Nourishing Pain

I have no idea what I'd like to say, but I crave the outpouring of language. I want to hear the click of the keys on my little netbook and I want even more to mentally crawl into the comfort of words.

         Words make sense to me.
Words are wondrously delicious when they walk the wooden plank and dive into the pools of your deep retinas.

Three weeks ago, my guy and I broke up. I made a conscious decision to not run from the pain of yet another loss, yet another chance to learn from another human being I was blessed to know more than superficially. The risk we take, of course, when knowing someone deeply, is that the wounds they may leave are also just as deep. Therefore, many thoughts in these past three weeks have brought tears down my cheeks, even more left to pool up behind the retaining walls of my irises, colored blue by my father and likely his parents before him, and theirs prior to that.

In the past, hot gashes to my already hurt heart would have demanded an escape, would have screamed for Novocaine in the form of cutting, overeating, or getting fucked up all day every day until the immediate danger of feeling that awful was safely hidden under scar tissue, hopefully never to resurface.

              Do you have any scars on your flesh?

      Are you aware of the loss of elasticity contained within the damaged tissue?

                    Do you know that scars still hurt a bit, even after the skin has healed, when the healthy skin surrounding the scar pulls and tugs at the resistant entity which is forever stuck within trauma?

Because it does. It will always hurt just a little, I imagine.

I saw this tree yesterday when I went out to run off my lazy sleepiness. That tree had obviously been cut across its trunk at some past point, for the tree, much like me, still carries a scar for the world to see.

             It looks a bit like my arm, right?

When I saw this tree, I felt a particular kinship with it, and a fondness for what it showed me. I found that tree to be distinctly beautiful and interesting. On my good days, I also feel beautiful and interesting.

As beautiful and interesting and unique as our scars make us, I would like to see what it feels like to actually heal fully from this most recent pain; see if I can do it without yet another scar. The night we broke up, I sat on the bathroom floor, crying into the roar of the industrial-strength fan that was whirring on the sultry July night and a new thought occurred to me. I became very curious about the pain I was feeling and I realized that I was, I AM, at a point in my life where I am stronger than I've ever been. I've been through countless heartaches and traumas that make other people cringe when hearing about them. I've been living in an After School Special for at least the past decade. I wondered what it would feel like, what it would BE like, to simply allow the pain to do what it does and not do anything active to escape it. I know for a fact that I'm not fast enough to outrun it, nor wily enough to dodge it, but one thing I had not yet done with my suffering is simply accept it. See what it wants. See what it feels like to just sit with it.

                What would it be like to do nothing whilst my soul cried?

So I sat. I cried but when the tears began to fade, I didn't purposely think of something sad in order to bring on more pain and tears. I decided not to run to the kitchen for alcohol or comfort food or razor blades, though all of those things were fighting to be heard and acted upon. I decided not to even write about this experience for awhile. I wanted just to sit with it.

I sat and I listened. I heard my heart cry and she sang like the most beautiful stringed instrument I've never heard. She sang to my ears only, stretching my heartstrings tightly and cascading down agonizing lullabies and promises that could never have been kept in the first place. She wailed behind my eyes and she railed about misunderstandings and the unfairness of it all. When I still didn't run from her or even protest, she sobbed like a little child and I wanted only to hold her in my arms forever. She was sad and beautiful. She still is.

It still hurts to think of him, but it isn't a constant pain. Honestly, I'm grateful that it still hurts me, that it hurt me at all, for if it didn't it would mean I never really cared for him. That isn't the case. I loved him very much, and a part of my soul will always love him, even though he isn't the man I will spend the rest of my life with. We are inherently different at our cores, and our differences do not lend themselves to lifelong compatibility in that type of a relationship. As we do love one another, it actually makes more sense to let the relationship we had go because we really weren't happy living together. I've never been through a break-up like this, where I'm sad but not destroyed, where I'm missing him but happy at the thought of the growth we're hopefully both undertaking because of knowing one another.

It's beautiful - Love. It reminds me of autumn leaves, gorgeous even as they're dying and then falling to the ground to become nourishment for the next cycle of growth. I like to ponder that image quite a bit.

---------------------------------------

So here's to you, Good Sir, and the painfully beautiful nourishment you've given my soul. I look forward to watching how she grows in this next cycle of my life.

Love,
~Q~

Balance, moderation....I'll get it one of these days

Alright, alright, alright.

So last night, I had the fantastic idea that I needed to stay off of the internet for awhile, as I feared that I was quite addicted and should thus rein that in ASAP. I was initially thinking that perhaps two days away would suffice my need to e-detox, but through discussing this plan with one of my very best friends, it was strongly suggested that nothing less than one full week would get this particular toxicity out of my system. I asked such questions as: "what about my divorce? can I work on my divorce?" (The paperwork is all generated online) and objected with "but what if something really important is emailed to me?".

Since I've procrastinated on the divorce paperwork for..........a long time now, really - would one more week make that big of a difference? Well......no............but.........

And are there any important emails that you are expecting in the next week, that you can't wait a week to respond to? Well.............I emailed the cello guy about lessons, and I want to hear back from him as soon as he replies, but.............not really life-threatening, I suppose.............I have no job applications out or anything.....................

*sigh* It was the sense of that icky-panicky feeling in my gut that I used to get when coming to the end of a bag of the green stuff, or when I had no more pop and no money to get more, or when anything I really passionately (if not desperately) desired was so obviously NOT happening in a timely enough fashion for me --- I got THAT feeling at the thought of being cut off from the world at large via the internet and so I figured that meant I was obviously addicted and needed to cut myself off cold turkey.

Of course, I went and immediately took all the necessary steps to bully myself into STAYING offline the full week. I told everyone on facebook what my plans were, I emailed a few people to let them know of my plans, and I even set up a "vacation response" to let anyone who emailed me know that I would be offline until next Tuesday, January 12th. I logged off last night around 12:30, just pleased as a pony in an apple orchard with myself for being so "healthy" and making this difficult decision.

Oh. My. God.

And then I woke up today, but refused to actually fully open my eyes and sit up until Mom came home for lunch at noon. Got the morning down - good job, Q.

I had lunch with Mom, read the Free Press, cheered out loud when I read that the bill that was passed last year requiring mental health parity from health insurance companies (meaning, mental health and addiction treatments are now covered in the same manner as physical disorders --- a HUGE step) is now in effect here in Minnesota, and talked to my beautiful dog Tyra.

By 1:00, I was down here in my cavern, writing in a journal (too unsure of my self-control to even turn on my computer so I could type), and by 1:30? I was in tears and having just the WORST time of things. All the old coping scenarios ran through my mind, none of which are actually helpful for longer than maybe 20 minutes. I wanted to talk to my best friend Ro, but with the geographic distance between us, I can't afford to phone her but once a year (on her birthday -- not until August). What I normally do when I need her input is to write to her - long, descriptive narratives that are the closest I can get to calling her up or heading over to her house for a hug and a vent session. I then also realized that even though basically everyone else in my life could simply pick up the phone and call me if they wanted to reach me, she couldn't. She calls ME once a year, on average, as well, and my birthday isn't until July. What if she needs to hear from me in the next week? Or am I simply being that self-important to think she'd perish or suffer without me to correspond with for 7 entire days?

I then started in with the "holy crap - you can't even go 24 hours without the internet? That's so pathetic, Q. Get a grip. Get a(nother) new hobby. Read one of the 15 books you have delved into that are littering this room, page corner bent down, book mark holding your spot, or book simply lying flat open, so you don't lose your place. Get on the treadmill." That last one exhausted me with just the formation of those words in my mind.

"I caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan't" my other internal voice whined. Me, myself & Q all know that what that really means is "I don't WANT to and you can't MAKE me - so piss off."

The silliest part of this whole predicament is that I did this entirely to myself. It was my idea. Once I had the situation set up so that I would feel obligated into following through - I freaked out. I KNOW this about myself and I STILL do it! I have joined probably 3 or 4 different health clubs in my life, thinking to myself -- "well, if I'm paying a monthly fee, I will certainly make myself go so I don't feel guilty for wasting the money".

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!!!!

Oh if only that worked. That tactic has the exact OPPOSITE effect on me. Once I feel the pressure to go to the gym, I refuse. I shut down and won't even discuss it with myself any further. I WILL NOT be forced into working out, just because of the money. I even pull out the economic concept of a "sunk cost" -- you know, where the money is already gone, either way, so why add additional pain and suffering of doing something I don't want to do? That just increases the total cost, overall.

Guilt is really an extremely ineffective motivational tactic. So is obligation or pressure -- from society, from family, from your peers, or from yourself. It's like forcing an addict into treatment. Even if that addict jumps through the required hoops and stays sober for the duration, graduating with flying colors at the end of his/her stay ---- if it isn't something personally desired, none of that will stick or be assimilated within. It's pointless.

Anyway - I discussed this predicament with my mom and then later on, with my dad as well, and they both said the same thing: "Who is running your life, anyway?"

Ummmm.....me?

"Isn't this another example of your black and white approach to life?"

Oh......

So through these discussions, I realized that I was not accomplishing the intended goal by staying offline for a full week. It isn't the internet that is such an issue for me. There are completely beneficial uses for the internet. Staying logged on to crackbook 24/7, even though I always have 3-4 other tabs open? Yeah - that's a bit much. A lot much, actually. I also realized that going cold turkey - banishing all internet from my life for 7 full days -- that's not really in line with the whole "balance" or "moderation" concept I'm working on. As Mom said, "that's like putting yourself on a diet and allowing ZERO cookies the entire time. Of course we all know what happens -- you deprive yourself, you crave it more, and then you either scrap the diet with a box of cookies, or once the diet is over, you then eat the box of cookies." It's really self-defeating.

As it turns out -- I DID have an email waiting for me from the cello teacher - one I'm happy to have received today instead of next Tuesday (as he asked about setting up an introductory lesson next Tuesday evening) AND I also got an important email from RoRo -- one I'm glad I received today instead of next week.

The new and modified plan, therefore, is to attempt to set boundaries for myself with the crackbooking. I will do what I need to do and want to do while online, but I will not keep myself logged in "just because". Let's see how this whole "moderation" concept plays out.........Never a dull moment!

Love you all~

~Q~

4 years later & I still Love

I'm having a bit of a dilemma right now, and I feel the need to write, even if I don't end up even publishing this post. In fact, if my knuckles on my right hand weren't bruised from smashing them with my fire swings last night, making it painful to physically hold a pen and write, I would probably simply go to one of my many, many journals to find my best friend in the world. Well, the best friend I have constant access to, anyway (being myself and all).

What is it about vocal harmonies - any harmony really - that rips my heart half out of my chest and stretches my being out to infinity? Seriously - because it would definitely be a LOT easier to focus and write, maybe even work on the memoir that I've been neglecting lately, if I could just hit the "stop" button. Just when I think I can do that though......*sigh*.............it inevitably changes key or another song I must listen to is on next. Or maybe not even that much - maybe I just have to hit the "back" key just one more time, I swear. Uh huh. That's what you said an hour ago, Q.....

So what's the big dilemma, lady? Oh - it really doesn't go any deeper than that tonight for me, I don't think. Writing now vs. music now. Although, now that I'm thinking and typing.............. I continue to wait patiently for the fear to set in, to rob the present happiness I'm wallowing in, as it always has in the past. I used to be extremely uncomfortable whenever I would even catch a glimpse of life not sucking-ass for me. Lately though - I don't know what happened to me, and I want to figure it out, if only so I could tell other people in the hopes that it could be repeated for someone else. I am just so............content. It's weird, but in that very great way. The fear just isn't there.

I was rummaging through old writings from several years ago, and I came across this description of one night in my old apartment in South Minneapolis, in 2005. This was almost exactly four years ago for me now - November 18, 2005, to be exact. Wow - four years to the day. I didn't even plan that. Huh. I wasn't attempting to write in any sort of form at all - I was just in agony - I remember this night. My arms were on fire that night and I didn't call anyone - maybe because there was nobody I felt comfortable calling, maybe because it was super late at night, or maybe because I was being stubborn - that I don't remember anymore. I was sitting in my brown chair in the corner of my apartment with one of my notebooks, just........god that was a shitty time in my life. Anyways - please don't snicker at me, even under your breath or to yourself, because - well. Just please don't. Here's what I wrote exactly four years ago tonight:

So deliberate it can't be called an accident
So painful it couldn't be deliberate
but it was.
153 red lines marking a semi-decent night
that ended
Right
where the day began.
Alone.


I hear the hiss of the steam radiator
and the persistent tic of a kitchen clock otherwise known as a leaky faucet
into week-old dirty bowls and plates.
I see sixteen inches of paperwork to be filed,
an empty bottle of Premium beer,
and the bloody razor blades from last night's escapade.
I feel the warmth of sterile cotton sleeves,
taped on either end to hide
the violent map of repressed emotion sliced up both arms.
I smell a year's worth of animal life
that the occasional cleaning can't mask
and faint lingerings of opium incense and smoked resin.
I taste organic cheese ravioli,
my last Diet Mt. Dew,
and unbrushed teeth.
I am with pets in a human's world
inexplicably sad and existentially tired.


Hm. Maybe that doesn't make you want to cry when you read it, but that was a pretty accurate description of way too many nights for me at that point in my life. I don't ache to cry anymore when I read something like this, but I do want to somehow get to her, the girl who wrote these things that night, and assure her that it IS going to eventually be worth all the pain. Eventually, my love, you will no longer question your existence, curse your parents for bringing you into this eff'd up world, swear that having children is pure evil knowing how reality is, and you will smile - for real. Unfortunately, she still has to wade through several more years of hell and it's only going to get uglier before the nightmare ends. But it is worth it - I promise.

This is exactly why I want to write and talk with others and do everything in my sphere of influence to help. I owe it to her. I promised a long time ago that I wouldn't off myself if it would just stop hurting SO bad - just sometime, please. I didn't even demand immediacy or, shit - I didn't even specify "soon". Just - it can't be like this forever. Please take it away someday. Even when I compiled a document outlining my desired funeral plans, down to what I wanted to wear, what food I wanted to be there, and who got my beloved pets and music (Emily got the CDs - I think the pets went to my parents) and what music (including the all important lyrics) I wanted played during the service - even at that point, which was admittedly pretty low - that can't all be for no reason. I can't believe that - I need to believe that good, beauty and love can grow from where I've been and what I've survived, and what others have survived as well.

I do believe it. I'm living proof that healing is possible and that life is what you make of it. I've been asked by several people "what happened to you? what made you change so drastically? How did you get the strength to leave?" I think that trying to define this in one answer is a ridiculous undertaking, but not being one to shy away from the ridiculous - I'm going to go with this: I gave up control. I stopped believing that I could man-handle my life into fitting into how I thought I needed it to go. Giving up seems to insinuate something sad, negative or depressing, but I've found it to be just the opposite. I stopped lying to myself - I stopped pretending that reality was something that it wasn't - and I stopped pretending I knew how the rest of my life would unfold. I still don't know, and I don't really even want to know. I have a few vague ideas of what I'd like to work towards, but I prefer the future to more or less take care of itself, to keep myself surrounded in possibilities for the time being. I'm not saying that I won't make any decisions anytime soon. Hell - I decided to start selling lefse just 3 days ago, and now an entirely new avenue is opening up in front of me that I have never even considered, and I'm running with it.

Anyway - if any of you are in that shit place right now - oh honey child.....I've been somewhere in that neighborhood before, and I promise, I promise, I promise - this too shall pass and it WILL be worth all that you're going through right now. Oh - and you CAN write an entire post with great music playing at the same time. ;) I just did.

Much love,

~Q~

You're right Michael Stipe - Everybody DOES hurt, sometimes...

I moved out of mine and my husband's house on Thursday, August 20, 2009. Two days later, various members of my family and I returned to the house for my things and my two cats, Trinity and Maya. I was still so angry with Jason that I was able to go through with all the packing and leaving, but it did hurt to see the pain in his eyes and to see him cry, knowing that he still believed I had the power to heal those wounds.

Since I've been back in Mom and Dad's house, I've been getting stronger and stronger. After several days, I was able to put my contacts back in, as the days of sobbing slowed considerably. After about a week, I took my wedding ring off. I started reconnecting with good friends of mine, friends I had been keeping out of my life either at Jason's request, or because I was afraid that they would find out the reality of my current situation.

The reality of my life was nothing near the romantic scene I had scripted for everyone. Some people knew of the drug abuse, both Jason's and my own, but we consistently lied to the world about the actual frequency of our use. Even when I did not use with my husband, I more often than not knew he was going to get high, and covered his tracks for him. A few people questioned the abusive nature of our relationship - the emotional, mental and physical abuse that had been escalating over our three years together - but we both did our best to paint a smile on our love. I feared the end of our relationship probably as much as he feared 2012, the end of an era. Having survived all too many failed romances, including two engagements that never made it to the altar, I was terrified that the end of this marriage would most certainly launch me into "spinster" mode for the rest of my living days. I believed him when he told me that "nobody would ever love me" and that I "didn't have the strength to leave him".

I don't believe either of those things anymore.

When I was in high school, I fell madly in love with a boy who, for the first time in my life, fell madly in love with me in return. I was 14 and he was 16. We dated for about 5 1/2 years or so, the last year and a half being an excruciating experience for both of us. Well, I'm pretty sure it was for him - you'd have to ask him. It certainly was for me. It was when I moved away from Mankato to go to college in Missouri that our relationship started falling apart. He once quoted the band Fifteen at me, saying "you seem to need a man, to retain an identity". Of course it pissed me off, but over 10 years later, that still sticks with me. Was he right? Am I the only woman in the world that has this problem? I doubt that I'm alone here. Why do we, as women, feel incomplete when we're single? Why this lifelong quest for finding THE ONE? For that matter, is this strictly a female issue?

Without diluting the strong emotions I've felt for the loves in my past, I do have to wonder: do I even know what real love is? I've heard that you cannot truly love someone else until you love yourself, and this has been a serious roadblock for me, until very recently. I didn't believe it, I didn't want to believe it, and I even tried convincing other people that I did, actually, love myself. There was no fooling Q, however, even if I did manage to fool a few others. The scars on my arms, the x's over my heart, the lines on my stomach - these remain as visible proof that I did not, in actuality, love myself. As disturbing as the volume of old cuts on my body may be to some, they don't even come close to the emotional wounds I've dealt with. Those inner wounds are so much trickier.

As I've been back in Mankato, I've learned that I am far from unique in my pain. This is a fact that I grasped years ago intellectually, but was only able to truly "get" within the past few months. When I tell people of my broken wrist, when I show people my scars from cutting, when I open up about the hurtful words that were pelted at me, and the equally horrible things I've said and done in retaliation - people understand all too well what I'm going through. I have met more women who have been in abusive relationships than I knew existed. I have related to more cutters and other people with Borderline Personality Disorder - outside of a hospital setting - than I thought possible. I've been more in tune to those in grief, to those going through the death of their own relationship, and to the mass quantities of suffering in this world. And for perhaps the first time in my life, I feel humble in my suffering, and grateful for the love and support I do have in my life. You cannot measure pain - one person's suffering is no better or worse than their neighbor's.

So far - and it's only been a few months now - I've learned several key lessons.
1 - Everything in this world is on a continuum. Nothing is black or white.
2 - Humanity is ultimately good. Negativity seems to come from suffering, from an attempt to avoid the inevitable pain that comes with being alive. People will generally help you if you let them.
3 - There is a reason for everything in this universe. You are exactly where you need to be at all times.
4 - I do love myself. I am worthy of love and I do not need anyone else to complete me. I have always been complete - I just didn't realize it.

So, with that said, I hope you decide to come back once in awhile to see how this journey unfolds. Feedback is always appreciated as well, although it certainly isn't required. :)

much love,

~Q~