Head, Meet Sand

You haven't heard from me much.  Maybe you've been looking for blog updates.  Maybe you've called and I haven't answered.  Maybe you emailed or texted, and I never got back to you.  Please trust me when I tell you that It's not you, it's me.

Things have been really difficult lately.  People ask how we're holding up, and I say we're fine, because that's what I'm supposed to say.  Fine.

Fine.

It's the biggest lie I'll ever tell, and I tell it ten times a day.  Twenty.  Thirty, if I venture out in public.  The conversation goes something like this:

Well-meaning friend/family member/loved one: So, how are you?
Me: We're fine/hanging in there/doing great/pretty darn good/really can't complain/<insert other upbeat yet completely vague response here>
Well-meaning person: That's great!

And then, we all move along with our lives. 

Note a few things about this exchange.
a) I rarely, if ever, reciprocate by asking how you're doing.  It's not (entirely) because I'm a selfish wench.  It's because I'm too busy panicking to remember social graces (see point B below)

b) If you listen carefully, you will likely hear panicky undertones that belie my casual words.  I am obviously neither fine nor hanging in there.  I'm certainly not great.  I really can complain, actually, but once I start I cannot promise that I'll stop, and nobody really wants to hear it.

c) These conversations last roughly 4.2 seconds (though they feel like an eternity to the poor suffering soul (me) in point B above).  The "Well-meaner" wants to get back to their happy-clappy life, and the "Me" wants to exit this terrifying interaction ASAP.  Nobody really wants to be here.  Society demands that we exchange these words, so we do.

d) "How are you" is not actually a question insofar as questions are requests for information.  It is a phrase meant to cue another phrase, in this case, something like "We are great!"  In deference to this fact, I do not complicate these conversations with facts or information related to how we are actually doing.  (Seriously, when's the last time you asked "How are you?" and hoped to hear "Well, my hemorrhoids are acting up, and boy is that anal itching ever bothersome!" - never.)


The thing is though, you have stumbled across MY blog.  I'm not sure how.  Maybe you clicked something accidentally on facebook.  Maybe I slipped a blog business card into a package of gently loved diapers that I swapped with you online.  Maybe another blog linked you to me.  Whatever the case, you're here, and this is where I get to be honest.  Avert your eyes if you're not into that sort of thing, though I do assure you, nobody's pooper is in trouble.  Well, not really.


I am not okay.

Do you know how hard it is to say that?  To type it out for everyone and their mother to see?  Maybe not everyone's mother, but certainly MY mother, who does in fact read this blog (Hi Mommy!) and might (but hopefully doesn't) then feel really bad for not being here (Please don't.  There are way more important places for you to be.).  But it's the truth.  I am not okay.

I am trying really hard to find a job, but I haven't found anything even vaguely promising yet.  Nor have I figured out how to have time to have a job while still getting my son the medical care he *constantly* needs.  But I can't even worry about that part right now, because priority one is that I need a job so that my family can keep this house we worked so hard for.

My family is hurting.  They are there.  I am here.  My CT family has lost an amazing, beautiful member.  Their hearts are broken and mine is too.  Instead of there with them, I am here, working through health issues as usual.  Mine, as usual.  His, as usual.  Knowing where I would rather be, but also knowing that I need to do what's right and responsible for the tiny dictator.  At the same time, my FL family is facing the unthinkable unknown that is Cancer for the first time.  We are all afraid as we hold our breath and wait to see what the prognosis is.  We know that it won't be good.  We just don't know how bad it will be.  I want to be there for Grandma the way she's been there for me ALWAYS, but I can't.  I have to be here.

My phone has been ringing, and I haven't been answering.  Voicemails have been left, and I don't have the heart to even listen to them.  Blog posts sit half-written.  Projects half-started.  I've been selfishly hurting alone, even while I know that my loves ones are hurting too.

I almost don't have enough left to be Aidan's mom.  Almost.  We're pushing forward, preparing for Christmas, planning a birthday, managing an EGID flare, and taking life as it comes.

I am hoping that writing this is enough to at least point me in the direction of reaching back out.  I will answer your emails.  I will call you back.  Don't give up on me yet.  I really need you - all of you.