BETTER THAN NUMB

I realised something today about myself that I do not like. It is about how I think about my brothers. I don't think about my father. I don't care what he thinks, he has no hold over me.

I found out that I do care what my brothers think and I am ashamed of that. I am shocked that I do care. I don't like either of them, certainly have no love for them. My elder brother I think little of, never have liked him. He is self-centred in the extreme, compassionless, nasty, spiteful and cold. His capacity for denial is greater than that of either parent. I do get he had the same parents and his denial and hatred of me is his way of not ever having to face the truth. The exact same applies to my younger brother except that he has on two occasions shown me compassion. The last time, in 1994, he also contacted me and he was very very distressed. He wanted my forgiveness for not having spoken up when I was put away in a nut house, for not telling the truth of what he saw happen to me and to us. Then he went and ruined it. He went and confronted my father on my behalf with an event that not even I thought had happened. Of course good old ME got the blame for that! My brother made it up, told my family, and I got the blame! But of course, as I am Devil's Spawn, they just lapped it up as more evidence I was evil and they could carry on hating me and keeping me as their scapegoat. 

I got over what he did. I might not have, had he not written two letters to me. I kept those letters because I knew I would need them. I was right. I don't mean I need them to show anyone. No. Just for my own benefit so I have proof for myself the whole debacle happened and that for a brief time, he was there with me in the truth.  It didn't last and he went back into denial and soon the 'you're evil' phone calls and years later, e-mails resulted with the same 'you are evil theme'.( My John has of course read the letters and he has met both brothers and is not as kind about them as I am.)

Troublingly, he now travels the world conning people out of huge sums of money for his 'therapy' and 'channelling'. I would like to think he is also conning himself rather than deliberately conning those poor people that he can help them. 

When he was young he got very very involved in a Xtian cult which is where me being demon possessed came from because I was the easy target. I was out gay even then, completely unaware that BOTH my brothers were also gay. They let me take all the shit and rejection whilst they sucked up to our abusive parents and colluded with them against me. Me being gay was the perfect thing for everyone to hang all the family troubles on. I was the cause of it all. It was thus a very short step before they had Biblical backing for me being evil and of the Devil.

So I discovered today that I would hate for them to know I am basically crippled by physical pain and my life is therefore limited by it physically. It would just be proof positive to them of my inherent evil just as my mental health issues-the OCD, anorexia, PTSD etc - were.

However, I have worked very very hard and overcome all the mental health issues, the self worth issues, the fear stuff and the religious clap trap stuff. I would NOT change a thing about my life. I happy within myself generally.

I think it may be just my pride that would not like them see me as I am. My success is not obvious.

My biggest success is that I am happy, I am not like them, I am the ONLY one in my family to have a good and successful relationship. Neither of my brothers have and whilst my parents had a long marriage until my mum died, it can hardly be called successful. My dad was remarried within a year!

It may seem petty to think as I do about this. It just came to me, I am not sure what triggered it. It twisted my gut as the thought of either of them seeing me in my wheelchair or hobbling along with my sticks or in a pained state. I know they would relish it. They will blame me. 

It pisses me off royally that I even think of them! But it's the truth. I don't very often and I can't recall what triggered it-something I heard this morning did.

I guess some things run deep and do find a way of rearing their ugly heads from time to time. Like I have said many times, abuse survivors never completely get rid of the shit BUT we can and do live very very well if we face it and deal with it.

I have done that and I have an excellent life, one I never thought possible. I am incredibly grateful for it, for it is one beyond my imagining. I certainly never dreamt of a life like this. I only ever wanted to be numb. To me that was most I could hope for. I am so glad I discovered I could have so much more. Feeling good is not longer feeling nothing.

It's being alive in every sense.
Appropriate

GIBBON ARMS

Busy day. Both had haircuts, then lunch at Panini's, then shopping at Peterborough Garden Park. I bought the dogs bedding! I have wanted to stop using newspaper for a long while because my lot eat it and scatter it all over the house. However, the vet-bed I previously used would get filthy very quickly, wouldn't wash clean and filled the washing machine with hair. Then today I saw this bedding that is waste, wet, dirt etc proof. From the blurb it was clearly put together by dog people. Just the right 19" x 24" size too. The one drawback was the £26 price tag but I could see and feel how well made they were so I bought 6 of them. 


Well, I am having a really good day physically so when I got in I got rid of the newspaper and gave them their new beds. They were fascinated watching me do it and when I put the new bedding in, each got into their own bed and rubbed around on it. Bought some local farm produce too. 


The one hiccup, which riled me enough to have to count to 10, was a silly woman who called her boss over to tell him to go and ask that 'weird' man to move as he was giving her the creeps!!!!! John was waiting outside the glass wall for me to pay for my shower gell. I said loudly, 'He's waiting for me!' and instead of an apology I just got laughed at by the boss and another woman. NONE of the three looked at or addressed me and the young twat just kept going on about the weirdo staring at her! Of course, he was looking at me but by that time he WAS wondering what was going on. My face is easily read. 


Anyway, apart from that it has been a good day if COLD! And it's not even anywhere near as cold as it will get. Oh, I bought mountaineer gloves to keep my hands warm and still usable. I almost bought a high tech undergarment, long sleeved vest, which would go a long way to helping me stay warm without bulk. Anyway, I need a medium, to hug my body, and like many IDIOTIC designers, the medium was a good 2-3" shorter so was no good for me. Stupid stupid stupid! Smaller chest does not equal less height just as larger chests do not mean Gibbon arms!


Plus, I went into Hobby Craft and I must say that their selection of knitting and crochet books was wonderful. I spent quite a while browsing and convincing myself not buy any. I won. I love to look and read but I never knit anything from them.

OH GOD!!!

I had been wondering what to call this post and I found myself  muttering 'oh God'  and I guess that is rather appropriate considering what I want to talk about.


Most often I can let this sort of thing go but today I saw a rather twee little postcard on Facebook which was basically saying that each of us needs to be thankful to God for everything that we have.  This sort of twaddle really annoys me. 

What exactly is a child sex slave supposed to be grateful for? What exactly is a person who is being tortured on a daily basis supposed to be grateful for? What were the victims of the Holocaust supposed to be grateful for? What are the starving and brutalised children of Africa supposed to be grateful for?

I am well aware that gratitude for what one has is a big part of being happy. In my recovery it plays a big part. However that is far from saying that as a child I ought to have been grateful! There was no God who intervened and saved me! Would you tell a parent who had just watched their child die in agony from some dreadful disease that they need to be grateful?

The people who say this nonsense do so for their own benefit and they seem to have no idea, and often seem not to care at all, how offensive their words are. Of course if one expresses one's opinion to them it is just confirmation to them that one is angry with God or that there is something wrong with one!  No matter what way one chooses to deal with it it just gives ammunition to the other. And guess what that feels like? Guess what abusers do? Yes you've got it.

I always have and I always will support any persons right to believe any damn thing that they want to believe. If it makes them live a better life, and by that I mean a happier life and a life in which they treat others well, then I will keep my mouth shut. However when they start spouting their beliefs as fact when those beliefs are harmful to others I will not keep my mouth shut.

One would think that it is only those who have not suffered greatly that would say such a thing. Unfortunately, this is not so. Abusers say such things for obvious reasons. However abuse survivors  also say such things when they are stuck in denial. 

I think this is the major problem with a belief in a supreme being that cares for us individually. In order to believe it we have to believe that somehow or other the terrible wicked and evil things that happen to people, most especially to children, are somehow just all part of some plan that we cannot possibly understand. This is denial run riot and makes one appear stupid at best and downright wicked at worst.

Let's leave alone the terrible evil that people deliver upon other people. What about those poor people that are born with terrible diseases and disfigurements.  Of those who live very short pain filled lives. And don't you dare tell me that it is so they can learn!

As an individual I have learned a great deal from my early life experiences but I know many many others who did not because they did not survive or they have become bitter and twisted people who treat other people badly.  I do not take credit at all for the way I have turned out. Everything I have done and everything I still do is to avoid pain and there is nothing heroic in that. It is just common sense. I therefore have never hated. Although I am not sure that that was a choice. I have never really wanted to hurt another or to have another suffer. It just never made any sense to me. It never crossed my mind that the suffering of somebody else would ease mine. Perhaps if I had seen that as possible I may well have hated.  The fact that I make the best of my life today does not make me a saint nor especially brave nor especially intelligent or especially anything. It is just common sense.

The one really big reason that I am able to enjoy my life today regardless of my disease and the 24 7 pain is because my present state is so much more preferable to my previous mental emotional and spiritual agony.  my physical difficulties are very much easier to deal with.  I can assure you that when I was in so much agonising turmoil I was not happy nor grateful.

I consider myself very fortunate. I have absolutely no idea why I am in the position I am in today. I do not believe that I was chosen to be in the position I am today so that I could lead others toward the light!!!  How crass!

I CHOOSE  to share my thoughts and feelings about my life. When I first started to do so I did it purely for my own sake. I had no idea of the effect it was going to have upon other survivors. In fact I didn't even consider what might happen if my words were read. Now of course I do know and I would be a liar if I did not say that this colours in some way what I do write.  I am not sure how it does although I am conscious of the fact that on days when I do feel down and fed up I tend to avoid writing about it because it makes me feel ashamed. This is partly because I was not allowed to express my emotions and also because of other people's expectations of me even today.  It is also of course my own expectations of me. I feel so profoundly grateful to not be the person I used to be that even I feel it is wrong of me to have days when I feel like quitting!

I do not know how to make any clearer than with these words: if I knew that I was going to return to the Colin I used to be, I would shoot myself or find some other way of ending my life. I would never ever ever want to be that person again. And I most certainly would not want to be a child ever again. Absolutely no way would I ever be that vulnerable again.

I do of course choose to concentrate on my good fortune. My incredibly loving and patient husband, my dogs, my friends and my talents. This does not mean I do not have bad days. Only a fool would expect to not have bad days.  There are days when I feel the terror of being a child come washing over me. There are mornings I awake and the first thing I feel is fear and I have to tell myself  that I am not at the family home any more and that there is no school today!  There is nothing I can do about this.  PTSD is like that.  One can be perfectly fine one-minute and the next not be.

I often think that those who are not close to survivors and are not survivors themselves have absolutely no idea at all how it affects us.  My ability to form relationships was severely retarded so I grew up basically without friends. I found myself in situations which only heaped more pain upon myself and unfortunately I also caused pain to others because I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. When one is totally shut off from one's feelings one has no idea of boundaries. I understand why people reacted to me the way that they did and why new friendships turned into new rejections. I have been lucky and that I do have 2 very long term friends, John and my dear friend Judy whom I have known since 1979 and now also a few others who came into my life during my healing process. Just because I can see how all those others went by the wayside does not mean it did not hurt and does still  hurt at times. I also very much regret that I cannot explain to these people why I was the way that I was and also make amends to those that I hurt because of it.


Anyway, I am fairly certain that many survivors reading this will not need me to explain why I find it offensive when told that even someone living in absolute terror and suffering have reason to be grateful to the Big Sky Daddy!

TUCKING IN

Puppies 21 11 2011

MG'S PUPPIES 2.mov

MG's Puppies

MARY-GRACE IS NO LONGER A MAIDEN

Mary-Grace gave birth to her 1st letter yesterday.  As I had predicted all the way through her pregnancy.  Are due date was Saturday the 19th.

She has given birth to 5 boys and one girl.  one boy and one girl were 7 ounces and the rest were 8 ounces each.  This is a  VERY  good litter weight of puppies wise.

The 1st part of labour was not very long in that it became obvious early Tuesday evening that she was going to go into labour.  I was up all night with her Tuesday night and she grew increasingly restless and she finally had her 1st puppy at 10:40 AM Wednesday.

Poor Mary-Grace.  The 1st 3 puppies were all proper breach and I had to manoeuvre each one of them out of her and she screamed her head off.  However, the following 3 just plopped out.

She has settled down very well with them.  They have already grown and are doing really well.  I initially thought that they were all  brindle and white with one almost solid brindle.  However I now know that one of the boys is a gold and white and to all the other boys are indeterminate colour wise right now.  I do not care but it will be interesting to see what they turn out to be.

I have never bred a litter in this manner before.  I was showing Mary-Grace and I had absolutely no intention of having a litter of puppies this year.  The last time that I showed her I was in the class and I heard this voice as loud as anything with inside my head which said you should read this girl now.  I ignored it until I got into the car on the way home and the feeling was really insistent that I ought to breed her.  The next question in my mind: well who on earth would I breathe her to?  Immediately a dog's name came into my head.  He is an obscure dog because he is not shown but I have seen him and been over him and know that he is a top-notch Lhasa Apso.  I remembered the telephone of the woman as I was driving home and so I called her.  We arranged a mating the following day and that was the only mating that she had.

I have said all along that I need a top notch male out of this later.  Now I have five to choose from!

I am of course completely exhausted as I have more or less lost 2 nights sleep.  I have had 2 naps so far today and I am sure that I will be sleeping well tonight.

I WRITE BECAUSE I CAN

Last night John and I went to see Janis Ian in concert in Birmingham. I have had tickets to her concert before but I was unable to attend the previous time so I was very pleased to get them this time. I was also very pleased that because of my being a wheelchair user I got both tickets at half price, a pre-booked parking space right outside Birmingham Town Hall which is where the concert was held, and a wheelchair space in the concert hall itself.

The concert itself was excellent. Janis Ian is very lucky that at just over 60, she still has her voice. I was very surprised at how she hit the high notes. The whole concert was just her and a guitar. No backing tape, no backing singers, no backing musicians. Astonishing.

Of course if you know Janis Ian's lyrics you will know that her songs can hit you right in the gut. Last night was no exception. However, the bit that really got to me was her talking about her mother. She clearly had a good relationship with her mother. She spoke about her mother being her place of safety when she was a child. About being held in her mother's arms and feeling safe.

I have never had this in my life. It is not true that one does not miss what one has never had. This feeling of safety is something I have hankered after all of my life. To feel as though I am home and safe.

To me my home is John. I also know that in reality there is no such place as security and safety. None of us are safe nor are we secure. We can have some measure of both. As an adult I am fully aware of this. So I wonder if this feeling that I have which I find very difficult to put a finger on is to do with the fact that I never had that place of safety when I was a child. There was nowhere for me to turn where I would feel protected and safe because those who were supposed to make me feel like that were the ones who instead frightened me and left me feeling completely insecure. I wonder if that is what makes me feel so keenly now?

I vividly remember the scene from the science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey in which one of the astronauts has his cord cut and he goes floating off into space. I was a young teen when I saw this film and that scene chilled me to the bone. I knew exactly how he felt. I have felt like that all of my life.

In 1979 I was in love with a man who did not love me. He was with me because I was young and available and accessible because of how screwed up I was. Even today, although I know precisely how one-sided that relationship was, it is one I have never forgotten. It was the 2nd time I had been in love. The trouble is, I had all the baggage of having been unloved as a child and being frightened and convinced that I was evil and not worth anything. He did not know this and all he could see was that his bit on the side was much more involved than he wanted to be. Anyway, the reason this relationship comes to mind is that a scene from our relationship seems very raw and apropos to this feeling of safety. The scene happened after our relationship was over. I had met him somewhere or other, by accident or design I cannot remember, but he clearly had nothing better to do that night and I went home with him. Afterwards, I lay with my head on his chest and I could not stop the flood of tears that came. I made no sound. At the time, I felt so totally alone and scared. Like the astronaut. I also knew I would not find any comfort where I was. It was truly one of the most devastating episodes of my life. In hindsight, I can see why, but of course then I did not know myself at all back then. Even as I write this, from my position of financial security, a 30 year relationship, and a profound understanding of myself and my history, I still feel the pain of the lost boy that I was.

As I write this, I don't really know where it is leading. I only know that I need to write and I am doing so because I can. The title of this post is a twist on the title of something else and I will not let on what that is just to see who might understand the reference.

I have been feeling something that I am finding very difficult to put into words. I felt it keenly last night at the Janis Ian concert. It has to do with time passing. With how much time has passed. And the full and certain knowledge that for me and for John time will stop (just as it will for you who are reading this ).

I think part of it is that I am aware of myself today and how I feel. I am fully aware of that which I lost, all of that which I never had and the effect that it has had on me. I am aware that so, so many years of my life were spent in darkness. I confess that now that my life is lived in the light, that I know how lucky I am in comparison to others, when I see the suffering around me, I find I am almost ashamed to admit that I do look back with a huge, huge sorrow.

I am enjoying experiences that I really ought to have had when I was young. I am now catching up on music which was produced during my time in the dark. It is not just new voices I am listening to but the voices of those current at various parts of my life which I was unable to appreciate because I was so dis-associated from myself and my feelings. I don't know if this even make sense. It is just my clumsy attempt at putting into words what I am feeling.

I realised last night just how frightened I am with regard to John's health and the fear that I have that it will claim him. Besides the fact that I could not bear to see him suffer in any way, he is also all that I have. I cannot imagine my world without him. That is a lie. I can imagine only too well. Hence my fear. I have made an appointment for him to have a review with is Dr. I will be speaking to her beforehand because John will minimise and with COPD, that is not wise.

I am not as honest in my sharing as people appear to think that I am because I very often refrain from writing the way I am right now. This is me though. Yes I am generally a happy and positive person but I'm not an idiot with my head in the clouds! I am not whistling in the dark to keep my spirits up. I am fully aware how temporary all this is

And when I feel this deep sadness, this terror, I can almost understand why people cling to very black-and-white views of the world and of life and death. I can understand why they choose such rigid Gods to obey and why they pour hatred and scorn upon those who deny their idea because it makes them feel less certain. It is why they cling together and have as little as possible to do with those who do not think as they do. In order to keep their idea intact they must have as little as possible to do with others who hold to different ideas. It is why relationships between the faiths are frowned upon. And while those of no faith at all so despised.

So recently I have not been watching as much DVDs. I have spent much of my time just knitting and listening to music.

It always amazes me how easily I can be made to feel deep shame when I am caught off guard or am distracted and tired. Last night on the way back from the concert we stopped for coffee at one of the motorway service stations. There was a man and woman seated at a table near me and the woman had the most beautiful wine coloured lacey long dress on complemented by wine coloured high heels and black lace stockings. As I left I told her that I thought her dress was beautiful and she reacted with the equivalent of a slap in my face! Both she and her husband turned away from me and she muttered something and it felt very much like she thought for some madman was pestering her. Or that I had just said: love your tits or something equally vile. I really was shocked and it made me feel sick to my stomach as I walked away. How very odd. I have strangers make comments about my attire, especially my boots, all of the time and it never occurs to me to react with anything but a polite thank you and I always feel and in a surprise that people would have the nerve to be kind like that to someone they don't even know. So I was very taken aback with last night's response from that woman.

Sometime this week Mary-Grace will have her puppies. I am really looking forward to this. As if I really need to write that! Despite having had many litters since I was 12 years old I still get excited every time.

I don't know about anybody else, I cannot be the only one, but when I feel just how much I love John, it frightens me.

WILLY THE SHAKE

AND SO TO BED

I may do a video today as well.

I am still in the process of getting my music and hi-fi equipment sorted out. If you have been reading here you will know that I bought some top of the range hi-fi equipment by a British company called ARCAM.

This has necessitated me recall being all of my CDs onto an external SATA drive via my Mac Book Pro. The reason for this is that getting up and down in order to change the CD gets tired very quickly and this is the main reason why I have not listened to music to the extent that I used to.

I use a clear wave dongle attached to the MacBook Pro which streams the music perfectly to the ARCAM rDAC which is classed into the ARCAM AV amplifier.

If you are like John you are already bored! All you really need to know is that the sound quality is excellent and that I am once again really enjoy my music.

I am constantly amazed at the changes within me since the seismic shift that took place at the end of 2007. I almost feel that that is when I became alive for real. Sometimes it can make me feel bitter that so much of my life was wasted. I try not to let that overwhelm me. Today I am so happy and content with myself and I therefore cannot really regret the past but I do sometimes feel that to not wake up until one is 48 years old to then find oneself with a fairly decrepit body and realising that one now could enjoy everything that I did not when I was young, if only I were young! I'm not sure if I've written that correctly but I think you probably get the gist of what I'm saying.

Most surprisingly for me I have got into male singers recently. I have never enjoyed male singers. The 1st but I got into a couple of years back is James Blunt but have since added Mumford & Sons, Noah And The Whale, and now Leonard Cohen!

I really thought that men in general did not do emotion and certainly did not sing about it. I could not have been more wrong. I know that part of this is the fact that all of my friends are female and most of my interactions have been with females. Certainly the women that I have known have a rather poor opinion of men and their ability to feel or express themselves. With my experience with John I know that this is not true. I do know however that there is a marked difference between the way that men and women deal with their stuff. Once I understood that John was just different from me in the way that he handled things, I stopped trying to fix him or thinking that there was something wrong with him, or that he was all repressed! It behoves us all to not stereotype and to not think that there is something wrong with another just because they deal with life in a different way.

Mary-Grace is due to have her puppies on the 19th although I will not be at all surprised if they come on the Wednesday before. I have yet to have a litter of Lhasa Apso go full-term. She was only mated the once.

On Sunday evening John and I are going to Birmingham town Hall to see Janis Ian in concert. I am really looking forward to this. I have previously seen Dar Williams, Nanci Griffith, Tangerine Dream, Donna Summer, the LSO. I think that it is about it.

Pain wise it has been difficult recently. Yesterday and so far today, not bad at all but so so tired! In fact, I am going to nap shortly and I have not done that for quite some time.

Swimming is going well again. Although I took some steps to improve matters, I think that nothing I did changed it. I think whatever disc in my neck impinges on the nerves, just stopped. The last time it was bad, really bad, was in '03. It has been on and off ever since but this last period was the worst it has been for a while. Now I am back to just the normal pain!

I may write some more later, or video, but for now I need to go to bed.

TOPSY TURVY

I knitted these simultaneously, using Chiao Goo 2mm/60cm circulars. I used my own Andersson Sock Construction Method and utilised my own Andersson heel Mark II.

I dyed the yarn by machine knitting up 2 x 50 gram balls of 75% sw merino 25% nylon, knitted in one piece. I then dyed. The result wasn't as I intended but I love the colourway. I shall be having another op at this form of dyeing.

Texas Judge Beats Disabled Daughter (Wife and Daughter Speak out)

This is unfortunately very common. The denial shown by ALL of them involved is extremely distressing.

NEW AGE TWADDLE.mov