The sweetest things

Lillian and Dan Smith lived in a small town in California where I lived when I was growing up. I remember Lillian as a loving a vivacious woman who was sweet and good and much like my mom. She and my mom were good friends. My mom forwarded this email to me today, from Dan - an update on Lillian's health. I wanted to share it with you (if there's anyone out there. LOL). It is what life is made of, and what life is all about.

Subject: Prognosis
Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2010 19:16:21 -0600

Lillian spent last Tuesday through Saturday in the hospital because of diabetic issues. Saturday night she was placed in Rehab. to give me a chance to rest. Monday morning early, I found her in a diabetic coma at the rehab. and she was transported again to the hospital.
The Dr. recommended she come home today and hospice enter the picture. Her outlook is six days, six months, or six years. They don't know, other than her Kidneys are failing. Monday all of us including the Dr. didn't think she would last the day. However she has
a way of fooling us. They recommended we take her off all medicine, including insulin. I asked if we took her off insulin how long would
she live, "if" she went back into a coma. The answer was about seven days. I said remove her from all her other pills, but I will keep
giving her insulin. I just can't put her through what I seen Monday.
Today I gave her a shower when we arrived home and she was almost impossible to shower. I will be glad to let hospice assist from
this point on.
Her memory is good at times and other times she doesn't even know her little dog. She had no idea how may kids she had and what
their names were. However this evening she is a little better. A lot more alert and talkative.
Hospice said they are not necessary end of life assistance. I feel a little better about that. They come out tomorrow to evaluate and
try once more to talk me into a Hospital bed for her. I want her in bed where I wake her up about four times and talk to her
or test her blood, if I don't like they way she sounds. I can tell most of the time when she is having blood sugar troubles.
If she were in a hospital bed it would be in the living room and I know I would sleep on the couch.
I don't want you too assume all is doom and gloom with us. We do fine and I really don't mind assisting her and trying to
get her to talk. Underneath her problems is still the girl I married...............Dan

Better than worse

An update from Mary states that her oncologist/gynocologist says he is pretty sure the business with her ovary is a cyst, not a tumor. Also her blood counts are good, so they're continuing with her chemo as scheduled. I'm not sure about her lymph nodes. Waiting on that answer . . .

She's very positive and upbeat. Good for her.

More . . .

My mom just let me know that Mary's cancer seems to have spread. She doesn't know any more. I'm trying to find out more. They started to do chemo, and it looked like the tumors were shrinking. It looked good, but then they did a full body scan, and they found more in her lymph nodes and an ovary. I really would like to know what's going on.

Prayers for Mary

So, yesterday I got a call from my oldest sister, Mary. On Friday she received news of a biopsy she had been waiting on. She has been diagnosed with breast cancer.

It was funny for her to call me. Even she noted the awkwardness and strangeness of the moment. As I mentioned before, we are not close. Other than our parents we have nothing in common. She is led by her logic and I by my emotions. She felt compelled to call all of her sisters to tell them of her diagnosis, to let them know of this increased familial risk of cancer.

It was an interesting experience for me. Why? Not in the way you might expect. You see - I've lived a lifetime of pain and illness. This has been my life. I've scarcely known a day of good health. No one in my family has ever understood the way I have suffered and endured and the way I have learned to view life and its unexpected ups and downs. I told my sister as much. It was an interesting experience for me because I was sad about the prospect of her having to suffer in the way I suffer every single day. Somehow I guess I thought I had managed to shoulder all of the pain and illness of the entire family. I know that sounds stupid. Yeah, of course it does. And why would I think such a stupid thing, especially for a sister I've never been close to?

Really funny - at the end of the conversation I told Mary I loved her. Her response was something like "Well, thanks for that." Don't you think that's odd? See, that's my family for you. Dandy, eh?

But she didn't call for my support. I'm not really sure why she called. She just needed to. I respect that she had that need, and I told her that I would be here for her, if she needed me. At times when I have been ill throughout my life, Mary has called to check in on me. She has been one of the only ones. Despite the fact that we don't understand one another she has kept track of me. She is a good woman in her way, and I respect her. We may not share a sisterly love, but we share something, and she did call. That's something, right?

I don't know. It isn't about me. This is all about her. It does bring up my unsettled feelings for her, feelings I just keep trying to push aside, because they will never be returned to my satisfaction. The truth is that I can't make people love me the way I love them. My own yearning leaves me feeling empty, and that is my own failing, I suppose. I can receive from others no more and no less than they are capable of giving.

So, for Mary, I offer my love and my prayers. I offer my understanding heart because I know the pain that comes from years of physical torment and the fears that accompany them. I have walked through their baptizing fire, and I can walk some distance with you, if you have need of me. I can be your friend, if you are seeking one. If you want me, I am here.

Sisters . . . or observations from a bathroom stall

I have 5 sisters. I always thought that really meant something. LOL

Awhile ago, Darrin and I went to the Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum at BYU with our son. We spent some time walking around, looking at the exhibits, having some fun. As usually happens with me, my bladder began to call to me. Off I traipsed to the bathroom. As I sat down in one of the 3 ancient stalls, I had an epiphany.

Almost all of my sisters and I have gone to BYU. The one that hasn't lived right by there for years. All of us have been to that museum. All of us have taken our kids there. Even my mom has been there. It struck me, as I sat there on that toilet, looking at the walls of the stall that had undoubtedly been there since the Eisenhower administration, that each and every one of my sisters and my mom had probably sat upon the very throne upon which I sat! What an intriguing and ironic thought!

You see, at that point in time, it struck me as ironic because I felt certain that my buttocks were firmly planted where theirs had surely been planted before, and yet, I would likely never see any of them again. I began to cry. Yes, right there in the bathroom stall of the Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum on the BYU campus, I cried like a baby.

I have always craved, even pined for a relationship with my sisters. Oh, what I would have given for a real sister! You know the type - late night talks, giggling, hugging, weekend visits, long talks on the phone, excited to see each other, "Oh, how I've missed you!" kind of sister! But alas! No. Born one of six sisters, and even blessed with three sisters-in-law, I was never so lucky to have one of them who wanted to be my friend.

Was I so undesirable as all that? See, I grew up wondering that? I wish I could say I had outgrown that question. I wish I could say I had matured beyond that insecurity. I'm still just that lonely girl who thinks there must surely be something wrong with me that none of my sisters want me.

Mary is my oldest sister. She's nearly 20 years older than me. I can see why she wouldn't be interested in me. I mean, she's old enough to be my mom, right? But as I grew, I tried so hard to connect with her. I saw her make friends with my sister who is 2 years older than me, and she just didn't seem interested in me. She just never seemed to approve of me. I really love her husband, though. He's such a good guy. I never feel clumsy around him, like I do around her.

Kathy is my next oldest sister. Oh, how I used to worship her! I would have gone to the ends of the earth for her! I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. Then I grew up, and I still thought she was the bees knees. When I was in college she asked me to come spend the night with her when she was alone and having a miscarriage. I was scared to death, but I had to be there for her. I adored her, and would never have left her alone. Then, years later, we had a difference of opinion, and she decided she was done with me. She hasn't spoken to me in several years. She won't have anything to do with me.

Cindy is next down the line. When my sister just older than I am was born, she "claimed" her as her baby. Then when I came along, Cindy already had one, so she didn't need me. LOL That's the way it has always been, I suppose. She really has had no real need for me. It has always felt that way. I have tried so hard to force my way into her life. I guess she really just doesn't understand how desperately I have needed her love. How can you make someone love you? I know - you can't. I couldn't. I've seen her try, but it was always forced. You can't pretend such things. It just always seemed like she was pretending. I wish she could just figure out how to be my friend, and stop treating me like a little girl.

And then there's Beth. Since Cindy claimed Sarah as "her" baby, Beth claimed me, by default. I really did love Beth. Oh, I followed her around like a lost puppy dog. She could do absolutely no wrong in my eyes. Beth is 8 years older than I am. When I was little she took me places with her, and her friends would tell me how much I looked like her. I was so proud of that because I thought she was so pretty. She was my hero. When we would go on family trips I would snuggle on her lap. She was my "Bethie", and I was her "Ruthie". In our adult years, I continued to give her my heart as I did when I was little. I thought we were the best of friends. I supported her through her times of heartache. I was there for her when she needed me. And when the most horrible thing in my entire life came upon me, she tore my heart out and left me bloody and dying.

Last but not least, there is Sarah. She never liked me, not for a second. My stomach turns when I think of her. I know that I deluded myself into believing that she cared for me at times. I would have given my life for just one kind word from her at any time. I agonized over every minute I was with her. I lived in hell by her side. She was the most cruel person I have ever known. We shared a bedroom all of our growing years. We even lived together in college. Everyone thought we were great friends - that would be because I just followed her around everywhere and tried everything I could think of to please her. I wanted her approval so desperately. I talked like her. I dressed like her. I wanted her friends. I wanted her to LOVE me!!! She was only 2 years older than me, and I always just thought we should have been friends. It made sense to me. Why wouldn't we be friends? It was obvious, wasn't it? But when we were quite young, she had a new friend over - Lora Miller. I remember the day quite distinctly. I remember the introduction, word for word: "This is my sister, Ruth. But I hate her." And that was it. Life pattern set. End of story. Script written for the rest of my life with her. You might think that was just a silly sibling thing that would pass. It never did. I was only a convenience for her when someone better wasn't around, and there was usually someone better around. We haven't spoken in over a year. The last conversation we had was via email, and she made sure to let me know what a horrible nuisance I had always been to her growing up. I wrote back, releasing her from that burden once and for all.

Other women have come and gone in my life. I have desperately yearned for a sister. I have found other sisters who have had great love for me. My own mother left me, and then returned to me. She loves me.

And yet, I still feel this empty place where my own sisters should be. Shouldn't they be there? Am I wrong to feel this? Is something wrong with me that they don't want me? What is it about me, that a lifetime of being who I am has just turned them away? Why can they just not accept me for who I am? In my time of greatest crisis they turned me out, deserted me and left me to die alone.

Why is it that I still miss them?

Fix You

It was a year ago that I tried to kill myself. This is a very difficult month for me. I wish July would just go away. My emotions are so full, I find myself crying often, and feeling alone a great deal. My little family is very dear to me. Darrin is precious. I know that the Lord cradles me close. I feel the Savior's presence often. Even with these blessings, this is a trying time.

Leah had surgery on Wednesday of this week, and Tori will have surgery on Wednesday of next week. It seems almost as if these things have come at this time to occupy my mind so I will have less time to think of myself. I suppose I should be grateful for the timing, and yet I just can't find any way to be grateful for my children's suffering. I want them better now. I want to fix them and make them better now. I would take their pain and keep it for myself if I could . . .



When you try your best but you don't succeed
When you get what you want but not what you need
When you feel so tired but you can't sleep
Stuck in reverse

And the tears come streaming down your face
When you lose something you can't replace
When you love someone but it goes to waste
Could it be worse?

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

And high up above or down below
When you're too in love to let it go
But if you never try you'll never know
Just what you're worth

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

Tears stream down your face
When you lose something you cannot replace
Tears stream down your face
And I

Tears stream down your face
I promise you I will learn from my mistakes
Tears stream down your face
And I

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

Grandpa Norris

Last night we went to see a delightful fireworks show. It was a real humdinger, I tell ya! Out of the blue, in the middle of the show, I was struck by the strongest feeling that my Grandpa Norris was there. I could feel him all around me. I kept thinking how this was just the thing he would have really loved. The music was loud, and I was singing along, just like he would have. He used to "deedle-deedle-dee" and hum along to things that had no words and he would bounce me on his knee like a grandpa does. He was so sweet and affectionate. Oh, how I loved him!

I found myself crying in the middle of the fireworks, big tears rolling down my cheeks, I missed him so much. It was so emotional!

Grandpa was made of joy and love and all good things. He knew how to take every moment, even the ones filled with sorrow, and find the good. He taught me how to be happy in spite of the bad things that come along, to find humor in the pain, and I'll be forever grateful to him for that.

I love you, grandpa, and I miss you every day! Thank you for the joy you've given me.

This song reminds me of grandpa:

What I'm looking for

I have my husband and my kids, and the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's pretty much what I've found in life that I'm looking for. That makes me happy.

But I keep looking around, looking for more. Since being abandoned by my family of birth, I keep looking around. I'm not sure why. I find it unsettling. However, I have revisited some old friendships that have been really very heartwarming and sweet, and I'm really grateful for them. I had let myself become cynical about people, thinking nobody wanted me, that I was undesirable and ugly. My family made me feel that way. They had beat me down until I was certain I had no worth to speak of. When I was sure I had no value, I tried to end my life, thinking my own children would be better off without me.

What a fool I was!

I have so much more to do! I have so many more mountains to climb, so many more sunsets to see, so much more of everything . . . I still haven't found what I'm looking for.

Lovely

Love seeketh not itself to please, nor for itself hath any care, but for another gives its ease, and builds a Heaven in Hell's despair.

-William Blake.

Just thinking . . .

I've been thinking of Tom and Dea.

And the time is approaching the year mark of when I became suicidal. I lost myself a year ago.

I'm not there anymore, though.

I've been thinking about Tom and Dea, and my state of mind when I was suicidal, and how completely forgivable it is to be there. People are so harsh and critical about suicide. I think that comes of their sorrow and pain, and certainly of their confusion and desperation and sense of emptiness. All of it is understandable.

And I mean ALL of it is understandable - everyone's pain, everyone's feelings. I mean to say that even those who have taken their lives, even their pain and sorrow can be understandable, in time.

I just have so much love and compassion for Tom and Dea. I could explain, but I don't know that it would do any good here. Should I try? I don't know. That is so personal, I think. If you want me to, email me and I'll share my feelings with you personally. I can tell you how I feel, having been there and back myself.

This song says some of it:



Spend all your time waiting
For that second chance
For a break that would make it ok
There's always some reason
To feel not good enough
And it's hard at the end of the day
I need some distraction
Oh beautiful release
Memory seep from my veins
Let me be empty and, oh, weightless
And maybe I'll find some peace tonight

In the arms of the angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort here

So tired of the straight line
And everywhere you turn
There's vultures and thieves at your back
And the storm keeps on twisting
You keep on building the lies
That you make up for all that you lack
It don't make no difference
Escaping one last time
It's easier to believe in this sweet madness
Oh this glorious sadness that brings me to my knees

In the arms of the angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort here

You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort here


I love you Tom. I love you Dea. I want you both to know that I'm staying right here. The feelings may persist in me now and then, but they are weaker now, and I see now that my reasons for staying are bigger and stronger than my desire to run home to his arms, as beautiful and sweet as they are.

No kidding!

Ok, I know I promised no blogging, but there's this really great contest, and if I mention it in my blog I get another entry, so here goes . . .

Check out this link!!!!! http://erinsummerillphotography.com/blog/?p=336&cpage=1#comment-147

Erin Summerill Photography is giving away an awesome frame, sitting and photo through her contest. You might as well check it out . . . ! You know you want to . . . ! Come on! What have you got to lose??? It will be fun!

Stop the insanity!

I'm done with this blogging crap.

All I ever do is blog negativity. I went to Stake Conference (I don't really think that should be capitalized. Hmmm . . .) on Sunday and had this sudden inspiration that I'm just way too negative.

Duh.

And really I just come here and write down negative stuff. I'm not all about this doom and gloom that I always put down in print. Honestly!

Mostly I'm happy. Mostly. It seems like I just blog when I'm moody, so it must seem like I'm horribly unhappy, which isn't really the case.

So I'm not going to blog anymore.

I resign.

At least for now.




tee hee

My offensive nature

Pardon me.

Excuse me.

I'm sorry.

Please don't mind me.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

Please, do pardon me, won't you?

How many times can I say it, and in how many ways?

Evidently not enough, and evidently I am not creative enough.

It doesn't matter, I suppose. I'm not going to change. I won't be who they want me to be. I won't claim to be a liar when I am not.

The truth I dared utter makes them squirm like slugs in salt, or like ants under a magnifying glass, so that just makes me a very, very undesirable creature - an unwanted thing. Nobody ever wanted to address the topic I brought up. It didn't matter that not addressing it was killing me. That didn't matter to them. Sacrificing me was all kosher to them, as long as it didn't mean disrupting their quiet little lives.

I get so tired of feeling like I'm stomping my feet and demanding attention.

No one is going to hear me.

It's exactly like screaming out into the blackness, only to hear the sound of my own voice echoing back at me.

No one is there.

So why do I keep doing it?

I don't know.

I want to quit. I really do. I just don't know how.

I'm fairly certain that nobody reads this. Even my husband doesn't read it. Who would? I just say the same things over and over.

I'm disappearing, I think.

I wouldn't mind, really.

I only hold on for my husband and kids. They're the only reason I bother to stay alive anymore. I've come to the uncomfortable conclusion that God, who I believe in without question, has stopped watching out for me, or has stopped holding me by the hand. I can't see any other reason behind the sorrow in my life. I believe in Jesus Christ. I know that he has suffered more greatly than I can ever imagine. But somehow that just doesn't bring me much consolation right now. I feel very distant from all that at this point. When the family I grew up in has betrayed me so heinously, and my parents are the very ones who have betrayed me most grievously - they being the ones who taught me the gospel itself, I suppose it would be unnatural for me not to be shaken to some extent. The interesting thing is that my belief in Christ and his gospel is not shaken at all. I'm just frustrated and confused at my level of grief, and the length at which I am asked to endure.

I don't know what God wants from me. I had a blessing not to long ago wherein I was told that God understood that I was frustrated with him. That was all. No words of comfort - just "Yeah, I can see why you would be bugged." Hmmm... What am I supposed to do with that?

I don't know.

So, I'm sorry.

Excuse me.

Pardon me.

People just get mad at me, no matter where I go, no matter what I do. I'm just that offensive, I guess. I think I'll just become a recluse. I'm not allowed to die, and my sheer nature is offensive to people. The only solution is to just crawl under a rock and live out the rest of my days.

If I happen to choose a rock you had plans for, well, please pardon me.

Excuse me.

Just let me know and I'll go someplace else.

I didn't mean to offend.

Alice

We saw Alice in Wonderland last night. I had determined a year ago that I just wasn't going to see it, because I really, truly and honestly have never ever seen a single Tim Burton film that I have enjoyed at all. I think they're all the same - dark, boring and nasty. Most of them even have pretty much the same plot. However, the kids wanted to go see Alice, (my neighbor/daughter called it Alison in Wonderland, so that is what it will forever be dubbed, in my heart and mind) and off we went, free passes in hand.

It was the most amazing movie. I just can't say enough about it. I want to see it 5 more times right now. It was so endearing to me. It had a great story for kids, but it had an even better message for adults. It was visually stunning, and it was just lovely all the way around. I think it was Disney at it's finest. Walt would have been proud. Seriously.

Alice is a story of coming of age, of coming to believe in one's self. You should see it, really. And get the album.



Trippin out
Spinning around
I'm underground
I fell down
Yeah I fell down

I'm freaking out, where am I now?
Upside down and I can't stop it now
Can't stop me now, oh oh

I, I'll get by
I, I'll survive
When the world's crashing down
When I fall and hit the ground
I will turn myself around
Don't you try to stop me
I, I won't cry

I found myself in Wonderland
Get back on my feet, on the ground
Is this real?
Is this pretend?
I'll take a stand until the end

I, I'll get by
I, I'll survive
When the world's crashing down
When I fall and hit the ground
I will turn myself around
Don't you try to stop me
I, I won't cry

I, I'll get by
I, I'll survive
When the world's crashing down
When I fall and hit the ground
I will turn myself around
Don't you try to stop me
I, and I won't cry

It's been a year . . .

It's been a year since I told my parents I was molested by my brother when I was a little girl.

So much has transpired in that time. My life has changed completely. The world I had anchored myself to, the foundation I had build myself upon, the very ME I thought I was - all have turned upside down in the past year. I have had to completely redefine myself and my world. I have had to find out what matters to me all over again, to rediscover the people in my life who actually care about who I am inside, and to find that my path to God was waiting for me all that time.

I found that the family I grew up in, including my own parents, were willing to sacrifice me and my happiness in order to preserve the fragile facade of 'normalcy' they choose to cling to. There is a natural plucking order in every family. In my family, I fell into the position of scapegoat. My brother Tom held that sorry role before I did, and after he committed suicide, they placed it upon my head. When I broke the code of silence, as Tom did, I was driven out and beaten to a bloody pulp.

Over the years, we did the same thing to my sister Kathy, albeit by degrees. I don't know how she put up with it. Although I was pretty much clueless about what went on with Tom, I was not innocent of what went on with Kathy. Of that, I am very, very sorry. I know how it all feels now to be on the receiving end of such cruelty and torment. Kathy is a better and stronger person than I am. After just a few months of such treatment from my family, I tried to kill myself, twice. I wanted to die. I just wanted to curl up and cease to exist. Even now I can still feel the sting of pain that comes to me when I think of those months of absolute darkness and despair that I spiraled into when my family cast me out.

I remember going through the stages of grief - denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance - over and over. I'm still going through them over and over again. I keep wondering if the cycle will ever end. I keep wondering if I will ever heal, will ever be a functional person again. Will I ever come to a point in my life where I won't feel like I have an 8-inch across shotgun blast-type hole going all the way through me where my heart should be? The truth is that I just don't know the answers to those questions. No one can really answer them for me.

After a year of betrayal and heartache, and time to heal, how do I feel?

Some days are good, and some days are bad.

That's really the best I can do.

I called and yelled at my parents a few weeks ago. I told them I hated them and wished they were dead. Our dog had died, and my 9 year old son was having nightmares of loss and abandonment, and they included his grandparents, of course. How could they not? I was so angry with my parents for their blatant disregard for their grandchildren! I told them so. If they had died, it would be easier for my kids than to have them just decide my child molester brother is more important than they are. How sick is that, anyway? So, on that day I just happened to wish my parents were dead. I confess I think it would be easier for me too. It would somehow be easier for me to forgive them once they were dead, than to have them living each day over and over, choosing not to care about the fact that they had betrayed me so horribly. Every day they live is another day they choose not to care about me. At least if they died, I know they would have to face the truth, and know that my brother actually did rape me when I was a little girl, and that I am not a liar.

I am not now a liar, nor have I ever been. I am not mistaken. My memory is not inaccurate or flawed in any way. My brother, Fredrick William Cobabe, Jr., sexually molested me. This would have been probably in 1977 or 1978. He is the oldest in our family, and I am the youngest - he is 21 years older than I am. At the time I would have been 6 or 7, and he would have been 27 or 28. He was married and had children then, and worked for my father. Because he worked in the family business, which was operated out of our home, he was around on a regular basis. He and my other brothers, who also worked in the family business, came home for lunch with our dad quite often. He previously had a criminal record as a sex offender in the State of California, and continued to have one after the time he raped me. Later, he moved to Utah where he continued his criminal career as a sex offender. He has always demonstrated a blatant disregard, and almost a disconnect from reality, when it comes to the welfare of family, where his sex offenses come to bear. Although I'm not an expert, I believe this is fairly typical of a truly criminal sexual addict. They just see no harm in what they inflict upon their victims.

This type of behavior seems to have been around in my father's family for at least a couple of generations. I have uncles who have had similar "problems". What do you do with that? In that past, it has always been a subject that has been swept under the rug. And, hey - that's what my parents have tried to do!

Frankly, that just makes me sick. How many other children did my brother molest?

But really, let's just sweep it under the rug, like the Catholic church.

But I digress . . .

It's been a year . . .

Am I better? Am I worse?

I'm seeing my therapist far less. I'm hardly seeing her at all, actually. I'm not a total train wreck anymore. (Between you and me, sometimes I feel like one - like now, for instance. This little moment of retrospect hasn't been altogether healthy, I don't think.) But really, for the most part, I'm seeing more silver lining than rainy day.

I do have a really incredible family. It just consists of my husband and children. That's all - no parents or siblings. Nobody else gets in. Maybe I have some friends. But I love my husband and kids so much. They are my treasures. Man, I just love them so much.

I've learned a lot about myself and I've grown about 40 feet tall. We had to build a separate doorway just so I could get in our house! I couldn't even duck to get in the front door, I grew so tall! Really, though, I'm not so sure about strength or anything. Sometimes I think I might still buckle under the weight, but I've really gained perspective. I don't find myself capable of judging too many people, having been in the gutter for so blasted long, personally.

And most importantly, I really just love my Savior. I just can't really talk about it here, because I can't put that kind of feeling into the right kind of words, I guess. Not right now. Not in this post. It wouldn't be right. Sometime soon, though. Just let me say that without his light, I would not be alive anymore.

So, a year. It hasn't been easy, and it hasn't been fun. I can't even say it has been really good. It has just been a year, and I've gotten through it.

On to the next. Man, I hope it gets easier.

The Olympics - I'm crazy!

Oh, how I love the Olympics!!!

I didn't love the Olympics this much before this year, but I am just nuts about the whole deal this time around (except ice dancing). I really can't say why I'm so crazy about it all this year, but I just want to watch it all night and day.

Ok, to be honest, I don't really care that much about the figure skating routine, and ice dancing really just makes me want to barf, but even the Nordic events hold a relatively reasonable amount of interest for me. It just all makes me so thrilled!

And can I rave enough about curling??? NO!!! I love, love, love curling! It is such a wild and wooly sport, I can't even believe it! I've decided it is the perfect combination of bowling and chess. What a hoot! Oh, that game gives me an ulcer! I just love it!

Hockey - do you know that I have never liked hockey before this very year? These Olympic games have made me love hockey! I've become a hockey fan. Seriously! Who would have guessed!? I can hardly stand it! So now I'm this person who yells at the tv screen during a hockey game. What is that all about??? Sheesh!

The Olympics.

Go figure!

Who am I, anyway?

I am . . . ?

We gain a great deal of sense of identity from the security we garner from our parents and the family we grew up in. At least, those of us who grew up in a family do. I don't know how it works for those who didn't grow up in a family. I can't really address that subject because I don't know.

So I have been struggling over the past year, really struggling because I've had to try to redefine myself as I've had to redefine my family. I've discovered that my family was not what I thought it was. My parents were not who I thought they were. I've become so disillusioned.

The truth is that they probably didn't really change. They've probably always been just who they are now. Or maybe my parents are different now because they are elderly, which does make sense (so maybe I should cut them some slack?). I don't know. Maybe my eyes are opened now and I see things for what they have really been all along. I know that I've put most of my family up on a pedestal my entire life, and I'm seeing things without rose colored glasses for the first time. I'm seeing things from a realistic perspective now.

It frustrates me.

I have to figure out not just who they are, but who I am. It isn't just that they look different from this perspective, but I do too. I understand that if I see them with all their flaws more clearly, mine are more evident as well. I'm not blind to all that. All that is painfully obvious to me. I spend too much time inside my own head, trying to figure out where and how I fit in this new world I've discovered.

I still haven't figured it out.

Let me know if you have any clues.

Rocky Mountain High!

It's a miracle!




Please welcome the newest member of the Brandt family, Miracle!

We just couldn't stand it any more, so we made some frenzied phone calls on Friday, threw some things in overnight bags, and hopped in the old family truckster. We headed out for Denver, where we ended up on Saturday afternoon, to meet our new doggie. We adopted Miracle, who we are calling 'Mira' from a racetrack there. The racetrack had been closed (HOORAY!) and is being used to house dogs now, ironically, which are being adopted out. Colorado is no longer a racing state. Actually, Mira came from a closed racetrack in Tucson, Arizona, and was shipped in to Denver for adoption. So - our dog, which we are transporting to Utah to live with us, was born in Arizona, and sent to Colorado where we drove to adopt her! She's definitely well travelled for a doggie of less than 3 years!

So, funny story that isn't so hilarious - we're now trapped in a hotel in a charming little ski resort town called Silverthorn. We decided to pull off for a potty break for Mira and a couple of others in the family, and as we came to the traffic signal at the end to the highway offramp, I said to Darrin, "Wow, that car in front of us really smells bad! What is that, burning brakes?" (We were coming down the grade from the Continental Divide.) We agreed that it must be burning brakes, and felt really bad for that car in front of us. So we pulled into the gas station parking lot and got out. Darrin decided to check under the hood, just to make sure it wasn't our car that had that awful smell. Good news - nothing under the hood smelled bad! We started heading in to the store and as we did, Darrin paused and pointed to the passenger side wheel. I looked down and saw that there was smoke coming from the wheel well, and there was actually boiling liquid emanating from the center of the wheel hub.

Um, I don't know much about cars, but that didn't seem very good to me. Also, we had found the source of that "bad car smell". It wasn't that car in front of us!

So, here we sit with our super neat (honestly) new doggie, Mira, in a great (honestly) hotel room, completely stranded! It's Sunday, so no repair shops are open. Also, tomorrow is President's Day, so we don't know if any repair shops will be open then! This is a big adventure, to say the least. We're just going to hunker down and have some fun, whatever comes. That's really just our style, anyway.

We are nestled in at the tippy top of the Rocky Mountains, somewhere between the big tunnel under the Continental Divide and Vail. It is just as beautiful as it can possibly be. There was a big storm that came through last night, and another one is supposed to come through tomorrow. Hopefully we can get our axle fixed and it won't break the bank! Won't it be exciting to see what tomorrow brings???

Until then, the entire Brandt family, including our new addition, is experiencing an extreme Rocky Mountain High!

End of the world . . . and I feel fine!

My thoughts have been racing like crazy lately - random and wild like this song. One minute I feel sad and blue and depressed and sure that things will be that way forever, and then I'm just happy and glad and I know that everything will be ok.

My whole family has been this way. It's wild how losing our Cairo has effected us this way. My sweet Jared, only 9 years old, has been having awful dreams. He dreams of loving and hugging Cairo, only to awake and find himself alone. Then he lays there awake and crying, all alone in the darkness. It isn't the dream that is so awful, but what he awakes to afterward. And then last night, he dreamed again of Cairo, and then dreamed of losing his grandparents who he had loved so much.

Damn them a million times over. Damn them to a thousand corners of hell! And I'm not kidding! I told them if they banished me they would be breaking my children's hearts, and that the choice was theirs. My children lived in their home for three years and grew to adore them in ways they could never have imagined. And then they made the conscious choice to abandon not only me, but to completely turn their backs on my children, their own grandchildren, who they knew to adore and esteem them in the highest fashion. My children felt that their grandparents could do no wrong! And then they did this to them! Oh, the deepest betrayal of all to their dear, young hearts! Oh, the pain and confusion! My poor darlings! What can I do for them? How can I mend their sweet little spirits? The poor things are having dreams of their abandonment by their trusted ones. What am I to do?

Somehow, I will pick up the pieces. I absolutely must put this back together.

This is the mess that caused me to attempt suicide. Can you imagine what it did to my tender little children?

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine . . . or at least I must pretend that I do, until my children believe it. Then maybe I'll really feel fine and we can move on.

BTW, I really like this frenzied rendition of this song. It really displays how I feel.

Lost Tribe - not so lost

I read this amazing and very stirring article on CNN.com about a woman on a tiny island in India who died last week. Her name was Boa. She was the last surviving member of her tribe, and the last woman on the face of this entire earth who spoke her language. Can you imagine such a thing? How lonely that must have been for her! What a beautiful relief to finally die and return to the presence of all your loved ones and be able to speak your native tongue with those who understand you! What a blessing, seriously.

She was part of a tribe that is believed to be one of the oldest known human cultures on earth, dating back 65,000 years. How cool is that? They lived on the Andaman Islands, about 150 miles off the coast of India.

I wanted to post this neat video of her singing some of the old songs of her tribe, but the best I could manage was the link. I hope you'll follow it and see her and listen to her voice. It is a record of a culture that has died with her. It is a treasure that we can take with us, carry in our memories even though she and her culture have gone. Her entire language and culture have now vanished from the face of the earth, but here is a brief moment captured in time for us to relish. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I have. It really delighted me to know that I've been able to share in a part of something that has otherwise disappeared from our planet. I'll keep it in my mind forever, and that way it will live on after a fashion. It's nice to think of that way.

http://cnn.com/video/?/video/world/2010/02/05/bo.lost.language.cnn

Dea

Dea was my cousin. I found out today that she died last week. I'm not altogether surprised, because I've been thinking that a family member had died. It was just a sense of something like that, an unsettled feeling that there was something I should have been aware of.

Dea and I became friends close to 10 years ago, over the internet. We would link up via instant messenging, and chat for hours. She was really sweet and good. She was several years older than I was, but we had shared similar life experiences. We became good friends right away. Dea had lived a hard life. She had made some lousy choices that had led her down some tough paths, and she hadn't been able to correct her course quite the way she would have liked. That never changed the fact that she had an incredibly good heart, though. She was a good woman, through and through. I loved her so much, although we had lost touch over the years.

She suffered from some major physical challenges, and dealt with awful pain. That was something we had in common, and something we understood about each other. Pain sears your soul and bonds people together, I think. She struggled with addiction to painkillers at times. I'll never judge her for that, because I know how it feels to be wracked by pain and have your body just cry out for relief. No one who hasn't experienced that can possibly understand, and there's just no point in trying to explain it.

Dea's family - her parents and her siblings - loved her and supported her. They may not have agreed with everything in her life, but they never deserted her. She wasn't a perfect person, of course not. Who is? But her family loved her. Dea seemed to have always been searching for the right person in her life. I don't think she ever found him, but I hope God, in his infinite wisdom, will help Dea work that out. I'd like to think of her happy that way - spending eternity holding hands with someone wonderful who makes her feel as completely special as she really is.

Carry you home

Today we sent our dearest friend, Cairo, home to God.

Maybe that seems trite or insignificant to some, but to me it was really a very big thing. Cairo wasn't just a dog to any of us. She was a dear, dear friend and sweet love. She was the best dog ever. She came into our lives at a vital time, and bridged some great gaps that seemed impassable for us. Cairo filled holes in my heart when I was bleeding. She gave me unconditional love and hope. She was our plucky comic relief when we were desperate for it. In short, she saved our lives.

After much prayer and deliberation, Darrin and I decided that it was time to let Cairo go. The medication we had been giving her didn't seem to be helping her much. She was miserable. She wasn't improving like she needed to. Poor Cairo just couldn't walk, and she needed constant attention. She could not be left alone for a moment. She was not happy. I kept feeling impressed that she was unable to fulfill the measure of her creation.

So, after the kids went to school this morning, we got ready and took her to the vet. They kindly gave her a shot, and she went to sleep. She fell asleep in our arms as we loved her and urged her to run home.

She was a beautiful dog, with a beautiful spirit. I know that she is racing like the wind now, unfettered by the broken body that bound her.

Oh.

My doggie is dying. She appears to have a brain tumor or maybe she had a stroke, we're not sure which. The vet tells us she won't last long. On Thursday she was ok, and in the night something bad happened. By Friday morning she couldn't walk anymore. She can't stand up on her own, can't pee very well, and can't poop at all. She hasn't been in pain, but the longer she goes without pooping, the more pain she's in. I think tonight will be her last night. I won't see her suffer like this anymore. I'll spend another night on the living room floor with her tonight. Tomorrow will be her last.

Tori won't leave her side. She just keeps sobbing. We haven't even told her we're putting the dog to sleep in the morning. We've done all we can to help ease the kids' pain, and prepare them for the loss. How can you do that, though?

No music today. I just can't feel it.

In need of sunshine!

We just keep getting more and more snow! Where we live it is supposed to hardly ever snow, and yet we just keep getting dumped on! The old-timey locals are scratching their heads and just don't know what to think. We just keep shoveling and digging out, and waiting for some blue skies.

I'm kind of dumb and happy either way. Yesterday, though, I fell on the ice TWICE!!! I can't even remember the last time I fell on the ice, but I fell twice yesterday, just to make up for lost time. LOL Today I am so sore! Oh well. What can you do??? The second time I fell, I landed in a huge puddle of ice water, and ended up with super soggy feet and water splashed up to my hips. The end result was a shopping trip for new, waterproof boots. They are toasty warm and I am happy.

Today I feel sleepy and ready for hibernation. I also got a new cell phone because my old one was on the blink. My new one is cuter, but it is identical to Darrin's, Tori's and Leah's, so I think I'll have to go to Walmart and get some stickers - you know, um, ***BLING*** for the phone! How silly. I'm embarrassed to admit I'm going to do it. But how else will we tell them apart? Leah has little flowers on hers. I'll try to find something low key, something 'me-ish'.

Oh, also, I got Jared the most handsome pair of Sunday pants. They are, well, toffee colored, and plaid, with a lovely blue stripe that runs through the plaid. I'm very pleased with the whole purchase. They'll look so good with his blue shirt. But what tie will he wear? Maybe I'll just have to buy him a new one! LOL

And the crown jewel of the week is our trip to the thriving metropolis of VERNAL, UTAH, for the kids' swim meet this weekend. They all are swimming in races this weekend, so we'll go and get a hotel and have some fun. We'll just stay one night. Afterall, it IS Vernal in winter time. What did you think we were going to do???

This time of year, I'm packing my sunshine with me.

The week's laundry

So, here's what's up this week -

I'm working on getting all the laundry folded. That's an ever menacing task. I can always get things washed, but getting it folded is another story. It seems like we live out of the 'clean' pile. Very tedious.

My big orange fish has big black splotches all over. Not a good sign. But I think maybe they'll just spontaneously go away?

My dog got all freaky weird kind of sickish yesterday. I heard this big crash, like maybe she saw a cat outside and bashed into the window. (Yeah, I know, she's not the brightest crayon in the box all the time.) But then she came in and crawled up on the bed by me and one of her legs wasn't working right and she was having a really bad muscle spasm in her shoulder for about an hour. Later she seemed to be paralyzed on one side of her body and she couldn't walk, and then she couldn't figure out how to lay down. Today she seems better, but she's really clingy. I wonder if she gave herself a concussion. Hmmmm???

I've been having a bunch of anxiety attacks. I don't know why. I keep having to take Klonopin. I have that love/hate relationship with Klonopin. It saves my bacon, that's for sure, but I just wish I could control my emotions on my own.

In Relief Society on Sunday the stupid lesson ended up being about honoring your father and mother. I leaned over to my friend sitting next to me and said, "Well, this is a difficult one for me. My dad came and sat on my couch last spring and disowned me." She just kind of blinked at me and said "I can see how that might make this difficult." I promptly buried my head in my lap and proceeded to cry. I didn't just cry. I BAWLED. And for some reason, I was just frozen on the spot. I couldn't get up. I couldn't leave the room. I was just sitting there crying and crying. I was shaking and crying. I was crying as quietly as I could, but everyone knew I was crying. I was all folded over onto my lap with my face buried in my hands, all snotty and teary, and I couldn't do anything about it. I was having a full-blown anxiety attack. I was just a mess. Finally I remembered that I had a great big handkerchief in my purse, left there from the temple dedication we had gone to a couple of months ago, so I leaned over and dug that out. I was able to mop myself up, and I do mean mop and the very literal sense of the word.

I just kept thinking "How can I honor my father and mother when they have not behaved honorably?" I have done everything I could to honor them throughout my life. Sure, I had my rebellious years, but I made amends for all of that. I've done all I could to honor my parents and serve them and treat them with respect. I've loved them unconditionally and I have treasured them. I have raised my children to do the same. My children loved and revered my parents, they adored them so much that when my parents turned their backs on me, my children were wounded perhaps as deeply as I was, albeit in different ways.

So, I went to my parents, whom I had always honored and trusted and loved, and I told them the truth. In return they betrayed me and dishonored me. They turned their backs on me. They disowned me and walked away.

How can I honor them?

That was the lesson that left me crumpled up in a ball in the middle of the RS room, bawling like a baby. I finally collected myself enough to leave about 10 minutes before the lesson was over. I felt so embarrassed. I felt really bad that I had done that to the teacher. I needed a Klonopin just then. The lame thing was that later I realized that I had one in my purse all along, and just didn't remember it! Me and my great brain! Oh well - if there's one thing in life I'm good at, it's making an ass of myself. We'll call that one mission accomplished!

I just keep wondering when I will stop crying about being hurt by those people, my family, you know. I honestly don't miss them. I don't want them back in my life. If they came to me today and apologized and said they wanted to be part of my life again, I would accept their apology, of course. But I would tell them I really couldn't have them in my life again. I've changed my life around and they just don't fit anymore. I've closed up those spaces. There were gaping wounds where they used to be, and they've healed over. I can't open them up again. I just can't do that. It would hurt me too bad. They almost killed me before with what they did to me, see? It just wouldn't be safe for me to open those wounds again. I can't. I couldn't. I wouldn't. I won't go there again. I'm moving on. I'm trying. I'm working on forgiving. I'm working on so much. It really is exhausting, but I'm working on it. Every day I'm working on it.

I feel like I'm pulling this enormous wagon up a steep hill with just straps on my back holding it to me. It is so heavy and precarious. Sometimes I could just fall backwards, and I don't know if I would recover. You just can't imagine how heavy it is, honestly. The work has to be done, I swear it does. But I can't tell if there's a top to this damn hill. I don't know if I'll ever be done! I don't know if the weight of the wagon will ever be lighter. I don't know if this will ever get easier or if I'll ever get stronger so it will feel lighter to me. I keep thinking I have to do this alone, too. I'm sure the Savior could help me somehow. I just have to figure out how. I keep thinking that if I pause long enough to get yoked up with Him, I might lose ground, or worse yet, sink into the mud. The mud is so horrible and deep. This is such awful work. How did I get here?

And the laundry keeps piling up. It never ends, does it?

This is a really lovely arrangement of this piece. It isn't the full piece, but I'll post that another time.

Happy music for a Thursday afternoon

A few nice tunes for today. Enjoy -



You have no idea how hard it is to get this piece. Nobody wants to let me embed it to share it! Grouchy people are stingy over such a happy song! Enjoy it while you can! Whistle along, go ahead. I know you want to . . .

Stupid Fiddler, anyway . . .

My father always idolized Tevye.

Do you know Tevye? If you know Fiddler on the Roof, you know Tevye. He was the main character in the story line. He had several daughters, which he was obliged to marry off, and felt the sting of that burden quite painfully.

Therein, I suppose, lies the tie my father felt with Tevye - the whole daughter thing. 5 daughters for Tevye - 5 daughters for my poor father. What a burden. Oy!

Poor Tevye was beset with the job of arranging marriages for his daughters, he, of course, thinking (as was the tradition of the day) that they should not do so themselves. Then, of course, his silly daughters went off and fell in love on their own, as daughters are wont to do. Tevye handled it all pretty well until his daughter, Chava, whom he forbade to marry outside the Jewish faith, eloped and defied him. She was in love! What was she supposed to do???

So then she returned and begged him to accept her and her new husband. What did Tevye do? Well, he refused to acknowledge her. He turned his back on her. He pretended she was dead, and ordered the rest of his family to do the same. So her mother and everyone in the family had to ignore her, pretend she wasn't even there while she was pleading and crying and begging. They all just pretended she was dead. Can you imagine such a thing? How horrible!

In the end, Chava and her husband went off to Russia, and Tevye took the rest of the family to America.

Interesting parallels here. See how my father romanticizes himself into the Tevye role:

So it wasn't marriage, but a revelation that went against tradition that my father couldn't deal with, so he simply disowned me. I became dead to him. And not only did I become dead to him, but with his pronouncement I became dead to the entire family. I'm not saying it well. Here's exactly how it happened -

As I've said, I went to my mom and dad last year to tell them about my brother Bill molesting me when I was a little girl. I was finally ready. I needed to tell them. It was time. After some time, (I'm not really sure about the passage of time - it all became very surreal) my dad drove over the mountain by himself, sat down on my couch and delivered a carefully rehearsed speech. He told me that he did not believe me. He told me that my memory was wrong. He told me that even if it did happen, he didn't see why I needed to tell about it now, after all this time. He told me that he just couldn't believe me because of how my memory had come to me. It was all too fuzzy, or something like that - I can't remember his exact words now. No matter what I said, he just refused to even discuss it. He had made up his mind. He had chosen to believe Bill, the son who had been convicted of sex crimes that my dad had no idea of how serious they were. My brother Bill was known to be a horrible liar his whole life, and yet my dad had chosen to believe him over me.

I was crushed, dazed, confused.

We got up. I saw him to the door. I was sobbing. We were planning to move to Texas at that point, at some nebulous time in the future. My dad said something to the effect that we should go ahead and go. He said he understood Texas was a "Hellacious" place, with hurricanes in the south and tornadoes in the south. I guess he figured it was a proper hell for me to be banished to (although it seemed a nice place to me!). Maybe it was comparable to Russia to him, to further the Fiddler analogy.

So I hugged him and I was sobbing. I told him I didn't know if I would see him again, and I was clinging to him. He pushed me away and said goodbye, then walked away as he handed me off to Darrin. Darrin pulled me in the front door, and I don't remember anything else for awhile, maybe days.

See, I really loved my dad. I mean, I just idolized him. I was absolutely a daddy's girl. I hung on his every word. And then he broke my heart. A while later, I was on Skype with my mom and she was in the living room. My dad walked by and I said "Hi Dad!" He ignored me. He walked by again and I really yelled "HI DAD!!!", so there was no way he could say he didn't hear me, but he just walked right on by and pretended he didn't even hear me at all.

Eventually my family quit having anything to do with me. They shunned me altogether. I put on a brave face and pretended I quit them, but the truth is they dumped me. They all did what my dad wanted them to do. They all pulled a Fiddler on me.

I didn't hold up very well at first. I tried to kill myself - twice. Darrin wouldn't let me go, thank goodness. Darrin is so good and strong, and he pulled me through this mess. He saved my life. I thank the Lord for him every day.

So, Tevye. My dad just thinks Tevye is so great. I think Tevye is a stupid, foolish jerk who cares more about his tradition than about his own daughter.

And that is the man my father idolizes. That is the man my father has emulated.

Pathetic, sorry excuse for a father.

frozen woman

I'm SOOOO COLD!!!!!



Ok, this isn't me in the pic, I stole it from some random blog, but this is how I feel all the time - INSIDE AND OUT!!! I can't get warm! Something is wrong with my thermostat, and my body is not warming me up right. I'm a walking popsicle! I started monitoring my temperature this weekend, and quite regularly my temp is as low as 95.5 and it never gets higher than 97.6 or so, even though I sleep with an electric blanket and my hot-water-blanket-husband. This morning after my daily regimen of water aerobics, when my body should have been all warmed up from exercise, my temp was 94.7!

WHAT????

That is medically categorized as hypothermia! How lame is that?

Ok, I'm going to the doctor tomorrow. I have an appointment at 9:40. I'm so tired of being cold! I'll keep you posted.

So, anyway . . .

Regarding the previously mentioned Meltdown, (drumroll, pleeeease!) . . .

In week one of our diet, Darrin lost 18 pounds! Holy cow! Can you believe it??? What a freak!!! Men are so lucky! Way to go, Darrin! I'm so proud of him. How awesome, seriously.

And, I'm not sad to report that I lost 8 pounds! Yahoo! That is not shabby. N'est pas? It makes me happy!

I'm wondering if bringing my body temperature up to where it should be would boost my metabolism and help me lose weight. What do you think?

Also, along the frozen woman frontier - there's a group of ladies in our ward at church that holds a book club once a month. In the 3 years or so that we've lived here, I've always thought it sounded fun, and I've thought how nice it would be to go. Well, yesterday I made up my mind that this was the time to go! I was so excited! Thursday night is the scheduled night, and I was going to go get the book at the library and read it quick and just go for it! Then I got home from church and promptly talked myself out of it.

I'm just too scared. (frozen woman. deer in headlights. scared stiff.)

I'll admit it. I'm chicken. I'm totally crippled when it comes to social situations. My sole thought is this - "What if they don't like me?" I worry that I might say stupid things, or that people will just be annoyed by me. I know I'm a little bit more than off, and people think I'm weird sometimes. I get that, ok??? I understand that I don't always fit in, but should that prohibit me from attending any and all social situations?

Oh, I don't know.

So, I ended up crying to Darrin about how I just wouldn't go to the book club because I was afraid of not being accepted. In the end, I just don't know if I can take rejection - not after 2009.

FEAR is a four-letter-word.

Lord, have mercy on the frozen woman.

The BIG MELtdown!!!

So, I'm on a diet. Isn't that just HILARIOUS??? I mean, seriously, isn't that just the iconic New Year's joke? How ridiculous is that? For Pete's sake! I've fallen for the traditional pitfall of all pitfalls!

However . . . I did put on a few pounds over the holidays . . .

I blame it on my medication . . . um . . . yeah! It was my Lyrica - notorious for causing weight gain. But I wouldn't trade it for the world. Really, it does tend to cause weight gain, but I take it for the pain of my fibromyalgia, and it reeeeally does work. And it doesn't give me the rotten side effects that painkillers do, so I just love it. I'm not taking narcotics for the pain anymore, so I just feel so grateful. I'll just have to work a little harder to shed the extra 8 pounds the Lyrica (and the holidays!) made me gain!

So, the local wellness center and the hospital have this big "Meltdown" weightloss program, like The Biggest Loser kind of thing. You sign up with your team, pay $20 and go on a diet for 3 months. Whoever loses the greatest percentage of body fat at the end of 3, 6, 9 and 12 weeks wins prizes and money. Cool beans! I have no doubt we won't win, but it does motivate me to not be the idiot who doesn't lose weight each week when we weigh in, so the pressure alone should help!

Yeah, stress and pressure!!! Just what I need!!!

So, anyway, last night I ended up with some nasty stomach bug, and was stuck in the bathroom for a couple of hours. This morning I weighed myself, and I had lost 5 1/2 pounds! Hooray!!! The diet is working already!!! LOL Does that count?

Hey, I'll take it anywhere I can get it.

:)

Let it be kind . . .

Ok, so the new year rang in last night, and we toasted it with our traditional non-alcoholic beverage. The kids love to do it, and we always have to do it but always forget until the very last second. Its always a mad rush in the very minute before midnight, but we always get a splash in the glasses and get the glasses raised just before the 10 second countdown. Then there comes the inevitable, joyful shout of:

10!

9!

8!

7!

6!

5!

4!

3!

2!

1!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Everyone is so happy and dancing around, and the glasses clink, and there's just so much really gleeful chaos. The kids are pulling their poppers and streamers are flying. And then Darrin and I have to dash off to get Tori and her friend from their teenager dance at the LDS stake center. Good times . . .

It's cold outside, really cold, and that brings me back to my senses a bit too abruptly. It shocks me a bit, I guess. I settle into the passenger seat, and very suddenly I find myself sobbing, just sobbing so deeply. It comes from deep within me. It surprises me, coming from places of fear and sorrow I had tucked neatly away over the last 365 days of pain and and torment. Hidden things come peeking out to see what the fuss is all about, craning their necks around corners of doors too recently closed. Darrin just drives on toward our destination, holding my hand and letting me do whatever it is I'm doing.

My thoughts become cohesive - "Dear Lord", I begin to pray, "Please! PLEASE! Let this let this coming year be better! Just let it be better! My silent prayers become vocal as my sobs begin to calm, and Darrin hears, and understanding dawns. He squeezes my hand and says "We'll make it better, ok? We'll just MAKE it better!" There's a tone of desperation in the end of his statement. It's a declaration, a pronouncement. Somehow it will happen. I don't know how. I just don't know how, but it has to get better, doesn't it?

I'm going to be honest here - painfully so, in the hope that I might get some poison out of a wound and be able to just move on. One of the most horrible things that happened to me in 2009 was the betrayal of my brother Jim. If he reads this, I have no doubt that he will derive some sadistic pleasure from the reading thereof, and I honestly haven't written or even spoken of it prior to this moment because I just haven't wanted to give him the satisfaction of knowing how deeply he hurt me, but I'm beyond caring about that now. I'm ready to move on. He can't hurt me anymore. I'm removing his barbs. He has no hold on my anymore, no more control. By doing this, I am completely removing him from my life.

You see, I saved his life a year ago. He was dying, and resigned to it. He wanted to die, and no one knew what to do to save him but me. I had prayed about it, and the Lord gave me direction. Jim is a divorced man who has wasted his life feeling sorry for himself. He has chosen to be a pathetic loser and just spindle away his days doing mostly nothing. He lives with our parents, who are now in their 80s, in the garage and just was getting fatter and fatter every day until he finally had a stroke. And then he had another, and another. He was in really bad shape. He was dying.

So, nobody knew what to do with him and my mom called me and asked me to come. I prayed about it, and the Lord told me what to do. I needed to take him to the University of Utah to the Neurology team there. I needed to get him admitted to the Neurology ward. I didn't know what would happen, really, but that was what I needed to do. It was what I was going to do. So I did it. Everyone was a bit confounded that I actually did - the family, the ER people, the doctors. Nobody could really figure out how I got him admitted. I kind of bullied my way in, but I did it. He was there for 2 weeks before they figured out what to do with him, and I never left his side. The doctors didn't know what to do with him. They couldn't figure out what was going on, and they were ready to discharge him because they were baffled and didn't think they could do anything. But I was just waiting, because the Lord had told me to bring him there.

And then in the middle of the night one of the doctors decided to MRI his entire head and spine. It turned out he had a couple of tumors along his spinal column, called schwanomas, that were causing some of the paralysis and stroke-like symptoms he was experiencing. He went in for neuro surgery the next day.

Better than that, his sons, who had been estranged from him since his divorce 10 years before, came back to him. I spoke to them early on in Jim's hospitalization and told them that if they were ever going to reconcile with their dad, they needed to do it then, because he might die. So, they got together and came to see him. All was forgiven and they found out that they all loved each other. It was quite sweet and good.

Jim became physically better, and spiritually far better. He not only was able to live physically, but found reason to live! It was so amazing. It was a thrilling experience to go through with him. We became so close during this time, I can scarcely describe it. My heart opened up to him in a way it never had any of my brothers. During the 2 weeks I spent at the hospital by his bedside I developed such love and absolute devotion toward Jim. It was one of the sweetest experiences of my life.

I believe it also opened me up to allow me to remember being molested by our other brother. The trust I developed for my brother Jim was key in allowing my memory to come forward regarding our brother Bill, who Jim and I discussed in some detail in our hours together in the hospital. I trusted Jim so intimately, so deeply. When I went to my parents to disclose the most private and secret nightmare that I had kept to myself for over 30 years, that I had been sexually accosted by my oldest brother while in my tender years, Jim sat with us at the kitchen table. I felt comfortable having him there. I trusted him with that awful secret. He was my confidant. He was one of my truest friends, I felt.

Jim had called me a gem, a treasure, a jewel. And in the time to come after I disclosed the awful truth of my childhood rape, I went to him privately to speak with him about it. He told me that although he did not know exactly what to think, he knew that Bill was a liar and that I was not, so he felt inclined to believe me. I felt satisfied with that. I felt happy, in fact, that my dearest brother would stand beside me and support me in my time of agony and sorrow. I was so alone - my parents were calling me a liar, and I was trying to stand tall in the truth that I knew. I had been a victim, and my oldest brother was a convicted sex offender. My parents were defending his past behavior by saying that he was currently reformed! What an illogical defense!

And then Jim changed his mind. And then Jim was no longer my friend. And then the betrayal came, the attack began, the onslaught ensued. It was fairly bloody and ugly. I was stupid and hapless, even I must admit. I was witless and unexpecting. It was sabotage, really, a total ambush. He hunted me down and made his mark, and then stepped on my neck, the victor. Jim has always enjoyed a good barb, a good twist of the knife. He is rather sardonic and cruel that way. We've had a good laugh or two about that now and then. He enjoys a superior attitude about his brilliant intellect. He likes to play the fool as a means of laying in wait for his prey, and then he'll pounce when the moment is right. I've observed this behavior in him often, even been the victim of it many times myself, but never in such a cruel manner.

Good aim! Well met, old friend.

But was your marksmanship really worth the price?

And so I wrapped up my fretful sobbing session in the car as we pulled into the church parking lot to pick up my oldest daughter and her friend. I had brought glasses and another bottle of fakey bubbly stuff to toast the new year with Tori and her friend, and poured a splash into each glass (I brought pomegranate for Tori, her favorite, of course!). Our glasses clinked together as we cheered on the new year with joy. "Bring it on!", I thought! Bring it on, indeed. In the last year, I've danced through hellfire and splashed through high water!

Oh, let the next year be kind to us all . . .