We made it through the first week of school. I'm pretty sure we're mostly intact. All the fingers and toes are still there...haven't checked brains yet.
C came home with homework again today. Even on Friday, they have homework. I'm finding this not only ridiculous, but intrusive. I also have to wonder, with all the homework he's expected to do, when and what is he actually being taught while at school? I mean, *are* they actually teaching him anything? Or are they just acting as glorified babysitters for 6 hours a day? I know I'm just frustrated, and I realize they do teach him, and they do a lot. It just seems...I guess I feel if they were effectively doing their jobs, then the kids wouldn't need so much homework. And I'm all for parental involvement, I am very actively involved in my children's lives, both academically and otherwise. But I send them to school for a reason, a reason that I am rapidly beginning to think no longer applies. The point of sending them to school was to provide them with a teacher who, I thought anyway, could provide them with a better education than I could. Considering the amount of time I spend helping with homework, I'm beginning to think we'd all be better off if I just homeschooled the boys. It would probably take less time, as well.
I'm also discovering that working from home is not as simple as you might think. It might just be because having been out of work for so long, I've come to think of myself as a stay at home mom and therefore feel it is my responsibility to keep up the house. But I find that when I'm working, I feel like I should be doing housework. But if I stop working to do housework, then I think about how I should be working so I can make money. I think it's just a matter of finding my balance, figuring everything out and planning my day. It is only week one, after all. I can't expect everything to run smoothly right from the start...just like everything else, I've got to find the rhythm.
My friend Carolyn's son got C's old teacher for 1st grade. It was the teacher that Lukas had in 2nd grade. She's been moved to 1st this year. Carolyn is so please with her. The teacher is an amazing teacher. She's wonderful with kids at any grade level, and great with the parents, too. What I find odd is that there is another teacher that got moved to 1st grade this year, and she's not such a wonderful teacher. She's actually had numerous complaints filed against her, complaints that as far as we can tell no one has ever actually taken seriously and done anything about.
This particular teacher was heard on a mother's voicemail calling that mother's child a bastard, an asshole, and being told to shut up and sit down and several other horrible things that should never be said to a child. For that incident, she was suspended with pay for 2 weeks while they "investigated" and then reinstated with nothing in her record about what she had done. And this was with proof on voicemail! I don't know the details of the other incidents, but I don't really think I need to. Based on that one alone, she should have been fired. This was when she taught 2nd grade.
Another parent at the school questioned why this teacher was still there, given the incident I mentioned. This parent was told that they moved this teacher to 1st grade, to see how she does there, and if she doesn't do well, she'll be fired. Ummm.....huh? We have a teacher who was recorded on voicemail calling an older child horrible names and saying other horrible things, and now we're going to experiment with younger, more emotionally fragile children to see what she does? Please explain to me how this makes sense. Why do we want to expose children who are even more easily hurt and influenced, who are even more likely to take what this woman says to heart and believe there's truth in it, to her? That just completely boggles my mind. When I look at things like this, it suddenly makes perfect sense why our children learn nothing and why we are so far behind other countries educationally speaking. How can we expect our children to learn when the people in charge are complete blithering idiots?
I'm glad that J didn't get that particular teacher, otherwise the school and I would be having some serious issues right now.
Both boys seem to like their teachers very much, a fact for which I am very grateful. C is not happy with the homework his teacher assigns, and honestly neither am I. But as I've told him, his teacher assigned it, so he must do it.
Today's math homework for him was about figuring out appropriate numbers for a description. For example, was the number of people living in a particular state in the millions? He had to answer yes or no. I had to laugh when I saw the following:
Q: Does your math book have millions of pages?
A (exactly as he wrote it): YES!!!
Can you tell the boy hates math? Not that I blame him. In fact, I'm right there with him.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Calgon, Take Me Away!
I love my children. I really do. No, I'm not trying to convince you. I'm reminding myself.
School sucks. Homework sucks. Hey...did I tell you that school and homework suck? They do, you know.
C is in 4th grade this year. Each year, homework has increased. The teachers claim it's 10 minutes per day per grade level. So, first grade is 10 minutes, 2nd is 20 and so on. So, 4th grade is 40 minutes. C takes...roughly 2 hours. I frequently find myself wondering if C is just that much of a whiner and procrastinator? Or if the problem is his ADHD? Or if the problem really lies with the teachers. I once, when he was in 1st grade, sat beside him as he did his homework and did it mentally myself. The 10 minutes that it supposedly should take him...is how long it took me, an adult who knows this stuff. I highly suspect that the teachers do the homework, and decide that how long it takes them is how long it should take the kids. They don't take into account that the kids are still learning this stuff and will therefore take longer. And then, with mine, you throw in ADHD and you end up with...2 hours a day spent on homework.
J gets done much quicker. Which leads me to believe that a large part of C's problem is whining and procrastinating. J is in 1st grade, but when he does his homework, he's done in about 10 minutes. C never was when he was in 1st grade; he usually took about a half hour. J has always seemed to have a much easier time academically than C, though. I'm not sure why. They are both incredibly smart, and eager to learn. I don't understand why it is that C won't just buckle down and get the work done. D tells me that I need to be firmer and make him get it done, but he's never here when we do homework, so he doesn't understand that I am firm. I am firm, I do make him get it done, the problem is that he doesn't do it in a timely fashion. And I can only do so much without making the situation worse.
I can't really put a time limit on him. First, it's hard to impose a time limit on something like this, because there's really no way to know how long is reasonable, considering he does sometimes struggle. Second, putting a time limit on him applies more pressure. And he doesn't do so well under pressure, which means if I put him on a time limit, he's going to feel more stressed, and therefore have more trouble concentrating, and thus take longer to finish.
I can only hope that as the school year wears on, as we get back into the routine, that things will get better. I can only hope that he will get tired of not having any time to play outside, or even inside for that matter, and decide on his own to apply himself and get the homework done.
On the plus side, it looks like D will have this otr job. It'll suck with him being gone so much, but we might actually have more time for each other. Plus, we'll finally be able to get the money together to get our own place.
I have a couple of friends who have volunteered themselves and/or their children to be my models to help me get my photography business going. And working as a Guide for ChaCha, though somewhat boring, does seem as though it might start paying off.
That's about all there is for now. Time for me to go figure out what the heck I'm going to make for dinner tonight.
School sucks. Homework sucks. Hey...did I tell you that school and homework suck? They do, you know.
C is in 4th grade this year. Each year, homework has increased. The teachers claim it's 10 minutes per day per grade level. So, first grade is 10 minutes, 2nd is 20 and so on. So, 4th grade is 40 minutes. C takes...roughly 2 hours. I frequently find myself wondering if C is just that much of a whiner and procrastinator? Or if the problem is his ADHD? Or if the problem really lies with the teachers. I once, when he was in 1st grade, sat beside him as he did his homework and did it mentally myself. The 10 minutes that it supposedly should take him...is how long it took me, an adult who knows this stuff. I highly suspect that the teachers do the homework, and decide that how long it takes them is how long it should take the kids. They don't take into account that the kids are still learning this stuff and will therefore take longer. And then, with mine, you throw in ADHD and you end up with...2 hours a day spent on homework.
J gets done much quicker. Which leads me to believe that a large part of C's problem is whining and procrastinating. J is in 1st grade, but when he does his homework, he's done in about 10 minutes. C never was when he was in 1st grade; he usually took about a half hour. J has always seemed to have a much easier time academically than C, though. I'm not sure why. They are both incredibly smart, and eager to learn. I don't understand why it is that C won't just buckle down and get the work done. D tells me that I need to be firmer and make him get it done, but he's never here when we do homework, so he doesn't understand that I am firm. I am firm, I do make him get it done, the problem is that he doesn't do it in a timely fashion. And I can only do so much without making the situation worse.
I can't really put a time limit on him. First, it's hard to impose a time limit on something like this, because there's really no way to know how long is reasonable, considering he does sometimes struggle. Second, putting a time limit on him applies more pressure. And he doesn't do so well under pressure, which means if I put him on a time limit, he's going to feel more stressed, and therefore have more trouble concentrating, and thus take longer to finish.
I can only hope that as the school year wears on, as we get back into the routine, that things will get better. I can only hope that he will get tired of not having any time to play outside, or even inside for that matter, and decide on his own to apply himself and get the homework done.
On the plus side, it looks like D will have this otr job. It'll suck with him being gone so much, but we might actually have more time for each other. Plus, we'll finally be able to get the money together to get our own place.
I have a couple of friends who have volunteered themselves and/or their children to be my models to help me get my photography business going. And working as a Guide for ChaCha, though somewhat boring, does seem as though it might start paying off.
That's about all there is for now. Time for me to go figure out what the heck I'm going to make for dinner tonight.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Some conclusions...
So, recently things have been...not good. D & I have been struggling, I've been trying to decide if I have anxiety or not, no job, a whole slew of things. But, some things are beginning to improve.
D & I are not yet perfect, by any means. But, things are better. We decided one thing we needed to do was to lay out our expectations of each other as clearly as possible. We both felt like we weren't getting what we needed from each other. Turned out, once we laid things out, we weren't as far apart as we were beginning to feel. That alone has done wonders to ease the tension between us.
On top of that, I realized that a lot of our problems were stemming from my insecurities and my issues. I have been insecure for years, because my ex cheated and lied and treated me so horribly. And although it's insecurity in thinking that I'm not good enough, attractive enough, whatever enough, it's also a matter of trust. I couldn't trust that D loved me enough, cared about me enough, was just a decent enough guy, to not treat me that way. I kept waiting for it to happen. I kept pushing him away, trying to protect myself from the, I thought, inevitable hurt.
I finally came to the realization that not only did I have to stop, but that D deserved better. He's a wonderful, loving, trustworthy guy and he deserves better than to have a girlfriend who thinks he's just biding his time until he can do something to screw her over. I looked at all the ways our lives our intertwined already, from car insurance to our movies mixed together in the entertainment center, and realized that if he didn't really want to be here, didn't really want to be with me, he wouldn't have let our relationship get this far. He wouldn't have invested so much time and energy into this if it wasn't important to him.
I've finally begun to get past my issues and insecurities. When they start to rear their ugly heads, I just remind myself of the things I've realized, of how much he loves me, how committed we both are to this, how much we've already combined our lives, and that reassures me.
Which is especially important, since it appears he may be about to go back on the road. He's got to submit a small amount of paperwork, and it looks like he will have a new over the road job. I'm happy in one way, and not so happy in another.With the job he currently has, the pay sucks, the hours suck, we never have time to even see each other much less talk. Most of our communication is by text right now, because it's the only way we can do it. If he's over the road, he'll be gone for 2 weeks at a time, but at least when he's home, we'll actually have time together, and we can actually find time to talk to each other. He'll be much less exhausted, which is definitely a priority. So, it's one of those things where in one way, it's good and in another it's not. We'll make the best of it. We love each other and we will be fine.
In terms of the job situation, things are improving slightly for me, as well...although how much improvement is yet to be seen. I am working as a Guide on ChaCha.com. I get paid per question that I answer. It doesn't amount to much, I only make maybe $2-3 an hour, but at least it's something coming in. And in addition, I have started my own photography business. I have absolutely no idea how that's going to go yet, but I gotta do something, and this seems as good an idea as anything else. It's a business with pretty much no start up costs, since D is letting me use his excellent camera. I only had to pay for business cards, which I only paid for shipping for, because I got them on vistaprint.com. I'm working on convincing my friends to be my guinea pigs...uh, I mean models. I've got to get them to sign to model releases, but my intention is to take their pictures and then use them to promote my business by showing what I'm capable of and hopefully drawing in paying customers. Yeah, I'm not charging my friends. I figure if they'll do it, they're doing me a favor, so doing it for free is the least I can do. I will charge them if they decide they want prints, but only half cost.
The kids are back in school now, so that will make everything easier...well, with some stuff. Having to deal with homework and such will make it harder, but whatever. It gives me more free hours during the day, but then I have more to do in the evening. But as it is every year, it's all a matter of getting back into the routine. Once we manage, then everything gets easier and better. It's only the second day...that means only 178 more to go. *sigh*
Well, I think that's about all that's going on for now. With the kids back in school, I should be able to blog more often, but we'll see.
To end this on a sweet note: both boys didn't want me to walk them in to their classes the first day. Yesterday morning, they both changed their minds. They let me walk them in on the first day. C walked about three feet to one side and two feet ahead of me the whole way, but hey...he let me walk him in !
D & I are not yet perfect, by any means. But, things are better. We decided one thing we needed to do was to lay out our expectations of each other as clearly as possible. We both felt like we weren't getting what we needed from each other. Turned out, once we laid things out, we weren't as far apart as we were beginning to feel. That alone has done wonders to ease the tension between us.
On top of that, I realized that a lot of our problems were stemming from my insecurities and my issues. I have been insecure for years, because my ex cheated and lied and treated me so horribly. And although it's insecurity in thinking that I'm not good enough, attractive enough, whatever enough, it's also a matter of trust. I couldn't trust that D loved me enough, cared about me enough, was just a decent enough guy, to not treat me that way. I kept waiting for it to happen. I kept pushing him away, trying to protect myself from the, I thought, inevitable hurt.
I finally came to the realization that not only did I have to stop, but that D deserved better. He's a wonderful, loving, trustworthy guy and he deserves better than to have a girlfriend who thinks he's just biding his time until he can do something to screw her over. I looked at all the ways our lives our intertwined already, from car insurance to our movies mixed together in the entertainment center, and realized that if he didn't really want to be here, didn't really want to be with me, he wouldn't have let our relationship get this far. He wouldn't have invested so much time and energy into this if it wasn't important to him.
I've finally begun to get past my issues and insecurities. When they start to rear their ugly heads, I just remind myself of the things I've realized, of how much he loves me, how committed we both are to this, how much we've already combined our lives, and that reassures me.
Which is especially important, since it appears he may be about to go back on the road. He's got to submit a small amount of paperwork, and it looks like he will have a new over the road job. I'm happy in one way, and not so happy in another.With the job he currently has, the pay sucks, the hours suck, we never have time to even see each other much less talk. Most of our communication is by text right now, because it's the only way we can do it. If he's over the road, he'll be gone for 2 weeks at a time, but at least when he's home, we'll actually have time together, and we can actually find time to talk to each other. He'll be much less exhausted, which is definitely a priority. So, it's one of those things where in one way, it's good and in another it's not. We'll make the best of it. We love each other and we will be fine.
In terms of the job situation, things are improving slightly for me, as well...although how much improvement is yet to be seen. I am working as a Guide on ChaCha.com. I get paid per question that I answer. It doesn't amount to much, I only make maybe $2-3 an hour, but at least it's something coming in. And in addition, I have started my own photography business. I have absolutely no idea how that's going to go yet, but I gotta do something, and this seems as good an idea as anything else. It's a business with pretty much no start up costs, since D is letting me use his excellent camera. I only had to pay for business cards, which I only paid for shipping for, because I got them on vistaprint.com. I'm working on convincing my friends to be my guinea pigs...uh, I mean models. I've got to get them to sign to model releases, but my intention is to take their pictures and then use them to promote my business by showing what I'm capable of and hopefully drawing in paying customers. Yeah, I'm not charging my friends. I figure if they'll do it, they're doing me a favor, so doing it for free is the least I can do. I will charge them if they decide they want prints, but only half cost.
The kids are back in school now, so that will make everything easier...well, with some stuff. Having to deal with homework and such will make it harder, but whatever. It gives me more free hours during the day, but then I have more to do in the evening. But as it is every year, it's all a matter of getting back into the routine. Once we manage, then everything gets easier and better. It's only the second day...that means only 178 more to go. *sigh*
Well, I think that's about all that's going on for now. With the kids back in school, I should be able to blog more often, but we'll see.
To end this on a sweet note: both boys didn't want me to walk them in to their classes the first day. Yesterday morning, they both changed their minds. They let me walk them in on the first day. C walked about three feet to one side and two feet ahead of me the whole way, but hey...he let me walk him in !
Friday, August 20, 2010
Everything stays the same...sort of
Not much has changed in the last couple of weeks. D & I are still struggling, although we are both fully committed to doing everything we can to fix this. And so far, we are doing much better. We've talked about some things we've been holding back on, and getting things out in the open, which has been a help. I am pretty sure that in the end, we're going to be ok, it's just a matter of getting through right now. Stress and exhaustion isn't helping either. We're both stressed to the max over money, he's exhausted from his hours at a job he can't stand, I'm getting ready to start putting in some seriously long hours at a work at home job. These stresses are the same ones that couples all over are dealing with right now, so we're nothing special in that regard. I think that those stresses are just kind of piling on top of minor things and making it all seem bigger than it really is to us right now.
I haven't seen a doctor yet about my anxiety issue. But I have been taking some herbal stuff that is helping...quite a bit actually. And I've been working really hard at making some changes to my thinking, which also seem to be helping a lot. I've also tried aromatherapy, which does help, but the other things seem to help more. I'm thinking that I might be able to control this without seeing a doctor.
The boys go back to school on Monday. We went to school today and met their teachers. They both seem to have really good teachers again this year. Their school, however, is not as impressive as it once was. It has dropped from being an A+ school when C started to being a C school this year. I find it telling that they dropped to a C school after the new principal started last year. I truly feel the principal is not up to the job, but I suppose since it's not up to me, I'll just have to deal. If nothing else, I have decided that I am not quite so determined to stay in this school zone anymore. I would love for my boys to go to the same schools all the way through, and stay with their friends the entire time, and all that, but at the same time, I don't want their education to suffer. And if they can go to another school that is rated better and has better teachers and a principal that actually knows what he/she is doing, that may be more important to me. I guess it'll all be decided when we find a place.
They are excited, and ready to go back to school. And so am I, to be honest. I love my boys, I love spending time with them, and I love summer so much, but I'm ready for them to go back. I need a little break, and plus I need some uninterrupted hours to put in at my new job.
So what is my new job? Well, I have begun working as a guide for ChaCha.com. You text in your questions to 242242 and it gets routed to me or one of my fellow guides and we search for the answer to your question. It's rather fun, quick, not too difficult, and a great way to expand your knowledge. I get to look up answers to so many different questions and learn a little bit about a lot of things. I'll never get rich doing it, but at least it's an income.
I'll be getting a laptop this week, so that I'm no longer tethered to a desk. This will enable me to work when the kids have a day off or a half day, if they are sick, on weekends, during the evenings, and not be confined to the room the computer is in, since I can move the laptop to whatever room (or even outdoors) that I might wish to work in. D is going to install Linux on it for me, so that it will match up with my desktop. Once he switched me to Linux, he made me a fan for life. I love Linux. It is truly awesome.
Ok, so that's about all for now.
I haven't seen a doctor yet about my anxiety issue. But I have been taking some herbal stuff that is helping...quite a bit actually. And I've been working really hard at making some changes to my thinking, which also seem to be helping a lot. I've also tried aromatherapy, which does help, but the other things seem to help more. I'm thinking that I might be able to control this without seeing a doctor.
The boys go back to school on Monday. We went to school today and met their teachers. They both seem to have really good teachers again this year. Their school, however, is not as impressive as it once was. It has dropped from being an A+ school when C started to being a C school this year. I find it telling that they dropped to a C school after the new principal started last year. I truly feel the principal is not up to the job, but I suppose since it's not up to me, I'll just have to deal. If nothing else, I have decided that I am not quite so determined to stay in this school zone anymore. I would love for my boys to go to the same schools all the way through, and stay with their friends the entire time, and all that, but at the same time, I don't want their education to suffer. And if they can go to another school that is rated better and has better teachers and a principal that actually knows what he/she is doing, that may be more important to me. I guess it'll all be decided when we find a place.
They are excited, and ready to go back to school. And so am I, to be honest. I love my boys, I love spending time with them, and I love summer so much, but I'm ready for them to go back. I need a little break, and plus I need some uninterrupted hours to put in at my new job.
So what is my new job? Well, I have begun working as a guide for ChaCha.com. You text in your questions to 242242 and it gets routed to me or one of my fellow guides and we search for the answer to your question. It's rather fun, quick, not too difficult, and a great way to expand your knowledge. I get to look up answers to so many different questions and learn a little bit about a lot of things. I'll never get rich doing it, but at least it's an income.
I'll be getting a laptop this week, so that I'm no longer tethered to a desk. This will enable me to work when the kids have a day off or a half day, if they are sick, on weekends, during the evenings, and not be confined to the room the computer is in, since I can move the laptop to whatever room (or even outdoors) that I might wish to work in. D is going to install Linux on it for me, so that it will match up with my desktop. Once he switched me to Linux, he made me a fan for life. I love Linux. It is truly awesome.
Ok, so that's about all for now.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Oh, where to begin?
So, the tone of my blog may be changing. Kind of already has, as I'm sure you've noticed.
D & I are still struggling quite a bit. We haven't given up. I know I won't give up...him I'm not so sure about. I don't think he will, but he doesn't talk to me the way he should, so it's hard to know really what he's thinking. And I suppose I'm guilty of the same thing...not talking to him the way I should.
We argued yesterday. He claims I'm clingy. I don't see it, but he swears to it. I can admit that I get insecure, and I explained to him why I get insecure. It's got nothing to do with him personally, but there are things about our situation that trigger it. He's moved out to another town, about 40 miles away temporarily, while we try to save money to get a place together. That essentially makes this a long distance relationship. And while he was over the road, ours was pretty much a long distance relationship. As I explained to him, every long distance relationship I've ever had, including my first marriage, I was cheated on. So, the physical distance triggers that. And I know he'd never cheat, so you'd think that would reassure me and ease my insecurities. But nope, that's not how my mind works. I instead jump to the next worst case scenario, which is that he'll end things. I can't give any valid reason WHY I would think that, but I do. And so I want reassurance from him, in the form of physical affection, or verbal assurances that we'll be together again soon, or he loves me, or he's not going anywhere, something like that. This, I can see, could come across as clinginess to him. Which makes him pull back. Which further triggers my insecurities, and keeps the cycle going.
One thing I did discover today, however. I am insecure, there's no doubt about that. But...I began thinking. There's no good reason for me to be insecure about D. He's never cheated, never lied. He's never done anything at all to give me reason to doubt him. He's stuck it out with me, through times at least as tough as any other relationship I've been in, and those never lasted through those tough times because the guy couldn't stick.
And then I thought some more. It's not just D that I do this with. I don't just jump to worst case scenario with him. I do it with everything. The kids, the car, finances, health, anything and everything. And I go beyond just thinking "what's the worst that could happen?". I go into "this is the worst that could happen, and oh, it will happen, and oh, what will I do when it happens..." and on and on.
So then I did a little research. And there is this disorder, I'm sure most of you have heard of it, Generalized Anxiety Disorder. And it fits. I even realized that although I denied ever having had a panic attack, it's likely I did: the night I broke my ankle. When the ER doctor came in and told me I'd have to have surgery to repair it, I flipped out, rattling on about how I couldn't leave my kids, and I couldn't be hospitalized, and on and on. And, ok, maybe it's possible that my reaction was justified, but when I think about it...it really wasn't. My parents would have watched the boys for me while I was in the hospital. My mother did while I was in surgery. She came down and took care of them that evening, and got us all to bed before she went home.
I panic over things all the time. People have told me before that I do that, and I've dismissed them. I've told them they were wrong, or denied worrying, or any number of other things. But I realize now...they're right. I worry about things that there's no point in worrying about, or at least no point in worrying about at the time that I'm doing it.
What really sucks is I have no insurance right now, so I can't even see a doctor to talk to him about this. I'm going to try some natural treatments, and see what happens.
So, be prepared to hear a lot about my attempts to deal with all of this: sorting out D & I's relationship, figuring out whether my anxiety is normal or not, and just generally trying to get my life together.
Something tells me it's going to be a long journey.
D & I are still struggling quite a bit. We haven't given up. I know I won't give up...him I'm not so sure about. I don't think he will, but he doesn't talk to me the way he should, so it's hard to know really what he's thinking. And I suppose I'm guilty of the same thing...not talking to him the way I should.
We argued yesterday. He claims I'm clingy. I don't see it, but he swears to it. I can admit that I get insecure, and I explained to him why I get insecure. It's got nothing to do with him personally, but there are things about our situation that trigger it. He's moved out to another town, about 40 miles away temporarily, while we try to save money to get a place together. That essentially makes this a long distance relationship. And while he was over the road, ours was pretty much a long distance relationship. As I explained to him, every long distance relationship I've ever had, including my first marriage, I was cheated on. So, the physical distance triggers that. And I know he'd never cheat, so you'd think that would reassure me and ease my insecurities. But nope, that's not how my mind works. I instead jump to the next worst case scenario, which is that he'll end things. I can't give any valid reason WHY I would think that, but I do. And so I want reassurance from him, in the form of physical affection, or verbal assurances that we'll be together again soon, or he loves me, or he's not going anywhere, something like that. This, I can see, could come across as clinginess to him. Which makes him pull back. Which further triggers my insecurities, and keeps the cycle going.
One thing I did discover today, however. I am insecure, there's no doubt about that. But...I began thinking. There's no good reason for me to be insecure about D. He's never cheated, never lied. He's never done anything at all to give me reason to doubt him. He's stuck it out with me, through times at least as tough as any other relationship I've been in, and those never lasted through those tough times because the guy couldn't stick.
And then I thought some more. It's not just D that I do this with. I don't just jump to worst case scenario with him. I do it with everything. The kids, the car, finances, health, anything and everything. And I go beyond just thinking "what's the worst that could happen?". I go into "this is the worst that could happen, and oh, it will happen, and oh, what will I do when it happens..." and on and on.
So then I did a little research. And there is this disorder, I'm sure most of you have heard of it, Generalized Anxiety Disorder. And it fits. I even realized that although I denied ever having had a panic attack, it's likely I did: the night I broke my ankle. When the ER doctor came in and told me I'd have to have surgery to repair it, I flipped out, rattling on about how I couldn't leave my kids, and I couldn't be hospitalized, and on and on. And, ok, maybe it's possible that my reaction was justified, but when I think about it...it really wasn't. My parents would have watched the boys for me while I was in the hospital. My mother did while I was in surgery. She came down and took care of them that evening, and got us all to bed before she went home.
I panic over things all the time. People have told me before that I do that, and I've dismissed them. I've told them they were wrong, or denied worrying, or any number of other things. But I realize now...they're right. I worry about things that there's no point in worrying about, or at least no point in worrying about at the time that I'm doing it.
What really sucks is I have no insurance right now, so I can't even see a doctor to talk to him about this. I'm going to try some natural treatments, and see what happens.
So, be prepared to hear a lot about my attempts to deal with all of this: sorting out D & I's relationship, figuring out whether my anxiety is normal or not, and just generally trying to get my life together.
Something tells me it's going to be a long journey.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)