We stood at the turning point

There is this part of How It Works from the AA Big Book that talks about standing at the turning point.  "We asked his protection and care with complete abandon." I often think of this moment as like standing on the edge of a cliff, and you have to decide whether to let go, completely, and step off.  I have found in my years of sobriety that when my faith in my higher power has been tested, and it has been tested, and I am forced to take a so called leap of faith, I find that when I step off the edge, my feet land squarely on the ground.  It has been a long time since my faith in my higher power felt strong, or since I have even felt all that connected to it at all.  It really takes work to keep that connection strong and to really feel the presence of it and to feel the safety of it.  It is very much missing from my life right now because I have let my practice of maintaining that connection slide.  For the most part in my sobriety I have believed that my higher power has my back - that things happen for a reason, even if I can't always understand what the reason might be.  I have believed that no matter what, things would always be ok, even if ok didn't look the way I wanted it to - that things would turn out right - whatever that would be.  And that my higher power always had me on a path to something better.  I think I am experiencing a crisis of faith at the moment.  I don't believe these things the way I once did.  I think they are just things we all tell ourselves to make the unacceptable ok.  What I would like to know, is why the hell have I had to suffer so much in life?  I must have gotten sober for a reason.  I must have changed for a reason.  I must have lived for a reason.  Faith has been described to me in many ways - one of them being blind optimism.  I have been told that you have to live life with blind optimism.  I do think faith is something like this, but I have never been accused of being an optimist.  I am missing my faith right now.  And I am very much at one of those turning points that the Big Book talks about.  The thing is - when you let go, finally, after struggling to hang on, you have to let go completely, or it doesn't work.  My faith in my higher power has always been the most important part of my sobriety.  I am really feeling the absence of it.

The truth is, I have been hesitating to post since getting back those fertility test result.  While this blog is mostly anonymous, there are a few people in my real life who do read this, and that means that sometimes I can't say what I mean or how I feel.  I simply say nothing instead and let it pass.  But I have been basically depressed since Paul left and since the test, so for a couple of weeks now.  It's unusual for this type of feeling to persist for me.  I'm not depressed because he left - I think it is mostly everything else.  I don't want panicked phone calls or emails from anyone really for what I am about to say.  I know that feelings are not facts.  I know they are not reality - that they flow and change and sometimes it's not even worth mentioning because, well, tomorrow you might feel differently.  But I feel pretty certain about this.  I guess when you go through something, like a loss, and I think I've had a lot of those, you always go through a grieving process of some sort.  I think I've been grieving the loss of ever having the things I wanted in life.  My life has "turned out" so to speak.  I know what you are thinking - you are 35 - life hasn't turned out to be anything, not yet.  But it has actually.  You are wrong.  It has turned out not to be lots of things.  It has turned out to be nothing I ever wanted.  I feel like I just have pieces that don't fit together into anything really, and it just makes me really sad.  I don't feel like I have much to live for or much to look forward to.  Don't take that the wrong way, or freak out, I just don't have much going for me really.  I feel like I have tried and tried in life, and I have failed so completely that I don't even know what to try for anymore or where to go from here.  I have nothing left.  I have no hope, I don't even have faith that it will be ok.

I have a lot of fabric.

I know you want to know about those fertility results.  I promise, I'll post what is going on later.

A year goes by

I had my dreaded annual mammogram on Tuesday this week in Chicago.  It went fine.  Everything was fine.  They didn't even call me back for additional films like they usually do.  It was quick and over with before I knew it.  I saw my surgeon afterwards and we had a short chat.  I am in the clear for another year.

It's a funny feeling.  I always think that I react wrong.  I always anticipate a moment of overwhelming relief because there is such a build up of anxiety before the appointment.  It never happens that way though.  I never have that overwhelming moment of relief.  I think to the outside observer my response could be very confusing.

Every year when mammogram time comes around, which is always in July, I retreat inside myself to what I can only describe as a dark place.  I anticipate the worst - because that is simply how I deal with it, and I become very introspective, reflective.  I really think about the state of my life.  What is right, what isn't how I want it to be, what I wish was different.  Are there things I can change?  Should change?  Want to change?

I am always astounded by the amount of regret that I feel when I go through this process every year.  I am so terrified every year that I will find out my time is up, it's over, I had my second chance and I blew it, I wasted it.  I ask myself every year - if I find out tomorrow I am dying, how am I going to feel?  How is it possible that I have so much regret?  I felt that again, this year - really strongly.  How many more chances am I going to get?

A crisis of identity

I am having a major identity crisis right now.  Let me first say that my annual mammogram to check me for breast cancer recurrence is this coming Tuesday - this is perhaps the most stressful time of the year for me.  And coupled with that I have other stresses going on, some of which I can write about, and some of which I can't, through I really wish I could.  I don't know if the identity crisis I am experiencing is the natural result of what I go through every year at mammogram time, or the result of, well, everything else in life.

My roommate has suggested that I give what I am experiencing another name - that it is not an identity crisis at all, but rather should be termed a moment of clarity.  See I feel like I don't know who I am anymore, but to her, who is the outside observer listening to what I say, it is obvious that for the first time in my life, I have figured out who I am.  Thus the moment of clarity, because I know who I am, it's just that who I am and what I want do not line up with my reality.  So call it what you want.  It feels like a crisis to me because I am so lost, but I guess my roommate would probably beg to differ and say that I have actually found myself.  Anyway, I guess what we call it isn't important, what matters is what's happening.

And that would be this - what do you do when you realize you are not who you thought you were.  And not only were you mistaken about who you thought you were, you don't even have the slightest desire to be the person that you once thought you wanted to be.  Honestly, this all started with my childhood - and really - trust me, you probably don't want me to go there.  Let's just say I needed to escape the hell I grew up in and so I designed myself a plan that I thought was right at the time.  And maybe it was right then, but it's not right now.  The plan was get an education and be something that would afford me financial stability and security to free myself from the grips of those horrible people.  And that's exactly what I did.  I decided to be a lawyer.  It was probably for the wrong reasons in the end, but I guess you make the best choices in the moment that you can.

When I choose my career path, it seemed to be what I wanted, and I got sucked into it like a lot of people do.  Working at a big firm and having this so called amazing job and identifying myself as a lawyer.  I was a lawyer, that's who I was.  I once had a therapist tell me that I should stop calling myself a lawyer.  That I should stop making that identification and simply say I work as a lawyer, because he told me, that's not who you are, it's just simply one thing that you happen to do.  So I went on my merry way down my career path, putting off marriage and having a family for this so called amazing career that I thought I wanted and that I thought I could be and would be good at.

And then everything changed.  I stopped working at the big attractive job with all the money and almost unbearable pressure and responsibility.  But I set out on a job search to find, well, something at a company - I refuse to work for a law firm ever again - but yet another high powered, high profile job.  It's been a while that I've been off of work, seeking this kind of opportunity out.  But a funny thing happened about a week and a half ago.  If I had ever paid even the slightest bit of attention to my own personality, I would have realized long ago that a high powered, high profile, high responsibility job is not for me.  I mean I knew it wasn't when I turned down the partnership track - but how did I ever think I could be that person anyway.  I am lacking in everything that is required to be that kind of person at that kind of job.  It simply is not who I am.  Not only that - but awakening - I don't even want to be that person or do that job.  I've only realized this, as I said, really recently, as I have been sewing all day and drowning my problems in yards of Batik fabric.

It's easy to say if only I knew then what I know now, and believe me, I did a lot of that when I had breast cancer.  The if onlys are never ending.  But seriously - what I really wanted out of life was a marriage and a family not a high powered job.  The entire past 10 years that has been my legal career - the whole time I knew it wasn't satisfying.  I knew it would never be the thing that would make me happy.  I knew what I went through never was and never would be worth the money.  I'm not saying that I don't want to be a lawyer anymore - well ok, actually I am saying that.  I don't want to be a lawyer anymore.  The problem is - I am trained to be only that and in a very specific area of law.  So I am fine with going on and being a lawyer, and being a privacy lawyer (which usually you are one of very few at a company), but I want to be just another lawyer at a company, with just a job.  Nothing fancy, nothing overly stressful, nothing flashy.  Since I can't be something else, I'd settle for that.  Something easy.

The sad reality is what I have alluded to in many posts - I have a lot of regret about life, the choices I made, things I have done etc.  The way it all turned out makes me sad.  And yeah, you can say but you are only 35!  But that's bullshit.  It's too late for life to turn out the way I had wanted it to. But it was a choice.  I made a choice - I traded one thing for another and in the end it would turn out to be a mistake.  But you never know that until the end.  You don't really realize where you went wrong unless you are afforded the opportunity, or well, forced to look at it.  Much of my regret came to pass because of the sort of life evaluation that I did when I had breast cancer.  At the time I realizes shit - I've fucked up life royally.  And you know what, I had actually in some ways.  And I wanted a "do over."  And I got it.  I'm still alive.  But I didn't do anything with my second chance.  I didn't change course, I didn't make corrections, I continued down the same damn old path.  Yes I have things that I don't regret, but I think that I will always be sad about how life turned out for me.

I don't mean for this to come out wrong - I hesitate to say it even because I mean this with the utmost respect for any woman who is a mother.  If I could have been married in my twenties and had 4 children and been a stay at home mom, that would have made me happy.  If only I knew then what I know now.  If only I could have a true do over.  If only it wasn't too late.

And the finished product...

I haven't been posting because I have been sewing - obsessively.  Here is what I made for my best friend's mother who is sick right now.  I am shipping it to her tomorrow.

I have lots to say though - so stay tuned...

My latest project

My latest quilt project is for my oldest friend's mom.  She is sick right now and I wanted to do something nice for her.  Here are the pictures so far.

Quilt boot camp with aunt Donna June 2012

I spent the past four days down in Charlotte making quits with Nina and her aunt Donna.  I decided the easiest project would be to make couch size quilts for my two nephews.  I hope my brother and sister in law don't mind!  Anyway, here are the photos of the front and backs of the quits.  They are all pieced together, they just need to be quilted.  I bought my own sewing machine down in Charlotte and that plus the quilts are being shipped - should be here Thursday.  In the mean time I need to find and purchase or order two additional "feet" for my machine.  I can't wait for my stuff to get here!

This is my older nephew's quilt.

This is my younger nephews quilt.

Safe and sound

Well, we made it back to NYC safely from our tour of New England.  We had a great time, but it's good to be home.  I don't really like being gone for so long.  I leave again on Thursday - yeah, I am quite the traveler.  I am going down to Charlotte where my roommate is currently staying with her aunt for a long weekend.  This would be the aunt whose house I went to the past two Thanksgivings, and the aunt who helped me make the quilt that I made last November.

We are going to a quilt show on Friday where we are hopefully going to get me a sewing machine (there will be vendors at the show) and pick a pattern and the fabric for a queen size quilt for my bed.  Then my roommate and her aunt and I are going to quilt like crazy on Saturday and Sunday to get as much done as possible.  Hopefully we will get the whole thing cut and pieced, and the back pinned on, and then if I get my own machine, I can do the quilting myself.

Then I have planned two other projects - couch quilts for my nephews!  Fun!  I am really looking forward to this weekend.

And for the last stop

Our last stop was Newport, Rhode Island.  I have to say, this was my favorite stop for sure (well except for the week we spent in Vermont with my brother's family, that is really the highlight).  I loved the town and walking along the water (known as the Cliff Walk) to see the mansions was really fun.  Looking back on the trip, I think it would have been more relaxing to stay in one place, however, at the same time, it was fun to see many places (and we did after all just take a vacation where we stayed in one place).  Newport is definitely the place I would come back to for sure. In just a little bit we head out for breakfast and then head back to NYC.  We have been gone for two weeks so I am really looking forward to going home.  Here are a few pictures from Newport.

Stop number four

After Kennebunkport we headed down to Provincetown, MA on the cape.  We stopped off at an outlet mall and that ate up a significant portion of our day and we still had a long drive ahead of us.  Shopping was successful though!  Anyway, I wish we would have had more time in Provincetown.  It was a really unique place and seemed like it could have been fun to spend a few days there.  Anyway, we only had one evening there, so we made the most of it.  Here are a few pictures.

For the third stop on our road trip home

We went to Kennebunkport, Maine for  a day.  Our stops were sort of timed so that we wouldn't have to drive more than 4 hours per day.  So we get up in the morning, do the drive, and then we have the rest of the day in whatever town we are in.  Yesterday we went for a nice long walk, had some dinner and bought some small gifts for my nephews.  I had this idea when we started out on the trip home to buy my nephews something small from each place that we stop.  A trinket or a souvenir.  But I have tried to put a lot of thought into it and get them things I think they will really like.  They are just tiny things, but I hope when they get the box they will think it's fun.

Anyway, after we eat breakfast we head down to Provincetown Cape Cod...but on the way, there is a giant outlet mall!  Who knew this could be the highlight of the trip (well not really of course).  It's just, I haven't been outlet shopping in forever, and well, there is a LOFT outlet AND a Coach outlet.  I am in trouble.

Here are a few photos from our stop yesterday.  See you from Provincetown!

And continued again...

We are still in Bar Harbor, Maine, but tomorrow we leave for Kennebunkport.  Today we went whale watching, well, tried to anyway.  Shockingly, we didn't see a single whale (although we did see other animals) - and the guide said they have a 97% success rate when it comes to finding them!  It was a beautiful day to be on the ocean though (a bit cold while we were way out there - it was a 4 hour trip).  While out on the water, we also saw a couple of Maine's lighthouses.  There is a lighthouse tour which sounds interesting, but we won't have time to do that.  Here are a few photos.

On a separate note, I got a call today about some possible job opportunities, so fingers crossed something works out.  There will be more from the road...see you at the next stop!

 

Second stop on our road trip continued...

So after the Bar Harbor beach and walk around downtown, we went to the Acadia National Park.  This park actually takes up much of Mt. Desert Island.  We did the scenic drive loop around the park, stopping off at key points to check out the view.  Here are some photos from the drive.

Second stop on our road trip home

We spent last night in Bethel, Maine and headed out this morning for Mt. Desert Island, Maine which is on the coast - more specifically, Bar Harbor and the Acadia National Park.  On the way we passed this bridge, called the Sunday River Covered Bridge.

We then got to our destination in Bar Harbor and headed for the Bar Harbor beach.  The tide was out so we were able to walk out between the two islands.

We walked around downtown Bar Harbor for a bit and then headed for the Acadia National Park.  I'll post those photos separately in a bit...

First stop on our road trip home

We left Vermont on Wednesday (sad to go), but headed out on our New England road trip home.  The first stop was the White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire - more specifically, the Mt. Washington Cog Railway which we took to the top.  Unfortunately, the weather was terrible Wednesday so we didn't get much of a view.  Here are a few photos anyway.  Today the weather was beautiful however, and fore casted to be such for the rest of our trip.  I hope the weather holds up because it is just gorgeous outside right now.  Anyway, on to yesterday's photos...

The great debate(s)

I have a lot going on in my head - not the least of which my lack of a job situation, which is really stressing me out beyond belief, but I think I am hiding that kind of well.

And my favorite photo of all from the day...

And we can't forget...

The always adorable Maddox!

Hiking in Vermont

Whenever I come to Vermont, I always think I will post more.  And then some how I find myself too busy, or just not in the mood.  Here are a few pictures though from our hiking trip today.  That's my brother and my older nephew Ellis, and Ellis and I by the waterfall.  Write more soon!