Waiting to wake up

I am currently 14 weeks pregnant.  I am having trouble wrapping my head around being the mother of 2.  Especially because my two kids will only be 16 months apart.  I can't imagine what its going to be like.  I am terrified. I am not too sure that I'm doing a real hot job of being a mother of one.  I don't feel very excited or connected to this pregnancy.  I didn't the first time.  The whole thing feels so alien to me.  I can't see myself as a mom even though I've been doing it for nearly 11 months now.  It has gotten easier, but some days I find myself fantasizing about the past... About life before baby.  Things were so much easier, I was only responsible for myself.  Now everything I do affects the lives of two other people, three if I include Matt in that.
Matt has been working so many hours so I can stay home with our daughter, and I am so thankful, but I am also a little jealous somtimes.  I have only been away from her one day in 11 months.  I don't even remember what its like to be alone anymore.
My feelings of indifference towards things make me feel really guilty sometimes.  There are so many people who want children so badly and can't have them, like my cousin Richard and his wife Jessie.  It makes me feel really bad that I don't love parenting more.  But I can't help how I feel.
I love my daughter so much, and everyday she seems to get more and more fun.  I just miss things being easy.  I feel sometimes like its just endless diapers and doctors apoointments.  She didn't gain much weight between 6 and 9 months and that opened a whole can of worms with her doctor.  She has been putting her through the wringer with so many tests and appointments with specialists.  I really think that she's fine.  I started feeding her a lot more after I found out how little she had grown and she gained almost a pound and an inch in less than a month, so I really think that it was just because I wasn't getting enough calories in her.  However, her doctor still wants to do all this genetic testing and have a ct scan done of her head.  I am not a big fan of the idea, she already had a head xray which came back fine.  I just hate putting her through all the tests, its like torture.  It took 5 of us just to hold her down to get labs drawn, it was terrible.  To do the ct scan they would have to start an iv, probably in her head-fuck that.
I'm rambling.

So much has changed.  I became a mother on December 3rd last year-little girl, Mahala Mae Hunter.  What a journey that was, and still is as I'm learning.  I hated pregnancy, every bit of it, every pound I gained (57).  I thought that when I had her I would have the rush of emotion that all mothers tell you about( and some must lie about), but I didn't.  The whole thing felt really alien to me.  They placed her in my arms and I felt...nothing.  It was surreal.  She had to spend a week in the nicu for who-knows-what.  They never did figure out what was wrong, and that further postponed my bonding process I think.  Now, she is almost six months old and I feel somewhat indifferent.  She is beside me right now-unhappy, per usual.  I love her I suppose, but I don't really enjoy being a mom, and the guilt that comes with that realization is heavy.  I feel like there is a constant weight on my chest, and that my brain is on fire from lack of sleep.  She is a terrible sleeper, probably got that from me.  I feel sometimes that there is no end in sight, and I feel really alone.

This lady died from work last night.  She died at the hospital in Ames.  She should have been here so she felt at home when she died.  She had dementia so at least this place was familiar to her.  It feels wrong to me that she had to die with strangers.  I guess I'm a stranger to her, but she's sees me so often that she knows my face.  It just feels wrong to me that she was there.  Life is so weird sometimes.  Things happen so wrong sometimes.  I over think everything.  It doesn't really matter now-she's gone either way.  I don't know that I believe that it makes a difference really... But I would have felt better had she been here... For her? For me?  I don't know honestly.  Probably both.

I keep wondering when I'm going to grow out of this state of mind I'm in.  Maybe this is just how its going to be from now on.  I feel really...Strange most of the time.  Through out my life I always felt like I was growing torward something.  Now I have settled into adulthood and I feel stagnant.  I feel like, "this is it."  I always felt like I had more time to do things with my life, to make something of myself-to change my mind about being a nothing.  Now I'm 29 and am still doing the same old shit that I was doing at 17.  I don't feel anymore motivated to do anything different than I did then.  I feel more burned out a lot of the time, but not any more motivated.

I think about things so much.  Every little thing. I over analyze everything.  Maybe its from having so much time alone.  I spend most of my time by myself. Especially since Matt started school, and I work alone.  I'm very lonely sometimes, other times I love my solitude because I'm a crazy person and I hate being around almost everyone.

Carla found out she's pregnant. Bad timing because Jeff doesn't have a job.  He's losing his mind I think. This keyboard is broken-I'm at work. What a piece of junk. So I'm going to have to cut it short.

Matt and I went on vacation last month-drove to California and up the coast to Washington. Camped in the redwood trees.  I wish time didn't go  by so damn fast.  I feel like I'm already dead.

This is what it would look like if I didn't take the time to fix what I typed on this stupid keyboard. I hae his stupid place everything they have i junk and none of the key wok on this thig hal of the time apparently.they probably won' fxit for another year or two ever thoug thespace bar oesn't wok and noneof the ltters do eiher. hahaahaha. Mom and dad are doigok.  M dads back is reall bad.  Momthinks hell be in  wheeelchair i two years time.  I makes me sad o think about that.  I alays think about my dada this vey strong man and watching him agis ver hard fo me.  It mkese very mad hat he won't go tot th doctor oget help whn he really needs it.  He's such an ss smetmes. Aywysas you can eeti thing is a piece of cra.

My grandma Alice died on Sunday afternoon.  She was 85, not that it makes a difference.  She died at a hospice in Mason City.  She was there for almost a week before she finally let go.
Mom called me last week and told me that she went to see her at Good Sheopard, the nursing home she had been staying at since her health declined this last winter and that she was non-responsive-so off to the ER she went for the 4th or 5th time in the last 6 months.  I didn't get too excited to be honest, because it seemed kind of like my grandma just kept coming out of whatever she was coming down with each time.  Then Tuesday mom called and said that she was mottling, and moving to hospice.  I had to work 7p to 7a Tuesday and Wednesday night so I struggled through those shifts trying not to think about the reality that was outside those walls.  I told my mom I would be there Thursday morning as soon as I could after work. (I had a stupid physical right after work, at Bethany Manor in Story City for a prn job I took on because I thought that was a good idea)
My brother Robert-being Robert, didn't want me to drive with no sleep so he drove down to my house in Story City from Dumont and up to hospice we went.  Robert has always been the brother that will drop anything and everything to help anyone.  He would move the earth to help any of us if he could.  He's got a heart the size of a Buick even though he acts like a gigantic ass most of the time.  We all know that in a pinch-Robert is a phone call away.
The drive to Chapin took about an hour.  We met my dad at my parents' house.  Robert had to go to work before he headed up so I rode with my dad the rest of the way.  My dad has a deep denial about death.  Part of him wanted to believe that somehow my grandma was going to snap out of this. Heh-snap out of her own death.  Sometimes the end is the end.  He believed right up to the end of my grandpa Carl's life that somehow-someway he was going to turn it around.
We got to the hospice house or the 'death house' as my dad calls it around noon.  What a beautiful place it was, I guess when my grandma got there, she looked at my aunt Julie and said "what are you doing here?" because she thought she was in heaven-probably seemed like it compared to the hospital.  I guess it used to be the original MacNider mansion in Mason City and was converted into the hospice.  Anyway-so my grandma looks like hell.  I shouldn't say it that way-my grandma looked like she was dying-because she was.  It was obvious, at least to me, but  I've seen hundreds of people die.  Its always so different when its someone who you love so deeply and have so many memories with though.  She looked very different from the grandma Alice that I remember.  MY grandma Alice was fat, always smiling and laughing.  This grandma Alice had lost so much weight, and wasn't laughing or smiling, or telling any of her stories.
My dad didn't stay long, he doesn't deal well with crowds, and like I said before-death.  It had been decided that we were going to have a memorial on Saturday because I guess it was assumed she would be dead by then. (what the hell)-Then it was decided that we would have the memorial Saturday whether she was dead or not.  Well I got really upset by this, because I just kept picturing my grandma, ALIVE-ALONE-while we are at a church reading her eulogy pretending she's dead.  Stupid-downright outfuckingrageous.  So, long story short, I changed their minds.  They wanted to do it that way because some of them had to be places on Monday and blah blah blah.
I went and took a two hour nap at Robert and Alicia's house on Thursday evening and then we all headed back to Mason City until 11p.m. Thursday night.  6a.m. Friday morning we were on our way back up and were there-awake until Saturday night until late.
During my time at that hospice house I realized that I am so proud to be a part of my family. 7 out of 8 of my grandma's kids showed up and stayed with her, not to mention all of the grandkids in and out.  I saw people that I haven't seen in years and it was like no time had passed at all.
There was a man there named Steven. He was there with his wife who was dying from stage four cancer.  At first he was a bit standoffish.  But I went ouf for some fresh air on Saturday morning at 4a.m. and saw him having a cigarette and introduced myself, and asked him why he was there.  After that it was like he was part of the family.  I told him if he wanted to have any of the pop in the fridge they provide for family that we brought he could or any of our snacks.  We ordered food for the group for most meals and he would kind of peak his head in once in a while and everyone would just invite him in, every one of my aunts, uncles and cousins.  No one cared who he was or why he was sitting at a table with us.  People were hugging him and asking him if he needed anything.  I am so happy to be a part of a family who, even during their grieving can bring someone in and help them with theirs- a total stranger.
My grandma died with her family singing to her.  They were singing "I often go walking," one of her favorite songs from church.  We had a good last couple of days with her, full of family.  I know thats what she would have wanted.
It seems really strange that she's gone.  I don't know that its really sunk in yet.  I feel like the last few days have been such a blur.  I slept so little during the whole thing, that most of it almost feels like a dream.  Memories of my childhood with my grandma come flooding back in waves.  Guilt of not spending more time with her as a grew older comes in even stronger waves as well.  Images of her in the nursing home toward the end, crying, telling me how much pain she was in-the anger in her voice on the phone.  In my head I know these last months she wasn't my grandma.  Turns out she had cirrhosis of the liver(undiagnosed for years) that was causing her extreme pain and mild dementia. Plus her galbladder was the size of a grapefruit.  Anger that the doctor didn't find the cirrhosis sooner comes and goes-it doesn't make a difference now...but if only they could have controlled her pain more.
She has 72 grandchildren.  And one thing is for sure, she gave us all great memories.


When I Grow Old
      1982
Alice Westfall

When I grow old, I want wrinkles 'round my eyes,
Little crinkles where the laughter lies,
The sounds of children in my ears
To ease my doubts and calm my fears;
A living room, a favorite chair,
A dog, a cat, you sitting there,
The simpler joys your love can bring
To turn my winters into spring.

When I grow old, I want a home
That calls them back from where they roam,
With roses there and hollyhocks,
Where children know there are no locks,
And though my days must shorter grow,
I'll see you smile and I will know
When I'm with you and you with me,
That "all the best is yet to be."

When I grow old, I want wrinkles 'round my eyes,
Little crinkles where the laughter lies,
When I grow old.

I spend so much time thinking about how and when I am going to say goodbye to people I care about. I think about when they're going to die... how they're going to die, are they going to die before me? What will my life be like without them...? I feel like I live my life in an almost constant state of grief, and its a fucking stupid way to live. I would say that it started when Zach died, but I think thats only when it got worse. I remember being a very young child and grieving my parents deaths everytime they left because I knew they were dead somewhere. Maybe every kid does that. I don't know.

Ruth was telling me about when Don died last night, how she held his hand at the end and watched him die. I have seen literally hundreds of people die, I have been the one holding their hand in many of those cases. I have sat vigil at their bedside because family couldn't be there. My heart has been numb through so many of these times...because it has to be or I don't think I could do this job. So what is happening to me lately? Why have I been so fucked up? I just keep thinking about when Matt is going to die, or my parents... My siblings, even my grandma, which is not too far off I know. Even myself.

I feel like a spectator to my own life. I'm not really living it, but drifting through... and its all happening so very fucking fast and the brakes aren't working. I have fallen so in love with Matt over the last year, I know that sounds incredibly stupid since we've been married five years... I've always loved him, but I see that love growing. Its a lot different now than it was in the beginning. I don't want to die and leave him here alone.

I've never actually had that feeling before, where I didn't want to die before, not that I want to die, but I've never actually cared one way or the other.

The twitching in my face hasn't stopped, its been over a month. Its been pretty constant in my feet and hands too. My MRI results came back with a spot on my brain. They won't say for sure what it is. The neurologist just told me it was some kind of a lesion, and said that because there was just one that they couldn't tell me it was ms. Well doc can you tell me its not? Well...no. OK. Well thats an awesome way to put it ass holes. So now I'm a twitchy, nervous, slightly mental fuck who has a mystery brain lesion. I wish they just wouldn't have shown it to me. They also took me off they Wellbutrin to see if it was that causing the twitching-it wasn't-due to the still twitching situation...but for some reason they don't want me back on it yet. So fuck.

I keep thinking back over the years and depressing myself over how long ago things in my life happened. Married five years ago. Fuck. Ten years out of school. Eh. Twenty years ago I was my nieces age... I remember it like it was yesterday.... I'll run into things in a box or a book-shit I remember drawing that.....in 2004? God, ten years ago? How is that even possible. Then I get out old journals from like 2001-man what a different time in my life that was. Its just like life flies by you and you don't even realize it until you're looking at old pictures and you hardly remember the people in them. People who meant so much to you at that point in your life, you knew they'd be part of it forever. People who have drifted away somehow...were goodbyes ever even spoken? You barely remember the person you were then.

I remember thinking I had it all figured out back then. I had the world on a string, and everyone was just trying to hold me down and get in my way, but man-when I was an adult I would just have it made. I would get out on my own and have anything I ever wanted, I was gonna show you, mom. Hahahahahahaha. I am not really disappointed in where I've ended up (well mostly-heh), but its hard for me to figure out how I got here sometimes... and yeah, there are times where I wish I could go back and do it over. Not to change anything maybe... but just to experience it again-the good, the bad and the ugly- even if the outcomes would be the same. I miss the way things felt as a youth. To have new exciting experiences again-to defy my parents again, to feel like I was living on the edge just by breaking curfew. Ha. What a rebel... Just to think that I was a rebel again. To see lost friends again.... Sometimes its hard to pretend to be an adult, when I still want to be a kid. Its downright depressing. 28 this year. Fuck that. People would laugh at me I know because thats still young, and I know that, but the thing is I feel like my life is in fast foward. I know that in the blink of an eye I am going to be 60...70? Dead. If I even live that long. I always feel like I'm racing a clock and its just counting down.

I've just been living in my head to much lately. Thinking about what was too much. My mind just feels so unfamiliar to me. Like I'm swimming in a fog. I'm in a strange place.

I'm sure it will all be ok.

I miss you cakedrink the nefarious.

I don't know why I had the idea to look back at Zach's old website archives tonight. (stupid fucking depressing idea) I had totally forgotten that you could do that. I have been thinking about him a lot lately. Thinking about him in different ways than I have in the past.
Its weird to think of that time of my life occurring in such a short time frame. I only knew him for a couple of years, but it seemed so much longer then. Time seemed so much different. A year seemed to pass in such a different way. Winter took on such a more sinister meaning than it does now. I feel like now its just a matter of months and we're back to the warmth of spring. Back then it was an endurance contest... to see if he could even make it. Then, one winter he didn't. Time was slower.
At least it seemed that way.
I've been thinking about him a lot-missing him a lot. Thinking about a lot. I remember thinking that time flew back then. I think its flying now. I can't even imagine what another few years will bring.
I should just quit doing things that remind me. But for some reason I always do. I just don't want to forget and in a lot of ways I am.

I'm always looking for something to make everything feel right in this life. Trying to feel normal. Trying to get outside my head long enough for things to feel right, because they aren't right inside it. I have terrible thoughts and images running through my head all the time. I try to trace my memories back to a time when I was happy, really truly happy... And I always get stuck. Maybe as a child. What changed? What destroyed it? Was it some small event that put my mind into a downward self-destructive cycle? Why can't I remember when everything went wrong? Was it after he died? Was I ever really truly happy before he did? I don't think I was. I feel like I've always been searching for something to make me feel whole. Something to make life seem worth living, and all I have been doing is grasping at straws.
When it comes down to it, I think most people are truly ugly inside. I know I am. And maybe sometimes people do wonderful things, but the cynic in me makes me question their motives. Maybe its projection, because when I look inside myself all I see is sadness and blackness... Its like a great void that sucks everything good in and destroys it. I do not allow myself to be happy, and I don't make other people happy. Not really. I keep such a distance between myself and everyone else that its just not possible. I feel alone, and stranded inside my own head. Every fiber of my being is telling me to just shut down, to not feel... and yet I can't stop this constant pressure inside myself. This never ending anguish. It seems as though when things start to feel somewhat normal, when I have built the world around me to be ok, something happens to break it all into a million pieces, and its usually something I have done or caused.
I don't bring good to this world. I hurt everyone I care about. If I really cared I would just take myself out of the equation. World-Augusta=a better place. I really do believe that, with all that I am. I am a parasite to this world. Something is broken inside of me and I don't have the means to fix it. I keep trying and failing, trying and failing, standing and falling...
I can't help but wonder what is beyond this life. What would happen if I just ended it all? I feel like I have just been waiting... waiting and waiting... running and running, like a hampter on a wheel, just going in circles, biding my time. Waiting to find out, waiting to get out. And yet I never bring myself to do it, I never pop the pills or pull the trigger. Why? I'm not really sure. There must be some small sliver of hope inside me that things will eventually right themselves, that something good will come, that one day I'll wake up and I won't have all these fucked up thoughts. What happens when that tiny sliver of hope finally fades out and dies? What happens when that tiny shred of fear of dying leaves me? I'm afraid that day is coming. Theres just so little hope anymore, and so much self-loathing, that eventually my mind will just self destruct.
But for now, for who knows how long... what will I do? Just keep on smiling I guess. Keep pretending that its all good, and maybe someday it will be.
But I doubt it.

My nerves are shot. How much time will have to go by this time around for things to be ok again? How many more mistakes can I make in this life before I completely destroy myself and can't take it anymore? I don't know. I don't know if I will ever be ok. I don't know if I am capable of normalcy. Something is wrong in my head and I just wish I could figure out what it is thats broken.