Fly in the ointment

So, things are going pretty well with the marriage counseling and the hubby and I are feeling pretty good about the progress we are making. I think we both see improvements in each other and our ability to listen and respect each other, and that’s been a huge improvement. We are definitely headed in the right direction.

Here’s the problem: my daughter is absolutely against the whole thing. She won’t even entertain the idea that we might work things out, she has said she won’t move back in to the house if that’s what I decide to do, and when I suggested she accompany us for some counseling, the next thing I know I got an angry phone call from her father about what I was supposedly “forcing” her to do against her will.

This kid has spent the last six months overinflating every negative encounter she has ever had with my husband and convinced herself he is Satan in human form, which he certainly is not. In fact, overall he has not been nearly as disciplinary with her as I have been. Now, everyone else in the family is willing to put the past behind us and work on the tools we need to move forward in a more positive way, except her. She absolutely will not let go of every tiny little injustice she feels she’s been dealt, from as far back as second grade (she is going on seventeen). And her dad is just fueling the fire. He uses terms like ‘outcast’ to describe her and it makes me absolutely nuts. She has never been treated like anything but a complete and total member of my family, often to her disliking.

So what am I supposed to do? If I let her move in with her dad full time, I can guarantee her diploma and any purposeful future will go right down the drain. But I have spent sixteen years trying to love this disrespectful, hateful little user, and when is it time for ME to get a break? I have tried, and tried, and tried… and her affection and respect for me only go as far as what she’s getting from me. The minute ‘NO’ comes in to the picture, I’m a rotten bad guy all over again. People, I am so exhausted.  She has worn my heart right out.

My husband feels hurt, and is hurting for me right now that she would turn away from me and her brothers simply to avoid the effort of making a new start with him. She can’t face the fact that she has been truly awful to him over the years, and our entire family has spent a great deal of time walking on eggshells as a result of her moods and tempers.

So what do I do? How can I move forward? I have told her I will never choose between her and my husband, but it seems she HAS made a choice… how do I deal with that?

GRRRRR!!

 

Grrr.

That’s my commentary on the day; Grr.

Grr for the snow that has returned to my finally melted world

Grr for the executive busting my chops over his own oversight

Grr for the cold and that groundhog’s stupid shadow

Grr.

Grr for the auditor who wrote up really stupid findings

Grr for the FDA visit that has to be just around the corner

Grr for my ever shrinking bank account

GRR.

Grr for the laundry

And Grr for the dishes

And Grr for the freezing conditions in my apartment

Grr for the projects I should have finished by now but haven’t

Grr for people who don’t listen

Grr for kids who won’t help out

GRRRRR for the traffic

Grr, Grr, Grr!!!

Self-Affirmation

Long nights of half-sleep

Anxiety over the nothing

Plodding through the tight stomach days

Living for the sunshine on my face

Slowly shrugging off the nonproductive habits

Learning to be okay with it all

Looking at life from a fair perspective

Taking stock of where I am and how I got myself here

Assessing what’s really important

Letting myself be human, even in my own eyes

Taking responsibility

Setting a better example for my children

Trying to put my life back together

Reminding myself what I can be capable of

Allowing myself to hope

Setting my sights on what I deserve

Communicating in positive ways

Developing better tools to relate

I will be okay.

I will be OKAY.

Not Normal… but at least Unchanged

So a few days ago the Doctor’s Assistant left me a voicemail, regarding the results of my recent brain MRI. He stated that ‘The results from my most recent MRI scans indicate my condition is unchanged’.

I love how they do that.

See, they can’t tell me the results are NORMAL. Ever since a neurosurgeon went in there and removed a golf-ball-sized mass from the center of my brain stem, my condition has not been ‘normal’. Ever since a month before that when the mass filled with blood and then ruptured, causing a hemmorhagic stroke, my condition has not been ‘normal’. They can’t use the word NORMAL when referring to my brain. I just get a kick out of it. They can’t do it. So they have to use the word UNCHANGED, to tell me that there is no cause for worry and that it still looks as good as it’s gonna get.

I’m glad things are unchanged; it’s pretty much what I expected. I figure I’ve gone this long without any recurrence, I’d be surprised to see problems of a neurological nature start popping up now. But hey, I guess you never know.

Some people are so obsessed with being normal. I think most people who know me could testify I am not one of them. I am hardly concerned with the latest fashion or the hottest accessories; give me some comfy jeans and pirate T-shirts and I’m good to go.  In most areas of my life, I’m fine with new things, new experiences.

This is one arena, however, in which I am happy to remain ‘unchanged’.

Bloggers, Riddle Me This…

Okay…  here is a strange question. If you were to change the word “GAS” to a plural word, how would you spell it?

I know… I said it was a weird question. I am reviewing a document for revision in which someone (who happens to be higher-ranking than me) has repeatedly put the word ‘gasses’ where I personally think ‘gases’ is more correct. Spell check accepts both of them, but in research I can find many headlines with the word ‘gases’ and not a single one with the double ‘s’ spelling.

So what would you do? Make a big deal out of correcting the whole document when it’s one outside eyes will rarely, if ever, want to see? Or just let it go, since as I said before, it IS a spelling that seems to be acceptable?

Hmmm.

Why does spelling make me itch like this? I cannot stand misspelled words. They stand out to me like a sore thumb, and once I see one I can’t see anything else. They make me crazy. My husband would write little notes to himself, and although he is a highly intelligent man, spelling just isn’t his thing. I would find these notes and be compulsed to error-correct them, I couldn’t help myself – it used to drive him nuts.

I, on the other hand, was that weird kid who thought Spelling Bee day was the biggest event of the school year. I took second place in 5^th grade… that was my big year. Woo hoo, buddy. Good times. I also took First Place in the school Reflections contest that year… I remember my teacher cried. She was frustrated that only two of her students submitted entries that year. I guess me winning first place kinda made up for it…

…but I digress. What do you think – Gases, or Gasses?