just UGH

I wouldn't say I'm recovered. I'm not sure that the word recovery is even meaningful for this disorder.

I would say that I've made a lot of progress towards owning my feelings and my actions. I can draw a diagram and provide oodles of context for my feelings and actions. I have slowed down enough to interrupt many of my major blow ups and minimize the ones I can't interrupt.

It's been a while since I've been seriously activated about living with borderline personality disorder. It's been long enough that I thought I was through with being activated by it.

*kicks rocks*

About that...I was totally wrong.

I am trying to hold compassion for myself and love myself through this time of activation. I'm not doing a good job of it. I have taken myself right back to the time when I felt so broken and so stupid. I attempt to hold compassion for my prior self. It's a bit easier, I know more things and better things now.

I don't think recovery is a word that applies to me in this context.

I have made progress.

Now I know there is more progress I need to make.

Heartache

I am sad and achy that our life circumstances only aligned for a moment in time.

Our alignment was  glorious and beautiful. Thank you for the time you spent with me.

Friendly Fire...continued.

Restless sleep was the norm for those few days before I decided that I would follow the advice in my dream.

The friendly fire situation is a situation of scheduling. Kyle and I do our best to take his family into account when we make our plans. We generally make the schedule on the last Wednesday of the month for the following month. This sometimes shifts about.

Kyle made plans with me on Wednesday for the upcoming Friday. It was the Friday before Mrs. Kyle's birthday party on Saturday. We know that the clean up prep usually starts the morning of the party. We discussed this fact when making plans, so we figured it would be okay.

We did not anticipate that Mrs. Kyle would be tired from the week and extra tasks that she took on for that week. Mrs. Kyle didn't say anything about it until friday when Kyle was leaving to come see me.

When he came over, he was a mess, frustrated and ranting about this situation where he was either disappointing me or disappointing Mrs. Kyle. I handed him the Ambrosia Salad I made for Mrs. Kyle's party, told him to go home and fix it. I was filled with righteous anger.

It was so simple in the dream. I had that dream every time I slept for 5 days. In it, I sat them both down and informed them that we are doing the schedule and we need all the anticipated information for the month so we can avoid this conflict from happening in the future.

Friendly Fire Isn't

Waking up this morning, I am exhausted. On Friday, I had a moment. I heard a snap. I came to an understanding that is changing my life.

I have put myself in harms way. The harm is not catastrophic; it is nagging and annoying and cumulative. My understanding came when the cumulative harm had gotten to the point where I could no longer endure it.

You see, I have been caught in the crossfire between Kyle and Mrs. Kyle. The ways in which they fail at relating with each other have seeped into my life and harmed me. I didn't know that is what I signed up for when I got together with Kyle. And now, with our relationship being what it is,  I do not know how to extricate myself from this friendly fire situation without walking away completely.

I ache.

Jew-ish Shabbat

I am witchy and Jew-ish and irreverent and stubborn. I feel God and God looks like a tube of Krazy Glue in my mind's eye. I find some rituals feed into this glue feeling and help me be a better person.

I eschew much religious dogma. It's like itchy and ill fitting clothing. I twist it up, tear it, beat it with rocks, and struggle with it. What fits? Is this comfortable? Is this really working?As a result, I am not confident in my observance of my rituals. I do not share them, even though I prefer to ritual in community.

I know I should just do, other's judgements be damned. I don't, though.

And then I ritual on accident.

I find the destination and revel in it. My heart is whole. My love explodes out of my body. I share joy and love and intimacy and heart-wholeness with my love. Bliss.

Afloat

Day 1, Week 2 of my unemployment.
Day 1, Week 3 of a new med.
Day 2, Week 4, Month 8, Year 2 of living legally single.
Day 7, Week 7, Month 7, Year 3 of relating with Kyle.

I'm floating on a lake, chilling with folks that are an extended web of chosen family and friends of my ex-wife's current sweetie. Many of us are mothers; our children are here, too.  I'm getting a sunburn, despite the sunscreen I put on.

I am far from the concerns of my life, set up as it is with no such extended family. It is comforting to be included. It is a relief that I am allowed my space, not forced to interact. I am coming back to myself.

Though my embodiment is different and my values have shifted, I am still myself. I am still the life and people loving person that walked to the edge and then over into the abyss of depression. I am still this person even though I got lost and behaved badly. I am grateful for BadBoi and her extensive heart. I am grateful that she knows me and that she has been there, even when I have rejected her help.

I'm afloat in my life. I am sitting with myself, trying to figure out how to come back to my loved ones, trying to figure how to relate authentically with them, no barriers, no walls, no small talk.

I finally feel like I can do it.

Context, because it matters.

con·text

ˈkäntekst/

noun

noun: context; plural noun: contexts

the circumstances that form the setting for an event, statement, or idea, and in terms of which it can be fully understood and assessed.

I am currently in CMST240 Intercultural Communication.  It is fascinating because of the different lenses that are used to gather, interpret, and understand different cultures in order to assist in communication.

Two of the three lenses don't even look at context. The circumstances, history, location that lead to understanding of norms in a given culture.

What is more interesting is how this applies to relating with people. People read this blog and think they know how I relate with my child, or BadBoi, or the Knife, or Kyle, or any number of other people that I might mention. Sometimes, they even comment on it with disparaging remarks.

And what they have taken in is simply data. They do not have information, because they do not have context. They have data taken at a finite moment in time. And then they make an ass out of themselves by making assumptions about who they think I am or what they think that I am about based on that bit of data, without context.

I find it unfair to be subject to this kind of assumption. I also find it cruel. If you feel a need to make an assumption about me, you might want to ask about the context of post so you can make an informed decision.