short but specific amount of time; or do you wait for the person next to you to drop and hope you are not too late in securing it around your face? Yep, for me limbo is one of the worst experiences known to man.

Yet, surprisingly, I have recently experienced confusion as a positive thing as well. Because it seems to me the more confused things are the more creative I’ve become. While confusion can shake your soul, rattle your senses and sometimes lead to a sense of paranoia because you can’t seem to do anything but stand there because either way you move seems equally dangerous or intimidating; it would appear that confusion can also lead to creativity. Instead of seeing only the limiting options of A or B, confusion often allows you to explore many paths that would normally go unnoticed like JJ, Z and Q. Confusion can stretch you, it can lead you and it often makes you examine minute details that while once seemed unimportant become pivotal to your understanding of the situation. It makes you ask the basic questions of:

Who

What

Where

Why

How

It is the answers to these questions which often help clarify the situation.

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So I am confused. Really confused. But I am also glad (kind of) because the way I am approaching problems and issues is bringing me a sense of peace that I have looked at all options as I walk this journey. At least all the ones that present themselves at this time. And I am okay with that. Because I am holding the hands of those who have gone before me and they are holding me tight so I feel safe and my doomsday gas mask is put in the deepest darkest corner of my Place of Mysteries.

https://myhusbandwantsadivorce.wordpress.com/2015/10/02/the-place-of-mysteries-303-days-to-fix-this/

On Motherhood…Does It Really Ever End?

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 1 Comment

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I talked to West last night. He hates his job. He hates his life. He wants a girlfriend. He wants a wife.

“What do I have to get up in the morning for?,” he asks. A sob catching in his voice.

He is 32 and lonely. And tired. Of a life in which he feels he carries the responsibility of 12 million people’s accounts on his back and a management that just doesn’t give a F*** about anything but making a name for themselves.  That and big bonuses. They love those more than the people they are suppose to protect.

“What would you like to do?” I ask.

“I would like to build houses. Go from point A to point Z and in the end see the product of my work standing there, something to behold. Something that is meaningful and will bring a few people joy.”

“So you are looking to do something tangible, ” I say.

And I think back to all the days of child raising I have done. Days of toys strewn about, laundry piles a mile high and someone tantruming loudly through out the house. And sometimes that person was me. I remember struggling to see if what I have said and done had made a difference. I still wonder now even as the kids get older, their needs not so intense and demanding as they once were, is anyone listening? Is anyone learning something meaningful? Has what I have done mattered? Has what I have given up to be a SAH mother been worth it for anyone? I am not sure I know the answer to those questions.

I think back upon all the mistakes I have made. Ones so shameful that I glance around to see if someone can see the pink stains of guilt still written upon my face. Yet, I also see the times where I did the exact thing without preaching that made my child learn a valuable lesson that they desperately needed to know. And if I am truly honest with myself, my goods HAVE outnumbered my bads by a large margin but it is so much easier to remember the mistakes. Why is that? Why do those errors in judgement reside in the front of our minds while the things we should rejoice about slip silently away? Why do we crucify ourselves for things that were long ago forgotten as if the thorns embedded in us make our lives more noble in some sort of sadistic way? I don’t believe suffering brings about clarity so why play this game?

I wonder if is there ever a time when you can sit back and feel your job is done and you retire from parenting? You’ve done well, you know it. Instead of a gold watch all of a sudden a grandchild appears at your hip and she is your new timekeeper as you see things winding down. The minute hand of  your life speeding around the dial while hers is still being wound.

Maybe all of this letting go of guilt, worry and wonder whether it has all been worth it happens when you are truly old.  I must not be there yet.

I wonder if it will ever happen and I will rejoice on the day it does.

So Paul’s Therapist Says…

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 4 Comments

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So Paul’s therapist said to me yesterday, “I know you are not going to like this much, less want to do it, but you will have to do this so it gets through to Paul. If he attacks any member of the family you must (without telling him) call the police and have them take him to the hospital on a 5150. He is getting too big and he needs a reality check that if he hurts someone there are dire consequences. If you do not do this now at this age while he still has a chance as he ages he will be incorporating this behavior more and more into his life. You have got to try and stop it now.”

Hearing those words cut me. Deeply. Call the police on your own child. You must. You have to. It is your obligation. Failure to protect your other children charges could be brought against you if you don’t. He has to learn.

And so I “get” the logic I must ask … if he was rational I would agree. BUT if someone  is undergoing and episode of psychosis/mental illness how can they just stop themselves? Is it as easy as all that? I think not.

One of the things that scares me is that police will come to our door. What if Paul were to run, resist being taken or because he cannot stand being touched in certain ways..hits an officer? We all know what happens to minorities in these times of situations. Often they are seriously injured or they die. How do you risk this happening because a 14-year-old is in a rage?

Yes, I know it is what must be done but what unintended consequences might result? Could I live with these if something horrific happened because I picked up the phone? Could I live with these if something horrific happened because I didn’t pick up the phone?

How do you wrap your head around all of this without it destroying your soul? Without it destroying…you, relationships, your child and your heart?

Nothing makes this possibility better. Nothing. All it looks like is a long scary road which I do not want to take but will in order to try and save my son.

 

 

Dyed Love

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 5 Comments

 

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I loved you once you know

Deeply. completely. selfishly

I devoured you…wanting you to know

Everything I was thinking

Because you couldn’t tell me

What was in your own head

So , instead, I put ideas into your head

While trying to force you to examine things

You had hidden away

From yourself for protection

Of a soul shredded

Long before I came on the scene

I am tired of you blaming me

For what the ghosts in your past

Did to you

And I am tired of seeking answers

From a man is not brave enough

To figure out whether he wants a life with me

Or without

I feel raw, used, scattered

Blown up into pieces that are gone

There is not enough glue in the world

For me to painstakingly put them all together again

Because I am busy and tired of trying to fill up

Your empty spaces and your selfish wants

The ones you know about (yes… those ones you selfish bastard)

And the ones you aren’t even aware of yet

but I am…

I am aware of more than you give me credit for

But I cannot put you together anymore either

You have to do it yourself

Stop depending on me to make

You feel good about yourself again

I can no longer carry your feelings for you

I can barely carry my own

When I remember I even have them anymore

Instead I remember a grenade

That exploded deep within my soul

And you are the one who threw it

Wounding us

You and me

And I wonder if we will ever be the same

For I am running on fumes

Somewhere near the end

Of wanting to figure all of this out

Wanting to run away from the pain

From You

From this life

That at times no longer feels right

Or loving or kind or cherished

A life that is made more complicated

By the issues of others

Until I can no longer differentiate between

Their issues and yours

But find I am growing tired of both

Of giving of myself 100%

When I just want to retreat

Somewhere deep. silent. and kind.

A place where I am no longer wounded

On a daily basis

A place where I can heal

And I can stand up again

Full of confidence. happiness. and belief

That I really do have purpose in my life

And that it starts with me

My purpose. my wants. my needs.

Alone

Without having to consider

And put first

The needs of anyone else in the world

 

 

 

 

 

The Return

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 1 Comment

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When you walk into the house after a week away you expect to feel that your husband is delighted if not intoxicated upon your return. Instead, it felt guarded and a little cold with a hint of resignation thrown in for good measure. Not what I expected at all.

Yes, Paul attacked him that morning. Yes, the grand babies are crying. Yes, things are stressful at work. I get it. I feel weary too at times. Actually, often. Sometimes it is hard not to in this household.

Tonight after being reunited, as I lay in B’s arms, I asked “Do you ever think we will get back to where you really love me. Like it used to be?”

Might as well be putting a gun in my hand and pressing it up to his head.

Why do I even ask these types of things?

I guess I want reassurance that he can, that we can, get to a place of love that once felt as wide as the Grand Canyon but now feels somewhat like a sink hole.

But I don’t get the answer  or the reassurance I am looking for. I get a question turned around on me?

“Do you think we can?” he asks, which tells me he is feeling this disconnect too. Which saddens me and makes me feel even more insecure.

Why do I have to always ask the hard questions? But even as I ask the question I know the answer…I don’t want to have to continue to try to guess. To try and read the mind of a man who doesn’t even know how he feels much less knows how to try and share it. I ask these questions as a gauge as to how our relationship is in his mind. But the thing is…I am not even sure I want to know. Sometimes I think I would like to just keep floating down the RIVER deNILE. FOREVER.

 

Being A Mom Sucks Part 3 But Sometimes Autism Sucks Worse

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 1 Comment

I am in the airport finally going home with the tween daughter of the last few posts. I am excited to see everyone when I get a text from B.

Paul attacked me. He charged me and to protect myself I had to take him down to the floor and hold him there.

My adult daughter, Nicole, who is at our house witnessed this and I get a text from her as well.

I was scared for dad. Dad handled it so well but I was really scared.

I hold my breath and die just a little bit more inside.

Several days before I left for Chicago there was another altercation with Paul involving me. He hurt me in a rage while he was trying to get something that I had taken from him.

Paul has always lived on the edge of rage. Since we have known him and brought him home at 10 months old. His first act upon arriving at our home was to toddle over to his brother and throw him to the floor. It has been some version of this ever since. While they are great friends Andre always knows there is a chance that Paul will get upset and lives accordingly. We all do. It is exhausting at times.

At the age of 11 after much grief and debate, we finally broke down and started using meds to help moderate his ever shifting moods.We have a great med doc who listens with compassion and always tries to use the least amount possible in order to achieve stability. That said, we still have periods of paranoid thinking and depression which has worsened as he hit puberty. Sometimes I want to take him off all meds and other times when I think of doing that I am scared about how bad things might become. Worse. Intolerable. Maybe even dangerous.

And now this. Increasing violence to himself and against us. Not horrible…yet…but where do you draw the line? When you love someone, as we love him, it seems the line keeps getting stretched further out. Further out than you would allow for any other person you come into contact with. There is no aggression toward anyone else except those within our family. Yet I worry that if he was ever involved in some sort of police incident he would be killed because he would run or maybe struggle with an officer and we all know what happens to minorities who do so.

My heart feels like it has been shattered in pieces so many times this past year and I wonder if I can find all the pieces to put it together once again. My mother heart, my marriage heart, my lover heart and my friend heart.

I ache to be and feel whole once again.

Being A Mother Sucks…Part 2

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 7 Comments

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She didn’t like the art museum. Okay, I kind of “get” that seeing pictures of old men with shrunken penises and heads being lopped off may not be your cup of tea but what about the woolly sheep standing in a brilliant green field or the pretty cuddly kitten chasing after a butterfly. Surely out of the thousands of paintings on display you could find ONE you liked. Just ONE. NOPE.

She didn’t like our dinner. She ordered pizza…what’s not to like? It’s a dish she requests time and time again but today it was as if the waiter brought her a plate of liver and onions.

She didn’t eat much of the blueberry pancakes she ordered. What the heck…we have blueberry pancakes all the time! But with hotel prices at $12 a plate for blueberries and batter she couldn’t stand them. ARE YOU KIDDING ME!

She didn’t like the Field Museum…one of the greatest museums in the world. You mean to tell me Ancient China isn’t amazing? NO. Or the gemstones the size of small hills? NO. How about SUE the most complete T-Rex in the world? NO. Really? You didn’t like her either? BORING.IMG_4388

Maybe the Ancient Egyptians with their mummies…thank you… NO!IMG_4429

Or maybe the animals mounted and stuffed in all their glory? GROSS. There was nothing in the entire building that caught her fancy.

Okay, BOLD MOVES by the Joffrey Ballet. This one I was a little worried about. I have really never loved ballet but figure I am giving her some “culture” and if nothing else ideas for her routine. images-6 Of course, she developed a nosebleed in the first part of the performance but I’d be damned if we were leaving. Here is a kleenex. Stuff it up your nose. And so we sat through the three performances and I wept like a crazy old cat lady during the final one. Never have I seen something so beautiful and moving in my entire life. Never could I relate so well. Today I learned to LOVE ballet…my  tween daughter…not so much.

As a mom sometimes it feels like nothing you do is right.EVER. But then you finally catch on and realize it isn’t about you at all. It’s the hormones and your daughter is turning into a bitchy, selfish soon-to-be menstruating maniac and you remember back to a days when your mother could do nothing right. You didn’t like the dress she bought for you…it was too old fashioned just like her. You didn’t do the dishes and she did them for you because it was easier than dealing with the likes of you. You wouldn’t eat her pot roast and sulked like a two-year-old because there was only vanilla ice cream and not chocolate. You refused to SING ALONG WITH MITCH and instead turned up the volume on Led Zeppelin. And that is when it really hits you…horror of horrors… you realize that she has returned as you when you were a horrid cruel totally-into-yourself-snotty-14 year-old. Suddenly you have become your mom… old, boring and certainly not cool. Then, like the principle dancer who hastened her demise and threw herself upon a sword, you briefly consider doing the same, just so you can experience a quick and easy death rather than deal with a reincarnation of a teenage you in the house. That’s when you fall to your knees and wish for just one more hour with your mother so you could apologize, beg her forgiveness and tell her how great a mom she was and that you remember how hard she tried to create moments so special that you would remember them for the rest of your life but not appreciate them until your own daughter’s hormones went awry. And then you cry yet again because suddenly teenagehood is upon you and YOU aren’t ready to give up that sweet little girl that once hung on your every word, freely cuddled with you and loved you back without restraint. Yep, the teen years are upon us…God help us all!

Sometimes Being A Mom Sucks Big Time

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 3 Comments

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So today was Gracie’s big meet. For a 11 year-old who has only been in the sport 2.5 years she does remarkably well. She works hard. She practices 20 hours a week. She watches videos of all her favorite Olympic divers and she reads books on the subject. She is the hardest working kid I know but sometimes that just isn’t enough.

Today’s meet was the largest held in the world with 29 states and 5 countries represented. She woke up and ate breakfast. When we arrived at the venue Gracie started crying.Hard. Fast and furious. This is a kid who never cries and goes into a meet exuding confidence. Always. But here she was crying and all the parents on the team were looking at her with big ??? on their faces because they had never seen her like this. She was a mess.

“I feel sick. My stomach hurts.”

“I think that maybe you are just a little nervous. Give it sometime and you’ll be fine.”

“No. I am really sick. I am going to puke.”

“You weren’t sick 10 minutes ago. Are you sure you aren’t just nervous?”

“NOOO I am sick,” she wails.

One of her teammates walks over to her and tells her a story of how sometimes she gets butterflies before competing.

“It’s not that. I am sick,” her body being wracked by sobs.

Back over to me she comes.

“I can’t do this. My stomach hurts.”

“Okay, well here is the thing. I think you are nervous and I am afraid that if I tell you that you don’t have to compete the next time you have a competition you will be paralyzed by fear and you won’t be able to compete then either. So I just want you to go out there and do what you came to do. I don’t care if you finish last. It doesn’t matter to me. Just go out there and try to have fun.”

Bigger tears. Sniffles. Lots. More tears. Huge tears. Rapid tears.

What is a mother to do? Where is the manual on the best way to handle drama?

Coach and team take her over to the staging area. Five minutes later she’s back.

“I can’t feel my hands.”

I’ve always had a fear of drowning and at this point I swear I am beginning to feel water rising to ankle level due to the hurricane of tears.

“Listen if your hands are numb then I have to take you to the hospital.”

“Nooo!”

She sulks back to her team. Obviously this is getting me nowhere fast. Time to switch tactics.

Three minutes later she’s back.

“I’m dizzy!”

“Okay. So go scratch. Go tell your coach that your cannot compete.”

“NOOOOOOOO! I can’t let my team down like that!”

What is a mother to do? What can I say to this tween that will make a difference?

“It is not a matter of letting your team down. It’s a matter of letting yourself down and how you will feel if you don’t compete. What matters is you. I don’t care what you do and in 10 years you won’t even remember your scores. You have decide for yourself if you would feel worse competing or not competing. It is all up to you.Only you can make that decision and I am not going to make it for you.”

“Mom, I just can’t,” she squeaks… gasp, gulp and even more tears.

“Seems to me you have two options. Either you scratch or you suck it up, buttercup, and get out there and do your best in a situation that is not ideal. I will love you either way.”

So she competes and earns two 4th place finishes and one tie for 3rd. Not bad at all for all the tears. For all the “sickness.” For all the doubts. For all the fears.

Later as she stood on the podium collecting her medals she was relaxed. Happy. Calm. And as those medals clanged softly against her chest I realized that the medals I cherish most from this meet are not the ones that hang around her neck but the one that now rests within her head. It’s the one that will remind her that she CAN do what she sets out to do even if she has to work through her fears to grasp it in her hand. To me, that last medal is worth more than gold. I hope she will think so too someday and will treasure the memory of how she overcame all the crap going on in her own head to earn it.