Anxiety - Microblog monday

I have something to say. 

My anxiety level is huge. Off the charts. The election. 

I found a growth on Lotus' ankle. I had a sleepless night thinking that it was more than it was. It's a Ganglion cyst. But I didn't know that and was terrified. 

I am so anxious and worrying worrying worrying. I'm having mood swings and I am not okay. I am frightened and as much as I tell myself not to be, and to stop worrying--I am having such trouble doing it. 

I'm posting this to ask how others are dealing with stuff and to get advice on how they stop the worrying.

What Alice Forgot

It's been a bit since I've talked about the Pages part of the blog.

I've been rereading a lot. I tend to do that when I'm under stress and this election is stressing me out.

However when a librarian puts a book in my hand I at least read the first ten pages.

The librarian shoved the book What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty into my hands and told me to read it.  I trust this librarian. She introduced me to The Black Dagger Brotherhood and likes a lot of the same books I do.

So I brought it home. I didn't plan to read it.

Then I thought I would go ten pages, and I was caught up.

The premise is deceptively simple. Alice, a 39 year old woman with three kids who is separated from her husband falls at the gym and hits her head. She wakes up thinking that she is 29, pregnant with her first child and still deliriously happy with her husband.

It forces the reader to ask a question--if you met yourself 10 years ago--what would that younger person think of you? What would she think of the choices you have made?

I also have to praise it for being one of the most realistic portrayals of infertility I have ever read. Alice's sister, Elizabeth, you see, has had recurrent miscarriages. A decade ago they were close, now infertility has separated them.  There were times when I read Elizabeth's story that I wanted to shriek that someone had read my diary.  It is brilliant.

This is a good one and I wonder if any of my blog -readers have read it, if so I would like to discuss it.

If you haven't--pick this one up. It is wonderful!

Microblog Mondays - Assumptions about choice

We are finally in the last stages of this interminable election. There are quite a few women I know who are voting for Trump or a third party candidate.

The women who are voting for Trump--all of them that I have spoken to which is in no way a scientific survey--cite the Supreme Court and anti-choice views as their reason.

When life begins--at conception, at sometime in utero, at birth--I don't know, I don't pretend to know.

When I did IVF and I saw those little dots on the screen--they were real to me. I was overwhelmed at how protective I was of those little dots. They were mine. When the IVF failed I was so despondent I can't put it into words.

That being said, I can't and won't use my beliefs and how I felt to say how others can and should feel.

I should say this. Pro-life is not the right term.
Anti choice is.

If you are voting for someone so that he will put forth justices that will force women to have babies that they don't want, and it doesn't bother you that he has no problem sexually molesting these self-same women--you are not pro-life, you are anti-choice.

If you do not see that there should be mandatory maternity and family leave, you are not pro-life you are anti-choice.

Please understand that, according to the Jewish religion, when the health (physical or mental)  of the mother is in danger the pregnancy must be terminated. Not should, not can, must.  If you can't embrace that because of your religion, you are not pro-life, you are anti-choice.

Do understand, if abortion is outlawed--there will still be abortion. It will just be unsafe.

Towards the end of her life my mom opened up about her college friend, Julie. She died because she had an unsafe abortion. My mom said that Julie was her best friend in college. Had she lived, I would have called her Aunt Julie. She was taken away from me because men in the 1940s didn't want to trust women with their own bodies. I would have liked her, my mom said. When I think of mom in the afterlife I like thinking of her with Aunt Julie, eating chocolate and drinking wine. She died horribly.

If you want to force women into this situation, don't you dare call yourself pro-life. You are anti-choice.

Microblog Monday - The sins of the mother

When I think of being Jewish, of the High Holidays, I always think about the Al-Chet. I allude to it, I think about it.

For the sins which we have committed.

Most of the time I go to synagogue alone. D isn't Jewish and Lotus isn't old enough to get much out of it. It is easier to let her stay home with D.

So I'm standing on Yom Kippur thinking about my own sins.

I think about Lotus.  She is wonderful. She fills my arms with hugs and lets me show her the world. She listens when I talk, and I try to explain the world to it as I see it.

I wish for the current year that I can be the mother that my little girl deserves.

There are sometimes I don't want to watch Elena of Avelor for the ntheenth time. I want to watch something adult.

There are times I don't want to cuddle, or play. I want to sleep.

There are times that as much as I love her little voice I just want quiet.

There are times I think I am totally fucking up this motherhood deal and maybe that's why I don't have a biological child.

There are times I think, What right do I have to be annoyed or discontented when I prayed and wished and waited every single day for nearly a dozen years for this? How dare I not be smiling and happy every single day.

I want so badly to talk to my mother to see if she felt this too. While I could, and I'd be fairly sure she'd hear me, I won't get an answer. i miss her when I think I'm fucking up this motherhood thing.

For all these sins, God of atonement, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement.

The new year

I was surprised that it has been a bit since I've blogged.

The Jewish Holidays came along.

I wrote this. I couldn't get it published on any of the usual sites so I published it on Medium.

I took the Praxis--which means that I have been considering becoming a teacher.

I passed the Praxis. Now I'm not sure what I'm going to do.

Lotus is growing by leaps and bounds. She's taking steps towards reading. She's noticing words on signs. Words like "No" and "Name" reading is just around the corner. She's not even 5 yet.

There are things I want to do in the new year. I want to be more productive. I want to do more tutoring and maybe teach.

It's going to be a big year of change.