Vulnerability and Records

"You cannot selectively numb emotion.  When we numb the dark emotion, when we numb vulnerability and fear, we by default, numb joy." -- Brene Brown

I recently had conflict with my baby daddy and his woman.  I was so frustrated and angry, I cried...the ugly kind of crying. I had a complete meltdown while driving on River Road.  I'm sure my ugly crying got some curious looks.  Homegirl did not care.  I had some crying to do and my car has always been there for me in these times of need.  So stare on, friends.  I was talking to my close friend in the midst of my ugly crying episode.  She unpacked the pain of what I was feeling with me.  And after lots of blubbering and snot, I found that underneath the anger and frustration was the familiar feelings of dismissal and insignificance.

I'm not sure when I started playing that record to myself, but somewhere along the way it began.  And we became good friends.  It was my most favorite record to play.

I felt dismissed every time I had an event and no one showed up for me.  I felt dismissed every time I cried and no one validated my tears.  I felt dismissed every time I got angry and had no one to be angry with me.  I felt dismissed when I tried to communicate with my husbands and got nothing but blank stares and occasionally laughter at my tears.  I felt dismissed when I tried to connect with my step daughter and was met with anger and silence.  I tried to change the story with behaviors.  I became a boss to multiple employees so someone had to listen to me.  I became an avid runner, running ten miles a day at times, though I hated every mile after mile 3.   My behaviors were all intended to numb me the hell out.  There are multiple ways in which to numb.  All equally effective.  Alcohol, sex, medications, drugs, exercise, staying extremely busy...pick your poison and welcome to the Land of NUMB.

Over the past few months, I have been intentionally interrupting behaviors that cause me to numb out.  It has not been fun, friends.  Ugly crying has ensued.  Years of pain finally caught up with me.  Pain can outrun the fastest runner.  It eventually catches your ass.  And after it caught me, we wrestled.  And I learned the vast importance of knowing the truth about who I am.

Homegirl won that wrestling match.

The truth is that I am worthy.  My worth does not depend on anyone's validation but the One who created me.  I am loved.  I am not alone.  I have an infinite capacity for joy because my Creator is Himself joy.  I have the infinite capacity for gratitude because He Himself is gratitude.  I have the infinite capacity to love others even when they don't reciprocate because He Himself is unreciprocated love.  That's His jam.

I have the infinite capacity to be completely vulnerable because the net beneath me is solid.  And catching me is something He will never tire of.

Vulnerability is not a fun practice.  It demands honesty.  It demands courage.  It demands your whole self, exposed, raw, open to any and all manner of torment.  It leaves you wide open to the elements.  But it also opens up the chambers of your heart to experience raw, unadulterated joy.

I was wholly vulnerable with my friend in the midst of my breakdown.  She met me where I was.  She accepted me for who I was.  She provided me with a safe place for my vulnerability.  She was able to look at me with complete love and acceptance even when I was ugly crying, complete with snot and tears and red splotches.  Without that raw vulnerability that she met so beautifully with love and acceptance, I would not have been able to identify the NEED I was seeking.

I NEEDED to be heard.  I NEEDED my opinion on the subject to be considered.  I NEEDED to speak for my boys as their mother.  I NEEDED their dad and his girlfriend to ask me for advice.  I NEEDED them to tell me I was worthy enough to be heard because I was a great mother. 

Pause for dramatic effect.  Homegirl needed two people who quite possibly hate her more than anyone on the planet to validate her.

Now that I'm in this space of living life without my behaviors that numb me, vulnerability is the gig.  Without my friend who was on the phone with me and who allowed me to wallow in vulnerability,  I would not have been able to understand why I had such an intense reaction.  (Side Note: I hope you have a friend like this...if not, I may be able to put my friend on retainer for you.  She's pretty great at embracing ugly crying homegirls.)   I would not have been able to identify that I was feeling dismissed and unheard.   I would not have been able to see this most favorite record that had been playing all my life.  I would not have been able to identify a false belief that I had about myself and replace it with Truth.

I may have numbed myself for years from feeling fear and pain, but this numbing of the hard emotions also numbed the joy that could have been.  And I'm done missing out on joy.

So vulnerability it is.  In all its scariness and ominousness.  Without it I would not have been able to uncover the lies and replace them with truth.   And finally take the needle off the damn record.


The Price of Invulnerability by Brene Brown

Not your Typical Rebekah

It's Christmas Day and I woke up alone.  I laid in bed for five minutes and contemplated what I would do with this day usually spent with family and loved ones.  I tried to muster up sadness over the situation, but all my emotions could return to me were feelings of gratitude and peace in the solitude.

This is the first Christmas my parents do not live near me.  This is the first Christmas I'm settled in a new home.  This is the first Christmas I have Sadie.  This is the first Christmas I am a fully present mother.

And this is the first Christmas after my divorce that I feel whole in my singleness.

My boys and I did our Christmas with Santa's arrival on Christmas Eve because it is their dad's year to have them on Christmas morning.  We could not have had a better day.  We played all the games they got from Santa.  We ate dips, sweets, and all things junk.  We went on multiple walks.  We went to the park with Sadie.  We watched Christmas movies.  We painted with their new paint sets.  My phone was never close by.  My presence was focused on them.  We had invites to do other things, but we were having too much fun as our little family to venture out and see others.  We were content in our threesome.

When they left that afternoon, I had plans to drink too much and watch Netflix because I was certain I would be sad.  Instead, I cleaned my house top to bottom and went to bed sober at 10 p.m. after reading.  I kept waiting for the sadness to hit me...but nothing, Jesus.  It never arrived.

One of my friends said to me in response to me telling him I was alone on Christmas that the man I was currently dating would not let me be alone for Christmas.  I chewed on that for a bit, then decided he was wrong.  I didn't know my current romantic interest well enough to spend Christmas with him.  I didn't want to spend Christmas with him.  I wanted to be with someone who knew me well and loved me...not someone I was getting to know romantically.

Pause for dramatic effect because this is NOT a typical Rebekah response.

Typically, Rebekah would be upset that the man I was currently spending time with had not made plans with me for Christmas after discovering I was alone.  The typical Rebekah would be waiting by her phone for an invitation.  The typical Rebekah would have found reason to feel shunned and rejected.  The Typical Rebekah would have drank too much and cried herself to sleep because her life is meaningless without a man.

Thank God I'm not the Typical Rebekah any longer.

I did not get him a present and hoped to God he didn't buy me one.  I did not wait for an invitation because I didn't want one.  I didn't feel slighted or rejected.  I had too much to do to waste emotion.  I had two little boys who wanted their momma for Christmas.  That's all.  And this momma was not going to be pulled in a direction that was not towards her kids.  This momma knows better than to seek happiness in a man.  This momma knows that happiness is achieved only within.

I have been walking through a new dating relationship with a friend and am appalled at myself for the advice I'm giving her.  It's the advice I got from healthy and happily single women.  I didn't understand how they could be so strong when they delivered such sound advice.  I didn't understand how they had no emotion over the potential of being alone.  It felt like they had discovered the shut off valve for vulnerability and weakness and desperation. I wanted badly to have also found it, but it always alluded me.

Change sneaks up on you.  It comes in small decisions.  You don't realize it's happened until you are surprised by the emotional response you have to a stimulus.  Our emotions do not lie.  They are the genuine core of who we are.  We can fool ourselves in all manner of foolishness, but we will never fool our emotions.

And my emotions about spending Christmas alone are simply gratitude and peace.  Thank you, Jesus, for change.

Exposed Bum and Floppy Pant Leg

"The purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things."  -- R.M. Rilke

Being a mom is like putting one leg in your jeans and letting the other one just flap around all day...exposing your bum and choice of undergarments in all your glory.  You're almost there...but not quite.  You made an attempt.  A thumbs up emoji is appropriate.  Or the drunk one.

My boys experienced something that was upsetting to them.  Brady was holding the information close because it involved people he loved and told me it wasn't my business to know.

"I'm your mother.  Everything about you is my business."  I responded with emphasis.

He didn't want to tell me because he didn't want me to be angry.  He's a protector and very loyal.

"What would happen if I did get angry?  What does that look like to you?"  I asked.

"I don't know, momma.  I just don't want to you to be angry at them."

We talked through the event eventually that he was reluctant to share.  And I wasn't angry.  I was sad.  I held his hand and told him I was sorry he had to go through that.  He gave me a weak smile in the midst of his sadness.

Putting your children through a divorce is one of the hardest things to do.  It requires constant affirmation that you did indeed make the right choice.  It requires an extra amount of patience for yourself and for others. 

It requires your pant leg and an exposed bum.

The effects are inexhaustible. 

Before I was a mom, I was a step mom.  I had a lot of difficulty with that role.  I wanted so badly to be involved in my step-daughter's life and did so recklessly and without boundaries.  I had an extremely volatile relationship with her mom because of my ignorance about the importance of boundaries.  And I had a great amount of ignorance about the effects of the lack of control over what happens to the most important person in your life when you're a mom...your child.

Allowing your children to flourish in an environment that doesn't involve you is incredibly difficult.  My heart still aches when I watch them walk into school, leaving me behind.  Sending them to another home where they are having experiences that you don't even know about is another level of pain...it's more than an exposed bum/leg combo.  It's a damn completely-nude-in-the-snow kind of vulnerability.  It's unnatural and if you aren't careful, you will lose limbs to frost bite.  Not to mention the unmentionables.

It means allowing them to love people you haven't gotten to vet.  It means encouraging them to bond with others who are strangers to you.  It means sacrificing your own selfish and suffocating love that often comes with motherhood for the sake of your children's hearts.  It means staying uncomfortable.

The beauty of this unknown equation (aka my children living in a different home) is that they are experiencing things that will require them to rise out of adversity and pain.  It means that I am given the incredibly difficult task of letting go and letting God.  It means that my trust cannot be in people or myself if I want to stay sane ... it has to be in the God who loves my boys more than I ever could.  It means that I have to learn to be ok living with an exposed bum while my pant leg flops around nonchalantly.  And occasionally be butt naked in the snow.

"In Over My Head"

https://youtu.be/6mAvt3CxEQM

I have come to this place in my life

I'm full but I've not satisfied

This longing to have more of You

And I can feel it my heart is convinced

I'm thirsty my soul can't be quenched

You already know this but still

Come and do whatever You want to

I'm standing knee deep but I'm out where I've never been

And I feel You coming and I hear Your voice on the wind

Would You come and tear down the boxes that I have tried to put You in

Let love come teach me who You are again

Would You take me back to the place where my heart was only about You

And all I wanted was just to be with You

Come and do whatever You want to

And further and further my heart moves away from the shore

Whatever it looks like, whatever may come I am Yours

And further and further my heart moves away from the shore

Whatever it looks like, whatever may come I am Yours

Then You crash over me and I've lost control but I'm free

I'm going under, I'm in over my head

Then you crash over me, and that's where You want me to be

I'm going under, I'm in over my head

Whether I sink, whether I swim

It makes no difference when I'm beautifully in over my head

Whether I sink, whether I swim

It makes no difference when I'm beautifully in over my head

I'm beautifully in over my head

I'm beautifully in over my head

Naughty and Worried MOMMA

The kids and I have a "Naughty and Nice" list.  For every good deed they do, their action goes on the "nice" side ... and likewise for the "naughty."  I am on the list.  But just on the naughty side for yelling.  Big sigh.

Since Graham's accident, I have largely felt lost in motherhood.  I'm not entirely sure I ever completely trusted my abilities to be a mom.  I questioned my approaches.  I tempered my expectations.  I allowed others dictate how I raised them by involving them in a great number of decisions.  I doubted myself even before the great fall in the bucket.  After his accident, my confidence in that area plummeted to greater depths.

Years of trauma therapy helped me to regain my confidence.  I had to imagine Jesus telling me in the moment when my baby was dead that I was loved and I was a great mother.  I didn't speak it over myself in that moment...nor did anyone else.  So Jesus had to do it after the fact.  He healed my broken heart and I became an even stronger mother than previous to the accident.

But it is still my most insecure area.  I soar with confidence and drive the week they are with their dad.  I feel like I have a handle on my life and I'm actually doing a good job of juggling everything alone.  Even though I miss them almost unbearably at times.  And then...

Enter kids....

The Monday I have them back is glorious.  I hug them tightly and can't stop staring at them.  I don't want to miss a thing.

And then they misbehave like kids do or make a mess like kids do and the beautiful reunion is shattered.  Insert chuckle.

I'm forced to decide on Monday whether I will react like a lunatic or like a pleasant Mary Poppins.  The lunatic usually wins...but there are cameos of Mary sprinkled throughout.

By Tuesday, Mary is on stage more than the lunatic.  I have regained my footing as a mom and my brain remembers how to respond to kid-related stress.

But I'm still a bit raw the week I have them...worry and stress and insecurities are more prevalent than when I don't have them. But the insecurities and worry over my kids aren't restricted to just the weeks I have them...it's an ever present companion in my life.

A guy commented the other day that his biggest pet peeve about parents is when they're on their phone while their kids play at the park.  I could see his point.  But I had "guilty" written all over my body and the emoji of the girl with her hand raised popped into my brain.  I'm that parent. 

I feel relieved when we go to a park and my kids are playing with other kids and they're contained and happily releasing inside energy that does no favors for my white couch.  I feel like I get a tiny break from responsibility.  I feel like my life just got made and I can breathe with untethered breath.  I feel no need to play with them.  I don't always get on my phone.  In fact, I mostly leave it in my pocket.  But I bring a book to read.  Or I just sit and watch them quietly.  Whatever I choose to do in that moment is a gift because my kids do not need me...for one small glimpse of our day.

I don't believe that men feel the same heaviness that mothers do.  I think they compartmentalize so well that they are able to be present in the moment without the weight of parenting squarely on their shoulders.  I believe they are able to function well at work 100%.  I believe they do a better job of divorcing themselves from their parenting responsibilities and the burdens that come with it than women do.

Women incessantly worry.  We can be in the biggest work meeting of our life, conducting the damn meeting, kicking serious butt, and our minds are still obsessing over what to make for dinner for our kids.  We can be on a date and laughing ... and the parent-teacher conference we just had is playing in the background.  We can be getting a massage, pedicure, manicure, exercising, eating, sleeping, showering, shopping, running errands, having drinks with friends ... and our children are with us...asking us to get them milk while we take a stab at relaxation.  Insert another chuckle because moms know relaxation is a mythical creature.  Like a freakin' unicorn.

My single girlfriend who is a mother and a very successful woman told me that she hated to admit it, but she would hire a man any day over a woman with kids.

We both sighed heavily at this revelation.

Good or bad, we are first and foremost mothers.  I've said it before and here it is again...dating without the presence of my children is a feeble attempt to get to know me.  Because they ARE me.  They are my motivation behind everything I do.  They fill my brain with happiness and worry simultaneously.  I've dated a man on and off for over a year and he has not met my children.  Our relationship will never progress because who I really am has been cut off from him.  He gets only a piece of me...and that piece is sub-par to the motherhood piece.  The men that have met my kids are the ones I am closest to.  They understand my role as a mom.  They know what they are competing against...and that they will likely lose because neither they nor I care enough to overcome this great obstacle of blending our lives.  Not many have the stamina to date a mother.  And mothers don't have patience for someone who doesn't care about their main priority.  (Having said that, you have to stick around a while to meet my kids ... or just be my friend and abandon dating.  Male friends are allowed.  Boyfriends have to serve their time.)

I am appalled at the number of men on dating apps that simply leave out the fact that they have kids.  A microscopic part of me gets it...it's unnatural to date as a parent.  So sometimes it's easier to avoid the anarchy of parenting that is you when dating.  But I do believe that men are not first and foremost dads...as mothers are first and foremost mothers.  Who men are as parents are largely driven by their motivation behind their role...their role as providers.  Mothers are driven by their role...we are mothers.  It is our identity, largely.

Whether we are naturally this way or society has encouraged this in us is a mystery.  But I tend to believe that God in His infinite wisdom gave women the innate consummation to live and breathe with her children.  This is why we are better at multi-tasking, I suppose.  (We have to be multi-taskers if we want to clean up vomit and do it while looking good.)

And why we are not the first choice as employees.

So though it may take me a while to adjust to immediate kid-related stress as Mary Poppins and get to add my name to the "nice" list, or the lunatic who yells on the "naughty" side...sigh..., after getting my kids back, I never have to settle into my role as a mom.  I am MOMMA.  Whether they are asleep in their beds at my house or not. 

So if I need peace for ten minutes while my kids happily play on the playground, you're damn skippy I'm jumping on that. 

And will worry incessantly about whether they will hurt themselves as I pretend to read a book. 

Move Over, Cinderella

"To say "I love you" one must know first how to say the word "I"."

-Ayn Rand, "The Fountainhead"

I first heard the word "Enneagram" from my sister in law Sally.  We were talking about life and changes and she asked if I had heard of it.  I had not, so we went into a full discussion about the personality typing diagram.  I was intrigued.

Then a few days later my dear friend Erin mentioned it.  I didn't need anymore prompting.  I was supposed to explore this.

I ordered the book recommended for discovering the Enneagram and your own type, "The Road Back to You."  It came a few days before my beach trip.  I was excited to dig into the book on a beach with a beverage.

And dig I did.  With a tasty beverage.

I am a self-growth junkie.  I can't get enough of psychology and literature and studies that will teach me more about myself.  However, I shy very far away from anything that is overtly "Christian" in its context.  I find it often lacks intelligence and dismisses hundreds of years of study on the subject of self simply because the authors of such discoveries were "secular".  And "good Christians" aren't selfish and have no use for the secular.

Big sigh.  HUGE freakin' sigh.

This book, however, was different.  Though the foundation to knowing yourself is wrapped up in your Creator, the journey is a task in SELF discovery...and with or without the knowledge of God, the journey is essential.

"Without knowledge of self there is no knowledge of God." -- John Calvin

After a few failed attempts to figure out my type based on some mediocre online tests, I discovered it as I read the book.  And it is indeed a road back to myself.

Ayn Rand is one of my favorite authors.  I devoured her books in college.  I listened to lectures on her.  I read biographies on her.  She made total sense to me.  I also love anything justice related.  Law and Order is one of my favorite shows.  Movies where the bad guys get what they deserve are my favorite.  Books that are direct in their story telling are what entertain me most.  I don't have a lot of patience for detail and chasing white rabbits.  I just want to get to it, Linda.  For the love of all that is holy....talk to me.  I'm aging over here.

I'm a Type 8 Wing 7 ... A Challenger/Enthusiast.  

I'm a truth teller and a truth seeker.  I don't do well with people who don't pull their own weight.  I lack empathy at times and do NOT like to be controlled.  I am not afraid of conflict.  I think a debate is a great way to communicate.  I'm intense and driven.  I'm energetic and bossy.  I am motivated by fear and anger.

All of the Type 8 traits that were trying to surface in me over the course of my life were shut down for one reason or another.  I married and dated men who couldn't handle them.  I had friends who didn't understand them.  I took jobs that required a different set of skills.  Type 8s are largely "un-feminine".  Their personality is not gender appropriate as a woman in society.  I was the daughter of a Southern Baptist minister.  I rest my case.  The list of why I didn't behave who I was created to be is endless.

I've had a difficult few days and I was talking to a good friend about feeling that I lack "togetherness".  I told her I felt like I was a mess. My label of myself to her was because of poor decisions I had made regarding my business and my money.  Her response was surprising. She said to not be too hard on myself because we as women were raised by Disney.  We were taught to believe that a man would rescue us, so women in general were not taught to be self sufficient in many areas that men were.  We were taught that our job was simply to care for others and look good doing it.  Thanks, Walt.  As if we didn't have enough to overcome.

Dating as a Type 8, the Challenger, has been a cluster of obvious failures.  In the past, my goal in dating was simply to enjoy myself. I didn't think much about who they were as people.  If I was attracted to them and we had a good time, that was sufficient.  I never expected them to stimulate me intellectually.  I was playing the part of a girl looking for a relationship, but I didn't really want one.  My Challenger personality and my brainwashed, presumed need to star in a Disney movie were in direct opposition.  The Disney-brainwashed Rebekah usually won.

I suppose I knew that I hadn't yet finished my own self discovery so dating was like gambling.  If I happened to find someone I connected with, score.  But it was by chance that it happened and even then it didn't hold my interest.  The real love affair I was looking for was within.

I was on a date the other night and found that I was able to be forthcoming and honest with my expectations and desires.  I didn't sugar coat them.  I wasn't afraid how he would respond.   How he responded was not my concern.  I was only concerned with communicating what I wanted.  I just said it frankly without emotion ... I could feel my soul sigh with relief.   This is completely opposite from how I used to conduct myself.  I am no longer worried about being chosen by just any man.  I want to choose him AND be chosen by him.  And being the "type" I am, this is no easy task.   I'm not a universal taste for men.  I frighten them away because they can't tame me.  I recently told an ex that attempted to connect again that I was not his girl...he needed someone sweet and submissive and that ain't me, Linda.  All those tears over men now seem silly and wasteful.  I was just playing the part that Disney suggested I play...the part of the damsel in distress who needs a man to make her life complete and without him I was desolate and deficient.  

This picture of the damsel in distress may be true for some.  Some may thrive on being rescued and rescuing.  But it's equivocally untrue for me.  All these erroneous messages about femininity and the supposed need to rely on a man have done for me is kept me from realizing the fullness of my individual self.  And that self is no romantic with a mop singing about when her true love will come.  That self is happily mopping the damn floor and listening to very loud and mostly inappropriate music while planning how she will make life her bitch. (No other word is suited for that statement.)

Fully embracing who God has created me to be will be the challenge of my life.  I won't have arrived until I'm dead and cremated.  (Please don't bury me.  I want to be sprinkled in the Mississippi River.   With a very large party to follow complete with live music and alcohol. And dancing must commence.)

Move over, Cinderella.  Your time has freakin' expired.