A Few of Those "Aha!" Moments

God bless best friends!

I spent an hour on the phone with one of mine this evening and it really gave me the words of wisdom that I always need to hear.

My man gave me a good slap across the face earlier with regards to my perceived hopelessness. Thank you baby, I needed that.

Yet, it left me lacking in the realm of knowing what exactly needed to be done about it....


A few text messages with my friend helped me to recognize that I have had this lurking concern with regards to my relationship that was somehow becoming a concern today. I don't know why... I blame hormones. They are a hellova drug.

Thankfully, I have an incredible level of communication with O. I bit the bullet and asked him about it.

Thankfully, I have an incredible best friend. I was able to decompress with her about his answer.


I have this thing. This problem. Where I see someone light a match and I instantly run out of the place screaming "FIRE!! FIIIIIRRRRRRE!!" Point being that my concern is not a pressing issue.


The reality is that my relationship meets all of my needs at the present and that scares the living shit out of me. This ties into another problem that I have.... I am uncomfortable with calm.

I know this sounds crazy. Just bear in mind that I have been diagnosable for roughly half my life. The truth is that I grew up in such a way that I am conditioned to be comfortable in chaos. I get unnerved by peacefully happy calm periods in life. I don't like them. They make me listless and anxious. This tends to make me look for problems where they don't exist.

This lead me to finding an issue that could pose a potential problem in getting my future needs met. That's right, folks. I am so happy that it made me uncomfortable enough to start thinking about ways that I might not be happy in 15 fucking years. Like I said, I have been diagnosable for roughly half my life.

Oy vey...

That was my first "Aha!" moment of the day.


I recently had my second....


I have another problem. I am the world's best procrastinator. I know that plenty of you would like to challenge me on this; but, I will never get around to figuring out how to measure this, so just accept that I am better at it. Simultaneously, I am also a bit of an extremist and an impulsive train wreck.

I am really wondering how my boyfriend tolerates any of this... Someone give him a medal for me, k?

Almost a year ago, I came up with this concept for a book. It was a bit extreme and raw and not at all realistic. Especially for a single mom going into her senior year of undergraduate and trying to apply for graduate programs whilst being involved in a custody dispute... Phew! Just saying all of that was exhausting!

Point being that my procrastination won out and my impulsively brilliant idea was abandoned. *sigh*

Suddenly, I realized the following:

• I have two weeks until I start my master's program
• Even once I start my master's program, I only have classes two nights a week at the most
• My daughter is in pre-school all day Monday-Friday and spends half of the weekends with her father
• I don't have a job and I don't really want or need a full-time job
• I have taken out student loans to cover my living expenses while I am finishing up my degree
• Once I have finished the first year and a half of my program, I will be forced to start working more heavily to earn my practicum hours
• I will then be entering my career and pushing ahead full force with that

LIGHT BULB MOMENT HERE!!!

I will spend the next year and a half working on and researching my book!!


It is so genius! I almost can't believe that I came up with it. I have the time. I have the ability. I have the material. I have wanted to do it for years!

It makes so much sense to me! This is why I have been so freaking bored and ho hum these last few weeks. I have really been beating myself up for not being self motivated or a good self starter about shit like house work so that I can get started on reading all of these books that I have gathered for research.

Fuck the god damned house work. I am not built for that shit anyways.... Seriously, I detest housework. I can do it... I just get little to no pleasure out of it. Don't get me wrong... I love a clean and organized environment.... I am just a lazy procrastinator who would rather be cranking out a 10 page paper than putting laundry away or vacuuming.

A friend of mine has told me about starting his book. I remember feeling this seething flash of jealousy and longing. Just this wish to be doing the same.


Well... fuck it. I will....


I love to write. I have a passion and a cause. I have doors that I need to open and doors that I need to close. I have a lot to do and a lot to say.

My primary told me something that I will never forget "I don't know if you are cut out to be a therapist. A therapist has to be a good listener. You're a talker. And, honey, you have a lot to say that I think a lot of people need to hear!"


I think I can be damned good therapist; but, I agree with the latter portion of that. Time to bite the god damned bullet and take this whole writing thing seriously.

Carpe diem, right?

Or are the kids these days saying YOLO, or something stupid like that?

Blech.....

So, I just re-read my blog post from yesterday and I can't seem to find the same oomph today. I feel like a pile of mush. As though I am sitting and waiting for something to happen.

I recognize that this is bullshit.

I also recognize that out of everyone in the world.... I have the least amount of need for something to happen.

The reality is that I have plenty of things to do and get involved in. I would just rather sit on the couch eating a variety of homemade snacks while I watch CNN, Food Network, Comedy Central and the Cooking Channel. I through in a pleasure induced nap just to give things some pizazzzz.

Yet, I end up spending this time angry at myself for not doing all of things that I would like to do or need to do. I am seemingly incapable of enjoying being lazy or productive at this time.

This has been going on since graduation. I have been a couch potato unless I have had to be somewhere to see someone or actually had some other time sensitive task. It is pitiful.

I need to riddle this out. I don't see my therapist until tomorrow morning so it is up to me to brain ninja myself into productivity.... because I just can't stand it when I am such a schlub.

side note: blame the crappy Yiddish on my mother's side ;)


My father likes to blame my health. Truth be told, I have the immune system of a preemie. I also have a toddler in daycare. I feel sick and rundown on a daily basis. I have had elevated Epstein-barr levels since high school. I also drink way too much caffeine and red wine. Not to mention that my toddler wakes me up in the middle of the night with: night terrors, potty needs, kicking, and/or falling into the crack between the wall and the bed. There is also the sad side-effect of having given birth to this toddler and my bladder not finding a way to recover its prior endurance over the last 3 years. The end result is that I can probably be diagnosed with chronic fatigue at the tender age of nearly 25.

Yet, I can muster myself up to do any of the following activities:

• go out to dinner with family/friends/boyfriend
• stay up late having sex and then more sex
• go on cleaning sprees for about 4 hours
• get research papers and other assignments 
• and apparently to go get my starbucks from my boyfriend who just called to cheer me up and ended up telling me that I was having a "first world problem if I ever heard one.... you're bummed out because you're bored and lazy"

grrrrrrrrrr...... I love him but I also want to choke him with his ATC headset right now....fck

I will finish this later.... while I watch him do his long distance brotherly bonding via some weird video game circa 1980 something.

Reality Check!

It has been a crazy month. I mean crazy. I will give a listed synopsis of the events :)

• Finals
• Graduation
• Bumped Master's enrollment to Summer 
• Sister's Graduation (involved a trip up north)
• 6 month-aversary with my fucktastical boyfriend
• My BFF is getting married
• My sister and my BFF are moving back in with us
• My sister is feuding with my father and I

There are plenty of stories and realizations that I have wanted to share. Yet, the reality has been that I have been far too wrapped up in actually living all of these moments. I have been immersed in my own life and there has not been much of a need to pick it apart. Life is relatively good.

Just as I was beginning to digest this reality. This peacefully stressful and quasi-normal reality that has become my life... It was checked.

It is not that something bad happened. There was no travesty necessary to make me realize that my fight is far from over. Not at all. It was quite the opposite.


I am a recovered bulimic. That does not make me special or unique. There are millions of women who can say the same thing. Or at least say that they have suffered from bulimia. Sadly, I don't know the current statistics for recovery. The point is that my recovery is not an isolated incident.

I have spent the last decade or so in the eating disorder community. I have been to therapists, nutritionists, treatment centers, groups, and conferences. I mentor. I speak to others who have suffered. I am a psychology major. I am surrounded by people who are aware of the serious nature of eating disorders. Who recognize them as being life threatening and chronic diseases. People who think like me and view these disorders from a perspective that warrants respect and caution.

Unfortunately, most people don't share that same viewpoint.

Most people do not recognize that eating disorders can be fatal. Most people don't realize that eating disorders are not a diet. Most people do not recognize that disturbances in eating behaviors is simply an expression of the underlying mental problems.

Most people joke about eating disorders as being the plague of models and actresses.

They don't seem to realize that there are 11 year old girls (and boys) out there who are terrified to eat their lunches.


This realization is what I needed. I had forgotten how important education was to me. How many people need to be more aware of what the statistics are. About how many women are dying. About how many children are starving themselves because they have been scarred in ways that most cannot fathom.


Simultaneously, I have been recognizing that I am officially making the transition to the other side of the therapy session. Pretty soon, I will be the one trying to provide a comforting ear. I will be the one with people's lives and minds in my hands. I need to do more than get good grades... I need to dive head first into the literature and the knowledge and immerse myself in that which will make me a great therapist.


I need to get my activist on again.

I have been far too passive the past few months...

Time to bring back the fierce ;)

Have You Ever Wondered "Why" ?

It seems like a rhetorical question; but it really isn't. Sadly, we live in a world where far too many people have the cahones to ask the hardest of the W questions: WHY?!?!

To understand why something is happening requires more than just the facts. It requires the intelligent interpretation of those facts. Before you even get to that point, though, you must recognize that there is even a question to be asked rather than to simply accept things as they are.

The who, what, when, and where are all given to us. Those are factual observations that require a minimal amount of digging. For example:

• A man walks briskly through the park.
• Who: a man
• What: is walking
• When: right now
• Where: the park

This is, obviously, a ridiculous example. At least until we get to the important question: Why?? The thing is that I have not given you nearly enough information to answer that question. I haven't even given you cause to ask it in the first place. Yet, there must be a reason that the man is walking briskly through the park. You just have to ask. Then, you will start to pay attention to the little things that may give you the answer.

I have little interest in this hypothetical man. However, I do have interest in the situations that prompt, or fail to prompt, individuals to ask themselves "why". I am beginning to think that the latter is more common than the former. There are so many things that go on in our daily lives. So many different situations. So many people. So many responsibilities. So many stimuli. How can we possibly look at all of them through a critical lens?

We can't.

However, it is important that we do so more than we don't.

I am the best at asking "why" when it comes to people. Particularly when it comes to myself and my loved ones. I am constantly scrutinizes and searching for the reasons. For the clues that will answer the question. Shockingly, it tends to be easier to do with others than with myself.

Yet, my observations in others will inevitably lead me through a cognitive loop that ends at introspection.

If you are going to question others, then you must also have the courage to question yourself.

For once, I do not really feel like sharing the specific situations that have gone on over the course of the last week or so to bring me to this place where I am placing increased significance upon my own motivations. However, I will say that it is all good. That my reasons for keeping them private are not sinister, just precious. Everyone has things that they like to keep as little treasures in their hearts.

Moments where you recognize that you are doing things that are no longer applicable to your life. Moments where you recognize that you no longer need the things that you once did. Moments where you acknowledge that the analysis of others is not nearly of as tantamount importance as the analysis of your self.

You see. When you have a situation in your life that causes you to react strongly or defensively, then you must gather your facts. You must look at the who, what, when and where. If the facts don't necessarily add up to your reaction, then you must search for the why. You have to look at the little clues and the details. You may have to think of similar situations from your past or times when you have had the same reaction in different circumstances. If the facts don't add up, then you have to do some serious digging.

Odds are that you will dig up some things that don't really have a place in the current situation. Your reaction was probably warranted in other situations. Meaning that you had learned to act that way. That you were not intending to act inappropriately out of spite or naivete.

Maybe this will help you to come to peace with things that are in your past. Maybe this will make you realize that you are not at peace with the things that are in your present. Hopefully, it will help you to be more present in the future.


Just a thought.