Dream Stories...

I had a dream last night that I thought, OH this is going to be a great story. 

Let me give you the highlights. 

It started with Brent and I looking through a back lot area of Lowe's. We were looking for some rocks for the yard and thought maybe they would have discount rocks back there. Yes, I was dreaming of cheap rocks. 

So anyway as we worked our way further and further into this back area it was getting darker and darker and spookier and spookier. I finally turned on the flashlight on my phone to look around. And apparently we had wandered off of the Lowe's lot and onto someone's private property. And they had spent years designing it to keep people away. 

There were tons of carved stones and wood work. Skulls and faces and dark craggy areas. Just really creepy. Finally we found the caretaker to have him show us the way back out. And as we were walking out I suggested to him that instead of trying to keep people away by scaring them they should open it up to the public and charge admission because a lot of people would pay for the experience. 

He said he'd take it as a suggestion. 

Which, of course generally means, yeah no. 

So I was telling Brent he was really missing out on a fortune and that's when we ended up at the house where the owner had gone missing. Everyone was pretty sure he had killed his daughter and then disappeared. Somehow Brent and I had been recruited to take a look around the house to gather clues for the police. 

There was a missing picture from their hallway of family photos. That was really about it. Except, of course, for the missing people. 

We were wandering around taking inventory of everything when THE GUY SHOWED UP! Oh! So we are in his house, without his permission, and we think he is a killer! How scary! Well, no. I mean, I was very nonplussed. He was there with his new girlfriend which made me wonder if he killed his daughter or if his girlfriend did. And the only thing I asked them about was if there was a cat. Because we were going to make sure the cat was taken care of since everyone had disappeared, but it looked like maybe they didn't even have a cat. 

While the girlfriend was showing me the cat food, I missed it because they kept it in a tupperware container. (Like we do, but somehow I didn't recognize that as cat food) the grand daughter and her new husband showed up. She had also gone missing. But apparently she was on her honeymoon. 

So the old man hadn't been missing, he'd just been out of the house for the day, the grand daughter was on her honeymoon and the daughter, well, we never got to the bottom of that but neither of them seemed concerned that she wasn't around. After all, she didn't live there.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, was what I woke up thinking, OH that will be a great story. I was sure the missing picture part was going to be the linchpin in the whole mystery. Even though I knew there was no mystery. Just Brent and I breaking and entering an old man's house. This was story time gold. I didn't write down any notes because I've learned over the years that they never make sense. And usually if it's really good I remember enough of it to write a story from it. And it was 3AM so I really didn't want to wake up enough to write down the notes. 

But lucky you, I remembered it. It's stuck with me all day. With the added, What the heck? vibe. 

So what that means is there is something in there. I just don't know what. I don't know if it's something I need to pay attention to in my life that the dream is highlighting in some way. I don't know if it's something in the dream that really will make a great story. 

The only thing I do know is I got a blog out of it and I gave you all a little understanding as to why it's not terrible that I suffer from insomnia. 

Flames...

Flames

Fire makes its own wind

The oxygen rushes in to feed the flames

A large fire can make tornadoes

 Spinning walls of flame

Consuming 

Moving

Burn

The only thing left is ash

Piles of what was, now blowing in wind

Wind created by the same fire

Its own destruction

Reclaiming

Clearing

Change

The smoke clears and what's left?

Some seeds cannot open, cannot grow without fire

It takes extreme heat to crack them

For the new to start again

Germinating

Sprouting

Grow

Fire can make its own wind

The wind feeds the fire, hotter, bigger, stronger

Ashes left behind feed new growth

That only happen from fires

Burn

Change

Grow

Old Habits...

Being a child of the 80s and growing up with diet culture and thin equals healthy and nothing tastes as good as thin feels and fat shaming and no positive body representation it's very hard for me to not equate my weight with a good day or a bad day. 

And since I am heavier right now than I like to be it's been quite a few bad days. 

So I'm doing something I've tried in the past, without much success, I'm going to just stop stepping on the scale. It tends to make me anxious to not do it though, like I feel like I'm out of control just by not paying attention.

Disordered eating, it's the gift that keeps on giving. 

But I think I've found a way to work around it. No Weigh May. 

You all know I love a rhyming challenge. 

And because it's a set amount of time I think it won't trigger that feeling of losing control.

I think.

And I know, a lot of people have thrown out their scales and never been happier. I am not one of those people. But I'd like to be. 

I'd like to never ever consider what my weight is. I'd like to be one size for clothes and never shift. I'd like to not equate my size with my health. And I am trying. I really am. 

But it's years of conditioning to overcome. And it's been really hard. 

Brent and I have talked about it and he is the same way. Really easy for him to tell people, "Are you healthy? How is your blood work? How is your fitness?" and then tell them to not worry about the weight if everything else is good. And yet, he still freaks out about his own weight. 

I am the same. Be healthy. Be happy. Love the body you are in and appreciate everything it does for you. 

YOU, not me. Don't be ridiculous. 

But because I know that I have these challenges, and these triggers that can lead me into literally starving myself, I am careful at least. I pay attention to what is setting me off. And I try. That's a huge change from my youth. But I'm still not completely there. I'm not sure I ever will be and I try not to beat myself up for that either. But I would like to be better about it. To love myself a little more. Not have that be dependent on what the scale says.

So this is going to be me trying. 

No Weigh May. 

Communication...

Communication is difficult at times. 

Or at least clear communication. 

I've written about it before, how important it is to me to not be misunderstood. After Brent asks me a question and I've answered in a paragraph worth of words and he then sums up the answer as "yes then?" I often feel like I need another paragraph to explain why I needed the first paragraph. Yes the answer is yes but there is a reason for it. It's not a stand alone answer, there are reasons.

I want to be understood. 

And I understand how frustrating it is when I think I've been really clear in what I'm saying and someone does misunderstand me. And how angry it makes me when I realize someone is intentionally misunderstanding me. 

So all of that is a lead in to an interesting interaction over the past few days with an author that I follow, Father Nathan Monk.

When Taylor Swift's album dropped he posted the following: "Taylor just dropped a new album which is a great time to remind y'all to buy art from starving artists. Signed, a starving artist"

So what do you see when you read that? 

Is there an also in your head or an instead of? 

That's what the discourse broke down to.

And I will say when I first read it I saw an instead of. 

And this is why: 

When Beyoncé released her country album a few weeks ago and people were having HUGE fits about it, Father Nathan Monk wrote one of the best reviews of the album I've read. He talked not only about how good the music is, but how it fits into an historical timeline of country music. How wonderful it was. But he didn't mention buying art from starving artists. Though Beyoncé is far from starving. 

Having those posts come on the heels of each other it was easy to assume he was saying, don't buy this, buy that. 

And people jumped all over him for it. 

Even I had something to say. (I know you all are shocked considering how reticent I am to share my opinions) "I think the word also in this post would have been good. Without it it's really easy to insert an implied instead of.

Edit: Which as I wrote it down it made me realize we all should insert the implied also. If there are two ways to take something and one makes you mad, take it the other way."

And that was my take. With the fact that people love to hate on Taylor Swift. With the recent love in post for Beyoncé. I think it was easy to misconstrue what he was saying. If he was indeed saying "also."

I also think it would be fine if that's what he was saying. If that was his opinion then that's his opinion. 

But he didn't take it well. And I mean, I'm not the only one to have suggested an also would have been a good addition for clarity. There were other comments. And I will say I don't think making a suggestion for clarity is bad thing. 

So today he posted an essay about being purposefully misunderstood. And how that wasn't what he meant at all. Though he spent a lot of time talking about how Taylor Swift doesn't need your money and other people do so maybe it is what he meant, he just didn't mean it in a way that would make people angry? 

But anyway, he ended it with a call out to the word 'also' and a call out to other Taylor Swift lyrics, which was both clever as well as kind of snotty. Which I for one, appreciated. 

"That’s what I was trying to say the other night, but because I didn’t say “also,” then I guess it’s me; I’m the problem, it’s me.

Oh, there he goes. Playing the victim, again"

Yeah, I mean, I love his writing, but in this instance I think so, I do think he was the problem. I understand that when your job is communicating, and that is what writers do, and you miss the mark when you feel like you hit it squarely it's hard not to take it personally. I mean, they are your words, of course it's personal. But sometimes you really do need a paragraph to explain your point, or even just one more word. 

And at the end of all of this I will leave you with a recommendation to follow him on whatever social media platform you use and to subscribe to his substack. He really is a gifted writer even when I think he missed the mark by just one word. Maybe even especially then, because he did come back with a whole essay about one word, and I can appreciate that. 

To guess what Brent would have said about it, "So you mean also then?"

Where Does It Come From?

I've had people ask that a lot. Where does the story come from?

Sometimes, okay often, I think it's asked with worry. Considering the number of dead people I write about I can sort of see that.

But sometimes I think it's just genuine curiosity. How do you make up a whole scene out of your head? I used to (and sometimes still will) do it as a party trick. When we were travelling during the summer with the church group I would tell stories on the bus. Just start one and go. Same as writing it down, but there is nothing left at the end except the memory of the story. The way stories used to be told before writing. 

I did it when Katie was growing up. First telling her stories, then telling stories with her. And we had stories we told over and over again. Things we had made up but became just as ingrained as The Birthday Monsters or Goodnight Moon because we told them over and over. But each time just a little differently I'm sure. 

I've done it at lunch with friends. Sometimes they've given me a brief "what about them?" nudge and watched as I spun a whole story about the couple at the next table. Or in New York, about the mafia squirrels in the park. 

I don't always know where the story comes from. It's just there. But sometimes I know what triggered it. What was the pushing off point. 

Today's story Shhh.... was one that started a couple of days ago. I was reading the comments on an ad looking to see if anyone had tried the product. 

It was for nonalcoholic tequila. I've tried the nonalcoholic bourbon from that company and it's pretty good. You wouldn't want to sip it straight but with a mixer? It's close. The challenge with nonalcoholic tequilas is that most companies add some sort of chile to it to get that tequila burn. I can't have nightshades so it takes it right off the list for me. This one doesn't have that so I was wondering if it was any good. 

It never fails that in the comments of any nonalcoholic drink there are people who are mad, like BIG mad that anyone would bother. If you aren't drinking for the alcohol why are you even drinking? Like just liking the taste of it isn't enough. Then there are actual alcoholics who are BIG mad about it because it could be triggering for someone to drink the nonalcoholic version and then just dive right back into a bottle. Both groups think there is no reason for these products. 

And in this comment thread there was a group listing their reasons for not drinking alcohol even though they weren't alcoholics. Family history was a big one. And I get that. I've always watched the amount I drink just because of that reason. Addiction is big in my family. Alcohol, drugs, shopping, food, we like to have those pleasure centers lit up, thank you very much. So over the years I've often just stopped drinking to prove to myself that I can. And then I start again when I feel like I want to. And stop again when I want to as well.

For instance, I haven't had a drink since last June. I did Dry July and never picked it back up again. I started Dry July because I was in one of my phases where the fact that your body processes alcohol as a poison, no matter how much or how little you drink, really bugged me. Like there is no other poison you would willingly ingest. Oh it's just a little poison, no big deal. Ridiculous. So I stopped drinking. Also alcohol makes my night sweats worse. And like I talked about yesterday I have a hard enough time sleeping, I don't need to do something that is going to trigger a heat wave that's going to wake me up. So why in world would I drink poison that is going to make me have a hot flash? Easy to stop. 

But during the times I'm not drinking people have opinions. And they get really mad at me for choosing not to drink. Like my not drinking is some sort of judgment on them. I don't drink. I'm not drinking right now. I might drink some other time but for now the whole hot poison thing is keeping me away from it. You do what you want, I'm fine. 

But if I were an alcoholic then people would be supportive of my not drinking. 

Like it has to be a disease before you are okay to stop. No preventative treatment allowed!

And reading all of the comments from people as to why they didn't drink made me think, what if someone pretended to be an alcoholic so everyone would get off their jock about not drinking? And then this story started in my head. The drunken confession of a nonalcoholic. 

I can't always pinpoint where a story idea comes from, but this time I could.

It was those damn ads again. 

Shhh....

She wasn't the only liar in the room. She believed that she was never the only liar in a room, but at least in this room they all admitted it. Addicts were known liars. To others, to themselves. They lied. But she was pretty sure she was the only one lying about this.

She also wasn't the only person in this room to have had an affair. Or if not an affair, slept with someone they should not have. It was a common part of their rock bottom stories. The affair, the tawdry one night stand, the piece that brought it all crashing down. She'd heard a lot of them. The stories. 

She'd been in AA for five years at this point. She often thought she'd heard all of the stories that there could be. Or at least all of the variations on a theme. 

She had never shared her own story. She'd thought about it in the beginning. But then talked herself out of it. Rightly, she believed. When it became too awkward to attend a meeting without sharing she'd change times or locations. A whole new room full of liars to hide with. 

In vino veritas. 

You are only as sick as your secrets. 

She did not drink and she did not share her secrets. 

So she guessed she remained sick. 

But that was okay to her. She'd rather be sick than spread poison. 

She'd argued once with a group leader working the steps. He believed that often addicts hid behind the second half of the 9th step. The one about making amends but only if doing so wouldn't harm others more. He thought people hid behind the do no harm part to protect themselves. She did not agree. She thought that often people made confessions to make themselves feel better, to stop carrying the weight of the transgression, without ever considering how that would make someone else feel. 

She had been drinking at a conference. That was her last time. She was drinking with a woman who she really believed would be able to make that leap from work colleague, to work friend and eventually to just friend. There had been a real connection. One of those very comfortable things that happens. You just click. And they had spent the past two days going to meetings together and eating meals together and sticking by each other at all of the forced fun events. And actually having fun. 

Then the last night she had more to drink than she should have and said something she shouldn't have. Revealed an level of intimate knowledge about a man that she could not have known if they hadn't slept together. Because they were only work colleagues at the time, because she didn't know her that well yet, her work colleague didn't even realize what had been said, but if the friendship progressed, eventually she would. Eventually she would think about that conversation and the math would not have worked out. And she would have known. 

It wasn't a risk she was willing to take. 

Technically she had not been married at the time. But it was truly a technicality based on legality. She and her wife had been together, had committed to each other, years earlier. And the affair, it was an affair, not a one time drunken accident, had ended not because she had realized she didn't love him, but because she realized she loved her wife more. And she loved how her wife looked at her. And felt about her. And all of that would go away if she found out. 

And all of her wife's friends who had told her that a bisexual could never be faithful would have been right. That she wasn't really one of them. She was just oversexed and couldn't make up her mind. She'd been dabbling but would go back to dick as soon as one came along she liked the look of. Some lesbians could be very unwelcoming to those they felt didn't fit the whole mold. And she didn't really blame them. So many of them had been told their whole lives that they didn't really want a woman, they just hadn't found the right man yet. And here she was sleeping with women when she wanted and men when she wanted. Just making it more difficult for the rest of them to assert that they had no urge to sleep with men.

There had been many late night discussions about monogamy and that it was the same with her as it was with her wife. Just because she was bixsexual didn't matter. Monogamy was monogamy. They were only going to sleep with each other. They promised. 

She had lied.

She didn't realize at the time she was lying. She hadn't meant to lie. And she had been deeply ashamed of herself even while the affair was happening. But she had fallen for him as well. And she had a lot of excuses and reason why it was okay. Why nobody was going to get hurt because nobody ever had to know. And that worked until the first person found out. And she realized it was only a matter of time before her wife did as well. And she did think about it for a moment. What she wanted to do. Maybe she didn't want monogamy. Maybe it had been a mistake to think that it was for her. 

Then she went home and saw her, at the time, eternal fiance, and realized that no, she was her home. She was worth everything and more and that there was no excuse in the world for doing something that could hurt her that deeply. 

So she ended the affair. Messily it turned out. Nobody wants to hear, I love you but I love them more. And no matter how she tried to word it, he had heard that as the truth. I still love you, but you are not enough. She is. She is enough. And you are not her. It had been dicey for awhile. She thought any day she would come home and find he had confessed, he had spilled her secrets. But he didn't. And she didn't. And life moved forward.

Until that night in the bar when she heard the words so casually slip from her mouth and the alarm bells that hadn't been dampened with booze rang. 

She hadn't touched another drop. She couldn't risk it. 

She told her wife she was stopping because her family history was rife with addicts, which was true. And that she was getting too comfortable drinking too much, which wasn't. She rarely drank too much. She could take it or leave it. But if she just left it people would still want her to drink. She didn't want to have that one too many drinks in vino veritas moment to sneak up on her again. So she would just leave it.

But nobody likes a sober person unless they are an alcoholic and then they leave you alone.  

She wasn't the only liar in that room, but she was pretty sure she was the only one lying about being an alcoholic. 

So Many Ads...

I have always had trouble sleeping. If you know me you know that about me. It's so much a part of who I am that I didn't realize it was odd until I was in high school. Like I legit thought that everyone had a hard time falling asleep and that everyone woke up for hours in the middle of the night. When I first heard that there were people that would go right to sleep and not wake up again until morning I was shocked. Thought that there was something wrong with them!

The few times in my life where I've slept well have been amazing. Just often enough for me to chase that high...low? The high of being able to stay low? Something like that...

But yeah, I'd love to sleep better. Though I manage with less sleep than most and I do think that my body is designed that way. And I don't really break down unless I'm in a complete insomnia stretch where there is little (an hour or two a night) to no sleep. I can do that and handle that for about three days. Generally it happens when I'm manic and so it balances out. The manic energy overrides the sleep need and I just keep going. But if it hits when I'm in a "normal" space or heaven forfend a lull it's miserable. By day three I'm in tears over everything. 

But that's rare. Usually it's just I'm a little tired and I would like some more sleep. 

I made a mistake the last time I was in a stretch of not enough sleep. It was one of those bad stretches where I didn't have a false bump of energy coming in to balance out the lack of sleep. I was just exhausted and it was taking its toll. And so the mistake happened. 

I clicked on an ad for a sleep aid. Then clicked through to their website to read what the ingredients were and if it was worth trying. 

I know. But I was tired and not thinking clearly as to the consequences.

So now I have at least a dozen sleep aid ads in all of my feeds. Facebook, Instagram, Google, Threads, over and over and over again. THC gummies, mushroom tea, ashwagandha, valerian root, melatonin, magnesium, tart cherry, over and over and over again. 

And I've tried most of them. Melatonin is no good. (It's actually not really good for anyone in the way that they market it, maybe for jet lag, but otherwise your body makes its own, and you'd be better off heading outside first thing in the morning for a dose of natural light to start your own system up) Valerian is a no way from me. (I get really odd dreams while taking it, and it doesn't work for staying asleep all night, just deep sleep for a few hours with really odd dreams then laying awake for hours wondering what the fuck I just dreamt) Ashwagandha I'm allergic to. I tried CBD drops before and they did nothing and I don't really think adding in the hallucinogenic part is a good idea. (I've never smoked pot or taken pot gummies, it's just not a thing I think is a good idea with the way my brain chemistry is already) I've tried the tart cherry and it did nothing but make my teeth feel fuzzy. So that leaves the mushroom and magnesium. 

And I just don't think that's the answer. But maybe?

If I could find one that didn't have all of the other pieces as well.

Because that's a big thing with sleep aids, they throw it all in there hoping one of them will work for you. 

And do not click through an ad to see if it does have all of those ingredients but then you will be just like me and inundated with nothing but ads for gummies, teas and pill. 

It's exhausting. 

But not in a good way that helps you get to sleep.

So what does work? As odd as it sounds I do have suggestions for anyone who has problems sleeping. 

Get a good sleep routine established and try your best to stick with it. 

We drink some tea an hour or so before bed. A warm cup of tea signals to my body that it's time to head to bed. A warm shower or bath does the same thing if you like doing that in the evening. For me the tea works because a bath takes too long and I don't want to get my hair wet in the shower. 

So a warm cup of tea
Brush teeth, wash face, go pee, all that bedtime maintenance stuff
I read for a bit. I know that a lot of sleep experts will tell you not to read in bed. Or watch TV in bed. That the bed is only for sleep and sex and I've tried that as well, but it doesn't work for me. What works for me is to read a bit to wind down. Usually only for 15 or 20 minutes maximum. 
Then I go to sleep. 

That's the routine. Every night. The only thing that varies is the starting time for the routine. I'd really prefer to be in bed by 9:15 and asleep by 9:45 every night. The hope is that I sleep most of the night and so clock as close to 8 hours of sleep as I can. It doesn't usually happen for me, but Brent gets close that way and he functions best on 7-8 hours so it's a good compromise time. That doesn't always work since we have hockey games and soccer matches and such that keep us out later than that at times, but I function better if I stick with the 9:15 in bed time frame. 

I'm waking up at least 3 times over night. If I'm lucky I get back to sleep right away. If not I pick up my book and read until I'm sleepy again. Again, the experts will tell you to get out of bed, but if I get out of bed it's game over. I am awake for the rest of the night. The idea of getting out of bed and doing some quiet activity until I get sleepy again is foreign to me. Once my feet hit the floor my brain is fully on and engaged and I will read or listen to music or color or whatever quiet activity I am trying out until the sun comes up and Brent starts his day. 

And I've also mastered lying in bed perfect still and almost asleep. It works for me as an almost good enough solution to sleeping. If I can shut everything down, quiet my mind as much as possible, keep my body as still as possible, it's close to sleep. Again, the experts will tell you that you should never do that. That if you cannot sleep you should get up. But if you have chronic insomnia sometimes that's as good as you are going to get so you should take it. Rest if you cannot sleep. 

I never pick up my phone overnight. I have it on do not disturb from 9PM until 7AM (we usually get up at 6 but if we're lucky and can sleep in until 7 I don't want a text ruining that). There are only a few people on my override the DND list and I cut it even further once our parents all died. There are very few problems that cannot wait until the morning to deal with. You'll handle them better with a full night's sleep anyway. If you do pick up your phone just say good morning and get out of bed. 

The blue light tells your brain it's time to be awake. All of your social media accounts give you something to focus on that isn't calming. It's just not a good idea. Leave it on DND, or leave it in another room if you have to. It's just not good for sleeping. 

Comfortable bed, good room temperature (I like it close to chilly without becoming freezing), comfy night clothes or no clothes if that's better for you. White noise or ear plugs if you want. We have blackout curtains (thanks to Dana and honestly I cannot believe we didn't have them before), or an eye mask would work. And no pets. 

Yeah, that last one isn't for us anymore, but it really does help your sleep if you don't have someone waking you up for a walk, or to be let outside, or to be fed, or because they just miss you so much while you are asleep (Tig). 

But handle the things you can. Set yourself up the best way for you to get the best night's sleep.

And NEVER, EVER, no matter how tired you are, click the sleep aid ads.