tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25405021077293240042024-03-13T16:33:27.196-07:00And it's not too lateJust some random shit that pops into my mind. :)Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.comBlogger39125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-39432526446385906732015-07-15T18:08:00.002-07:002015-07-15T18:11:22.754-07:00Seated at the Table of Horrors<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In some ways I wish that I had learned this earlier in my career but I was too young, too naïve and unschooled in the ways of the world to know that there had to be self-love, self-care and that the compassion I felt for others needed to be directed to myself first. I sat at the table of horrors, mine and theirs but mine was always pushed aside, theirs was always the most important. I didn’t get then that loving myself and honoring myself and reserving some of my energy for myself would have made me a better worker, a more rounded person. I also didn’t understand energy then and how much of other people’s I carried with me because I was just so open and ready to receive any energy that I came in contact with. It was hard for me not to give 100% because I felt so honored, so humbled that I had been trusted with someone’s story, they shared with me the parts of themselves that they thought were ugly and shameful that I wanted to be worthy of that honor. I don’t regret those times for they will always hold a special place in my heart – but I did feel crushed by the horrors, at the end. I sat with clients 100% open, 100% giving and tuned in, they were magical times in a way because questions would come to me to ask that didn’t make sense but I trusted that feeling and I asked. One very vivid memory I have was of one particular client who was quite possibly one of the most beautiful people I have ever seen, not just physically – although he was stunning that way too – but <br />
he carried with him a light, a most beautiful shade of violet and it was the colour of everything sweet, pure and good in the world. I saw this light before he even opened his mouth and this beautiful being was well-dressed, obviously well-educated, soft-spoken and lovely. I heard his story, every word, but as I was explaining our services something made me ask in my most gentlest voice, “do you need food?” He dropped his head to his chin and whispered, “Yes.” And in that moment I wanted to just scoop him up, give him the biggest bear hug and tell him what I saw when I looked at him, that he was a gift. But I didn’t share that with him, I couldn’t because I couldn’t have explained it to even <br />
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myself then, nor could I explain the vision I had of what a beautiful life he had ahead of him but what I hope I did was treat him with kindness and dignity, and maybe that’s all that I needed to do. Maybe it was enough. I only hope that my pure heart and good intentions were enough for my clients, that I helped in some way because that's all I ever wanted. I have learned as I’ve grown and matured (yeah, I know, I’m as shocked as anyone that I’ve matured in any way) how to use my gift of “sight,” and when I’m well physically, mentally and emotionally I use that gift for its highest purpose of walking alongside someone in their journey and I am able to be fully and completely present while still maintaining the purity of my own soul. But when I’m not well, when I am depleted on a spiritual, psychic, physical, emotional – soul level then I can’t control my “gift”, I can’t put my shields up to minimize the impact of the horrors. I know that at some point I will return to social work and I often question myself as to whether the timing is right, but when I am authentic to myself I know that I’m not ready. I know I will sit at the table of horrors again and I’ll be ready when the time is right but until then I’m going to give that love and compassion I have inside me to my family, my friends….and most importantly, to myself.<br />
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-63429218173668918832015-03-21T02:44:00.002-07:002015-03-21T02:51:15.823-07:00Yellow<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13.4399995803833px; font-weight: normal; text-align: left;">It's 2:30 am and I am walking the streets of Inuvik, my destination is clear, it was from the moment I woke up a few minutes earlier and peered out my window and caught a glimpse of the green light dancing just above my roof line. Ski pants over my pyjama bottoms, a thick woolly sweater and the hat Steve gave me on my head, the flaps covering my ears - they get coldest first - and my camera strapped around my neck. </span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-r4-Pi_jxZLE/VQ05rdK94eI/AAAAAAAAAx4/i96ttxcbLD8/s1600/IMG_7481.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-r4-Pi_jxZLE/VQ05rdK94eI/AAAAAAAAAx4/i96ttxcbLD8/s1600/IMG_7481.JPG" height="211" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial; font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">It's funny, I had no hesitation walking outside in the middle of the night, because the night has always been my friend. When I was growing up I'd walk home from art class in the pitch dark, there are no street lights in the country, and I would memorize every star. It was probably the only time I felt completely safe and completely me. There was no judgement in the night, just stars gazing fondly down upon me. It was peace. And that's why moving here wasn't so strange for me, because those same stars are here - the ones that bore witness to my tears of frustration and listened to my hurt, anger and sadness of my younger years, things I never shared with anyone else. There were wild animals galore, I could hear wolves howling and had seen bears in the area, but I never feared them. Just like here, I'm sure there are animals but I don't fear them - people, yes, animals not so much. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">I digress, but it's 3 am, cut me a break. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">The moment I stepped out of my door and walked down the steps the full glory of the northern lights showed themselves to me. That little brush of green I could see from my window extended and arched over the house across the street and danced and crackled in a broad strip to south over the hospital. There have been many surprises for me here in the north that have challenged what I thought life in the north would be and this is one of them. The northern lights move. They dance and shift across the sky and while I've mostly seen the green colour but tonight I saw red dancing in amongst the green. I say dance, because that's the only word I can think of to describe what I see....and the energy that I feel when I see them. And there is a sound they make, that again I have no words to describe but it's there.</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4NmzipILAbA/VQ05t_vXdbI/AAAAAAAAAyQ/-S66SvSCuZU/s1600/IMG_7489.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4NmzipILAbA/VQ05t_vXdbI/AAAAAAAAAyQ/-S66SvSCuZU/s1600/IMG_7489.JPG" height="212" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">I walked to the end of my street and that's when I saw the red in the lights, it was so vivid and it shifted and danced in the green, and how I wished I had a tripod or the ability to capture what I saw. I felt such frustration that I couldn't capture it on film to show you all - because that's what I wanted, to share with you all this beauty - this magic. It's been a gift to share with people this journey, to share myself after so many years of hiding away but I realized that tonight, it was for me. These stars, they shone for me, the northern lights, they danced and sang for me. I am a blessed, beloved child of the Universe and I deserved this moment and this beauty.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">I turned left and followed the road to the service road, alongside the utilidor where there were no street lights. I climbed that hill, my feet crunching in the snow and didn't stop until I was in complete darkness, and I sat down in the snow and I watched the lights and looked at the stars. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">There is a legend that the aurora borealis are spirits and ancestors who come to visit and sitting there I think that is very true because I felt very close to my grandparents there. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.4399995803833px;">It was a very spiritual moment for me, I don't pray, I'm not religious but I thanked the Universe for bringing me here, for giving me this life, this glorious display and tonight, when I talked to the stars it was only of love, healing and light. And this song, it keeps playing in my head, and I smile, because I know it's true.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;">Look at the stars, </span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;">look how they shine for you, </span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;">and everything that you do.</span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial;">- Coldplay </span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"But I don't know what to say."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">I hear this often when people find out what I do for a living. They are often surprised that I actual choose to work with the dying and those living with a life threatening illness - and that I have chosen this as my career, my passion for close to twenty years. And I totally understand that it's overwhelming for some people to deal with that potential level of e</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">motional response. But. There are people in your community, your family, your workplace, your circle of friends who are living with a life threatening illness. And these are not only the elderly, these are people your age, with kids, bills and everything we all have, but they also have a disease which can be scary beyond words.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">So you don't know what to say? Well how about;</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Hi."</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Man, those Leafs suck!"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"How are you?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"I'm talking Fido to the dog-park, would it be okay if I took yours along too?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Thought I'd give you a call to see how you're doing."</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Hey, I'm going to the store, can I get anything for you?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"I made a pie, thought you'd like a piece." (Pie always works for me)</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Can I pick the kids up after school for you?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"Do you need anything?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"I'm here if you ever want to talk, have a cup of tea, trash talk our ex's, have a glass of wine."</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Whatever you would say if they were well!!!! If you feel like shit (which some people who dying are - and some don't) and your world's falling apart and you are suffering loss after loss (physical abilities, roles in the family, etc.) you really don't want someone to now treat you with kid gloves like you've lost a few IQ points or capabilities. Kinda condescending and douche-y really - don't do that shit. So speak like you would normally speak. If they're in a hospital bed, grab a chair and SIT yer butt down, now one likes being hovered over. Safe, consensual touch is often welcomed - IF you had that relationship with them before! Like if you were buddies who shared beers and ribald conversations over the backyard fence then grabbing their hand and stroking it would probably be awkward. ASK permission. Don't assume shit. Especially with the elderly, oftentimes when I'm with a client they'll grab my hand and hold onto it, but if I feel I'd like to take their hand or greet them in that way I ask....and so far no one has said no, most gratefully say yes. If you are afraid of hurting them due to the complications of their illness then express it; "Man, I'd love to give you a hug, think that'd be okay? I don't want to hurt you." Don't go in with a script - you're not a robot. Ask open ended questions. If you ask questions that are going to illicit one-word answers it's going to be painful.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"How are you feeling today?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">as opposed to;</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"You feeling good today?"</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Don't assume that the person wants to talk about their illness. Let them lead the conversation. Maybe they want to talk about their dog, the sucky Leafs, how much this never-ending winter has sucked balls.... who knows? Just be open. But be prepared mentally if they do want to talk about it. If they want to tell you how they're in physical pain. If the chemotherapy has made them lose their eyebrows and their hair is falling out. If they are scared of dying alone. If their family is driving them nuts. That they are so damned angry at God, life, the disease, the dirty floor that they can no longer clean themselves. You are there to hold their story. Not fix them, cure them or make them better.... just to be a listening ear, a friend. And for the love of God, please, please, please do not make a shitty comment like "I know how you feel" because you don't. You're not them. Try instead; "That really sucks, I am so sorry you are going through this." IF that is your language, your vernacular and it's appropriate. If you're nervous, tell the person. Risk being vulnerable, because they already are.</span><br /><span style="font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Laugh! Laughter is important, when appropriate, like don't burst out laughing when they tell you they're having a horrible side effect from one of their treatments - but there is a time and a place for humor.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Oftentimes when a person is dying their world becomes really small, maybe because of their diagnosis they are confined to a hospital bed in the family's living room or in a nursing home, long-term care facility or hospital. YOU can help widen their world. Bring the local paper, some home baking, pictures of your grandkids, kids, etc. Tell them about your day - so many times when I meet a client for the first time I end up fielding questions about my own life, which I do when appropriate. If the person you are visiting is elderly ask them about their life! The seniors I have had the pleasure of meeting have led rich, interesting lives - establish a rapport with them, ask about their life, some people who are dying like to reflect on their life - both good times and bad.</span></div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />The next piece is space. Know that some people are not going to want you hanging around 24/7, can maybe only handle short visits. Also, some of you folks show your love by "doing" and having tasks like watering plants, etc. to show your love. Some people don't want that. They don't want your charity, they want your time and your attention. Respect that.<br /><br />When someone is dying it is not just them who are suffering, their spouse, children and caregivers are also hurting and stressing and burning out. Check in with the partner of the person who is dying, give them space to talk and share. Ask if there is anything that you can do to help....and when their loved one dies continue that loving care in the months that follow the death.<br /><br />But we are all human, we are all different, there are no hard, fast rules to this - just this. Respect for the person and where they are at and however they are choosing to deal with this illness. The inherent dignity and life that they have to the very last breath. And most importantly, intention. If you do this with a pure heart and a kind, caring spirit then nothing you do is wrong.<br /><br />So now you have the tools, you are armed, no more excuses. Go forth my lovelies, spread the love and light. </span><br />
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-24494436581172562882014-01-28T15:12:00.001-08:002014-01-28T15:12:16.385-08:00Using my Mind for Good Instead of Evil.<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hSPV2MJ9pBU/Uug475EKzcI/AAAAAAAAArs/30n8OwozLEo/s1600/IMG_20140123_083712.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hSPV2MJ9pBU/Uug475EKzcI/AAAAAAAAArs/30n8OwozLEo/s1600/IMG_20140123_083712.jpg" height="200" width="184" /></a><span lang="EN-US">I have always
had a pretty powerful imagination, it has got me through some lonely
times. Even as a kid at recess as I was
sitting by myself, with no one to play with I’d sit, my back against the hard
brick wall of the school and fantasize and create stories in my head starring
yours truly. Then I used my imagination
to escape a reality that was painful and traumatic, to float away to a place
where there was no rejection or pain. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">One of the
most powerful images that has ever come to me during a time of great pain was
the vision of me, standing inside a dark, cold, dungeon-like tower. The tall brick walls stretched so high to a
small window whose light didn’t reach the floor where I stood. I imagine myself so beautiful,
ethereal. I’m wearing a long white gown
and I have a bangin’ body. I’m thin,
healthy, luscious….and for some reason I don’t need glasses. I am bathed in a white, celestial light that
radiates from the core of my being. I
can almost feel the angel’s wings extending from the bones in my shoulder
blades. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">In this dark
place was my partner. He is sitting on
the cold, damp dirt floor, his knees drawn up to his chest and his neck bowed,
with his face buried in his knees, refusing to look up. Then I kept thinking that he wouldn’t look up. Wouldn’t look at the light that was me, to
see me. And then I thought…wait a minute! I wasn’t looking at the light that was
me. And more importantly, I was staying
in the prison with him, willingly. And
this was a powerful experience for me, but I was missing a part, an important
one.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I’ve turned
this into visualization that I do every time that I start looking to everyone
else for my light, to engage in this co-dependent behavior that I gravitate to….and
I added something to it that has been so enlightening, and it is this.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I imagine
the same vision, I see the picture so clear in my mind….but the person sitting
in front of me on the floor is not always an ex-partner, but a parent, friend,
etc. that I feel has slighted me. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">But there’s
someone else in that tower now.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">This person
is me. At age 7. And I’m sad.
And lonely. And standing in the
shadows of the wall, to the left of me, just slightly behind and out of
sight. Crying silently, tears streaking
down dirty cheeks. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Now in the
vision I stop looking at the person sitting in front of me and I turn to her,
enveloping her in my light and I kneel beside her, take her sweet chubby cheeks
in my hands and say softly and gently, “I’ve got you, my girl. I’m sorry for ignoring you and letting you
hurt. No more. I love you.
I love who you are. And I will
protect you and nourish you from now on.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">And I scoop
her up in my arms, cradle her to my heart and I use those wings to fly high up
to that sliver of light and I take my sword (because it’s MY vision, there’s
gonna be a sword) and shatter that window, the shards floating to the ground as
we fly out to a beautiful sun drenched valley, beside a gurgling brook and I
sit there with her playing by the river bank, and Moses is there because wherever
there is happy he has to exist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
Finally, I’m
using my mind for good instead of evil.</div>
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-40501589729107482152014-01-07T19:34:00.001-08:002014-01-07T20:10:19.307-08:00The Exoneration of Bill & Gwen<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dT3s4VT5s28/Usyj0MUtqHI/AAAAAAAAAoE/826UrXJJ2e8/s1600/collage_2014-01-05_13-56-51.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dT3s4VT5s28/Usyj0MUtqHI/AAAAAAAAAoE/826UrXJJ2e8/s1600/collage_2014-01-05_13-56-51.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a>Dear Judge:<br />
<br />
If you are reading this, I am dead, most likely hacked into pieces and thrown in the wood chipper because my parents found my Facebook posts. I figured most likely that I'll be too busy as a ghost hanging out with Johnny Cash and other awesome people but I wanted to come to Bill & Gwen's defense. See, in their mind it would be justifiable homicide because they don't know. What they don't understand is that while anger sometimes hides pain that sometimes humor hides love. And that is what each post about them has been about. Covert expressions of love to the two people who found me at my darkest hour and helped lead me back to myself. We don't say "I love you" in my family, we tease and annoy each other because that's our secret language. But see below examples of my posts, you can see how they may not see the feelings behind my words. Forgive them dear Judge, because they are good people and I love them.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
Wendy</div>
<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit A:</b><br />
My Dad has been watching 4 days of Criminal Minds marathon straight, now maybe I just have a vivid imagination but I'm getting suspicious. I'm just saying that if they find my body all hacked to pieces that it was not an accident! I repeat, NOT an accident!!!<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit B:</b><br />
Is it wrong that I'm super excited that my parent's are going away overnight Friday to see Bill Engvall at Casino Rama? I feel like I should have a party or something - you know, the kind of party where the toilet gets broken and people defile the furniture. Or. I could watch the Netflix in my underwear. Damn I'm getting old.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit C:</b><br />
At Canadian Tire with the parents, thank God the air gun nailers aren't plugged in or loaded or I could see an "incident" occurring in aisle 5 if Gwen got her hands on it. Ah wedded bliss.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit D:</b><br />
Oh my God, if I can ever figure out how to put the screenshots from my Mom and I playing Just Dance 4, FloRida Good Feeling on Facebook I would, it's pure comedy god. <br />
<br />
Oh, and she'd for sure kill me. Slowly. And painfully.<br />
<br />
It'd be so worth it.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit E:</b><br />
Maybe this is just a man from the country thing or a man from my family thing but they all seem to enjoy peeing outside even if there's a washroom close by - my Dad is the same. My theory is that it's because they're marking their territory or mocking me because I can't pee standing up - well, not without peeing on my leg. But I digress. Tonight my Momma and I were playing Yahtzee and drinking wine and when Dad went to pee I casually suggested that she should push him into the snow bank when he was peeing. She was wayyyyyyyyyyyy too open to that idea. Long story short, if my Dad has to go to the hospital for frost bite know that it was wine's fault...not mine or my Mom's and we're sticking to that story.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit F:</b><br />
*ring ring*<br />
Mom: Hello?<br />
Me: Hi. Can you come here? It's important.<br />
Mom: (walks upstairs): You wing nut, what are you doing? I was doing the dishes.<br />
Me: Moses is so comfy I didn't want to disturb him and if you followed me on Facebook or texted we wouldn't have this issue. Now watch Moses eat popcorn when I feed it to him.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit G:</b><br />
This was a really popular song for 2013, a true sign of how shit 2013 was. I showed it to my Mom and she thinks there is something seriously wrong with foxes in Norway. And. She hates me for putting this song in her head.<br />
<br />
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<br />
<b>Exhibit H</b>:<br />
I sat down to a pleasant meal, excited that after a few spoonfuls that I was finally able to keep food down (mostly) of roasted cauliflower and this kitchen sink ground beef, cheese thingy when they started, Bill & Gwen.<br />
<br />
Mom: Can you turn off the goddamned television?<br />
Dad: I could, yes.<br />
Mom: Well go and do it, Jesus christ can't stand this noise.<br />
Dad: *grumbling turns it off*...well it's not that much better, you're still talking.<br />
Mom: Jesus what did you do all day today? You didn't even shave.<br />
Me: See Dad, Mom was probably wanting a romantic night in.<br />
<br />
Okay, I see what I did there, I gave them an opening I shouldn't have, but too late the words were out.
<br />
<br />
Dad: I'll rub my whiskers on your belly (this was directed at my Mom)<br />
Mom: *dirty look*<br />
Dad: Right on your hooters (again, directed at my Mom)<br />
Me: ABORT! ABORT! ABORT! as I ran from the table.
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jqIy3xXSzEo/UsyogN31fFI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/Uv7rAIcHUyE/s1600/528320_10153667006095075_689857518_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jqIy3xXSzEo/UsyogN31fFI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/Uv7rAIcHUyE/s1600/528320_10153667006095075_689857518_n.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit I: </b><br />
I asked my Mom if she could start making me meals like this, she said "fuck you," but I can tell she's thinking about it.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit J:</b><br />
Me: Mom, look, I put another profile on a dating website and look who is on here, Captain Underpants (aka: the jerk I was dating, we don't refer to him by his name).<br />
Mom: Why would he introduce you to his daughter? He really has problems.<br />
Me: Yes, and thankfully they're not mine anymore.<br />
Mom: What a cunt stain.<br />
<br />
How can I not love this woman?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
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<b>Exhibit K:</b><br />
Me: God, Mom is such a selfish bitch!<br />
Dad: Why? (okay, it was more of a grunt but I interpreted as why)<br />
Me: 'Cuz every morning I wear these tights she tells me they look stupid and here I am today wearing them and she's not here to say it.<br />
Dad: You look stupid.<br />
Me: The TIGHTS!<br />
Dad: I'm just covering all my bases.<br />
Me: You're too good to me Dad.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>Exhibit L:</b><br />
Because I was working late tonight I went into work later this morning, my parents left before me to go to Costco in Peterborough. Being safety conscious daughter I locked the doors and set the alarm when I went thinking that of course they had a set of house keys with them.<br />
<br />
Wrong.<br />
<br />
My Mom had to climb in through the wood bin, the alarm blaring as she slid down the woodpile to run up the stairs to stop the piercing sound (I've heard it, it's brutal).<br />
<br />
I was really, really sorry. Probably my sincerity wouldn't have been questioned had I not been laughing so hard at the time nor would my Mom have smacked my forehead.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit M:</b><br />
Now I get that how my mind works in general is pretty scary and when I drive and have time alone in the car my imagination kinda runs rampant but today I even disturbed myself. I was thinking about my parent's and how they are so sarcastic to each other and joking all the time and then I thought maybe that's just their sick version of foreplay and that when I leave they engage in some wild monkey lovin'. I know. Disturbing. Clearly my imagination is out of control. Still, I think I'm not going to sit on any of the furniture ever again and maybe I'll wear rubber boots inside instead of slippers.<br />
#billandgwenmonkeylovin.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit N:</b><br />
We were watching TV this morning and there was a commercial for Ice Pilots where the one guy says to the other "your face is going to hurt soon because I'm going to punch it."<br />
<br />
I looked at my Mom and "wow, that sounds like something you would say." <br />
She's like "No. I would only maybe thunk your forehead."<br />
Dad says "You know the forehead is part of your face."<br />
Mom says "well not in your case, it goes so far back on your head."<br />
<br />
Gwen - 1, Balding Billy - 0<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit O:</b><br />
My Mom, she slays me...she'll hear me use a word and then she'll incorporate it into her every day life. For example I used the word dildo once and now she calls my Dad a dildo when she's pissed off at him (among other things). I told her about a movie that had the line "cunt stain" and then she called her co-worker a cunt smear. <br />
<br />
Today's phrase: "reach around." <br />
<br />
Can't wait to see what Gwen does with this one. <br />
<br />
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<br />
<b>Exhibit P:</b><br />
Dad: Gwen, will you get my glasses for me?<br />
Mom: What? Do you want me to bend over so I can lick your ass too?<br />
Dad: Sure.<br />
Me: *vomiting profusely in my mouth* This is a sick environment for me to be recovering in.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit Q:</b><br />
So for any of you who ever wonder how I became so fucked up - well my parents and I were looking through a book that had the whole history of the McGill name (my Mom's maiden name) in our area and besides pissing ourselves laughing at some of the names like Ervil, Epizeibah, Lovey and I shit you not, there was even a Worvel. Anyway, this one description of this dude Henry McGill said "Henry continued his fondness for horses throughout his years." I, of course made an off-colour joke about old Henry LOVING the horses and my parents both laughed their faces off. Yes, my parents think jokes about people having inappropriate relations with horses are funny. So there. I came by my messed-up inappropriateness honestly, thanks Gwen & Bill!<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit R:</b><br />
Me: So Dad, what are you getting Mom for Christmas?<br />
Dad: I'm getting her power steering in the Gator as our shared Christmas gift (for those who do not know what a Gator is, it's like an ATV thingie).<br />
Me: Dude. Seriously. You've been married for 40 years and you think that's an appropriate Christmas gift? How have you ever gotten laid?!??! What about a trip for your beautiful bride?<br />
Dad: Down the stairs?<br />
Me: You're hopeless.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit S: </b><br />
Dad: It's like Chiefy (my Mom's Dad) always says, you've never lived until you've kissed a man with a moustache.<br />
Me: Just how close were you and Grampa?<br />
Dad: *gives me a dirty look*<br />
Me: What? I'm not judging.<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-q9ouaR61Ymw/UszEU2dsLEI/AAAAAAAAApI/YmoWByOJKNU/s1600/1464741_10153600959110075_56138601_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-q9ouaR61Ymw/UszEU2dsLEI/AAAAAAAAApI/YmoWByOJKNU/s1600/1464741_10153600959110075_56138601_n.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit T:</b><br />
Dad: I have a sore neck.<br />
Mom: Take your head out of your ass and it won't hurt so much.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit U:</b><br />
Mom: My feet are freezing.<br />
Dad: Oh you're weird, it's not that cold.<br />
Mom: Want me to put my feet on your belly so you can feel how cold they are?<br />
<br />
Dear Lord, I hope this isn't part of their foreplay.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit V:</b><br />
My parent's are building a shed together. It's comedy gold. But I'm steering clear because Dad is pissing Mom off and she has access to power tools. Because when the cops come I'll want to believe my Mom's claim that Dad fell on the drill and it became lodged in his orifice accidentally.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit W:</b><br />
Things my Dad says I don't understand #1: "I don't care if they're gay, but why do they have to have a parade? My tax dollars pay for that! You don't see us straights having a parade.<br />
Me: Well Dad, you go forth and have a parade, no one's stopping you - just dear God please don't wear buttless chaps.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit X:</b><br />
Discovered as I stumbled to the bathroom in the wee hours of the morning that my Dad sleeps with his door open, and only in his underwear. Does anyone know how to remove forks from your eyes because I still need to rinse with bleach and those suckers are pretty deep.<br />
<br />
In other news, I've decided lesbianism is a viable option.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit Y:</b><br />
I called my Mom in to watch my cousin's video on Facebook when she got home from work. It was so cute. We laughed and the she pointed to my tights and said, "God they're stupid." <br />
<br />
I love that woman.<br />
<br />
<b>Exhibit Z:</b><br />
I think my Mom is on the Freedom 60 Plan, but she's confused as to what it means. See she's not trying to sock away a ton of cash to go on cruises, etc......no, no...she's annoying coworkers, supervisors and well customers to see if she can get fired by her 60th birthday on the 13th. It's hard to believe at this point in her life that I have to tell her it's inappropriate to goose coworkers.<br />
<br />
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<span style="background-color: #eceff6; color: #444444; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span></span>Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-85129215328080154832014-01-05T12:03:00.003-08:002014-01-06T07:41:14.502-08:00Do it for Her.<br />
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Do it for Her.<br />
<br />
I've been thinking a lot lately about forgiveness, sometimes when I sit with clients what they say triggers me, makes me think about some of my issues, sore spots, wounds. Last week I had the discussion with a client about forgiveness and they said "I forgive myself for this, but I don't forgive myself for that." But. That's not forgiveness to me. Forgiveness is utter and complete and I called the client on this, but driving home it felt real hypocritical <span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">that I encouraged them to have this life of acceptance, forgiveness and abundance in their life when it hasn't been what I've always wished for myself.<br /><br />I've struggled with forgiveness and it's partner's in crime shame and self-bullying for most of my life. I have been so hyper critical of myself for all of my crimes, both real and imagined, for forever. It has been a never ending vicious cycle of blame, shame and repeat - repeat the actions that make me feel like shit about myself, the thoughts in a continuous cycle of hate.<br /><br />Well I'm not doing that anymore.<br /><br />I believe that we are given seeds of truth throughout our lives, some that grow and blossom quickly into knowledge that we can access immediately and others that take time to germinate and grow (okay, suck it I failed biology - be impressed I know the word germinate!). When I saw a therapist in college she did this exercise with me, she gave me a pillow and told me to hold it and imagine that it was me at age 5. I have a vivid imagination so this was quite easy. Then she told me to say all the horrible things to this 5-year-old self I was visualizing. I couldn't do it. I couldn't say those things to her, because in my mind it wasn't her who committed the crime that made her hurt - it was me. And thinking about it now, I didn't know I was capable of time travel, of going back in time and fucking the innocent, naive, clueless me of the past. Then she said, talk to that little girl, tell her what you want her to know. And I stumbled past the tears, stopping several times as the pain that came so deep from within my soul took my breath away and told her how I was so sorry that she had went through the horribleness and how I wished I could protect her and save her and that I loved her.<br /><br />It was a life changing experience. And I got the lesson. Well, partly. The part I didn't hear was that this self-forgiveness thing, it's a daily practice, hourly if need be.<br /><br />My new habit for self-forgiveness in 2014 is to take ownership for my actions, ask for and give myself forgiveness.....and on the days that I can't grant permission to the adult me starring back in the mirror I will look to these pictures and I will do it for her. Because she deserves a beautiful life and so do I.</span></div>
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-17800895268174633822014-01-01T14:53:00.002-08:002014-01-06T07:42:06.922-08:00Love you to Life.<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--LyMvk4J9EY/UsSa963PT-I/AAAAAAAAAnQ/XpjS8zdiQGo/s1600/529edf4491b095dca26e9ac6e0fd0e6a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--LyMvk4J9EY/UsSa963PT-I/AAAAAAAAAnQ/XpjS8zdiQGo/s1600/529edf4491b095dca26e9ac6e0fd0e6a.jpg" /></a>Maybe this used to be true, before but in the early hours of this morning, in the newness of 2014 I changed the negative thinking, started a new pattern. I thought about the roles we look for other people to fill in our lives, parent, mother, friend and I realized that I had the ability within me to fill all those roles. And yes, I need friends to fill me with love and acceptance but they can only be echoes of the love I give myself. And I suck at meditation, but this is how I did it.................<br />
<br />
I kissed the palm of my hand, brought it to my forehead and pressed it there, and whispered to myself: "In this moment, in this place and until I lay my head back on the pillow tomorrow night I promise to take care of you. I promise to protect you from ugly words and thoughts by bringing to light the beauty that is you and exposing the lies that have damaged you in the past. I will provide you with discipline, structure and a gentle ass kicking when you need it to help create this beautiful life we have designed in our head. I will remind you daily that you need to nourish your body with good food and exercise and I will listen patiently as you work through your excuses and then remind you why we did this and nag your ass till you do it. :) I will be the voice of reason when your body is weary and you're overwhelmed and you can't figure out if you're hungry, horny or lonely. <br />
I will give you space to be creative, to indulge in fantasy, wonder and magic. This I promise you."<br />
<br />
I brought my hand to my lips again, kissed it gently and held it to my throat and whispered: "In this moment, in this place and until I lay my head back on the pillow tomorrow night I promise to take care of you. I will help you to find the words as you walk alongside clients in their journey and the wisdom to know when your silence is what is required. I will clear that knot of self-doubt and fear that stifles your ability to speak your truth. This I promise you."<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MFMyeRsda-A/UsSca7TAIMI/AAAAAAAAAnc/UI4R8S2O-vI/s1600/20140101_012024-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MFMyeRsda-A/UsSca7TAIMI/AAAAAAAAAnc/UI4R8S2O-vI/s200/20140101_012024-1.jpg" height="200" width="171" /></a><br />
For the last time I kissed my hand and placed it on my heart and whispered: "In this moment, in this place and until I lay my head back on the pillow tomorrow night I promise to take care of you. I will love you to death.<br />
<br />
No.<br />
<br />
I will love you to life.<br />
<br />
This I promise you."Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-3281357263525401452013-12-22T14:07:00.003-08:002014-01-06T07:42:30.329-08:00Redneck Hair Club for Men<div role="article">
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<span class="userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}">My Mom and I braved the ice storm and walked across the street to wish my brother a happy birthday. When we arrived my Uncle Donald was there too. My Uncle Donald has always been a shit. When I was a little girl he'd tease the living hell out of me. When he still lived with my grandparents I'd call to talk to my Gramma and he'd answer. This is how most of our convers<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">ations would go when he would answer the phone:<br /><br />Me: Hi, can I talk to Gramma.<br />Donald: Who is this?<br />Me: It's Wendy! Can I talk to Gramma?<br />Donald: Well what do you want?<br />Me: I just want to talk to he, give her the phone ya jerk.<br />Donald: *hangs up the phone*<br /><br />As the only girl in a family of all male cousins I was always picked on but he just had an unholy delight in targeting me. It's partially because of him that I'm the smart ass jerk that I am.<br /><br />Thankfully, he has turned his fuckery attention over to my niece, Montana.<br /><br />So today the conversation started that he was bugging her because she had a ribbon in her hair and her response (because she's my girl and talks back!) was "well you don't have any hair!"<br /><br />So he proceeded to tell her that while yes he was balding a little bit that he was transplanting the hair from his ass onto the top of his head, that's why the hair on the top of his head was curly. Also, that he couldn't do it all at once because it hurt to "harvest" the hair.<br /><br />On my suggestion he's thinking about patenting the process. My Uncle, he's not only the President of the Redneck Hair Club for Men, he's a client.</span></span></div>
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-83318949528652871972013-12-12T21:14:00.000-08:002013-12-14T09:02:39.805-08:00Who am I?<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Who are
you? It’s simple enough really, this
question the facilitator posed at the team building workshop today at
work. Each person took a turn answering
the question and as I was last in line to go I listened to the other’s talk
about their roles as wives, parents, what they did for work as I searched my
mind for what I was going to say. <br />
<br />
When the facilitator arrived at me all I could say was “I don’t know who I am.” Because to define myself as a job, a family relation
(daughter, sister, etc.) just doesn’t fit anymore. I’m just Wendy. I’m this tangled ball of insecurity, hope,
wonder, magic, hurt, fire and tenderness.
I just am. And I’m not okay with
boxing myself inside the lines of roles, to limit who and what I can be. Yes, I’m the Sr. Bereavement and Palliative
Care Coordinator and I love my work, it nourishes my heart and my soul – but more
importantly than that – I’m WENDY. And I
am fully, wonderfully complete just being me, job or not.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I made this
collage of pictures of before and after weight loss and I would be furthest
from what would be considered a conventional success story. At my highest I was 285 lbs, at my lowest
197.9 and then life, cancer, the breakdown of a significant relationship (not
necessarily in that order) occurred and I ballooned up to 230 lbs. I lost my uterus to the Wendy vs. Cancer War
of 2013 and in the course of a month when I was recuperating I barely ate and I
walked away my pain. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1HCi0bT8tdk/UqqXE-ILScI/AAAAAAAAAjc/AOFTKf8Z5NI/s1600/collage_2013-12-12_23-41-37.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="472" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1HCi0bT8tdk/UqqXE-ILScI/AAAAAAAAAjc/AOFTKf8Z5NI/s640/collage_2013-12-12_23-41-37.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Together
with my trusty canine, Moses I roamed every inch of my parent’s property. I mourned, I hurt, I crumbled and I fell into
a bubble of pain I didn’t think I’d ever come out of, and all I could do was
put one foot in front of the other. And
I thought. And I let my Momma take care
of me. And finally the tears came and
only the trees in the forest bore witness….and Moses. He never left me. He became my constant. My best friend. Holder of my secrets. My savior.
And he didn’t care if I was 500 lbs or 140 lbs. He just loved me, Wendy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">And as I
made this collage I did it to say that yes, I lost weight but what I gained was
a life. That was me wearing a hideous
pink dress playing paintball – fuck yes that’s right, paintball!! That was me not hiding behind my coworkers
and sitting on the arm of the couch.
That was me sitting with Chris Witten & Erin Day-Nunn wearing a
dress that exposed all of my arm and I felt beautiful in my imperfection.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-565QJ8OtTS0/UqqXQYeZGFI/AAAAAAAAAjk/HOXz_N3Xyc0/s1600/1384179_687264517953484_542889251_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="185" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-565QJ8OtTS0/UqqXQYeZGFI/AAAAAAAAAjk/HOXz_N3Xyc0/s200/1384179_687264517953484_542889251_n.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
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<span lang="EN-US">So who am
I? I’m Wendy. And that girl, I like her a whole lot.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-42960095798903912142013-12-05T19:30:00.002-08:002013-12-05T19:30:58.993-08:00Happy Place<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3TPRFthHnAs/UqD2A0i3boI/AAAAAAAAAgo/QByZVFLgs5g/s1600/20131205_115648.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3TPRFthHnAs/UqD2A0i3boI/AAAAAAAAAgo/QByZVFLgs5g/s320/20131205_115648.jpg" width="235" /></a><br />
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happy place </div>
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place inside all of us where we are all happy and get the warm fuzzies. Our happy places are insulated from the shitheads that make up just about everyone we encounter.</div>
<div class="definition" style="text-align: right;">
<b>- Urban Dictionary</b></div>
</div>
<br />
I totally think that nuggets of wisdom come to you when you're in the right frame of mind to receive the message. The seeds of those words are planted but sometimes it takes time for them to germinate, grow and blossom (okay, I failed biology, suck it). That process of growth can be minutes, hours, days, months or even decades. For me the concept of a Happy Place is a really good example of that.<br />
<br />
As a survivor I became an expert at disassociating. It was a wonderful trick of the mind to leave my body, fly far away from the pain. Even when those horrible things weren't happening and I couldn't stand to be in my skin, to feel so vulnerable and unsafe in the world - when the shield of my fat didn't stop the panic, the scream rising in my throat I'd drift, float away in mind. Far away, where no one could hurt me.<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XlonaS7mKsk/UqD1_lpknOI/AAAAAAAAAgk/FORAPsye9cY/s1600/20131205_115005.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XlonaS7mKsk/UqD1_lpknOI/AAAAAAAAAgk/FORAPsye9cY/s320/20131205_115005.jpg" width="232" /></a><br />
When the concept of a "happy place" was introduced to me it was described as a place that you created in your mind where you could get away from the stress of life, a place to find peace. At the time I remember thinking, "but I already do that." And yes, in a way I did, but I think I missed a big part of that definition, an important part. See, when I disassociated from my body and floated away there was no peace in that place, it was just a dark void. There was no happiness, no sadness, just.....nothing. A bleak, dark, desolate prison in my mind where I could hide from pain. <br />
<br />
And when I was in my body I judged myself so harshly, those kids on the playground who called me fat, well they weren't even trying...the inner bullying I did to myself left wounds and scars inside that no perpetrator could ever match. Because I was always ready with a joke or inappropriate story I think I hid how I was feeling quite well, no one knew how I felt because I would never let myself be vulnerable enough with someone to share with them my broken, bruised heart. And that bullying and those lies I told myself that I wasn't good enough, that no one like me or loved me I never could describe it, but this quote does a pretty good job:<br />
<br />
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"<i>And it hurts that I can't be what everyone wants or what anyone needs</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>and it hurts that I can't be what I want or what I need</i></div>
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<i>because I'm not enough and I won't be enough and I'll never be close to enough</i></div>
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<i>and I'm just so damned tired."</i></div>
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<i>- a.d.r.</i></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2nTlD-v5KLg/UqD27bDYf4I/AAAAAAAAAhs/6vUVRJ4ifN8/s1600/20131205_120126.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="235" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2nTlD-v5KLg/UqD27bDYf4I/AAAAAAAAAhs/6vUVRJ4ifN8/s320/20131205_120126.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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In college I met a wonderful therapist, Kaia, and she helped me through some really dark times. That first year of college, I still don't know how I made it through when every class I had triggered me, an experience, a memory...there were days when all I could do was just dig my fingernails deep into the floor to stop from falling off my world. The first time I went to see her she asked how I was, I made a joke and said okay and she looked deep into my eyes and said "bullshit." And the floodgates opened. No one ever had seen past Wendy the clown to see the real me. Ever. And just like when you're a kid and you fall and hurt yourself, if your parent doesn't react and say "are you okay" all in a panic then you're all chill and shit, but as soon as they make a fuss you're a crying hot mess. Same deal with her. I couldn't reign it in, despite trying to be the tough girl. But she shattered my defenses, she wouldn't let me avoid and she wouldn't let me hide. She put a name to what I did when the abuse happened. She validated me and unlike with my family who also joked about everything (you wonder where I got it from), she took what I had to say seriously.</div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-brRiC8suOHs/UqD3W6thd2I/AAAAAAAAAiE/4391adbbucE/s1600/20131205_120343.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-brRiC8suOHs/UqD3W6thd2I/AAAAAAAAAiE/4391adbbucE/s320/20131205_120343.jpg" width="240" /></a>She helped stop the panic attacks, showed me how to create a safe place for myself when I felt I couldn't breathe and terror clawed at my throat. Kaia introduced me to other women, they too were survivors and their stories and shared experience made me think that maybe I wasn't alone in this. They echoed my thoughts of feeling dirty, guilty and full of shame. I was in a better place than I had probably been in years mentally, but I was far from well. I used school work to escape, to not connect with people my own age. I tutored and I was a note taker, I was even a foster parent. And I ate and I ate and I ate some more. Always going through periods of working out like a maniac for like 2 months, then having a set back and eating a fridge-and-a-half daily for 4 months. </div>
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It was always this one step forward, five million steps back. Because you see food had always been my secret love, my comforter, my confessor, my worst enemy and my best friend. I used food like some people use a razor blade to cut, piercing their skin, marking it....sometimes to have physical pain that could equal my emotional pain and other times because I wanted to feel nothing at all, to stuff and avoid and numb out and hurt myself for some transgression. And yes, the pressure cooker of emotions brewing in me had lessened, my time with Kaia and with group gave me space to let some of it out so I could at least function. Of course at this time I discovered my new drug of choice, sex. I had physical contact that I so desperately craved, connection and even if at the same time I was telling myself that I was ugly and that I was only good for sex. What I realize is that for me it was a form of control. I got to decide who got to have sex with me, it was almost a "fuck you" to my abusers to prove to them (not that they knew - I didn't say I was being logical) that I was in control. There was no love in these encounters, just control and touch. </div>
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When I graduated and was ready to leave college I got really overwhelmed again, out of control, not sure what my future held - and so damned scared of change that I went to that dark place again and things got really out of control....but I spoke about that in another post, I'm not going there again.</div>
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Those years after college were much the same. Avoidance behaviours, acting out sexually. Eating so out of control. Numbing out. Anything to face me. And their were bad choices and bad behaviours and inner bullying and bullshit. But there was also wonderful friends, cherished memories and gifts that I would never exchange. Of course I also had sporadic therapy and it would help, peel off layers of hurt but they all felt like crisis management..... I wouldn't go until things were so bad that I couldn't function again. It has seemed like I have always been striving for the "if only's". </div>
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If only I could lose weight, I'd be happy.</div>
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If only I could go on vacation things at work wouldn't be so out of control.</div>
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If only I could find a boyfriend I wouldn't be so lonely.</div>
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If only I could win the lottery I'd never have money problems.</div>
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If only I was anything but who and what I am I'd be at peace.</div>
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In everything I did I was always running at a million miles per minute, in my head, in my job, in my life. I don't think there was any time where I could just be. And as I look at the events of my life, the abuse, the bad relationships, the addictions and even the cancer I realize it was life trying so very hard to get my attention and me being the hard headed stubborn little bitch that I am I tried to avoid life at all costs. Short of taking a shovel and smacking me over the head with it life gave me sign after sign to stop, to slow down, to go to the inner but to no avail.<br />
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But there has been seeds germinating in my head from when I had cancer, words that a dear friend and fellow cancer survivor spoke to me. She said "Wendy, Stop. Breathe."<br />
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Little buds of that truth have been growing in my brain and when I started to take the anti-depressants in October the mental fog I had been blinded by lifted. And I started to stop. Stop saying yes when I meant no. Stopped pushing my body to exhaustion and really listening when my body said it needed sleep, food, water...love. I made playing with the dog a priority over staying at work for hours on end. Spending time with my parents and chronicling our memories on Facebook for all you to see touched a place in my heart and created joy. I breathed. Every day. Deeply. When I walk in the woods I slow down my breathing, force myself not to take greedy gulps of that sweet country air, but instead savour it slowly as I feel it enter my nose, throat, lungs....along with life, energy and abundance. And the exhale is stress, tension and strain...sending it back to the earth. I walk in prayer, this time that I hold sacred as I let the Universe heal me and in that solitude I have found peace and I've found me. It has taken 41 years and it may take another 41 but this journey into the very core of my being it has been an encounter with the divine. <br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PwXxgoBEPAQ/UqEuw4LZSiI/AAAAAAAAAi8/UZfsM_pETQs/s1600/288be1b0f0b7575769f1fe64cf63c3f8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="171" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PwXxgoBEPAQ/UqEuw4LZSiI/AAAAAAAAAi8/UZfsM_pETQs/s200/288be1b0f0b7575769f1fe64cf63c3f8.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
Slowly I am making peace with my past, memories that could once puncture and tear at my heart are now just lessons, gifts that have made me who I am today and I am grateful to be in a place where I can use that pain to help others. Never before have I been able to sit so fully with another's pain without my own being just a huge a presence. And as I cherish and nourish myself every day that well of giving that I have available just flows over for my clients and the passion and love that I have for this work fills my heart. <br />
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And that happy place, that mythical place in my mind that I create to avoid stress, well I don't need that because I am my happy place and life, it is a beautiful place.<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1AtsxYoGkn4/UqD1mtxiKgI/AAAAAAAAAgQ/Y77tzjCWR9M/s1600/20131124_094415.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1AtsxYoGkn4/UqD1mtxiKgI/AAAAAAAAAgQ/Y77tzjCWR9M/s320/20131124_094415.jpg" width="240" /></a><br />
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-43025120619894323802013-11-23T20:20:00.005-08:002013-11-29T17:11:19.482-08:00The Key<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3UeE8AWZDhg/UpFln74abKI/AAAAAAAAAbs/MDO_b947-oo/s1600/20131122_111937.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3UeE8AWZDhg/UpFln74abKI/AAAAAAAAAbs/MDO_b947-oo/s320/20131122_111937.jpg" width="240" /></a>I found the key to loving myself and it isn't to have a partner who tells me every day that I look beautiful (today I believe the exact phrase was "u looked amazing today.") - not that I don't appreciate that and encourage it but the key was me. I chose every day to fall a little deeper in love with myself.<br />
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I remember in College when I first started to see a therapist and was really struggling with being negative and hating myself. My therapist gave me this exercise where I was supposed to look in the mirror and tell myself that I loved myself. <br />
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Needless to say, I failed miserably at that exercise. I couldn't look in the mirror and face the woman staring back, all I saw was ugliness there and I would just look away after a few seconds. 20 years ago I wasn't ready to learn that lesson, it just wasn't time.<br />
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But it was my time now.<br />
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I took the path of least resistance and started with my hair - because it has always been the one part of me that I really liked and I focused on it. Even though as a kid I got teased for being a ginger and it made me upset, part of me always liked that I was different, special that way. Also didn't hurt that I've gotten a lot of compliments about it. At times when I just felt like a big, blob of sexless fat my long hair made me feel pretty and feminine. <br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F_9PTd7-IIQ/UpF3VsduXsI/AAAAAAAAAdI/Foae2lglWz8/s1600/20131116_080748.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F_9PTd7-IIQ/UpF3VsduXsI/AAAAAAAAAdI/Foae2lglWz8/s320/20131116_080748.jpg" width="240" /></a>I thought about how my hair colour is tied so much to my personality and that feisty-ness and what makes me - me. The length, the way it looks like dancing flames in the sunlight...... and I think it's just beautiful. <br />
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That I'm beautiful.<br />
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I started by looking at myself objectively, as if it wasn't me in the mirror - just a stranger that I was observing with none of the judgments that I'd place on myself.<br />
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I looked at the shape of my nose. The shape and size, and upon close inspection I was taken by how damned adorable it was. How cute, perky, perfect really. <br />
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But if I was entranced with my nose well then my lips were a revelation. That full bottom lip, the delicate pink .... and that's when I fell in lust. With that sexy bottom lip.... that delightful smirk, the devious smile. I traced my finger along my lip, following that line, across to the dimples that flashed in my cheek when I smiled.<br />
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And then there were my eyes.<br />
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Oh my eyes. <br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w34n72m33Jg/UpFxQWeYyXI/AAAAAAAAAc4/zd7n-XdWYsU/s1600/993453_10153461399670075_671993563_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w34n72m33Jg/UpFxQWeYyXI/AAAAAAAAAc4/zd7n-XdWYsU/s200/993453_10153461399670075_671993563_n.jpg" width="199" /></a>The almond shape and the way the colour changed depending on my mood; navy blue when I was angry or stressed, an almost grey when I was happy, turned on, at peace.<br />
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And my lashes, they were so long when I took off my glasses. I never noticed that before.<br />
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I fell in love with the curve of my eyebrow, the light, almost invisible arch.<br />
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My heart beat a little faster at the twinkle in my eyes, the depths I saw there, the pain, the beauty....like my friend Daniel says, you really can see a person's soul through their eyes. And unlike twenty years ago, I didn't look away from the pain this time, I saw it, I honored it and saw that it too was part of the loveliness.<br />
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I became enchanted by my eyes. They drew me in and when I looked at them I knew it was time for the love affair to expand.<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6DN3za8lFME/UpFlnjS8vuI/AAAAAAAAAb8/tN19YEwOoFI/s1600/2013-11-23+11.16.15.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6DN3za8lFME/UpFlnjS8vuI/AAAAAAAAAb8/tN19YEwOoFI/s400/2013-11-23+11.16.15.png" width="208" /></a><br />
In the past my body was a constant disappointment for me, a reason to feel ashamed..ugly. Having lost over 85 pounds meant a lot of excess skin, scars on the outside from surgeries, hyterectomy and then there were the scars that were on the inside. Those invisible ones that no one could see but that in my heart I felt were uglier than even that angry red line on my belly left over from removing my cancerous uterus. A past of sexual abuse and holding onto shame that wasn't mine to hold onto anymore had made it impossible for me to see the beauty in those curves. The femininity, the vulnerability, the beauty. People probably wonder why I take so many pictures of myself to post on Facebook and they most likely assume that it's because I'm narcissistic but the reality is that I'm getting to know me, to fall in love with me and sometimes I need that picture to really believe it is me. <br />
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I take a picture of the curve of my breast, the bones in my shoulders, those delicate bones that made me cry the first time they appeared when I lost the first thirty pounds. I take another picture to look at the shape of my bottom - a bum that actually has a shape now....that tapers down from my waist. Then yet another of my legs, legs that look impossibly long.<br />
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It took months this process, this love affair but this first part was kind of superficial... lustful. (I'm not saying that was a totally bad thing). What I wanted was not just to love the sum of my parts, I wanted to love ME. And as I thought about that I realized that love wasn't a noun, it was a verb and if I really wanted to love myself then it was action that was required. <br />
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After the diagnosis and the surgery I fell into a depression. A deep depression. Cancer had left my body but it still remained in my heart, in my soul...and on my mind. I couldn't change that. I couldn't stop myself from thinking every twinge, pain, bump or spot was the cancer returning. I wasn't sleeping. I was falling back into that same pattern of escaping life by working and pushing myself to exhaustion. And I felt like I was on the edge of a breakdown. <br />
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Hell, if I was honest I think I actually had a breakdown.<br />
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And that is where the action came in. <br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cKmDDWxlqu8/UpFlnADal9I/AAAAAAAAAbw/7iaiLf0PhT8/s1600/20131118_160401.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cKmDDWxlqu8/UpFlnADal9I/AAAAAAAAAbw/7iaiLf0PhT8/s320/20131118_160401.jpg" width="240" /></a>After giving myself a verbal ass-kicking that I sorely needed about having fought so hard to be well that I wasn't going to let myself throw that (and me) away. So I got help. I talked to my doctor, I talked to my boss, I went back to see my therapist. I took Friday's off and shortened my work week to 4 days instead of 5. Despite a lot of internal conflict I broke down and started taking anti-depressants. I started to be honest about what I needed and that included sleep, being around people I love, spending time with my boy...and making time for love. <br />
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It's only been a month but already I feel clearer mentally. I feel rested. I feel happy. At peace.<br />
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Is the exercise finished? No. Every day I commit myself to this life-long love affair with myself. <br />
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And life, it has become so very beautiful.<br />
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-15671814457927275992013-08-31T23:59:00.001-07:002013-11-29T17:11:43.601-08:00Weirdos with Ice Cream Cones Smushed on Their Forehead aka: Bogus Unicorns<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-uJIjRin_vzo/UiLk-mxbwzI/AAAAAAAAAZM/NMeEzkC-Hi4/s1600/unicorn-glamour-shot1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-uJIjRin_vzo/UiLk-mxbwzI/AAAAAAAAAZM/NMeEzkC-Hi4/s200/unicorn-glamour-shot1.jpg" width="153" /></a>Oh the world of online dating, it's like the Badlands of dating, the regular rules just don't apply. Dangerous territory really. Some men take the anonymity that is provided on sites like PlentyofDouche (thank you Kathryn MacPherson) and ask the most inappropriate questions - questions that if they asked in real life they'd get their faces slapped. Maybe this is just me, but no man ever has come up to me in the grocery store and asked me how big my breasts are!!! <br />
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Now if you know me at all, I'm inappropriate, but never, not once have I asked a man how big his dick is within the first five seconds of speaking with him online. Okay, once. But special circumstances applied, this is when my addiction raged and I was actually looking to get laid. Although I have to say I was a little more creative about it, I found "you have a pretty face, I'd like to sit on it" to be pretty effective. But some dudes, they're just crass. <br />
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But I digress. <br />
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Now that I've moved past the addiction and I'm actually looking for my Unicorn I just find these guys entertaining and I unabashedly enjoy fucking with their heads. I have to give some of them credit, they're nothing if not persistent in their quest to get laid but I always end up shutting them down.<br />
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<u><b>EXHIBIT A</b></u>:<br />
<b>BOGUS UNICORN:</b> Are you trimmed, shaved or natural? Because I prefer shaved.<br />
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<b>ME:</b> Oh that's your preference, is it? I totally get it, I have a preference for my sexual partner's pubic hair too - it's almost a fetish. I'm only really turned on by men who trim their pubic hair to look like David Hasselhoff - and not Baywatch David Hasselhoff, Knight Rider David Hasselhoff- bonus points if you can throw your voice and say "K.I.T.T.....K.I.T.T. I need you!"</div>
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<b><u>EXHIBIT B</u>:</b><br />
<b>BOGUS UNICORN:</b> "That's a pretty dress you have on in your picture, what were you wearing underneath?" (Their leery, ickiness is just oozing through the keyboard).<br />
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<b>ME:</b> "I was wearing military-grade Spanx, really the Hoover Dam doesn't have to hold back as much as these puppies. God help anyone who is close if they blow it'll take out a damned eye or even worse."<br />
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It's like shooting fish in a barrel really. :P<br />
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It seems like a whole lot of trouble, this search for my unicorn, but it is certainly worth it when you have conversations like this (getting ready for the wedding):<br />
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<b>ME:</b> "I need to go get beautiful."<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AsF69w71tu0/UiLk96VKQCI/AAAAAAAAAZE/VfqBzCHPiic/s1600/1233501_10153175954395075_550560002_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AsF69w71tu0/UiLk96VKQCI/AAAAAAAAAZE/VfqBzCHPiic/s200/1233501_10153175954395075_550560002_n.jpg" width="150" /></a><br />
<b>DA POSSIBLE UNICORN:</b> "You're beautiful right now. You're going to make yourself glamorous."<br />
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Yup....so worth navigating those weirdos with ice cream cones smushed on their foreheads. Mmmmmmmmmm....ice cream (Liz Epstein!).</div>
Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-66764006554529920582013-08-25T15:59:00.001-07:002013-11-29T17:12:12.865-08:00Dating & Unicorns<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YmqmAGInoMM/UhkbZ5HnbAI/AAAAAAAAAWE/mrKziB-GInE/s1600/1233333_10153163910930075_1886440467_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YmqmAGInoMM/UhkbZ5HnbAI/AAAAAAAAAWE/mrKziB-GInE/s320/1233333_10153163910930075_1886440467_n.jpg" width="212" /></a>I remember when I was little I used to be such a water baby. I loved the water, I loved swimming, I loved every little thing about it. As a chunky kid - yes, looking at pictures now I was chunky, I wasn't huge, I wasn't this fat blob I told myself I was in my head - the weightlessness of being in the water was my first experiences with disassociating. My fertile imagination dreamt up in depth scenarios where I was shipwrecked on a deserted island and there wasn't anyone around for miles or I was a beautiful mermaid with my long hair floating in the water behind me. I floated on my back, my eyes closed, the sun on my face.....and I just felt all the things that I didn't feel in reality or on land; happy, beautiful, safe, at peace. This was my safe place. No matter how horrible or hurting I was I could go to the water and I would almost automatically feel that serenity. Yet despite this being such a wonderful place for me, I still plugged my nose every time I went under water. I was convinced that if I didn't the water would come rushing in my nose, I'd choke and drown. Squeezing my nose was my protection, my control. If I did that, I'd be fine.<br />
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I'm not really sure whether it was that part of me that craved what had become my normal of feeling out of control and in danger or if it was my stubbornness that no one could tell me I couldn't do something that led me to make the climb up the stairs to the high diving board at the Lindsay Rec Centre. I know that I had a few botched attempts, one where I was actually standing on the diving board and had to shoo people out of my way to do the climb of shame back to the bottom 'cuz I wussed out. But finally I got to the top, my pride wouldn't let me turn around this time and I stood at the edge of the board, out of my mind with fear. It was deep, really deep there and I tried to think logically about what would happen, I'd jump (no fancy diving here, just your standard leap of faith) my fingers clamped around my nose would stop the water from rushing in and flooding my brain - I was a bit hazy on biology at the time, I didn't understand that if water came in my nose it would go in my lungs - and I'd hit the bottom and push off and swim safely to the top. <br />
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The first part went off without a hitch, I jumped. The second part, not so much. As I hit the water at top speed my hand was wrenched from my nose. I freaked. Silently, in my head...and I couldn't get my hand back up to my nose no matter how hard I tried. It took longer than I thought to hit the bottom...my panic made everything go in slow motion, my heart nearly stopping as I waited....and waited<br />
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for my feet to hit the bottom so that I could push myself off the bottom of the pool and rocket to the top. When finally my feet hit the bottom I was desperate, I launched myself up off the bottom as hard as I could but still time seemed to stand still and it was taking so long for me to reach the surface. My lungs were burning. I clawed at the water. I kicked as hard as I could, lifting my face upwards, searching for the surface. Just when I thought I would have to give in and take in a deep breath for my oxygen starved lungs my face broke the surface. I spluttered and coughed (and yeah a little snot came out), gasping for air and swam to the edge of the pool and pulled myself out of the water and shakily walked to the diving board and repeated the experience - to the exact same results.<br />
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Now what you'd think I would learn from the whole thing experience is that plugging my nose wouldn't save me from harm, that in fact it made it worse - which could be documented from my many ear infections during swimming season. But no, for years after I still plugged my nose. It wasn't until I was in my late 20's that I finally started to teach myself to swim without plugging my nose underwater. And now, I would never think about plugging my nose. When I go to the cottage and swim with my Boy I imagine that we're dolphins and I leap in and out of the waves, frolicking and playing - yes I still have that fertile imagination - and I have gained back my love of the water, I've taken away that need for control and I just surrender myself to the bliss. And I have to say that Moses has helped me to reclaim that joy, watching him "swimming" or his version of it anyway, he just does it with such abandon, such joy. Have I mentioned how much I love that dog?<br />
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What does this all have to do with dating you ask? Nothing, I just thought the diving board was a damned interesting story! Kidding. :) What it has to do with dating is that I've been approaching it all wrong. I've been trying to be such a control freak about it, pre-planning every move, putting measures in place that would protect me from being hurt and not enjoying the experience. it was, until I had a few realizations and I spent some time thinking about what my motives were in dating in the first place. Why was I doing this? What did I hope to gain?<br />
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I had the hysterectomy May 7th and was told that it would take 6 to 8 weeks to recover, well after the infection and news that the cancer had spread (thankfully I didn't require further treatment and the hysterectomy resolved the issue) I ended up "recovering" for closer to 3 months. Those first few weeks after the hysterectomy I was numb. I didn't want to eat, all I wanted to do was walk. And walk. And walk and sleep. Three hour, arduous walks during which time I didn't think about anything, I just strapped on my iPod and I roamed. I was staying with my parents for that first little bit as planned but still maintained my rental space in Ajax. I returned home after six weeks, still weak, still feeling like shit and bleeding like crazy and riddled with infection - waiting for the appointment with the oncologist to let me know my fate. Was it going to be chemo? Had the cancer spread? I don't know whether I've ever known "normal" in my life, but during that time I felt as far from normal as I ever had. When I got the news that everything was okay and I didn't need further treatment I just wanted to return to "normal" even though at this point my landlord had gone bat shit crazy and I had moved back to my parents. Everything felt so out of control but at the same time I felt like I had been given such a gift, a second (or more realistically eighth) chance at life.<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lRbHBP1FK1w/UhqJJ5dN7HI/AAAAAAAAAYE/ihSg-K6VJYY/s1600/4e9c1c084dedcff583539674bbac350c.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="86" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lRbHBP1FK1w/UhqJJ5dN7HI/AAAAAAAAAYE/ihSg-K6VJYY/s200/4e9c1c084dedcff583539674bbac350c.jpg" width="200" /></a>So I started online dating. And I found myself doing the same stupid, self-destructive shit I did before. The pictures I posted were of me showing an impressive amount of cleavage, I stated I wanted a relationship, but in my heart I still thought I didn't have what it took to be in one. I went on a few disastrous dates and was left feeling horrible. Hurt. Sad. I did a lot of self-reflection after that and gave myself a much needed ass-kicking. I did not go through hell to have this life of misery - especially since most of it was self-inflicted. And I decided, this I'm not good enough shit? It's done. No more. This thinking I was only good for sex? Hell. No! And doubting whether I had what it took to be in a relationship??? Yeah well I beat cancer, I can do anything. Most importantly though, I reminded myself of how fucking fabulous I am. I am beautiful, funny, compassionate, kind and I deserve the same level of awesome in a partner. And at the end of the day, it's all a little too ridiculous to even take seriously and I needed to relax, let go of my control and just have fun. And oh, it has been such fun. :) <br />
<br />
I've learned a lot about dating from my "Bachelors" (I refuse to learn their names until they prove themselves worthy of the effort). Here are just a few random facts/observances; <br />
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<br />
<ul>
<li>When dating men, you have to be good at math, always subtract 2 from every measurement they give you.</li>
<li>Men will make outrageous claims to get into your pants. I once had a guy tell me that he could help me lose weight through having oral sex performed on me - damn and here I've been busting my ass with diet and exercise - LIKE A SUCKER!</li>
<li>Bachelor #1 named his penis Henry. To all men everywhere - that's just creepy and contrary to what Bachelor #1 believed, not cute at all.</li>
<li>When on a first date it is NOT okay to take multiple pictures of your date - and if you do you shouldn't act all pissy-pants when they ask if you are part of a white slave trade ring. </li>
<li>Acceptable contact/PDA's on a first date are: kissing my hand, gently placing your hand on my back when going through a door, hugging at the end of the date. Unacceptable contact/PDA's include: dry humping me at the monkey cage at the Peterborough Zoo.</li>
<li>Acceptable PDA's AFTER we've been dating for awhile: full on tonsil-hockey style kissing, holding my hand, grabbing my ass. Unacceptable PDA's AFTER we've been dating for awhile include: dry humping me at the monkey cage at the Peterborough Zoo.</li>
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<b><u>Kissing Techniques</u></b></div>
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Now this needs to be its own paragraph because kissing is important. When it comes to seduction and sexual thrills a man who can kiss well is imperative. What I've discovered is that there are a lot of men out there that are horrible at it. I've placed them in the following categories:<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-q-KOaQTyXRQ/UhqJJ5HYVrI/AAAAAAAAAYM/DJBtrhX0bBY/s1600/1150231_10153124916115075_1546346280_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-q-KOaQTyXRQ/UhqJJ5HYVrI/AAAAAAAAAYM/DJBtrhX0bBY/s320/1150231_10153124916115075_1546346280_n.jpg" width="320" /></a>THE DIVER - this guy tries to explore the depths of your tonsils by ramming their tongue deep, deep down your throat as their opening act. <br />
THE BLOW UP DOLL - utilizing the same skills needed to blow up an air mattress (or similar item) for kissing they form a tight seal over your lips and ram their face as hard as they can into yours.<br />
THE CHICKEN - A quick peck on your lips, almost impersonal, which doesn't sound that bad but is horrifying for someone who is scared of chickens.<br />
THE PUPPY DOG - my whole face is wet after this experience: nostril or eye socket wetness is not uncommon and is oftentimes followed by having my leg humped. <br />
<br />
What I have been looking for is a Unicorn. A rare man that I didn't let myself believe existed. One that was intelligent, funny, compassionate, kind......not perfect, but actively working on making himself better every day. One who recognized how awesome I am, who wanted to be with me, loved spending time with me but also had interests, hobbies, passions outside of me too so that when we came together it was magic.<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ruvcBhrHxQo/UhqJK5K9EPI/AAAAAAAAAYc/rRmh86dIczk/s1600/f1afae0ad2ef29b6c855f086befa1d61.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ruvcBhrHxQo/UhqJK5K9EPI/AAAAAAAAAYc/rRmh86dIczk/s200/f1afae0ad2ef29b6c855f086befa1d61.jpg" width="200" /></a>Someone who would stand by me as I fought my demons - and I could do the same for him. What I realize is that I already talked myself out of the unicorn before I even started the search. I told myself it didn't exist and if it did I certainly didn't deserve it. What bullshit. What a coward's way out this line of thinking because all it really boiled down to is that I wanted to save my heart from being hurt. But hearts are made to be broken, to feel joy, love and yes, hurt and this protection I try to put around my heart it is all a lie, I love people - I'm always going to love people and for me to live without them would mean my death. So hurt is inevitable. So enough fighting myself. Enough protection. I'm all in. I'm going to love myself - and make room for my unicorn too.<br />
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-84633368169316674952013-08-14T05:45:00.001-07:002013-11-29T17:12:33.385-08:00Adventures at the Gym<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VSNHoydkdOk/Ugt7YVxFNSI/AAAAAAAAAU8/kTzFP-lhIno/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VSNHoydkdOk/Ugt7YVxFNSI/AAAAAAAAAU8/kTzFP-lhIno/s200/photo.JPG" width="150" /></a>Whoever said that getting up first thing in the morning to work out is a good thing is basically a dirty liar. The one and only shower in the house is leaking and Billy has been trying to use his mad plumbing skillz to fix it and replace the taps - that was last week and during his reno's I have been able to at least bathe but not shower. Well yesterday he got the new tap and replaced it - now I can't bathe or shower so I dragged my ass out of bed at 5 am and went to the gym to work out and to shower. That's just a godawful hour for anyone to be awake especially since I was up at 1 am, 2 am and 3:15 am (just to switch things up) with the mother of all hot flashes. Anyway, I jumped on the treadmill half asleep and started at a very slow pace. I'm quite sure I dozed off and woke up startled that I was fully dressed and apparently walking uphill briskly on the treadmill, I may have screamed a little - at least I think I did given the response of the guy next to me. So after 20 minutes on the treadmill I switched to the elliptical, or as I refer to it: Satan's Spawn. Like really, who in the holy hell is coordinated enough to move their arms and feet at the same time - well I mean other than the line of other people using making it look effortless - but real people, klutzes like me it's just a disaster waiting to happen. Don't ask how but I managed to trip while using it and had to use the arm thingies as holy shit handles. It was embarrassing as hell but probably burned a few extra calories there. <br />
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On the up side I totally got hit on today at the gym, this lady stood outside my shower cubicle and watched me shower - totally inappropriate but flattering - I mean sure she was around 70 and probably Dementia was a factor but I'm taking it as a compliment. Clearly I'm a hit with the senior, lesbian crowd.<br />
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Also, can I just say that I'm totally loving my ass lately? I mean yeah, it's big but before it was just a big blob - now I see a curve. <br />
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Here I thought that not riding the bus anymore would mean that my adventures would be over - but nope!!! Really it's about perspective and attitude and I just see opportunity for fun everywhere. <br />
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Have a wonderful day all!Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-20507494786403395422013-07-11T00:26:00.003-07:002013-07-12T12:16:51.682-07:00The Storm<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7D_kd1wbeGI/Ua_wDSsocXI/AAAAAAAAATI/BIQ_6KR05kM/s1600/1e19b40952b7d329837277e53bd30a06.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7D_kd1wbeGI/Ua_wDSsocXI/AAAAAAAAATI/BIQ_6KR05kM/s200/1e19b40952b7d329837277e53bd30a06.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>The wind howled, the rain beat mercilessly against the ground, I burrow deeper into my coat but the force of the rain batters against my face, the rain so cold that it penetrates through the layers of clothes and skin to settle deep into my bones. There is no reprieve from the elements, standing alone in that bleak, open field. Branches from the trees that dotted the fence line come crashing down. The thunder booms, echoing in the vast emptiness sending vibrations deep in my chest like when the guy next door cranks the bass on his car stereo and blasts shitty 80's metal. The flash of lightening illuminates the terrain, casting shadows and heightening the impending sense of doom and danger. The air was alive with electricity...the force of mother nature produced an unequal carnage. I struggle to maintain my footing, the ground underneath me made unstable as the rain slowly turns the once hard earth into mud. The world feels off-kilter, dizzying blows come from every side and while I am scared, terrified really, the tears remain stuck in my throat, a dull ache in my chest as I focus all my efforts on remaining upright as my body is pummeled by the unseen forces. All my senses are heightened and dulled at the same time and I find it hard to make sense of what my eyes see I'm so </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>overwhelmed by the assault to my senses so I shut down a little, experience tunnel vision focused on one thing: staying alive. And after what seems like hours the winds start to die down, there is an eerie calm, an uneasy silence. I breathe, my lungs gratefully gulping in the air and I start to gain my footing, the world finally righting itself and I gain my equilibrium. I feel a reprieve, a calmness settling assuming that the worst is over but it is only the eye of the storm and just as I lose that sick feeling in my stomach it comes back, stronger, harder....the winds don't scream, they howl...the rain is like someone is standing over me with a bottomless bucket and I'm drowning....it </i></span><i style="font-family: inherit;">steals my breath and the scream that tried to escape. The water accumulates quickly under my feet, seeming within seconds to rise to my ankle, then to my knees....swirling angrily around my thighs...dragging me down, pulling me to my knees. I struggle, trying to pull myself upright but now there are waves and they are crashing over my head again and again. I lose track of time, what could have been minutes or hours or years pass by as I struggle to keep my head above water, to gasp for air and fill my screaming lungs when </i><br />
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finally the winds subside....the rain gentles and I tread water. And miraculously the water it starts to calm...and lower, until I find I can stand....shivering, my clothes plastered to my aching body. Slowly the water ebbs away, the clouds start to clear and with it all of my energy....I fall to the ground unable to get up, my brain and body bruised beyond reason and still that edge of fear that this is not over, it can't be over ...and then blackness as my body and mind snap and I collapse to the ground.</i><br />
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<i>I wake up panicked on the ground, the soft earth warm beneath my face....scrambling to my feet, casting my eyes to the sky looking for the dark clouds...and there is none. The sky is a brilliant blue, the sun bright and warm, I can see this with my eyes but I don't trust it...I can't trust it. When I started this journey I knew where I was going, there was a destination, but I can't remember what it is now...my mind can't seem to grasp the strings of that memory yet I know in my heart that whatever that destination was I can't go there anymore for it has forever changed.
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g5wn4xlGnbs/Ud5ZYh8OxsI/AAAAAAAAAUk/4bmhm53fsDg/s1600/542365_402684516485244_1989594051_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g5wn4xlGnbs/Ud5ZYh8OxsI/AAAAAAAAAUk/4bmhm53fsDg/s200/542365_402684516485244_1989594051_n.jpg" width="178" /></a>I started this blog post three weeks ago, a friend sent me that .jpg about the storm, it was so fitting a description of this cancer journey, but all I could put in was the title, I couldn't find the words to write. I couldn't find my voice beyond that lump in my throat, that lump I tried to ignore because I was so afraid to let that storm loose. I have been living in a constant state of fear, every pain, every twinge of my body settling all I can think is "oh God, it's cancer." I let myself believe that first time that everything was going to be okay and I let myself feel safe and then more bad news hit and now I don't know what to trust, I don't know how to lose this wild eyed fear inside my belly. And then I think maybe the point of all of this wasn't to lose fear, but to use it. Yes, cancer can come back, I could get hit by a bus, aardvarks could attack me in my sleep.....in the end, I can die. Not I can die, I'm going to die....but it can be 5 minutes, 5 years, 5 decades from now but what really matters is how am I going to live? Am I going to go back to how I was living before, ducking my head and plowing through the world ignoring my hurting heart? Or am I going to really take time to cherish my friends? To ride that roller coaster? To hug my Mom? Am I going to use this experience to fuel my heart, my passions and really live life eyes wide open? Fuck yes!<br />
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So this next chapter of my life, it's about healing and building relationships and friendships and focusing on the good and the possible. xo</div>
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-59168953595371845682013-05-24T20:07:00.002-07:002013-11-29T17:13:09.621-08:00It's Gonna Suck.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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“<i>I can’t tell
you exactly what your journey is going to look like, everyone’s is different,
but I’m not going to lie to you, it’s going to hurt and it’s going to suck….a
lot</i>.”<br />
<br />
<o:p> </o:p>“<i>For how long</i>?”<br />
<br />
<o:p> </o:p>“<i>As long as
it takes</i>.”<br />
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It’s the same nearly every time, meeting with
people who have suffered the loss of a loved one, especially if it is their
first one, they want to know what to expect.
When I meet a person that first time, I may know a brief history of
their loss but literally everyone’s reaction is different, but whether it’s the
ones who sit there shell shocked as if they’ve been through a war and stare
blankly at me almost as if they can’t remember why they’ve come or the angry
ones whose sadness and hurt is so overwhelming that they revert to anger because
it hurts a whole less than the sadness in their heart or even the ones who sit
there, crying into tissue after tissue apologizing because they can’t stop
crying it’s always the same version of a question. What next?
I don’t have any concrete answers for anyone, I can’t make the pain go
away, I can’t stop their hurt and while it may sound weird, I don’t want to. This is their journey and those feelings –
even the painful ones – and to take that away for them means that they miss out
on something they need to experience. It
took me a few years (okay closer to a decade) to realize you can’t fix people
and it’s really arrogant to think that I can or should even try. What I can do is assure them that whatever
they are feeling or experiencing is normal FOR THEM – you’d be surprised at how
many people are concerned about grieving “correctly,” whatever the heck that
is. I can sit and be present with them
as they tell their story, not flinching from the pain but holding it and
honouring it and giving them a space to let it out. I do that for clients, yes because I get paid
but also because I love the work, it is my passion and I think that there are a
lot of people wandering this earth hurting because they never got a chance to
grieve and it doesn’t have to be like that – not for them and not for me
either.<o:p></o:p></div>
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For the last 2 weeks I’ve found myself wandering
into rooms not remembering why I went there, feeling fuzzy mentally and numb
most of the time depressed at others, wanting to be alone, not wanting to eat
and unable to sleep and it’s only now that I realize that I’m grieving. I guess I have the excuse that I’ve been
healing physically and dealing with pain but underneath that focus on healing
there was that little lump in my throat that I could never quite swallow
down. Those moments when a few stray
tears would fall. I don’t know if I’ve
been trying to be a tough guy so I don’t have to deal with the enormity of the
pain, but if I am then that’s okay, I give myself permission to. Our brains have this safety switch that makes
us numb out when something traumatic happen – it knows when we can’t completely
absorb the enormity of something so it shuts itself down and then releases
information out in little drips, in pieces we can handle without completely losing
our shit. (Sorry to get all technical
there on you). I had my surgery on May
10<sup>th</sup> and I have to say that the last few weeks have just been a
blur. I’ve went for walks with the dog,
played cards with my Mom, helped Dad around the farm but it’s almost as if I’ve
been standing on the outside watching myself do these things. I nap a lot and even though the pain in my
body has subsided I feel exhausted all the time. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-54_vfYeesE4/UaAlq91vMeI/AAAAAAAAASY/g6LZXqImUrE/s1600/oh+ya.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-54_vfYeesE4/UaAlq91vMeI/AAAAAAAAASY/g6LZXqImUrE/s200/oh+ya.jpg" width="150" /></a>My parents left for the cottage this afternoon and
after I ate dinner I bundled up and went for a walk, my iPod on shuffle. I don’t think I quite made that first field
before the tears started pouring down my face.
My brain finally released that information that has been there all
along. I am never going to have my own
biological baby. I am never going feel
my child growing in my belly. I am never
going to hold them in my arms and rock them to sleep. I won’t be able to kiss the top of their
little head and feel their breath on my neck.
When I was in high school I didn’t have much of a social life, I worked
at the local grocery store after school on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday night
until 9 pm and all day Saturday. After
work at the grocery store (except Wednesdays) I would go to my babysitting gig
and they would drive me home usually at around 2 am. They had a little girl who was around 3,
cutest little curly haired blonde angel named Tricia and a baby who was around
3 months old named Michael. I loved those
kids. Tricia and I would play until it
was time for her to go to bed and then I’d stay up with the baby, rocking him
to sleep in my arms. I never wanted to
put him down, I would just rub his back, kiss the top of his fuzzy little
head….and trace my finger on his cheek - his skin, it was so soft. Life then was horrible. I was so unhappy and sad at school and home,
but those moments with those kids and especially with the baby it just felt so
right. I was so good with kids, they
never made fun of me – and they wanted to spend time with me. They didn’t care what I looked like, that I
never had a boyfriend, that I didn’t fit in….they just accepted me. In all the unhappiness and chaos of my life
at that time this was my calm center of the storm, my safe place. At those times I would dream of having my own
children when I got older, because surely life wouldn’t suck then, right? In college I did two placements with children
and babies and they all loved me, I had the knack to make babies stop crying –
and at the one community center I had a baby in each arm most times. When I first started as a foster parent I had
babies, toddlers, older kids and I was good with them, even when at times I
felt way over my head. Then came the
teenagers… and the challenges they brought with them – and one lifelong
friendship. I guess what keeps coming
back to me is the words of my Gramma Bernice said to me when I was in my early
twenties: “I want to meet your babies.”
Well, that’s not going to happen.
And it hurts and it sucks, just like I said it would. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-S9DxDkRRXU4/UaAlnUgrYcI/AAAAAAAAASQ/lDYVYRyBkM0/s1600/bee.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-S9DxDkRRXU4/UaAlnUgrYcI/AAAAAAAAASQ/lDYVYRyBkM0/s200/bee.jpg" width="150" /></a>It’s funny, in school we learn how to add numbers
together, how to read, to learn about chemicals and plants, about distance
lands and wars and the acts of our ancestors.
These are all important things, and while we may never have practical
need of some of these things (I’m looking at you Calculus when I say this) they
make us more interesting as human beings and hopefully somewhere along the line
we learn something that will have meaning later in life but no one taught us
how to grieve or what to do with emotions that seem pretty overwhelming at
times - that seems like a pretty important part in being a human. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vdTevGiLb18/UaAlqpSOk5I/AAAAAAAAASo/ilVd3wAWZ-4/s1600/moe.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vdTevGiLb18/UaAlqpSOk5I/AAAAAAAAASo/ilVd3wAWZ-4/s200/moe.jpg" width="150" /></a>Next is listening to my body, my heart and my
mind. Sleeping when I’m tired. Eating when I’m hungry. Crying until it feels like my heart is
shattered in little pieces. Walking with my bee eating boy, because he makes me happy. Walking every inch of this property, slowing down to remember to breathe, smelling the cedar trees and feeling the damp earth beneath my feet, my safe place to cry, to yell, to scream out loud at the fucking unfairness of this all...or to just to have time alone to figure out how I feel, to find some peace in the silence. I know I've been isolating myself, it feels like just being around people is so draining and I can't handle it, but don't worry Amie, I won't forget to crawl out of the rabbit hole...I just need time. On June 18th I get my results, I will know then whether I have to have chemo or radiation or if removing my uterus has contained the cancer - and I'm scared what those results will be. Every little twinge, pain anything I think it's cancer. And I think that's probably pretty damned normal too - well normal for me. And when this is all over I will figure out a new dream and try to be brave enough to fight for it. But that will come in time, for now I need to listen to my heart that is aching for a good cry. This one does it to me every time. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-73569664302532548542013-04-24T21:06:00.001-07:002013-05-04T20:56:49.948-07:00The Real Fairy TaleEvery girl knows the story line to follow, we don't even have to read from the cue cards we know how the perfect fairy tale unfolds; boy meets girl, they fall in love, get married and live happily ever after. Sure I was the little girl who grew up on the farm, who more often than not was found covered from head to toe in mud, but I read those books and if I had only them to rely on to judge how I'm doing at this thing called life I'd be royally boned today. See I got to watch a fairy tale unfold right before my very eyes, one more powerful, meaningful and real than any Princess who found her Prince Charming (who was clearly a necrophiliac and into running around kissing non-responsive women. I really do wonder how that fairy tale ended, did he only get off if she "pretended" to be asleep?). <br />
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Before I continue this story I need to apologize to the lady who told it to me, she lived this experience and dealt with harsh judgment and probably a lot of shame. When she told me this story she asked me not to talk to other people about this and I have respected that until now, I am not telling this story to place judgment on any of the people involved, I wasn't there. All I can say is that I'm sorry Gramma I love you so much and miss you every day, but I need to tell your story so that I can heal this part inside of me that is hurting so much right now and to find the hope and strength I need to carry on and I hope you find it in your heart to forgive me, wherever you are. <br />
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My Gramma and I were best of friends, she was always so kind and loving - quick with a joke and she had the cutest mischievious grin ever. I was so socially awkward growing up, I didn't have a lot of friends and I had a Dad who drank - this woman she made me feel so loved and she lived close to me too. I spent a lot of time with her as a teenager, I'd drop in after school to talk to her when I went away to college we wrote back and forth and called all the time. They were comfortable, but never rich by any means but she gave me a gift no money could ever buy, the gift of herself. We had real conversations, I could talk to her about anything and I got to ask questions and ask about her life...this story is pieced from those conversations.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-584Td226ci0/UXc_c9Zw4eI/AAAAAAAAAQw/VecOBKsWzno/s1600/Gram.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="270" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-584Td226ci0/UXc_c9Zw4eI/AAAAAAAAAQw/VecOBKsWzno/s400/Gram.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">My Gramma Bernice and the love<br />
of her life, Grampa Jimmy.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
She grew up with like a million (okay, probably 10 or 11) brothers and sisters and with that many kids they didn't have a whole lot of money but the way she talked about her parents I got the picture that where there wasn't an abundance in "things" there was in love. She only attended grade school and then she worked at a store at some point and then she met my Grampa Jimmy. I don't know all the details of this other than they had a relationship of some sort that he was her childhood sweetheart and then somewhere along the line they had a fight and broke up. (I don't know all the details because although I appear to be perfectly fine with asking inappropriate questions - just ask my friend Leah who had to field questions as to whether the Church was okay with nuns masturbating - but even I have limits when it comes to those kind of details with grandparents). Anyway she then met and married this other man and had my two older uncles and my Mom. I never met this man, he's not my grampa. He wasn't a nice man, he drank, spent all his pay on booze and then came home mean and violent. They would have to run to get away from him into the ditch. But this was the 50's (ish) and there was no supports in place then for battered women. To have known my Gramma, this beautiful soul, the tiniest woman ever and to think of anyone laying hands on her or scaring her makes me physically ill - and not just because I know that experience all too well myself. <br />
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Then somewhere along the line my Grampa Jimmy came back into the picture and they got together. Don't ask me the details of when or how, I don't know - and honestly, I don't care. She divorced my Mom's Dad and married my Grampa and together they had two more boys - but he was a Dad to those three other kids from day one. And again, I wasn't there - and I know there was a lot of hurt and anger on some sides but all I know is that my Grampa was one of the best men I have ever had the privilege to know. He always had perfectly coiffed hair, he used this cream to smooth it back and he had a well trimmed beard - he was a quiet man but then he'd slide these great zingers in, he had a wonderful sense of humour. When I was a little girl I would run and get the comb so I could sit on his lap and comb his mustache. For a little girl whose father barely acknowledged her you don't understand how much that meant to me. You can't even begin to imagine how hard it is to type when you're crying this hard. <br />
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They weren't the storybook perfect couple, my Gram swore like a sailor and because of her stomach issues (or so she said) she did have some flatulence issues which would piss my proper Grandfather off to no end. He always said she did it on purpose... and her story probably would have rang true if she had wiped the damned shit eating grin off of her face. I never once heard them raise their voices to each other, yeah they fought, but it was respectful fighting and there was no ill-intent there. One of the best memories I ever have when I was in high school and we had this big bonfire and my Grampa put his arm around my Gramma and pulled her close - my parents aren't affectionate like that with each other - seeing their intimacy and how loving they were with each other - it still touches my heart. Of course once when he was drunk he grabbed her boob and she was always goosing him, but they had romance too. Are you really shocked? It's my family! :)<br />
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I was in high school (the mid-90's) when my Gramma had a heart attack, I was there when it happened. She threw up again and again and she was in such pain, laying on the bathroom floor and my uncle had to call the ambulance. My Grampa never left her side, not once. He went to the hospital every day, helped her to recover...held her hand. He was her rock. She recovered, thank God...and I remember us laughing about the book they sent home with her about having sex after a heart attack. I was never more grateful in my life than when she came home and I knew that she was going to be okay. It nearly tore my heart out watching her in that bathroom in so much pain, and I couldn't help her. <br />
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In the late 90's my Grampa was diagnosed with bowel cancer and it was my Gram's turn to become the rock - she never left his side either. He had treatment and he was so sick...this vital, strong man just sat on that green chair in the living room or laid on the couch...the morphine making him so sick and pale. Although he still found it in him to make fun of my car. I was so proud, I had a Barney-purple Geo Metro, I drove it up close to the house so my grandparents could see it. He got his can and looked out the door for a few minutes, said nothing. Then out of the blue he says "it's small, has it been sick?" Fucker. lol. <br />
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He died when I was away on a work trip to Vancouver. I didn't get to say goodbye. I didn't get to tell him I loved him and how much he meant to me and when I walked into the funeral home and saw him laid out in that casket I cried like I never have in my whole life. And my Mom, the woman who was never a hugger came over to me and folded me in her arms and I wept. <br />
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The night of the wake I asked Gram if I could stay over with her and she said yes. I remember we were getting ready for bed, they had a waterbed and a wall with carpet on it - wow, the things I remember..anyway we both just got settled and we were talking for a little bit about Grampa, the wake and how much we both missed him. Then there was silence. I looked over at her and said "Gramma, did you fart?" Thank God it was a motionless mattress because she quite literally shook with laughter, we both had tears in our eyes from laughing so hard.<br />
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She never married again, or dated... she was still in love with him and really I still always felt his presence in that house, sitting in the green chair. <br />
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Some time in the early 2000's Gramma got diagnosed with Colitis, she was really sick could eat barely anything without it ending in some sort of explosion. Still, she had the best sense of humour ever, we could always make each other laugh. She's always come into my parent's house and grab the leaves of this plant by the door and literally maul it and ask if it was real....my Mom was like "yes, ya bitch, stop wrecking it." Man she would laugh. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zeklFHH4_9Q/UXc9lVak0kI/AAAAAAAAAQU/DviCBWpyVzc/s1600/23859_10150140953920075_361767_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zeklFHH4_9Q/UXc9lVak0kI/AAAAAAAAAQU/DviCBWpyVzc/s400/23859_10150140953920075_361767_n.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I have very few pictures from my wedding, but<br />
this one I cherish with all my heart. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
When I got married a friend gave me beanie baby bride and groom bears - my Gramma collected beanie babies and I helped her to find some to add to her collection. Anyway, we went to a family potluck and I brought the beanie babies to show Gramma. Oh how she fawned over them, I packed them away and didn't think about it again. Well two weeks later in the mail I got a package, in it were the two beanie babies with a note that said "don't you love us?" Bitch. So then Steve & I moved into our first apartment together in Bowmanville, she and Mom came to visit. I took them for the very brief tour (it was tiny but beautiful and by the water and you could hear the train), we sat and chatted it was great. Two weeks later again I get a package with the beanie babies in it - she had stolen them! Well I fixed her little red wagon, at my wedding I bought another pair of identical beanie babies and enlisted the help of one of the groomsmen to help with the massive prank. So at our head table we had all these flowers, candles, etc. and my set of the beanie babies...well at one point I removed them and hid them under the table and then our grooms man stood up and announced "someone stole the beanie babies!" and then everyone from the head table looked at my Gramma. She was mortified! I laughed my ass off and then pulled out the other set and gave them to her. lol....she took it like a champ.<br />
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SIDE NOTE: An even better story of revenge around my wedding was that my Dad always used to say that I was the mail man's kid - the mail man being Perry Grandell who wasn't even the mail man when Mom was pregnant, but whatever. He really wouldn't let it go, so I put an announcement in the local paper that said Perry Grandell and Gwen Gray (my Mom) along with William Gray are happy to announce the wedding of their daughter.... It caused quite the stir. And go figure, Dad was pissed. Tight assed bitch. Ha!<br />
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My Gram and I stayed close and I called her all the time, she was like my go-to person when something good happened, hearing her voice just made me happy. I never really told her about the bad stuff, I don't know why - I guess I didn't want her to be disappointed in me and of all people she could have related the most. I don't live in regret, but there are days that I wish I had reached out to her, but it's hard to reach out to anyone when you're busy punishing yourself I guess and I forgive myself for that...and I know she does too.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cT9VIKX3qsI/UXimNdIoTYI/AAAAAAAAARI/zAz3qf8HezE/s1600/4371213541eeac7cffbf2b6a9bd168d1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cT9VIKX3qsI/UXimNdIoTYI/AAAAAAAAARI/zAz3qf8HezE/s320/4371213541eeac7cffbf2b6a9bd168d1.jpg" width="240" /></a>Not long after my wedding my Gramma got gall bladder cancer....with mets, well everywhere. She died just before her birthday in July 2005. I remember her laying in that bed, so damned little and in so much pain and I was so filled with anger that this woman, this beautiful, wonderful woman had to suffer so fucking much, I was rocked by the unfairness of it all. She never complained, when I went to go see her in the hospital - she'd ask how I was what was going on in my life. We still had real conversations, even in that hospital where she spent her last days. I told her I loved her every time I left, I hugged her when I saw her and I hugged her even tighter when I was leaving. At then end when they called the family in I was the last one to arrive, everyone else had went in and said their goodbyes so I went in alone and I sat with her. She wasn't conscious. She looked so damned peaceful and even though she was in a room by herself the room felt full, and I knew she wasn't alone. Think what you will, I don't have to defend myself but I saw little tiny pinpricks of light around her bed and whether they were angels or relatives who had already passed on who came to be with her, I felt at peace knowing she wasn't alone. I held her hand, I told her I loved her and I hope that she heard me. <br />
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So what does this have to do with my story? Why did I have to tell hers? Because their story is all that gives me hope some days. I have hope that there are men who love their women and don't yell and scream and hurt them and then call that love. I have hope that there is a time for romance....sickness, love, everything, every wonderful, beautiful, painful part of this life still left to live. And listening to this song I think what I got out of spending time with my Gramma in the hospital is that she didn't need me to make things better for her, she didn't need me to take away the pain (although I really, really wanted to more than anything), she needed for me to treat her like a person. She needed me to make it okay to laugh, to cry, to hug....to just be. And from the other side as someone who is going through this right now I get the perspective of maybe not knowing what to say. The other lesson I have learned is that I can't live my life wrapped up so much in my own pain that I escape and live in my head because I miss out on all the wonderful people in my life and being there for them - and that's not okay with me. I can't escape from life. I'm handing in my title, I don't want to be the Queen of the great escape anymore.<br />
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I have been vulnerable and scared in my life and before I used being overweight as my shield, to make people not want to be near me - and now, now when the pain feels so overwhelming and like my body is betraying me that feeling of being vulnerable and scared has increased tenfold because I feel like I couldn't protect myself. I need to remember, I'm not in that place anymore. I'm safe. I have beautiful, wonderful friends who love me so much, I've never had a greater outpouring of love and that's what I need to immerse myself in, the love - not the pain. How can I not be living my very own fairy tale? I have friends who are throwing me a farewell to my uterus party and sure it would be cool if the uterus-shaped cake Amie was making me had strawberry jam in it so that it exploded when I cut into it - but her way is good too.<br />
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I think Pink says it best: "I'm terrified of the dark, but not if you go with me."<br />
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Love,<br />
Wendy<br />
xoWendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-26158621958040089862013-04-05T18:16:00.005-07:002013-05-25T06:14:04.387-07:00My pen is a razor and I have been bleeding...Anthony Beal<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 17px;">We accept the love we think we deserve. --Stephen Chbosky</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">I've given this quite a bit of thought, and I'd say in excavating my past relationships that this has been the problem all along. I thought I had done a lot of work around this in the past year and a half, made changes in how I felt about myself and what I deserved but there is still a hesitancy, not believing that I deserve good. Even after agonizing and working up the courage to work towards things I want, I run away the minute there is a bump in the road - I interpret those bumps as an indication that I'm not enough, that no one would ever want me and that I am flawed beyond redemption. </span></span><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bjRLDumQqbU/UVcRSPFyv8I/AAAAAAAAAPo/6dyUsw_P1Qs/s1600/164_16430275074_2279_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bjRLDumQqbU/UVcRSPFyv8I/AAAAAAAAAPo/6dyUsw_P1Qs/s200/164_16430275074_2279_n.jpg" width="150" /></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">This has been what my mind has struggled with since weight loss surgery, I thought what I was fighting against was the half life of not being able to physically be a part of the world - well now I am and that hasn't fixed the core of the issue. I have been so busy fighting fat, fighting cancer...fighting with myself - half in love, half in hate with myself and I realize that's the problem. I'm fighting all the time but the fat - it's part of me. The cancer - it's part of me too. I'm not usually a stupid person but man I have been dumb as shit, I stopped losing weight right around the time I abandoned the promise I made to myself that I mattered and I would do everything to take care of myself and work towards health and happiness. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">I don't know why I thought my inability to salvage a marriage that was sick on so many levels was all my responsibility - but I thought it was, I thought I should have been able to fix it, fix him, fix me. And it would have been our 11th wedding anniversary on April 6th and I miss him, not the bad times and the fighting and the anger, but I miss him. He was the first man who ever loved me when I was massive and felt so ugly inside and out. And now that so much has happened health-wise a lot of the bullshit has just been cleared and I realize I love him, he was the first man I ever loved and in my heart I will always love him. </span></span><br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Efsh_KXsrNM/UVdht7KhjWI/AAAAAAAAAQA/3CRh54BvpJg/s1600/2013-03-30_16-39-11_295+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Efsh_KXsrNM/UVdht7KhjWI/AAAAAAAAAQA/3CRh54BvpJg/s200/2013-03-30_16-39-11_295+(2).jpg" width="150" /></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">I have avoided writing about him, I told myself it was because I didn't want to bad mouth him, and that's true... but not the whole truth. I think the real reason I haven't written about him is because it hurts so fucking much. He was my best friend - and good or bad (and yes, there was a lot of bad) - and sometimes I still want to pick up the phone and tell him about my day. I wanted it to be a good goodbye with him, in our marriage we had tons of time for blame and I didn't want our divorce to be about that. I realize now that I have done myself a disservice by not writing about him, he is part of me - I carry him with me and to not honor that and work through the pain has only added to the weight on my shoulders - and today I let that go, it's not mine to carry anymore. I don't need to to bad mouth him, I don't need to excavate the past and lay it out for the world to see. I've found peace with him and I can honestly say that I will always be happy that he was in my life and at his heart he is a good man, his intentions are so pure but like me he just didn't have the skills to make a relationship work: communication, self-worth...I could go on but there is no point. All that matters is that I wish the best for him, love for himself, romance, happiness and health and I know he wishes that for me too. So today I raise a glass to "Steve & Wendy" and I will be sad, just a little but the devastation, the guilt and blame, it's gone. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">One day there will be romance in my life, I know now I will not always be alone. I still come with flaws and scars, but they are beautiful and so am I and for the person who is worthy of my love and trust well we will build a life on mutual respect and support. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">This song, it means a lot to me...and I dedicate to Steve & I to the love we shared and the love that is still to come in both our lives. </span></span><br />
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-36923130019723695032013-03-17T18:55:00.001-07:002013-03-17T18:55:25.472-07:00Cancer: The Drinking Game12 hours, 45 minutes until my appointment with the surgeon. It seems really, really real now and I'm petrified - so scared of the unknown. I know that I should be focusing on questions to ask, plot out how I'm going to navigate the next few months but I can't do it. There is something in my brain that is just not letting me process this whole thing, my brain feels so fuzzy and I am beyond overwhelmed. So, I'll do what I do when I am put into a situation I don't feel equipped for - stupid shit. So here it is, I've decided to deal with this diagnosis by creating a drinking game. All I need is a flask and a shit load of alcohol and then the rest just works itself out.... so here are the rules...<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NQF8x3xfjLM/UUZzvW3hP4I/AAAAAAAAAPY/O-6wzT6Vitc/s1600/1742_624129797612866_707143569_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NQF8x3xfjLM/UUZzvW3hP4I/AAAAAAAAAPY/O-6wzT6Vitc/s320/1742_624129797612866_707143569_n.jpg" width="231" /></a><br />
For every time someone uses the following words I'll take a shot:<br />
Abnormal<br />
Early Onset Menopause<br />
Cells<br />
Prognosis<br />
Biopsy<br />
Numbness<br />
<br />
For any of the following words full on beer bongs:<br />
Side Effects<br />
Recurrence<br />
Removal<br />
Chemotherapy<br />
Radiation<br />
Explosive Diarrhea<br />
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<br />
Oh fuck, who am I kidding? I just want my Mommy. :(<br />
<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-483702757696080532013-03-12T19:01:00.000-07:002013-03-12T19:05:04.197-07:00Cancer is an Asshole.<div style="text-align: justify;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-a3UGuUSyFH4/UT5np76YfYI/AAAAAAAAAOo/0wvjK1meG94/s1600/ArcSoft_Image382+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-a3UGuUSyFH4/UT5np76YfYI/AAAAAAAAAOo/0wvjK1meG94/s1600/ArcSoft_Image382+(2).jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My Ren & Stimpy shirt always makes me feel better.</td></tr>
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<b><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">XXXX</span></b><br />
<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">hey</span><br />
<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">does cancer hurt</span><br />
<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">like right now?</span><br />
<b><span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wendy Gray</span></b><br />
<span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">the cancer part doesn't. it's the cysts on my ovaries that are rupturing that hurt</span><br />
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<b><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">XXXX</span></b><br />
<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">are you scared</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wendy Gray</span></b><br />
<span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">yeah</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's weird, I knew I had the appointment on March 4th to get the test results for the biopsy but for some reason the week before I experienced this rush of energy, it was like a switch got flipped in my head and I felt such hope and drive, something that has been missing for awhile. There was no reason, just a bubbling of joy inside me that couldn't be contained. My intuition, it's usually bang on and I know when bad - or good things - are coming, but I was way off on this one. I had a lot of people offer to go to the appointment with me, but I turned them all down, part of it was because I didn't want to put anyone out...but that wasn't the whole reason. The big reason was that I felt like I had to do this on my own. I have held onto this guilt and shame, that part of me that believes I deserves cancer and the pain the comes with it, I've believed that this is all mine to bear - I damaged my body by letting myself be so fat and unhealthy and felt so dirty and ashamed of the things I have done when I was hurting so bad. I thought I let that go, came to peace about it all, but cancer came to call and all of this insecurities and blame and shame just came to rest in my heart. And I hate cancer for that....I hate that it stole that gentleness I had found for myself, the love and confidence I worked so hard to find. I got really overwhelmed and I reverted back to my old ways of just pushing things down and pretending that I wasn't scared or hurting - and beat the shit out myself verbally and mentally. It was a brutal beating, one I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. And I masked it, I masked that fear with anger...blinding hot anger at cancer, the situation, myself. Then on Wednesday night I lost it. I was putting my hair in a ponytail, getting ready for bed and I caught sight of myself in the mirror - and that girl I saw looking back looked about 8 and so scared and lost and I broke. I cried myself to sleep that night...and the next. I didn't get much sleep in the next few days, but I found something in that time - peace with myself. I have told myself that I have to be strong...but I don't want to be strong anymore, I want to be real....and the reality is that this shame and this blame isn't mine anymore and I'm done punishing myself with it. I really saw myself in that mirror - something I haven't seen a long time and I realize I've been hiding, I haven't been real and those things that I have tried to keep hidden, those imperfections - they have gained too much power - robbed me of joy. So here they are, the scars - the imperfections...and they can hold no power over me anymore. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This scar on my hand, the white line that follows just below my thumb it's from carrying beer bottles around when I was 3 and dropping them on my hand.</span><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9MIGHYxpQvE/UT_ZCjgWkzI/AAAAAAAAAO4/6X0azVHi6wA/s1600/beer+bottle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9MIGHYxpQvE/UT_ZCjgWkzI/AAAAAAAAAO4/6X0azVHi6wA/s320/beer+bottle.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I was 7 I was riding my bike down the hill near my house, I hit a pothole in the dirt road and flew over my handlebars, landing on my hand - I walked home crying, blood running down my face - there's still a dent there, but it has faded - I think only I can see it.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-UsIKig6Cvyo/UTlQd1eg3fI/AAAAAAAAANo/v2sZPxhJkGg/s1600/2013-03-06_22-32-42_934+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-UsIKig6Cvyo/UTlQd1eg3fI/AAAAAAAAANo/v2sZPxhJkGg/s320/2013-03-06_22-32-42_934+(2).jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the scar I woke up to on my belly when they were only supposed to take a cyst but ended up taking the ovary...and my hope. For years I tried float away from my body and make myself believe that this body wasn't mine. Today I trace the scar with my finger, it feels kind of neat...it's not ugly, just another battle wound, proof that I survived.</span><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DIRiVDAsxPo/UTlQfQ8RmCI/AAAAAAAAANw/v1F0qFo2a1g/s1600/bye-bye+ovary.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DIRiVDAsxPo/UTlQfQ8RmCI/AAAAAAAAANw/v1F0qFo2a1g/s320/bye-bye+ovary.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In 2011 I had weight loss surgery - 5 little cuts where they opened me up and re-arranged my guts...and gave me back my life. They look like little bullet wounds intertwined with the stretch marks. I never wanted these scars to heal, I wanted them to stay red and angry so I would never forget the price I paid, the pain. But I don't need that reminder, I will never forget.</span><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YkY1yEnNTl4/UTlQfyJ6mkI/AAAAAAAAAN4/zmdX7mSZY-8/s1600/2013-03-06_23-27-56_396+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YkY1yEnNTl4/UTlQfyJ6mkI/AAAAAAAAAN4/zmdX7mSZY-8/s320/2013-03-06_23-27-56_396+(2).jpg" width="179" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I was big I would never wear my hair in a ponytail, my neck it was so fat it looked like I had a hump and there was an angry line where the base of my neck met the hump. I cried the first time I wore a ponytail and there was no hump....I still do some days.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So here I am, imperfections and all. Nothing hidden. This is just me. And I'm still scared but I'm scared and I'm free. Whatever happens next I am making a promise to myself: cancer isn't going to take anything from me, shame and guilt, there is no place for it anymore. Oh there are going to be weak moments, but nothing is going to take my joy, my bliss, the fire in my belly or the beauty in my life. I will reach out to those people who love me and allow myself to be cherished and loved. I will take risks with my heart. I will find someone that deserves my love and trust and for that person I will hold out my bruised and beautiful heart and it will be good. I'm suiting up kids, full-on super hero mode - my own hero.</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong>XXXX</strong><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: blue;">Hey
bud, I am so glad to hear that you are feeling better.</span><span style="color: #333333;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong>Wendy
Gray</strong><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: magenta;">Thank
you XXXX, it's been a rough year but I'm not giving up.</span><span style="color: #333333;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong>XXXX</strong><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: blue;">I like
to think of these little jolts of super power as vines and we just swing from
vine to vine. It's pretty fun sometimes, right?</span><span style="color: #333333;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: magenta; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong>Wendy
Gray</strong><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: magenta;">That
is pretty much the best analogy I've ever heard to describe it.... ya when I'm
in my super hero/power mood I have so much fun. Inappropriate fun, sure but
better than being a miserable bastard.</span><span style="color: #333333;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong><a href="http://www.facebook.com/JayKing71"><span style="color: #3b5998; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">X</span></a>XXX</strong><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: blue;">Let's
build more vines.</span><span style="color: #333333;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Q660bl3tuco/UTlVoyuCb1I/AAAAAAAAAOQ/pWQ72ihiSPI/s1600/b3e7_self_rescuing_princess.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Q660bl3tuco/UTlVoyuCb1I/AAAAAAAAAOQ/pWQ72ihiSPI/s200/b3e7_self_rescuing_princess.jpg" width="200" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Not Princess - Queen!</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><b><br /></b></i>
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<i><b>"To be a princess is to play at life. To be a queen is to be a serious player....The purpose of life as a woman is to ascend to the throne and rule with heart."</b></i></div>
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<i><b>- Marianne Williamson</b></i></div>
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Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-82769026474040187162013-02-13T19:58:00.004-08:002013-05-25T06:09:09.045-07:00Love<i>Love is great, love is grand, but love ain't chemotherapy - it's not going to magically turn some sick fucker into a healthy fucker.</i> - Dan Savage<br />
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Some people use public transit as a means to get to work, but for me it has become so much more, a time to reflect, relax, annoy other commuters and to just stop the busy-ness and focus all on me. This morning I had a moment when I was sitting in the bus shelter, texting friends and making plans, Facebooking others and checking in, responding to inappropriate posts people had put on my wall (I really appreciate this part) and I realized how very much I am loved. I am surrounded by it, by love, kindness and caring of friends and family, I'm encircled by it - when I am in a dark place all I have to do is reach out my hand and a million hands reach back, pulling me out of that place. Even when I let the darkness take over and I am so overwhelmed that I can't reach out they come to me in the darkness and sit with me in my pain, hold me and love me.<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-IItK5NZgjWw/URxgpG7NpiI/AAAAAAAAAL0/yuS-tAnS9uo/s1600/477e4b88fecd0993765f2ec7d5976625.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-IItK5NZgjWw/URxgpG7NpiI/AAAAAAAAAL0/yuS-tAnS9uo/s200/477e4b88fecd0993765f2ec7d5976625.jpg" width="200" /></a>There are a lot of goals I have made for myself out of this whole experience with weight loss, recent ones; weight loss, health, travel... but the biggest one, the one that has been in my heart for ever is to not be lonely. I wanted to not be that fat little girl who spent every recess sitting against the cold brick wall of the school watching others on the playground laughing and playing and feeling so utterly alone and beyond sad. But like all other goals that I thought would be achieved by wishing and hoping for a miracle this too required work - hard work. With weight loss it has been moving my bum, eating well, being accountable to myself. Travel meant taking responsibility for my finances and saving. Health - being my own advocate and kicking and fighting until I am heard - well, I'm working on this one. But to not be lonely...well that has been work too, work on myself. The biggest part of my loneliness was that I didn't even love myself, didn't believe that I deserved to be loved and cared for. That has been hard, sifting through the past discovering truths and dispelling lies.... looking in the mirror and loving the woman behind those eyes. It has meant exposing my hurt, myself, my core to the world on Facebook and on my blog and being vulnerable, open to rejection, ridicule. And more importantly it has meant being a friend - inviting people into my life. And this is a work in progress. But today this writing by Rumi says it all.<br />
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<i>Love came, </i></div>
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<i>and became like blood in my body.</i></div>
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<i>It rushed through my veins and </i></div>
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<i>encircled my heart.</i></div>
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<i>Everywhere I looked, </i></div>
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<i>I saw one thing.</i></div>
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<i>Love's name written</i></div>
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<i>on my limbs, </i></div>
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<i>on my left palm, </i></div>
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<i>on my forehead, </i></div>
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<i>on the back of my neck, </i></div>
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<i>on my right big toe…</i></div>
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<i>Oh, my friend,</i></div>
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<i>all that you see of me</i></div>
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<i>is just a shell,</i></div>
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<i>and the rest belongs to love.</i></div>
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<i>- Rumi</i></div>
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-42792265636405546082013-02-03T18:07:00.002-08:002013-03-13T09:38:51.473-07:00When my feet are in stirrups you laugh at my jokes!<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #351c75; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">The box of letters I wrote my Gramma Hazel while I was in College that she kept till the day she died. I added the ones my Gramma Bernice sent me to the box - this is the most treasured item I own and when I feel down and lost I re-read these letters and I find strength to move forward and reading those letters from 20-year-old me, I fall a little in love with that girl who was so idealistic and funny.... and become so damned sad that I nearly threw it all away and killed myself. If only I could have seen then what I see now. (By the way, the return address on that envelope said Wendy Einstein-Gray - I thought I was so damned clever, but fuck it I made the Dean's List I was impressed!</span></td></tr>
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It's a pretty nice view I have from my cozy bed, it looks super cold out this morning, one of those sunny, crisp days where you just know your snot is gonna freeze the second you step outside. Still, when my grandparents were alive often on these cold Sunday mornings we'd all bundle up - the whole gang, my family and aunts, uncles and cousins - and head back to the woods where my grandpa had built a cabin nestled in this little clearing. In general I have a shit memory but to this day you could blindfold me at their front porch and I could lead you through those trails they had cut through the bush to that clearing. That sweep of lawn that used to have those four big oak trees (I think they're oak. Fuck it they're big, I got that part right anyway). There are only two now, the one up by the road they cut down when I was in my teens, it was messing with the power lines, Grampa cut a big whiskey barrel in half and put on top of that stump and filled it with soil so Gramma could plant flowers in it............ <br />
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<i>..........On a totally unrelated to this blog note, in an impressive feat of driving I managed to put my Dad's truck up on top of that whiskey barrel when I was learning to drive. I got freaked out when I had to turn and instead of putting on the brakes I just pressed harder on the gas. Long story short, Grampa made one killer speed bump which luckily stopped me and the truck from barreling (pun intended) into their living room. Funny enough my Dad was not even a little bit impressed with my mad driving skills. Oh well...back to my story...........</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #351c75; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">My Uncle Donald... aka: The Fucker.<br />Funny, even those people who he<br />wasn't related to called him that. He<br />teased me and tormented me as a kid, but<br />I know that's how he showed me that he<br />loved me. And I love him, more than he'll<br />ever know. When I was a kid and stayed<br />at my grandparents house for dinner<br />he'd do anything to drive me nuts<br />like take his half eaten pork<br />chop and put it in my mashed potatoes.<br />Anything to make me yell at him. <br />Or, I'd call to talk to Gramma and he would<br />answer and instead of passing the phone<br />to her he'd try to get me to tell him what I wanted<br />and when I wouldn't he'd hang up on me. <br />Such a fucker - yet my favourite uncle and yes,<br />it should have been my<br />Dad who said the words "I loved you<br />from the moment you were born", but<br />coming from him it was just as sweet.</span></td></tr>
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Where was I? Right, the Stephen King-like long ass description of a lawn. So anyway, past the lawn to where the cars were parked - in the summer time Gramma planted rubarb and peonies (to this day peonies are my favourite flower) in alternating bushes beside Robert's shed. It's weird, Robert (my grampa's Dad) had died decades ago, yet it always remained his shed. The chicken coop was to the left - the place where my fear of chickens was born. In the fall when it was time to kill the chickens my bastard uncles would force me to hold them and I'd inevitably drop the damned things because I got creeped out by their talons of doom. Then they'd make me hold the string that they had tied around the chicken's neck as it was placed between the two nails on the block of wood - you would think that I would find some small satisfaction in knowing that one less chicken would be on the earth to plot against me but I didn't have time for that as they'd toss the newly severed head at me making me scream. Then you had to pass the barn where we used to explore and play in and through the gate to the field. That field sometimes had cattle grazing in it and we would have to jump the electric fence - and not stand too close to that fucker Uncle Donald who would try to grab your hand and then the electric fence so you would get the shock. The wind whipped across that field because there was no trees to buffer it and between that and dodging fresh cow patties that was probably the least fun part of the trip...but once you got to the end of the field and entered that gate oh that is when the fun started. My grampa had a whole "graveyard" of old cars and trucks back there from the 50's onwards.... it was almost creepy and cool at the same time seeing those abandoned cars and making up extraordinary stories about them in my head. There were probably 30 or 40 of them, half of them that my Uncle Allan (the mechanic) would restore when he was younger and use in cop chases with my Uncle Donald. When Grampa died the auto wreckers came through and took away those vehicles and I felt a sadness at that time I couldn't quite explain. Then came the actual forest, that path was full of cedar trees that just smelled so damned yummy, the air was so clean and crisp and we'd all frolic and play - some jerk would eventually take one of the snow leaden branches and grab it so the person behind them got covered in snow... or barring that a snow ball fight would ensue. That path wound through the woods, you could hear the creek trickling in the background...and it was so warm there, sheltered from the winds. The path split at one point and if you went to the left there was another, bigger clearing where the tree that got hit by lightning was but if you went to the right that led to that special place - Grampa's Shagging Shack. It was a little wooden cabin with a wood stove, it was far from fancy yet it had Grampa's old recliner there and their old kitchen set and of course the obligatory topless Sunshine Girl pictures. Just in front of the cabin was this perfect spot that was surrounded by huge cedar trees (yes, for sure they were cedar trees)...and we would build a fire and put hay bales around it and talk and roast hot dogs and marshmallows and talk and laugh. Those days, they were magic. And when your hands got cold you would go into the cabin and the heat from that wood stove would warm you right to your bones. Oh how I miss those days.<br />
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Why am I telling this story? Because I'm stuck in my bed, the pain has reached the level where I can't breathe without it hurting and my stomach is upset and I have to focus on something good or this will consume me. I'm hurting from the Oncologist appointment where they took the biopsy to test for uterine cancer and the bleeding and pain hasn't stopped since. Everyone asks me why I didn't take someone with me to my appointment but there is just that part of me inside who feels that this is my fault - that I didn't take care of myself, let myself get so fat and I brought it on myself so I need to deal with the consequences on my own. I know that's stupid, I do in my head, but it is my heart that needs convincing. I have never felt so much dread going into a hospital ever before - because I had walked this walk before, I had a cancer diagnosis and I knew what was coming. So in typical Wendy fashion I started cracking jokes. The doctor who instructed me to put my feet in the stirrups didn't even crack a smile. I panicked, tensed up knowing what was coming next and that probably made it even worse. I sobbed through the entire procedure. The tears ran down my face, I couldn't stop it, I couldn't control it the intense, sharp pain of her using that instrument inside me was unbearable. The nurse held my hand as the doctor kept telling me to relax and I fought the urge to kick her in the face. It probably only took ten minutes for her to get the sample but it felt like hours. And all I kept thinking was please God, make this stop - I can't do this anymore. After she was done they left me to get dressed but I couldn't, I just sat there and sobbed, covered in blood and doubled over in pain. Finally I was able to get dressed and walked to the bus stop and took the long bus ride home. <br />
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So now I have to wait until March 4th for the results - a full year since the original problem and referral took place so until then I am going to focus on me, continue that archaeological dig of my past - sift through the debris for the truth - because as I mentioned before my memory is shit and I really need to look to find the good and the wonderful of who I was and who I am and looking through these photos I think I am finally getting a glimpse of that.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yVAuKXuqV9M/URwpufW7efI/AAAAAAAAAKU/Ux2a9XUt_hQ/s1600/2013-02-13_15-12-40_716+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="221" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yVAuKXuqV9M/URwpufW7efI/AAAAAAAAAKU/Ux2a9XUt_hQ/s400/2013-02-13_15-12-40_716+(2).jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gramma Hazel & my niece Montana</td></tr>
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My Gramma Hazel was so proper, an English teacher and Sunday school teacher to boot. She still had that sense of humour about her though - I remember when she was 80 how she was listening to a rock station every morning to listen to the DJ's daily funny - it was always a pretty inappropriate joke. When I was little she lived across the street and would come and babysit me while my Mom was off driving the bus. She made every little thing special - she would make us tomato and mayo sandwiches and serve them on my little table and chair set my Uncle Donald had bought me. When my brother and Patricia & Elyn would stay over on New Year's Eve she would always have a little bottle of champagne and give it to us in fancy mini plastic wine glasses. She died a few months before my wedding - and I was devastated....she was such a huge part of my life. She was classy, generous and she had such a solid sense of self that I always admired and still try to attain. Her faith in God was unwavering but equal to that was her faith in herself and I carry a part of her with me that brings me such comfort. She was so<br />
different from my Gramma Bernice, she came from a more affluent city background, she definitely had more education and she was very, very practical - and I loved her - still do actually, but in a way that<br />
was so different from my other Gram. It's weird though when I went to college and all the stuff around the sexual abuse came out, it was her who I told about it all - wrote about it to. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DzH0QhUCXo0/URwpwNMuGJI/AAAAAAAAAKo/amIlY-0leo8/s1600/2013-02-13_15-14-28_968+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DzH0QhUCXo0/URwpwNMuGJI/AAAAAAAAAKo/amIlY-0leo8/s200/2013-02-13_15-14-28_968+(2).jpg" width="111" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My Gramma Bernice and<br />
Uncle Doug</td></tr>
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This lady... oh how she holds such a tender place in my heart, I loved her smile and her laugh...still when I'm sad I think about her and her laugh and it brings me such comfort. My Gramma Bernice (my Mom's mother), she was my rock in the world. I always knew just how very much she loved me and thought I hung the moon - because that look in her eyes was reflected in mine. She faced some really rough times with an abusive first husband - but she persevered and left that bastard and married her childhood sweetheart. Because of her I have a love of Smarties, she used them to teach me how to count and my colours and at Christmas time when she was doing her baking and making her special Smartie cookies she made a batch just for me. She found humour in everything... .and she suffered, oh how she suffered with colitis and then the cancer. When I am hurting and scared I think of her and of how brave she was, how she handled things with such grace. I love her and miss her every day - and I am so happy that she was in my life, she saved me. It's funny, she never had as much money as my Gramma Hazel but she gifted me with something I have treasured far more than any gift I have been ever given - she shared herself with me. She talked about her past, how she felt....about who she was as a person and she gave me the space to share the same with her. If I'm even half the woman that she was I will be happy.<br />
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Me and my best friend Patricia (we are the two standing on the ground), I was always taller than her, but looking at this picture I wasn't that big - I thought I was the size of a moose. Trish and I always joke that we were put in the crib together, but it's not far from the truth. She has always been in my life, she knows me the best of anyone in the whole wide world. She knows my fucked up family and laughs when I tell stories about them. I never had a sister, but she pretty much was. I love her with all of my heart - and I consider<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-weacwL1dWYA/URwpvIYBcsI/AAAAAAAAAKg/GOSzQbalfcI/s1600/2013-02-13_15-10-42_924+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="111" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-weacwL1dWYA/URwpvIYBcsI/AAAAAAAAAKg/GOSzQbalfcI/s200/2013-02-13_15-10-42_924+(2).jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Me and my best friend Patricia - that's her sister Elyn on the float<br />
doing her Canada's Next Top Model pose.</td></tr>
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her family mine....although I'm still not that cool with vacuuming when I go to her parent's house or going down the stairs to that creepy ass basement to get bread from the freezer. Some of my best memories of my life involve her, a lot of times at my parents cottage laying on the dock and looking at the expanse of stars and talking about everything that was in our hearts....or just laughing and being highly inappropriate. Even though we have had times where we didn't even live in the same country when we came together it was like we had never left each other's side. This woman, she was God's gift to me and I hope she knows how much she means to me.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1gng10Asfdg/URwsxMzT3RI/AAAAAAAAAK8/w8h3iROPI_E/s1600/2013-02-13_15-11-58_530+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="179" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1gng10Asfdg/URwsxMzT3RI/AAAAAAAAAK8/w8h3iROPI_E/s320/2013-02-13_15-11-58_530+(2).jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grampa Jimmy (R) & Len Barr (L) at New Year's Eve</td></tr>
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And then there's my Grampa....yep, the dude with the Kenny Rogers beard and festive hat. I can't even look at his picture without wanting to cry. He was such a good man, when I was a little girl he would let me sit on his lap and comb his mustache. He treated my Gramma Bernice like a Princess, yeah he was human and he would get mad but he also had such grace and love in him. He was tender and in my world men weren't tender. He was a father to kids that he didn't have to be, he was respectful and loyal and amazing. He stayed by my Gramma's side when she had a heart attack, they were each other's best friend and when he had cancer and was on morphine and snapped at her he cried because he had hurt her and apologized profusely. If I ever decide to pursue a relationship in the future it will be with a man like my Grampa, I won't settle anymore. I remember after he died and we went back to my Gramma's house after the funeral and I swear I saw him in that green chair in the living room - his presence never left that house. When my grandma died and my aunt and uncle took over the place I felt like I couldn't go in that house anymore because it would be too painful to be there without them in it but once I did I felt such peace because I knew that they would have wanted my Uncle Allan and Aunt Donna to live there - things were as they were supposed to be.<br />
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I laid in my bed surrounded by these pictures and I felt so very loved at that moment, but it is still so hard some days to reconcile that girl who was adored with memories of feeling so ugly and damaged and broken inside. I do an exercise with groups - I have them sit in a circle and in the middle I put an object - usually a cardboard paper towel tube and I color it all different colors so if you are sitting on one side of the circle you won't see the same thing someone on the opposite side of the circle will see. The lesson is about perspective and seeing things from someone else's point of view. I think I need to learn that lesson, perspective and what other people are seeing, not just my tiny point of view that is coloured with my own self-judgment and shame. <br />
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I had a friend (who shall remain nameless) email me a picture - when I saw it I stopped breathing, that ugliness of the past it was there again in my face. My immediate thought was to judge, to look away from that girl and pretend she wasn't me. Then I read the note my friend wrote with it....<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YHIpSFVBYv8/URwud0iG74I/AAAAAAAAALg/BEW_GfSnOLk/s1600/ME.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YHIpSFVBYv8/URwud0iG74I/AAAAAAAAALg/BEW_GfSnOLk/s320/ME.jpg" width="240" /></a><i>I'd like you to meet my friend Wendy from grade school/high school. She is a zany girl and always laughing and cracking jokes. </i></div>
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<i>I kinda wished I was more like her. I was always worried about what people would think. I think that's why I chose photojournalism in school. I was comfortable behind the camera, it gave me power or a shield. It made me feel like people actually wanted me around, like I wasn't just some afterthought. </i></div>
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<i>I always wanted to be confident like Wendy. </i></div>
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<i>This was taken the last day of grade 13 right before exams. We went down to the locks and had lunch. I think we had Mary Browns Chicken. </i></div>
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<i>For some reason, you had a pinwheel. </i></div>
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<i>I always wanted that joy. </i></div>
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<i>Makes you think.</i></div>
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Yes, it really does. This friend who I always thought had it all: a kick ass personality, boyfriends, popularity.... well she was hurting too and I was so damned wrapped up in my pain I didn't see that either and I missed out on having an even deeper friendship with her than I could have.....but like the blog is named, it's not too late. </div>
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It took a lot of courage for me to post that picture of myself - part of me thinks that people will say look how fat she is and ugly, but I need to let that go. I need to love that girl, love me....all parts of me, and those things that I bring into the light - the pain I share, the vulnerability they only help me to be someone better, freer. </div>
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And there are still days when I feel so lost, so scared and overwhelmed about the future and what it holds and I don't know if I have the strength to go on but I'm going to keep playing this song - it is my new anthem - and I'm going to keep playing it till I believe it. </div>
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Thank you friends for letting me share myself with you. xo </div>
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Wendy</div>
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-3372220189084622422012-11-21T12:38:00.001-08:002013-07-12T11:41:48.158-07:00Until the Fat Lady Sings, or Gets Weight Loss Surgery, loses a shit ton of weight and has a fabulous fucking life.<div style="text-align: center;">
The nerve of those Whos. Inviting me down there - on such short notice! </div>
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Even if I wanted to go my schedule wouldn't allow it. </div>
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4:00, wallow in self pity; </div>
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4:30, stare into the abyss; </div>
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5:00, solve world hunger, tell no one; </div>
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5:30, jazzercize; </div>
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6:30, dinner with me - I can't cancel that again; </div>
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7:00, wrestle with my self-loathing... </div>
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I'm booked. </div>
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Of course, if I bump the loathing to 9, I could still be done in time to lay in bed, stare at the ceiling and slip slowly into madness. </div>
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But what would I wear? </div>
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I did something I never thought I'd do after all that I have been through, after how hard I fought; I gave up. I gave up on me, my dreams, my hopes...I found myself in a pit of despair so deep I didn't know how to get out. <br />
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I have had PCOS (Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome) for over a decade now - basically that means that I get multiple cysts on my ovaries - I know, clever name. My period has never been regular, going from gushing the amount of blood one expect from a stabbing victim to not having a period for literally years. When I was finally diagnosed it was with the discovery that I had cysts on both ovaries they did surgery laproscopically (through my belly button) and were able to remove the cysts. At the time they told me it was because I was fat that I had this problem and that I needed to lose weight, etc. which of course at that time I was too fucked up to heed that advice but I sure took it to heart. Again the cysts came back, this time the size of a grapefruit on the one, it damaged it so much that when they did the surgery this time they were forced to take one of the ovaries and part of the other one. I was told at the time that there was a chance that my remaining ovary would come back and start to work but again, I had to lose weight. Next came the pap smear and the abnormal cells that were later determined to be cancerous - a quick d&c and that was taken care of. <br />
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I didn't have a period for years after that second surgery where I lost my ovary, no sign that my body was functioning in any way, shape or form. And I put that dream of babies into the back of my mind, tucked it so far back in the recesses that I didn't have to touch it, to feel that pain but it was always there. I told myself that my marriage wasn't stable enough to bring a baby into - and it wasn't, and I don't say that to lay blame at anyone's feet because it took two of us to form the relationship and two of us equally and in our own ways contributed to the instability and the insanity. Here's the thing about me, don't ask me where I get it from but there is this stream that flows through me that even in the most desperate, sad, scary times and that is hope. This optimism that some way, some how things will work out and inevitably they do, maybe not how I envisioned them working out, but work out they do. <br />
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When I had weight loss surgery and lost 30 pounds prior to the actual surgery because of that devil's nectar Opti-Fast the day of my surgery who should appear but my period - of fucking course, because it was inconvenient and the worst fucking timing ever, but there it was - my period. A sign, surely that my remaining ovary was actually working and more importantly that the chance for a baby was indeed possible. If you have read my blog (and shame on you if you haven't) then you know what happens next, I lost a shit ton of weight, got so healthy and strong physically and fell and got back up again repeatedly. And still, my period was irregular maybe once every 3 months but hell, it was there. <br />
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In May I discovered that again the lining of my uterus was again thickened and because of my history my doctor referred me to the Oncologist I saw at Sunnybrook. It twinged with me then that possibly this baby thing was going to be affected, but I didn't let it overwhelm me and I still had it, that hope and even if it was cancer that I could beat it like before. I even went so far as to ask for a referral for a fertility specialist and I went to that first appointment and I quickly realized that this couldn't be an option for me - not with the state of my marriage and I put it on the back burner. Next came the discovery of a "mass" above my uterus. Again, I tried not to freak and I held it in - told few people - and held onto that hope. I made the decision to end my marriage in August and I'm not really going to go into it here but needless to say it was many things - mostly my fear of cancer and what that would mean, but to say it was only that reason is a lie and right now I can't talk about that, maybe one day, just not today.<br />
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Anyway, a few weeks ago I developed this pain in my belly...well actually it started in my belly, went to my side, my back and finally my chest. It was horrible, it made me keel over and I went to the hospital but pretty much shrugged me off as nothing. Last Tuesday the pain got so bad that I said fuck it and drove myself to the ER. After hooking me up to a morphine and doing xrays and an ultrasound two days later I had the report from the doctor. In addition to the stuff I already knew about, the mass, the uterine lining - I now had cysts on my ovary AND cysts where the missing ovary should be.<br />
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Call it intuition or whatever, but from that first visit to the ER when the pains started I knew what this was. I had felt this pain before, the twisting and rupturing of cysts in my belly. I became frozen inside - there's no other word for it. I literally stopped feeling anything. I went to work, put in crazy hours, came home and went to sleep. I avoided friends, I avoided Facebook. I avoided life because that sense of being frozen, it was my protection. It saved me. Because I lost my shit at that moment. Hope died. After all the weight I had lost, how hard I fought it still wasn't enough and I had failed. And that little nasty voice in my head, the one that I have tried so hard to overpower came back. That I didn't deserve a baby or love or support. I punished myself....the most evil kid in school couldn't come close to how I bullied myself. I did everything I could not to feel, because I thought if that sadness, that hurt, that anguish came up even a little bit I wouldn't be able to handle it - that I didn't have the strength to deal with it anymore and that I didn't deserve those tears because I did this to myself. My friends, my beautiful, wonderful friends...they called me, texted me, Facebooked me...and I couldn't bear to talk to them. I shut them out. I froze them out. I froze myself out....I did the very thing I promised myself I'd never do ever again and that's give up on me.<br />
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That second visit to the ER, that's what started the thaw, maybe it was the morphine - it is delightful stuff - but my guard came down and everything spilled out. And I cried. I cried doing the dishes, I cried making my bed, I cried in the shower, I cried in my doctor's office, I cried on the drive home, I cried at Shopper's Drug Mart (which made the cashier pretty damned uncomfortable to say the least)... I was written off work until November 30th and the walls, just crashed in. Without work I had nothing left to hold onto anymore. The depths of that sadness were like nothing I've ever felt before and I thought I've known pain, I wasn't even close. And the anger, with God, with myself was a burning hot rage that took my breath away. It sounds horrible, and yeah, it really was and on the other hand it was the best thing that ever happened because whatever part of me that wasn't ready to give up reached out to my friends. And their forgiveness and understanding, I don't know how I ever deserved to be so blessed but I am so grateful for each and every one of them. I called my Mom and she came and got me and took me home and has been taking care of me ever since. <br />
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I have some perspective of this all now, given that I've been weaning myself off the morphine - 1 day sober, I'll take it and I realize that even though it has felt like pretty much the worst thing to happen in my life ever that there are victories to be found in this experience. One, I didn't eat my way through a refrigerator of food. Two, I didn't leave a trail of sexual partners and condoms. Three, even though it took me awhile to get there I actually responded in an emotionally healthy way to this situation. I cried when I was sad because that is the correct response to sadness, not eating a cookie. I cried when my heart was broken because that is the correct response to heartbreak, not degrading my body with strangers. I cried because I was afraid and lonely...because THAT is the correct response to fear and loneliness not finding 700 ways to self-destruct in an epic fashion. Yes, it took me awhile to reach out to friends, but I forgive myself for that and they forgive me too. <br />
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Thanks to a much needed dainty foot of a Southern gal up my frozen Canadian ass (thank you Carolyn DeDeugd) and the sweet, loving friends and family who have surrounded me in light and love I woke up this morning with a new resolve. I'm not going to give up. Not on me, not on my dreams. So I checked my work emails, worked on some stuff that needed to be done and I bundled myself up in some warm woolly socks over my pyjama bottoms, put on my Mom's rubber boots and a thick jacket over my pyjama top and I went for a walk through the field with my boy. Sure I could have probably used a slow moving vehicle sign strapped to my ass that's how slow I went but the fresh air cleared my head, the movement eased some pain in my body and I took that opportunity to take down the banner, pop the balloons, throw out the horns and wrap up this pity party. I got on the phone and harassed the gynecologist office until I got an appointment (December 3rd) - I have an appointment with the oncologist December 17th. I re-affirmed in my mind what my goals are - and have been all along. I want to be healthy and happy and damnit I want to be a Mom. So I'm going to take this one step at a time, weigh my options. And if this means a full hysterectomy - which the chances are pretty high of it being what needs to be done then I am getting my financial life in order and my power of attorney (thank you Amie Heaslip-Cosgrove) and do what needs to be done - on my terms.<br />
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Hope, it's not dead and neither am I.<br />
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-6872314543565310492012-10-23T20:39:00.005-07:002012-10-23T20:39:54.159-07:00Happy Birthday to Me<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b>HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME</b></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-j4NxWmDeVCc/UIdiB8cdUcI/AAAAAAAAAFs/g4tPiU_BB4c/s1600/404698_10152197387045514_57425119_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-j4NxWmDeVCc/UIdiB8cdUcI/AAAAAAAAAFs/g4tPiU_BB4c/s200/404698_10152197387045514_57425119_n.jpg" width="200" /></a>In one hour, 1 minute and 39 seconds I will no longer be in my 30's. It's quite a milestone, one that I admit I had some trepidation about meeting. I don't know really what I thought turning 40 would do, what would change or where the fear came from. Maybe it was the thought that I hadn't reached all the goals I thought I should have reached by now, become who I thought I should be. I can't help but smile at how foolish I was with the expectations I had set for myself, the goals I had. There is also a part of me that was happy to leave behind my 30's, the disasters, the pain... but then I thought that no, I don't want to leave it behind either. I don't want to forget. I can hold in my heart both pain and joy... there is room for both and one does not diminish the other. I honor both of them. I honor the Wendy that was 30, I like her. No, wait, I love her. She was someone special and beautiful and I know that by the people who showered her with love this weekend. No one that is horrible could have friends that are as amazing as those people who have blessed my life so I guess somewhere along the line I must have done something really right.<br />
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I danced this weekend. Me. I shimmied, I shaked, I jiggled and again I felt such joy, such freedom in my body. And typing this I am crying, not because I am sad, but because I am so damned happy that for once in my life I got to fully be me. No fear. No shame. No hiding. I wore a little black dress on Sunday with the brightest, prettiest pink coat (Yes, pink!) and I rocked spanxed and no, I didn't look perfect, my body isn't even close to perfect but I felt beautiful. Like a princess... and that smile on my face it was real. I felt joy. To my bones joy. And gratitude. So 40, bring it on. I can't wait to meet Wendy at 40. So here I sit, huddled in my blanket a smile on my face no one can wipe off because I can't wait to see 40... what adventure comes next. So again, I hold my hand out to you, my friends... come join me in the adventure, the best is yet to come. :)<br />
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<br />Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2540502107729324004.post-37151075585491522682012-10-15T04:31:00.001-07:002013-02-19T15:56:47.412-08:00The Selfish Act.I packed all my things neatly and stacked them on my bed, erasing every sign that I had existed once in the space. I didn't want anyone to have to go through the bother of sorting through my life afterwards, didn't want to be an inconvenience. I never wanted to be an inconvenience. <br />
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I left everything behind that day; everything but the letters from my gramma's that I folded up into my pocket and that bottle of pills and the voldka. I didn't cry at all on that 30 minute drive from Thunder Bay to Kakabeka Falls. I just remember hoping that for once I would do something right and that they'd find the letter on my bed only after I did what needed to be done. And empty. I felt empty inside. All the hurt, the pain the fear it was gone and I felt nothing. I parked the car and I walked into the forest, I picked there because it reminded me of my gramma's forest and I wanted the last thing that I heard to be the water. I sat at the base of a tree, my back against the bark, it was hard but somehow comforting and I started taking the Tylenol, chasing it with mouthfuls of the voldka. It burned as it went down, but I just closed my eyes and kept going until the both bottles were empty. I lost all sense of time. I pulled the letters out of my pocket and sat in the dark, holding them against my heart. I curled up in a ball, waiting. And waiting. Feeling sick. And anxious. I didn't know how fast this was supposed to happen, but somehow in my head I thought it would be immediate. It wasn't. I fell asleep at some point, and the nightmares came again in my sleep and I woke up, clawing for air to the sound of my name being called. I was disoriented, it must have been my imagination. But no, there it was again... and my brain so fuzzy couldn't make sense of it. Then the face of my angel appeared, but not the dropped from heaven, wings and things kinda angel - the living breathing kind. It was Terry my friend, my roommate had found the letter and called her. And I don't know how she found me in that big, dark woods but she did. She bundled me up and put me in her car...I don't even remember the walk, I just remember waking up in the hospital and being so very fucking angry. At the world, at her, at myself for not even being able to get this one thing right. I also remember having that disgusting charcoal and feeling like I wanted to die even more.<br />
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That happened close to 18 years ago, but that memory remains vivid in my mind. I had finished college program, my gig with the Children's Aid was ending and it was time to go back home. To my family. And I couldn't deal. Everything that I had run away from 3 years previously I had to go back to and I had to go back with debt and a sense that I still didn't have the skills to deal with it. I just couldn't do it. And what strikes me the most is that so many people say that suicide is such a selfish act for those that you leave behind, but I disagree because in my head at that time I didn't matter. In my head I was of no importance to anyone and my death wouldn't affect them at all. Was this based on logic? No. Of course not, I had just tried to kill myself logic wasn't my strong suit at that point. <br />
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So why is this coming up for me right now? Well partly because of the workshop we had on suicide last week but also because of some of the work I've been doing with my clients - both palliative and bereavement. I have sat with people who have lost a loved one to suicide and my heart has ached for them, but I think I've been able to give a little insight as to how that person might have been feeling at the time and hopefully given them some peace - I get that I can't fix it for them, but I can provide a measure of comfort. And I think at that time of how devastated my Gramma's would have been and not just them, all of my family and friends.... and how fucking sad I feel right now that I didn't know at 21 how very loved I was.....and how very hurt and broken... and fuck, now I can't stop crying. <br />
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Where was I? Right, the palliative client. I met this lady who suffered hugely with cancer, her family was worried about her, that she was depressed. I remember going into the room and pulling up a chair beside her bed and asking her how she felt. She described the physical pain she was feeling, of the suffering that had went on for so long and the loss, the loss of life and of self. Hers was the face of suffering and pain, physically, mentally and yes of the soul. There are times in this world where I feel ill equipped to deal with the situations life throws at me but when I stop and I listen to my gut - that whispering that comes from my heart I find the answers. I took her hand and squeezed it gently and told her what her family didn't want to - that it was okay for her to let go. That I saw her pain and I understood. And we both had tears in our eyes when she squeezed my hand back. She died a few days later.<br />
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That was all I wanted then, was for someone to see my pain. To tell me that they understood. It's all I want now. But I realize that no one is going to see my pain or me unless I take off the mask and let them see me. Well friends, my mask is off. This is me. I am hurting right now. I am mourning the loss of a relationship. I am dealing with debt. I am waiting for an appointment with an oncologist that might mean big health implications. I am struggling. I fell hard and got off track. I haven't been exercising or seeing my therapist - honestly, I can't afford it. Well there's a lie, it costs nothing to exercise. And yeah, it sounds horrible, but it's not. It's manageable because I've realized that I'm someone of value, that yes things may not be perfect but I want to live and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to make this work and to fight for me. And words, they mean nothing without being backed up with action one step at a time - and my first step was at 5 am this morning when I got dressed and walked out into the dark, rainy morning and put one foot in front of the other. And I'm going to hold my hand out to those who love me because this journey, I can't do it alone. Won't you walk with me?Wendyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06600040344170833447noreply@blogger.com0