Tuesday 12 August 2014

I get so angry...

When he pushes my buttons, when I feel like I'm talking to the walls, when I've repeated myself for the 5th - 8th - 16th time.  When he explicitly does the exact thing I just asked him not to do. I just want to scream.  Sometimes I do. Then I instantly feel bad as he startles and then crumples to the floor crying that he now needs a snuggle cause my yell apparently scared him that much.  (Or is it just that he knows that's how my make me forgive him right away? Just how manipulative can an almost 3 yr old be?)  Either way.  I don't like to yell.  I don't want to be "that" mom.   Like the mom I hear behind out house who screams at her older kids and they, apparently used to it, just scream obscenities back at her or just ignore her completely.  

And then there is the urge to spank.  To reach out and slap him when he's laughing because he just kicked me and I yelled at him to stop hurting me. To swipe him across the bum when he's sticking it up in the air as protest to going to bed after over an hour of battle and delays.  I was raised on a belt. My mom was raised on a wooden spoon I was told. 

So what's stopping me from following suit? 

Well, there is that one time when I actually did give in,  where he was hitting me over and over because he didn't want to nap and after repeating over and over "we don't hit, hitting hurts!", "stop hitting!"  "We don't hit!" I finally said loud and angry "you want to see what it feels like?!" 

..... and he said yes.  *SMACK*

Right on that bare spot just below his diaper. My hand stung, his bottom quickly turned red, and the instant look of pain and betrayal in his face as he just melting and started crying.  My heart, in that moment, shattered into a million pieces as I felt the the full weight of FAIL drop on my head like a ton of bricks.  I gathered him up, tears pouring from both out eyes,  I hugged him and cradled him, repeating over and over I'm sorry and I whisked him downstairs to put an icepack on the bright read hand print on his upper thigh.

We spent the next 15 minutes icing, crying, and snuggling as I tried my best to explain to the, at the time just over 2 yr old,  little boy in my arms that this is what it means when I say hitting hurts and how I never ever ever ever ever ever EVER want to do that again because it hurt my heart to do that. That THIS is why we don't hit. 

Of course he's hit me many more times since then. But I've done my best to not repeat that day. But it's still there. The though crosses my mind when I get really frustrated, I can feel my muscles tense.  I squeeze my hands into balls and try to take a deep breath, try to calm down.  But I feel the shame just as hot in my face as the anger building. The shame at even having those thoughts. This is a little thing, a human being, still learning, still grown, a little thing that I am supposed to protect, to nurture, to care for.  How can I possibly be having thoughts like these? How horrible of a person am I? 

But I don't. I still yell and scream,  (though I'm trying harder now to count myself down before I reach that point because I do realize screaming accomplishes nothing). I may slam doors or storm out of rooms, but, I do not hit.   I grew up with a fear of my mom. Granted I now respect her more seeing what she went through from an adult perspective. Single mom working full time and night schooling. But I was always afraid of her anger. I don't want my son's fear. I want his respect. I want his love. I want his trust.  

But every day I feel like I'm failing to gain these things. Every day just feels like a new battle that often ends in tears for both of us.   And I go to bed feeling guilty, promising myself changes that never seem to follow through.  I wake up with hope and go to sleep in guilt.    It's a ride that I'm ready to get off of but I can't find the stop button.

Saturday 9 August 2014

I am nobody special...

So, the name of the blog.  It sounds a bit depressing doesn't it? But it's true. Honest!  I am nobody special. I have no specific talents, just a bunch of little mediocre skills that get me by.

  • Just enough artistic skill to create stuff,  not enough imagination or skill to make it amazing. 
  • Not good enough at any one thing to make a career of it.
  • Never went to college.  
  • I'm a slow reader with a short attention span. 
  • I can cook if I have a recipe but I can't make much without one.
  • I have cut a couple of friends hair with decent successful result but I lack the inspiration and vision to actually pursue that as a career. 
  • Same can be said for movie/tv makeup (was into SFX/horror makeup for a while) 
  • I'm fickle in my projects as I tend to start things and then forget about them or give up on them.
  • I get over zealous about ideas and never follow through.
  • I can't keep my house clean.
  • I struggle with my weight. 
  • I....
......well that list just ran away with itself into a mess of negative attributes.   Oops.   But you get the point.  

Really though. I found myself recently obsessing over Misha Collins and his Gishwhes event. A week long scavenger hunt the winners of which will get to go on a pirate adventure with the man himself.  I found myself trying to get in on his Q&As, his Ask me anythings, on twitter, on facebook. tweeting him like mad only to miss out each and every time.  What made me think I was any different than the other 100's of 1,000's of people trying to ask him a question?

I found myself drooling over the guest list for a local geek convention coming up and wanting so desperately to go even though I'd be 36 weeks pregnant at the time. And for what?  To spend $400 of money better spent getting ready for this baby or on fixing up the house just so I can oogle, meet, touch celebrities who, as nice as I'm sure they are and as inspired and in awe of them as I am, will not remember who I am 5 minutes after I walk away? Why? What should they care who I am? I have nothing remarkable about me.

The most remarkable things I've done in my life include growing humans in my belly. 

Don't get me wrong, I adore my family,  I love my husband and my little boy.  But I spend a fair bit of time thinking I deserve neither of them.  

So, given all that, why do I feel the need to be recognized by celebrities and people who inspire me when I have no reason for them to?  I'd love to meet Misha, not because he's Castiel, not because he's an actor, not because he's bat shit insane (Okay, maybe partly because of that). But mostly because of all the good he has done using his status. The kindness organizations and hope2haiti missions and good deeds he spreads.  But I'm still me. Nobody special.  I will not be noticed, I will not be remembered, and I need to accept that.  My timing will never be right, my words always seem to fail me when I need them.  (Like the time I met Bruce Campbell, and all the questions that were teeming in my brain about the movie biz and horror and make up and whatnot, and after hours and hours of waiting in line, when it came my turn to shake his hand, I turned into a giggling school girl spouted some stupid and walked off with my autograph no different than before, other than $50 poorer)

I need to stop chasing fantasies and focus on who and what are in front of me.....




Tuesday 5 August 2014

Self Pity or Self Loathing?

That is my question.  Where do you draw the line? How do you tell the difference between self pity and self loathing?  When I'm upset or hurt, why do I turn on myself so harshly? Beating myself up, my focus becomes locked on every fault I own and every criticism I can think of.   A downward spiral (my how melodramatic) of self abuse that leaves me feeling worse that being kicked in the box.

So which is it?  Sometimes I try to share these thoughts and I'm told to "stop feeling sorry for myself".    If, say, my husband and I have a fight, I said or did something, even in unintentional as I tend to have terrible timing for random thoughts and sometimes just don't think first, if I'm to blame in an argument with him suddenly I'm believe I'm the worst person in the world.  And my brain just starts spewing garbage at myself....



I'm a disappointment. Well I've always been a disappointment, nothing new there. 
                                   Can't ever do anything right. 
                                                  Always a mess, always a mess, always making a mess of things. 
A  disappointment. 

Stupid.  
Yeah you heard me, stupid. 

What a mess you've made.  Can't do anything right.  What use am I? What good am I? Why can't I just keep my mouth shut? Why can't I be better than this? Why am I always messing up? Lazy. Why can't you do more? Disappointment. Other moms can do this. Other moms keep up. Other moms don't turn into a puddle of tears when things go wrong.  Other moms just do it.  What's wrong with you?
Fail. 
Fail. 
Fail. 
FAILED.

And so on and so forth, beating these thoughts deep down inside like an angry drum.  

Is this just self pity? Feeling sorry for myself? So I need to just grow up and get over myself? I'm 32 and a mom. I would have thought I'd have figured out how to do that by now....