"Don't cry because its over. Smile because it happened."

Its official now.  The "estranged" boyfriend and I are no longer estranged...and we're no longer a couple.  Although, we really haven't been a couple for years now.  I wanted this-so why am I so sad?  The relationship has been crappy for years and I've wanted out for years.  I don't know.  Maybe its the finality of it?  Although that probably will not fully hit me until I move out.  That's the unfortunate part of the situation.  I cannot financially afford to move out just yet.  The good news is that he is being understanding and empathetic to the situation.  He...that just sounds odd.  What do I refer to him as now?  The "ex?"  We were together for nine years but we were never married.  We were engaged for a while.  I'm really not patient enough to explain to people how I live with my "ex".  We have agreed that the plan is to remain friends.  I do hope that is a realistic wish.  We have been through A LOT of shit together.  More shit than some married couples who have been married for decades. At one time I considered him my best friend.  Actually I think we were better off as friends.  Calling him my "friend" right now doesn't seem accurate either. 

I guess I'll go with "ex."  The only situation where it would be sticky to explain is if I were to start dating again.  Which, NO THANKS!  I have no plans whatsoever to get into that mess anytime soon.  I want to be single and figure out myself before I even attempt getting close to anyone again.  Frankly I don't have the energy, patience or desire to even think of dating someone.  Right now my priorities are (in no particular order) getting a better job, getting my own place, going back to school and spending more time with my kids.  Although the latter part is difficult.  My kids are getting older and have their own lives.  I try to steal moments here and there. 

Our friends don't really know yet.  I've told my kids but I don't think they consider us "broken up" until I move out.  We haven't told his mom-just don't want to deal with the drama that would come along with that!  She would have to be completely ignorant to not know something is up.  We are not-nor have we been affectionate towards each other, we don't go anywhere together and for the last month or so we don't even sleep in the same room together.  Of course his mom is not the most perceptive person in the world so she may not even realize it.  They are not an affectionate family either, so things may appear normal to her.  That's one of the issues he and I have.  I'm big about family and I used to be affectionate.  I am Italian-American after-all. 

Something positive has to happen.  I've had too much negativity here lately.  Some of the stuff I won't get into.  I don't want EVERYTHING published in this blog.  Let's just say its not been a very good year.  Actually the last three years have been pretty negative.  I'm still sober, though.  That's definitely a positive.  Nothing is worth drinking over.  Ever.

I'm thinking that maybe another reason that I've been so teary is that its the anniversary of my mom's death.  Actually I just realized that it is almost to the minute right now.  16 years and it still sucks.  Its times like this when a girl could use having Mom around to cry to.  At times I feel incredibly selfish.  I feel "ripped off" by her damn cancer.  There's so many things that she hasn't been here to enjoy with me.  It also makes me face my own immortality.  Right now I am only four years younger than the age she was when she died.  Obviously I do not know if I will suffer the same fate that she did.  Although, I am diligent about my breast health, just in case.  I think I might start living as if I would have her fate.  That way regardless of what happens, I'll have no regrets.  No shoulda-coulda-wouldas.

L'amo la mamma.
Buona notte!

City vs Country

This is my original home...the Columbus skyline.  Beautiful, isn't it?  I have about had all that I can take of the "locals" bitching about "city people."  For the past eight years or so, I have lived in one of the largest counties in Ohio.  However, it is largest in AREA-not population.  It is a county directly next to Franklin County...which is the Columbus and surrounding 'burbs.  My original home. 

Now I'm not saying the city is for everyone...and that's fine.  You are either a "city person" or a "country person."  Nothing wrong with being either.  Its a personal preference.  I'm definitely a "city person."  However, I do on occasion enjoy the simplicity, beauty and laid-back feel of the country.  I just wouldn't want to live there.  In some areas of the country, folks are generally very friendly, polite and quite hospitable.  I have family in parts of West Virginia and have vacationed in many parts of the South.  (Tennessee and NC)  You can be driving down the street and see old folks sitting and relaxing on their front porch.  Its nothing to have them throw up their hand, nod their head conveying a warm and welcoming "Hello."  That's nice.  It restores my faith in humanity.  

Down in WV where my family is from, apparently they don't believe in street signs.  Either that or the damn things have been stolen or shot down.  I get lost every damn time I go down there.  Directions down there go something like this, "Well, ya go back down how ya just were coming in.  Now you'll see a fork in the road...ya wanna veer to the right.  Once you're back in the holler you'll come to another fork in the road.  Then you'll wanna veer to the left.  After ya pass over Hickman's crick (creek), you'll come upon Old Widah (widow) Hettie's Farm.  There you'll wanna take the second dirt road up the holler...don't take the first one, younse need a 4 wheel drive up that road..."  By this time I'm usually looking at the nice gentleman like he has a third eye.  They usually lose me at "the holler."  On occasion I've even had folks offer to take me where I'm going by me following them.  I've offered to give them money in the past but they never accept it.  Usually saying "No thank ye Ma'am, just being neighborly and Christian-like."  Oh if only all Christians would be "Christian-like."

However, its not always like that.  Maybe its a territorial thing, a personality thing, who knows...but the "country folk" around me tend to be assholes!  I don't even refer to them as "country folk."  To me, they are white-trash-hick assholes! All they do is bitch about how "city people" are assholes and rude as hell.  How the crime in the city is outrageous.  FYI, Columbus' crime rate is relatively LOW considering the population.  In fact, I have read reports that say the crime rate per person is actually LOWER in Franklin County than out here in Licking County.  Try explaining that to some of the twits out here, though.  

They bitch about city traffic yet I find the traffic out here MUCH worse.  They don't know how to drive and apparently the cars out here aren't equipped with turn signals.  Traffic lights and stop signs appear to just be suggestions.  Learning how to merge onto a highway also must not have been a prerequisite to obtaining a driver's license.  Also, the concept of the "left fast/passing lane" is foreign to them.  Its nothing to see one in the far left lane going 50mph or so.  

Crime rate?  Don't get me started on THAT!  Oh sure, the murder rate out here is fairly low.  They just molest children out here, cook up meth and blow up houses.  There was actually a couple busted a few weeks ago for cooking Meth in a Walmart store!  For real!  And it seems that every other week somebody is being arrested for child molestation.  NOT AN EXAGGERATION!  Last week a man was sentenced to 15 years for molesting/raping a 7 and 13 year old...impregnating the 13 year old.  This week a 33 year old man was sentenced for molesting/raping his foster child.  Nope, no crime out here!

I'm just sick of it.  Its a small town and seems like everyone knows everyone.  They are able to pick out a "city person" in an instant and have no qualms about rudely voicing their opinions of the city and "city people."  As I work with the public, I have to deal with these assholes on a daily basis.  I have recently grown quite tired of their rhetoric and have started to fire back with FACTS.  I was told to "F**k Off!"

Yeah, and apparently I'm the rude one.

I can't wait to move back to the city.

Why I Quit

I have been asked many times what got me sober.  I have thought about it many times and have yet to come up with an answer.  I just don't know what did it this last time.  Lord knows I had plenty of "bottoms."  Most of my "bottoms" were more severe than my bottom on October 13, 2007.  

November 2003 was when I got my first and only DUI.  Even though I was in and out of blackouts for the majority of the day, I still remember it rather well-considering.  For some reason I had just snapped that night.  It was just my kids and me.  I had just caught my (then) husband molesting my daughter and kicked him out of the house.  I had been a stay-at-home mom and had no idea how I was going to support myself and the kids.  My (then) husband gave me about $200 per week in child support but I knew that would be ending soon after he went to prison. 

I think that night the reality of my situation finally sank in and I started to loose it.  First I remember being incredibly sad and having crying spells all day.  I don't think my kids paid much attention to me crying.  Around that time it was quite common for me to be crying at some time or another.  Plus I think they didn't really want to ask what was wrong for fear of me irritating the shit outta them.  In my vodka stupor I would get all weepy, profess my eternal love to the kids while hugging and crying to them.  I'm sure they wanted to barf.  I would have.  

At some point my sadness turned to anger...and then rage.  Then I decided that I was going to go find my (then) husband and RUN HIS ASS OVER with my mini-van for molesting my daughter and ruining our family.  Luckily I didn't find him because I seriously think I would have tried to kill him that night.  In a way, my DUI might have been a blessing in disguise.  

I drove around town looking for him.  All I remember is sitting on the side of the road and not being able to get my minivan going again.  Turns out that the traffic in front of me stopped, I slammed on my breaks and veered right.  I ran off the road, hit a fire hydrant and did something mechanically to my minivan.  I am eternally grateful that I did not hit the person in front of me and that the fire hydrant was the only casualty.  (Luckily it was not a person along side of the road)  

My father and step-mother showed up and tried to figure out the best thing to do.  My dad ended up reporting the accident and me as being drunk.  A lot of people wonder why I was not pissed at him for this.  I wasn't then and I'm not now.  He was trying to wake me up and probably figured a night in jail might do the trick. I know it was killing him to do that.  It was only the second time in my life that I had seen tears in my dad's eyes...when I was arrested.  The other time was when he spoke of his alcoholic father-who died from alcoholism before the age of 40.   

I was labeled a "chronic relapser."  Several years of trying to get and stay sober...I could never manage to get past 60 days or so.  I have my theories on this but they're too involved to go into right now.

There were many other "bottoms"...scaring my kids, increased blackouts, losing our house, etc.  Many hospitalizations and emergency detoxes.  Once I was even hospitalized for alcohol poisoning.  Once the hospital stabilized me, what did I do?  Yanked my IVs out, left the hospital, walked home and continued drinking again.  I've had bleeding ulcers and needed blood transfusions.  None of that seemed to wake me up.  Or rather maybe it was the accumulation of them?  October 13th, 2007 I sat in my TINY 20'x12' studio apt that I shared with the boyfriend.  We had just lost our home...which was not entirely my fault.  My alcoholism contributed to it most definitely.  Other parties had a role, though.  My dad and stepmom had taken the kids from me and rightly so.  I was a train wreck.  

I remember sitting in the apt and thinking "I'm just so frigging tired of living like this.  I can't do it any more."  And I went to an inpatient treatment center for 6 weeks.  I had been to the same treatment center a couple years prior but really wasn't there for me at the time.  I was there to shut everyone up and get them off my ass.  This time I was there for me.

Of course my boyfriend was very supportive of my choice.  He is not nor has he ever been a drinker.  In fact, I think my former career in alcohol has permanently jaded him against drinking.

I can't stay I've been perfect since that night but I have yet to feel the need to climb back into the bottle.  Some days are better than others...some days are really rough and its all that I can do to make it through sober.  My stomach turns and I physically feel sick when I think to going back to living like I was.  

So that's how I quit.  No major event or anything.  I guess I was just so beaten down and like they say "sick and tired of being sick and tired."

P.S.  I normally hate pictures of myself...especially terrible ones.  I'm posting this before and after to show what I looked like when I was still drinking and then when I sobered up.

And yes, I still have the puppy "Max."  Although, he's a grouchy big dog now.  ;)

Getting The Hell Outta Dodge!

Maybe I’m being a bitch, maybe I’m just evil…maybe both.  My living situation is less than desirable.  To say the least.  I live with my boyfriend (for lack of a better term) of 9 years and his mother.  The relationship has went on about 7 years too long now.  Although, there really isn’t a “relationship” left.  We are roommates basically.  Actually, I think roomies have fun together and go out and do things.  Not us.

To compound my nightmare; his dear ol' mother lives with us.  (Long story of how that came about…will explain in another entry)  Her health is not the greatest and she has many chronic conditions.  Her lifestyle and refusal to change her lifestyle just compounds her conditions.  I do not feel sorry for her.  She seems to relish in her health problems and is actually excited when diagnosed with something new.  (Or is told that something is worse)  Her Chronic Kidney Disease is a Stage 4 now.  More than likely she will be on dialysis by this time next year.  We’ve told her that she really needs to watch her diet, quit smoking, exercise, etc.  She doesn’t care. 

The new thing is that I’m about 75% sure that she has Parkinsons.  Her doctor suspects it also.  I’ve been planning on moving out but this has made me push it into urgency!  I do not want to be stuck here taking care of her.  I know that may sound horrid but I have things in life that I want to do.  Going back to school is one of them.  Regardless, I have to work while going to school and there’s no way in HELL I could do all of that and take care of her ass too.  Not to mention "the bf" and his mom are extremely selfish and self-serving.

All of that is pretty much beside the point.  I have to get out of here soon.  My sanity is at stake!  I need a better job though.  My hours just got cut and last week I only managed 8 hrs for the week.  Can’t live on that!  Especially since I plan on having my youngest (son) living with me. 

The saga continues…

Help Wanted

Unfortunately I'm job hunting again.  My hours at work have been SEVERELY cut for the last two-weeks.  I haven't asked why yet.  I'm waiting to see if my boss has my hours back up on the next schedule.  If not, then I'll ask him.  Last week I was scheduled for 16 hours.  This week for only 8!

I really never stopped job hunting anyway.  This was a job I accepted just to have at least something.  In the meantime I had been keeping my ears and eyes open for something better.

There are a plethora of nursing jobs out where I live.  Unfortunately I let my license/certifications lapse years ago.  I was a stay-at-home mom and really didn't think I would be going back into the field.  I was really burnt out at the time also.  I was sick and tired of not being able to actually do "nursing patient care" instead of more administrative duties.  

Now I miss it tremendously.

I have checked into what it would cost and how long it would take to get my license back along with my certifications.  I have also thought about getting into Medical Coding/Billing.  I could finish that a lot faster.  Another good thing with the Medical Coding is that you can do contract work and/or work from home.  That would be perfect with me wanting to go back to school. 

In the meantime, I'm going to see about getting back some certification to at least be able to work as a tech somewhere.  That would at least enable me to be able to get out of here and into a place for Son "B" aka "Quack" and myself. 

As of recent developments, its imperative that I get out of here asap!  I'll explain that in my next entry.  ;)