My Blog

Transitions. The most difficult one for most people is surviving junior high school. The kids are mean and judgmental. Your body becomes hormonal and changes beyond recognition. You are emotional and trying to navigate a new relationship with your parents. You have to cope with going from class to class and it is confusing. There is a lot of pressure to be popular. Junior high was a nightmare and it seemed to last forever.

The truth is it was just a few short years and a lot of growth occurred. At the end of that tunnel, out came an adult who was much more independent and was capable of driving, dating and going to high school. The discomfort was temporary.

Now, as I am undergoing great relationship discomfort, I have to remind myself that it won’t be as bad as high school. At the end of this tunnel, I will come out wiser, and more emotionally rich. I will be in a happier place as a result of the change I am now undertaking. I will be ready for a new great chapter of my life.

This too shall pass.

 

Just like being born or dying, any great change in life is done alone. Great change happens like the skinny center of the hour glass where one individual grain slides through at a time. That is the scary part of great change. It takes a tremendous amount of faith to fall through alone into the space you cannot see from above.

You can swirl around and around above with your friends, support systems and self help but nothing happens until you let go and slide down. Alone.

Yikes!

The idea of a pill that makes you happy is very appealing. If fact, I want one that will roll back time and make my relationship work again. I also want to love my job and be able to cope with my parents many age related problems without having an anxiety attack when the phone shows their caller id. Hey life, is that too much to ask?

OK medical community, what do you have for me? I have tried yoga. It works. I take SamE. It helps. I do talk therapy and hike and take time to smell the roses. At the end of the day I want to feel more joy. I don’t want to miss this life.

Enter real life: what I have is lots of really heavy stuff to deal with every day. I would like something to help take the edge off. Maybe I can feel good and say yes I have challenges but they are totally manageable. I need a pill for situational depression and anxiety. My doctor prescribed Lexipro. I was very excited and had it filled immediately. She warned me that it may or may not work for me and put me on a low dose to start.

My 1st sign of trouble was that I found myself sitting at a stop sign thinking it would turn green. Yikes. Then I tacked up my horse without the girth. Certainly can’t stay on like that! Also, I felt very very manic and did not sleep well. After only three days I felt too strange and discarded the prescription. Its not for me.

Back to the drawing board. I will my doctor for other suggestions. You can’t be too happy.

 

Divorce is all about pain. There is no doubt about it. But can you focus on the other side? What does the after picture look like to you?

In the Western world we are so afraid of pain and discomfort. In China, a life well lived is considered to have had 10,000 happinesses and 10,000 sadnesses. Yin and Yang. In Asia it is an expectation that you will feel pain. It is a part of living.

I have a wonderful yoga instructor at my local YMCA. She really is a guru and her classes are as packed. It is just like you would imagine classes would be in India. Six inches from your neighbor is the requirement for matt placement so we can all fit in. The room gets very steamy and we do head stands and back bends and half the people are middle aged like me. She pushes people to think and change. We all get so much out of her classes. The result is like a happy pill. Peace and present mind. Her most recent class was about creation.  As we move through our Asana she chants for us “You are the creator and the creation, if you feel pain, modify. You are your own creator”.  Ok, I was upside down at the time but it struck me as so simple. If it hurts, change it. No fear, no expectations. Breath in breath out move on.

I just love yoga.

Loneliness is the emotion that I went to my therapist for seeking help. Mind you, I have been in a 20 year marriage and my husband has been working from home for the past 8 years. I am lonely but rarely alone.

According to Wikipedia, “What makes a person lonely is the fact that they want more social interaction than what is currently available.” While my husband is very social he is not and has never been emotionally available. In other words he wants our relationship to operate on a superficial level. Pass the peas.

Many times when he is out of town I experience blissful periods of solitude. For a few days I do exactly what I want and find that I accomplish quiet a lot. I am rarely lonely. I make a point of seeing my friends. It is an event. “Steve is out of town. Lets get together for a girl’s night”.

Then what is it? I feel alone with his companionship and solitude when I am with out him. When I really contemplate life alone it is frightening. But am I not alone now?

Emotional isolation is just as torturous as physical isolation. The health ramifications of physical isolation run the gamut. High blood pressure, cancer, stroke, cardiovascular disease and depression. What about emotional isolation?

For now, I am focusing on solitude and my wonderful network of friends. You are only as lonely as you feel.

 

 

In my opinion, there is nothing more powerful that sunshine to chase the blues away. This morning I woke up too early feeling cranky and stressed out. I was having one of those moments where you want to chuck it all and GO BACK TO BED.

Mind you I am one of the most optimistic never depressed persons in the world. I am a happy girl. But start layering on relationship problems, financial problems and health problems with my elderly parents and it begins to be a heavy load. The truth is many people in midlife are facing this level of stress and MORE. We are sandwiched between sending kids to school, helping elderly parents, navigating a financially troubling time for the middle class and facing aging. Aging! count me out! Sometimes, like this morning it seems intolerable.

But one of the simplest and most beautiful things happened. It was a gorgeous day. I went outside. I felt the earth under my feet. I played with my pets. When it was over, I felt complete. Sunshine, they should bottle it.

I love Oprah Winfrey’s quote  “Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.”

Today, I spent time with friends basking in the sun and enjoying good times. This year I will not create resolutions that restrict me and cause me stress. I resolve to take things lightly and live in the present.

I will be open to opportunity and say yes more. I do have time. I don’t know why I ever say no.

I will have confidence in myself and the faith that things will work out.

I will speak the truth with kindness and compassion.

I will be open for abundance in love, money, friendship and happiness.

Every day I will wake up realize that every day is another opportunity to get it right.

It will be a beautiful 2012

Happy New Year.

 

After having low blood pressure all my life, I now have prehypertention. Frankly, I find it hard to comprehend. I have used my home testing blood pressure machine over and over staring at it with disbelieve. How did this happen? I am very active. I go to the yoga several times a week. I never eat junk food. My diet is excellent. I have no family history.

I have lots and lots of STRESS. Most of it I brought on myself. I carry the heavy financial load in my marriage. For some reason, I feel compelled to fix everything instead of just allowing things to be broken. If I just allowed stuff to be broken, then maybe he would fix things too.

Doing less seems easy. I have become a master of walking past a pile of laundry or dishes. When it comes to walking past a financial mess I get a bit squeamish. I guess it brings out a lot of security issues. That is OK. There is work to be done here.

The author Louis Hay claims that illness can be traced back to specific emotional issues. In the case of high blood pressure Hay claims that it is as a result of a long-standing unsolved emotional problem. Makes sense to me! She also gives a mantra to repeat in order to cure the thought pattern. In my case it is “I joyously release the past. I am at peace”.

I like it!

I live in a community property no fault state. When you go to divorce court they just slice everything down the middle. Ouch!

How am I going to make that work? My therapist is always trying to get me to visualize the life after husband scenario and the economics are a little bit of a stumbling block. I have worked hard to have some comforts. The reality is that some of these comforts will likely evaporate in the not so happily ever after that follows the happily ever after.

What do I do now? Lots of brainstorming for starters. I am thinking creatively about where I might like to live and what of my current life I can do without. I’m also looking at fun ways to supplement my income.

I’m also trying to find a win/win in my negotiations with my husband. If we can agree on how to divide our assets and not go to court we can save on attorney fees. I was quoted $10,000 to $15,000 for the messy divorce in attorney fees. Multiply that by two. The amicable divorce price tag is roughly $500 to have the paperwork filed by a legal service.

Amazing. Nice guys don’t always finish last.