Divorce

Lists

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 1 Comment

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So it is past midnight and I am suppose to get up to leave for the airport at 3 a.m. Of course, I can’t sleep. And why should I? There is just too much to do. Writing out lists…Andre starting his first night college class tomorrow night and I am worried he will get lost and be wandering around campus at 9 p.m. and Nicole and her two babies won’t be able to find him. Where to buy his textbooks and how to cancel the second class he is signed up for should he get into the first.Lists about what meds he is on and when he has to take them, emails to teachers about the fact we are going to be gone and he might just have a huge melt down at school. And the chores he is suppose to do, but in reality will fight his sister about… the entire time we are in Tibet. I hope she spares his life while we are away!

Lists about what time Paul needs to go to school for math tutoring and what time he needs to be picked up. Lists about what to do should be not do well emotionally while we are done and how to call his therapist if he is headed for a breakdown. Lists about the things he needs help with, what is expected of him at school and to tell administration that we will sign the IEP when we return.

Putting up video of Gracie’s 1st place wins in diving yesterday, finishing first all around for her division and also qualifying for state with this one meet. Lists of her practices and trying to find that book she was “suppose” to read during X-mas vacation but didn’t.

Lists about who to call in case of our demise and lists for the wonderful folks that would take our children and raise them as their own. And I worry about what that would do to our kids if they had to go through losing a second set of parents when they have already lost their first. Thinking about that just about kills me. Ridiculous to shed tears about something that probably won’t even happen, but yet, I do. Lots.Because I feel like I would be letting them down when they needed me most.

I look at all these lists and I think, “how they hell do I do all this?” Seriously. I mean when I am living my life it doesn’t seem like much at all but when it is written down for someone else to follow it seems daunting. And this is minus all the doctors appointments, therapy appointments and all the extra’s I have canceled out of their lives while I am gone.

And then I start the list of why I am taking this trip and how much I love B and how much I want to be with him. Just the two of us. Alone. And soon I realize that it is the longest list, as it should be, because for years we have put our children first. As it should have been too. But now, if we want to make it to thirty years we must make us a priority. It sometimes seems selfish. Irresponsible. Indulgent. And it us. And at this point in our lives it is okay. Now if I could only believe that where it counts…deep in my soul.

Sex… And On Being A COLD B****

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 3 Comments

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Okay, I leave for Tibet/Mt. Everest on Monday. I am still terrified of going. Why? I have no clue. I have traveled so many places and never have I experienced the sense of doom I have regarding this trip. In fact, this sense of death is so foreboding that I gave my girlfriend my password to my blog with instructions on what to write should something bad come to pass. If I could, I would up the amount on my life insurance too but at my age that would take a overnight fast, a blood draw and numerous other personal questions that I would have to lie about should I be asked. And just to make this absolutely clear…this sense of doom has NOTHING to do with B… just airplanes, icy goat roads that when you look down its 1000 ft to the bottom, freak snow storms and COLD. BITTER COLD.COLD SO COLD that a word hasn’t been invented for it yet.

So what does one take to Everest in the middle of winter? Who the hell knows… but I have come to suspect that a dash of crazy is probably useful if not mandatory. Better yet…a jigger of vodka which you are cautioned not to drink (makes the altitude sickness worse). Yet, if pressed, I would have to say that the most important thing about being at the Everest Base Camp in the middle of winter is for you to be warm NO MATTER WHAT IT TAKES. Unfortunately, if the past dictates the present, one might say that when I am cold I revert to the personality of a full-on bitchy badger. Yep, where I am concerned: cold =trouble=misery=down-low-bitchy-self.

Since we are going on this trip to celebrate the fact that we have managed to stay together despite B’s pronouncement that he might want a divorce back in July; I have decided that in order to remain married I will need to convince myself that I am in the middle of the desert when in fact I am in the middle of a snow storm with air so thin that just taking in oxygen wears you down and out. So to keep the peace and to promote harmony and ditto that “good will” stuff; I have invested an obscene amount of warm weather gear and “feel-good-about-going” stuff including:

  • One warm -40 weather degree parka from Land’s End snagged for $136 on sale (not sexy)
  • A blacava (sexy in a bank-robbing-bad-girl sort of way)
  • 2 pairs of light thermals in black (sexy…black makes me look 10 pounds thinner)
  • 2 pairs of arctic thermals (sexy if you are a bear)
  • 1 fleece lined pair of pants/shirt (sexy if your mate is a sasquatch)
  • 1 pair of mens polar arctic under your pants wear (sexy if your mate is a gay man and he thinks you are too)
  • 5 pairs of heavy socks (I’m too sexy for my socks!)
  • 1 pair down mittens that have proven not to keep me warm at night in the middle of the CA desert (might prove useful for certain hand work)
  • A second pair of special hand mittens to fit in said down mittens (sexy for that more intricate hand work)
  • 5 paris of chemical hand warmers (I’ll let you see mine if you let me see yours)
  • 5 large patch body warmers (I need to check if there is a warning on where NOT to put them)
  • 5 pairs of chemical foot warmers (for playing footsie)
  • special caches of toilet paper (come on… my world would cease to exist in a meaningful way without the stuff and I would NEVER shake your hand without knowing there is some around)
  • thing-a-ma-jigs that you put over your boots so you can walk safely on ice (hmmmmm…new sex toy?)
  •  I am trying to find waterproofing for my boots (which would be sexy if you sprayed it all over your body and jumped in a pool)
  • Three accidental life insurance policies (sexy if you are the beneficiary)
  • One evacuate you out on a helicopter insurance policy (sexy if you are doubled over in pain and know there a good drugs when you land)
  • One foreign hospitalization policy (sexy in certain countries)
  • One water bottle with water filter (clean water is sexy water)
  • Various antibiotics, car sickness pills and stop-the-poop pills of various sizes and colors
  • A small diary to write a note to my children should the need arise (not sexy but isn’t anything involving your children is anything but sexy)

 

There. Now you know all the thinking that has been involved for the past three weeks and if you saw me with all this warm wear on you would think I look like an terrifying 300 pound arctic snow beast. Even worse for B, there is no such thing as sexy lingerie that comes in flannel, down or polar fleece.

Frankly, what I have come to realize is that this was an impulse vacation for the hubby and I don’t think B thought this whole thing through. If he wanted sex (which he always does) I would have thought he would have picked a deserted island with a clothing optional theme but Everest in the winter…in a tent or monastery…well, I would have to guess that his chances are about as good as when hell freezes over. Sexy and Everest…they just don’t fit together…and it is doubtful that we will either!

*** Oh…Happy Birthday, Mom. Ironic that I would be posting this on a blog that has B**** in the title because you never were one. Not once. You were a kind gentle soul who suffered much heartbreak over your short 50 years. Hard to believe you have been gone 30 years now. At times I still miss you desperately but rest assured  when a smile still lights up my face I am most probably thinking of you. Gone but never forgotten.***

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IEP Services From The School District

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 2 Comments

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For years we have been fighting our local school district to get our son what he needs in order to learn. Comprehension is sometimes difficult and math often impossible. We have watched him struggle to learn things that others grasp without effort while the school district ignored our concerns. Yet, if he is taught using particular methods he is often able to do the work that is required. Unfortunately, we do not yet know some of the methods that he would benefit most from.

We first realized he was having difficulty with math in first grade. We brought it to the attention of the IEP team. Our concerns were dismissed. In second grade, “It just takes some kids longer.” In third grade, “So he won’t be at the top of his class in math. (Yeah, duh!)” We then paid for him to go to an after school program at the cost of over $400 per month to learn his multiplication tables which the district could not manage to teach him. In fourth grade, he really started slipping but it was “Well, we can’t do anything now because he isn’t failing.” The rage I felt was immense. We were trying to be proactive but the district wouldn’t take our son’s lack of being able to understand and apply concepts seriously. By fifth grade they couldn’t quite ignore it anymore but their solutions and IEP goals were meaningless. He is now in 8th grade and doing math at a 4th/5th grade level. SIGH. I can also say the pathway has been similar for reading and comprehension but not as difficult or severe. In retrospect, the things we would do differently are numerous including taking the school district to Due Process. But the end result is that we have refused to sign his IEP for more than two years and continue to work with an outdated one.This, of course, is beginning to make the district nervous for what it means for them should we instigate legal action.

One of the things we have been fighting for is a GOOD educational/cognitive/psychosocial assessment of our son as we have disagreed with the district’s findings. We feel this is the best way to discover the issues that are effecting his learning and how he needs to be taught to reach his full potential. We have had a well-known and respected doctor in mind to do this assessment who specializes in kids with multiple “things” going on and have been fighting for the district to get him seen by him. Thus far the school district has refused citing their policy (which is illegal, BTW) that IEE’s must be performed within 60 miles of our home. If you understood where we are located you would also know that these types of services are not available here.

It has been a long, hard road with often disappointing results and constant stonewalling from our school district. But after all this time we were just notified that they have agreed to this testing and with it comes a very belated victory for our child which has cost him dearly due to these very purposeful tactics and delays.

Unfortunately, no family should have to go through this. Yes, we have at times hired a lawyer to push our case but the cost is immense and we see very little action for the money spent. School districts often stonewall because most parents cannot afford legal services, they don’t understand the law and districts know that most parents get weary of fighting “the machine” and give up. It’s hard not too. When you are already struggling at home because of the way your children’s disabilities impact your home life taking on a huge school district seems impossible and the educational system counts on that. Yet, by not doing right by our children it puts a future drain on our economy because these kids get discouraged by their lack of understanding/comprehension/accomplishment and drop out of school. They then face a life-time of unemployment or underemployment and the use of social services that could have most likely been avoided had they had some measure of success in school. Prison and gang activity is also a direct measure of the failure of the educational system.

I wish I could say it has been easy but I can’t. In fact, fighting this battle against the local school district has contributed to our ‘almost divorce.’ But I do urge all parents out there to continue to fight for their children’s place in the educational system. I have to believe that eventually we will make a difference.

 

 

YOU ARE THE JUDGE, JURY AND EXECUTIONER

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 4 Comments

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This weekend I was on trial. YOU KNEW I have been having severe pain for weeks and was having it when the “incident” happened. You knew my cousin was visiting but you would not step in and control the boys when they were so out of control.  You did not step in to help but instead chose to sit in judgement me when I finally lost it. And I didn’t even yell. NOT ONCE. How dare you!

You say,” I don’t know if I can live with you because you yell too much”, so I quit.Now its, “I don’t know if I can live with you because you sound stern and mad and point your finger.” How would you like me to handle discipline in our home so our kids know that things are a serious matter? Smile sweetly and in a chirpy voice say, “Oh please, sweet boys stop what you are doing. I beg of you?” UGH.

I am NOT your mother. You are NOT my son. I am who I am. A person trying their best. Changing. Me Changing. Yet somehow it always seems as though I am the person in this relationship needing to be the one to change…what about you? Are you putting as much effort into those things I told you I would like to see you change? Let me answer that for you. NO you are not.

So let me in on a little secret. People get upset. Yeah I know you don’t like to because you want everyone to like you especially our kids. Our kids who know this is your weakness and exploit it. Our adult daughter who admits this and says it sucks for the adult but is grand for the child. Guess what, I have emotions that I show which make you uncomfortable because you don’t or won’t show yours because your mother punished you for it and you are afraid that will happen with me. No insist that it will/does so you use it as your excuse not to figure out who you are as an emotional being.  And yet you stand in judgement of me. And if I don’t do what you want, what you need, then you will leave. But surprise it might be me whose ass is hit by the door on the way out because I have to be who I am and frankly it ain’t so bad. Sure there are things that need refining. But at least I feel. At least I can say what it is I know as my truth, my faults, my goods and my bads.  I show those sides of me and no one has to spend their energy trying to guess what it is going on inside my head.

And surprise, here is one for you…often I can even understand why you feel the way you do. But just because I speak my truth in the way I do and you get flooded…that has nothing to do with me but with your relationship with your mother and I cannot deal with that because it is your issue that you do not want to have to look hard at.

And so I go to my therapist and we go to joint counseling but when are you going to go down deep and work on you? I’m trying to change for me, for us and for our family and to do so I am having to go to places I don’t want to examine but I do it because it needs to be done. When are you going to get brave and do that too? When are you going to really look at how your past is effecting our lives now and in the future?

 

Shhh…Don’t Say A Word

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 5 Comments

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This weekend we have hired a sitter and will be without our darling children for 24 hours…I can’t wait! But before we go away I will be telling B something that he needs to know to make our time together perfect.

“Shhhh…don’t say a word.”

Don’t say a word as we walk towards the bedroom. Don’t utter a sound as we pull back the sheets. Don’t whisper a word as we undress (unless you want to tell me how sexy I look). And PLEASE, JUST PLEASE, don’t say anything (nada, nothing) while we are making love.

I know a lot of women like to hear sex talk while they are indulging in adult time with their partner. I am not usually one of them. Okay, maybe sometimes I am, but definitely not tonight. Frankly, I don’t want to hear your fantasies while we are trying to create our own. Worse…I don’t want you intruding on the fantasy that is going on in my own head by imploding/imposing yours onto mine. Believe me they are two totally different shows. Mine is opera and yours is grunge heavy metal. Mine is A Walk In The Clouds while yours is James Bond. Tonight, I just don’t want to hear “it”…I want to hear “you.”

The only external thing I want to hear soft sax music in the background. Besides that, I just want to hear your heart beating as I lay my head on your chest and I want to listen to it quicken when I put my hand between your legs. I want to hear that sigh you make when we first connect with one another and I want to see your blue eyes sparkle at that instant we reach deep into the most intimate of places. I want to eavesdrop on your body’s reactions as we touch one another deeply and passionately. And I want to hear that rumble that starts in your soul and spreads through your body before we both explode.

I want to hear all of you tonight. So please.. “Shhh…don’t say a word!”

Renovation

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 1 Comment

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As the months have gone by I have come to realize that a “maybe divorce” is analogous to the dismantling of a house. Most “maybe divorces” appear to me to work in this way:

1.You take down the house slowly brick-by-brick until you reach the foundation and realize that no amount of structural engineering can save it. You then buy two very civilized but individual abodes one stuffed with everything from the marriage and the other devoid of all that it stood for.

2. You blow up the entire structure leaving a giant gaping smoldering hole in the ground with both parties going their separate ways clutching whatever they could find in the ruins. Little is wanted or salvageable.

3. Or you renovate over time; adding on a little here or taking way something there, until something new materializes that you recreated together.

Our “maybe divorce” appears to be going the renovation route which is in some ways not surprising. After all, we have built two houses and a winery during our time together. Our shared history includes a hand-dug out basement using just shovels, our bare hands and a wheelbarrow crafted just like smugglers tunneling underneath the US boarder.We are good at sawing, hammering, planting and building huge retaining walls to hold back all the dirt. We excel at seeing one thing and turning it into another. Our life together has been one big “honey-do” list. And then, just as a project came to fruition, we would always move for the sake of B’s career. All the time and effort down the drain but at the same time offering a chance to start over and reinvent our lives.

Today we live in a tract home. It’s identical to so many others on our street. Nothing outside gives an impression of who lives under the eaves. Being architecturally unique is no longer part of who we are and I miss that. Our renovation seems anti-climatic as we chip away at the old broken tile that covers the surface of our lives and pull up the carpet hoping against hope that there is an undiscovered wood floor residing beneath. And while we find some cool relics from the past as we dig around, the treasure we seek seems to be so well hidden that sometimes it seems as if we may never find it despite our best intentions.

Of course, all this renovation comes with a price. The foundation we once thought stable needs shoring up. We fight among ourselves over what we keep and what we let go. The professional “fixers”charge by the hour and cost overruns are the norm. Load bearing walls stay high while other less-necessary walls come down only to go up in some different form again. And the construction dust/debris covers every surface of our lives as we work within the confines of the boundaries of the house to create something that has a better flow. And so it goes.

Yet, recently it came to my attention that with all the care we are putting into our new creation we did forget one tiny but important detail.  We forgot to ask the real question…the most important one…is this the right house in the right location in first place?

I suspect only time and the heart will tell.

 

 

 

YELLING AT MY TOMBSTONE

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 3 Comments

As you know when I started this blog it was because my husband came to me and stated he might want a divorce. One of his main issues with me and my relationship with my family is that I was YELLING…a lot.

If the truth be told I had just gotten into a habit of relating to my family members that way. It was a bad habit and a habit that was destructive to everyone’s psyches in this family. So I vowed to change.

I am pleased to say that being mindful, meditating, doing personal self care and personal work on my own inner being has helped me tremendously. Since the end of July I have yelled just 5 times and out of those times  twice I caught and stopped myself after only a few words. It has not been easy. Yet, the rewards are huge. Not only do I feel better about myself and my life, I see a softness in my family that was not there before. Paul is less depressed….can I say that not yelling has helped him. Absolutely. There is a much calmer atmostphere here and the kids no longer feel like they are walking on eggshells around me.

I regret that I didn’t take this path a long time ago. The damage my yelling has caused (no, I never did the “you are stupid” calling names type of yelling but the “why do I have to tell you a 100 times to pick up your shoes” kind) is immense. And for that I am sorry. For I don’t want to have an epitaph that reads “SHE WAS THE WORLD’S GREATEST YELLER” written across my tombstone. What I want is “SHE WAS A HAPPY PERSON” engraved on it equipped with a built-in motion detector laser so when anyone walks by, the song DON’T WORRY, BE HAPPY automatically plays. And I think I am finally on my way to living up to those things I do want memorialized about myself when I pass on.

P.S. Yesterday I saw this on Facebook and thought it was just perfect. So the explanation says whenever my mother was asked for her special Christmas cookie recipe she would say “Over My Dead Body”

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Married Sex…Some Thoughts

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 7 Comments

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When I was single, sex was often a disappointment.  The number of sexual experiences which were wonderous, to the moon and back, totally mind-blowing, I got your back.. your neck… and your orgasm; were few and far between. Usually, I came into contact with men who fumbled. They were men with rough tongues, stabbing penises, callosed hands and hearts. And FYI forget the idea that French men are fantastic lovers based on my personal experience of several of them coming in my hand (pass the sanitizer please).  Give me married sex anytime.

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The great thing about married sex is if you are smart you have a chance to train your partner to be your own personal sex toy. “I little to the right, your tongue should feel like silk on a bed sheet and ahhhh that is the perfect spot.” And of course you receive that loving training back a thousand fold…yep, I’m selfish that way! Amen to that!

Married sex gives both partners a place to explore and feel safe. It allows you to speak in a language in which the partners are fluent with words known and shared only with each another. A private secret code in which pleasure substitutes for commas and semi-colons. And THE END is like the satisfaction you feel when you finally reach the last word in a fantastic book.

And while its true that married sex can sometimes get a little boring with some sexy talk, a few costumes and maybe a night or two away; most of the time you can both get your groove back on track if you just put the effort in.

So give me married sex anytime. At the very least it saves me a ton of money on hand sanitizer and it also keeps Mr. Potato Head happy. While at its best it allows me trust again and truly believe that we something that is worth its weight in gold and something I should keep fighting for. Either way…I win!

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Sit with the Frustration

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / Leave a comment
frus·tra·tion
frəˈstrāSH(ə)n/
noun
  1. the feeling of being upset or annoyed, especially because of inability to change or achieve something.

As I go back over the notes I have written during my therapy sessions one thing is abundantly clear. My therapist keeps reinterating that I need to sit with the frustration I am feeling and just be. Another thing that remains abundantly clear is I STILL struggle with this. I guess I am rather like a two year old… I want what I want, when I want it. And this means NOW.images-2

Coming from a family where life and death hung in the balance by only the newest that science could offer; that lack of control and unsettledness continues to effect me in ways that I am still unpacking and just beginning to understand. When you have life-threatening illness at your doorstep for years it doesn’t stop banging on the door just because the patient is doing better. In my case I was not the very ill child, my sister was. But in those days parents tried to protect their other children from “the truth” believing that they shouldn’t have those burdens put on them at such a young age. However, in my case, the lack of true understanding and knowledge lead to envisioning things in my mind that were probably worse than any real facts would have been. And basically since that time I have spent my life trying to mitigate surprises and always planning ahead. Frankly, this just doesn’t appear to be compatable with sitting in the silence, sitting with the unknown or sitting with frustration very well. I want purpose and I want action…NOW DAMN IT!

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Making this “sitting with frustration” even worse is that I am suppose to wait until B makes his own discoveries about himself and his own truths instead of spoon feeding my perception of the truth to him. His process is suppose to be his own process but like a famous Hollywood director I have the script already written and filmed in my mind about how the scene is suppose to go. And because feelings are on the periphary for him which makes any sort of immediate action of self-discovery difficult; I am afraid that this film is going to be WAY OVER BUDGET both emotionally and financially.

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And so I sit. Tired and frustrated. Tired of sitting. Tired of waiting. Tired of thinking about all this sitting when suddenly it occurs to me that B is probably just as tired of waiting for me to just sit. What a gift it could be it I could just be comfortable being in this limbo and in doing so freeing him up to make his own discoveries on his own timetable instead of feeling the silent pressure of my discomfort in sitting having to sit with my frustration. This realization sends a shiver of freedom down my stiff spine as I contemplate what it would be like to let others set their own timetables instead of trying to get them run on mine. And just like a passenger waiting for a delayed train getting annoyed at the situation isn’t going to change a thing and it certainly isn’t going to get the train there any faster. So today..a breakthrough… I finally “get” that I must tolerate this frustration without disappointment or anger because in the end I am not in control of it anyway.

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Trying To Find Our New Roles In Life

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / Leave a comment

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Throughout our lives we have roles we take on. Some have been forced upon us and some we take on willingly. Many of these roles we discard as time goes by, some we reinvent in a slightly different form, while some we seem to keep until the day we die. Somehow the latter seem to be the ones that we like the least and yet we retain them the longest.

This weekend was difficult for us. I think that when you are over 50 and going through a “maybe divorce” that one of the biggest issues is the discarding of roles and the discovery of new slots out of which you are now going to behave. After operating from one set of expectations for thirty years it is difficult to recognize and accept new patterns of doing things and unfamiliar ways of thinking. Years of acting one way are difficult to channel into something else and difficult for “the other” to accept.

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I know that in your 50’s it is suppose to be a time of gains. Money, richer relationships, second homes, etc. For me, it feels like a time of discarding stuff including those parts of myself I no longer need or wish to operate from. As I take out this “stuff” I am forced to really look at it and contemplate whether it is of value to me anymore. As a result, I am feeling lighter and freer than I ever have before. But that doesn’t mean it is easy especially for the other person involved. Honesty, in the form of being true to myself, has moved to the forefront of my life which at times hurts B. And while I dislike seeing B feeling uncomfortable and knowing that I have caused his discomfort; at this point in my life I am not sure that I care anymore as long as I know that the truth of who I am…who he is…will make things better in the long run. But what exactly is BETTER? What does that mean?

I guess I won’t know the definition of BETTER until we reach the end of whatever all this is. And I’m okay with that because either way whatever changes I have made I suspect will have led me to a more authentic me.

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And this relationship? It will either be or it won’t but in the end I will be all that I have envisioned and right now that is what feels important.