I’m very thankful for many things that have occurred in my life. And still, I’m on the verge of giving up: There’s no way I will ever be happy. I don’t want to be super bubbly sugarbomb happy or anything, I just want to have some internal joy. But right now I feel like nothing. It reminds me of 7of9 from STar Trek Voyager, where cybernetic brain components would shut her down if she started to feel deep emotion. I feel like this a lot. 

I know the Christian perspective is to pray and give thanks to God, praising him, and this helps with our state of mind. 

I just don’t feel anything. Maybe I’m just dissociated. But it still is true. 

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Just a few thoughts:

Had we stayed in Chico I think I would’ve been a libtard. I miss that place and was feeling sad the other day, and as I was listening to an unschooling podcast (a topic various groups of people are involved in) I got a shock of a feeling: that had we stayed, because I sway more left on a lot of things , or at least the idea of certain things, I would’ve been lost. I think it’s true.

We just got done with Memorial Day. We stayed home . Hubs and I took a walk last night with the Littles at the track in C-wood. They took their light sabers and were chasing each other around with them. They tend to go all out expensing their energy and get really tired right away. haha.

Small tasks. I want to be useful. I want to see God. I want to hear from Him. I think I need to show Him that I can be responsible with small tasks first. The notion of making the bed came up, like how soldiers are trained early on. But also bible reading, or family prayers could be others. Maybe all three. ?

I don’t know what to write about these days. My anxiety and crap just seem to get worse. I went to Walmart with Hubby the other day when it wasn’t even that busy, and I nearly lost it. I feel like I need to stop fighting against myself even more. I try to accept my limitations but sometimes things have to get done. But, what if I need to detach even more from the outside world? It’s hard when being here in this place (neighborhood) can make me crazy with all the noise & feelings of not being safe (the fence and rude neighbors).

Another sleepless night.

Yesterday was a day full of vidja and games, but today was pretty calm and low energy. With the exception of the chainsaws and leaf blowers that had my wanting to scream.  Nice rains with a little thunder and lightning made its way to us too, which is always lovely.

The house is a wreck right now as I’m trying to reorganize the living room for Onie’s bed. He’s decided to move out to the front rooms for the summer in part for the extra play space they get in the bedroom, but also I think it’s a more peaceful sleep out front. Hopefully, I pray, we can move out of here soon.

I have to clean their bathroom tomorrow. I can hardly wait to get everything soaped up and clean. Maybe I’ll post pictures of my work lol.

I’m going to try (try) to fast tomorrow. Erm, today. My goal is a full 24 hours but we will see what happens. I tried to ease off the carbs this week so maybe I’ll get lucky and have a somewhat easy time of it.

Today in prayer I got the feeling (the thought) that the Lord was telling me that reason I’ve been denied a certain thing is so that I can keep trying and working towards it. It made sense to me as the thought came to me- if I really want this “thing” from Jesus, then I need to keep striving for it and searching for Him. If he gave into my request too soon, and I did hardly any work towards it, then what helpful thing will I have learned in the long run. So, he’s basically playing hard-to-get with me right now, if I may say so, so that I may prove my own faithfulness and patience, and in essence learn ... something. I’m sure I’ll be able to put it into better words in the future.

Tomorrow the kids and I are going to do proper morning prayers with artois. The last time we did this together I felt very leveled and spiritually and psychologically strengthened for the day.

It’s 2am and the snoring ...

Today was great. Late start but fun. Kids played their game day and I was having a blast watching Jonesie and Roo do some dungeons. I’m impressed with how much Jonesie has improved his tanking abilities lol, and Roo is just hanging out with him leveling his Druid that he’s incredibly excited about. I couldn’t help but backseat drive and tell him to cast an extra heal on his brother, or Target the proper mob, or bust out the aoe for this fight lol. But really, the two of them were getting on great, and I’m really proud of Roo for trying his best to pay attention and do what Jo tells him.

Then I spent most of their game time practicing the recorder. It sounded pretty good today. I mean, the quality of sound seems different. Perhaps I am starting to become more familiar with how my breath affects the instrument. My fingers still need help.

Later in the day I had my HOTS tutorial with Jo. I’m going to be sticking with Rainor for a while. It’s a game that I’m going to be very slow at, but the prospect of playing all together is pretty sweet.

Tried to regulate my food better today. I want to try and fast on Wednesday perhaps, but I’m trying to cut down my carbs up to then, so that hopefully the gear switch will happen effectively.

Saw a beautiful double rainbow outside my window yesterday. Along with an egret sitting in one of the oak trees. He flew around at one point trying to get a better perch. I took a pic but it wasn’t very good.

Today is Husband’s last day of vacation with us.

He hoped to get us, or at least the boys, to communion today but it just wasn’t gona happen.

My anxiety has been a real fight for me but this morning I ate some eggs first thing and I did start to feel more “even”. There is no doubt in my mind that protein in the morning helps me feel better with morning time anxiety. So... I’m ok mentally with eggs, possibly bacon, but for now I’ll just stick with eggs as a go-to.

I’m currently cleaning my kitchen and it’s a very slow process. I soap up everything. It becomes more of a mess than before I start cleaning. But in the end it’s sparkly clean and I know germs are mostly gone. At the very least it alleviates my anxiety of having to see it a dirty wreck.

As I was cleaning I was listening to some of my favorite ost music. (Natsume) I remembered how cathartic watching certain movies and shows can be, such as Howels Moving Castle and Natsume, which always make me tear up, if not outright start bawling. I know that urge to let go is already there, but the movies just help to bring it out into the surface so I can release it. It’s helpful, and I haven’t experienced this in a while.

I get scared and panic-filled thinking about Hubby going back to work, and leaving me behind to deal with life alone. I wanted to break down on him this morning. I told him I felt so weak and that I couldn’t do life like a normal person. It’s exhausting.

I’m going to try my best to repeat bible verses when I start to feel panic. I’m not really helped by the Jesus prayer during these times, but I started saying a few positive affirmation verses while going through it (the panic) this morning and I believe they helped. Example: Nothing can separate me from the love of God . And: I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I have my little prayer rope (rosary) I love to just hold onto and not actually count prayers with, although I might at times, so I will try to use it more.

Ideas:
Transcribe some Natsume and Wow themes for duet. Crochet Nyanko Sensei.

More gardens: https://www.minnpost.com/second-opinion/2020/05/having-your-own-garden-and-spending-time-in-it-improves-health-and-well-being-study-suggests/

Was absolutely zonked today. I was woken up at 1:30 this morning and didn’t go back to sleep till around 6 or something. My body and brain just never recovered. So I slept (wasted) this whole day. Doesn’t feel good, man.
:::
Dad, eldest and youngest are watching the final Star Wars movie: The Rise of Skywalker, or something?  Andrew and I are sooo not interested lol. I’m instead going back to bed after our Chinese food feasting, and continue with being lethargic as heck. But my Turinku-chan is keeping my lap nice and warm. I think Roo is watching Minecraft vids in his room.
:::
The kids have recently introduced us to the chungus meme. I can’t stop calling everything chungus. Somehow tonight it’s morphed into the word chingas... which Dad is responsible for and I could not stop laughing over. So I’m going to have to make sure the kids don’t say it in public lol. Eg: “It’s called the Rise of the Chingas, The Search For More Money.” Oh man I died. 🤣
:::
I need a shower.

Having a good day.

Last night I read prayers with the boys but this morning I woke up very sluggish.

Got out of the house around 9am and got a coffee with Hubs. Then we went to a local all weather track since it was raining the day before and the track would be nice and dry to use. Next we headed home by way of one of our very long detours through the back roads.

Now we are home and trying to get home-work done. I was feeling very edgy but then Hubs made me some eggs to go alone with the cold block of pork meat I just shoved into my face. And he ended up making some for everybody.

Loads of laundry, and sweeping, and deep cleaning, and organizing drawers. I will try not to stress out about it since I have homeschool stuff we need to do as well. I will try to keep my head leveled and not spiraling.

Took a walk in the pouring rain with Roo. We were going to try and find Jonesie for fun, who had talked a walk just earlier. I asked Roo is he was ready to learn cursive and he was like, “no I think it’s too hard.” So I told him if he learns it then it won’t be hard. So he says, “yeah I should learn it. Cmon man, I’m 13 years old I should really learn some cursive.” 😆

Played some tin whistles with Roo and he randomly asked if it would be rediculous if someone made an instrument out of corn, to which I told him to hang on while I pulled up some video of vegetable orchestras 🤣. He was not disappointed.

Husband has been home from work this week. Day 2 of his vacation was a dud. We started with a late morning walk up our hill to check out the storm clouds. Then he made a nice fire when the rains started to come down. It rained all day, which was awesome, but the pressure in our sinuses was not, so neither of us really had the energy to do much today. Plus, I’m thoroughly overwhelmed by my disaster of a house right now.

Roo has been walking around inside the house with his boonie hat I bought him lol. He looks so cute and he likes to clip up the sides of the hat so he looks very Australian.

I hope we can at least get out for a drive tomorrow.

Hank came by yesterday and he had a gimpy leg. We felt really bad for him and hoped our neighbor didn’t shoot him with their air rifle.

I’ve Been having some good days.

We did communion today at church. We had to do confession over the phone and it was better than I thought it would be; just straight to the point, which was nice. Jim was struggling with whether or not to talk to Fr., and Jonesie basically told me that although he wanted to do it I needed to make him do it. In the end it all worked out.

The Littles were quite confused and a little bothered by the whole thing since it’s so unusual. Roo basically said he wanted to wait until the corona was over, lol. But we were all still able to take communion, which made for a really good day.

I wonder if this is how it was in Soviet Russia when they weren’t even allowed to have services but we’re permitted to just do communion.

I want to try and write more things down so I can remember the good days. I’ve been so saddened and disturbed by how much of our lives I don’t remember. A common thing for people in constant trauma and stress.

My recorder skills are improving. Some days I feel like I can’t hold the thing for anything. It hurts, feels uncomfortable, and my hands feel stressed. But today felt a lot more nimble and strong, and the recorder felt familiar.

My kids are growing so fast. It’s not fair how fast the time goes. The Littles need new clothes !

Today was Rooroo’s birthday

And I cried. 13 years,where did it go? And just last week was Jonesie’s 16th!! It’s crazy! We didn’t celebrate extravagantly; pizza and game night. We pretty much did the same on J’s birthday too. Nice and quiet family time.

 I have such a horrible hazy memory of things.
I love my kids so much and feel such pain because I miss my babies. Yet I’m so proud of who my boys are becoming. I love them so much. I regret that I wasn’t a better mom. We talked tonight about some difficult memories they had. Some things were hazy for me. Was I even conscious? Was I so disconnected? There were some really difficult times and I’m ashamed that I was/am such a weakling. I regret many things about how I handled the pressure. Poorly. But I want the boys to know that they can talk about anything that remember that they feel they need to talk about. I can only apologize for whatever I did or didn’t do to hurt them. And yet, we have a lot of live and forgiveness in the family. I thank God and pray that we will continue to do so. I always wanted to be a mom. I wanted a lot of kids. Yet for so many years I was convinced that I was never meant to be a mom, because I was so damaged. I don’t know if I would say that now, although I would admit that I’m still damaged. All I know is that love my kids so much it hurts to think about how fast the time is going. I miss my babies. But love my young little men.

I’m addicted to sugar. When I went carni it was so hard but I felt so much better. I’m trying to do it again but I feel so borked. I woke up really struggling with some anxiety which then triggers me to obtain sugar (I think). This morning that happened. My anxiety wasn’t as high as it sometimes can be when I first wake up, but it was noticeable enough that I started feeling like I need to make it stop. I’m pretty sure that’s what happened.
Solution?:
Wake up earlier and eat right away, (apple, pb, water?) (sausage biscuit?) go walk or do a thing that makes me feel productive. Because once that dread sets in it’s really hard to break out of it to do those productive things, especially after giving in to the sugar.

Still in lockdown. I’m hating the shopping situation the most, and being herded like cattle worse that normal. It feels like Christmas frenzy even though things are somewhat slower. The energy is just really unsettling. And I’m really annoyed and irritated with the neighbors and their noise and the fact that they think they own the damn street.

Post panic Tuesday

This morning I made a quick store run to get a couple supplies. I’ve been waking up feeling ‘on the edge’ a lot lately, like I’m fighting off sinking into a hole of panic, or dread, or something. I try to push through it because what else is there to do. My kitchen is a huge trigger for me right now too, and i often have to leave it and go sit by myself to regroup, before I tackle the chores I need to do. The panic rising becomes such that I often feel that my soul is about to leave my body, or maybe it’s my mind (dissociation), and I have to fight it which usually means I have to get out of the kitchen. It’s not just the kitchen that this has only ever happened to me, it’s just that my stress is unusually high in relation to it and life in general right now. No, it is not the wuflu that is making me stressed, I’m just psychologically exhausted.

I came home from the shop to find my neighbor, who owns the three houses that surround mine and have their family living there, cutting my oleander in my driveway. She’s done it before with our permission after the fact in order so that her relative next door can have a safe view of the street. But I was not expecting her to be at it today, and without asking permission. At least have the courtesy to let us know you will be doing it, because I have nothing against making it safer for the neighbor to see the street when they pull out of their driveway.

The feelings overwhelmed me. Feeling like I was being violated, my literal safe space (my home!) was being violated, disrespected, and the my safe space wasn’t safe! Then, my other neighbor comes out of their house and looks towards me which is the direction my neighbor cutting my oleander is. By the way, I’m still in my car from driving up into my driveway, but I’m one the phone with my husband, and at this point he’s trying to calm me down. But after seeing my second neighbor come out of his house and gawk towards where the action was I’d lost it. Full on feels of being surrounded and trapped hit me. Yes, I’ve felt these emotions before concerning being surrounded by their clan.

After my eldest came out to retrieve the groceries I left (ran away), sobbing while still on the phone with Hubby, feeling awful with no power to change things, and no cajones to set boundaries.  After wandering around a little bit I decided to get a coffee and a pastry, and to go sit at the park to just give myself some time to calm down. I suppose it helped. A little Afterwards Hubby came by and we drove home together. But I was well zonked the rest of the day, and feeling pretty empty.

Quarantine and wuflu

I figured I needed to start writing again to delve deep into my motivations and thinking patterns. I would rather not have to do this as it takes a lot of mental power, and is a bit exhausting, but therapeutic rambling actually helps.

So let’s see, update:
Here in norcal we’re not too burdened with quarantine orders, thank God. We can still leave our houses, go for walks, and buy relatively ‘non-essential’ things without being arrested. We are not being pressured or forced to wear masks, and things at times seem almost normal. Many business have switched to pick-up orders, home delivery or, in the case of some retail, they are closed. Traffic, although thinner, still sucks because people have been driving like maniacs. True colors come out and the selfishness of people. It’s too bad and a little bit scary.

I went in a little hike with the kiddos yesterday and had someone scream out the side of his car “Fuck You” to us. (Most likely just me, since I’m the obvious adult in the group.) Nonie became very disturbed and even collapsed in the ground in a bit of a meltdown. I had to push us on, though, not knowing I’d this person was just drunk and retarded, high and violent, or being his regular charming jackass self. I told him rather matter of fact to get up, there wasn’t time to feel bad or meltdown, we have to get to the car first, and once there he could let himself feel whatever he needed to. It was certainly the way I was feeling, and in the end it worked to get us back to the safety of the car quickly. Once there, we were able to talk about what happened, what we were feeling about it, etc. My Nonie is pretty sensitive like me, and he had fight himself to remain calm and keep his mind from going real dark.

I’ve been trying to get out of the house at least once a week. Or at least go for walks around the neighborhood. I try. The weather has been bipolar: cold and cloudy one day, hot and sunny another day. Typical spring weather, but annoying.

The nicest thing about this whole crazy situation has been the clear skies.

I guess I’ll be trying to write here again a bit more regularly then. Hope it helps. 

Edit: I’ve just seen all the spelling and grammar errors. Typing on a phone isn’t the best. I will correct the post another day.