so, so tired i’m not looking at the keyss

this is one of those random, no punctuation, stream of consciousness blog posts that i sometimes do with my eyes closed. thanks to my junior high school teacher who taught me how to type and bribed me with multi colored jelly beans.

mu head is back lying on the pillow and i just finished a lot for dessert, chocolate covered cherry and small lorna dunes.. i am so tired that mh ehes are thickenening with sleep and conjuring up stories’\\that make no sense. christopher robbin and winnie the pooh, a sinister man in a closet and in the background thart i can’t see but i can hear is the ocean, roaaring with an forceful tide.

i know i love the ocean so it doesn’t scare me at all//. tomorrow my baby girl of 20 comes home i can’t wait, her brother coming home on saturday i think. i have to rememver  the  3 day adjustment period we went through over thanksgiving that i totally forgot about. this time, prepared, maybe it won’t happen. i long to see them sometimes, my heart aches and yet  dan and i are happy to be alone together which is nice.

another year ending, i won’t be wsorry to see it end, it was a rather tough year but i i guess we didn’t notice that when you re young but, likr s rainbow after a thunderous cloud and rain storm, we get through the storms, one afrer another yet the rainbows are hard to find now.  rainbows are very rare, but if one day you see one it will stayu with you forever.

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i’m tired so i need to go to sleep on my newly washed old flannel sheets that i haven’t used in yers.they have a dog and cat pattern on them and they are cheerful. they have been sitting in my closett scrunched in a ball,aching to be used. i thought theyw ould be too warm for mme…what on erth was i thinking? maybe that was pre fibromyalgia or pree aging but to me now they are a gift of softneww. i rub my feet against their  velvety surface.

now i must go, my eyes will remain shut. i will open them just to shut down the computer to turn off my pjone and my bedside light. i’m looking forward to putting m y head on my dancing dogs and cats pillow aand tht first cup of my morning strong cup of coffee with cocoa powder mised in. anothers night brings nother day. there’s hope.

View image | gettyimages.com

Fibro Life, Friday


Please, just let me sleep, don't find me...


I am too tired to keep my head up, I tried to make good on advice to get out more. As Fibro patients know, I’m paying the price. Minus two spoons. I owe two spoons from tomorrow, not that it really works that way, right fellow spoonies? We really can’t win either way.

I generally never complain about Fibromyalgia, Savella and Tramadol usually do the trick but then again, I haven’t pushed myself this hard in a long time. I really have to ask myself if it is worth it? When I am racing around town, doing errands, getting my hair cut, drinking a strong cup of coffee, going non-stop I am NOT able to handle it because apparently now, I am a wreck, a demolished car on the side of the road, Not one part left, it’s sitting up an embankment totally crushed.




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I have given the same advice to my friends “don’t do too much” but I didn’t listen to myself today because I was on a new mission to “live, to explore, to get out of the house.” Yep, I overdid it.

I might be so tired that I can’t even eat dinner. Nah. Who is kidding whom? I’m sure I will perk up after food, I smell chicken breasts on the grill, the salad is on the table already, I’m chopping tomatoes for bruschetta. But, really, all I want to do is to curl up in a ball and somehow loosen the muscles in the back of my neck and fall asleep. I don’t see that happening nor do I see myself cleaning my room and organizing it.

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Let me stay here, in the midst of my bed, covered with clothes and freshly washed laundry, next to my calendar and my phone and a pink and blue pen. I will push things aside in a corner, I won’t complain, not a sound will come out of my exhausted mouth except the sweet snoring sounds of an overtired, head-throbbing, weak patient.

Don’t tell anyone I am here, I am so broken I don’t want to be found. I just want to sleep. Shhh, please just let me.

* Two images should have appeared, if no images appeared, I will let zemanta support know again, feel free to join me. Thanks in advance. If they both appear, I will be delighted!

#Free Write Friday, Kellie Elmore

 

Nowhere To Go, In Time Or Place

I felt the tears of uncertainty and dread spring to my eyes. I quickly wiped them away with the back of my hand because if I didn’t they would stick to my face like hot glue. Change hasn’t happened in our lives for years but I know, in my gut, we will be saying good-bye to the world as we knew it, forever.

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Saying good-bye to the past, yet clinging, pathetically, to the memories that I hold dear. Old memories that rust in time but bloom in my brain like day lilies.

Another chapter will be beginning but we don’t know when or where.  Getting older is not easy unless you are a sweet, innocent child. Children love to turn another year older, there is no death in their future, just presents, and  cakes with candles, hope, fun and friends.The aged lack hope universally.

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For us, their parents or grandparents, it takes on a whole other realm of closing a chapter and warily beginning another, the last third chapter or the beginning of the end. We don’t celebrate parties in the same way anymore; birthdays come around, it feels like, every few months. There is no happiness in aging when you can’t go back in time. Even memories become stale, photographs, blurry.

Our bodies hurt, pain clings to us like Saran wrap on cheese, transparent, almost impossible to remove. It holds us hostage in our weary, broken bodies

I hold on to the wooden stair rail, going downstairs slowly, sticky over time, but now I am fond of the predictable stickiness in certain areas. I have walked up and down these stairs thousands of times, with sick babies, and naughty toddlers, with gleeful children and with young adults I was proud to call my children. I walked with my husband supporting me and me supporting him.

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I am not sure of the timeline, of when we will leave. It could be as early as six months but it could be more like a year, maybe two. The jittery nerves inside me says it will sneak up on us like a deer crossing our path in front of our car in the dead of the night.

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I have practiced saying good-bye to everyone I love and have to leave behind in my shaken heart. I will be leaving this home, this carrier of memories. I know I am on my way, still clutching to some false sense of security.

Entering into another phase of my life, of our lives. I have to control myself from me not to sob out loud. I know this tiny, white house which in six months could be painted navy blue or brown. I don’t know, I will never know. But it will never be my house again. My children will not grow up here, the trees we planted for the children will stay and the two big gray rocks other people’s children will climb on.

We are homeless, we have nowhere to go although we can stay for a little time in a few places but never like this again. The locks on the doors will be changed in two days, maybe three, new owners will eventually move in.  The FOR SALE sign on the front yard seems to deface our property. It has already defaced our home.

A chapter in our lives is about to be over, a new chapter has not yet been written, the lines blur together. We are standing, clutching on to memories not yet ready or willing to create new ones. I am not sure I will ever want to make new ones.

We step aside, we cling to the naked walls and to each other with the depths of our depression in our hearts beating slowly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sad Saturday

*In The Early Morning Rain

It’s 12:33 in the morning and I’m eating Froot Loops, with some mini Shredded Wheat and a bunch of blueberries tossed in that lack flavor. The rest of the family is doing a volunteer ambulance run and while they are helping people I know the roads are slick, black ice lurks sneakily in the dark.

I have felt totally listless all day and night. I lack energy and for the past seven years of having Fibromyalgia, this chronic pain-in-the-ass illness, I feel my whole body and mind stuck in a ditch, in neutral, spinning my wheels, going nowhere. I stay in my light, colorful, flowered patterned pajamas all day, I don’t even have the energy to change much less go out. My nose is stuffy, I ache all over, I am a floppy “Raggedy Ann” doll without her cheerful smile.  I feel older than the old person I am. There is no energy within me. None. The word “lethargic” sums it up well.

Who am I and who am I not?  Or, are the physical limitations and limited time having energy really getting to me? Of course, this horrid, freezing cold winter never helps me, it makes everything worse. Every year I start the same sob story about wanting to move to Florida or California, maybe even Arizona. I say it every year but we are still here in a very COLD town on the East Coast. I don’t fit in but at 57, that is the very least of my problems. The divider here is youth and money, lots of money. I lack both.

I need to go to sleep soon, my eyes are just about closing, my tummy is full with children’s cereal and sugary milk to slurp from the light green ceramic bowl.  I love these bowls, I have them in all different colors, they make me happy each time I use one. I take a few delicately pale pistachio nuts from a bag that is already open. Food is very important to our family, especially to me. It is imperative that we like our dinners especially on Sundays.

While my husband is unemployed, we deny our pleasure of going out to eat except for special occasions. Generally we eat scrambled eggs with cheese, and toast, my home-made pea and lentil soups, with a loaf of French bread, my husband’s eggplant parmigiano, chicken in the slow-cooker, lots of pasta, salads. We will go out only once to say good-bye to our son, heading back to college. I am not good at good-byes. It’s easier for me to leave than to be left. It’s one thing I can’t change, I’ve tried. Now, I accept it and my family accepts it too.

I’m humming the tune that is in my mind, the one that is the title of this essay. It is soothing to me, I’ll try to attach it here for you. Good night everybody. Thanks for sticking with me on this cold, dreary night, while the rain pelts down on the windows.

Photo credit: LAF 2014

 

http://youtu.be/3Fb19TaybZ0

Feeling Like Crap And Other Such Novel Events

Frozen Yogurt with Banana and Blueberries (Photo credit: planetc1)

An ordinary day, three loads of laundry,

Clearing my throat incessantly,

constant coughing,

a headache that won’t go away, top and forehead

swollen glands.

My dog, barking, throwing up water, three times.

Me, internal and external fatigue, Fibromyalgia or taking care of my sick child, combination probably.

Hard to move one muscle, I will it to move, it does not listen.

I call the far side of my bed “the office” too exhausted to get up, shuffle.

Imagining what it must be like to have so much money that money doesn’t even matter,

Can’t.

Worrying about our Mom getting older, all of us getting older.

Not driving as much. Reality. Stay in the moment.

Don’t meet worry half-way.

Sit. Listen. Quiet.

Old friends become past friends for me. Finally.

Goodbye you-know-who, I’ve cut the chain, I can sail away.

I value myself more, now.

We had great times but that was thirty years ago.

Friendships need to move forward, together.

What is there to miss when you had nothing for so long?

Happy 25th ANNIVERSARY to my husband and to me in October.

a lovely accomplishment, not always easy.

Life is work, kids, work is life.

Plain, unsweetened frozen yogurt with fruit.

slides down my aching throat with chilling ease.

A beautiful summer day.

An ordinary day… (Photo credit: ` TheDreamSky)

Playing ball with my dog, Lexi, at the park.

We are both exhausted now, lying together on the bed.

Her long, red body, snoring, my pale body tossing and turning.

Everything feels as right as it can, for this moment, this day.

There are no promises and certainly no guarantees.

Free Write Friday, Kellie Elmore, Photo Prompt

the stars around us

long ago i sat under the stars now seems like ive been sittin here under this tree for all my life. all my life and nothin’s changed.  i sit here in the morning, at night, don’t matter. someone asked me if i was happy, what the hell she mean by happy. i don’t know what happy means no more, can’t feel it, can’t remember it,cant taste  it. but not sure i remember real sad neither. i sit in my chair under my tree, yes in deed that is my tree just watching and listening to the Lord to see if the Lord wants me to come Home or not or if i should just stay on here. im not surprised by nothing, no more.

why should I be? seen too much destruction in my home, too much sadness and pain, you know nothing about me so dont judge me, little boy. what do you think you know, something better? well you dont. i had it all too once, yup, me and my friends who used to live down the street, we all had us some good jobs and on friday nights we would take us out with our gals and we would have us a fine night, eatin dinner out, dancin under the stars and smokey playing the guitar, me on the haermonica. everyone else laughing and drummin, the beer and wine flowed an we didnt care that we was drinkin from paper cups, why that was like china crystal for us, we didnt know better and we didnt care neitther. nothing was more important to us than doing an honest days work, being with family, eating all together with friends and looking at the stars around us. why that was the most beautiful picture of them all.

you dont need a lot of money for beauty, thats what i’m trying to tell u  but a little money, yeah, that does help. I got none now, none, not for lack of trying, but sooner or later you just bury those dreams and give up cuz no one care about you anymore and you feel the same way. i dont care about me no more, i eat whats other peoples leftovers are, i crawl around at night, i cant walk quick no more, but  i can get around with the cane i made myself so i get scraps here an there, i share them sometimes. i dont care about eating, no more tho i used to, have my pots and pans still, little stove. i don’t use them much.

i just sit, waiting, just in case someone visits, i even got an extra chair beside me but i know, it stays empty, and thats just alright, juz fine by me. i had that love once, i dont get   entitled to a second round mized up my life with the wrong people  and too much drinkin. so now i sit alone, i know no one is coming round to see me, i know that chair besides mine is gonna be empty till the day they carry me out from here, stone cold dead.

ramblings from a very tired person

“I Am Tired” – NARA – 558861 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

so tired I think my eyes are asleep, they are certainly half closed while i am typing this so forgive the e.e. cummings style, a wonderful poet.i feel like there are pieces of chalk in my eyes, the ones i used to use when I was a kid, outside on the street; thick pieces of multi-colored chalk sticks, pink, yellow, blue, white.  they always got on our hands and clothes but they were great for hopscotch games and messages to the world. hearts and balloons and your best friends names. when i was little we had a tight group of friends, 4 of us that played together every day; our moms were great friends too. we played in an alley and our moms sat together on a little wall, talking, smoking cigarettes back then. in the summertime, we would run like crazy when we heard frankie and the Good Humor truck coming around the corner, his familiar voice shouting “Hola Amigo.” our very first Spanish words.we were so proud.

out of the 4 of us, I am still friendly with all of them since we are all in our fifties and have known each other since we were born. our lives live in each others memories, moments that one of us remember, we fill in each others blank stairs; we’re all very different. one guy is not much of a communicator, he sends a joke or two on line once in a while and every ten years we see each other on his big birthdays in July which is fun. the next one will be 6o ,wow that sounds so ancient  yet it’s a mere jump. skip and dive into those frozen waters for me. I can’t just yet roll it around my brain or head and certainly not my tongue.not yet.

i could never understand people reading the obituary pages, what’s the point? my 85 year old mother started reading them with one of her friends a few months ago and now she does it every day. i looked at it once and the one time I looked i found our realtor dead, at a young age. or the age they said. she used to tell me about all the cosmetic surgery she would always have; there was no cause of death listed. I was shocked and saddened to see her familiar face on the page.you just don’t expect to know anyone when u glance at the page. i stopped reading after that one.

that’s what tonight has been like, looking at old photographs, too tired to get out of bed to pee, too lazy to go down to the kitchen and snack because i don’t want to change my feeling of warmth and safety from this 60 degree bonus day. we deserved this day, after super-s0aker  Sandy and the snowstorm that followed. this tiny neighborhood has outtages every single year, except for this one, we were so very grateful.

thanks for giving us a break this year. we sorely needed it and was much appreciated. i need to save this and then save draft. and then, right away before you say anything else, i will be dropping my head on my cool pillow and try to go to sleep. peaceful sleep. good night.

Carry on Tuesday: Wishful Thinking

The Waitress (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It’s one of those dreary, black, rainy nights and I have gone food shopping for what seems to be the eleventh time in a week to buy food for my family. I’m so tired that my legs ache and they sure are swollen. I’ve been on my feet all day working at the coffee shop waiting on customers. I’m so tired I could sleep in this old car, for sure. I load the groceries in the car, rubbing my back the whole time; I stop in the card store to buy a birthday card for my sister. We share one old computer at home, not a fancy one like the orange or the apple, whatever it’s called, but we bought it second-hand and the kids use it for homework. This “e-mail” may be convenient but when it comes to good friends or relatives, I’m old-fashioned, I still buy cards and stamps even though the stamps will soon be the same price as the cards sooner or later.

I go to the register and as I am about to pay for my card when I decide, last second, to buy a lottery ticket, quick pick just for some fun. It’s a guaranteed few hours of playing our favorite game: “what would we do if we won the lottery?” Tonight it gives me some happy time while I soak my bones in a bubble bath. We don’t have much but we do have a tub and some bubbles, heck, even Oprah took bubble baths and she could have gone to a fancy spa. While I am soaking I’m going to imagine me wining all those millions of dollars and then I’m gonna spend that money in my mind. First thing I’d buy would be a new truck for my boys, brand, spanking new. You got to make your own happiness sometimes and since I am blessed with my family and our health, this is sure good enough for me.

My own momma and poppa used to call this “wishful thinking” they never believed in it because they said that” it’s no sense in dreaming if you are never gonna win anything anyways.” They wouldn’t let me dream, I just had to work on the farm but now as a grown-up, I can do what I want. I will NOT deny my children of dreaming, no sir. People have to dream, dream big even, that’s what I tell our children. Work hard, study hard and your dreams will come true. I don’t tell them what their grandparents always said to me, I learned what not to do from my parents so I set it right for my own children. Dream big because I believe in you. I tell them that because no one ever told that to me.

Tired, Tired, Tired

(106/365) Tired but can’t sleep (Photo credit: Sarah G…)

I can’t watch the news anymore; even when I just glance at the news on the computer, I know the world is a scary place, a terrible place.  The fear is in my stomach first, like raw clenching tentacles and the tightness inside me like an army of multi-colored stretched rubber bands.  I feel anxious, I see it reflected in my own eyes, fear, insecurity, doubt. Yes, the world is a bad place and many dreadful things happen. I also take other people’s pain and clutch it in my arms, like a hug surrounding a wounded child.

I can list a number of my most awful days in a second, like rapid-fire stock market trading but when I try to conjure up incredibly good days, I have to think, hard. The usual, marriage and childbirth come up, of course, but really, what was the last golden day I had that was out of the ordinary?  I stop to think. Tonight, I can’t come up with anything; my brain has been taken over by fear and pain.

I know I am too sensitive but it sticks with me like a second skin; sometimes I invent future nightmares. I know I shouldn’t do that and I try to stop myself  but there are times when I feel overwhelmed. It passes, I know, but while it happens, I forget.

My legs, from Fibromyalgia tonight are aching, painful, much more than usual. Fibromyalgia is eating up my world slowly but aggressively. New symptoms, tingling and numbness of my hands and feet, leg pain, imbalance, nerve pain too. It wasn’t supposed to get worse, that’s what the doctor told me, or did I dream that? I knew it wouldn’t get better and I accepted that easily but today is so much more painful than other days. I want the pain to end and drown in sleep. Tonight, I want to curl up and try to find a comfortable position and just lay here in the dark. I asked my husband to come upstairs to kiss me good-night, I haven’t done that in many years; his tender kiss on my forehead reassuring.

I don’t want conversation or to watch television, I don’t want to read a morbid book or even a funny book and I don’t want to listen to music which usually calms my soul. I just want to stay still in the dark and breathe evenly and not hurt. This pain is severe; I never take pain medication but tonight I may have to grope for a pill from an outdated prescription.  I don’t really want to take it, it’s a false reading of tortured limbs but tonight, but tonight I need a break.

A break from physical and emotional pain, let me lie here and fall asleep with my dog sleeping on my foot and my warm diet root beer by my side. Let me forget the worry and the fear and the pain. “I don’t want to fight,” I said, to my sister online; I don’t want to waste the little energy I have on our frequent disagreements. Fighting is not the answer and not the solution. This stress on me is unnecessary and I want it to end, there is no room in my life for painful interactions. Whatever it takes, I promise to try to do it because I want peace between us, even if sometimes, it is artificial.

Let me stay in my little corner tonight, huddled on one side and let me sleep, just let me sleep.

Alone

Description unavailable (Photo credit: physiognomist)

Two bitches, foaming at the mouth, always ready to pounce on me. I feel their saliva dripping, I am close enough to feel their hot breath on my skin, I want them to back off, I scream for them to leave me alone but they stop short of biting me and tearing my face apart with their sharp, pointed teeth. I am bleeding, all over, yet they can’t see it or they don’t want to acknowledge how much pain they cause me. It’s easier to blame me.

I know nothing will change. I have fought this battle so many times before and I still feel empty, scared and I am hiding in bed. I don’t want to talk to anyone, see anyone. I feel sick, my stomach is in knots, I drink tea with milk and honey, a sure sign of my malaise. There is sunlight coming in through the window but I don’t see it, I turn to the wall instead where the shadows are dark; the door of my room has been shut tight all day. There is no one I know that can make me feel better; it’s been non-stop stress for weeks and I feel like I want to run away.

I want to be like my childhood friend who lives for herself, wherever she pleases, dining, dancing, enjoying life. I am not enjoying life right now, I am barely getting by. My body hurts, my heart hurts and I’m questioning if my soul is even alive anymore or if it is even attached to my body. I don’t think it is. I saw a professional who was the opposite of professional, she, a nasty, cold, devil who did more harm than good. How can you abuse a patient? I just recently let her go but her words still ring harshly in my ears, there are many bad doctors in the world, untrained, shameless, heartless with just initials after the name to claim their worthiness. It’s not enough.

I’m wounded but not like a soldier bravely marching back to duty. I feel defeated and empty, in despair. My stomach rebels with a hard knot and pain on the back of my lower right side. I don’t eat, I’m not hungry. I am more than sad, less than suicidal; I’m a tightrope walker without a net. I don’t remember ever feeling like this before. I wish I could hate it so I could claw my way out of it but I don’t have the energy or the will to do so. I am tired but not sleepy; I am forgotten. I don’t know who I used to be just how I feel right now.