Child Abuse Survivor

Email about my wife

This was just a part of an email someone sent me the other day, and I wanted to share it with you.

I also want to say that your wife Angela must be an amazing woman.
You speak of her often, and the love you have for her shines through your words.   You know how when you read written words, you actually hear yourself saying them silently.   I was to a point where I came to your wife's name....  Angela, and to myself I said 'Angel'.   Then I corrected myself, and read Angela..... and just then, I thought...... to Mike, she is
~His Angel~.

It made me happy to see that without having to get too sappy in my writing  someone can see how much my wife means to me. I've never been a big proponent of having the right wife, husband, boyfriend, etc. be an important part of healing yourself as a survivor, because I did a lot of healing before she came along, and I believe each of us has the ability to do that work in ourselves. I don't need Angela to be healthy.

On the other hand, it is important to have people in your life who you respect, and who inspire you to improve yourself. My wife does that in a couple of different ways. One, I adore her and aspire to be the husband she deserves to have. I can't do that without constantly striving to improve myself. Secondly, she inspires me in her day to day life. When I watch the way she makes friends easily, interacts comfortably with people, is hospitable towards them, and generally attracts people to herself though her generosity and thoughtfulness I realize that I want to be more like that. I learn how to be a kinder, more thoughtful and better friend by watching my wife every day.

So, while I may not have needed my wife to be there supporting me to learn how to heal, it sure helps to have people in your live who do support you, inspire you, and who teach you through their examples how to improve yourself every day.

I hope, in 2008, you can find your own forms of inspiration, no matter where they come from!

Merry Christmas to our On-line friends!

Somewhat Painful Reminder

As the holiday season approached, one of my fellow Friends in Tech members, Douglas Welch had a great idea for a series of podcasts. Called the Wishbook the idea was to go take a look at on-line versions of old Wish Book catalogs from our child hood, and record some audio talking about a particular toy or memory that is sparked by the catalog.

When I first heard about the idea, I thought it was great. I still do, but in the course of looking through the catalogs from my youth, I also quickly realized that I couldn't possibly take part.

Not that I didn't see some toys that I remembered having as a kid, but that was pretty much it. Yes, I had that toy, and I remember playing with it, but that's the sum total of my connection to my child hood. There are facts that I remember, with no emotions tied to them. Not exactly the warm, fuzzy holiday spirit, eh? :)

When I think about being a survivor, and what that means, I often think in terms of how it affects me now, and all the work I had to put in to learn how to make healthy decisions and take care of myself. When people ask me about the costs of being a survivor, or what the abuse took from me, those are the costs I immediately think of. I forget the things I missed out on as a child, the lack of any connection to my childhood. I almost tend to think that it's normal, and it's things like this project and hearing other people talk about childhood memories that remind me that it isn't normal to look at a photo of yourself as a child and fell no connection to that person. To not feel some sort of connection to who I was or what I was feeling at the time.

I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on it, because I have learned not to spend much time dwelling on things that I can't change. There's no way to change this, it is simply the cost of being a survivor for me. I accept that, but that doesn't make it easy.

Continuing a theme about showing appreciation

In each of the last two posts I've written here, I've made mention of both using this time of year as a good excuse to show your appreciation to the important people in your life, and also offering friendship and support to them during troubled times.

I had another, related, thought today. The most important gift you can give to anyone is your time. Think about it, how many people do you know who go out of their way to make time for you? I'm betting it's not many, and I'm also betting than when you do make time for someone, there are no words that can more clearly express that they are important to you. I can proclaim how important someone's friendship is to me all day long, but if I'm unwilling to make time to spend with that person, take time to think about that person, if I am unable to act in a way consistent with my words, then they are just that, words. The people who are most important to you are the people you spend time with, no matter how that time is spent.

This past Thanksgiving Day, I had a somewhat unique opportunity. My wife had passed along some information about a gathering at OSU's campus, where they would be serving a traditional meal to about 1200 international students and faculty, and their families. Since we had already decided our plans for the holiday would be separate, she out of town with her family, and I in town with mine, she wouldn't be able to volunteer with me. Being a somewhat socially awkward person, I wasn't really interested in volunteering by myself, but we also knew that a good friend of ours would also be in town, and had been looking for various ways to get out and volunteer. Angela also knew she felt similar to me, and wouldn't want to do this by herself, so she contacted her and this worked out well for both of us.

By her willingness to spend a couple of hours working this event with me, I was able to do something good, and enjoy myself quite a bit in the process, and vice versa. Because of both of our willingness to do this together, along with the 120 other people who spent part of their Thanksgiving Day giving of their time as well, 1200 people of various cultural and religious backgrounds, sat and had a meal together. None of it took any special talent or skill. Literally, I spent most of the time spooning out corn to people as they came by, not all that difficult, but someone needed to do it! :)

All it took was the willingness to spend the time listening to our friend when she mentioned wanting to volunteer, being aware of opportunities for her to do that, and then spending the time doing it together. I can't imagine a better way to show appreciation than that.

I also can't imagine a better way to show appreciation than the way my wife did, by being the person who facilitated this to begin with. She was willing to look at this event and think past her own plans to find other people who would be available and would want to do it. That's appreciation for me, our friend, and the folks she knows who were coordinating the event! She was able to show us that, simply by sending a few emails and getting people in touch with each other!

New York Photos

For any of you who might be interested, I did manage to get some photos from the trip to New York last week posted to Flickr.

Now that I'm done with all the traveling, at least for now, I should have more time to actually say something of interest around here. Soon....

Enjoy!

Home, and then off again!

I'm off in the morning, yet again! This time I'm flying to NYC for a few days, a couple of days enjoying the city, visiting with some family and old friends, and then a couple of days at a conference for work.

For those of you scoring at home, yes we just got back from the latest trip Sunday, a short weekender with the wife's family, which came 3 days after we got back from vacation, which was about a week and a half after I got back from SF, again for work. Throw in a 12 hour work day this week, doing onsite support for an event, as opposed to being in the office, and it's been a wild ride!

It's been fun, and exciting, but I do believe that after this trip, I will be very, very happy to have some routine in my life again! I don't really anticipate having that routine again until maybe Thanksgiving. I already know I'm going to come back to the office with piles of work to do, but I'm hoping that a quiet, 4 day, weekend, will be just the thing.

Of course, by then, I might wind up with even that being busy at the rate things have been going. I kinda hope not. As much as I condone shaking up the routine a little from time to time, and seeking out new experiences when you can, it's also nice to feel the comfort of your normal life too. :)

Go Watch a Sunset

While I was in San Francisco, I had the opportunity to go down to Ocean Beach and watch the sunset. The sunset was so amazing, that the next day, I was emailing pictures back to all of my friends, because I wanted to share that moment of perfect peace with them.

One of them write me back that it was nice to get a reminder that despite everything we may be involved with at the moment, and how important it all seems, that life's bigger than that. It served as a useful reminder to her that there is much more to life than work and all the things we need to do on a daily basis to get through the day. It helps to put things in the proper perspective when you realize that life has more things to enjoy than you can even imagine, especially in the middle of everyday struggles. So, with that I give you, some perspective:

I hope it brings you even a little bit of the peace I felt being there.

How Mental Health Care has Changed

In preparation for the trip, I did a little reading on the history of the place, which, of course also read like a history of mental health treatment. On the cemetary page, naturally, we learn why most of the gravestones bear only a number and no name. The vast majority of the patients were simply brought here by their families, and left to die. Only the graves of those patients whose families claimed them, and bore the cost of the headstone, have names.

The lack of names on the tombstones here bears witness to how little mental illness has been understood, and how poorly it has been treated in our past.

Tags: MentalIllness, Asylum, The Ridges, AthensOhio, Cemetery

Priorities

For all the good things that I've been experiencing in the last few months, it all pales in comparison to having my wife to share them with. Without that, the rest of these things just aren't the same. With that in mind, I need, this weekend, to make a concentrated effort to work on being a good husband, and nothing else. It's time to reconnect with my wife, to spend some time simply enjoying each other's company, relaxing, doing the things we enjoy, and just generally being attentive to each other, instead of paying attention to all the other things that seem to distract us from that.

There's plenty of time to work at improving myself in all areas of life, and I have no intention of ever stopping trying to improve in any of them, but I need to get back to focusing on improving myself as a husband first and foremost. I've been guilty of letting that work take second fiddle to other things for too long. It shouldn't be second to anything.

Tags: Marriage, Self-improvement

Hope you enjoyed your weekend

Tags: Chicago, Travel, Photography

Quiet few days

I know, I know, I've been pretty quiet around here lately. Those of you who read my other sites know I haven't been quiet on the tech side of things, but between the many projects I've been working on over there, the various events leading up to my birthday Weds., and just having a busy summer social schedule, I haven't had much time to be introspective and thus, find writing topics for the site.

On the other hand, it's been an interesting time. I've been able to be more social than usual, while spending free time working on some tech projects, which has helped me not feel totally exhausted from being social. I'm glad I've been able to find a good balance.

I've got a number of social events upcoming, as well as a whole lot of traveling around in the Fall, so we'll see if I can maintain the balance. It's a tricky thing to do for any introvert, as I'm sure many of you understand.

Anyway, I hope those of you in the US enjoy your holiday, and take the time to do something nice for yourself. Assert your independence. :)

Another full Weekend

I've been off-line all weekend, and a bit behind on responding to emails and what not. My brother got married yesterday, which always makes for a hectic time, between the rehearsal dinner on Friday, and the wedding going late into the evening on Saturday, leaving us with only Sunday to run errands and spend some time with the wife.

It was a lovely wedding, and I'm happy for my brother, and my new sister in law. I think he made a good choice, she's a great girl.

Even with all the errands today though, it was too nice a day to not spend some time outside. We took a nice stroll around the neighborhood. Naturally, I had the camera with me, and spent some time experimenting with some settings, getting a few photos like the one below. I believe I've talked many times about how being a bit creative with photography is very enjoyable, and somewhat therapeutic for me. So, in that sense, doing this today was the perfect ending to a weekend spent interacting with all of my family. :)

Staying Social

I'm finding one of the unexpected challenges of my new job is the loss of social interaction. When I worked at the helpdesk, interacting with people and keeping in touch with the folks I considered my friends, was easy. Just as part of the job I'd have to talk to them on a regular basis, so it was easy for someone who is naturally as shy as I am, to be pretty social. I really had no choice but to be in order to be good at my job.

Now that I've moved into a different type of work, and moved into my own office, I am finding it difficult to keep "in touch". I don't have the normal day-to-day interaction with people as part of my job, there is some, but not anywhere near as much. I have to make an effort to go and talk to people, in a social sense, as opposed to just chatting while I was working with them.

I'm not very good at that, but I'm going to have to learn to be better at it if I want to keep the friendships I developed while working at the help desk. We'll see how it goes.

Good News

If you read my other blog, you probably already know about the good news of my new job. While I'm certainly really excited about the possibilities this new position will offer, I'm also a little bit nervous about stepping out of my comfort zone, again, and into something completely new. It's only been about a year and a half since I started working at this firm, and I've gotten comfortable at the help desk. Now I'm really starting that whole process again, complete with all the insecurity, uneasiness, stress, and everything else that goes with a new job.

I comfort myself in the knowledge that I felt completely overwhelmed when I started this job and, eventually, got over that enough to be good at it. Hopefully, I can do it again!

If nothing else, it'll be interesting and will certainly give me plenty to blog about, in both places!

Walking away

Well, I took my own advice today. All that talk about knowing your limits and knowing when a relationship is demanding too much, made a lot of sense when it came to my volunteer commitments with the Friends of the Library. I realized that while I enjoyed the work I had done there, and was proud of it, that continuing to be involved was draining me mentally and emotionally.

There have been too many times when I've come home from lengthy meetings exhausted, stressed, and in a very crabby mood. Volunteer work shouldn't have this much of a negative effect on my emotional health. It's all been too much stress for me to continue to deal with. So I made the decision to walk away today. I think it was the right thing to do for myself.

That does mean I'll have a tad more free time, which is nice. Maybe I'll finally get around to all those tech projects I've been meaning to do. ;)

Regaining Focus

I've discovered, in the process of trying to get regular exercise, that a good workout can really help get myself mentally focused as much as it benefits me physically. Tonight was a fine example. I had a pretty cruddy work day. Came home angry with myself for not being extra cautious and creating a problem that I was going to have to spend a lot of time fixing, and feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the number of things I wanted to try and get done tonight, emails that needed replied to, blog posts needing to be made, little tech projects that need to get done, etc. I even considered for a minute blowing off working out tonight, but with our weather being the way it's been lately, we hadn't been in a week, so I knew the last thing I needed to do was find another excuse not to go.

So we went, I got a vigorous workout, came home, grabbed a quick shower and sat down at the laptop to starting banging on my to-do list. Only now I was in a much better frame of mind, and getting those things off my list was a little easier because I had a better focus on the tasks at hand, and not so much on beating myself up.

I still have a bit of a mess to clean up at work, but it's my mess, and it will get done and be fine by the end of the day tomorrow. A good workout helped put that in perspective.

Back on the bandwagon

After my surgery in November I wasn't able to workout for a couple of weeks. That only served to prove the one thing that people always say about exercise, once you stop working out regularly, it's incredibly hard to get start up again. It really is. Between a case of the flu and holidays it seemed like there were a ton of reasons why I couldn't go workout, so I didn't. After the new year though, Angela and I both agreed that we simply had to start going again, and we have.

We've been going 3 times a week for a couple of weeks now and I can't tell you how much better I feel. I have a ton more energy, my thinking is much more focused, my creative juices are flowing again.

If nothing else, I'm typing this up to remind myself of why I don't want to get out of the habit, or if circumstances force me to do that, to remember why I want to get back in the habit as quickly as possible!

Lack of exercise

I have to confess. I got off the regular exercise bandwagon last month and haven't gotten back on it.

Looking back I can see the problem. I went from a vacation, straight into having and recovering from surgery, and just when I was getting back on my feet from that, I caught a mean case of the flu. It's no surprise that I fell off the bandwagon.

It probably shouldn't be a surprise either that I've been feeling a lack of energy, and have struggled to establish enough mental focus to get much of anything accomplished, huh?

End of year donation

Sorry I've been out of touch, life's been a bit of a whirlwind thanks to getting sick, and then having a death in my wife's family. Many things, let alone blogging, have had to be pushed aside due to those circumstances, but I did want to make a note.

Normally this time of year I talk a bit about what charitable donations I am going to make for year. Normally there's a donation to a child abuse prevention charity, it's been the local children's hospital for example, but I think, in light of recent events, my charity donation is going to begin with something different this year.

You see, the death in my wife's family was her great-grandmother. A woman with many fine traits, a woman my wife has looked up to with the utmost respect, and who has been a source of inspiration to my wife since she was a little girl. Unfortunately, she is also a woman I never knew. For while I've known Angela for almost 7 years, and we've been married for 5, and I've met her great -grandmother many times, she has suffered from Alzheimer's for all that time. She wasn't the woman my wife told stories about, our spoke so highly of, she was a shell of that woman, and as the years went on, she became less and less of that woman. Her Alzheimer's took her away long before her life ended, it deprived all of us from sharing these last years with her, in my case it deprived me of ever getting to know one of my wife's heroes. That was my loss, I have no doubt. From what I've been told of her, I can see her spirit living in my wife, and will continue to do so for many years, I hope, but I never got to see the source of that spirit, even though she was right there physically for all these years. That's a shame, and it's something I hope you never have to know.

I've known it in my own family, and now I've known it in my wife's family. I've watched as my own relatives became distant shadows of themselves, and I've missed out on the opportunity to know a great lady because of Alzheimer's, I want to try and do something to help make sure others don't. I believe Angela and I will be making a donation to the Alzheimer's Association, in memory of her great-grandmother this year.

Weekend Update

I had high hopes for getting a lot done this weekend, figuring since I would be laid up somewhat for the weekend after the surgery, I could drag out the laptop and do some things.

I highly underestimated the power of Vicodin to knock me out cold. So, instead of being laid up and working, I've been laid up and sleeping, a lot!

That being said, the surgery went well, and aside from sleepiness and the occasional discomfort, the after-effects haven't been all that bad. We'll see how the work day tomorrow goes!

Dissociating

I read with great interest Marj's post about feeling grief as opposed to dissociating. One, because I also was diagnosed with one of those "other" dissociative disorders, with fugue being the "major" symptom. But secondly, because my history of dissociating has been a concern of mine recently. I'm due to have some minor surgery in a couple of days, and while I know with full certainty that it's a very simple procedure and there shouldn't be any problems, I still have some fear and anxiety about it, mostly because I'm unsure of exactly how I will react to the situation!

The surgery is a minor procedure, truth be told I'm having a vasectomy, making our decision to not have children a permanent one. Not a major deal, but then again, as a survivor of sexual abuse, simply by virtue of the location of the procedure, it stands to be somewhat emotionally traumatic for me. Perhaps I will write about both the procedure and my difficulty with it in more detail over the weekend, after it's over. :)

Unfortunately, when faced with this anxiety I have noticed myself dissociating ever so slightly. That's not good. That's not the healthy way to deal with this, but it is still my natural inclination. I still react to the stress the same way I always dealt with my depression, having the desire to either sleep, or just not be present in some way, until it's all over. I'm afraid that in a small, but significant way, I haven't been here lately while I wait for this to be over.

Which just goes to show, even after all this time some behaviors are very tough to unlearn.

Lovely Afternoon

The original plan while Angela was off visiting her folks this weekend was to get caught up on some tech projects. But the late afternoon sunshine was too tempting for me, so I just had to put those off and go shoot some pictures today. :)

Hope you're all enjoying your holiday weekend!

Ego Boost

Someone I know who works for OSU was checking out a few of the pictures I had sent her that I had taken around the campus, and they were popular enough that the folks working on a reunion website asked if they could use a couple of them. Granted, the fact that I would let them use them for free without requiring any credit played into their decision to use them I'm sure, but it's still nice to know people think highly enough of something I've done to want to use it.

We all need the occasional ego boost every now and then, and I promise I won't let it go to my head. :)

80469-060420-721825-51
© 2006 All Rights Reserved.

Chocolate Milk?

We spent the weekend in Findlay visiting Angela's folks and touring around their new home town. Apparently, the Blanchard River got a little muddy from the storms Friday night, because the spillway looked like a whole lot of chocolate milk. :)

36592-060416-283058-70
© 2006 All Rights Reserved.

Exercise update

I was reminded by seeing the throw-away remark by Robert Scoble in a long post about the need to get some excercise to help deal with stress, that I haven't really discussed our exercise plan here lately. So, by way of an open letter to Scoble, here's an update:

Robert,

I saw with great interest your comment about needing to get to the gym and how it might help with stress and I just wanted to encourage you to do exactly that. My wife and I made the decision after the first of the year to take advantage of the fact that works for a university to go ahead and get a membership to use the campus recreation facilities. I knew I needed to get in better shape, and lose some weight, but never having been a big "fitness" guy, I had my doubts about how well I would take to it. So we only bought one quarter's worth of a membership. That expired earlier this month and there was no doubt we'd be renewing.

From one IT worker/blogger to another, there's simply no better way to transition from work to home or personal tech projects than spending an hour or so working out. For me, it cleanses the stress of the work day and allows me to get focused on what comes next. That gives me more energy to get more done in the evening than I had before. Now, instead of vegging on a TV show, or struggling to focus on personal projects after a long day at work, I hit the gym, spend 45 minutes on the bike, or treadmill do a little weight training and head home completely ready for what comes next, feeling less stressed, less worn out, more energetic, and more mentally aware.

What would be even better is if you could get Maryam to go as well. Knowing that we're going to be doing something together 3-4 times a week helps Angela and I stay in touch when things are busy, and gives us a shared goal, which is a very good thing to have. It keeps the wife from feeling like all my goals and interests are tech-related. :)

I'm not going to get all fitness-nazi on you. Anyone who knows me either in real life or on-line knows I'm no stranger to pizza, beer, Twinkies, etc. and I don't really care if I carry a few extra pounds, so I haven't just started dropping pounds and proclaming my exercise program to be the best thing since sliced bread. But, I have lost some weight, I see a bit of difference, and more importantly, I'm mentally healthier because of it. I feel stressed less often, and the extra energy is helping me get more things off my to-do list.

That seems like reason enough, doesn't it?

Back from San Francisco

Had a nice time, spent a lot of time and energy exploring the city and surrounding area. You can see more of my pictures over in the gallery.

A littte break

Yes it's true. I've been very, very busy of late but with the end of my volunteering to hang around as a consultant to my former employer having come, at last I can begin to focus on some other projects, and maybe make an effort to post more often! ;)

However, the first order of business is spending some quality time with my too-neglected wife. With that in mind, we leave in the morning (very early in the morning) for a nice long weekend in San Francisco. I'm looking forward to the opportunity to recharge and come back full of energy, ready to take on the next challenge that awaits.

Remember, it's very important to take the time to recharge, refocus, and otherwise take care of yourself. Without that, burnout or breakdowns awaits at every corner.

ESBN 18366-060303-100792-89

Weighing in

Just an update to the goal of getting in better physical shape in 2006. After 3 weeks of regular workouts I was somewhat disappointed to find that I had only lost 4 pounds. I was hoping the wieght loss would be a little more than that, but then I remembered what the goal was, it was to just be better. So I'm 4 pounds lighter than I was before. That's a good thing!

Also, upon further reflection and a couple more weeks of workouts, while I might not be melting the pounds away I am definitely feeling like I have more stamina, and more energy. I'm able to work out harder without getting tired or sore, and I definitely notice my stress level going down on days after we've been to workout the night before compared to days we have other plans. So I'm building muscle and stamina, which is going to limit the weight loss, but I'm feeling better and I am losing some weight, so it's all good!

Better in 2006

As I've discussed before, I've spent years working on simply being better instead of making new year's resolutions. I figure that's it's better to concentrate on the goal of being a better person every day than it is to make resolutions that go away after a few weeks. I've worked, with some success, and continue to work on being a better husband, writer, friend, and worker. I try to make better decisions, make better use of my time, and keep learning, but this year it's become clear that one area of life has always been more difficult than others when it came to being better, and that was working toward being better physically. I've found this area to be a problem for many abuse survivors, though I'm not sure why.

Over the last few years of being married and happy, I've put on some weight, there's no denying that. My wife's job at the university alumni association afforded us the ability to purchase a sports and recreation pass to use all of their facilities, which offer a vast number of options for getting exercise. (Everything from a lap pool, cardio equipment, weight training, to dodge ball sessions.) We decided to sign up for this quarter and see whether we could keep up a regular schedule of workouts before signing up for a whole year. So far, we went twice over the weekend and are planning on going again tonight. I even weighed myself the first night we were there, which was scary. I haven't weighed myself in years, and I weigh even more than I thought I did, which is unsettling, but now at least I have a way to measure my progress. Here's hoping we can be diligent and I can make some progress!

Happy Holidays

I know for many survivors this time of year can be difficult and filled with stress as we navigate the treacherous waters that constitute our families, so I just want to take a moment and wish you all well, and hope that we all remember to take care of ourselves!

Time flies

Last night I found out that two of my younger brothers got engaged over this past weekend, including my youngest brother, which makes me feel very old, but serves as a useful reminder that time flies. I was almost 16 when he was born. My mother was very sick after his birth and my dad was working nights, so there were more than a few occasions those first weeks when I was the one who got up with the baby. I still have very vivid memories of rocking him to sleep while watching late-night television, (He stayed awake through all of This is Spinal Tap with me.) or making sure he was fed and put back to bed. Now he's engaged.

Talk about a wake up call to make sure you're living life to the fullest every day, because it sure goes by quickly!

Good news

Cross-posted on both my blogs:

It's been a long week. I know I've been quiet around here, but besides being just a busy week, I've been distracted all week by the birth, and subsequent complications, of our new niece. I'm happy to say that she is progressing, and they anticipate her being able to go home in time for Thanksgiving. Angela was able to get up to Akron Children's hospital on Monday, when she was first transferred there, but today was my first opportunity to travel up there. It was the first opportunity for either of us to hold her though.

Angela has some of the touching details on her blog. I'd only add one more. Last year I made a contribution to our own local children's hospital in Columbus and directed it to their child abuse prevention programs as part of this site. After this experience, I will be giving some serious thought to adding to the contribution and directing some of it to the medical care as well.

Put in Bay

IM004247
Originally uploaded by mikemac29.

Getting outside my comfort zone

For those of you who haven't seen the news on my other blog I'm going to be switching jobs at the end of next week. I'm going to be leaving the first job I had after being in the hospital, getting divorced, and finally getting healthy through therapy and off anti-depressants. The job I've had, and played no small part in learning to value myself, learning to deal with stress in healthy ways, learning social skills, etc. The job where I would eventually meet the love of my life and get married again, thereby breaking two promises that I had made to myself, not to date co-workers and not to get married again. (What can I say, when someone like Angela comes along, it changes the rules you've lived by before.)

Yes, I'm leavng a job I've held for almost 8 years, a job I knew like the back of my hand, where I safely had navigated all the office politics and interpersonal messiness that goes on in small offices, and moving to a place where I'll know none of this stuff.

But I'm still excited, by the challenges, the new experiences, new people and new technology that I'll be using and learning about every day. So, even though the switch might take me away from the things I've grown used to, and maybe change many of the patterns I've grown accustomed to, finding new pattersn should be a lot of fun!

Or, at least it won't get boring. :)

Weekend

The weekend started with the Jazz and Rib Fest Friday night, then checking out the Karamazov Brothers and the finale of the orchestra and fireworks at the Lancaster Festival Saturday night. It's already been a fun-filled summer weekend. Hope you're finding a way to enjoy yours!

Has it been that long?

Gee has it really been since June that I posted anything here? For that matter, how did it get to be July 9th already? I'm not complaining, last weekend was filled with so much of the fun and frivolity that comes along with celebrating my, and the nation's, birthday that I seriously have nothing at all to complain about. It just all flew by so quickly and then I simply swung back into work made so quickly that it doesn't even seem like I had any time to really savor it all.

Eh, but life's like that, isn't it? If you're not careful, you miss a lot.

End of an era

Earlier this week, I gave away all my roller-hockey equipment. When I first started coming off medication and learning how to make healthy decisions, I started playing rec-league hockey just for me. It was one of the first things I did simply because I enjoyed it, not because it was going to impress someone, or because it served some higher purpose, it was just fun, it helped me enjoy life a little bit.

As the years went on though, and I learned to make those sorts of decisions on a regular basis, and I got a little bit older, and slower, and busier, so I quit playing. I haven't played since before Angela and I got married almost 4 years ago. When I heard that a woman I work with was having a garage sale to benefit her daughter's basketball team, and that she was looking for donations, I finally looked at that old equipment sitting in our basement and said to myself "I'm not going to be playing again, I've gotten older, and have a different life now, and playing hockey just isn't the priority it once was, so why not give it away?" So I did.

Of course, the funny thing is, there are still some people I work with who will ask me about playing hockey, as if I have been playing all this time. They see me as a guy who plays hockey in his spare time. Apparently, it's never occurred to them that I might have moved on and changed over the last 5 years, or at least they've not bothered to notice that I'm not the same person I was 5 years ago. Makes me wonder if there are people out there who don't grow and change over the course of 5 years or more. Seems like such a waste.

Vacation

I had a good time on vacation this week. It was tiring trying to get everywhere I wanted to go and see everything I wanted to see, but I really enjoy that. There's something about the adventure that really makes me feel alive. Plus, getting out and seeing the larger world really puts my problems in perspective. Let's face it, when you're standing in the "Bloody Lane" at Antietam, where over 5000 men died in just about 4 hours of fighting, it's pretty easy to see that the things I worry about day-to-day aren't quite as all-important as I might have thought previously. Pictures available here:

http://www.mikemcbrideonline.com/gallery/Charlottesville

http://www.mikemcbrideonline.com/gallery/SkylineDrive-HarpersFerry

Speaking of pictures, Angela posted the picture she had to take of me today, sporting the surprise I had for her when I got home. It's been a long time since I sported a look with no facial hair. :)

Friends

It's been a very eventful couple of weeks in the workplace for me, but it's also provided a very interesting look into the people I work with. One of my coworkers needed to take a leave of absence. Nothing that doesn't go on in the business world every day, but in a small office like ours, his absence, combined with the recent turnover of another position in the same department really left that department scrambling to get things covered.

I've often heard the expression that it's the tough times that let you know who your friends really are, and this case was no exception. I remember too when I was first diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder and major depression that I really found out who my friends were, and much to my surprise, there weren't that many.

In this situation, my first reaction to the news that this guy was going to be off for a little while was to figure out what I could do to help him. The following thought was simply, "if he was here to tell me how I could help he'd tell me to do everything I could to help his boss get things covered". Since he and I are good friends, that's exactly what I set out to do, and in the process I've actually become much more of a friend to his boss than I was before. Luckily my skills match up with some of my friends job, so I could help her out with getting things covered, but more than that, and not to toot my own horn, but I think she was just relieved to have someone come and ask her what they could do to help, as opposed to complaining about things not getting done faster!

Anyway, my point in talking about this isn't too brag about myself or the others who stepped up to help, nor is it to complain about the people who didn't. It's more to pose the challenge to you, the reader. Are you the kind of friend who responds to trouble in other's lives with "How can I help?" or are you the kind of friend who keeps their distance from other's troubles?

I know which choice I've gotten more fulfillment from the last couple of weeks. It hasn't always been easy, but I've formed some bonds and attachments with people in my office that wouldn't have been possible without that experience of working hard together through tough times. That's a pretty good reward for working hard. A lot better than the reward I'd get from doing nothing.

April Fools Day

Perhaps you won't be surprised to know that Angela and I went on our first date exactly 5 years ago tonight. We're both just a couple of fools!

I definitely didn't foresee what was to come over the next 5 years, but then again it just goes to show you how much life goes on and things change quickly and things sometimes take us by surprise. It's a real rollercoaster, life, and you wouldn't want to miss out on the ride!

On another note, I've been considering starting up an email list for this site. I've noticed that the forums really haven't taken off the way I had hoped, so I was thinking about an email list, where every post to this blog would get mailed out to the list, and all of the subscribers could discuss those posts, or anything else they wanted to discuss. What do you think? Would you subscribe?

Networking as listening

Last night I attended a brief workshop-type class on social networking, as opposed to the computer networking that I usually study. :)

Being a typical IT guy, sometimes in social situations I can be a bit awkward, at best. Since I keep reading about most people find jobs through people they know, and since as a Trustee for the Friend's of the Library I'll be attending a lot more meetings and functions, I figured it was time to try and learn to handle social interaction a bit better. A couple of things stood out about this workshop that I wanted to share, since being awkward and shy seems to be a common trait among survivors.

At the beginning of class, the instructor had us go around and introduce ourselves and talk about why we were there. Most of that, as you can imagine, centered around people talking about being shy, uncomfortable, etc. He then told us all to stand up, and said in the next 3 minutes go around and introduce yourself to as many people as you can. At the end of three minutes he could hardly get everyone to sit down again. He then used that to show us that the problem isn't our inability to be social, afterall people with true social inhibitions wouldn't be at that class! Here, when we were forced to introduce ourselves and talk to each other, no one had any problem doing just that. What we needed to learn what how to overcome fears, and how to stop selling ourselves short.

Later he addressed the subject that so many of us dread, not having anything interesting to say. He began with a few stories he had read, or experienced himself, and then asked us to think back upon our day, and count the number of times we had someone's undivided attention. Then think back upon the last week, last month. I know at times I have my wife's undivided attention, and at times she has mine, but that's about it. He then began to describe how, by giving someone our undivided attention, by really listening to them talk, we would make a lasting, good impression on them. By moving from "guest" to "host" behavior, where you are more concerned with making the other person feel comfortable and enjoying themselves, you worry less about having something witty to say. You pay more attention to the other person and what they have to say, and because it is so rare for someone to actually listen and care, you make a memorable impression without having to say much of anything.

Of course the trick is learning to care, if you don't care about what other people are saying, you can't fake it. People see through that.

Been a long time...

I was just looking over this site and realized it's been awhile since I had anything to say here, so I figured I'd drop a few lines for those of you who don't follow my other site, to let you know what's been going on.

Things are fine, in fact they're better than fine, they're downright cool. Maybe that's why I'm out of sorts writing here. Between my wife's new job, my own election to the Friends of the Library Board, and various techie projects these last few weeks, survivor issues have been put on the back burner a bit, and I don't really see that as a bad thing. Sometimes, it helps to simply put our issues aside and go out and do something. To live a little, while we can.

I know that feeling

I know the feeling Kevin talked about on his blog last night all too well. For all the guilt and depression I suffered through all the years of abuse, none of that feels as bad as disappointing a wife so worthy of my love and care.

Hang in there Kevin, the best thing about our wives is how much they see the good in us even when we don't.

The best laid plans...

Last week was a definite reminder that plans can change. What I had thought would be a relatively quiet weekend of catching up with errands and a few tech projects, turned into a trip to Louisiana for my wife's grandfather's funeral. Amid all the running around and all the family time, I was reminded of how often we try and control every aspect of our lives by planning and scheduling and how, sometimes, life just doesn't work that way.

On the other hand, I can also remember that when I was at my worst, considering suicide and not seeing how my life could possibly be any good to anyone, that the one thing that kept me going through that was the knowledge that with life, you just never know what's going to happen. I never could have pictured the life I have today at that time, or really at anytime prior to that, yet here it is. Sometimes things don't always work out the way you plan them, but that's what makes life so interesting and adventurous!

Slacker

OK, ok, I admit it, I've been a slacker when it comes to this site. I've been extremely busy at work, and extremely busy with holiday stuff that I simply haven't really had time to think any deep thoughts that would be appropriate for this blog. I've been completely preoccupied with technolgy-related thoughts.

Of course, that's not a bad thing. I'm getting a lot done, accomplishing many things, learning new and interesting stuff, and investigating some interesting "hobbies", which are activities that always make me a happier person, but which have taken a little too much time away from writing here. So, given that I have a few spare minutes, I hope you all are getting through the holidays and finding your own joy in the midst of what can be a rather difficult time for many.

On a personal note.

Today at work, one of my co-workers mentioned to me that her husband was just "in love" with my wife. Now before you assume this is some big scandal, I should probably tell you that they're an older couple who we had over to our house as part of a Holiday get together over the weekend. He got to meet Angela for the first time and was very impressed with her hospitality, wit, charm, etc. To top that off, Angela sent my co-worker a recipe for a cake that he really enjoyed, and sent me to work with some leftover Habanero cheese that he enjoyed too, proving that her thoughtfulness and hospitality extends beyond just the event at our house.

She made the comment that Angela made quite the impression on him, but that was no surprise, that she is impressive. I said, "I know, that's why I married her". :)

It's unfortunate that sometimes I get so lost in my own work or problems that I have to be reminded of how wonderful my wife is, but I'm glad I was today. I'm incredibly lucky to be her husband, and while I can't say that I deserve her, I'm glad that I was able to overcome and become the sort of person she'd want to be married to.

Three years ago...

It's Sept. 21 2004. Three years ago at this time, the world was still recovering from 9/11, yet somehow life had moved on. Three years ago at this time, my own life had moved on, and another event was about to change my life. The two events will always be tied together in my mind, not only because the plans for one had been affected by the first, but because, to me, nothing else is so powerful a reminder of what it means to be alive.

Being alive brings pain, and suffering, as it did on that September morning. Yet being alive also brings with it joy, happiness, and love, as it did for me on the 22nd of that month, when I was lucky enough to marry my soulmate, my equal, and my best friend.

This time three years ago, we were wrapping up our rehearsal dinner, and I was taking some time to myself back at the hotel in Jonesborough, Tenn. Despite everything that had happened 10 days earlier, (much of it in my hometown, New York, which affected me deeper than I admitted at the time), I was feeling hopeful, and looking forward to a future with my bride. I was, dare I say, excited about this future, which was sort of a new feeling, I admit!

Now three years later, I can honestly say that the vision and hope I had for our future together pales in comparison to the reality of sharing my life, and my love, with Angela every day. I am a very lucky man to have found such a love, and such joy, and I don't want to ever forget that.

Happy Anniversary, my dear.

That's work..

I've been reading a book about networking as part of my attempt to find a new job. Last night I was trying to work on a few of the exercises concerning professional goals, values, etc. One of the exercises was to list 5 accomplishmnets that I am proud of. Ha! Little do they know me, do they?

On the other hand, even though it took a lot of work and I really had to stretch to get to 5, I did come up with 5 things that I am proud of. Believe me, that's 2-3 more than I've ever been proud of before in my life, and 5 more than some points in my life. That's improvement, right?

The five:

1- Survivng and overcoming child abuse and depression
2- Having a happy, healthy marriage and being a good husband
3- Having taught myself enough about computers to be very good at my current job.
4- Passing my A+ technical certifications last year
5- Gaining the confidence and comfort to be adventurous, turning that into opportunities to travel, photo, and explore the world around me.

Lovely weekend

Yes it was a lovely, and exhausting, weekend! :)

First off was my appointment with my massage therapist Friday evening. Now, since I work with computers, and spend a lot of my free time working with computers, I have certain issues with my neck and shoulders that have, on occasion, led to problems with migraines. Going to see Amiee once every couple of months seems to really help with that, but it comes at a cost. It hurts. It makes me sore. Sore in that good "Oh this is moving the tension out of my neck/shoulders" way, but sore none the less.

Saturday, with Angela off at her parents, I took advantage of the free time to spend the day/evening at the Dublin Irish Festival. I love Celtic-Rock music and stayed until 11ish taking in bands like Gaelic Storm, the Prodigals and the Saw Doctors. A good time, most definitely! I identify strongly with my Irish heritage, as most of you know. I think a big part of it is how much fun the Irish have. Seriously, listen to some traditional Irish music sometime. The stories are tragic, and they're all fighting mad about being oppressed but darn if they aren't having a good time while singing! When I stop to think about all the things that were taken from my, between the abusive childhood, and the years of manic depression, and all the things that trouble me still, I can't help but think that maybe they're on to something there. I mean, no matter what life brings you, no matter how much other people try and hurt you, or things aren't working out, you gotta enjoy yourself and have a good time. :)

After finally making it home and to bed around 1AM, I was on the road at 8AM Sunday to meet up with Angela an her folks in Cincinnati. Another day of tooling around the aquarium and downtown Cincy, and then another 1:45 trip back home, and I pretty much just collapsed into bed last night, dreading well the early rise for work this morning.

But like I said earlier, even though my work's not everything I'd like it to be, and things here over the last few years have really made me unhappy, I can't let it keep me from enjoying the rest of my life!

Now if I could just manage to fit in a little extra sleep and some rest for my weary, sore legs before Angela gets back Weds., that'll be grand!

Back from vacation

Yes I know, I've been back for a few days, but I've been pretty busy, mostly wishing we could be back on the beach! You can see more of our vacation here, or Angela's version of events, here. Enjoy!

The ocean

It wasn't until we got to Myrtle Beach today and walked out on the beach and hit the water before I realized something. I realized that I really, really miss the ocean. It was a place I got to as a kid every summer, living in NYC, but I haven't been to an ocean beach in years and years. How could I have forgotten? There's something sort of sad about that..

Birthday

Yes last weekend was my 36th birthday. On the 4th, as a matter of fact. It made for a fun weekend, what with your normal 4th of July festivites on top of various birthday celebrations. It was rather nice to have a 3 day weekend, to spend time with family and friends, relax, celebrate, etc. In fact it felt so nice that I've had a really hard time being motivated to do much work on anything this week.

You've probably noticed how little I get done on this site when I'm feeling content, happy, even joyful. It's nice to take a break from thinking about, reading about, and generally paying attention to child abuse issues. Can't ever truly walk away from them, they're a little too dangerous, and always will be, but it's nice to simply enjoy life for awhile without them!

Been away

I haven't been updating here as much as I would like to, but hopefully now that Angela's feeling better, life can get a little bit back to normal! Who knew a little virus could create such havoc in our lives? :)

I can tell you that while she gives me a lot of credit for being there and taking care of her when she was not feeling well, I can honestly say it was my pleasure. Being a good husband to my wife is the most important job I have. Doing it well, is truly it's own reward! I hope you all can know how much being truly in love can change your life for the positive...

Oh and, as always, even if I'm not available you're all welcome to "talk amongst yourselves" over in the forums.

Reminders

Yesterday I got a physical reminder of why it's important to keep stress levels low by finding ways of coping with stress better. Most days I do this fairly well, but yesterday there were a number of issues at work and people I either needed to get information to, or get information from, or get in contact with, or help with probems etc. By the end of the day I was physically exhausted, even though I hadn't done anything more physically active than being on vacation was! No, all the stress and the adrenaline had left me feeling quite weak and shaky. Not good!

The situation was taken care of fairly quickly by arriving home, having some food for my blood sugar levels, and relaxing for a little bit, but it is a nice little reminder of how much can go wrong physically if you let stress issues go for too long. One stressful work day where I didn't pay attention to my stress level caused this, I don't want to know what weeks or months of slacking on my stress-coping techniques would do to me!

Home again

Made it home again safely. I've put together a gallery of pictures from the vacation here, hope you enjoy them!

As if to remind me of why it's important to enjoy these things in your life while you can, I returned home to news that one of my roomates from way back in my college years passed away from diabetes complications last week. It was someone I had lost contact with over the years, and probably haven't even heard from in 10 years or so, but reading about his death brought back a lot of good memories of times we had in that house on Summit Street. Memories I haven't thought about in a long time.

Silver and Gold

As if to add an exclamation point to last week's mention of living every day, I picked up the last Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros CD this weekend. The very last song on it is a song named Silver and Gold. It's a reworking of an old country tune by Bobby Charles called Before I grow too old in which the chorus is:

I'm gonna take a trip around the world
I'm gonna kiss all the pretty girls
I'm gonna do everything Silver and Gold
But I got to hurry up before I grow too old

Given the fact that this album was released posthumously, there's something very sad about listening to Joe Strummer sing these words.

Live every day

A couple of people that I work with are dealing with deaths in their families this week. It makes for a work environment with a twinge of sadness to it. But it also serves as a good reminder to enjoy every day to it's fullest and to appreciate all of the good things we have in our lives because they won't always be there. That's not a bad thing to be reminded of every now and again...

Happy St. Patrick's Day

I wrote this about the day over on my tech site:

"As most of you know from reading my sites, I very closely identify myself with my Irish heritage. I've spent a lot of time studying Irish history, as well as the history of Irish-Americans. I have a great respect for the people of Ireland and all that they, and the early immigrants to America, have had to overcome. Yet with all the sadness, tragedy and hardships they've had to endure, you'll find no group of people who enjoy everything life has to offer any more than the Irish. Take today to follow their example and enjoy all the good things in your life!"

I'm sure you can recognize why I identfy so much with the suffering and pain of the Irish, as well as the ability to overcome it all and enjoy life. There's a lot to be respected in that, and a lot to be learned, especially for those of us learning to overcome childhood abuse.

More about goals

Following up on that last post, I want to expound on a couple of things. Both of them have to do with personal responsibility. The first is something that should be obvious, but I know isn't to many people. It wasn't obvious to me for almost 30 years. :)

As we've already discussed, you can't be responsible for anyone else's happiness, but you are responsible for your own. If you are not happy with your life, do something about it! Quit waiting for someone else to make you happy. Quit waiting for that one person to come along who is going to make you happy. Quit blaming other's for the unhappiness in your life. Take responsibility for your own happiness!

The other thing is the idea of life goals. I talked about one of my life goals being to be a good husband to my wife. That's a good example of a goal, but it's misleading. It's a good example because meeting the goal is entirely up to me. I'm not dependent on anyone else to meet that goal. It's a bit misleading because if you're not married, being a good husband is a horrible goal! It's horrible because you're not anyone's husband and you can't work toward that goal today, which is what life goals really are all about.

I guess I should have explained further. One of my life goals is to be a good man. By that, I mean that my goal is to do the right thing, stand up for what I believe, be a good worker, be chivalrous, caring, kind and generous. To enjoy all the things life has to offer and share them with others, and to share the pain and suffering that life brings us as well. It involves many, many different aspects of my life, and it involves always striving to be better than I am today. Being a good husband is part of this larger goal now that I am someone's husband, but before that, I was focused on being a good man, period. That's a goal you can work on every day, for the rest of your life.

When setting your goals, the important thing to remember is where you end and other's begin. I desire to have a good marriage, but it's the part I control that I focus on, because I can't control the rest. I desire to be respected at work, and recognized for my abilities, but my goal is to simply go to work each day and do my very best. That's the part I control, the rest depends on someone else. If it happens, great, but even if it doesn't, I met my goals, and I can feel good about what I've done. Waiting for other's to affirm or approve your efforts can be a very long and unsatisifying wait.

Bottom line: It's your life, you choose how you want to live it, and nobody else is going to live it for you.

Is everybody happy?

I got an email the other day with a sort of throw away comment that bothered me. Not so much in an offensive way, more of a "huh?". The comment was this "My goal in life is to make everyone happy".

Now that sounds nice, and on first reading it was that sort of self-sacrificing, kind thing that people say, but don't mean literally. Except I think this person, and many other people, mean it exactly as it's said. How sad for them. They've made the goal of their life something that they do not control, can not control and aren't responsible for!

Let's give an example. I love my wife, and having her be happy is one of the most exciting and worthwhile things I can spend my life trying to do. But I can't ever do it completely. As much as I try, there are any number of things that can make her unhappy on any given day that I have nothing to do with. (her job, her family, her friends, her health, etc.) The choices she makes concerning her job and her relationships with other people are her choices, and if they make her happy, great, but if they don't, that's her responsibility, not mine.

Of course, if I make it the goal of my life to make her happy, then every set back, or everything that makes her sad is, by extension, my fault:

My job is to make her happy. She's not happy, therefore I am failing.

Real life isn't that linear. In fact, my job is to be the best husband I can be. That should, in turn, make her happy with that aspect of her life. But the happiness is a symptom, not the goal. The only part of that equation I can control is being the best husband I know how to be. The rest of it is beyond my control. Her happiness is a step beyond what I can do. It's like going into a job interview. All you can control is how you act and how you handle the interview. You could go in, do the best interview you've ever done, do everything exactly the way you wanted to, and still not get the job. That doesn't mean you were a poor interview, it means they made their own decision about what they wanted. A decision you don't control.

On the flip side of this, consider also the fact that living this way is selfish. It sounds selfless but it's not. You're robbing other people of their rights. I have the right to make my own choices and pursue my own happiness, if I can borrow from historical documents. By taking the responsibility of my happiness on yourself, you are taking away the things that make me most alive. Being alive is about making choices, making mistakes, enjoying happiness and experiencing profound sadness. Anything less is not a full life. By taking it upon yourself to be solely responsible for another's happiness, you're shortchanging two lives. What a waste.

Follow up

I told you earlier about my wife getting a gift certificate for a professional massage and the way the have to deal with victims of abuse and rape often. Well last night was my appointment and I'm happy to report that it was pretty cool.

The first thing you have to do is fill out a medical history form, and also a "permission" form. The permission part of the form let's you specify if there are certain parts of your body you do not want to be touched, whether it be legs, face, abdomen, etc. That's a nice touch. Of course, for me it's not so much about where I'm touched as much as it is by whom, so it was good that when I met the therapist, I felt absolutely no sense of intimidation or fear. Then I could just check off that everything was ok and go from there. That lack of intimidation makes everything easy for me, and is somewhat hard to define. It's just a feeling I get from seeing someone, their physical presence and their attitude. She was also very good about communicating what she was doing, and letting me know that it was ok to tell her if something made me uncomfortable. That's important too, mostly because you have to realize that for a good portion of this procedure you're on your stomach and can't see the person touching you. I know that makes some survivors very uncomfortable. For me, it's only uncomfortable when I don't have the chance to see you first and acknowledge to myself who you are. It's those "surprise" touches from behind that tend to get me, and this is not a situation like that at all.

Anyway, like I said, I enjoyed it, I think it did a lot to relieve tension in my back, shouders and neck that can lead to migraines and it's another stress-reduction tool in the toolbox for me, which can never get too many tools! Especially since the alternative, for me, to reducing stress is dissociation. Not an acceptable option!

I'll probably do it again sometime!

Happy memories

I was reminded yesterday that, despite everything that went on in my childhood with the abuse, the lack of self-exteem, the depression, etc. there were actually some happy times. We went to see Miracle yesterday, the movie about the 1980 Olympic hockey team. I was 11 years old when those games were played, and I can still remember how awesome it was to watch that bunch of college kids beat the Soviets. I was also reminded that all I wanted to do after that was play hockey. Normally after hockey season was over all us neighborhood kids would switch over to baseball or other sports, but not 1980. We spent that entire summer playing roller hockey, no matter how hot it got! I think I spent at least part of every day of that summer vacation on skates, pretending to beat the Soviet team. It was my escape, my happy refuge from everything else that was going on, and I cherish every minute of it.

Breaking out of the winter doldrums

This probably happens every year, but this year I really started noticing it. I started feeling anti-social, grumpy, just plain out of it. I think a large part of that is winter. When it gets as cold and snowy as it has been around here lately, my life consists of going to work, and then going home. I don't necessarily have to interact with anyone at work most days, and then when I'm home I interact with my wife, but that's really it. So I decided to start to do something about it. Saturday, thanks to my wife's great idea to get out, we went to the Conservatory, which was a nice way to get out and do something without being in the cold! That helped, but now it's up to me to keep myself from getting back in the doldrums. So today I'm having lunch with an old friend of mine, I'm making plans to get together with another friend after work next week, and Angela and I are going to take a trip to DC next weekend.

All that should put me in a better place emotionally!

Dreams

Isn't it weird how much a bad dream can leave you feeling completely out of it when you wake up? I had a dream last night/this morning about having a panic attack. I don't normally suffer from panic attacks but in my dream, I had a bad one, and since no one around me seemed all that concerned about it, I'm assuming that to mean that they were used to the attacks.

I have no idea what any of it means. Probably nothing, I just find it interesting. :)

Just because

I'm posting this just so you all know I'm still here and things are still working. :)

We spent the last few days in Louisiana, a state which I am now determined just doesn't like me, visiting with Angela's grandfather. As any trip with your in-laws would be (or any trip with anyone is for me!), it had it's up and downs, but I'm glad we went. It was nice to meet Angela's grandfather and uncle and see where they live and the place that holds a lot of memories for her. It was warm for a few days, (It was like 11 degrees Fahrenheit this morning after we arrived home last night and I felt it!!!) and there were some fun times in there. Of course, there were the times where we were all getting on each others nerves, as any family visit can be, but I get along with my in-laws pretty well, so it was tolerable. (I don't ever, ever wat to travel somewhere with my family. Someone might have to die by the end of three days..*L*)

By the way, the reason I say it just doesn't like me is that the last time I was in the state, I got sick and spent 9 days in the hospital with a virus. This time, brushing across one lousy stalk of a weed left the entire left side of body covered in stickers, and the tiger in the zoo even growled at me and got up on his hind legs to shoo me away from him! *L*

While we were gone I got an email back to an email I sent out to a guy I grew up with back in Brooklyn, NY. It was a blast hearing from him, and I'm looking forward to corresponding with him but I had a rather strange thought today as I was thinking about what to write back. I thought about pointing him to my two websites, to show him what I like to do in my spare time, and it occurs to me that he knew me when I was actively being abused. Somehow telling him seems a bit different then talking about it to other people. Maybe it's just me...

Survived

Well I managed to survive the Christmas holiday with the whole family. :) Hope you managed to do the same...

Actually, my Christmas day was pretty nice, I got to wake up and open gifts with my wife, go take in a good movie with her, (Cold Mountain) and then go to my parents house for the chaos that is our family Christmas dinner. *L*

Now I'm just enjoying the fact that I had no work today and a nice, relaxing weekend to look forward to. Enjoy your weekend folks!

Reflective Pause

Yesterday marked an anniversary for me. Nothing big, but it was important to that time of my life. 6 years ago yesterday I started working at my current employer. Starting this job then was a big deal, not because of the job necessarily but because it marked the final corner turn in my recovery. After a couple of years of manic depression, random fugue states, therapy, medication, a divorce, a stay in the hospital and almost a year of unemployment recovering from both the physical symptoms of the illness that put me in the hospital and the mental/emotional symptoms of my depression, I was finally getting back to work. I don't suppose at that time I knew that I would spend 6 years of my life here, and I certainly never anticipated meeting and falling in love with Angela here, but it happened. That's sort of the way life goes sometimes. :)

Thinking back, I probably am most surprised that I lived through that time. Lots of other folks who go through similar experiences don't. I don't know why I was lucky enough to survive, and lord knows I even tried to not survive it, but I did. Again, that's the way life works sometimes. Doesn't make much sense, but there it is.

Starting a job at that time was such a huge event for me. Oh I suppose it's a huge event for everyone, but just having a job was pretty huge. Like I said, it was a major corner turn, it was the last bit of the puzzle. It allowed me to feel like I was living more of a "normal" life. I got up in the morning and went to work. I was doing something productive, and getting paid. For the first time in a long time I was taking care of myself, and viewing my life as something worth taking care of. I was also learning to take all those stress techniques and lessons from all that time in therapy and applying it in everyday life. I was learning how to do my best and be happy with that. I was learning how to handle stressful situations without falling back into depression. I was seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. The light that represented healing. It didn't end my struggles with depression and other issues, but the light gave me hope that I could at least learn to live with them and be happy. Just simply being happy didn't seem possible for years and now I could see it as a possibility again. That has made all the difference in the last 6 years.

Good weekend

Had a pretty good, albeit busy, weekend, We spent Friday evening out at Easton meeting a fellow blogger and his wife for dinner and good conversation, then spent Saturday cleaning and preparing to have a couple of folks over to our house for dinner, and then spent Sunday getting caught up with Christmas shopping and then trying to spend some quiet time at home by ourselves. All in all a pretty good balance. I enjoy being with people but it's a very tiring experience for little introverted me, and holiday shopping is just plain exhausting all the way around, so the quiet time last night was very well appreciated. Hopefully I'll make it through all the extra social holiday times with a good balance of quiet time alone to keep me from getting grumpy. I'm sure Angela would appreciate that too! :)

Discussion

Over the holiday weekend, my wife and I had a very long, very interesting conversation about relationships. Not the dating, marriage kind, but the people who you spend so much energy trying to impress. It seems like everyone has someone in their life who makes them feel inadequate, someone who's respect you want the most, but who is either unwilling, or incapable of giving it. The person who you so want to love you that you'll go out of your way, turn your own life upside down, give up your own plans and dreams, just to try and make them happy. But it never really does.

People who demand that you do that are no better than abusers. They may not physically beat you, but they steal your self-esteem, they steal your time and attention away from things that are more constructive. In some cases, they steal your life. They make you believe that pleasing them, and gaining their respect is worth more than living your own life. It isn't. They manipulate you and control you in the same way that your abuser did when you were a child, but you're not a child. They are.

Don't let anyone else control you. You only live once, make it worthwhile for you and the people who love you and accept you. Not for the people who demand you to be something you're not.

Latest forum posts looking for a discussion: (or start your own!)

Couple of Psych blogs

Ozzy Osbourne

Comments on dating a survivor

First birthdays

This past weekend we were with my family to celebrate my niece's first birthday. I couldn't help but think about what her life is going to be like, all of the many, many things she has in store for her childhood, all the happy memories that she and her older brother are going to have growing up together, and all of the hopes that we all have for her to be happy and healthy. That's what a childhood should be and I hope she can have the best one possible!

Family thoughts

I've had some incomplete thoughts about my family ever since my grandmother was in town this past weekend. She's the last living grandparent I have, and she delivered a batch of old pictures to my mother when she came up for the visit, which were also interesting to see. (I'm planning on "borrowing" them from my parents at some point to scan for my own safekeeping.) The problem is, I just don't seem able to put into words the feelings and thoughts I've been having since then. It's a muddled mixture of sadness, regret, loss, and anger about the past, mixed with contentment and happiness about the present and the future, with a twinge of missing the aunts, uncles, cousins, and other various relatives that I've lost contact with over the years.

Maybe, eventually, those feelings will find words, but for now, they're just a big melancholy mess.

Vacation

You can see some of the highlights from our vacation here. We had a really good time, it was very relaxing and fun, and it was just plain nice to get away from day to day life for a little while!

Lucky Me

Today is my second wedding anniversary. We aren't going to be doing anything special today to celebrate, mostly because she's got a 12 hour workday scheduled, but we will be celebrating in style by relaxing in Tennessee for most of the week!

After my first marriage ended in utter failure due to my ongoing battles (losses were more like it..) with depression and abuse issues, I really didn't plan on getting married again. When I finally started to get serious about taking care of myself and getting mentally healthy again, it wasn't because I wanted to be a better husband, boyfriend or whatever. In fact, I was doing it as a matter of survival more than anything else at that point. After everything I had been through, suicide attempts, living on the streets, a hospital stay, etc. I knew I was just lucky to be alive. I can see a number of situations, looking back, that could have just as easily ended up with me dead as not. The fact that I, somehow, survived these drove me to try and make sure that I managed to stay out of those situations before my luck ran out!

At the time, my main goal was simply learning to live with myself, let alone living with someone else. I had to go back and learn how to do things that most people learn as children. I had to see my life as worth living, see myself as someone with skills and talents who could live a responsible life. I had to learn how to make decisions, how to see what makes me happy, and give myself the freedom to do that. Most of all I needed to simply live. To accept who I am, and where I'm going, to be happy with nothing but myself.

I learned those lessons and began to put together a decent enough life for myself before I ever met Angela. It wasn't great, but I learned to be happy with it, to find enjoyment where I could, to be content with myself and my health.

Two years ago, however, I married the woman who had come, at that time, to be my biggest supporter, my best friend, my love. She saw beyond the weaknesses I still struggled with and saw the strength I had used to come this far, she loved me for getting to where I was, she didn't shun me for not being where others thought I should be. She showed me even more how to enjoy every day, and how to love with reckless abandon by loving me recklessly. She still does to this day, and the last two years have been absolutely the best two years of my life.

I know that, after everything is said and done that I'm lucky to be alive, and I'm lucky to be healthy, and I'm lucky to have the happiness I have in my life today. Most of all, I'm lucky to have someone to share it all with.

Or maybe I'm most lucky because I have a wife who blogs Billie Holiday lyrics for our anniversary? :)

Tennessee

I saw this entry over at Instapundit the other day of pictures he took driving around the mountains near Knoxville and Gatlinburg. I got really excited because we're going to be in Tennessee next week. We'll be staying closer to the Cumberland Plateau part of the state than we will be the Smokies, but there should be some great places to shoot some nice landscape photos, and then we may even go by Gatlinburg and through some of the mountains before we head home. (Plus my brother and sister-in-law will be with us for part of the trip so that means pictures of my niece and nephew too!) I'm looking forward to getting out there and taking some pictures. It looks like this may be about the last vacation I take for the rest of the year, we'd better make it worthwhile!

Stress

It's amazing how much stress I can feel when any change might be coming in my life, even when it's good change! I feel run down, tired, and a little under the weather, all because I'm using up all of my energy worrying about how some things are going to work out. Yes there's potential for some big changes, but I should take my own advice and take them all one step at a time and not until I can actually do something about it, right?

That being said, I'm still nervous, and there's still nothing definite to talk about..:)

Wow

Gee it's been awhile since I wrote anything here, huh? I guess by the time I got back from vacation I needed to catch up on so many things that I sort of lost track. There was a ton of work stuff to get to, there was spending some time with my wife, there was fixing up the laptop since the drive crashed the day before I left and I just sort of threw together a quick install to have something to work with on the road, there was the Irish Festival, a bunch of emails and everything else that comes with being gone for a little while.

The trip was good, got to spend a lot of time playing with the cameras and seeing some amazing scenery. I got to see my friend, Steve, who I haven't seen in something like 5 years. It was a pretty good reminder of just how much has changed for me over that time. How different I am now, what with being healthier and happier. ;)

Lastly I think it was good because in some ways, it laid to rest some ghosts. It allowed me to enjoy spending time with someone who has been a good friend in the past and not have to feel guilty because I've changed so much and my interests have changed so much that we no longer have anything in common. That's been my experience in most cases when it comes to people I used to go to church with, now that I recognize how much being that involved in the church actually contributed to my illness more than it helped (by allowing me to think that being just like these people would make me happy somehow), we have nothing in common and I mostly just make them uncomfortable. Being with Steve wasn't like that. We still actually do have some things in common and can still relate and enjoy seeing each other. I'm glad for that.

Rest Day

Now I know what you're thinking, spending nearly 11 hours driving from Des Moines to Denver is hardly what you would consider a rest day, but I never claimed to be normal. You have to understand, as much as I enjoy meeting people and chatting with people at something like Gnomedex, I'm an introvert, to the extreme. Carrying on conversations and hanging out with people is fun, but it's also exhausting for me! It is just simply a lot of mental and emotional effort for me to not clam up and be shy, and it takes a lot out of me. Driving by myself for 11 hours was exactly what I needed before getting back into the "social" me tomorrow morning! I am looking forward to seeing Steve though, I haven't seen him in a few years, it'll be fun!

Gnomedex

Yes, I'm here at Gnomedex again this year. Having a pretty good time, although in groups like this I find myself being somewhat guarded, and my past definitely shows up large at times. It's a bit weird having people come up and talk to you because they read one of your sites, or more, and know so much about me. I mean, I'm naturally shy so it's nice in the sense that people will start conversations with me and we can talk without me being too terribly shy. On the other hand, it just shows me how much I don't naturally trust people right off the bat because I find my self being somewhat guarded in talking with them. Each year I get a little bit better though, so that's good!

I'm sure I'll get more practice at it throughout today and this evening. I'm looking forward to it!

Combining my two sides

As you know, if you've been reading here long, my two blogs really, to me, represent the two different sides of me. My tech blog is, obviously, my geeky, technical side, while this blog is more about my emotional, sensitive and creative side. Well, now with my new birthday present, a Minolta X700 SLR camera, I can see both of them being very happy. The techie side is excited about learning to use the camera, and messing around with the features, while my creative side is excited about getting some really great photos!

Between this and the digital camera I already have, photography is quickly becoming my "crossover" hobby that appeals to both sides of me.

Visiting

Angela and I went to Chickamauga National battlefield memorial while we were in Chattanooga over the weekend. There's something about standing in a place where 34,000 men lost their lives over the course of just a few days that really puts all of life's little problems in perspective.

Personal Update

Those of you who follow along on the tech blog know that I was anticipating a long, stressful couple of days this week because of our annual meeting at work. I was looking forward to that being over and done with Weds. night and relaxing. However, that did not turn out to be the case, as during the event Weds, I learned that my grandmother passed away.

Instead of going home that night and relaxing, I rushed home at 7:30 to grab some food and then work on finding out what I could about the funeral details, how I might be able to make it back to New York for the funeral, etc. Not exactly a stress-free activity. That carried over into Thursday morning, when I finally was able to find out some definite information about the funeral and wound up, ultimately with my decision that it just wasn't feasible for us to get there for it.

I'm not overly sad that we won't make the funeral. My grandmother has been suffering from dementia for a long time now. Angela and I were back there in Oct 2001 to see her, before the dementia got really bad. It was, in my mind, a chance for my new wife to meet my grandmother, and a chance for me to say goodbye, knowing that even if she somehow survived long enough to be around the next time I was in town, she probably wouldn't be coherent. I knew that then, and took the opportunity to "say goodbye" while she could still appreciate the time and the visit. That, to me, is far more important than whether I make it to her funeral or not.

As far myself, I don't think the reality has hit me yet. Like I said, I found out in the middle of a very busy day, and didn't have time to even think about it, let alone feel anything. By last night, I was just tired. Physically and emotionally there was nothing left last night. Today, I feel it somewhat, but not in the way I expected. I'm not sad, or having any sort of emotional outburst, I just can't seem to really find any enjoyment or desire to do the things I normally do. I'm simply not in the mood to read the tech news, check up on the political happenings, watch the Stanley Cup Finals, etc. All those things just don't interest me right now. Mostly, I just want to sleep. Maybe after I'm not so tired I'll be able to feel again, and then things will get back to normal. We'll see..

Marriage

My wife spent Saturday and Sunday visiting with her folks while I was on call all weekend and had to stay in town. I know there are some people out there who see that we actually do travel off to do things without each other as a bad sign, but to us it's just normal behavior. One of the best things about our marriage is the freedom to still be individuals. There are certain things that I enjoy doing that she doesn't, and visa versa. There's nothing wrong with that, and there's even nothing wrong with us doing those activities apart from each other. (Not that I don't enjoy visiting her folks, I just couldn't this time, so why should she have to cancel as well?)

I love spending time with my wife, more than anything in the world, but I also love, that when we are together, we can talk about the things that we've done when were apart. The best thing about a trip or an event that I attend without her is coming home and telling her about it. If we did everything together all the time, what would we talk about? :)

So, for all of you who feel sorry that she went to her parents without me, just remember that the strength of our marriage comes not from being together all the time, but from being two strong individuals who share our lives together. I'd take that choice every time.

Geeking out

If you read my other blog at all, you pretty much know I've been working on a ton of tech things lately. I know this is directly in response to the stress that's going on at work. Our annual meeting is next week, and we're having a bigger meeting than we've ever done before. Somewhere around 900-1000 people are going to be there. Obviously the entire office is completely stressed and working hard on this meeting, but in response to that, I guess as sort of a way of keeping myself from thinking about it all the time, I've found some things that will keep my attention away from it.

Mostly I'm doing this because I'm not in a position to be in control of much of what will happen next week, and I think some of it is going to be a mess. Rather than fret or dwell on the poor, IMHO, decisions that were made, it's probably best if my mental and emotional energy is tied into other projects, eh?

It's all part of recognizing what I can and cannot control and taking the proper steps to not waste emotional energy on the things I can't control. Hmm, maybe I'm actually starting to fiigure some of this stuff out? Nah, probably just lucky. :)

Out of control

Want to know how little control we have over the circumstances of our lives? Yesterday I was sick, at home, with an internet connection that wasn't working and, later in the day, a telephone that didn't work.

And there wasn't a damn thing I could do about any of it, so there was no real point in getting angry about it either.

Long week

Man I'm glad it's Friday. I've been working on so many different things this week that I've completely lost all track of what day it is, which makes the week seem really, really long! You know, because like Weds night I wasn't thinking "two more days until the weekend", I was just getting through Weds and then moving on to Thursday without any thought as to anything past that.

I'll still be doing quite a bit of work with computers over the weekend, but at least I'll be able to get some extra sleep and spend some time with Angela. The stuff that usually makes me feel a little less run-down. :)

Maybe I'll even get out of my overly geek mode and be sociable too? I'm sure she'd enjoy that!

Hope you have a good one!

A week?

Gee has it really been a whole week since I posted anything here? That can only mean one thing, I've been living on the logical, analytical side non stop lately!

Actually I have been. Between job hunting, holidays, working, and playing with a bunch of beta software in order to increase my skill set, I've been pretty much completely geeked out lately. That's not necessarily a bad thing, for now. There's a lot on my plate, and let's face it, most of this stuff is done much more easily sans the emotional side. :)

At the same time, it's the excitement of all this new stuff, and the new possibilites that keeps me going, so there is still some emotion. It's just not a negative emotion so I'm not really used to describing it. *L*

Hope all is well with you!

Pictures

Baltimore pictures are up. Angela also has her own version here.

We had a really nice time, and it was wonderful to get three whole days of uninterrupted "us" time. Baltimore wasn't the greatest city I've ever visited but we enjoyed ourselves none the less!

Have a nice weekend

Angela and I will be off early in the morning to spend a nice three day weekend exploring Baltimore. It should be fun, seems like there's some neat stuff to do there, and most of all, it will just be nice to spend some time with my wife! We've both been so busy and preoccupied that it's been a long time since we just enjoyed each others company without any outside distractions. I'm looking forward to catching up on "us" time!

Hope you all have a good weekend!

Panic attacks

I discovered something yesterday. I always thought having a panic attack was the most out of control feeling I would ever have. I was wrong. Watching someone you love having one and knowing that there's nothing you can do, is worse!

Snow Bound

Since we currently have somewhere in the area of a foot and a half of snow on the ground, I'm feeling very glad to have the President's Day holiday off work. We don't have to go anywhere today, and it looks like the most logical thing to do in this weather is exactly that, go nowhere!

Hope you're enjoying your Monday, wherever you are.:)

Car Trouble

Is there anything more stressful than having car trouble? I'm fairly sure that it's an alternator problem, but the car is only a year old. I shouldn't be having that sort of problem with it! Not to mention the fact that I just had it at the dealership for a recall last week. (Unrelated problem.) It's not exactly the most convenient place to get to either, let me tell you.

Grr I hate cars!!!

Gee and I was doing so well

I was doing so well, making new entries almost every day, and then the weekend hit, and , well, not so much. :)

I guess I just see weekends as "my" time. That may mean updating a site, or working on a tech project, but it may also mean just spending time, getting caught up with Angela after a long week. This weekend was a little of both, as we spent a good part of the weekend enjoying being together, talking about what's been going on, appreciating what we have every day after witnessing the tragedy of the Space Shuttle Columbia. Then it also had it's tech projects, as I strive to learn more and more that can, hopefully, lead to a new position and even more opportunities for learning.

I think that's a pretty productive weekend. Enjoying what we have right now, and striving to educate yourself is a pretty good prescription for anyone's weekend, I would think. Hope your's was as good!

Stress related

I'm showing all the classic signs of someone struggling with stress related disorders right now. Headaches, fatigue, jaw pain from gritting and grinding my teeth, etc. That's not good, but at the same time, it's something I've got to learn to live with.

You see the stress comes not from looking for a new job, but from the "unknown" surrounding everything. I need, and want, to find a new job. I want to broaden my search to some out-of-town areas because Angela and I want to move to one of them eventually, so why not see what possibilites are there now?

Sounds exciting doesn't it? Yeah it's hard work, but the potential payoff is worth it, right? That's true, and I do feel that way, but you also have to understand that ever since I was a little kid, I've lived in abject fear of the unknown. Any situation that I cannot plan for in every detail is a great source of stress for me. It's a very personal challenge right now for me to enter into a search when I can't know how long it's going to take, where I'm going to end up, how much money it's going to cost me to conduct interviews out of town, and maybe eventually move out of town, or even if I'm going to make the right choice! That's a lot of stuff that I don't know and that I can't really plan for. That leaves me feeling very on edge, and out of control. And while that's not necessarily a bad thing, it's something I've tried very hard since my illnesses to avoid.

On the other hand, it's time to grow up and take on this responsibility as an adult. It's time to face this challenge and come out the other side as a better person, with a better job, and start to build a future with my wife. It's time to realize that all the abuse, and all the depression I've been through is in the past, and that there's nothing wrong with taking a chance and trying to step up to this challenge. Most of all it's time to learn how to do this without over stressing about it, or at least it's time to learn to live with the stress I'm feeling now, knowing that the end result is worth the struggle.

Maybe it's just time to realize that even if I make a mistake, or even if I don't plan absolutely 100 percent correctly, that life will go on and I will still have another day to try again. There's a feeling I'm unfamiliar with and really shouldn't be. :)

I passed!

For those of you who have been following things over on the Tech Blog, you already know that I passed my A+ Certifications on Monday. That's a relief!!!

I did, however, find it odd that I got so stressed out about them. I can remember in HS being so incredibly good at taking tests that I never sweated a test. I was one of those geeky kids who actually looked forward to tests as a time to shine, and ruined the grading curve for everyone else :)

But that was then, and this is now. It was a real strong reminder of what a different person I am now. Even though the abuse was going on in my childhood, I was always convinced that I was smart. "Gifted" if you will. I never doubted that. But now, after all the depression and other mental illness that the abuse spurred in my adult life, I have huge doubts about how smart I really am. I guess, while I may not miss the cockiness I had about it when I was younger, I do miss the confidence. Hopefully more things like this will help me start to get it back. :)

It doesn't really feel like New Year's Eve.

I have decided that it just doesn't feel like New Year's any more. Last year didn't, and this year doesn't either. Even though the new year will start in less than 11 hours, I don't find myself with any sort of undue anticipation of the event, nor do I have any plans to do much of anything out of the ordinary. I can't figure out why this is so, however. I think it has to do with the fact that, really, what difference does it make? It's the day we have chosen to mark the beginning of the next calendar year, but really we could have picked any date for that. Would it make any difference if the new year started on July 1, or Oct. 1 instead of Dec. 1? I don't think so. (Strike that, it would make one big difference, if it were July 1, we Americans would be the ones having New Years' beach/barbecue parties instead of the Aussies. *L*)

It's not because I am no longer a child, looking forward to family New Year's traditions. No, I'm afraid, in my case, most of the new year memories I have are of other people celebrating while I was sick. (Call it a freak of coincidence, or a psychosomatic fear of crowds of drunken people, but of the 34 new year's I have lived through, probably about 20 of them have been spent with me getting sick somehow..)

No, I think it's the Y2K bug. You remember, when the calendar changed to 2000 it was going to be a major event, there might even be chaos and panic on the street, but even if not, the celebrations were huge, amazing, a triumphant entry into the new millennium! Every since then, every other new year has just seemed rather anticlimactic, hasn't it?

Oh well, at least we get a day off of work for it!

Holidays

Hope your Christmas was good. Ours was actually pretty nice. It didn't used to be this way. Christmas growing up was about getting presents, obviously, but it was also very stressful, never knowing where the family fights were going to start, what sort of snide comments were going to be made about you, etc. I guess it still is that way, but I don't care anymore. My family is what my family is and I can't change it. I have, however, started to create my own Christmas traditions that are shared with my wife, and mean much more to me than any time with my family does. I can handle all of the stress of visiting with my family much easier when I know that they are only a small part of my life anymore. That the bulk of my life and inspiration, my identity, and security come from within myself, and from a person who truly loves me for everything I am now. No one can touch that, and no one can take that away from me.

My fondest hope for you this holiday season is just that same piece of mind. The ability to see your true self, and the ability to see those who would tear you down for what they truly are as well. :)

She made me cry..

My wife made me cry today with this post over on her blog. I hope that you and your loved ones are making joyous memories as often as possible!

Thankfulness

After spending the weekend at the in-laws for the Thanksgiving holiday, we have returned home, and as is our yearly tradition, Angela and I will make a list of the things we are thankful for. This year my list will be topped off by my health, mental and physical. It's the top because I know that nothing else that I have to be thankful for would even be possible if I hadn't managed to get healthy and start to live my life after surviving the abuse and dealing with some of the issues that followed me into adulthood, especially the manic depression. :)

After that, of course, I'll be thankful for the love and life that I share with my wonderful wife, and after this weekend of being pampered by my in-laws, I might just have to be pretty thankful for the good relationship I have with them. It would be pretty hard to have better in-laws than I do in Angela's parents.

Get a clue...

Here's a little life lesson for you. If you're dating someone who breaks up with you, lying about being pregnant to get him to stay and then covering up that lie with a mystery miscarriage is bad. When he finds out it was all a lie, he's going to hate you on a level that you cannot even comprehend right now, so don't do it.

Suffice it to say, no matter how many years pass, a phone call from you is going to wind up with the same exact sound every time. *click*

Baby stuff

We, finally, made it over to my brother and sister in law's last night and got to meet our little neice, Kaitlyn. She's so tiny, at 7 lbs 11 ounces she's very small compared to the rest of the boy McBride babies. (I was 10 and a half pounds, which is just average for my family..*L*)

Angela's got more details, and pictures.

Update

The conversation went well, he was shocked to find out about what all had happened, and had some questions, but it was good to get it out.

On the other hand it went later than I expected so we didn't get to go see the baby. But on the third hand, that's probably a good thing since I wound up being sick this morning. I didn't need to be around newborns carrying whatever germ I might have. I'll see her some time in the early part of next week.

The odd thing is, my brother and sister-in-law's good friends were also due next week, and I understand they had their son about a half-hour before Kaitlyn was born. So Congrats to Brian and Susie as Well! (Babies, babies everywhere!)

Tiny little life

I became an uncle for the second time today. My sister-in-law gave birth to a baby girl this morning. I can't wait to go meet my little niece.

On the other hand, I'm also supposed to be meeting the other member of my family that I talked about earlier, to talk about the abuse and the history of certain things. I guess today is a pretty good microcosm of life as a whole, eh? Things worth celebrating going on at the same time as things that are difficult.

We'll have to see how the schedule for the evening works out.

Been awhile

Yeah it's been awhile since I had anything to say over on this side of the world. I guess that all has to do with being busy. Haven't had a whole lot of time to really be contemplative lately, so it means less posting over here. Of course that usually means more posting over on the Tech Blog, so it's a mixed bag. :)

But it's also a sign that maybe I need to slow down a bit and take stock of where I am with my emotions and my mental health. This weekend's our first wedding anniversary and while it means more activity, as we travle to Chicago for the weekend, it's also a good opportunity to pause for a few moments and make sure I'm not bringing any unneeded emotional baggage with us on the trip! I want this to be a wonderful weekend of Angela and I enjoying each other and celebrating what has been an amazing year together. I think we can accomplish that, but I probably need to take some "alone" time between then and now, to unwind and let go of work stresses. I didn't do a good job of letting go of work stresses last weekend, and wound up not being in the greatest of moods by the time our weekend was over, I don't want to repeat that!

Perfect way to spend lunch

The perfect way to spend my lunch hour today, not reading news stories about the anniversary, or looking at haunting images of the WTC, but meeting my wife for lunch and spending time appreciating what we have together. Thank you Angela!

And on that same note, let me also say thank you to the inspirational bloggers over there in the blogrolls. You guys rock! :)

Fargo

Made a stop in Fargo, ND Sunday as part of my great vacation getaway. This stop was especially to see my friend Jen, her husband, Nathan, and their new baby, Amelia. I loved seeing the baby, and getting to spend a little time with Jen. On the other hand this is one little five-week old that has not learned to sleep more than 2 hours at a time. I was looking at two very tired parents. Two parents who have been working and taking care of this new baby and who both had to turn around and start back with their classes this week.

Yet through all of that, I also saw two people who love each other and their little girl more than anything. I have nothing but respect for them and what they are doing. I really can't complain much about my little problems when I see them sacrificing so much for their baby. I just wish there was something I could do to help them out somehow, even just a little. :)

Gnomedex

Hanging out here at Gnomedex this weekend. There's more details on the tech and speakers on the tech blog but something that occurs to me today is more appropriate here.

There's something very intimidating about being around this many smart, successful people. It's hard to see myself as belonging, or being smart enough. I know that it's simply a self-esteem issue, but it still really keeps me from being more outgoing and talking to more people. I'm glad for the few conversations I have had and the few people I have met, that's a success! I just hope I can continue the growth and someday come here and really feel like I am one of those smart, successful people. Someday...

Irish need not apply

I saw a replica sign that said "Irish Need Not Apply" at the Irish festival, and had some thoughts about that. I was reminded of those thoughts when I was listening to the Donegal X-Press CD I picked up over the weekend this morning. There's a song on there called The Work Shanty that is about the job discrimination that Irish immigrants faced when they came to this country.

I am reminded of the fact that while I come from an immigrant background, my great-grandfather McBride was part of the Irish immigration around the turn of the century, Angela can trace her family in America to well before the Revolutionary War. Her forefathers were possibly the ones discriminating against the Irish immigrants. :)

But that's not my point. My point is that I really came to appreciate what those immigrants went through and how hard they worked to overcome stereotypes and discrimination, because if they hadn't, I don't believe Angela and I being happily married, like we are, would even be a possibility. They struggled and worked, fought and clawed their way to respectability so that their children and future generations could take full part in the American Dream. It makes me proud to be an Irish-American, to understand who came before me, and who cleared the way for me to enjoy the life I have now.

Thought provoking

I was reading a post over at Robert Scoble's blog today about what he's been doing, the things he's learning about himself and how his blogging fits into his life. It's all very interesting. As you know, I have two blogs, so these questions about how they fit into my life, and what part of me they represent are interesting to me.

I've tried to keep the two separate. I wanted the tech blog to be mostly about technology, about my work, with a little bit of my life to give it some personality. Meanwhile I've tried to make this one very personal, to give you a glimpse into my introspective life. A place to share my thoughts, my struggles, etc. I try to stay focused on the core reasons I started each blog, as they are what truly differentiates them. The tech blog is all about sharing information, creating a community of tech enthusiasts to share knowledge, tips and ideas with each other. I try to further that goal with each post over there, sometimes successfully, sometimes not, but that's what I'm trying to do. The goals here, however are a little more convoluted. I'm trying, as I have for all the years I've been doing a Child Abuse site, to help survivors feel less alone. How do you communicate that in a journal form though?

I mean, I can sit and say that I was abused as a child, I was beaten and molested, and that would accomplish what I set out to do, show survivors that they are not alone in their struggles. But once I've stated that, where do I go? I try to talk about the things I've learned after years of therapy, and what I did to get myself to being healthy again, but what worked for me may not work for you. Healing is an individual accomplishment, and a personal journey. Our struggles and our coping mechanisms may be similar, but they are not exactly alike. We are all individuals, and have our own ways of healing from the abuse.

So the more I try to write about these things, the more the blog is about me, and not about the subject of child abuse. The same goes for the tech blog, the more I share myself, and give it some personality, the more the blog is about me, with a subtext of technology. I started out thinking the two would be completely different and find myself thinking that really they aren't that much different. They represent two different aspects of me. There are many other aspects that get only brief mention, not whole blogs, but they are all part of me, and they intertwine quite often, despite my plans of keeping a "wall" between these two areas.

The bottom line is, to understand who Mike is, you need to see all of the different things that make me what I am, and both of these blogs do that in part. They intertwine because the subject areas intertwine within me. You can't truly understand the driving forces behind my love of technology and internet communications without taking into account the severe distrust that comes with dealing with people face to face for me. At the same time you can't fully understand the enjoyment I get out of doing the abuse site because of the way I was able to learn about technology by working on that site. The audiences aren't the same for the sites, but they are both part of me. The only way to truly understand me, at least the parts of me that are there to be understood online, is to understand how both of them fit together.

Ultimately, if you read both of these blogs, and my wife's blog, (because she'll include day to day things that we do that aren't part of my blogs sometimes) you might get a fair picture of who I am and what I'm about, but it'll still be incomplete because I don't know myself completely. It's a life-long journey of searching and learning about myself, and trying to better myself, and these sites are both part of that process. I don't understand those who think they can understand someone by reading what they write, because most of us don't even understand ourselves, let alone other people. The best we can do is write what we know, as of now, and keep learning and communicating.

Life is full of changes

Tomorrow is the last day that Angela and I will work in the same place. It's going to be sort of weird to not work together anymore. This is where we met, so even though we're married and have had a bond outside of the workplace for over 2 years, this will be the first time we've not had work in common. I think there's something a little scary about that, but I'm not sure what it is. I know I'm going to miss having her here in the office everyday, that's for sure. I'm also sure there will be a period of adjustment at home as well. Now, since we see each other all day, we've both gotten very used to just doing our own individual things in the evenings, but that's probably going to change to some extent. There's always something a little scary when you start talking about making changes and adjusting what has been a pretty happy and comfortable marriage thus far, but I know for a fact that she is going to be happier at this new job, which makes any adjustment worth it to me.

If she's happier, then the rest will just fall into place eventually. We love each other enough to make sure of that, no matter how much adjustment might be needed. I'm excited by the new opportunities she's going to get at her new job, and I know she's going to rock at it!

Good stuff

This was good news weekend for me. On Friday evening we found out that Angela got a new job, and then Saturday morning one of my best friends, Jen, had her baby! Amelia Elizabeth Meyers came into the world at 3:38AM Saturday and mother and baby are both fine. That's awesome!

Obviously both Jen and Angela are looking forward to the new challenges in their lives. I'm sure they'll both be great at it, they are both incredibly strong, smart and talented women. As different as they are, they have that in common, and I am lucky enough to be able count one as my wife and the other as a good friend. There's something to be said for having people you have the utmost respect for in your life. I think it's almost a source of pride for me to have people who I respect so much, care about and respect me in return.

It's been a good weekend to remember all the good that life has to offer!

Some followup on church experiences.

As I have previously discussed, I no longer consider myself a member of any specific church. I used to, in fact I used to teach Bible Studies on a regular basis, but I no longer do that. On the Tech blog, I mentioned that as part of discussing public speaking in general, and it seemed to spark some interest on the whole subject of religion, which I thought it would. I tried to downplay that aspect of it, or at least keep it civilized by pointing out my theological training and how people did not want to argue with me. Mostly that was to ward off the knee-jerk reactions of both those who would condemn me for no longer attending church or those who would laugh at having wasted 10 years of my life on a "myth". Trust me, I can defend myself from either extreme position quite well.

However, there did seem to be a small, civilized group whose interest was piqued, and it's to those people I want to address a more thorough explanation.

As the previous post indicates, the church I attended, at least the people I worked with, were incapable of seeing mental illness and depression as a real illness, and not just a question of "spiritual health". That hurt, probably more than I will ever be willing to admit. But on top of that, there came a point in my life where I was doing everything the church leadership would have suggested I do, and I was still miserable. I heard a very good sermon this weekend while visiting my in-laws church, (out of respect for them and their beliefs I do attend church with them when we are down there for the weekend, so I do actually step foot in a church from time to time!) about how God will sometimes make you miserable as a way of letting you know that you're not doing what He would want you to be doing. I identified with that, completely. I was miserable, because I was using my church-life to ignore the very real issues I had with depression and dissociation. I had to step back from that life in order to deal with my issues, but that was completely unacceptable to a large number of people in that church. You simply weren't allowed to not attend and be heavily involved with the church, and making the choice to do so to attend to other matters was simply "walking away from God" in their eyes. They wanted nothing to do with me after that, and I will never go back to that church because of that.

To put it simply, as I have to others, I don't have a problem with God, or even theology, I simply don't think I will ever be able to trust a group of people again enough to make myself a part of their church. I realize that means that I give up some of the good things that can come out of working in a church structure, but at this point I'm willing to trade that for the solace of knowing that I won't have to deal with this sort of thing ever again. Maybe that will change, and maybe it won't.

On turning 34

Well it's after midnight, so I guess that means this is now officially the 4th of July, and, my 34th birthday. It means that we get to wake up in the morning and prepare for the annual McBride family gathering at our house, which isn't too bad. With that being an annual tradition, the 3rd has sort of become the day Angela and I spend celebrating by ourselves. Tonight that involved her taking me to a new place for dinner. Paul's 5th Avenue is right on the corner of our street, yet we had never bothered to check it out before tonight. Oh what we have been missing! Delicious Italian food like I haven't had since moving from NYC. Angela had the Chicken Parm, while I went with the Angel Hair with Gorgonzola Pollo. It was so freaking good! After a bit of a break at home we then ventured off to see the fireworks. Luckily for us, our neighborhood has a nice park with a view of downtown just 3 blocks away. Going there beats the heck out of messing with all the downtown traffic, what with half a million people being downtown for the show. She wrote more about it on her blog. If you want more firework details go there, and then come back!

Now it's late, and, like most years, I get to spend a little time being reflective. What does turning 34 mean? Not much really. It's not an overly significant age, it puts me fairly close to 35, but even that isn't a big deal. It's 4 years since I turned 30 though, and that's something. I remember turning 30 vividly. I had gotten divorced the year before, had only been off medication for a short while, was still very unsure of how healthy I was, and was still very much seeking for the correct path for my life to take. I remember running into a friend who told me turning 30 was the best thing that could happen to me right then, because my 20's were filled with trying to do what was expected of me, or what I thought I was supposed to do. Now that I had screwed that up, I could go on and make a new start at 30, and do whatever I wanted to do with my life. That's some of the best advice I have ever gotten from anyone. Thanks, Bruce, wherever you are! :)

Now it's four years later and I see the path my life has taken over these 4 years. I've lived my life as well as I could, experienced some of the highest highs, and even some relatively low points. It's not the life that I envisioned for myself at my 30th birthday, it's better. At 30, I had given up on love, and would have been content just to have a good job, a few good friends, some people who I could trust, some hobbies I enjoyed, etc. That would have been enough for me, and would have represented such a comfortable, safe life, that it appealed to me greatly after all of the shit that was packed into my first 30 years on Earth. I still believe that I could have been content with that life, but I've taken some chances, I've made some "unsafe" choices and have been rewarded in ways that exceed anything I could have imagined. I've fallen deeply in love and committed to share my life with someone who loves me better than I deserve. I've been places and seen things that I never could have imagined, I've laughed and cried with friends who love me, who accept me, and who want nothing more from me than to enjoy the friendship they have with a healthy Michael. I've learned more in the last few years than at anytime in my adult life, and I've discovered a whole new wealth of people through my websites who share my interests, my passions, and teach me new things everyday. In short, as I turn 34 today, I have to consider myself a very lucky, and a very blessed man.

I thank you all for blessing me, and my websites with your knowledge, and your passion. Have a wonderful Independence Day! (Or for you Canadian folks, hope you had a wonderful Canada Day on the 1st!)

Driving

There is just something about a driving vacation for me that is so much more relaxing than flying. Flying, to me, is always about being on time, rushing to the airport and through security, worrying about what you've packed, how long this is going to take, will I make my connection, etc. Driving is just about me and the road. Sure there's traffic, and sometimes there are even delays, but I'm not going to miss my connection, I'm sitting in it. I can listen to what I want, stop when I want, take a scenic detour if that's what I decide, or just take a break from the mental work of driving wherever, whenever. Try that when you're flying!

Ultimately, I think it's more relaxing for me because it doesn't have to involve anyone else. Flying involves forced interaction (some of it much more intimate than I would like!) with so many other people, that becomes a stress in and of itself. Driving is much more under my control, my social interactions are far less intrusive and are at my whim. I can talk to the waitress at Denny's, or the gas station cashier, or a trucker at a rest stop at my discretion. Those can be interesting interactions, or they may just be mundane and eveyday sorts of things. You never know. At the airport, you know exactly what sort of interactions you're getting, and they aren't going to be pleasant. (Unless you happen to like going through a crowded airport carrying your shoes, trying to pick up your carry-on while a security guard is demanding that you turn on your laptop right now to prove that it really is a working laptop, and a handful of other people are standing behind you, waiting for you to get out of their way so they can do the same thing. Nope, no stress there! ) I don't deal well with forced interaction, maybe that's still a little part of me that distrusts people in general, or is intimidated by people, I don't know. Or maybe I just like the long, deep thoughtfulness that comes from being on the road.

I just know that driving is more enjoyable for me, whatever the reason.

And we're off! I'll be

And we're off! I'll be in Boston all weekend, and Monday for an extended weekend. It'll be a nice little break from the monotony that has become everyday work life. Hopefully I can come back Tuesday and feel somewhat refreshed, and have killed the road trip crave for a little while anyway!

My wife and I went

My wife and I went to see A Beautiful Mind tonight. It was a good movie, but a difficult one for me to watch. Anything that reminds me of the complete emptiness that losing time created in my soul is tough for me to swallow. Watching John come to grips with his delusions, and the sense of loss that he must feel when he realizes what they are was a stark reminder. The reactions of his coworkers to him after his hospital stay was eerily familiar to me as well. The uncomfortable laughter when you make a joke about your own mental illness, the worried looks, the neverending doubts, etc. all are there for the rest of your life when you have a breakdown that public. They are for me, as well. Even now, 5 years after the last hospital stay, more than 4 years since I've been off meds, there are still moments of uncomfortable laughter with my family and friends, and doubts in my own head. Like John's delusions, they never really go away, you just learn to ignore them and go about your life.

She has a more "theater critic" type review of the movie on her blog , if you're interested in seeing the movie.

While I know 2001 will

While I know 2001 will be remembered as a bad year by a lot of people, it will always be a very good year for me personally. It was the year Angela and I got married, it was the year I started blogging, which I've come to enjoy quite a bit, and the year I finally got my own domain.. It was the year one of my best friends' also got married and I was able to get to MN. to see it. It was a year that saw me have the opportunity to travel to Toronto, Minnesota, Johnson City TN, Asheville NC, Des Moines IA and New York City, all of which were wonderful experiences. As the media focuses completely on 9/11 and the events surrounding that, try to remember that there are good things that have happened this year, to all sorts of people, all around the world. Just like every other year, there is the good and the bad, and life goes on into the next year, which will bring happiness and sadness all on it's own.

I realize that for some of us, it is very difficult to keep things in this perspective. Depression and abuse have robbed us of the ability to see things as they really are, in the proper perspectives. Bad things are always worse than they are, and even good things can be frightening, as we fear getting too excited or happy about something that we fear will just be taken away again anyway. If there's one thing I could wish for all of you in the new year, it would be the ability to enjoy the good things for what they are, each day, regardless of the pain and sadness that is sure to be part of life as well.

Have a safe and happy new year celebration.