You Have to Eat!

I drink on occasion. Half a glass of wine on a stressful day. A drink out with friends at a writer’s conference. Maybe two. I’m not a big drinker.

If I had to, I could never drink again. Wouldn’t bother me. Wouldn’t hurt my life or make me sad--really.

I’ve never done drugs…no, not even pot. I don’t need the munchies. Fat, remember….

The problem is, you HAVE to eat. If you don’t consume some basic calorie content daily, your body will go into starvation mode. It clings to what you’ve got like it’s a famine out there…that actually makes it harder to lose weight.

So while other addictions can go cold turkey. No more alcohol, drugs, or whatever…(heck docs can help make detox easier). But there is no such help for people who eat too much… Not eating is against human nature. Food is necessary to live.

Maybe it’s just my perspective. If my thing were alcohol, I’d probably think that was the worst thing to kick. But we don’t need that to live. The next closest thing to food is probably drugs where a person is in real pain. How do you treat the legit pain and not give them a high? Or feed the addiction?

Well, I’m trying to figure it out but all I can do is work on me. Try to find a food plan that I can stick to that isn’t too difficult or expensive (all the cheap easy food is bad for you).

Kids are pawns…and victims

No news here. Parents use kids. My dad did. If my mom had ever wanted to leave, and I remember one big fight. He threatened to keep the kids. She had no money. No power. No help. She couldn’t support the kids or hire a lawyer.

He threw it all in her face and made it very clear. It was his way or no way.

Wow….what an a$$. Sorry, the truth hurts sometimes. These aren’t divorced parents. They were married for 41 years.

My sister was in tears during that fight. I told her over and over mom wasn’t leaving. I’m only 3 ½ years older but it’s funny how with one kid, adults a lot of times forget kids listen to everything. I knew more. Had seen more. The parents hide it better later but I already knew. Mom had no alternatives. She wouldn’t leave her kids and dad got his way.

I feel bad. i feel guilty because she deserved a lot better than the way dad treated her. the way he modeled for us to treat people. He was so different in public than in private. It makes me sick to go that far back in my mind…no wonder I escaped into books.

Even historically, at least women were respected in some times. The regency era…Jane austen. It seemed like women were at least treated well but they couldn’t earn their own money or be independent. And they were ruled by their father, husband, son or even brother…they needed a man. So it was all manners…fake respect?

I guess there has never been a good time to be a woman. Maybe being overweight was a way to keep men away since I don't have good examples (first hand). Maybe food is just comfort? Of course I'd like the right guy but being financially independent--able to walk away if the guy turns into a jerk--that's critical. 

We should all be able to take care of ourselves because if we CAN'T, then others can and may take advantage of it. I'm sure not all men are bad and not all women are good. Each of us suffers from our own intense up-close experiences 

Game of Thrones, Bullies, and Poptarts

Saturday was 2 months since my father died. I'd hoped to be writing or doing something useful/productive by now.

I can't seem to do that. There are legal things and family things. There is grief and another funeral.

But I've had time to think. To reflect. I need to fix things. Be better.

My dad was a good dad in Game of Thrones sense. he protected me. He provided for me. But he wasn't a TV dad...he wasn't involved. He wanted us to be safe and secure, not happy.

He was a bully...he had to have things HIS way. It was the only way. And that's why, I think, I'm having a hard time taking steps. Even writing, he didn't like that I wrote. When you live under the rule of bully or near one...when they're gone it's odd. You're used to measuring your actions in the reaction it'll get.

There is a void. Positive? In many ways yes. Then I feel guilty because he was my father and is dead.

My mother and I spent SO much time taking care of him. Getting him well...and he's gone.
Feels like a failure somehow but it's out of my hands.

So I have to rise, like a GoT lady whose father was struck down. Even if I'm eating Poptarts for my breakfast while I catch up on the show....(strawberry frosted if anyone is interested). I know, not healthy. Bad food choice.

Right now, I'm trying to find my new normal and my path. I know what I want to do but I'm wandering a bit until I get my strength back. A grandparent dying is one thing, but a parent is a new level of  shock.

I've been bullied most of my life for being overweight and introverted. It's horrible in the time but schools change...you go on to junior high and high school so some of the dynamic shifts. A family bully is different.

I need to untangle the bully mystery...

When you can’t be yourself…

The food thing was about control. Sure…but it wasn’t just about big decisions. Someone in a family is going to be the money controller and the main decision maker a lot of the time. When it’s absolute and only one person, it feels oppressive.

But the other part of this, for me at least, is that I couldn’t be myself. I’ve mentioned being the black sheep and it’s true. I wish I could explain it. my mother tried sometimes but I just never fit in.

I’d make an intelligent joke and people would be confused. Or laugh at me like it was dumb. They didn’t get the references. Dad reinforced his ideas, ideals, and standards constantly.

When you can’t even be yourself, it’s hard to know yourself. I’m in here somewhere. Buried under decades of fat to numb and placate the real me who had to be repressed.

The hardest part is figuring out the real me. Peeling it away from the façade that survived in that situation. It’s about survival for a lot people a lot of the time. I’m not unique or special.

Mother's Day Post Blog

I missed a couple of blogs...largely because of Mother's Day. It was my mom's first one after Dad died. I took her out to eat and ice cream after balloons and a gift card. I know that doesn't seem like much but then I had lunch with some writer friends Monday and I have a funeral to attend tomorrow...that is something I'm dreading.

I've been trying to write off and on since I returned from a writer's con in Atlanta...

That conference was a nice excuse to hang with some friends but I was disappointed in reader turnout and I got a great gift from a fan!

I know part of the problem is I haven't had anything new out...other than the YA and that con wasn't really drawing YA readers. But I spent money on things at the con and a few people showed up...while others had full rooms. So not the right event for me.

Right now I'm struggling to get the writing going. I need to jump start my energy...exercise maybe?
Hopefully that'll help me start writing! Small steps...

Luckily I'll be at a conference that is more all genre and PG friendly in June!

Always Fat…

Food, Alcohol, drugs, cutting, shopping, etc… it’s all coping. Or it starts that way.

Coping turns to addiction and feels normal. Change is hard when people watch your every move. Comment on things constantly. Even too much encouragement can feel like pressure==what if you fail??

It’s scary. But the scariest part about the food. About being fat is that it doesn’t work like the others…

If you don’t shop today, and you’re an addictive shopper—you’re clean for today! Yay you!

If you’re an alcoholic and you don’t drink, you’re sober!! Awesome!

Same with drugs. Clean for one day is clean…make it another day etc…

If you’re fat and you eat healthy one day…to the world and yourself in the mirror—you’re STILL FAT!

Trust No One... Else

When I was sitting with my dad in the hospital a lot, obviously I wasn’t working a day job. The family thought I’d been laid off….

That was a lie but sometimes you have to lie to family to keep the peace. Where I used to work in Harvey, IL…well, a coworker was attacked at 5:30pm in the parking lot. The parking lots were spread out and she happened to be alone in that area when a guy mugged her. She gave him her purse and keys but he still busted her nose. The trail of blood led back into the building…

It could’ve been worse, I know.

The company had fencing around that area of parking, not all. But there was no gate to keep others out of our parking area. Random stray dogs would get in there. Kids would ride bikes in there… but in 11 years of working there, that was the first violent crime I knew to happen to an employee where I worked.

Did the company put in gates to keep the parking secure? No. They increased the patrols of security. Now they didn’t ADD to security so it was then lacking elsewhere. The company was all about the bottom line and had been going downhill for a couple years at that point.

I didn’t feel safe anymore and started looking for another job but it was the holiday season. Then, at a townhall meeting, the president of the company (who had a multi-million-dollar golden parachute) said WE are the 1%. Speaking to union laborers and single moms working customer service as well as accountants and salespeople, he said that.

He is the 1%, not us…That was the day I turned in my notice.

It felt like that was the time to try writing full time. I’d been saving seriously all my adult life. Paying down my mortgage. I basically had 2 full time jobs. Writing and accounting. So I wasn’t blowing a lot of money elsewhere…the odd writer con was all.

It’d been fine actually for a while. Writing full time was working out, more or less.

I was writing some cozy mysteries and getting good reviews—in addition to the hot stuff I’d been writing before.

Then my mom had a seizure and needed a driver/ sitter for a bit. She recovered well, needed surgery for her collarbone but things were looking up. (It was a reaction to medication so the seizures weren’t ongoing, thank God!).

So back to normal…Until dad landed in the hospital.

Back to that hospital time. I told them I was writing while I was looking for a new job since I’d been laid off. Dad wanted to read something. Nope.

He doesn’t like no. We’ve established that.

He pestered me. Bugged me. Tried to buy one. LOL

Please…he’s not getting his hands on it. He’ll only JUDGE it. MOCK it. I know better. I’ve known him far too long to fall for that crap.

He plays the wounded puppy. Like I hurt his feelings. I didn’t buy it. I didn’t care because he’s a master manipulator.

He asked WHEN I’d let him read something I wrong. I told him the 100% truth. NEVER.

And he never did. I don’t feel bad about that either. Maybe I should but he never encouraged me. Never believed in me. He had his chance when I was applying to local colleges. BTW He lowered my bar all the time. going away to school is SO expensive. Local was cheaper. Live at home to save money .( And he could keep an eye on me all the time…). Still, he could’ve encouraged me. Even met me half way and said to double major in creative writing and accounting. Weird, but I’m weird. At least it would’ve been some acknowledgement of what I love.

No, he didn’t. When I was a teen, he stuck with writing was a cute hobby and I needed a REAL job.

He never apologized. He never understood the pain and damage he inflicted. I know, I do…I understand in his mind he was trying to protect me. He wanted me to be financially secure. I get that…it’s easier to deal with life with money than without it… but he never made tons of money. He wasn’t Richie Rich.

The worst part was he had no faith in me. No hope. No dreams. At least none that matched up with my own. Compromise made no one happy…

Writing full time, I don’t get migraines, I don’t have to deal with bosses who know less than I do but suck up and play the office politics better so they make four times what I do and just sit in meetings. I might not be a huge name but I’m still trying.

I know others play the Amazon system or work the trends with more savvy. I’m trying to get back to writing after the funeral and there will still be things with the estate. Clearing out the house with mom. I want to be chugging along writing my stories and doing what I’m supposed to be doing. I’ll get there.

I’m much happier writing and accounting wouldn’t make me a millionaire either.

Now, Dad can read whatever he wants—I’m sure. But I don’t have to listen to the mocking commentary. I couldn’t handle that…I have to build some self-esteem on a solid foundation. 

The title of this blog is Trust No One....Else. Others may have good intentions. I believe my dad thought he was doing the right thing. In his estimation shaded by his experiences, maybe. I know he thought I was a dreamer and I'd never do anything or make anything of myself. A nice safe little job is better...to him. He was so overbearing with his opinions it was hard to argue or fight him... 

But in the end, no one else knows what'll make you happy. You might try things and find they aren't what you thought, but you tried. No one else can tell you what'll make you happy. no one else knows you as well as you. Trust no one else's opinion more than your own. I've always known I wanted to be a writer. Deep down for no logical reason, it was there in me...

Annual Check Up

I did go for my annual check-up. I got blood work and did what the doc asked. I’m waiting on any feedback/results/info. (ps it all came back good)

It’s not fun to go to the doctor when you’re overweight. The scale…dread it. but I did it. My dad didn’t go to a doctor annually for normal checks. When he got horribly ill, my mom called her doctor in.

They had no background info. No baseline information on blood tests or other issues. Would that info have prevented his illness? No.

Would it have prevented his death? No.

But would his illness have been less severe? Probably…because he might’ve gone to see that doctor instead of waiting until my mother called an ambulance. Going to a doctor is scarier when you don’t have a relationship with one…when it’s not a habit.

There is no way to know if my dad’s illness were less severe and he recovered faster/ better last year, if he’d have been stronger and possibly survived this year…but still, anything that helps your odds.

I could be in much better health, weight-wise…but I have a doc that knows me. Has current info. And if something happened to me, she’d know if it’s new or not…worse than before or normal…etc.

So, whoever reads this…I hope you see a doc every year and get a checkup! 

Choices and Money

We didn’t have a lot of money when I was little. I mean little like elementary school for me. My dad hated debt and paid off things as fast as he could. We never did vacations. A day at an amusement park, that was a vacation.

YET my sister and I were sent to private Catholic School. If the public schools were bad, it’d be one thing. They weren’t. Those schools have been among the top schools in Indiana most of my life. This was especially hard because Kindergarten was public only (Catholic school didn't have it). So I, an introvert, adjusted to K for one year and then got yanked into a new school of uniforms, nuns, and a lot more strictness...

Religious programming meant that much to him? I guess…but it’s so funny how when my sister had kids, and my dad had more money…he spoiled those boys like crazy. They went on the Disney cruise.

We never went to Disney world…not once. Sure, there are plenty of kids who never get to go. But he moved us in this middle to upper middle class town with great schools…then paid for private school. He didn’t seem to get how it was seeing other kids going on real vacations and we didn’t really do one…

All he had to do was not choose private school, go with the BETTER public school and he’d have had the money for one nice vacation. But knowing him, he’d have put it toward the mortgage. People’s priorities only seem to change when they want them to.

Harshness warning: The man didn’t take care of himself…but saved money like he’d live forever. Maybe now he gets it. You can’t take it with you. You actually have to enjoy life while it happens…I need that reminder sometimes because I wasn’t raised to believe that life was fun. My first fear is financial security and work...

Then...reality time. my Dad paid for my sister and her family (nephews were like 4 1/2 and 3) to go on the Disney cruise. It's amazing how priorities change. 

I don’t do any of that…

When Dad was in medical rehab, they try to do all this physical therapy that seems useful. Folding laundry. Cooking. Washing dishes etc…

He flat out refused to do any of that because he didn’t that *#&!. And this is very true. He’s never cooked a meal. He’s never washed clothes. He tried once, my mother was I the hospital for one night. She broke her collar bone during a seizure. A reaction to a medication that she as prescribed for arthritis. She’s okay now but it’s scary what one med given by a doctor can do when it doesn’t agree with you…

Anyway, mom was in the hospital. Dad tried to do a load of laundry. Couldn’t do it. He might have microwaved something at some point….maybe. he never cooked. Never cleaned. Never did dishes.

Never.

Men these days still don’t do half of the household stuff but I swear it was like growing up in the fifties or something. So sexist.

Yet, my sister and I had to go to college. I never could understand why women had to do the cooking/cleaning…if all the men had to do was go to work. If I go to work….screw it. why should I clean and cook?

This is still something I struggle with. Doing housework feels like he’s winning somehow. But I don’t have a husband. Lol. I think I need a cleaning lady to help keep me on track…honestly! Maybe one day I can afford one. 

It’s a button and I want a clean house but I need to write/ work. And I need to lose weight…and it all gets overwhelming and I do nothing. like now.

sometimes you need help. Of course men don’t call it help. They treat women’s work like it’s beneath them. THAT’s the problem the traditional roles. It’s not that there is anything wrong with a woman being a judge or a housewife. I have nothing against stay-at-home moms. Or housewives… But society has conditioned us to treat anyone NOT making money as less. They are dependent on someone else. Powerless.

If society doesn’t respect a role…how can anyone expect someone to want that role? My father took that modeling to an extreme…money was God and work that didn't make money was beneath him.  I get the dysfunction. I'm trying to reprogram my brain so I can clean without feeling like I've lost some cosmic power struggle. 

Just Take Care of the Boys

Whenever my sister said she was going to come up to see my dad while in the hospital…that was his answer. "just take care of my boys..."

This is the sucky part of not having kids. And I’m REALLY good with not having kids myself….I like kids but I'm not meant to be a mom. 

But people with kids ALWAYS have an excuse. They have a built in get out of whatever it is card. And they vent about their kids...Um...YOU chose to have kids. Not my problem.

I noticed this first at work…on Halloween, the dads and moms would be ‘let out’ early to see their kids trick or treat. The rest of us, nope. Shouldn’t companies treat employees fairly? You’d think so.

Another time, a coworker’s kid had a fever. She had to be at work for close (ah accounting) and she brought the kid to work. There’s no daycare. So this kid is wandering around our cubicles while we’re trying to work. A toddler with possible germs…that’s not part of the work situation either.

Back to when my dad was in the hospital for months and months. Mom and I were there every day.

My sister was there for two 3 day periods. Sure she lived in another state and worked and all of that. But my work apparently didn’t count.

So as many days I probably missed from a bad snow and the 1 con I went to…those were the days she was there.

And if I said anything to my dad, it was all about the grandkids. She had to take care of the boys. Like she doesn’t have a husband? And he has a ton of relatives around where they live. He was the reasons he moved away. They can figure it out.

Now, my dad always tried to keep things FAIR between his daughters. Fair meaning the same. It didn’t matter if we weren’t both into the same things. It was the fairness that mattered to him. But parents can never be truly fair because different kids need different things. So rarely can you be totally fair…

Which is fine, life isn’t fair. And when grandkids arrived, I was even more the disappointing child. Why? I don’t want to spend every waking minute with my nephews. Um…they’re not my kids. I love them. they’re fun. But MY life doesn’t revolve around them. They aren’t the sun and the moon…not to me. Sorry…not sorry. I’m trying to be a writer here…

It’s not their fault, I guess. I’m the black sheep of the family. No one is a creative type. My dad would only approve if I was making big big money. Like Oprah money…okay then he’d be proud. He’d probably still make jokes. I’m not the normal one. I don’t want to be.

I'd fit in so much better here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3CH0tN515M

If Work was supposed to be Fun...

"If Work was supposed to be Fun, they’d call it something else."

(Since it's Monday...I thought this post would fit best...Sorry for bouncing around. I'm processing Dad's death and all the childhood stuff comes up too. )

This quote from my father is burned on my brain. When I got up the courage to tell him I wanted to write for a living, that’s what I was told. Work isn’t supposed to be fun. People who get to do what they love are just lucky. More people end up waiting tables in Hollywood because they want their dream.

Work isn’t fun. Work is about making money. I was told to major in something that’ll support me.

What is that telling me? At 16…I was told your life is going to suck. You won’t succeed as a writer. Dreams don’t come true….no matter how hard you work. Just give up and pick a job that’ll pay enough. Get financial security and be happy with that. 

Really?? Yep…That whole conversation is stuck in my head. Oh sure, I could teach English or write for a newspaper. But novels? Writing fiction? Be a teacher…not much money but it’s a steady job....that was Dad's compromise.

I didn’t want to be a teacher (sorry, too much of an introvert back then to contemplate public speaking). Truly, I wanted to write. That was all. 

But he really wanted me and my sister to be nurses. The problem is I don’t like blood and I'm not super great at reading people. 

He came up with accountant because every business needs one. I hated it. But I did it so he couldn’t make comments at me all the time when I hadn’t sold a book yet. I had a job, I paid my bills, and I wrote on the side. 

Guess what my sister is?

Right: Nurse (and she's very good at it and good with people...he wasn't always wrong).

I quit accounting in 2011…Now I’m a writer. Now to make it all work!

13 months of insanity…

So my father passed away in March. Far too young and suddenly.

But he was the sort of man you couldn’t tell anything. He had all the answers. He had all the power. The sheer will to heal himself, he thought.

He never went to the doctor until he was in his sixties and then only a podiatrist until he landed in the hospital—septic.

He nearly died last year. My mom and I split the time with him in the hospital. He was so sick he didn’t remember half of what had happened. Plus he had six doc and three therapists rounding on him.

My sister phoned in a lot. She wanted to talk to every doc. Gave us questions. I felt like a servant and a secretary…(this is a truth space…in case you were wondering). Being a nurse, my sister had a lot of questions and opinions.

She’s also made the choice to move away. Convenient. She claimed she never thought about it. Okay…sure. My grandfather had been heavily dependent, ill off and on and lived to be 89.

Anyway, I have no guilt. I showed up. I was pissed off a lot of the time but Dad thought he knew better than everyone else. He’d play nice with the docs etc but he just wanted to get out. Well, when you ignore your health for a long time, it’s a long recovery.

Nearly 4 months of hospital sitting. My writing on total hold. My readers probably thought I’d abandoned them. My muse was a wreck crying in the corner. I needed to be creative to be somewhat happy and balanced. I was functional at best.

My swag piled up because I wasn’t sending it out to cons. I canceled cons. I was so tired coming home from the hospital, I didn’t care about cleaning the house. I paid the bills and did the bare minimum. Because there would be another day at the hospital…it felt like it never ended.

When he went home, it was worse on my mother. I helped some but in the last year, things have changed a lot in my life.

My writing was derailed. I managed to get two books out before things went downhill fast this year. Now he’s not sick…he’s gone and life has to go one. My writing, my road to recovery from the control and my weight and all of the bad stuff.

I want to be healthy, happy, and writing…lots of work to do.

My Own Personal Drama….Er…Journey

Journey to what...I'm not quite sure yet.

My father passed away last month. That shook up my plan. But my plan has been messed up for over a year now with his health issues.

Now poof! It's over in some ways and in other ways it's far from done.

I need to do something to keep things anchored. To keep me on track and accountable.

There is a lot of work to do with my family. In my house, cleaning.

Me finally losing weight...slowly but I need to get on that path.

Either way, it's about taking back power. My dad was all about power/money. He wanted it, he tried to get as much as he could...

But now I've got to take back my power and make my life more like what I want. Focused on what I want. I'm glad I have no guilt about what I did. I was there.

It will be a journey. There is stuff to clean up, take care, and arrange...it might take a year or more but I'll get there.

There will be a lot more detail in future posts. More personal stories in this quasi journal to get it all out of my head. Processing stuff...it's public yes. But I have to get it out somewhere...

Stay tuned...