A letter to fill you in

I have spent my time in bed,  crocheting, watching for drug o'clock, dreading that time when my arse cheek falls asleep and I have to roll to face yet another wall. Watching my belly swell with the life blossoming inside, poking to try and guess what is head and what is feet, begging for the pain to let up for just a little while.

Yes. This post is miserable,  today, quite frankly,  I am miserable. My words are not beautiful and I feel all smoggy inside. My countdown til baby evacuation is stretching ever longer and choking down painkillers has grown tiresome. Today. Quite frankly. I have had enough.

But, tomorrow I will be woken by my biggest boy, I will help him dress and talk about dinosaurs. My littlest will watch episode after episode of Fireman Sam and I will do my best to not hate Norman Price. Tomorrow, my resolve will strengthen and I'll tell the grump to go.

Today, I'm stuck in a misery rut.

Tomorrow, I'll find my fight.

Funk of misery

I'm writing this not knowing where it's going, what message, if any will be found in the words dribbling from my fingertips. But today my painkillers haven't stolen my words, today I'm going to write, drivel maybe, but letters to shape my current present.

For the last 4 weeks I have been on bed rest. The can't get myself a drink, can't look after my children, can barely roll over unattended type of bed rest. For those who don't know, my current pregnancy has been blighted by a condition knows as SPD. It basically means your pelvis goes all wonky and is very, very painful, a lot of women get a mild form, but, of course, I have to go the extra mile. After ignoring my pain for weeks I eventually got stuck in a chair at church (ironically during a sermon about letting go of control) and wound up in the sorry state I'm in now. Laying down crocheting teeny tiny baby hats and praying, actual real prayers, that I don't end up with an RSI in my hand. My boys pop in and out my bedroom, roaring at me and asking to read the same lion book over and over again, my Mum shepherds said boys whilst bringing me drinks and making sure I'm fed and well. She dims the lights and tries to keep peace to let me nap, she teaches my eldest about bees knees and chickens eyebrows, she reads the lion book when I simply can't roar any more.

That's the funny thing about this whole situation. I'm in pain, and I'm not going to lie, the pain is crap. But I should be a lot more miserable than I am. Today was a bad day, I was fed up, grumpy and hormonal. I cried at surviving the next few weeks and lost any inspiration for worship music, sermons and crochet. I desperately wanted to go to sleep to make it all just go away. Just as my eyes were finally closing the kids burst in, proudly showing me autumn pictures they painted at playgroup. With glitter on their faces and paint splodges on their clothes they told me about cars and slides and how they weren't playing with a boy called Thomas, just playing next to him. Whilst my youngest napped my eldest snuggled up and watched Dumbo, proudly telling me about every animal and how Dumbo was an elephantplane and that that was a real thing. My Mum sat, enjoying the rest. I slouched, still in my fug of gloominess, fighting back the tears.

The husband arrived home. Still grumpy. The boys went to bed. Still grumpy. I ate my dinner. Still grumpy. Then something, somewhere, switched. I apologised for my mood, even though I secretly felt justified, and was starting to realise it wasn't all about me. My husband has been working his arse off, my Mum likewise. My friends sending concerned texts, popping in to hang out on my bed, posting chocolate fingers through my door, just because.

Through all this doom and gloom and pain and misery, God is working. I literally cannot be the strong, indestructible me right now. If I didn't accept help...well, I couldn't not accept help. I am, after all, helpless. But those well timed phone calls when I don't think I can carry on anymore? Those messages, popping up here there and everywhere asking if 'there's anything I can do?' People I barely know asking if they could please bring a meal round, or a cake, or even just to say they're praying for me. Messages of reassurance, of sympathy, of the overwhelming sense that I am not in this alone.

And I'm not, the time will tick past and this baby will be born. We will celebrate, I will mend, this brief period will soon be forgotten. But my friends, my family and the love and care they have given me never will. It feels like a hard shell I never realised I had is gone, going, which maybe is just what God wanted all along.  

Revelations

Last night I wrote a blog about being far less than perfect. This morning, I woke up, still flawed, still battered, still in pain.

My perception of Christianity has skewed, Satan whispers, drilling rules and regulations into my head, rules I can never live up to, lists of behaviours that I don't conform to. How being a Christian is all the things I will never be.

A lengthy conversation with a dear friend has helped.

Throwing insults around is not bad, but neither is it nice. I don't loose 'God points' for being miserable, I don't need to win back His love because I haven't read my Bible for a few days. He loves me. End of. And really, I should live in the way He wants me too. I should love my neighbour (even when she has 3am arguments) and when I think bitter, angry thoughts I should try, really try, and pray instead. Not because I should. Not because I think it'll win me my place in heaven. But because I want to, because I love God and I want to be closer too Him, because that's what Christianity is about.

My second time in church I came out in tears, I learnt that Gods love never fails. How He holds you, snug in His arms, and, if you pull away, He squeezes that bit tighter. My first time in church I learnt the freedom of forgiveness, and applied it, truly and honestly, into my life. It was amazing.

I haven't gone to church for the last two weeks.

Right now, I'm sat in peace, the only noise coming from the washing machine. Rinsing clothes, dirty with life and living. Right now, I'm praying that He will help rinse me of the paralysing pollution happening in my mind. Right now, I want rekindle the love, burning in my heart.  

Breaking news

I'm a Christian.  And I'm not perfect.  That's right, not even a little bit. I sit in meetings and get distracted by daddy-long-legs gangbangs, I laugh at my 3 year old when he falls off the bed, I whinge, I moan, I throw insults around without knowing what they actually mean. All in all. I am flawed.

Sometimes, I make inappropriate jokes about church halls being hotter than hell, which is ironic (if you think about it). I wonder if God gets overwhelmed when everyone prays all at once. I question whether falling to the floor in a fit of 'Holy Spirit' is actually holy at all.

I wonder what is mental health and what is devil whispers. When that fog of gloom descends I hide in my bear cave until the outside world is a little less challenging,  until I have the strength to say f*** off devil. Then I remember, good Christians don't swear.

Sometimes,  I enjoy sex with my husband. And I mean really enjoy it.

I am flawed.

God knows, He made me this way. I am not perfect. But I am perfect too Him, who knit me together in my Mothers womb. He, who knows every hair on my head. He, who let's me fall, over and over, just to help me back on to my feet, on firmer ground with a stronger heart. He, who listens to my prayers, to my fears, and He, who gave me the joy to laugh at inappropriately sized vegetables. Always.

A letter to a younger me

To me.

You are not alone- in this battle in your head, demon whispers and black holes. In the corners where shadows lurk and grey scales blur into a fog of nothing.  Pick up that book, the one sat abandoned on your shelf. Read about God,  about the Lord and your armour and His plan. Fill yourself with the knowledge that He's on your side and it's not your fault. Wear your scars with pride, they're your story, and find peace.

You are not alone.

Xx

Linking up with #lettersto at http://indirectrevelation.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/letters-to-younger-me.html?m=1 go, read, link!

A letter to put in your pocket

'Come to me, all you who wearied and burdened, and I will give you rest.'

Rest, that laughable word coveted by Mothers around the globe. The thought of closing your matchstick propped eyes and easing into blissful slumber,  no worries about defrosting meat, no lists about all the chores that need doing, no panicked googling about that mysterious rash on your 18 month olds chest. Just peace. A blank mind. Rest.

I'm still searching for the elusive state, where there's actual silence and no ticking in my mind. Where the vacuum, parked up in the hallway, is not calling me. Where the disney channel is silenced and the dog doesn't need a walk. Life gets in the way of our sleep time but we need the rest to do the living. It's difficult. So very difficult.

My task is to carve out those little snippets of time, where deep baths are acceptable and my skin is allowed to prune. When my phone can be switched off, completely off, and I can unload my worries to Him, heave the anxiety off my shoulders and place it firmly in His hands. For really, what option have I got?

So Lord, please give me rest. Cos God knows I need it.

Linking up with Ruth Povey and Letters To.

Letter to... the one who noticed.

We'd been friends for a while, until we wanted more. You came to my house and never left, watching films on my teeny tiny tv, relaxing on a floor bed of duvet and pillows. We ate dinner together. Got some pets. We were happy. Only, you saw me crying, inconsolable, at photo albums of my much loved Gran, you battled into the bathroom and mopped up blood running down my arm, you peeked behind the mask and didn't run. 

You helped me to get help.

That day, sat in the mental health nurses all-too-comfy chair you cried with me. That day, with a thousand thoughts whirling round my head, I knew you would never leave, you'd seen my soul, bared raw, seen me, more vulnerable than a person has any right to be, and you stayed. You visited. You did the housework while I was away and you celebrated me coming home. You built me back up into a person of worth. And even now, years down the line, when I'm struggling and go a bit quiet, when my finger nails dig half moons into the skin on my thigh, you notice, you always notice.

There are no words to say my thanks, to explain my love for you. But for now, just for now.

We'll be forever and always.

Meg x

Linking up with Sabrina at Just Keep Singing. Come link up to!

A letter to explain

Dear depression,

This week-I'm going to kick your arse.

Depression,  you have taken too many years from me, reduced me to a shell, a puppet, smiling though I'm empty inside.  You've hidden, deep away, for months, then returned with a vengeance,  slapping my self control round the face and whispering bitter insults into my mind. You've tried to destroy anything good, everything good, til my Husband came along, stronger than you, and my friends, you cannot ruin my friends.  Because,  and hear this, they know what your up to. They know exactly what you're trying to do, and they said no.

And I say no.

So pills and sunshine,  fighting your exhaustion and rationalising your irrational. Ice cream, hugs, and loving arms. These are my weapons. And depression?  Believe me.
I will win. For I am never alone.

Forever free,

Meg.

Letter to the Brave

Brave girl,

I catch your eye in the mirror, make up half done, hair fuzzing like a mane around your ears. You don't look brave. Anything but. Your toddler bursts in demanding a drink and your smile snaps back into place, in a minute darling.

You aren't anything special, no stunning beauty, no weeping in the corner, no dragging the world down with your pain. So, why? Why is this averagely average woman brave? What could she possibly do? She laughs, she jokes, she cuddles her kids, even when her heart is hollow and her pelvis snapping in two. She got back behind the wheel when every frayed nerve was screaming not to. Last week she drove across a bridge of a doom, a bridge that she'd narrowly avoided a panic attack on just a few days prior. Before that, drove in rain so heavy she could barely see. This woman, this seemingly nothing, can look in the mirror and smile at the face looking back. She has turned her heart and is ridding herself of the darkness that invaded her soul. This woman is brave.

Braver than even she will ever know.

Concrete Words-The Tainted

For a while I was tainted. Now I'm getting over that and I have become a 'tainter', I break most things I touch and, am mostly always, sporting some cut, or bruise, from some clumsy accident.

In just a few short weeks I have dropped and smashed my very shiny, beautiful, new phone, dropped and chipped my husbands shiny new iPhone, broken myself building a lightweight, plastic climbing frame, and, as of last night, burnt the finger prints off my middle finger by touching a barbecue. A lit barbecue.

A large portion of these misdemeanour's is simple stupidity, my brain fails to catch up with my actions and pain happens. A smaller portion is my sense of super hero-ness. Lit barbecue? No problem for me, teflon hands! Pregnant with a dodgy pelvis? Walking 3 miles can only help, surely? Have a new, probably expensive, technical item? Dropping onto a hard floor from a certain height can only help it run better. No?

I do not like being a 'breaker of self and shiny things'. Unfortunately, as time ticks by and days roll forward my lack of spatial awareness and butter fingers only get worse. Especially as I have no fingerprints left.

Keep your technology away from me, please, unless you want to see if it bounces.   

Letter to...

Dear man,

As I lay there, crumbled and twisted, literally trapped under my own stupidness, you crawled through the chunks of windscreen. You lay, belly pressed to glass, chatting to me about my hobbies, my interests. Tucked me under a manky old jumper. You searched through the shards of plastic to find my brand new phone. You told me I was going to make it, and I believed you.

As the car was lifted and my hand finally freed. It hurt. Really hurt. You stayed. You strapped.  You told me not to move. You cared, really cared, about the 17 year old bloody mess before you.

For you. I was a job. A horrible job but a job none the less. For me, you made the worst time in my life survivable.

Thank you.

Five Minute Friday - Listen

Linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker here for five minute Friday.

So, my ears are open and I'm listening. Straining to hear the words behind the words. To see that look in my friends eye that means her 'I'm fine' is not fine at all. I listen with arms and heart open and tears running down   and sorrow hidden behind a mask of composure. I listen and I'm hear and I want to fix things. I really want to fix things. So many people are going through so much. And I know, I know I can't fix the actual problems so I sit. Offering tea and sandwiches. Letting these problems know I'm here, I'm fighting. I'm listening.

The Frame - Concrete Words

The Frame.

Let me tell you about a frame, a little, blue, giraffe encrusted number sat in the deepest corner of my living room. A frame showing the first ever picture of my first ever son. A frame that reminds me of all the things I was going to be as a Mother. We were going to go to the park every day, we would eat our 5 a day, birds would flutter through the window and help me do the washing up. Sadly, sat here at 12.42pm, pyjama clad, watching that first born demolish a plate of sausage and chips, the reality of Motherhood does not, at all, meet with naive promises of late.

That innocent, womb-fresh babies face has morphed into a nearly 3 year olds sliding mask of pure expression. He's happy, he's sad, he's angry, oh so very, very angry. He wants to play, he wants to watch Cars, on repeat, all day, he wants to eat, but he does NOT want to eat vegetables, thank you Mummy. He is, for lack of a better word, challenging. But on those hard days, those days where the room is too small and his voice just too loud, on those days where I would happily trade him in for a pet camel, I glance in the corner and see that little blue frame. I remember those promises. I remember his innocence wrapped in a purple blanket, I remember all the things I was going to be, and I remember the things I am now.

Forever and on he shall be my son. I will remember his tiny fingers, counting his tiny toes, watching in awe as he opened his eyes to the world. I shall teach him how to be strong in himself, to take what the world throws and toss it right back, to be strong, to be confident, to take the bins out, unprompted, on the right day. Mostly, I will love him.

And those, my son, are my promises to you.

Linking up with sixinthesticks for #concretewords.

Bravery - Take 2

This bravery issue has been bugging me.

What, if anything, is brave?

After a few days musings these are my conclusions, prepare yourself. Lets go...

I think bravery is a far more complex thing that it first seems. A watered down word used to describe everything from necessary injections to carrying on when you have no other choice. A word chucked about here and there, the meaning, the actual root of the word, diluted and buffed away over time.

But to be brave, completely, truly and honestly means to sacrifice a part of yourself. To swallow the actual fear growing in your chest and carry on. For different people this can mean different things. To do a presentation to an audience of blank faces, to climb so high your head is spinning, to hurt yourself to save another. Every day there are brave acts but their often so minute they get forgotten.

To be brave is a big thing, a huge thing, but often shown in a tiny, tiny way.

The Road - Concrete Words

I was thinking about writing all about my life's road, the ups and downs, twists and turns, the beautiful stretches with cow-studded scenery. But no. I'm going to take the theme literally and write about a literal, actual, tarmac road.

At 17 I thought I ruled the world. Despite failing my driving test I paraded round in a little Renault 5 (GTS whatever that may mean, Goose Towing System?) with a friend 'supervising' me. It was fun. I drove too fast, panicked at busy roundabouts and thought a crash would never happen, how could it? It would never happen to me.

But, inevitably, it did. The scar on my hand is a painful reminder not to drive fast. In fact, for many years, a reason not to drive at all. I could have died. I could have killed people. I could have been the person the radio people talked about 'Avoid the A329, there's been an accident and traffic is queued right back to Bracknell'. That's hundreds of peoples minor delay. That's somebodies life.

9 years later, after my survival, I am ready to drive again. A much calmer, much more aware, much slower driver. Time is ticking down til I am insured on our great, big family car, my theory test is booked, my nerves are steely. Or aluminum-y. I am ready to go but, most importantly, ready to stop.

I'd like to see a few more cows please.



Linking up with six in the sticks and concrete words.

Five minute Friday-Brave

Today I'm linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker at Five Minute Friday. Setting my timer for 5 minutes, ignoring the kids war cries and writing all the nonsense from my head. Ready, set, go.

                  

I do not feel brave, last week I did the leap of faith, a literal leap where I flung myself off a small platform trying to catch a trapese bar. Brave? No. Foolish? No. An act to impress that I can do these stupid things when I think I can't. Well yes, maybe. I jumped and I caught and I swung in the air like Tarzan. It was fun, but not necessarily brave. 

Fighting through a pregnancy-of-pain and keeping a smile (mostly) plastered on my face. Not Brave.

Sitting being tattooed with my words to live by. Not Brave.

Coming home from hospital, heart broken and hollow. Not Brave.

The more I write about the things that aren't brave makes me question what bravery really is. What supreme act fits the bill, what, if anything, can be counted as bravery? Most things are done through pig headedness, a genuine lack of fear, or just, because, because why not. 

My time is ticking away, if someone, anyone, could please tell me what bravery really is then comment below.

Five minute Friday - Remember.

As it's Friday I am sitting down to write for 5 minutes with Lisa-Jo Baker. Today's prompt is 'Remember'.

My challenge? Writing about remembering when I just don't want to. How can I paint my lovely memories in words, smear them all over this page, when a lot of stuff I just want to pretend never happened. Sure I've got my good ones, pleasant, bright, sunshiny thoughts that pop into my mind and make me smile. But the crap? That can stay right in the back of my brain, in a small, dusty cardboard box marked forever with 'do not open'. I like to think about the good, my wedding day, my children's birth, my baptism and the day my Husband strolled into my world. I do not, however, like to remember Fright Nights at Thorpe Park, freaky conversations with seemingly non-freaky people and the dark edges of living that scratch a creepy feeling across my shoulders.

Scary films leave a blueprint in my 'do not open' box. When they edge into my mind I have nightmares, convincing myself of horrors unknown. Crap from my past, rather than reminding me how strong I am now reminds me how weak I once was, how I was that way once, how I could be that way again.

 

Poultry

Todays prompt for the link up at ruthpovey.com (she lies and says there's links when there isn't really ones) is poultry. As in birds. As in big, running, giblety horrors that most probably will chase you across a lawn. I do not like poultry, I do not like geese, I do not like chickens, I do, however, like ducks, particularly when their all upright and racing.

My friend (the fantastic Ruth) quite often has chicken visitors in her garden. My son loves them, tempts them into her kitchen (using a series of animal shrieks and interpretive dance) then makes Ruth panic leaving me to wrangle said chicken and send it on its merry way. I pretend to be brave, I pretend to try and pick the beast up, in my head I'm thinking 'please just go away and keep your weird red jowls away from me'. I DO NOT LIKE YOU CHICKEN.

That being said, I keep threatening to create a chicken hutch in my garden, along with the fictional duck pond (for the racing ducks) and an alpaca pen, they can all be friends in some big, lovely farm where the sun always shines and no animals ever poo. As long as the chickens have fluffy legs and no weird dinosaur scales we're ok, oh, and no weird head bobbing. It freaks me out.

Today I've laid on my friends sofa watching my children play. I've barely moved, barely spoke, barely bared any of my savaged insides. I've healed minutely, my wounds stitching back together,  my mind shredding a little more as the reality sinks that little bit deeper.

I will mend.  I will sip tea and cry. I will scream at the sky and think angry thoughts about strangers in the street. I will cuddle my boys and tell them off. I will clean and dust and vacuum.

But I don't think I'll be the same.

The Instrument

 When you hear the word 'instrument' what comes to mind? A glossy black piano? An old man with a banjo? The acoustic guitar you rocked at college whilst trying to be mysterious? For me, it's something entirely different. The shiny, sharp scalpel, the surgical instrument that saved my hand, that fixed my knee, that scarred me for ever more.

Mental Health awareness week happened at some point (probably shoved in between Autism awareness week and  'Talk like a pirate' day) in this week you're supposed to reflect upon someone you know who suffered with mental illness, maybe put a nice picture on your Facebook page and talk about how your sisters brothers cousin was once a bit sad. The reality is a whole different ball game, the reality leaves very non-surgical scars.

My right hand, and arm, are a mess of marks, bumpy, uneven, some caused by a scalpel (neat scar on my palm) some by gravel (all the way up my forearm) some by my own stupid driving (the massive bumpy pink splodge on my hand). These scars have a story, a tale that's told to impress, to warn and to educate people on why driving fast in a dark, wet lane can be bad for your health. My left arm however, tells a very different story. Those neat fine lines on my upper arm are each caused by an argument, by an upset, by the feeling of just not being good enough, of needing to feel alive and needing to let the hatred seep out. Each of those lines represents the (pardon my french) but shit storm that was happening at that point in my life. Those lines are a completely different, less shiny, page of my story.

Each of these marks are necessary, some to save, some to harm, some to fix that dodgy knee.

All to teach, all to learn from and all to remember for what they are.

Linked up with http://tanyamarlow.com/