Posts Tagged: truth

#RealMamaLife: From The Vault(ish)

Welcome to Real Mama Life! <<< (click there to learn more about how you can participate.)

Where we embrace the glory and humour in the chaos. Un-staged and imperfectly beautiful.’

You know, I don’t really miss this baby. I LOVE(D) that baby and will treasure the memories.

Father & Son Boating

#RealMamaLife: On Television & Accepting Programming That Creeps Me Out

Welcome to the 6th edition of Real Mama Life!  <<< (click there to learn more about how you can participate!)

Where we embrace the glory and humour in the chaos. Un-staged and imperfectly beautiful.’

This right here? This would be my children watching a show that I had until very recently, completely hidden from their radar.

Toddlers Watching Barney

Throwback Thursday: The Truth Can Cage, Rattle & Set You Free

Do stories really tell a picture? Of course they do. The ones we want them to at least. With photographs we get to filter – and not just with phone apps. Take for instance, one of the most popular hashtags on Instagram, #tbt.

Throwback Thursdays…

#RealMamaLife: There Is No Pause Button

Welcome to the 4th edition of Real Mama Life!  <<< (click there to learn more about how you can participate!)

Where we embrace the glory and humour in the chaos. Un-staged and imperfectly beautiful.’

Mother

And Then There Was Me

Hello friends. Its been more than a while and all the things that I thought I wanted to do with this blog have changed.

So many changes.

Much to do with personal happenings and relationships in my life that I shouldn’t write about becasue, well, they are not only my stories to tell.

I’ve been thinking about starting an anonymous blog. For reals. My journal (for actual pen to paper writing), has been my cathartic weapon of choice , but it’s starting to feel as though I’m not holding it right. It’s not filling the gap, I’m yearning for something more.

It has been a few years now that a couple of close friends, who know all the stories… (and even then some they don’t, as I myself am just starting to figure them out) …and they keep telling me. Write them Selena. Use your gift, in the ways in which a traditional story-teller would. (Not a blogger.)

That last part I say to myself.

What am I looking for you may ask? Community. I have always found solace in community. There are others out there with me who struggle with the same sorts of things that I struggle with, there are those who have stories much like mine.

There are those out in the world who are ‘misfits’ just like me. I think I want to find them. Because whether some people may believe so or not, there is power, there is healing, there is regeneration to be had by using the power of you voice, of your pen – your keyboard…to share the stories that don’t shine. The ones that crumble and heave.

Because at the same time those stories are hope. They are strength. They are survival. They are me. While I may not be ashamed of who I am anymore, the whole of me – all of my stories don’t belong in public sphere with my face next to them. It definitely doesn’t feel right to talk or hint at them in this place anymore.

This is where I share the happy stories. The shiny ones of my children. Of my hobbies. Of my loves. All of the good and vastly wonderful parts of my life. Perhaps even the not-so-good and the undeniably hard parts of mothering. Those sorts of topics belong here.

Perhaps this explains why things have been silent here since before the New Year, and if vague blogging is what these first few paragraphs could be defined as – so be it. This is after all, my small corner in the universe. I’m struggling to define a new space here and define a space that is real, that is me.

So. I’m not going to talk about this anonymous blog thing again and if it happens – it happens. It will be my way of delving into chapters and who knows – perhaps one day it will become a book, when times are different and more stories will be okay to share. Memoirs take decades to write. Having a private blog, for me – seems like a good way to start the process.

As for here…gosh. I’m thinking of a white slate. Starting fresh. Stories and pictures that my children can look back on and know how much they were loved. The recipes and DIY projects that come easily to me. An editor of mine recently told me, just share what you’re good at. Screw what anyone else thinks or comparing yourself to others.

This must be my new mantra. I am all-too familiar with the soul sucking, dark-art of comparison. I’m a mom who on most days…most days, it’s all I can do but to love-on my kids. Make sure they’re clean, well-fed and nurtured. That my house isn’t in complete and manic disarray. To keep on top of the myriad of things it takes to run a house-hold and keep a family happy. For whatever reason, I feel like a failure if ‘that’s all’, I am able to muster.

It’s as though I need to be great multiple things in order to consider myself a worthwhile, intelligent, contributing human being. A person who makes things happen. That used to be me. What I’m starting to realize is that I’m making a whole new wave of things happen that aren’t defined by the amount of career goals I meet or ideas founded; they are defined by the greatness in which I mother.

Love my partner. Love myself.

Perhaps that sounds cheesy – but right now? My biggest task at hand is finding peace within and exuding that grace to bestow upon my loved ones. To mire through our recent struggles and my own – and to come out on top. That is all. This is most important.

In the wake of the constant doing, that I used to attribute to being a natural part of who I am – there has been a break in the noise.

To present new truths amidst the old ones; that I can’t ignore anymore and which require my full attention.

Until the next. Thank-you as always – for reading.

RANT

verbal warfare?

On the internets and in real life; ‘good intentions’ are not anyone’s justifiable shield against honesty. Or even criticism.

If a person says or does something
offensive, who cares whether you meant it or not? Good intentions aren’t some fucking invincibility spell–they don’t make you immune to honesty or having to suck up to the consequences of your actions.

I’m tired of constantly having to muster up grace, patience, kindness and understanding in the face of ignorance. Those who refuse to even TRY to understand themselves…

I Would Write You a Letter

*Disclaimer: This post is about abuse, including links to websites and articles that may be disturbing to some readers.*

I Would Write You a Letter…

If I knew where to send it.

How often have I walked into this lonesome place, how often have I dreamt that once I had a family of my own — my heart wouldn’t keep wavering about like a fly.

I’ve been trying to keep you off of my mind and keep everything all in line. I suppose it’s not all about the knowledge of you and who you are, or the type of blood that runs through your veins.

In being honest it’s much to do with events that wrap around those times when the darkest truths were spoken, flippantly or with anger…until it broke my heart. Acceptance and forgiveness like a maze of impossible, when it comes time. Sometimes I do okay at it, and other times it wraps around me…

Like a storm.

The one that’s always been raging inside of me.

I wonder when I’ll finally persuade myself to be at peace with it all.

All of the ugly.

All of the beauty.

All of the triggers.

Every single twist and turn in my memory.

When will it all become a sweet melody? (The answer is never, and that’s what I have to be okay with.)

I recently read a study which found that adults who have survived abuse in various forms tend to lose big chunks of their autobiographical memory.

How did I miss remembering that little tidbit I learned in school? As soon as I read it, I was immediately taken back to that prof, that lecture hall, his lips moving and my brain disconnecting. Much in the same way I did as a child. As a teen. As an adult.

Disconnect. Float away.

That’s a lot of layers to mire through even as an adult.

I remember almost losing my mind. I’m still learning and least now — my arms and heart are open.

Even though I have an anger that is soft and frayed and comes up to boil now and then. Forgiveness is a grace I can’t seem to muster. Sadness that I can’t be better at. It’s all overwhelming at times, especially in knowing it’s not just about me anymore.

It’s like you’re glowing in the distance, a light I can’t turn out.

It can’t be all about the enigma of you.

And it’s definitely not about hurting anyone else. These words, this trail.

It’s about speaking truths that in some ways I am painfully shy about; although as each tiny bit unfurls…a great release washes over me.

I’m coming on a new dawn of healing. Yet another path of self-awareness and self-work.

This is for other survivors who are afraid or ashamed. Or concerned about hurting their enablers or aggressors.

This written truth is for me. There may be more where this came from.

For once that needs to be acceptable.

I won’t be doing it here. (Digging in deep anyways.) I’ve found this place that gives abuse survivors a voice, anonymously if they so choose. I’ve thought long and hard about integrating something like a ‘Flashback Friday’ here — and every time, I balk.

Because in doing so, I would hurt others. I somehow have to find a way to stay true to the amazing support and community, the healing that I have found in sharing my experiences with the others like me.

Why on the internets?

Why not just in a personal journal?

Because in doing so, I am contributing to breaking the silence. Because reading other people’s stories, perspectives, success, and failures in continuing in life; REALLY DOES HELP. It is powerful people.

If we as a society know that gathering as a community is good; to support one another for various causes – then why is this such a hard concept for people to grasp when it comes to allowing survivors of abuse to do the same?

I understand it makes some people uncomfortable. Move along then. Our voices are not speaking for you. (Yet, in fact, they are, in a round about way — scraping at society’s disillusioned ideals of what weakness really is. Of what strength really is).

Survivors of abuse have every right to engage in public forms of community building too.

To Be Young & Wild & Free – A Love Story

I had 6 too many drinks last night.

That was a regular occurrence, and then some, ‘back in the day’. Always trying so hard to forget. And then I stopped. I came to some honest truths about myself. I stopped ignoring that I was smart enough to know that a path of self-destruction would not lead to anywhere I really wanted to be. Not rocket science, easier said than done.

Ours is not a conventional love story. This is the the story of how we met. I’m not going to get all poetic in describing how we fell in love because, well – I don’t feel like rolling that way right now.

No No Keshagesh…Reconsider This

*UPDATE 2012: This post is a biggie. Leave it open on your browser. Come back to it often. Soak it up in all of it’s entirety. Please.*

In lieu of the upcoming holidays; there is much to be thankful for, much to discuss in love and unity, much to reconsider. I was in a debate recently over FB. Yea, Facebook. It happens. It was in response to this video being posted by a wise friend.

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