Sorry to those of you who were worried. I’ve been all caught up in the stress, guilt and worry of Nathan leaving for Canada . Now I am apparently caught up in the stress of talking to him as he realizes he made a mistake and shouldn’t have gone in the first place. I knew it was a bad idea, but this is what we must do as parents. We let them go, and learn, and then we are here for them when they need us. It’s painful not being able to teach him these lessons, but rather to have to watch him go through them.

I’ll be back here soon, just writing whatever. I need to just let it out without giving it so much thought or being afraid of disclosing too much. I hope that everyone is doing well.

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.

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?

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.

Damn, I had forgotten how isolated and depressed I can feel being a stay at home mom. I am reminded of when I was pregnant with Nathan; I was the lead party chef supervising a small group of women on the graveyard shift. They were always kind to me, and I wanted to be the type of boss who worked harder than her employees, and never asked them to do anything she wasn’t willing and able to do herself. I wanted them to respect me, but thinking back I guess I wanted them to like me too. There was one woman who was a born again Christian. She was a hard working, kind mother of two, and as long as she wasn’t trying to convert me we got along well. Being an unmarried 18 year old, I was nervous about telling her that I was pregnant. I played fat for awhile but it soon became obvious. After I told her about my pregnancy she asked me constantly when Alex was going to marry me.
There I was: broke, 18, pregnant and working for $7.75 per hour with no insurance. Alex was out of work and I was traveling 90 minutes each way by bus to a restaurant where I constantly picked up extra hours out of a desperate need for cash. I had an envelope hidden in my desk at home. The outside was marked Crib Fund. At times I needed to sit down to rest when before I’d been able to work twelve hours straight no problem. I lived on 7UP and those little saltine cracker packets they served with the soup. I hated Alex at times. He hadn’t asked me to marry him. He hadn’t wrapped his arms around me and told me that everything would be OK. I was mad at myself too, and I kept thinking that if Alex would just get a job and I could be a stay at home mom I would be happy and I would never complain ever again.

Finally Alex did find a job, and I was able to rest for a few weeks before Nathan was born. In the beginning I felt OK resting during the day while Alex was at work. I was recovering from pregnancy, labor and delivery. I was breast feeding. Then I started to feel guilty. The laundry piled up, as did the dishes, and I had no idea how to go grocery shopping with a baby and no car. When Alex would get home from work I would have him watch Nathan so I could have a shower. That shower was the highlight of my entire day. One evening as I stepped out of the tub, wrapping myself with a towel, I glanced at my face in the bathroom mirror and burst into tears. This sucked too! I had envisioned myself at home with my baby, making all of our food from scratch, and greeting Alex at the door every evening wearing a crisp clean apron and saying, “Hi honey, how was your day? Dinner is almost ready.” I felt like a complete failure. I knew that for thousands of years women had managed to keep house, cook and raise children, I just didn’t know how they had managed it. I didn’t expect to be bored, and so fucking lonely.

Over the years I have tried being both a SAHM and a working mom. Both options have their pros and their cons, as I am sure a lot of you with children know. My self worth is and always has been tied closely to my ability to earn some income. I am not saying this is good; I am just being honest. I like having a check with my name on it. Another thing that work gives me is structure to my day and a chance to interact with my coworkers. To be honest, I don’t have any friends. So when I need someone to talk to I either talk to Alex or I call my Mom.

My original plan to return to college was something that scared the hell out of me, but I was excited about it. When I was laid off from my job after taking Family Medical Leave that plan was put on hold as I filed for unemployment and then dealt with interview after interview with the man who was deciding the case. I ended up winning, probably because my employers weren’t returning his phone calls. I had documentation proving that I was laid off eight days before my Family Medical Leave ended.

I joined this food buying club in my neighborhood where people get together and order food and since it ends up being large quantities we get the food for the wholesale price. It took me a little while to get the hang of it, as there are several different purveyors offering different things, and there are several different dates during the month when you have to have your order and payment in by or you miss out until the next order. Before I applied for membership I told the head of the group that I don’t drive and she said that she lives close to me and wouldn’t mind dropping off my orders. I have tried to give her gas money but she always refuses. When she asked me what I did for a living I told her that I was an artisanal bread baker and a pastry chef. She exclaimed that it would be great if I could teach bread making classes to the group. One thing about me, I hate training people, even when I am being paid to do it. I told Alex about it and admitted my regret over those words. “Why the fuck didn’t you just say you were a housewife?” was his response. I realized that it just didn’t sound good to me. I wanted to BE SOMETHING. I was ashamed of myself and when asked an innocent question by a woman who went to college and earned letters to place after her name I wanted to at least have a trade to be proud of. Why do I care what others think? Why do I define myself so much by what I do or don’t do for a living?

So, to make myself feel better about not working I have been working extra hard at home. In addition to my fall garden I have been buying cases of tomatoes, apples and peaches. I have a freezer neatly stacked with tomato sauce, spaghetti sauce, applesauce and apple butter. I peeled and sliced the peaches and froze them too.  I even made salsa from scratch and tried to freeze a couple of pints of that. I’ve never frozen salsa before so I’ll have to see how it tastes after it thaws. I have been making huge pots of soups and freezing those to have on hand for fall. Sometimes I like to open the freezer and look at the fruits of my labor. It makes me feel good to see everything neatly stacked and labeled. Yes, I do realize that I could have canned everything instead but I didn’t want to mess with it. Plus, Alex won’t eat home canned foods because he read somewhere about someone dying from improperly canned food and he never shakes stories like that. I’ve also been growing my own bread starters and baking at home. It’s fun now that it’s not a job.

My sister called me yesterday to ask if I could babysit her three kids some Friday in October. I told her that I would check my calendar and get back to her. When I did I realized that my calendar is just scattered with various doctor’s appointments and the physical therapy for my back. Ouch.

I always get excited about the mail even though it’s always bills and junk mail. Yesterday I received a letter that read in part, “Recently President Obama announced that people who receive unemployment benefits may receive financial aid to pay for job training or education. You may be able to continue receiving unemployment benefits while enrolled in an approved training program. Studies have shown workers with more education and training have more secure jobs and higher wages.”  (Duh)  It used to be the case that those who were on Unemployment weren’t allowed to attend college because you had to be available for work 24/7.

I am excited about looking into this because school was what I had wanted to do in the first place. Thank you Obama!
Hopefully I will find a job training program. My primary care physician took some new images of my back last week and gave me a stern lecture about finding a new way to make a living. She said something about me ending up in a wheelchair within a couple of years if I continue at this pace and being totally narcotic dependent by the time I am 40. Zipping around on a Hoveround while wasted on Percocet sounds pretty awesome, but I’ll give this job training a try.

Besides, my freezer is getting really full and my kids just want to eat Hot Pockets and spicy hot Cheetos anyway.

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.

Remember pagers? Oh, I’ve been paged! Now I need to get to a phone.

***

With summer nearing its end my teens seem to want to spend every last second doing either nothing, or hanging out with friends. I feel a rush inside, things to get ready for that probably have already been taken care of. Polly is starting her first year of high school. She was originally excited about the school she will be attending, but the friend who was going there as well up and moved over the summer. Now it’s as if her life is ending, she has been crying at random moments, exclaiming that she won’t go, no matter what, slamming her door, yelling at me for not giving her any choice, for ruining her entire life. I reminded her a couple of times that it was she who selected that we apply to this school, she begged to go there, but really, in the face of her at times extreme angst, it’s best for me to say nothing. She has always been resistant to any change of school and I remember the tears when she started at the junior high she quickly grew to love. I hope that she settles in comfortably to this school as well. Alex and I have asked her to give it a chance.

Nathan is back to school soon as well. At 17 he is about as calm as he could be. I think back on the rough years with him, the times when I never admitted it to anyone, but I feared he’d end up dead or in jail. Every once in a while I remember those years, if only to be grateful for how far he has come and to remember that this too shall pass with Polly.

I am recognizing the power of my own thoughts. I am acknowledging my fears over what the future holds for me, for us, as well as trying to keep a mental list of my hopes, my dreams, and all that I have to be thankful for.

I know that I feel better when I take a walk everyday. I know that gardening feels so right. I know that no matter what I can pick up my phone and call my Mom, or my sister Maria. Most of the time just knowing that is enough. In the middle of the night, gripped by panic, sadness, anything, I could call either one of them and they would be here for me. Having that is a gift.

I can’t ask too much from Alex. I can remember a time years ago when I was sick and I reached out for him. He said, “What do you want me to do, lay my magic hands on you and cure you?” The response stung at the time, but I realize now that he had given all that he could at that particular time. It was time for me to ride out the rest of that virus alone, for the most part, resting in bed. Mental illness is much different than a flu of course. I notice my ups and downs more now that I am not working. Before I was able to throw myself into baking and it kept me occupied enough that I could push a lot of my negative thoughts out because I was focused on the different doughs and what stage they were at. I was always counting, making sure there was enough of every product for the next day. I was trying to think ahead with the dessert work, making sure that nothing ran out. It was an escape. I miss it sometimes, as well as the camaraderie I had with my coworkers.

I have some seedlings to transfer into the ground now.  I am excited that they grew and happy to be trying to grow several different vegetables I’ve never grown before.  I am lucky to have my dog, Maggie. She loves to be by my side and I can chatter away to her all day if I feel so inclined.  It’s a beautiful day today. I’m headed out to get my hands dirty.

In the days since I last posted here, boy have I slipped back down.  It seems like one thing after another. The washing machine broke; we were able to scrounge up the money to buy a used one, and then the dryer broke. Our kids asked when we were going to get a new one and I just shrugged and continued to hang clothes on the line and on the drying racks. Fuck a dryer. It’s been hot here. Our stove is down to one working burner. I just hope that burner keeps going. I have cancelled cable, netflix, and greatly reduced our grocery budget. I have cut down on the cigarettes substantially. I have been baking and cooking from scratch and Alex has been sewing ripped clothes instead of looking for new ones. We have been through worse than this.

I just feel so drained. I feel as if I am just going through the motions. I honestly don’t think I would have lived through this without Alex and my Mom. My Mom stops by and checks in on me. Last weekend I was showing her what I felt like was a pathetic attempt at a garden, my few zucchini plants, a few tomato plants, acorn squash and several different herbs. “Remember Tammy, Fall is coming, and your Fall garden will be great.” I had somehow forgotten about Fall. I started broccoli seeds this week, as well as chard and collard greens. I keep going. I made a lovely pesto out of my huge basil plant, substituting walnuts I had in the freezer for the pine nuts.It was delicious.

Alex is watching me. I know this. Sometimes he reminds me to take my medication, or checks to see if I’ve eaten, as I often forget. He will gently suggest that I get some rest when I am in one of my manic modes and I feel as if I must stay upright to keep doing things around the house or we won’t make it. He tells me to calm down, to lie down, to watch a dumb TV show with him. He knows the exact spot on his chest where I like to cuddle up and press my face against him, listening to his heart beating, his slow, regular heartbeat such a contrast to my own.  I know he is not much for snuggling, especially when it’s so hot, but he doesn’t complain. I wonder why he has stayed beside me for 21 years. I am afraid to ask.

I have been able to spend time with both Nathan and Polly, time that I didn’t have when I was gone 16 hours a day. I can’t believe my babies are 17 and 14. I want to be here to watch them grow and learn. Alex and I certainly had so difficult times over the years, but our children are still excitedly planning about their futures. I long for happiness for them. Sometimes I fear that I may have passed my illnesses on to them. It is genetically linked. I wasn’t thinking of that when I was wanting babies.

I went to my psychiatrist recently for my monthly check in. This is just medication management and a brief 10 minute chat. He asked me about returning to work and I told him I have been going through the steps to attend college in the Fall. His brow furrowed briefly, “You’ve never mentioned any desire to do that in the past.” He flipped through the notes from our sessions. “So, you have a GED. You have a long way to go then. You are going to go for your Associates at a community college then?” That tiny little sliver inside that actually believes that I may have some type of potential answered, “Yes. And then I am going to university until I get my PhD.” He usually pushes me out the door after ten minutes (and then bills my insurance for a whole hour) but this time I stood up to leave. I am on the wait list for a new shrink but it’s a long wait.

I feel as if I can’t go on. I push myself everyday. I have no energy, no appetite. I feel as if everything is falling in around me, yet there is a huge part of me that has shut down, perhaps as a self defense mechanism.

I miss the structure of the daily therapy at the hospital. I sometimes look through the notes that I took while I was in that program for inspiration.

I try to remember my goals and the dreams that have stayed with me over the years. I am looking to hold onto that sliver of self esteem I still have that tells me that I can accomplish anything I set my mind to. Onward, forward mostly.

I sat on the edge of the worn green couch, sipping warm black coffee and trying to remember how to make small talk. I tried to remind myself that I had to do this. I had to meet the parents and visit their homes before I could just leave my child there to play.

After we talked about the Holocaust, of all things, she leaned in closer. “Say”, she asked with a smile, “does your daughter have fleas? As soon as my daughter started playing with your daughter at school, she came home with fleas.”

I was hot with anger. I felt the need to defend my children, my home, and my pets. Unfortunately, I also started to feel incredibly itchy.