Sunday, 31 May 2009

Under the Skin

I've known for a while I've been headed downwards. I just did myself a favour today and surrendered to it, instead of fighting.

Maybe it was the heavy shit in my last post that tipped me over the edge. All of a sudden I got very weepy about not having a dad. I hardly ever get weepy about my dad(s) .... I repulse myself when I do. Watching Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler today ... the scene where he explains to his daughter that he sucked as a father .... seeing her anger soften, and the honesty in his words - "I tried to forget about you, tried to pretend you didn't exist. But you do exist .. you're my girl."

Kind of cut me to the core, in ways it hasn't for ages. I sat there on the couch, blinking back tears ... wishing so badly I had a lonely wayward dad to come back into my life to offer apologies, want to know me. When I feel this way, it's like a tornado of black-holeness. I don't want to be here, anywhere, anymore, and I collapse into myself like a retractable folder. Grief death abandonment addiction suicide abuse depression. It's all too much and I go into overload.

I used to think that I had been through SO much already in my life, that the next half of my life would just be slow and content and quiet, studiously picking up all the pieces. And then my husband gets cancer right before the baby came HAHAHAHAHAHA and stole any remaining safety in life I was clinging on to. Bad shit happens, man. Bad shit. I really really hope the cancer doesn't come back. What REALLY pisses me off is other people's reactions to his remission. They're all like, "How's Dave?" Cocking their heads to one side, reminding me of my auntie at drunken family functions offering me "lemonade." With this pitiful look on their faces - and when I say he's fine, he's in remission .... there is no change in their expresion. And they just nod, offering simpering words like, "Ohhh, good luck." Then skulk off, because I do not handle people who shit me like that, and my eyes accidentally start lasering them to death.

Cancer means different things to different people, some obviously think it's only a matter of time until the cancer comes back - "Hopefully not in his internal organs, tsk tsk." (Cue laser eyes).

I'm sick of Dave's cancer business. But it sent me for the biggest six of my life, adding more fuckedupness to an already fucked up unit.

Lately, Rocco has been screaming and screaming every night again, I can't placate him. Nothing works - bottle, rocking, dummy, soothing. Every night now ... usually a few hours at a time. It makes me want to lose the plot, like Marge did when she got scared of flying and she was running up and down the aisle like a lunatic. Except instead of big blue hair I have long red hair and I just want to run around the house at 3am waking everybody ELSE up screaming "I GIVE UP I GIVE UP I GIVE UP I GIVE UP." My sister has told me a few times to ring the helpline available with a 24-hour midwife on call .... I think I'm so fucked up I will ask for help.

Things MUST be serious.

Where is that pesky gratitude I had? I can't remember where I put it.

It's difficult, this "life" business. Last week I was in Kmart looking to price an electric blanket for Max because winter starts tomorrow .. and I saw the most shifty people, caps pulled down over their hoodies, loading their pockets up with stolen shit.

I did what any self-respecting member of the public would do and felt jealous of the junkies.

I wished I could just say "fuck it" and join them, but, I'd end up in some lady's driveway in Cabramatta dazed and confused thinking "WTF? Didn't I just have a family and a warm safe house somewhere??"

And I would miss out on moments like this.


Thank you so much for your comments about my brother. He read them, and I hope he got a bit puffed up. We all deserve a bit of puff-uppery every now and then.


  1. Hi E.

    I think it's understandable (understatement) that you lose your grip on gratitude and everything else. That you have it at all, even for a second, is a testament to you. It's an incredible load to lift. Even for a super woman like yourself.

    I am sorry about it being hard (another understatement). I am glad you are writing about it. And rather than try to make fix-it statements (you've had enough unhelpful feedback to fill a canyon from my house to yours), if it helps, you know I'm listening. Lots of us are. And if there is anything we can do, please ask. It feels like such an impotent thing to say, because short off magic wands ... you know. But I'll say it anyway.

    I could not be angrier for you at those dolts who manhandle your grief. I would love to have a chat with all of them.

    As for Rocco, I forget ... have you asked his doctor about the night stuff? Could it be reflux? That night-time drama is brutal and that alone is enough to tip anyone over let alone someone whose been through what you have. This must be something a pro ... either another mom or a nurse or a doc ... could help you solve?


  2. You may have already investigated this stuff ... but just in case it helps ...

    (BTW ... I read the book recommended in the Q&A above and it's great. Not saying it is the solution for Rocco. Just brainstorming.),1504,146,00.html,1510,3975,00.html,1511,1001,00.html,1510,3972,00.html,1510,3973,00.html

  3. Hang in there girl! I know that things seem like they're all falling apart but if you can weather the storm for now it will get better! Somedays life sucks. Someday's it's fan-fucking-tastic. On the days it sucks just remember how many there are here rooting for you and holding up until the fantastic starts again.

  4. I cried my eyes out in that Micky Rourke film. It was so beautifuly done and reminded me when my dad came back after abandoning us to go on an 8 year drinking binge. He came back sober but the damage was done and died young. I still miss him like you miss your dad.

    I'm sorry that everything is conspiring to bring you down a little. I am sending my love and a big (((hug)))

  5. About the dad shit, I SOOO understand. Mine chose the bottle over me and there is a part of me (at 51) that still feels like the little girl he walked away from.

    Ya know, my boys all want through that crappy shit of getting up and hollering all night long. The age from 9 months to 18 months, wellllll I was ready to build a dog hut out back to put them in. I was not strong enough to let them cry for long, it not only made me lose sleep, it actually made me mad at them. Horrid mother=me.

    As they got older I had to wonder if they were possibly feeling growing pains. I know it sounds weird but when you think about it, they are growing at such a fast rate that why WOULDN'T it hurt? ALong the same line, maybe a leg massage in his dark room might help.

    It always makes me sleep better ;)

  6. I could say a bunch of crap like "it's always darker before the sun shines" or "there is a light at the end of the tunnel" but you and I both know that you'll just want to kick me in the c@nt, so I won't say them. What I WILL say is this: it is ok to feel the misery every once in awhile. Without misery how will you enjoy the beauty? You're doing great, hon! Once you put those thoughts out there, they get out of your head and you can allow others to help you cope with them. You can't possibly cope with them on your own because they all didn't happen when you were by yourself. I love you and I love your strength and hair. Seriously I LOVE your hair!

  7. I'm thinking that you get overcome because you try to suppress the sadness. It might be easier to give into it earlier, have a good cry, and then move on. Building up under pressure just makes for a larger explosion. Just my $.02

    As for Dave's remission...clearly they just need a better term. Maybe you could start telling people he's cured. Then they'll be too busy wondering how they missed hearing about a cure for cancer that they won't have time to irritate you with pitying looks.

  8. Eden --

    There are times when what you write so clearly crawls inside of me that I have a difficult time responding to it -- the last post -- I wanted to tell you how hard it was when I finally wrote the post about my father's death -- the unwritten getting written -- but how it comes at the right time -- and you know when you're ready to write it -- in your center -- you know.

    I get shang-hai'ed by the father thing sometimes -- I witness a father and daughter, or some song -- and I feel like I can't breathe for the pain of it.

    And I remember when I began to read your blog -- before the news came --and when it came I remember thinking -- it can't happen this way -- because I knew that you, like me, had been through so much -- it wasn't supposed to work this way. I remember that so clearly -- understanding that so deeply.

    I want you to know that even if you don't see a comment from me for days -- that you are in my heart Eden -- and I mean that in a way that transcends all the internet intimacy that can come so quickly in this medium -- you are in my heart because I so get it. I feel it. I am here with you -- and I am holding you up, cheering you on, thinking of you -- and someday when our roles are reversed and I am down and you are up -- you can help me keep my head above water.

    My love to you Eden, my love and thoughts and wishing we could sit and have coffee on some patch of sunlit wood floor somewhere.



  9. Eden, I just want to send you big hugs.

  10. I really hate that some people seem to get such an easy ride in life and others, who deserve so much better, seem to get kicked down again and again. Sometimes life just doesn't make any sense to me.

    I hope Dave's cancer never returns, I hope you can find some peace with your Dads, I hope you can ask for help with Rocco's nighttime dramas.

    I hope that the rest of your life is slow and content and quiet and overflowing with wonderful moments between you and your boys. You SOOO deserve it.

    Love you E,

  11. I want to tell you that I understand but I don't. I know I don't have even a fraction of a clue. I want to hug you too but I'm stuck in stupid Greenland, way too far away to do anything as productive as a hug.

    I dreamed about you this afternoon while I was taking a nap. We went for a walk around a sunny city block, both pushing our babies in strollers. You were happy. You are always wearing a cowboy hat in my dreams. I was thrilled that we were seeing each other in person at last. The dream started with me scooping up jewels off the sidewalk. I woke up thinking that maybe that's how life is; friends are like jewels we acquire along the way. We need them because life doesn't stop getting rough and unfair.

    It may not seem like enough right now but God is a Father too. And He sees you in all your brokenness, with all you've been through and all you're feeling, He sees you with infinte love. You are unique and created for a purpose. No one else will do. I wish your human dads hadn't failed you, wish that they were around to tell you these things because you need to hear them. Since they can't, let God tell you all the things He loves about you because Eden, there's so much.


  12. You always are so honest with your feelings. I admire that so much. (I tend to hide them, keeping them bottled up until they explode and create a big fat mess.)

    This road to healing is shitty, isn't it? Sometimes it feels like there are many more dips and valleys than peaks along the way. Bleh. Wouldn't be nice if we could just figure out the magic cure and make everything in our worlds all sunshine and rainbows. But, then again...we have a lot of sunshine to bathe in as it is. The hard part is just remembering that.

    You know I send my love to you as always. I hope that tomorrow (well, today for you) brings you clear skies filled with rainbows. Hugs, my dear.

  13. I read this in the post before Eden ... "That death was a puncture, blowing us all open and out of the water, and defining us for many many years to come." That is such a true analogy - my Dad committed suicide a month before my 14th birthday and it took about 15 years before I was recovered enough to live sensibly. Totally blew a hole in my boat.

    I'm sorry that you're feeling like sh!t at the moment, no words are particularly good. I know feelings like those you describe, they suck. I'm thinking of you. And sending your family all the positive eff-off-cancer-forever vibes I can muster.



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