Any and Everything

April 1, 2025

Happy April Fool’s Day! I love spring. It is my favorite season. Don’t get me wrong I enjoy summer as well. Warm weather is just amazing to me. The pollen count here is astronomical though. I am sure we will all start feeling the effects of that soon enough. Last week was spring break. I have to admit I really enjoyed not having a defined schedule. Well, for a bit. I really do like to be on a schedule. Not having one does get old after a little bit. We just stayed home. I would like to go someplace next year. But, this year it was really nice just doing things around the house. Plus, one of the twins just started a job and didn’t need to ask off within her first month of working. That didn’t put me out a bit.

I was able to play with some plants and get my small garden going. I was also able to take the kids to the zoo and just piddle about for the day. I love to just go somewhere and really take it all in. We didn’t HAVE to do anything while we were there, we just played it all by ear and it was relaxing really. I haven’t taken them to a zoo in years. I think we all enjoyed it a lot. It was also nice to just do something different. It did make me think about how much fun it would be to do something like taking the kids to the beach or on a cruise. Something where we don’t Have to do much as far as site seeing while on a trip. A fun trip where we just loaf about and spend the time doing what we feel in the moment. I have taken so many trips where an itinerary is necessary. I would like to take a trip where we could make one or we could just wake up and do whatever we feel like doing.

My friends and I host a chat every Wednesday night. We had a topic recently that broached “red flags” I mean we talked about the other flags too. It got me to thinking, I believe I am a whole red flag. Not to others maybe… Well, maybe I am. But, definitely to myself. I honestly don’t know though. I do not allow people to get too close to me. I know it is all about self preservation and trauma. I do get that. I am trying to stop that but it is hard when you are set in your ways. I am set in my ways. I went through so much in my last relationship that the thought of a new one is not appealing to me. Not even a little bit. I know I have had people say, “Well, you just haven’t met the right person.” I assure you that is not it. It is me entirely. I still need more time to myself. I know that whole-heartedly. It is hard conveying that to others but I do think most people understand. It isn’t an excuse to close myself off. I am very open as a person. It is more the reasoning that right now I would not make a good partner.

I was reflecting on certain specific scars that I have accumulated throughout the years. I have talked some about the emotional ones but I don’t touch a lot on the physical ones. The ones that do remind me outwardly of the times I usually do not like to revisit. It has made me realize even more that I was conditioned to think that certain things were normal when, in fact, they were not normal at all. I still remember the first one. Josh pushed me into a table. I was bending over to pick up one of the twins out of a baby swing and he pushed me, which made me lose my balance and my forehead struck a waist high table we had in the living room. I still have that straight scar. It was a clean cut that needed to be glued shut. I don’t know exactly why he felt the need to do that. I do know we had exchanged words. But he claimed it was an accident. Looking back, I wish I had seen the reality of it all then but I was blinded. I knew it was no accident but I let it go. I think that was because I was used to so much emotional and verbal abuse at that point. Him pushing me was terrible but didn’t register as bad as it actually was. That is where the conditioning over time must have come into play.

The second time was just a couple of months after that. He pushed me again. I had turned to walk away while he was screaming at me in our foyer. I had socks on and we had hardwood floors. He shoved me with both hands and I hit the floor. That time I needed stitches in my chin. I don’t have a rational reason why I couldn’t see that situation for what it was. Again, it was an “accident”. I have the scar on my scalp where he was angry at me one night and while I was asleep he hit me with something. I still don’t know what that was honestly. Because for the longest time he said he didn’t hit me. But I had to have my head glued shut. I think i rationalized that one by telling myself that it was just a flesh wound and wasn’t “that bad” because I didn’t need stitches. That was years after the chin incident, after we had our third child. It left me with night terrors. I don’t know what it is about being woken up like that but I have some trauma from that whole nightmare. I have had some sleep issues since then. I have them under control at the moment but there are times when they flare back up.

There is so much in between all of these, I’ve had so many concussions, a fractured eye socket, a fractured jaw, and so many more I couldn’t list them all off if I wanted to. I would have to sit and make a list. My point, I guess is, why did I stay? I ask myself that a lot when I think back on things. I guess it wasn’t always bad but there was a clear cycle of repetition there, love bombing included. And I do know that I was not always one to de-escalate a situation. I was very emotionally driven. A lot of that was gone from me towards the end. I just wanted out but it took me 18 years to start making my moves to get out and I did it very covertly. Had he not passed divorce was how that was going to end. I used so many excuses to stay but I think the fear of change was one of my primary issues. I don’t like admitting that but it is the truth. I do a lot of analyzing myself. I do believe that is one of the reasons that I know I have more work to do for myself.

I remember when I started therapy years and years ago. He hated it. I was taking some of my power back and I am sure that scared him. He wasn’t sure what I was going to tell her. I actually put him on speaker phone once because he continuously called me during a session. My therapist’s jaw about hit the floor. He didn’t know I had done that but it gave me a little insight as to how others perceive what I dealt with on a daily basis. At that moment I could see in my therapist’s face that my feeling that this isn’t okay was right. She confirmed what I knew. I had convinced myself that my situation was normal. In my defense, for me it was normal and I didn’t tell many people. I actually isolated myself from people. I didn’t start really trying to assimilate back into the real world until about 5 years ago. It was a battle the whole time. It still is for me. It is easier without him here.

I still don’t like being around people for very long 2 days is kindof my maximum before I want to retreat to my own space. I get it honestly from many different aspects. If you look at where I come from we are all kind of like that in a way. I don’t know if it is hyper-independence or just the need to be alone with ourselves. I’ve said it many times, even when I say that, my children just don’t seem to count. I can be around them 24/7 and still feel like I am having my own time. Maybe it is because I carried them and they are a part of me. I’ll have to really put some thought in that.

While I am constantly a work in progress, I know it is a process that can not be rushed. I know my limitations. I close down very quick and easily. Little by little I can see progression and that is nice. There are also many times I feel smothered. I have learned I can’t control that. It is an emotion derived from my traumas. I just have to go with it. It will probably waver after more time and healing. I guess we will see.

It is inching on time to go get my children from school. I suppose I should stop rambling now. It is always good to look back on things and try to gain more understanding. I don’t review these things with a sense of pity or sadness it is more me trying to understand my own feelings and thought processes now and back then. I don’t thing anyone knows or will know everything about another person. But, I also think we don’t know ourselves as much as we would like. I am trying to work on that. It is funny to think about it like that but I would really like to know myself better, more intricately.

I hope you all have an amazing day. Enjoy the first day of April 🙂