It's Summer Time!

Well the summer is almost here, and Alaina is getting older by the day!


My life is going great! I am still working retail *for now*. I am spending my free days with my baby girl who is 3 and a half now, and with my boyfriend of two months. Things could not be better. My meds are finally stabilized, at least I think so lol. I had a relapse with drinking, but it was short and I jumped right back on the sober wagon. I am starting to figure out who I am and I am loving me!


M- My new boyfriend. He is super sweet. He treats me and Alaina great. He is kind, funny, sweet, considerate and everything I am looking for in a man. We have our hiccups now and then, but nothing to serious. What I love about him is that we are so different but we click so well. We have different religious and political views, but we don't let that get in the way, instead we joke about it and concentrate on the things we agree on the the similarities we have. We share an interest in psychology (that is his major and masters) which is great! We spend tons of time talking and cuddling, and well I am in love for the first time in a lil while, and I am in the first healthy long term relationship I have been in for awhile. We have gotten pretty serious pretty quick, but it just feels so right . . .


Alaina- She is doing great. She finally started peddling a bike about two months ago and loves going on bike rides. We go to the park almost every time I have her. She is also going through a huge Arthur phase which is great because I love watching Arthur too :) She is Mommy's lil girl. Tomorrow she starts swimming lessons again for the first time in a year, so we are both excited for that, and now that she is over three she will be in the pool solo without me; Oh well I will just watch from the sidelines. I also took her tubing behind my parents boat last weekend with her on my lap. She was a little scared but enjoyed it. What she enjoyed even more was watching me tube by myself and being thrown in the water lol. Alaina is flipping smart, people have always told me this, but I am finally starting to see it myself. The other night I read her a book, and she was able to read the whole thing back to me page by page, in her own wording but with the right words on each page, I was like OMG I have a genius baby!


Me- I am doing as good as can be expected. A long time friend of mine started a company and has made me the partner. I am doing all the marketing, advertising, HR, customer service, client management and other stuff for the company, and am loving it. Today he even asked if I would like to put my name on the bank accounts so I would have access to the funds for marketing, Woot! Woot!. I just celebrated one month of sobriety after a quick relapse I had in May. I am somewhat upset because I would have had 6 months of sobriety last week, but instead I was celebrating one month, but that is my own fault and I can't let the guilt eat at me, I need to just think of this as another learning opportunity and a fresh start. I am trying to enroll for school again in the fall so that I can finish my degree, I only have a little over a year to go and I will be done. Also I am still working retail but am looking for a full time or part time better paying job. I stopped taking my ADHD meds because they make my bi-polar worse and make my moods up and down more frequently, this has made a HUGE difference. I am now stable and happy :)

That is about it for this update. I am in DBT therapy now, which is helping me build great skills for the rest of my life. I am also seeing my counselor once a week which helps. I have been working on my faults and I am currently working on my 4th step for AA. It is such a wake up call to see all of these repetitive negative things about myself written down in a notebook, but I am starting to see my character defects and behaviors that I have been repeating since teen years and mistakes that I keep remaking. In future steps I will ask God to remove these character defects.


Ok that is all for now, I have to finish working on Troys fathers day present : )

Cravings

Since I have been out of inpatient (Dec 30th), I have been really good at controlling my cravings to drink. When I have a craving I simply call a close friend or find something to do to distract myself. Tonight I am going to blog about it.

I am definitely craving a drink right now. Not because I want to taste the harsh tequila running down my throat, nor because I want to cure an insane headache, or insomnia (well maybe the insomnia) . . . but mainly because I am an alcoholic and I am obsessed with the feeling of being intoxicated.

I love the way my body slowly loosens up after a few shots hit my blood stream. I love the numbness that sets into my brain once I wash down a few glasses of tequila with a little bit of sunrise in them. I love the senselessness that comes with being drunk, the numbness that comes with it. The loss of sensation, the loss of feelings, forgetting my past, my problems and my worry's.

I have a problem, I know this. This is why I chose not to drink. I don't have just one or two drinks today because I have something to do six months from now, and those one or two drinks today would lead to 5 or 6 tomorrow and a bottle next week, and a bottle everyday here after that. 

AA has truly helped me with my addiction, as has my sponsor and my friends and family. 

Tonight instead of drinking like my body aches to and my mind is screaming at me to do I am going to listen to some music and go to bed, because 6 hours from now I have to be up and getting ready for outpatient :)

Insomnia

For some reason I could not sleep last night. It could be for a number of reasons. I am in rehab, and my bed and room are unfamiliar to me. Or maybe it is because I have not drank in 7 days and drinking puts me to sleep. Perhaps its the fact that I am starting to realize that I have lost a few close friends because of my drinking. Maybe it was me missing Alaina and having her presence near me at night. BUT for whatever reason it was I could not sleep.

So hear I am in a treatment center for me . . .(cough, cough) . . . Ok I will say it, my alcoholism. recently I have been trying to figure out what got me to this point in my life. I know it wasn't my first drink at age 17. I also know that it wasn't the occasional social drink I had when I was with my daughters father. So how did I go from drinking once in a blue moon to daily. From having one to two drinks in a sitting to 10+ drinks in a night.

In the last three months I have lost my job, been suspended from school, lost close friends, totaled my car, been to jail (luckily only 3 days), and maxed out all my credit cards, which means I will lose my apartment too. The only thing I have left is my little girl, and I am going to fight this problem to the end so I can keep her. She means the world to me, but I don't think others around me realize that. She knows it, I tell her every day. Not only do I tell her I love her, but I show her by singing songs, reading her books, playing silly hide and seek games, and having conversations (even if they argumentative) with her.

I don't know what the point of this post was. I guess I just wanted to write considering my lack of sleep. There it is folks, and update on my crazy life that has somehow spiralled out of control.

This Is Me

Don't be fooled by me.
Don't be fooled by the face I wear.
For I wear a thousand masks, masks that I am
afraid to take off and none of them are me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature
with me, but don't be fooled.
For God's sake don't be fooled.
I give the impression that I am secure,
that all is sunny and unruffled with me,
within as well as without, that confidence
is my name and coolness my game;
that the waters are calm and I am
in command, and that I need no one.
But don't believe me, please.


My surface may seem smooth,
but my surface is my mask,
ever-varying and ever - concealing
'Neath this lies no complacence.
Beneath dwells the real me in confusion,
in fear, and aloneness. But I hide this.
I don't want anybody to know.
I panic at the thought of my weakness
and fear of being exposed. That is why I
frantically create a mask to hide behind;
a nonchalant, sophisticated facade, to help me
pretend, to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation.
My only salvation. And I know it.
That is, if it is followed by acceptance,
if it is followed by love. It is the
only thing that will assure
me of what I can't assure myself,
that I am worth something.


But, I don't tell you this. I don't dare. I am afraid to.
I am afraid your glance will not be followed by
acceptance and love. I am afraid you will think
less of me, that you will laugh at me,
and that you will see this and reject me.
So I play my game, my desperate game,
with a facade of assurance without,
and a trembling child within. And so begins the
parade of masks, and my life becomes a front.


I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that is really nothing,
and nothing of what is everything,
of what is crying within me;
So when I am going through my routine do
not be fooled by what I am saying.
Please listen carefully and try to hear
what I am not saying.
What I would like to be able to say,
what for survival I need to say,
but I can't say.


I dislike hiding, Honestly!
I dislike the superficial game I am playing,
the phony game. I would really like to
be genuine and spontaneous, and me,
but you have got to help me. You have got to
hold out your hand, even when that
is the last thing I seem to want.
Only you can wipe away from my eyes that
blank stare of breathing death.
Only you can call me into aliveness.
Each time you try to understand and because
you really care, my heart begins to
grow wings, very small wings,
very feeble wings, but wings.
With your sensitivity and sympathy,
and your power of understanding,
you can breathe life into me.
I want you to know that.

I want you to know how important
you are to me, how you can be the
creator of the person that is me if you choose to.
Please choose to. You alone can break
down the wall behind which I tremble,
you alone can remove my mask.
You alone can release me from my
shadowworld of panic and uncertainty;

From my lonely person.
Do not pass me by.
Please... do not pass me by.


It will not be easy for you;
a long conviction of worthlessness builds
strong walls. The nearer you approach me,
the blinder I strike back. I fight against the
very thing I cry out for. But I am told that
love is stronger than walls, and in this lies my hope.
Please try to beat down those walls with
firm hands, but with gentle hands for a
child is very sensitive.


Who am I, you may wonder?
I am someone you know very well.
For I am every man you meet and
I am every woman you meet.

This is who I am, help me.

For Better or Worse: the Newest Developments and Changes

Wow it has been only a month since I have updated my blog, yet it seems so much longer. So many things have changed or are changing in Alaina's and my life. Hmmmmm where to start . . .

Alaina- She is still in full blown terrible two mode, there is no stopping her. I tell her to come to me so I can fix her hair she runs, if I am trying to cook something and ask her to stay away, well she is right by my side. I am very close to using the reverse psychology method on her like my roommate does on her son :) I am trying, key word trying, to potty train Alaina, but she has no interest, she hates pull ups and will only sit on the potty so she can flush it and put toilet paper in it. If it were not for her extensive vocabulary I would think she is like every other two year old, which she is, and she is not. Alaina is a very intelligent toddler (and no I am not just saying that because I am her mom, a few doctors have stated this as well). The way she plays on her own, or even with others is more in the three to four year old range. I love just sitting and watching her, you can learn so much about your child just by observing. She still loves baking and cooking with me, so I try to let her help whenever possible. Yep so that is the update for Alaina, still as cute and adorable as can be, and still making trouble whenever the opportunity arises.

Boys/Men- Well K and I broke up. Actually it was on our three month anniversary, he chose softball over me...AGAIN, after we had already made plans to go out to dinner to celebrate. To make a long story short, the day before we hung out, so he told his teammates not to schedule a for fun practice, the next day, Monday (Our 3 month); he had a game that I was aware of so we planned on dinner around 8:30 or so because the game was at 7. I sit at home and wait and wait (similar to the blog post a few down), and eventually around 10 he calls and is ready to go. I am ticked at that point and tell him just forget about it, I am not hungry. I have him come and pick up his dog and go to the bar with a friend instead who was in town from South Carolina. Keith and I end up arguing on the phone, I break up with him. A week later we talk and think about making it work, but nothing comes of that, which is fine.

My take on this relationship and why it did not work out-There are many reasons. He was too busy with Softball (3-5 days a week) and work, and I was too busy with my schedule. Also, he believed that feelings only came from the heart, not the brain. I am a very analytical person, so I am all about the brain, that drove him nuts. He could not stand that I questioned everything, and thought about things so much, I need a man who appreciates that, not that gets annoyed by it. Also, he said he was ready to settle down and get married, but his actions did not speak that. I could keep listing reasons why it did not, but I think my point has been made. I have now added to my perfect man list "must be willing to make time for girlfriend" :)

School/Work- Bad BAD, BAD topic. Work I just received a three day suspension from because I am always coming in 5-10 minutes late (yes that is an awful trait I have, never being on time). I love having 3 days off, but I am extremely extremely close to being pointed out of the company (fired, this place uses points as their punishment system). I can't afford to lose my job, I need it with the economy being the way it is, so I really really need to shape up. As far as school goes, well that is an off limits topic too, that is how bad it it.

Life- I am planning on moving out in the next two months. A close friend of mine from college and I are getting a newer big mobile home together, the only thing in the way right now is she lives in Rochester, and I need to find her a job up here in the cities. My roommates are driving me nuts, very very nuts. My female roommate is trying to weem herself off a strong anti-depressant which is making her more bitchy and moody then a teenage girl. She keeps getting on me for different things and making me feel like a 12 year old (she is totally mothering me more then my own mom did). Also, it is hard living with 2 other people and 3 kids, I think Alaina and I just need our own space. As of recently I am planning on getting a tattoo on my right wrist, a small one that says Live Laugh, with a four leaf clover separating the two words (to represent the Irish blood that runs through me). I am doing this because I am fed up with always looking for love, and the perfect man to sweep me off my feet. I have decided that I need to concentrate on living my life and being happy (laughing). If I do this, then hopefully eventually true love will come and I will find my Romeo.

That's it for now, I need to go spend some quality time with my beautiful girl before I go to work.

Bizzare Dream

So last night I went to bed around 1:00 in the morning. I had not slept in over 3 days (I went 2 nights without sleep). I slept until almost 3:00 this afternoon and throughout the night and the morning I had this totally weird and bizarre dream, if you can call it that. It was so real and so vivid. Before I spill the details about the dream, I want to say. This is becoming a pattern, I have had many dreams in the last month about someone close to me being in a car accident. It is always someone different, but someone close to me. I keep telling people to drive safe because I am worried that these dreams are a sign of something to come. Ok now the Dream . . .

It started out taking place in the house I lived in from ages 11-16. I had a bedroom on the second floor, but the porch was right under my room, so if I had wanted to sneak out I could have. My age in this dream was a few years younger then I am now. I was in love, I had found my soul mate, the perfect man, romantic, sweet, everything I was looking for in a man. It was young love: strong passionate love. The dream started out with this man (with no face), sneaking into my room, and telling me that he wanted to be with me forever, and I told him the same. Even though the dream started here, I was able to see things that occurred before this instance, like I had just found out earlier in the day I was pregnant, also I could see that my dad hated this man, and told me on many occasions to stay away. Anyways, back to the scene in my room. This lover, he sneaks in and tells me that he wants to be with me forever, I tell him the same. I want to tell him I am pregnant, but don't know how. He tells me that because of my dad, we will never be able to be together, and he wants me to run away from him. He asks me this with tears in his eyes, he knows that the chance of us being able to run away together and not be found are rare, and he is crying because he knows he will lose me and does not want to. I start crying to and tell him that I would go to the end of the earth with him.

We sneak out of my window and start driving. We are talking about our lives, our pasts, what we want out of life. He looks at me and tells me that he knows he has to do this, that he does not want to but he has to. He says that I will be better off in the long run and he wants what is best for me, I don't know what "this" is, but I sense it is bad. I start to tell him no, that everything will work out, we will make it. But he looks at me with tears streaming down his face, and he says "No Stephanie, I want to believe it will but it won't, I have seen our future, I want what is best for you, and even though I know it is me, it is not", "I love you more then anything, and your happiness and what is best for you is more important than my life". At this point I want to tell him about the baby, his baby but I don't know how. He asks me to buckle my seat belt, knowing I shouldn't and that I should argue with him, I just silently obey. We speak a few more words and then he tells me again, I have to do this, I know you don't understand, but someday I hope you will. I love you and want what is best for you, please forgive me, please understand.

It is that point that he is driving fast and we are driving on top of a big mountain of dirt, slowly circling up it, yet fast. He then turns the wheel as fast as he can and the car starts flipping. I can't count how many flips we did, but then for 10 feet we are falling and the driver side window, where he is is closest to the ground. All of a sudden, smack we hit. I remember the last thing I was thinking in my head was that he was dead.

I wake up in the hospital, I see my mom standing next to me. I look at her in a panic and start screaming and asking where he is, my Romeo. I knew even as I was asking that he was gone, but I had to hear it. The nurse and my mom confirmed my fear. I then reach for my stomach, which for the first time in at least 8 weeks, was feeling empty. I whisper to them, "and the baby?". They both look at me somber, yet my mom not that somber. She tells me its gone. I begin to ball, and I cant stop. I am having a panic attack at this point. I look at my mom and I can see in her face that this is not upsetting her as much as it should, its as if she got what she wanted. I have no baby, and I have lost my one true love.

An amount of time goes by in the dream. I am constantly crying and thinking about my lost love and my lost baby. I can't stop crying, throughout the dream, I am at different places that remind me of him, and I cry and cry. I went from being the happiest person in the world, with the perfect man, about to create a perfect family, to having nothing.

Then I am back at school, and it is weird. I still can't stop crying and thinking about everything and how crazy everything is. Yet my teachers and professors act like there is something wrong with me for not getting over it. I cry on field trips, in the library, during class. The teachers and kids look at me and nod there heads, like I should be acting normal, like I should be over this massive loss. Then for my art class, I am supposed to create a presentation using baby clothes. I can't do it, I just ball and ball. I walk through this studio that looks more like a library, the other students presentations are on display. Baby clothes and outfits everywhere, I start bawling a howling. The teacher then asks where mine is, I look at her mystified, and try to explain to her I can't do this project, she just looks at me and nods her head disapprovingly, like I am a failure. I don't want to be there, I don't want to be alive. I am mad at him for leaving me, for doing this, I don't understand!

From then on the dream is a blur, just a lot of crying, questioning, and depression . . .

Even just typing this dream has brought me to tears, and I am crying hard, harder then I have cried in a long time. I feel like I have lost something, even though it was only a dream. When I took a shower earlier I analyzed the dream, and I thought I had figured out what it was about, and what different pieces of the dream meant. I am too upset to type an analysis now. I just feel so empty, and alone, and I can't stop crying. It was a stupid dream for gosh sakes... Wow this is crazy.