Tag: finished

Welcome To Existence Everyone’s Here / Everybody’s Watching You Now Everybody Waits For You Now What Happens Next?

She was set free5 Comments

Today an ad popped up on my Instagram about preparing wills.

This is something I have been purposefully avoiding my entire life.

Not because I’m afraid to die because of death and all that jazz, but because in my will, I will undoubtedly have to name a Guardian for my kids. And I have no one who I would name. At this point in my life there is not a single person or couple that I would want my kids to be raised by other than with me.

My parents are out of the question for many reasons, part being the strained relationship my mother and I currently have. But also, they’re old. I want my kids to have a fun fulfilling life and my parents don’t have it in them to be sitting at soccer practice once a week and dance recitals/school plays all the time. They’ve done the discipline thing (horribly) and I don’t want them (my parents or kids) to go through that ordeal. They are just not the right fit. Sure they’re fine for a visit here and there and I trust my kids with them for like a sleepover, maybe even a weekend or something although that’s never happened, but anything longer would just be to much of them. And I know what to much of them turns into. Been there done that got the postcard and all the bills from therapy type situation.

My older sister R has 4 daughters of her own and as much as I’m sure Z would love being surrounded by sisters (or hate having less attention focused on her) I would feel uncomfortable for Little E being put in a situation like that. Plus they are super strict and highly religious and I’m just not on the same page regarding their beliefs about god or many other things in life, and therefore wouldn’t want that for my two children.

My younger sister N just had her first child last summer. I will admit it has changed her attitude towards life for the better in my opinion. It’s not so much all about her anymore which is nice to see, but the way her and her husband D live is just chaotic. They both love my kids but they have no sense of organization or discipline and they struggle so much with finances that I just can’t add this kind of thing to their life. It would be a lose/lose situation for everyone.

And that’s it. Those were my choices. I thankfully have sole custody of my kids, and they are OBVIOUSLY not going back to E. But I have no friends that are close enough to even consider for the possibility. And you can’t prepare a will without having that plan ready to go to put into the will. Like what am I going to do? Write a will but say ‘ oh I’m not a responsible enough person to have decided who my kids are going to live with so just either let my family decide or make them wards of the state’? Cause that’s basically what I’d be doing so what’s the point.

You can’t name someone Guardian in your will, without discussing it with them first. Like at least make sure they’d be willing and able to do it. I have no one to have that discussion with. I live my life independently from everyone, which as a result has ironically enough left me independent from everyone. So now, I have these two precious children to care for, and I do care for them. So much that right now in my opinion, no one else is good enough to care for them if/when I die. So I have to just not die until they’re old enough to care for themselves. Oh but C you say, what about accidents? What if you get run over by a car tomorrow?

DUH!!!!! So now you see my motherfucking problem. I have to make a will! I have to pay off my debts. I have to plan for them. Z still has 12 more years to go until she’s 18. 12 more years. I’ve only been a parent for 8.5 but I’ve made it this far. First I had to get through the divorce. Now, it’s time for me to actually start looking ahead. Planning for the future. Something I haven’t ever really done before. Everything was just get me through this day, this week, this marriage, this divorce. And now? Well now I need to be able to say get not only me through this life, but my kids through theirs.

So I’ve got to start planning ahead. But how do I plan another parent for my children? Seems like trying to get the past and the future to merge as one. I already picked a dad when I made them, and that didn’t work out well as we all know. As you can see I’m quite hesitant to try again. I don’t want to utterly fail my kids in the parenting department twice… or more.

So needless to say I won’t be writing a will anytime soon.

As dumb as it seems, it seems more logical than wasting time and money on preparing a will when I don’t know what it should say.

-Switchfoot/Dare You To Move-

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Shadows From My Past Life Is Real / So Real Sleeping Is My Leisure Waking Up In A Minefield Dream Is just A Pleasure Dome

She was set free1 Comment

I haven’t been writing.

How do I go from my last post to…. Little E joined soccer, or something else that seems so trivial now? Life is simultaneously seeming more pointless as the days go one, as well as revealing a wealth of information if I’m paying attention, which sometimes I refuse to, since the knowledge it reveals only makes living more confusing and…. pointless. Thus the infinite loop I seem to be stuck in.

I see how everything I do or have done in the past is influencing each moment in my present. I don’t mean something like “oh I spent my last twenty yesterday so now I’m broke”

I mean that each and every word I’ve said, or movement I’ve made or comment said to me is now literally fitting together in a puzzle that was my life. I can tangible see the moments of my past come together when the moment is suitable and I recognize why each thing in my past took place to mold me the way I am today… good or bad. Every breath reverberates out and the air flows to create things that take place I see now, but they take place tomorrow. Or I recognize small memories coming together to physically form situations large situations happen now. I can’t explain it well, but it’s like it happens in waves.

Even in my “sleep” a team I use loosely since I don’t feel like I’m even sleeping anymore. My dreams are constant all night. Vivid recollections of mine and K’s past melding together. Reconciling. And I find I jolt awake through the night when either harm comes to me in my “dream/sleep” or we come to a disagreement on how our life should proceed in that level of consciousness together. And I feel the same amount of rest that I used to get before this journey started, what like 2 years ago now? But now I’m more aware of the life my soul is living in my unconsciousness while I “sleep”.

Maybe I’ve been living that life with K since my soul journeyed into this world. Maybe this world here is just a fun thing for our souls to do in our spare time in the unconsciousness over there? Maybe that’s why we have this connection that we never knew possible or planned on or whatever. But maybe this perception is just a break from another larger perception?

Anyways, while I sleep, everything in my life as C has been reconciling. Fixing hurts and healing pains that have occurred since me as C was born. And it has been hard and I’ve been crying a lot as suppressed memories and fears have arisen as I jolt awake. But it’s also been very healing. Knowing more about why I am the way I am. How I got to be this way etc.

The main thing I have scaring me now, for a lack of better word, is the fact that my memories and dreams are now pretty much done, and now my dreams are so close to mimicking current life. Like last night it was just last summer and living in my parents house before the move out here, and how I felt being around my mom and why that caused me to feel and K visiting for Christmas and his pain with that etc. But my fear is, what happened when I’ve worked through everything?  What happens when my unconscious/subconscious catches up to my life/consciousness? What happens when there’s no more division between sleep and awake. Do I just live a day, then sleep the whole day on repeat??? If that even makes sense?  I guess saying it like that isn’t really a big deal, but it does bring up thoughts of death. I always thought when you die, it’d be as serene as sleep used to be for me. Just a vast nothingness… Like the best forever nap. But now that my sleep is not even sleep…. Is death even death?

I mean at this point, is life even life?

Everything has changed for me.

And I’m not sure what to believe or perceive anymore. All I know is that so far, I’m proud of my asleep C self. I can tell she’d making decisions my awake conscious self would be proud of. Choosing love, truth, and hope in all the situations she can. Although last night she road a motorcycle like a badass for fun (no harm in that) and ended up getting shot in the leg by someone… which is why I definitely know these memories/situations are not all mine lol. Anyways that made me wake up with pain shooting down my leg, that’s how life-like this has become.

So like I said… If there’s no “sleep” what is even real anymore?

But yeah… Little E loves soccer 🙂

-Queen/Life Is  Real-

Thoughts

She was set free5 Comments

A few weeks ago I was laying in bed and relaxing before going to sleep and calming my breathing and thought patterns as has become my habit lately. Also something that has become part of my life is thinking of K too much. I try to avoid it as much as possible. I pushed thought of him as far I could. Sometimes thoughts of him would come, but it’s wasn’t so much thoughts of him so much as thoughts from him. And sometimes I figured what’s the harm of enjoying what little of him I had in my life? And I would allow the thoughts from him to hold me while I slept at night or tell me he loved me… things like that. But a few weeks ago, as I was relaxing, and getting rid of my thoughts from the day and releasing unwanted emotions and energy etc, all of a sudden I was just a thought. I wasn’t even in my room or on my bed. Me, in my whole entirety as C, was represented as only a thought. I had no weight of the world holding me down. No previous emotions or situations keeping me here. I was just so in that moment that I was singularly that thought of Me. And I was with the singular thought that represents K. And we talked.

And then to reform my world was a slow scary step by step process. What should I do first? How should I move to ‘rebecome’ C? The room and remembrance of where I was on my bed in Kelowna took place first. And then from there the whole world as it was just sort of fell into place in my memory as I reached slowly for a drink or water. The whole time thinking is this the right move to make? Or should I be recreating this scene differently? Am I fucking up all of my future? Or is this predestined already? Anyways. I laid back on my bed and went to sleep almost immediately, and dreamt of K which at this point is normal.

What was not normal? K called me the next day. After all this time.

Up until now, I could basically play it off like this was all in my head and I’m just a girl who was way to in love with a guy. But when he called the next day and said he was thinking of me the night before… a lot. And that he’d been thinking of me a lot all the time? It was both a relief and a stress.

Now this is real real. Like now I can’t just play it off like this is only in my head. Now he’s obviously connected to me too. I explained what happened to me (kinda, I mean how do you explain this) expecting him to have experienced the same, but was disappointed when he said no, he just heard my name said over and over so loud and clear in his head. I asked him who’s voice it sounded like and he said his own. So either he’s downplayed what happened to him, or he’s not experiencing things as deeply as I am, in which case lucky him because this shit is scary. When the whole universe dissolves enough to bring your being close enough to someone else’s so they hear your name, but then the reality is recreated like no biggie? How else do you describe it other than terrifying?

And how do I move on from here? It’s not like there’s a textbook full of studies on the subject. When you’ve discovered something this mind blowing and new, it’s…. well mind blowing and new. So I’m at a loss.

A loss so big it’s leaving me feeling very alone and helpless. Because I literally feel like there is no one to turn to for support, as this is not something that’s been dealt with before and the person I’m supposedly going through it with, is not even as deep as I am.

My Shadow’s The Only One That Walks Beside Me

She was set free9 Comments

I went to Wal-Mart last week and found this  for Z’s room (see previous post for reference)

IMG_1291 (Edited)

Yes, I know the hair is covered which kinda defeats the purpose, but my options were limited and it was better than nothing. Next I went to the dollar store intent on buying gold paint to redo her dresser handles and match the painting (which is massive) and ended up calling my mom for advice. This was where I made my mistake. All I needed was advice on if the kind of paint they had there would stick to the metal handles or if I needed to go elsewhere, since I’m not a crafty person I wanted to get it right. That’s it. But nope, as my 31 years should have taught me long ago it’s not that simple with my mom.

I guess I just still feel like no matter who you are/what you’ve done, you should always be able to have a relationship with YOUR OWN MOTHER! At least that’s what I’m trying to teach my children. So anyways, I guess deep down in me, I keep trying. Trying no matter how many times I’ve been hurt by this woman, to keep reaching out. Opening up, and just end up getting slapped in the face.

So I’m in the dollar store and I call her for paint advice. She really doesn’t know but just tells me to get what they have and that it should work and to by some of the cheap brushes they have there too. I have some at home but I just let her say her thing and give her motherly advice even though I say twice I already have brushes. I briefly explain why I’m doing this for Z, and it doesn’t really faze my mom, which bothers my on it’s own, but I know by know not to expect much from her in that area. She’s kind of a you made you bed now sleep in it woman. I go on to give other small updates regarding my life. How I registered Little E for soccer, she asks why didn’t I sign Z up for dance, I explain it doesn’t start until the fall. I talked about how I was looking for a second job, both to keep busy as well as meet new people and bring in extra income. She poo-pooed the place I was interviewing at. I explained how I had just come from the Dr’s that morning and filled my seizure med’s and had also asked for a prescription for anti-depression medications, because I just didn’t think I could make it until spring anymore, and basically rounded out the call with “and that’s what’s new” to which she responded with “Actually C none of that is really new. It’s all very round about and the same old stuff for you”

So I was just like, ok bye. And all I could think about is how my family always complains that I never share things with them. Can they not see that when I do share, I get responses like this? So I sent her the following text. IMG_1286

IMG_1287

And so I find myself here.

On my blog.

At the request of my oh so loving mom. With literally nowhere else to turn. I’ve made no friends here in 8 months. K and I no longer talk and I long for those meaningful conversations with someone who at least pretends to care.

I have nothing. And it’s more difficult than it should be for anyone pretending to live at a level where they have to maintain sanity for the sake of their kids, but when does even that seem stupid and pointless?

And for those wondering, I haven’t spoken to my wonderful mother since, nor do I have any plans to in the foreseeable future. 🤷🏻‍♀️

-Green Day / Boulevard Of Broken Dreams-

I Wish I Could Be Every Little Thing You Wanted All The Time

She was set free12 Comments

Last night Z nearly broke my heart.

I was washing her hair, which could be considered a full time job, although we do it on average once a week if I’ve had enough coffee and sleep, when she made the comment that she doesn’t like her hair and wished it was like all her friends hair, which is in her words ‘smooth’.

Z has the most fantastic Afro, which I’ll admit at first I didn’t at first know the first thing about dealing with for obvious reasons, the main being I never had hair like that so why bother learning right? But over the years as her hair grew I realized it was getting more curly and thick and I would need more insight on how to care for her crowning glory to do it full justice, I started researching what the better quality products would be to use. I learned all about a wash n go and wet plopping and deep conditioning which to be honest were all very helpful for my hair as well since I also have curly hair, although not to the extent of Z’s 3c/4a curls. I learned not to use drug store brands that contain sulphates and other harmful chemicals that will further dry her hair out. I learned how to trim her hair myself to maintain it and get rid of dry, split ends on my own without spending a fortune on a hairdresser. I will admit though that I still cannot plait her hair, but I have learned twist outs and how to lay her edges so I’ll just take that as a win for now. One step at a time. 🤷🏻‍♀️

But when she was upset last night because her hair wasn’t ‘smooth’ like all her friends at school my heart fell into my gut. I can only be so much of a roll model for her in this area. I wear my hair as big, full and curly as possible, because I honestly feel the bigger the better, and I truly think natural hair is better. I’ve straightened my hair maybe once a year since finding out all this information about hair for Z. Little E wears his hair pretty close cut because he just has no interest in keeping a style and prefers it practically shaved, and even when he does grow it out, it’s not as curly as Z’s, it’s more of a thick bigger curl. Her dad maintains a bald head although they don’t see him often (as my regular readers know 3 visits when we went back at Christmas and before that it was February last year). So I guess my point with all these “examples ” is that she has no natural hair role models as far as her hair texture. I’ve shown her on places like instagram woman with beautiful hair like hers and how they wear it even bigger than hers. For reference, her fro averages between 6-10 inches but I don’t fluff it out on the bigger side often. She prefers to style it pushed back with a headband or with a few clips or two pigtail afropuffs. Which is for the best because those are the only ones I can pull off half decently.

Anyways this is a very roundabout way of saying I hurt for her. I want her to be proud of every part of her, but this is a way I can’t directly be a role model for her. Yes, I can wear my hair naturally and I do, but her hair is distinctively different, not only from mine, but from the streets of Kelowna and even where we were before and heck even in a Kenya because of the mix, and others notice. I think it’s fantastic and beautiful and many others do as well. We constantly receive compliments while out about how nice her hair is of which I reminded her last night. I told her that her hair is original and beautiful and she should never want to change who or how she is. I was detangling it and showed her how long it was while wet and stretched out and she was so impressed, since it reaches to her elbows. So after the bath, I did one long braid for her down her back and she was much happier and kept mentioning how long and smooth it looked. Albeit it only lasted about 15 minutes until it was completely dry and shrunk up to her neck but it made her happy in that moment.

I’m just wondering how to move forward from here. I’m WELL aware that my kids should have strong black role models in their life, but if there aren’t any around… I can’t just produce them out of thin air.

My in laws are not an option, her dad is out of the question. The black community in Kelowna is to be honest practically nonexistent (trust me, I’ve looked). But I know that it will be something they need to become the fullest version of themselves they can be.

I guess that’s the most frustrating aspect of this experience. Knowing I can be the best mom I can possibly be. I can make all the healthy lunches and arrange all the play dates and study up on all the hair care and do all the sex talks, to name a few examples, but facts are facts, and facts in my situation is that my kids are half black, there’s no denying that, and I would never want to. And that culture is not something I can provide them, and they desperately need it.

It makes me feel so inadequate.

Knowing no matter what, I’ll never be enough. And I can’t do it on my own.

And what’s worse it that the right people are not offering to help.

***update***

Just stopped at Walmart and saw this ironic and timely display showing Robert Munschs books on display

All had been picked through except the braids book (which Z owns). It’s a book about a girl with hair like Z’s and how she doesn’t like to have it braided since it takes a while and hurts. Etc. But anyways it’s literally just shows how no one in Kelowna has that culture in their life nor is trying to pass it on to future generations here and I’m on my own with my kids. 😑

*Z with morning bed head for reference*

-Dishwalla / Every Little Thing –