Ayn's Multiple World

Shorter than I'd like for a holiday :(

Good morning. This is me. I’m here, but I’m not sure where here really is. It’s now about 10:15 am and Rich just went out in the kitchen to make us a couple eggs – him and us. We’ve been doing stuff together for the last couple of hours and yet we feel a deep need for more of him and less going back to work tomorrow. I’m really panicking about that bad.

Right before now, he finally sat down with me and we went over our plans for the day. I think we agreed that since I have to get to the pool before it closes at 3 pm and I wanted to do writing too – that I’ll leave for the pool at 1 pm. His needs are to bring his son home maybe later between 5-10 or so and then maybe do a few things around here … He talked about doing a load of clothes and then the kitty litter and then getting some bills paid. I don’t think any of that seems very fun. I’m much too far into avoiding my mess with the bills. Until I get Thom’s mail, it’s really hard to tell where I am and because I’ve been playing with the money instead of spending it on bills – the thought is that I’m really not going to have enough money to pay them, so will be very unhappy, so it leads to more avoidance.

Maybe we can sort that out later today. I think I would feel really much better if we have a couple hours to write … get in some sex … go swimming … AND pay the bills and pick up in here. I think I’m going to make that our aim. I won’t say anything to Rich though, because I might not be in a space I can do all of that by after swimming and needing to do something hard like bills or cleaning. We were a little crabby too because Rich was SCHEDULING in sex, which drives us bonkers. We think aren’t we alluring enough so we can catch you off-guard? I know women are very hard to please.

He tried to explain why his body doesn’t allow us to have morning sex, but we’re really not going there … we watched together instead a couple of hours of fishing shows with him. I like doing stuff with him, but I don’t get as much out of sitting on a Sunday morning with fishes. I could have turned around at any time and done some writing, but then somehow I was more tied into sharing the world where he was in it more directly.

I’m afraid by the time we got to working out our schedules, I was crabby anyway. I knew he was going out most likely for dinner with the kids, but he hadn’t told me that he was going to be out all evening which is necessary if he’s taking Jon home.

He’s not saying much about what’s going on with the kids. I know that last night he didn’t get home until after I’d already fallen asleep about 10 or so. I know I have to be patient with this kind of schedule because it’s the kids and we both agree that’s priority, but then I’m left with the feelings that I’m missing time with him. I need to pull myself together and realize that just now and this next 2 ½ hours IS my time with him.

We had started the dishwasher early and now I can hear him in the kitchen cooking and cleaning out the dishwasher. Do I want to give up writing to join him? No, I’m afraid not. We did give up writing earlier. About quarter to 8 we’d gone in because he said he wanted to wake up at 8 and we wanted to get some snuggling time with him. That all led to the fishy show.

Again that wasn’t a bad thing, but it still puts me in a position where I am dreading the end of this 4 days off. It seems now very rushed. Ok, we’re going to have to calm down. I know that we got our medicine done back around 7 am when we woke up. Just we got to let go of the panic. I would stay home an extra day tomorrow, but I think that we’re going to need it for putting together a staffing. I’m not sure. Maybe we’ll take off the day anyway? But, then Rich is talking about vacation time.

He says that he wrote it down or I did and I know he’s right. I still though haven’t asked for any official time off. I’m so not looking forward to taking time only for the ridiculous thought that if I use it I won’t have any more of it. It’s like putting off a birthday, because then it will be over. Or, not wanting to open presents for fear of disappointment – in that you can always wish for more than is practical. In this same way … I dream of an ideal being with Rich, but I don’t know what that ideal is – so pretty sure I’m going to waste it.

I’m thinking now the best deal would be to look more forward to sex then I’m doing. Unfortunately, I’m one of the parts that gets intimidated by it. I try to imagine being on the other side of it … and I know we get really relaxed and don’t want to move or anything. But, then mentally now that seems like a scary place to go and then tricky in that even that will take up valuable hours. There is just no pleasing me at the moment I’m afraid.

I have to think more carefully … I know that Rich usually helps us past the scary part, but I don’t know how right now to get past that its going to be terrible. Shhh, I know I know … it’s not really terrible. Maybe I’m just terrible. No, I know that’s not true. I’d like to go swimming sooner, but I don’t want to give up the writing. Everything I do just makes somebody else unhappy.

Hmm, now it’s time to eat.

I think now that we’ve eaten and I squeaked a little conversation from him, but it’s not very much. We ate together in the kitchen and then we came out here in the living room and talked in between his 0-3 calls through to the kids. I’m thinking that maybe I could try to call my kids too, but I’m not so sure that they will have anything to say.

We told Rich we wanted to talk about more philosophical things. But, in reality we just want to talk about anything that’s important. He was here now just a second ago. He said that he was going to be in the bedroom cleaning it up, so he was going to put on the TV in there. So, we turned back on the Rhapsody.

Hmm, we did a Rich thing … we called all our boys and asked them how they were doing. We just left messages with Maury and Thom and we got Joe, but it was noisy in the background. We just said you are not in a good place to talk are you? And he said no, and we just let him know he could call. He might have said where he was, but it was too noisy to hear him. We put in a text message for Alexis too. Maybe she can talk to us. That be very cool. We’ll be patient. I think she should be up now though.

I think I will call my mother and sister today too. We’ll do that later though after Rich is gone and when we’re not in writing time.

The other 4 would be a worthwhile interruption. Rich and us have talked a bit … he’s going to for sure be leaving to pick up Jon at 5 pm. Rich wants to do a small dinner by 4 pm. I should be back from the pool about 3 pm and go there about 1 pm. That gives us now an hour and a half. We’re being pretty obsessive with our time. We want every moment filled to the most. I think Rich tried to call his mother too, but Jon called while he was saying hi so he’ll call her back in a little bit.

I don’t think much more has happened since the beginning of the day. We’ve been aching to talk to Rich about something substantial, but we don’t know what that’s about or how to get there. It’s the same probably for the kids too. We generally talk about something happening specifically, but are not as good talking in-depth. You’ve gotten a little idea of that from reading our blog. Not much deepness going around here. Hmm, better finish up yesterday too? What happened?

Hmm, it was a Saturday and I think we left you … hold on we’re looking it up.

Ok, now I got it … we were just spending time with Rich before we went swimming, BUT, unfortunately, I didn’t catch that they’d closed the fitness center early for the holidays. I left here at 5 pm to go swimming thinking the regular 7 pm time, but then it turned out it closed at 3 pm. It’s going to be the same today. After we got back what happened. I think that Rich was still around. I don’t remember much. I think we just watched TV while Rich was out. That’s about it for the night. Nothing significant … just something light about these guys wanting a radio station to air their music and then they ended up holding it up. Adam Sandler was in the movie, but not the lead role.

Maybe if something profound is going to be said around here we’re going to have to look a bit deeper into our soul. We did for the record listen to a little of Aristotle for Everyone while waiting for Dr. Marvin. But, we haven’t been back there and it’s not held anything important in our mind, or we would have remembered it.

I think we already went through our Dr. Marvin thoughts. Someone young was out and we weren’t really remembering it. We do know that we left off the other day trying to understand “Selective mutism.” I think that’s what Dr. Marvin is saying that we’ve had. I don’t know if it necessarily carries out into adulthood. I remember the passage saying that some adults still have it, but I don’t know if it’s something or not that can get cured. Every time I’ve tried to explain it to Rich – the last time being out at the Chinese restaurant, we cannot make out enough of it to carry on a conversation.

Now, we’ve pulled up the written section where we printed out to an entry the characterization of it and the traits. I don’t think we got through deciding which parts might cover parts of us. Looking at it now it seems that we pass the characterization part. Now as to some of the traits. First was maintaining eye contact. I remember saying something about this being a signature item. The next item – reluctance to smile … seems like another normal. I think we’ve been having trouble of late, especially with Rich and Dr. Marvin. We start off feeling unhappy and we wait for someone to talk to us – we want someone to feel good with, but we don’t always get there, because there are things going on that aren’t apparent as to what’s making us feel bad. Just feels like we’re not getting to something important. We feel like were intrepid.

Stiff, awkward body movements is next. We think of this as the times where are hands arms, legs, or such get so stiff we can’t move them and that that leads to feelings of perilzation. This usually happens when we are also timid, fearful, or angry.

Maybe in general are feeling some of the negative feelings. I know that Dr. Marvin especially has helped us through those times. We need to focus on moving just one or two fingers or bending our wrist – whatever is necessary.

The next part is anxiety in situations where speech is normally expected. I think that was a big part of our morning today. We feel as if we can’t live with the situation of going to work and having to perform. If it were just a matter of going to the office it might be different, but as it stands, we need to talk to people and that is where our systems break down. Everything seems too hard or overwhelming. It feels that way now about the bills and cleaning, but we’re going to save time to work on that specifically after the swimming, dinner and Rich leaves. I’m not sure whether we are going to put on music or TV, but one way or another we’re going to practice moving our body within the living room. It’s hard to think we’re anywhere toward normal when we are having these kinds of thoughts. I know that we can get over them and it usually happens when we are with people, but it’s like pulling teeth sometimes to get us in that direction. People feel very threatening to us being able to just breathe.

Do we worry about things more than others? Hard to tell where the others are, but I know through this process of writing, we think about things a lot and we don’t necessarily think most people are doing the same thing. I’ve seen a couple of writers when we were more social with the blog people, but for the most part people don’t spend long periods of the day writing out their thoughts and concerns – or for that matter their goals. I think some of the frustration I’m feeling now isn’t because of Rich not being here, but because we haven’t had enough time to sit with ourselves to feel out where we are.

We talked to Rich about vacations again during our lunch and he said not for a couple of weeks … and then at that he’s saying just a half of one day and not two full days. We’re still back at maybe tomorrow. We need some time by ourselves in the morning I think where we can focus. Before that were to occur, I think we should come up with something very specific that we want to accomplish so the time doesn’t get twittled away. This project on itself – going into the psychology that we’d skipped might be one of those important things to do, but it’s not the only thing and doesn’t feel close enough to where we are imagining we are supposed to go.

The material we were reading the other day talked about generalized anxiety disorder. It further explained that by saying about a lot of irrational worry about the day to day things. They said it usually interferes with normal functioning. It also mentioned catastrophising … man that’s been taking place for over 20 years. We do also get more into concerns of health issues, money, family problems friend problems and work difficulties. To be fair though, I think we’ve had enough health problems to substantiate time and energy in that direction. For the most part … our concern now focuses in on pound by pound weight loss and in getting out to the gym. If we can do that and take our medicine … then we figure we’re doing all right and can leave some of that obsessiveness behind.

Money there’s simply not enough that can be done in that direction. The problem is that I spend more than I have. When I do go into figuring it out … I do it with painstaking details. Maybe that’s one of those things we can slate for tomorrow. I don’t think our family has had real problems for quite some time now. The boys and their girls seem to be getting along fine … they are all productively engaged in their worlds, and nobody really needs me for anything special. I’d like to put more energy toward all that, but I can be reasonable too in that they have set their destinies in directions that takes quite a bit of personal experimenting with their life situations where I’m not necessarily involved. I wish that I could talk over more with some of them, but they are still at stages where it is difficult to listen about things of my concern more than a few general statements such as how much I way, that I’m getting to the gym, or work is in general fine.

I have to be careful with Alexis. I don’t want to tie her down with myself as a burden. I look forward to talking with her and getting to know her, but I want to be careful I don’t invade her space and especially the space she has with Thom. I also have to be careful in that I’ve never really gotten past the surface with Lauren and that it might be seen as discriminatory if I wasn’t trying to pay attention to her as I would like to try with Alexis. I don’t know how Alexis feels about my mental health. I can’t imagine that much has been said, but something must have. Again, I have to stop and appreciate the balance of getting to know her and her getting to know me. I don’t want to be needy, but can and do I represent myself as anything different. I think here we get back to the messages of seeing self as worthwhile.

We’ll see … as long as I’ve been trying to improve myself as a human being there seems to be so much more to be working on. I don’t think however, I’m a particularly courageous being. Definitely no nerves of steel. I think we’re regressing from the point we’d been trying to follow in the traits. I think there though we’ve diverted to thinking of generalized anxiety disorder.

Is there anything more to be said of that? We don’t seem to have many physical dysfunctioning from it other than things that can be explained in other manners. Like sleep being a problem of Sleep apnea and not general tiredness. They go on to explain phobia as a general persistent or irrational fear. More clearly they state that fear is defined as an emotional and physiological response to a recognized external threat. It is also said to be an unpleasant state and sometimes the threats aren’t recognized. In contrast they also talked about social phobia, which might be a subset of the first. This is more like anxiety in social situations causing distress and impaired ability to function. They say the basis of this is being judged by others, and that is followed by the potential to be embarrassed or humiliated for one’s own actions. This could be triggered by real or imagined encounters. It becomes extreme on the social side when fears become unreasonable and cause considerable difficulty in getting over it. This is the kind of situation that leads people to me like not wanting to go out of the house and do purposeful things.

Moving back to the traits though – looking for safer ground here. The next part of selective mutism is the part of having frequent temper tantrums at home. I can’t help here to think what a hard time we give Rich sometimes. Usually, it’s very short-lived and sent down to younger parts, but could we consider a part yelling she’s not tired enough to sleep – even if in little voice maybe part of what they are talking about as a frequent temper-tantrum? We usually feel horrible even while we’re going through it. But, there is little to be done when something isn’t going right. Unfortunately, this is captured by something as easy as having to wait 4 minutes for a microwave food to be cooked. We’re finding though the best way for us to handle it is to step out of the situation directly or to have parts consider the others feelings. This way when Rich says now I’m feeling bad …then the other part comes back more in a mothering role as if to say … it’s ok, I’ll take care of you.

As to using public restrooms … I don’t know how that works into the general gist of things except to say maybe part of this is anal retentive. We do have fears of stuff getting on us – looking quite like germs, but I don’t know … it feels severe like that to us, but isn’t then everyone a bit grossed out about toileting excursions in the wild? I know we’re like never going to Japan, because we couldn’t handle the difference in toilets. Hmm, now I’m thinking of our most common nightmare being terrible bathrooms, in every which shape of form or disrepair. Ugh. Maybe that was more important than I want to give it credit for.

Next? Compulsive traits, even obsessive-compulsive disorder. YIKES … did anyone have to mention that? I think Rich thinks half of what we do is obsessive.

Even to worry about the kids – though I feel like we give them a lot more freedom than other mothers. We do get set into things and it’s terribly difficult to get us out of that way of thinking or behaving. Ok, let’s not go into this one too far. We know we do things obsessively, but we like to think there are some advantages to doing things like this in that some things get done. I am thinking now however the concerns we’ve obsessed over in not going back to work. Man do I hate it after a long weekend getting back into what we wanted to distance ourselves from. Right now we’re back to thinking what’s causing us problems is the thought of being around people, wanting to be around our desk here, having staffings coming up, and doing the Leadership group which includes getting us through Friday when we’re supposed to be doing that damn presentation on Africa. This has horrified us from the time of its inception. Only thing is that last time we didn’t go into work, we were that much terrorized of it. We have to be doing something toward all that if we’re going to get past our fear of it this time.

I think that all stems from our comparison of being compared to others. The group that went last time from Poland was very threatening – Theresa had covered many parts of the country and in our mind we can’t pull it all together.

Hmm, thinking there’s one more thing, but I think Rich is off the phone and coming out.

*Sigh* Now it’s the next day, but the last thing before I post is the clinging behavior. This covers the times that we don’t want to see someone go, or something end, or in not wanting to leave where we are whether it be at work or home. We don’t do that much, right? Yeah, right! Let’s call this another signature behavior.

posted by Ann Marie @ 9/02/2008 05:26:00 AM Comments: 0