leaving me only
broken
and lonely
and not knowing which way to turn

Broken.

I think my marriage may be over.

Loss.

15 years ago this month I had a miscarriage. No one knows. I was two months along, alone, scared and not wanting to be pregnant.

When I started bleeding I cried, and I couldn't tell if I was happy or sad.

10 years ago this month my ob-gyn put me on bed rest for the remainder of the pregnancy that would result in my daughter. The whole time I was expecting her I dreamed of a baby boy with dark brown eyes and hair.

At the first follow up after she was born, I was advised that I shouldn't have any more children if I was interested in living to parent the one I had currently.

Now I look back, and I'm so sad about that miscarriage. Though there is no rhyme or reason to it, no logic or sense at all, I believe that that was my baby boy.

I never knew I wanted a son until I learned I would never bear one.

Struggles.

I am struggling with a lot of things right now. My illness, my weight, my marriage, parenting, housecleaning. Nothing is coming easily. I get so very tired of having to work so hard at everything.

Hell, even blogging this my mind is jumping in, criticizing the language (see that black and white language, all or nothing thinking is unhealthy and wrong).

I hurt. My body hurts. My mind hurts. Thinking hurts. I feel trapped, lonely, desperate, wracked with despair, and broken. I feel weak, ugly, fat, crippled and useless.

Life feels alien, the way walking into a strange church for a wedding in some different religion feels. As if I am a stranger in my own skin. Things taste wrong, sound wrong. Textures feel wrong.

Desperation, despair, desolation, other things that begin with the letter D. And Cake Wrecks. I've been reading the Cake Wrecks website obsessively for a few days now, because it makes me laugh. Really, honestly laugh.

The power of pills.

I'm not exactly happy about my pill situation - on top of the psychiatric medication I've started this year, my psychiatrist keeps suggesting this supplement and that supplement, and now I'm taking about five things daily, which bugs me.

It's hard to feel healthy when breakfast is oatmeal, oj, and a cup of pills.

But...... it's really helping. My mood is stabler and happier on a consistent basis then it has been ever before in my life. I'm sleeping a bit better (there's nothing in this world that could make me sleep well), and all around things are improving.

So, I need to learn to how to over come this feeling of pill-quantity induced ill health, and while I work on that, work on figuring out how use the nutritional parts of my cooking program, so that I can eventually get my various nutrition needs from meals instead of pharmacies.

Today is a good day.

Today I have recorded and shared memories of a pleasant time in my life.
Today I have crafted with my daughter, teaching skills that give me pleasure.
Today I have baked, filling my home with goodly scents and a feeling of worth.
Today I have cleaned, creating order and comfort in my home.
Today I have planned, foreseeing what is to come and preparing for it so that when it comes a hard time will be easier.

Today is a good day.

Knowing when to quit.

It's one of the most difficult pieces of advice to accept - to quit doing something that is too hard. We're taught from earliest childhood that "winners never quit, and quitters never win" , that "the only sin is lack of trying", that "if at first you don't succeed, try and try again."

But sometimes, you need to quit. You need to stop doing what creates only pain.

That's what I'm looking at right now. I am - was - a backpacker, and there's a lot of pride and sense of self tied up in my being a person who backpacks.

But these days, it hurts. I suffered a leg injury a couple of years ago, and spent a big chunk of time in physical therapy getting my ability to walk back to normal. There is, however, a big difference between walking around town or hiking with a daypack and compacting the whole of life into 35 lbs, strapping it on, and heading out into the woods for days on end.

I just got back from a backpacking trip - 3 days, short 4 and five mile days, 33lbs, trekking poles to help compensate for the leg weakness I know I have. A planned shake down hike for the long vacation hike I've got planned for August.

And it was no good. Even with the physical training I've been doing, even with the additional physical therapy work to make sure that the joints and all did what they should, it was no good. Better, yes, much better then last time I tried this hike, but still..... I hurt too much to be able to enjoy it. I didn't hurt so much I can't move afterwards, which is an improvement.

But it was no fun. It was mile after mile of low-grade agony that didn't let up, and stole every view, despoiled every sudden wildflower, and left me weeping at the end of each day.

Maybe if I only hiked for being to say I got the miles done, this would be enough. That I could do the miles.

It is time, I think, for me to try and find a way to be happy without being a person who backpacks. It's a very challenging thing to try and do, especially right now, when I have train tickets, and motel reservations and child care arranged for a three week hike that I want to do so badly... A hike that I have dreamed about being able to take for years.

A hike that I am - despite having trained and focused on preparing for it since January - physically incapable of hiking.

I am not strong enough to say today that today is a good day.

I am strong enough to when it is time to quit.