“If you want something that you’ve never had, you must do something that you’ve never done.”

I’ve had this quote in my head for weeks, maybe even for months now. I have been trying to use it as a personal mantra of sorts as I deal with the anxieties that going to college have stirred up in me. I don’t know who to attribute it to and I’m certain that isn’t the point.  I’ve spent my entire life believing that if I just worked harder I, and therefore we, would make it. I still think that there is a truth there, but what I am trying to change is what I am working harder at. I’ve had moments this summer,sitting in my math class staring at an algebraic formula on the board in front of me, when I’ve thought, “I was a really good baker. I should just go back to that.” I have to remind myself that my back isn’t going to make it another 30+ years in the food service industry. I have to remind myself that after my last job as a baker I ended up in a nuthouse. My mom hates it when I refer to that time of my life in such a way. Somehow psychiatric hospital is okay with her, but nuthouse, or looney bin is not. I tried to explain to her that I needed to look back on my past with a sense of humor.

The last time that I was called up to the board to solve a problem in front of a class it was chalk I held in my hand. I could sit here and blame my brilliant mathematician father for creating a math phobia in me so deep that certain words my teacher uses trigger panic attacks, or, even better, the feeling that I am going to shit myself. That’s how much math scares me! It’s tied into my goddamn bowels, not that I’ve shit myself yet, but my stomach gets sick. Blaming my dad, or wearing the victim t-shirt, as I’ve come to think of it, hasn’t gotten me very far in life at all.

Defining courage is relative, but for me this summer it has been continuing to go to class everyday. It has been studying when I feel like crying, or napping, doing my homework even when I think I am writing down the wrong answers, and resisting the urge to run out of the classroom in the middle of a test.

If financial aid and possibly a student loan pan out I hope to be able to attend full time in the fall. I have ideas as far as what program I wish to get a certificate in, mostly careers in the medical field that have a high demand, decent pay and benefits, and a reduced potential for continuing to exacerbate my back problems, if that’s at all possible. A lot of these programs are already full of students who got their asses in gear earlier in the year than I did. I’m just going to continue to enroll in classes that will be applicable as prerequisites no matter which path I choose. In that new agey way of speaking I loathe, I believe that if I just keep trying I will find my way. Also, just to brag slightly because I want to, my math teacher told me that I was at a B+ the last time that I checked in with him, and since then I’ve handed in one homework assignment that I got 100% on, and taken an exam that I got an A on, so that puts me at, hell I don’t know, now. I’m doing fine is my point.

Well, Thursday was right in her comment on my last post. I didn’t listen to her though. No, when the former friend himself expressed a desire to communicate I did it. I think that it was helpful to me in certain ways. For example, I was able to say some things that had sat boiling inside of me.  Probably more important to my recovery was the fact that when I got angry I said so. Vehemently said so. I think that the therapist in the hospital who pointed out to me that I wasn’t going to be able to heal until I let myself get angry was spot on. I can’t control the responses of others but I can own my own.

Belle, please know that you do have a voice and a way of communicating that is no less than the voice of others. I hear you and I appreciate you.

The most importnat revelation came as a total surprise. If I have a moment with another person that I feel deeply is significant ; it doesn’t matter if the moment is significant for them. In fact, it doesn’t even matter to me if they remember the moment. I can still have it as my own, and it’s no less precious.

In other news, Nathan turned 18. He has decided to go up to Canada to stay for awhile or maybe to live with a family member. I can give him my opinions and advice, but I can no longer control his decisions. So once again the topic of letting go is first thing on my mind. I can say good luck, and goodbye, and even tell him that he’ll have a home to return to if he changes his mind. But I have to let him go.

The part of this month that has surprised me is the fact that none of the pain brought me straight to my knees. I have cried; I have gotten pissed off, but I haven’t gotten into bed and stayed there. I am carrying on. I have continued to go to my doctor’s appointments. I’ve had a couple more steroid injections for my back and hip pain and they seem to be helping. I am starting yet another series of physical therapy. I am trying differnt medications for pain, depression, insomnia, and anxiety. My mouth feels like a desert from one of the new meds, so I have been chewing gum and sucking on hard candies and sipping water.  The doctor said that the dry mouth often goes away after awhile so I hope for that to happen.

I am in the process of waving goodbye while still letting it be okay for me to carry the memories of my own significant moments with me. I’ve never been good at closure or letting go, or whatever you want to call it. I just know that I have to figure out a way that works for me because the weight of it all is just too much to carry forward.

Does anyone know where Bonnie is? I just wanted to see if she’s doing alright and I’ve had no responses to the emails I’ve sent her.

I’m going to call this a rough draft because it originally came to me as a song when I was in the shower. I’ve been fucking around with the tune, and the verse chorus verse, and I don’t have a guitar or a piano here, and I got frustrated, to say the least! Still angry, except now with more tears!!!

The book we wrote together was six years long. He wrote the ending without me, years in advance. So not fair. I wish he’d warned me before I got so deep. I’m alive. He fed me his words. I fed him mine. I was never full, always hungry for more, counting down the moments until the words started again. I was butterfly flutters and all aglow. He was all smiles with eyes that spoke a language I never interpreted.

I knew what I wanted, was longing to just settle down together in the comfort of cloud like pillows of trust. His mind was set to wandering and he was longing to head east, where he could get to feeling alive. I just fed him more, hoping he’d know that
everything he was itching for was right here in me. He grew thinner no matter what I did.

When he lifted up his little empty cup for me to fill; I held up my empty bucket. It must have been overwhelming. I wasn’t being greedy, just being the me I was then. I thought I was doing most of the giving, didn’t realize how much I asked of him until tonight. I didn’t think that I wanted more than I needed.

He told me to run along, go play now; he had other writing to work on. I went off and waited without him. I am not a patient woman. I grew restless trying to crack the code of his messages. He smiled, even chuckled a bit, at my frustration.

Spanning time together, we went from our nine hour phone calls to rides home from work, sitting in our seats, silent. Rage came along for the ride. I slammed his car door hard. He took off, no longer waiting, watching to make sure I made it into my house safely. I saw him throw the five dollars that I had left on the dash for gas out the window.

Once he was ‘round the corner I searched for it by streetlight, finally finding it amongst a pile of wet leaves. He asked me later if I’d gone after it and I lied. He was so far under my skin he could tell the truth. I tugged at my hair nervously and waited for him to turn everything back around.

I don’t know how we got going in that direction, but once we did there was no turning back. I trusted him; he was the one who knew how to drive.

I was wrong when I told him no one was keeping score, but I meant it when I said that I didn’t want to play his game, but that I wanted to win.

Six more years have passed since our book read THE END.
I looked him up online, thought I was ready to just check in, say hey.
I found someone who knows him now and she emailed me and said,
“Hi! He has mentioned your name before. He is doing great! He seems happy and healthy!
What message do you want me to give him?”

I realized that I’d made a big mistake.
I hoped he hadn’t let her read our book, wondered if they’d written one together.
Now I wanted to see him one last time, study his face, and ask him why he went away.
I wanted to know what I had meant to him, back then, and why he spent so much time on me.

I typed out message after message, contemplating and then deleting. I’d thought there were so many things I wanted to say.
All the words are used up now, we had spent them frivolously.
In the end I wrote, “If you see him, say hello”, the nod ‘n’ wink to Dylan’s “Blood On The Tracks” was for me, not her.

I hope he got to the place he needed to get to; a place of health and happiness that I couldn’t give him. He is not lonesome without me.
Now I know that he is alive. I can find just about anyone on the internet, but I can’t find myself. I asked my doctor about ECT treatment for this depression, hoping to have the memory of him zapped out of my brain. He’s doing great; he is happy, and healthy, without me.

1993: I sat across from my psychiatrist. She never wore the same shoes twice. She asked me a lot of questions about my childhood. She asked me if I’d ever thought of harming my son in any way. I was horrified by the thought of hurting my baby boy. It had never occurred to me. She looked me straight in the eye and said, “Tammy, what you need to realize is that your life will never be as bad as it was when you were a child.” I nodded, but I didn’t believe her. She was my psychiatrist for years. She was the only one I ever told about the times my dad tried to kill us.

1985: He was trying to kill my mom and us kids. My mom took us and fled. My brother refused to leave. We hid in a trailer. Dad killed himself in the basement of our house. When we drove up the driveway to the house that morning I already knew. I’d tossed and turned all night having dreams where I was choking to death. The threat to my life was over, but I kept seeing him around town. There he was walking down the sidewalks, there’s his face on a bus going by, oh shit and he’s that man in the store. He was everywhere. I started to feel him behind me when I was loading clothes into the washing machine. I would close my eyes and run. My mom came home from work and scolded me for leaving the lid up and the washer half full of clothes. The water was cold by then. I told her that I had to run from the basement and that I was sorry. She hugged me. She bought a new house. I wanted to ask the other five who had survived with me if they saw him but I didn’t.

2009 Mother’s Day: I am sick in bed, shaking with fear, unable to go to work. I can’t get my valium refill. The doctor says he faxed it in and the pharmacy says they never received it. Alex holds me and wishes me a happy mother’s day. “Probably your best yet, huh?” I couldn’t laugh at his joke then but he tries to remain lighthearted when I am in extreme distress. He recommends that I have a shot of Jack Daniels to calm me down. I refuse. I am afraid that it will trigger an alcohol binge.

The following Wednesday, I am sitting in front of a new psychiatrist. He asks me what happened the weekend prior. I try to explain about the panic attack I can’t stop. He bumps Effexor to 300mg and Valium to 30 mg. He adds Trazadone. He spends an hour with me and tells me I have post traumatic stress disorder, panic disorder, and severe depression that is medication resistant. He snaps my file shut, ready to go, but before he stands he looks at me and says, “If you ever find yourself out of valium again and going into withdrawals, drink some alcohol. It acts on the same part of the brain that valium does. Don’t you go telling anyone your doctor told you to get wasted.” We shake hands. I make a mental note to tell Alex he was right.

I spent some time in the lock down facility. I am panicked the whole time I am on that floor because there is no escape. Only the employees carry key cards. The doctor who gives me a physical tries to make jokes. I can’t laugh. I am trying to behave in a way that will get me out of the lock down floor. For whatever reason, the severe psychiatric patients are locked down with the drug addicts going through their withdrawals.  They are so sick: some pacing and shaking, others vomiting into garbage bins, there is crying and face picking and wails I will never forget. I can’t drink water without supervision and I am watched as I piss. I wonder if I could break through a window and jump out. I want to be outside in the freeway polluted air, smoking a Camel filter. I pretend I am doing research for a novel. I sit still and observe. I want my cell phone back. I want to go home. Dr. Joke asks me how I am doing and I tell him it’s not like I thought it would be. I joke that I am looking around for the table with Jack Nicholson and Danny DeVito playing cards. He says those days are long gone. He asks me if I have ever thought of hurting myself or anyone else. I lie when I say no. I have to sign a contract that if they let me move to outpatient I won’t hurt myself or anyone else. I don’t tell him that I imagine jumping in front of every fast moving vehicle I see. When I am finally set free they put me in outpatient loony bin. I am escorted out by card carrying scrub wearing men.

I am assigned a therapist. They take me to him. He is nice. He already has my file. He asks me if I’ve ever been raped or molested. I ask him if I can go home early. He sighs and says it’s time for lunch. I get into the line and wait. Sugar and caffeine are forbidden. People nibble candy from their purses and pockets; fill water bottles with coke or coffee. It’s finally my turn. I take my cucumber sandwich and sit at a large table. They have little packets of mustard and mayo, but plastic knives and forks are forbidden. I find that amusing. The groups of people sitting around me are talking about work as I choke down my sandwich with warm water. They are comparing notes on patients and discussing how to care for the nonverbal ones. I realize I have sat down at the employee table and try to eat faster. I have 15 minutes until I have to be back from lunch. Smoking is prohibited. I throw away my paper plate .I walk through the door right in front of the woman at the front desk and exit. I walk until I am standing over the freeway overpass and smoke as much as I can. It would be a perfect place to jump. I imagine my body down there, splat.

When I return to the building, room 2, I sit at the table ready for the class to begin. Some of the people I had eaten lunch next to come in and take their seats. They are not employees after all, they are patients like me. There are other patients in the chairs surrounding me. Some have their mouths wide open and the saliva runs down their chins and onto their shirts. Some patients are so drugged their heads fall over and smack the table, startling me. The therapists try to talk to us in calm tones, asking the ones who keep nodding off to please try to stay awake.
There is a woman in the corner reading Twilight with her headphones on full blast. The therapists try to remove them and bring her out of the corner and into the group. It’s a no go. She needs the music to drown out the voices in her head. She said they are telling her to do bad things. I close my eyes and thank the sky that I am not that sick. There is an elderly woman who sits at the front of the class surrounded by bags. I find out over the course of weeks that she believes the feds are watching her and that they will come into her apartment and steal all of her belongings while she’s gone. That is why she must bag them up and bring them with her. Her diaper leaks sometimes. No one says anything about it. Psychiatric facilities involve a lot more body fluid than I’d imagined. I carry hand sanitizer.

When I do my one on one time with my therapist I ask him about all of the patients who are nurses, CNAs, LMTs etc. He says that those in the care giving industry are statistically number one on the list of people who seek help there, followed by teachers, and then insurance salesmen. I laughed, just about the insurance salesmen part. I ask him where and how the doctors go for treatment. He pauses for awhile before telling me that they go to hospitals outside of the one that they work for, and that they don’t identify themselves as doctors during the group sessions.
As the days go on I start to like the structure there. I start to worry about some of the patients when they don’t show up for a day or two. There is a woman with trickatilamania who sits across from me. Once, when I was speaking during group, she announced that my voice is a trigger for her. She asks them to stop me from speaking. I hate her suddenly; her head a pattern of long curly hair and softball sized bald spots. I over think why my voice would be a trigger. She cries a lot and lets the snot run free. There are tissues everywhere in the room. I don’t know where I fit in.

I encourage a few others I feel comfortable with to come out and smoke with me on the lunch break. After a few weeks more and more patients are there now. There is a tiny little 20 years old girl with two babies at home. She likes to spread out on the grass and close her eyes to the sun. She came to the treatment center from the hospital where she was treated for a suicide attempt. She wears the tiniest outfits, little halter tops and shorts, overall shorts with no top underneath. Her arms and legs are covered in scars; fresh bloody cuts over old purple skin where she had started to heal. She tells me that they have taken all of her meds away now that she had tried to OD. I want to hug her but I don’t. I have never seen someone with that many cuts on their body in my life. I talk to her about ways to take care of herself while taking care of her babies. I bring her a recipe for edible play dough she can make with her kids. She offers me a hook up on the opium poppy seeds she’s been buying. I just laugh.

There are a few patients who swap their pills with others, the smell of marijuana hangs in the air and that guy named Josh under the tree there is smoking heroin. I can’t imagine that a group of us who have decided to have our lunch outside goes unnoticed but it’s never mentioned inside the hospital. I crave coffee but since it’s forbidden inside the building I sometimes walk around to the little corner shop and buy a cup. It’s nasty but I chug it hot, just trying to get something into me to make it through the rest of the day. I wonder if I’ll ever be OK and what OK is.

There is a pregnant woman in the program. She dresses up each day in patterned thrift store dresses, stockings and heels. She makes no attempt to hide the track marks on her arms. She smokes Marlboro Reds and talks in the group about wanting to get sober before her baby comes. She is six months pregnant. She’s always asking people for things: a piece of paper, a pen, an Advil. She deals drugs to some of the other patients. I recognize it immediately because I used to be part of that world and I’d recognize the drug/money pass off anywhere.
I am standing alone during lunch on a sunny day, not far from where Josh sits with his rolled up tinfoil smoking heroin, when she approaches me. “Do you have a tampon?” she asks. I immediately dig into my purse and pull one out for her, but as I do I can’t help but look at her swollen stomach. “Are you bleeding? You should call your OB/GYN.”I say.  “Nah”, she answers, “This is my ninth pregnancy. I’ve had eight miscarriages already so I’m sure everything is fine.” She staggers away on her high heels, the backs of her feet covered in Band-Aids. I remind myself once again that I am not the doctor here. I am a patient. I try not to judge her, but I do.

With my insurance running out I begin to feel more pressure to be better. In a private one on one with my therapist he asks me if I am starting to feel the effect of the doctor doubling my Effexor. “I am beginning to think”, I spit out, “that this quest for happiness is bullshit.” He looks taken aback and he comments that I seem irritable. I look at him sitting there calmly and I tell him the conclusion I’ve come to, “I think that life is just a series of hrumph moments, sometimes punctuated by joy, or sadness, in varying degrees.”
He looks at me for awhile before smiling. “Tammy, you just described life.” It hadn’t occurred to me before that this could be true. I had imagined that most people were happy most of the time, with a few ho hums bits and grief only on occasion. “So how do I get there?” I wanted to go from the constant sadness to the ho hum. He didn’t really have an answer. When I left that day I didn’t know it would be for the last time. I made the decision the following morning that I had learned all that I could there. The medical bills piled up.

December 23, 2009: I sit in front of my psychiatrist. He asks me how I have been feeling and I try to explain that going through the physical therapy has brought up a lot of old memories and emotions. Taking the huge step of wearing a bathing suit and getting into the pool at the hospital every week was hard, but I did it. I tell him that I joined a book group and that I am now attending family functions instead of hiding at home. I think that this is all good news, but he wants to know what I have been doing about getting enrolled in college. “You’re not twenty anymore, but you’re not sixty either. You still have time.” I can’t explain to him that I want someone to take me there and stay by my side as I go through the process of enrollment. I can admit to him that I am scared that I am going to fail. “You’re not going to fail.” His response surprises me. I wonder where it comes from. Is it because he makes $300 per hour to talk to me? Is it because he been seeing me for over a year and he really believes that I can do it?

I know that our time is running short so I ask him the question that has been weighing heavily on my mind for most of my life. “Do I have to go through life feeling so incredibly sad all of the time?” He responds that it is not normal for someone to feel sad most of the time, as I do. He suggests adding another medication to my list, a tricyclic antidepressant, checking back with me in a month, and if I’m still feeling so sad adding a drug called Abilify. I want to ask him if he could prescribe something with a weight loss side effect as well as a daytime boost of energy, but the timing seems wrong. I thank him and leave.

I see my dad riding with me in the elevator down to the first floor. He’s not stuck at 57 this time. This is what I imagine he might have looked like had he lived. He has shrunk in size and has difficulty walking. I think about that and feel no rage against him. He would be approaching his 82 birthday. In my mind I want to believe in God and in a place where people who die go and spend eternity in peace. I don’t believe it. I want to believe that maybe my dad is now my guardian angel. Before I take the two hour bus ride home I go to the chapel in the hospital and sit in silence for awhile. I feel empty but calm. I feel stronger.
I imagined that 2009 would be the date on my death certificate. Now it feels like more of a rebirth. I have no idea what’s ahead but I feel ready.

Remembering Summer's Peaches

A Fraction of the Apples

Just One of the Varieties of Tomatoes I Preserved

My First Try at a New Dog Treat Recipe

In the months following my discharge from the psychiatric hospital I became fixated on food. Not on eating food, but on researching prices until I’d found incredible deals, buying frequently used items such as flour, yeast, oil, dried beans, rice, etc. in bulk and learning how to store them correctly, and taking advantage of some incredible produce prices in the summer. I learned a lot about myself through this. I realized that in many ways I express my love for my family through food. I had to let go of the need to please everyone every time and just know that I was providing my husband , myself, and our teenagers with the healthiest, tastiest food I could find while still sticking to the very tight food budget. I was then, as I am now, having trouble focusing on books or TV or my writing. In the kitchen I felt as if I was keeping busy doing something worthwhile. It helped to throw my mind into making applesauce, or bread, or spaghetti sauce. It helped me feel less afraid about not having as much money as we used to. I knew the medical bills would be coming in soon, and even though my therapist had directed me to focus on getting well and not on money (ha!) I felt responsible for the burden I was placing on my husband’s shoulders.

Looking back now at the year 2009 I can clearly see what decisions I had made that led up to the time in the hospital. I ignored all of the warning signs that trouble was looming and continued to work too much, sleep too little, and consume far too much caffeine . I was so consumed with guilt and worry over leaving my children at night and then sleeping during the day. I constantly missed doctor’s appointments and let my prescriptions run out because I was so tired and taking hours  on the bus to go to different visits seemed to be a bad idea because it cut into the small amount of time I had each day for sleeping.

Tonight I sit here, not cured, but accepting of the fact that I need treatment still. I have been doing my physical therapy because I must take this gift of time and strengthen my back. I continue to see my primary care physician as needed and my psychiatrist for medication management. It is quite a process, but I am pushing myself to learn how to take care of myself.

Christmas will come, whether I feel ready or not. All of our utilities are on. We have a roof over our heads.  We were able to purchase gifts for Nathan and Polly. I have taken both of them to the doctor and dentist and they are healthy. For that I am so grateful. Both of them are doing well in school and have friends with whom they socialize happily. Polly managed to pull her math grade up from a D to a B and I am so proud of her, as that was the subject she was really struggling with. I now have more time to spend with both of them and just a seemingly simple thing like having a family movie night at home with a bowl of popcorn means a lot to me.

The time that I spent earlier in the year stocking the freezer and pantry are paying off big time now. Not having to constantly run to the store on foot or bus in the cold and rain is so nice. After being invited several times by my 22 year old niece Audrey to join her book group I shared a copy of the book with her from the library, read it, and went to the book club last Tuesday. I was tempted to cancel because I had a bunch of painful dental work done the day before and I had been informed that the group started with dinner. I knew that Audrey would be disappointed and so I went anyway. I ate mashed potatoes and chewed on one side of my mouth and nobody cared. I don’t know why I was so worried.  I was able to talk about the book with the group. A few of the women I knew from my past but hadn’t seen in years: Audrey’s grandmother, her mother, and her aunt. I was concerned that seeing them might bring up some painful memories for me, and it did. There was a moment during dinner when someone asked some questions about things that I had done in 1985. Poor choices that I had made at the age of 12, immediately following the death of my father. Before I could slowly inhale I felt a sob rising up in my chest. Time froze and I wondered about the correct protocol involving cloth dinner napkins and tears. A woman I hadn’t seen since 1988 rose, grabbed me some tissues, and turned to the inquiring woman,” Stop being mean! This is obviously a painful subject for her, and she was only 12 at the time. Jeez!” I dried my eyes and smiled my thanks. The moment had come, the moment had passed. My initial reaction to flee the house dissipated and I was able to get my breathing back under control. The subject was changed and the night went on.

Having gone made me feel proud of myself. It also made me realize that I can have personal limits. I know that is probably common knowledge to most, but to me it was a good realization. There are certain subjects I don’t wish to talk about with most people. There are certain decisions I made as a child that I am tired of apologizing for.

Last May I felt as if suicide was my only option. Today I am looking forward to what 2010 will bring. It wasn’t easy to get here, and it is still filled with pain and challenges. There are bits of joy mixed into my life too and for that I am grateful.

As an aside, I am a ridiculous perfectionist when it comes to things I bake. I can’t post that photo of the dog treats I baked above without mentioning what I learned from trial and error. The original recipe called for rolling the dough out very thin and then cutting it into squares and baking them for 25 minutes. I followed the directions, except I just cut them into pieces with a pizza wheel, and I will admit that I placed too many on the sheet pan because I was feeling lazy. The ones around the edges began to bake faster than the ones in the middle and I had left no room to move them around. Another thing that had bothered me was the mess. I was looking to save money by making dog treats at home, but the clean up was horrible, as the dough was very sticky and difficult to roll with a pin. The second time that I made them I doubled the batch and after it was mixed shaped it into logs that I then placed in the refrigerator. When the dough had firmed I took a log out, sliced it with a knife and baked them that way. It was so much easier. Yes, I realize that I just wrote a whole paragraph about dog treats. Oh, and my German Shepherd? She loved all of them, even the ones that I thought were too dark. If anyone is interested in the recipe let me know and I’ll post it.

Edited to add that I posted the recipe for the dog treats in the comments section of this post.

Matilda

My mom got a goat, and I spent a glorious day over there last Thursday preparing her chicken coop for winter. I may or may not have stopped numerous times to cuddle said goat.  Just between you and me, I think this goat loves me best of all.

I have tried and tried to finish the post that I was talking about in the comments on my last post. The post about how I came to name myself Sarah when I first started writing and posting online. I am in such a funk; the post sits as an unfinished document on my desktop. If I can’t get the flow of something after this many days I need to wait. I’m sorry. I really do appreciate all of the nice comments I received on my last post.

Cork , who is a man I met online over ten years ago, has never been anything but supportive of my efforts. Even though we have never met in person I consider him a friend. He is an incredible writer; I wish that I could link to him here, but I don’t think he has a website up at the moment. Last year he suggested that I try to do two simple nice things for myself everyday. I did for awhile, and then I got caught up in the hell of working graveyard and struggling with my guilt over sleeping during the day and being a sub-par mother to two kids who really needed me. I am going back to his advice now. I will seek at least two moments of bliss for myself each day. If bliss seems like a bit of a stretch I’ll settle for a little flicker of joy. If you would like to join in, please do so. If you would post your moments in the comments I would love it. We can do this together if you’d like. I already have my visits to my mom’s goat. The photo above was taken with my phone, so it’s not great, but she’s a sweetie. I asked Alex if we could get a goat but he didn’t like that idea that much. He was initially resistant to getting a dog too, but he changed his mind and got me Maggie. She makes me happy everyday.

I have been open here before about my drug addiction and alcoholism, so I feel comfortable sharing my morning here. I got up to my alarm (yuck) got the kids up and off to school, pulled on some sweats and took the dog for a walk without brushing my hair, came back and made coffee and checked the status of the dough I’d mixed up last night before I went to bed and peeked at the sticky buns I baked off last night to see  how many were missing (three) and surveyed the house to see which chore I should tackle first. I was standing in the kitchen when it occurred to me: I hadn’t thought about getting high. It’s usually right there, first thing in the morning, that craving to numb myself. Just last night Nathan and Polly got into an argument and I was trying to diffuse the situation before it escalated further and in my struggle to stay calm when I really just wanted to tell both of them to shut the fuck up and to go to their rooms I kept thinking, “I need a drink.” Instead I finished mixing the dough recipe I am trying for the first time (it requires an overnight sit) pulled the sticky buns from the oven and glazed them, and kept my cool. But I wanted a drink, a scotch, to be specific, a big one, a whole bottle. Instead I tried to breathe slowly in and out and I went to bed soon after. Sober.

This morning is the first in decades where I didn’t wake up with that hunger for drugs and that realization is my moment of bliss number one for today. What was yours?

Last week I found out that one of my former coworkers had committed suicide.  I went through this whole range of emotions. He was only 25. I had been planning on calling him to wish him a Happy Birthday as it’s just days away, but that day will pass and 25 he shall remain forever.

I went over the many nights we worked together in my head, looking for signs I must have missed, finding nothing but more questions. I had this feeling that I needed to do something, but I couldn’t imagine what that might be.  I’m not foolish enough to believe that I could have saved him, but I would have tried.

My thoughts kept returning to his Mom on the East coast, and to his little sister, and the  times we had sat together drinking pints of beer after work. He had planned on returning for a visit home. He felt guilty that the years were slipping by. He wondered aloud if the letters and little gifts he was sending to his much younger sister meant anything at all. I assured him that his sister was undoubtedly thrilled to have any contact with him whether it be phone, email or letters and encouraged him to keep the lines of communication open with his mom even if it was hard at times.

He has returned home now, his body anyway, where he can be buried close by his family. Last night I finally sat down and wrote his family a letter and slipped it in a card. I can only hope that my words can one day offer even the slightest bit of comfort to them.

In honor of his love of music, and Sam Cooke in particular, I wanted to post the following song.

Hold On

The Dough Rests But The Baker Does Not

I have been trying to write here, but I can’t seem to finish anything. I set my standards too high and then get disappointed when I can’t make the words dance the steps I choreographed. I have decided to listen to Thursday and Jean and their encouraging words in my comments for my last post. Haven’t read the comments? What’s the matter with you, go and take a look, it’s fun. Join in. Everyone is welcome. I want the communication to flow both ways here. I’m lonely. Christ. I’m lonely.

Yesterday I tried to write a post about anger but I got so pissed off recalling the tale I was telling I ended up furiously weeding in the garden on a very blustery day instead.

That food group I mentioned joining, well, I can get large quantities of apples amazingly cheap and so I do. I did just about everything you can do with an apple and it got a bit nutty, my quest to make sure none of them went to waste.For dinner the other night I baked a beautiful lasagna and an apple crisp. I pointed out to my family that the sauce was from the tomatoes, zucchini and basil from our garden and Nathan said, “Yeah, I don’t really like basil.” and later Alex said, “The next time that you make that crisp could you cut the spices in half, it was way too spicy.” I had to excuse myself to the bathroom where I sat on the toilet and had a little cry because I’m tired and I sometimes fantasize about living alone, leaving my husband and two teenagers here to clean up after themselves and to cook their own fucking meals. I cried because I wanted to be a writer when I was a little girl, and a clown who could make people who were sad laugh, and a photographer, and a sculptor, and the person who took on world hunger, because when someone is down and out and you take away the pain of hunger it means so much more than words like love.  I cried because I want a room of my own with no TV noise in it so I can just sit in peace. I cried because I have been longing to fill this emptiness inside of me for so long, a lifetime of longing, and I don’t know how to do that. I cried because last week I got a coupon in the mail for some crappy chain salon so I decided to take myself down there all by myself on the bus and get my hair trimmed. I asked for two inches of the ends and she chopped my hair into a mullet. English was not her strong point. I came home and tried to brush it into a ponytail and now it won’t go. I found some barrettes and clipped the sides back and Nathan laughed and laughed at me when he saw it and I wondered how he could be so cruel. Polly patted my hand and told me that it wasn’t bad and that I looked pretty and I wondered if she meant it. I know it’s just hair. It’s not about the hair. It’s me, never knowing how to be a wife, mother, daughter, sister and aunt and still have time to do a few little things to feed my soul before I dry up. When is it OK to say, “Fuck it. The garbage needs to be taken out again, the toilet keeps clogging, I have to get some towels in the washer if they’re going to line dry in time for everyone to shower, but I am going to take a walk to the library and spend the afternoon sitting amongst that wonderful old book smell?” Oh yeah, I wanted to be a librarian when I was a girl too.

Moving on now…

***

Jean was asking me about a recipe of her mother’s that she had tried to recreate. She was kind enough to share it with me (it’s in the comments of the last post) and so I will be giving it a try as soon as I can.  I wanted to talk  a little bit about baking here. This advice is general, and not directed at anyone in particular.

One note about the photo of the dough up there resting before I shaped it: If someone ever wanted to hire me to bake for them again I would check the kitchen for wood benches.  In my dream bakery, the one that I fantasize about opening, I have wood benches for dough. It’s the way. I also have the fantasy about taking this city by surprise with the simple goodness of fresh baked goods coming from a woman who, at the age of 36, decided to go for her dream. I just need the financing. It’s a dangerous idea  in this economy, but it’s fun to imagine designing it.

OK. Simple advice for home bakers.

Just because you set your oven for 325 doesn’t mean it heats to that temp. Get a hanging oven thermometer and see what temperature it really is. The piece of shit oven in my house is off by 50 degrees. Adjust! It can make a huge difference in the finished product. If the recipe calls for you to preheat your oven, do so. When your bread, or your cake, or your muffins are ready to go into the oven they need to get in there and have that heat ready. Muffins, cakes, etc. are usually leavened by baking soda and/or powder. When the wet ingredients hit the dry it is activated. With yeast breads and pastries that need to be proofed (allowed to rise) they need to be placed in the oven at the correct time, where they will rise for the final time.

Baked goods continue to cook after they are removed from the oven. Resist that urge to slice into that loaf. Allow yourself the time to gently lean down and listen to the crackling of the bread as it finishes. Don’t burn your ear!  When I first started training new bakers I was amazed at how many of them burned the cookies. You want most cookies to finish cooking on the hot sheet pan after you pull them out. The trick is learning  exactly when to pull them. Practice. You can always eat the mistakes.

Bake times. This is yet another reason why I have trouble training people. Night after night I had people come to me with things that they had burned. They used the same excuse every time, “But the recipe said to bake for 25 minutes!!” The time listed is a guideline. Set your timer earlier than the recipe states. I call this my check timer.  Check fast! Every time you open the oven you lose heat. Sometimes things are done early and sometimes they take longer.

Yeast. Oh how I love yeast. Baking sweets gets old fast, at least for me, but I am always fascinated with yeast doughs. Before I lost my job I was working on developing breads using no added yeast at all as it is everywhere, wild and in our air and water.  Check the expiration dates on your yeast. To test if our Active Dry Yeast is still good use this simple test :

Fill a 1-cup liquid measuring cup to the 1/2 cup level with warm water (110 to 115 degrees F). Stir in 1 teaspoon sugar and sprinkle with 2-1/4 teaspoons yeast (1/4-oz package). In 3 to 4 minutes, the yeast will have absorbed enough liquid to activate and start rising to the surface. If at the end of 10 minutes, the yeast has multiplied to the 1 cup mark on the measuring cup and has a rounded crown, it is very active. The yeast mixture may then be used in your recipe if baking immediately. Adjust the recipe for the 1/2 cup water used in the test. Discard yeast with slow activity.

Instant yeast needs no blooming, or proofing before it is mixed into the flour.  Bread Machine Yeast and Rapid Rise Yeast is instant yeast that may include ascorbic acid, a dough conditioner.   To substitute instant or bread machine yeast for active dry yeast, use 25% less instant yeast than active dry. I have heard this debated by others numerous times, some say the reduction should be closer to 33%, blah blah blah, but I’ve never had any trouble with the substitution and I’d rather get busy baking than stand around debating.

Fresh Yeast, also known as compressed or cake yeast, is active yeast.

It is sold in tiny cakes in the refrigerated section of your supermarket. I have baked with it at various commercial kitchens with success, but I’ve only purchased it for home use once because it doesn’t keep long, and I hate to waste.

A .6-oz cube of cake yeast is roughly equivalent to 1½ to 2 tsp. instant yeast or 2 to 2¼  tsp. active dry yeast. It needs to be proofed in tepid water (80-90 degrees F) before use.

Speaking of water temperatures, I recommend that every baker have a thermometer. I use one of those instant read probe thermometers, but you can also use a candy thermometer. Active Dry Yeast is proofed with water, (or whatever liquid you are using), at 110 – 115 degrees F. Ideally, the other ingredients you are using should be at room temperature. Did you forget to pull the eggs out? Soak them in a bowl of warm water to bring them up to room temp.

Instant yeast does not require proofing, it can be added right along with your other dry ingredients. I will admit to being an instant yeast convert. I use SAF Red Instant Yeast. I found a store here that sells 1 pound for $2.99. I empty it into a mason jar and store it in my refrigerator. With instant yeast you can use cooler water, as the granuales are smaller and they disolve into the liquid much faster.

If you can’t find it at your local grocery store, here is a link to buy the yeast I recommend. 1 lb. lasts a long time and you can save a lot of money if you were previously buying the little envelopes from the grocery store.

There are numerous reaons for bakers to have a thermometer handy. If the liquid you use in your dough is too hot, it will kill the yeast. Yeast dies at approximately 138-140 degrees F. This is yet another thing I’ve heard debated endlessly in kitchens. Who cares! There’s work to be done! Why are you arguing over 2 degrees? After the dough is mixed, the optimum temperature for it to rise is 78-80 degrees F. Higher temperatures will adversely affect the texture of the finished product. Doughs at lower temperatures will rise slower and have a higher alcohol content. It is of course possible and fun to play around with cold fermentation and I recommend trying it at some point. It’s all about letting time do the work instead of kneading. I recommend this recipe.

Teaching people how to learn how long to let the dough rise, how to shape it, how long to let it rise before it is ready etc. takes time. I’ve noticed that certain people seem to have a knack for this. I have always struggled with people who want exact times ie, exactly how long do you let it rise before it goes into the oven? I tried to train a girl who asked me that question every single night. I kept trying to explain that it varied, that she was going to have to use her eyes and her hands. She wanted exact times and there are too many variables. I trained a young man who was a complete natural. Although he had never baked before he caught on so fast it was amazing. When I complimented him he replied, “That’s funny, because I fucking hate this job. I hate baking.” We laughed. One note about training guys versus girls, if you leave the guys alone with the dough they will eventually shape some of it into a penis. I haven’t finished conducting my research on this, but I will, one day.

When to pull the bread from the oven? I finally started training my bakers to probe their loaves to check the internal temperature. I was so tired of seeing so many loaves with raw middles. Novice bakers often pull bread too soon because it is getting dark and they get scared. The internal temperature you are shooting for is another heavily debated topic. Shoot for the 190-210 range and you’re good.

Most of all, relax. Have fun and remember that everyone has flops and failures no matter how long they have been baking.

One last point before I go, things that come out of the oven are hot. I seem to need to learn this one over and over again.

Thanks everyone. You are wonderful, all of you. I am feeling better. There was only the option of going even lower than I was when I wrote that last post, and I’ve been there and hope to never return, or getting better, and I managed to pull myself up to functional. My Doctor added a new med after my appointment with him on Monday. Right now I just feel tired, but I am no longer suicidal. I don’t think I’ve often spoke here about my suicidal ideation. I know what suicide does to those left behind, but it still exists inside my head as a plan B, or C, or D… I am still working on trying to stop that.

I just wanted to check in in case anyone was worried. Today was Polly’s 1st day of high school so she wants to whine about how much she hates it and Nathan got a PT job at a pizza place, so he is at the hospital right now taking a UA. I asked him if he was going to pass, just in case, and he laughed and said he hasn’t smoked pot in years. WTF? He’s 17. I think he was joking with me. Anyway, you have to pee clean to make pizza. I am proud of him for getting the job. He has been looking for a while and was starting to get down. Unemployment is around 12% here so it’s tough.

I’m off to get dinner started and really, thank you all again. It meant a lot to read your comments.

when I don’t think I’ll make it. Days when I can hardly bring myself to do the very basic things, eat, swallow pills, take my dog out, do a load of wash. I am so tired of fighting. I can’t calm the racing of my heart. My hands won’t stop shaking. I don’t want anyone to look at me. Everyone knows I am sick; it’s tattooed right across my forehead. I can’t explain to my husband why I am too scared to leave the house. I can’t ask for anything more from him. I can see him already weighed down by the burden of me. My mom said yesterday that she has done all that she can to help me. It’s true. I’ve asked too much. I think about checking myself into the psychiatric ward of the hospital. I don’t want to have to explain what is wrong with me. The last time I had to call for emergency help on a weekend the woman on the other end of the phone said, “You are so strong to have made it this far, so brave.” I didn’t believe her.

I’m tired. I’m down on my knees. Every single bit of me has been drained and what’s left is a burden. I don’t know where the hope goes, where that feeling of being destined for something much, much better is. People going on and about their daily lives, smiling, working, laughing, talking. I don’t understand. I want to know their secret.

I think about different quotes therapists said while I was in the hospital. “Every single one of you can get better, but there are different degrees of better.”  “Mental illness can be a dangerous gift.” “The introverted mind would never be discovered unless that person took the time to write things down.” “You can live with your illness, but with less pain.” “Your choices increase or decrease the stress symptoms.” “Focus on changes in your behavior, everything bigger has to wait.”  “Feelings are not facts.”

I have an appointment with my doctor on Monday. I can do this.