New Sewing Machine

I got a new sewing machine today!!  I’m so excited about this. My old one had several problems that couldn’t be repaired. I know way more about sewing machines now, so I’m keeping the manual, keeping all the parts that came with it, and watching all the YouTube videos that come up when I do a YouTube search for the model number. Walmart had an entire endcap of this model Singer sewing machine on sale for $144. I also bought Kevin and myself a Christmas tree, a keurig for Anna for Christmas, Christmas decorations in pink and red with several red cardinals, and a handful of groceries. All of that and it won’t even be payday for three more days. Working 60-84 hours a week helps. 

On another note, my coworker sent me this picture of her dog. I love “cookies and cream dogs”. And just look at his face. He looks like he’s so sick of her shit. 

 

Well That’s New (to me)

 A couple days ago, I reached out to some therapists to see about group therapy. One of them got back with me in a “consultation”. Something new about this one- he was a man. He was very monotone and to the point, which I liked. Maybe I would do better with a male therapist?  There didn’t seem to be this, “Oh my god you did THAT?!?!” Level of drama and judgement. Plus, he must not have a problem with the fact that I married my boss, because he said his wife does his scheduling. So she works for him. 

He told me that he does “cognitive processing therapy”. It’s specifically for PTSD. He said this AFTER I told him that one therapist diagnosed me with it and another one took the diagnosis away. So he must really believe that someone with my background can possibly have it. I agreed to it for $160 per hour.  Then I started researching cognitive processing therapy, and basically- it’s just telling you that your interpretation of your trauma is wrong. Oh wait excuse me. They don’t tell you it’s wrong. They ask you and ask you and ask you until you tell yourself it’s wrong. Why would I want to be argued with?  One guy online said that if someone has a traumatic experience in a large crowd, then they may walk away from that thinking “all large crowds are bad.”  And the point of CPT is to get them to believe that not all large crowds are unsafe. 

So- it’s a big “not all” fest?  What if someone gets raped?  Does the therapist then try to get them to believe “not all men”?  I don’t mean to bring up the one example where “not all” is losing popularity, but the whole process just seems like button pushing. Sounds like a real dick head thing to do to someone with ptsd. 

Besides, if I go in there and say, because of my trauma, I believe ABC.  They then proceed to “question” me out of believing ABC into believing XYZ.  Then what happens if I go to another therapist and say, “Because of my trauma, I believe XYZ?”  Will that person then question you full circle all the way back to believing ABC?  Technically yes, unless of course you volunteered the information that you saw someone else. But you don’t have to. 

Maybe it’s just me, but I was always under the impression that if someone holds a certain view of something due to trauma, then just leave them alone about it, unless that belief is somehow racist or otherwise discriminatory. A good example would be my coworker blaming energy drinks for her husband’s death. I can either not drink them around her or put up with the lectures about them. There’s no reason to try and get her to drink them. “What would happen if you just had one Red Bull?  Are you sure that would happen?  What are the chances that you would DIE?” How obnoxious. It would be interesting to see what would happen if she went to CPT, got into a 6 a day habit, then went to another practitioner and became against them again. I don’t know. 

Besides- if you don’t want to believe something to be true about your trauma, then you wouldn’t be going to and paying for therapy to “get someone to change your mind” about it.  The act of going in the first place tells me that at least a little part of you already believes the new thing 

I sent him a brief message saying I researched it and wasn’t comfortable. He responded that the only other thing he offers is EMDR. Blah blah  EMDR strikes me as a placebo at best and brainwashing at worst. However, I realized this morning why I’m so afraid to do more “physical” therapy methods like EMDR or brain spotting. It’s because so many people report feeling a lot worse before they feel better. There’s nothing wrong with that!  However, if there’s any possibility that “feeling worse” could get you locked up in a psych ward losing your freedom then that’s a concern. Is “feeling worse” just going to look like being exhausted and having  a headache?  If so that’s fine. Take something and go to bed. Or is it going to look like loud crying or a meltdown?  In that situation, you could end up in a psych ward for a month or longer, lose your job, who would care for your children and/or pets, etc?  That’s catastrophic. I’m not willing to let that happen. And you don’t know how something will make you feel worse or react until you actually do it. Why take that chance. 

The reason why I’m writing these things here is just so I can have a record of how much I tried. A big misconception is that people who don’t want to go to therapy “just don’t try” and I’m trying, it’s just different for me. A lot of people do not worry about losing their freedom over an extreme negative reaction, and that is either fine for them or it makes you wonder if they just have no idea. If a cop is called on you during said emotional breakdown, what if you get shot?  I’m just saying, a lot of cops know nothing about mental health. 

Unbelievable Writing

 Recently I talked on here about the struggles I had with my writing by and talking about it in therapy. My therapist thought that the part of the beginning of my outline, the element that describes the main character’s pressure on her to *not* marry or have kids being “not believable” because “women are pressured *to* marry and have kids.”  She had no concept of anyone having a different experience than she did. I never went back to her, but I countered it here on my blog with examples of writing that showed experiences of individuals that were vastly different than my own. Just because that’s the case in a story doesn’t mean it can’t be written about.  

Have you ever watched “The Crown”?  I believe it was on Netflix. This scene shows a newly-crowned 20-something Queen Elizabeth II having a conversation with her grandmother, Queen Mary of Teck. She basically asks her grandmother, why do you think I have to answer to God? (In so many words). Queen Mary replied, that monarchy is a gift directly from God to Grace and dignify the Earth. The monarch is someone who people can strive to be like, ideally. 

Woah, ok!  I remember being taken aback by this scene. Of course, I’m a 20th century American, so I know zero people who feel this way about monarchy. Of course that doesn’t mean this scene shouldn’t have been written or portrayed. Queen Elizabeth’s grandmother most likely really did tell her that.  There’s a certain appreciation for humanity when you understand that different people can have different experiences than you. To think otherwise is very myopic and unintelligent. 

That’s all for now!! 

100th Birthday

This was the oldest child of my grandparents, Kosta (Gus) who only lived to be four years old. I believe he may have died from a burst appendix. If he had lived to see my mother’s birth, he would have been 19 years old. And if he were still alive now, then today would have been his 100th birthday. 

When my daughter was born, a lot of people on my mom’s side said she looked like him. Here’s a picture of her at a similar age for comparison. 

 

Giving Therapy More Chances

 I continue down a vicious cycle in which I talk with others online about mental health and anxiety, which in turn causes my algorithms to be inundated with mental health advocates and therapists. In these online circles, not going to therapy is NOT an option. If you have negative experiences, it’s either because you should “switch therapists” or because you’re a bad person who deserves to have those bad experiences. It’s literally never a valid option to say hey, this isn’t working for me AT ALL , so I’m just going to walk away and not pursue it anymore. You must always “find another one.”  And, they always tell you the unbearably high number of therapists they went through “before they found the right one.”  

In other words, there’s no therapy version of “I just want to be single right now.”  You must always “find someone.” 

One person suggested to me to try group therapy- in their mind, it would take away my fear of the therapist not believing me like the one I saw this spring, and also the possibility of them snapping on me and telling me to get over it like the one I saw in May. This would be because other clients would be present, so if the therapist was going to pull any of that crap, there would be people around to witness it. I thought they were right. Since they very suspiciously won’t allow me to record sessions to protect myself from this, the group option seemed viable. 

So I spent this weekend submitting inquiries to 12 practices that claim to offer group therapy. Yesterday, which was a Monday, I heard back from 7 out of the 12 saying that they don’t actually offer group therapy. Each incoming call or email was way more devastating than it needed to be. If I simply reminded them that their profile or their website said they did, they would just matter of fact say “well actually we don’t.” 

I never gave any history in any of these inquiries. So they had no concrete reasons to reject me at all. I can’t tell you how utterly devastating it is when I try and just get more and more turned away. I almost felt like something was wrong with me, like I was “seeing things” when I saw that they had group listed on their profiles or sites. Their condescending attitude and pervasive belief that they’re the expert on everyone else’s life makes one feel like they’re crazy in this regard. I have also noticed they do this with “specialties”. They’ll list all kinds of specialties that they have and then when you actually talk to them they’ll do a complete 180 and say they don’t specialize in it. 

The tricky thing with algorithms is that they feed you whatever they think you want to see.  So if you click on one topic, like it, comment on it, etc, it just causes the algorithm to give you more and more of that.  What happened here was just that I was getting too much information from content creators who are either therapists themselves (who often go on and make fun of their clients) or people who “strongly believe” in mental health and that since it’s the right choice for them it must be for everyone.  

I deleted my TikTok account because of this, and uninstalled the app.  It would be nice if someday in the future I could go back on and see short clips having to do with my actual interests, but my algorithm is so inundated with therapy crap that my whole account needed to go. 

It would also greatly help if therapists learned to not misadvertise.  Trying to seek help as someone who they do not believe is as deserving of that help as other women has been a nightmare for me.  The fact that they constantly turn it around on you and say “you just must not want the help” is so extremely cruel.  I do not know what kind of person you have to be to say that to someone who is paying out ten times what they make per hour to try and get said help.  (And yes a lot of their fees, I personally would have to work ten hours to pay for one hour). They are just vile.  

In some ways, I am jealous of women who can get the help, but at the same time I really am not, because those people essentially don’t have any autonomy.  I say that, because of how a lot of them had such a huge problem with the fact that I married someone I met at work, who was my supervisor.  If I was to end up seeing a therapist who didn’t believe in that, then I would have to leave my husband.  That would make things exponentially worse for me at this point. 

Cleaned Out the Fridge

 Last night was a good night to clean out the fridge at the group home. 

Holy Yogurt from 2024, Batman! I threw out an entire 13 gallon bag about 3/4 full of long expired stuff. I took shelves out and wiped it all down. It was so gross!  

Not even my parents’ fridge has ever been this bad. 

On a good note, I slept long hours at home yesterday. 

Tidbits

 Anna sent me this perfect picture of Tommy. What a good, photogenic boy!!  This picture is now my phone background. 

My life has become a big cycle of 12 hours on, 12 hours off. This group home is getting cleaner now that I’m cleaning it. The house supervisor refuses to do household chores (and also seems unable to) and the residents of the group home aren’t able to do much either. My Clorox wipes are finally not coming up so “muddy”. This place was gross when I started. Now we can walk in and not immediately smell funk. 

Every few mornings, I make the guys a big pan of scrambled eggs. They know how to do everything else breakfast related.  Except clean up after themselves. One of the guys helped me in the kitchen. I gave him one simple task at a time. Like, “find me a frying pan.”  “Get out the milk”. Etc. Then I told him to put a little butter in the frying pan, and he scooped half the entire tub into the pan. When I saw it, I was like ohhhh. No, just a teeny amount of butter. I showed him how much and dumped the rest back into the tub. A couple days later, the same thing happened. I asked him to put a little bit in, and he didn’t remember my little lesson about how much butter to put in a pan. Once again, he dumped half the tub out. 

That was eye opening. While this job may be easy, it’s still necessary. These people truly can’t live on their own. When I was a CASA volunteer, I worked with some teens that had “preparation for adult living classes” that taught them this stuff. They all caught on, as did my daughter whenever I taught her basic skills like this at home. 

I still have a lot of down time at night. I often doze off, and set my alarm for the top of every hour. This dozing causes me to not sleep much at home so I need to stop doing it if I want healthy sleep. So I brought my laptop, and I try to work on my writing. It’s hard, though, knowing that I was not believed in therapy about some key elements of my story. I just wish people knew that I am absolutely understanding of the fact that other women had different pressures put on them than me. When I told my cousin that my first boyfriend and I wanted 7 kids, she grabbed my hair and slammed my head against the wall. I got away from her and kicked her in the crotch and she grabbed my hair again. Then she forgot about the 7 kids and told me to cut my fucking hair or she would. At the time, my hair went all the way down my back. There was another time that she assaulted me that she spit in my face. That’s actually more disgusting than you think. 

What would eventually happen was that, of course, I would end up working at the child abuse shelter in Arizona. I would contract lice from the kids and it would be too difficult to comb them out of waist-length hair. So I cut it. It was also too infested to donate to a wig maker. With short “boy hair”, I was able to comb the lice out successfully. My major haircut was only a few days after the 9/11 attacks. I was watching rescue attempts at ground zero when my long ponytail was cut off. It was probably 9/14 or 15 😢. 

I wish I could be the type of woman who is believed and who “deserves” to be heard, etc. Then maybe I could go get help for some of my trauma responses. Writing my book, The Child Advocate has made me realize the astronomical amount of things I’ve been through working with children, elderly, and disabled people in precarious circumstances. I’ve absorbed a lot of *their* trauma as well. Normal people can go to therapy and unload this and be validated. I can’t. That makes writing hard. 

So I don’t know what else to do with my down time at work if I want to not doze and get healthy sleep at home. I do not want to bring any sewing projects whatsoever, because I’m afraid the nastiness of the house will embed into my sewing projects. 

The good news is I got an amazing paycheck and bought a couch for our living room with a hide a bed!!  I have a hide a bed couch at my mom’s house in Houston, but it was lest cost and hassle to just get a new one. Previously, there was no couch in our living room, just a table and chairs. Now when Anna comes, she can spend the night!  

Kevin reiterated several times that I never got a paycheck that big when I worked at his workplace. He does, because he makes a salary. (He’s a supervisor).  But I was hourly, and I reminded him that I did get paychecks like this when we had a lot of hours. I knew it was not what he meant. He meant that this is more steady. I know, and I’m honestly still jealous as fuck of him being on the Austin crew. The Austin crew seems so much more chill than the Houston crew. But not only are they fully staffed with my husband on board, but my husband is actually so extremely proud of me for other jobs I’ve had that aren’t working with him. He doesn’t really understand the astronomical amount of trauma and burden I uncovered by writing about it. 

So since I’m trauma blocked from writing on my down time, and the dozing interferes with my  regular sleep at home, the only other option is to doom scroll. I try to “positive scroll” but it inevitably turns to doom scrolling. 

I can’t wait for my next big paycheck. They’re a plus!!

Blue Texas 🧞‍♂️🌊🫐

Well, I didn’t think a Democrat sweep of Texas was possible!  I always thought Texas was rigged Republican. I also didn’t think it was possible since, for the past two years, they’ve been saying “we are in a dictatorship now”. 

What never fails is the opposite side acting like the whole country is over.  One of my friends posted this:

I wanted to say, “Quit being dramatic.”  

But I stayed out of it. 

A lot of sad and pissed off texans are blaming “Californians moving to Texas”. However, I don’t know anyone from California here. All the Californians I know never ventured past Arizona, and they all strongly dislike Texas. 

We’ll see how this plays out. I’m not into politics. Not at all. But I do lean left. I am so not into politics that I couldn’t remember Abbott’s name, and I’m still not sure what office Talarico won. 

I did get a very big paycheck today!  

I also bought a couch!  It’s coming on Friday the 13 th 

 

Can’t Find This in Houston

 Somehow I ended up on “new in Austin” TikTok, and I especially like this one guy who goes to people’s homes and buys food they make at home. There are so many people here who do this- they make a specialty at home, then sell it and you can pick it up at their home. The comments are full of people worrying about the health department, but this seems so prevalent here that it must be ok with the health department. Here is his latest video, and I really want to buy that plate from that lady!  Everyone he buys from is linked in the description. 

35 Years Ago Today

 Art is by Mary from WorshipInk in Huntsville, Alabama. 

On October 30th, 1991, I was in 8th grade at a Baptist Christian school, even though I was growing up in a Greek Orthodox family. It was my first year outside of public schools, and I was getting used to the culture shock of church services with angry preachers speaking English instead of chanting and rituals mostly in Greek. On that day, I did the thing that evangelicals like my school believed to be the most important decision of one’s life, but that my family’s denomination didn’t believe in or ever talk about- I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior. 

Even though my parents saw my decision as unnecessary because I’d been baptized as an infant, they still saw it as me leaving their church. It would cause animosity between my mother and I for decades, even though she was the adult who enrolled me in that school. 

Over the next two years, I accepted Christ 85 more times, because our preachers at school had a propensity to convince you that you “weren’t really saved”. So I would go on a roller coaster of getting saved again and again. I know I did it 86 times, because I kept a diary. However, 10/30/1991 was the first time, so it’s the only anniversary I keep. 

Do I still believe in the same thing I did at age 13? No. I’m no atheist though. I’ll get into the evolution of my beliefs later. (Maybe). Some think I shouldn’t commemorate this “anniversary” because what they did at that school was essentially abuse. However, I still do, because it’s a huge part of my story. Our hardships and trauma shape us. 

Mom Daughter Lunch Date

I drove to San Marcos yesterday to take Anna to lunch. The hair is green now!  It’s a part of her Halloween costume. She told me she’s going brown again after Halloween. 

After lunch, I went back to her place and got to visit the black cat formerly known as Jordan. A while back, Anna asked me if she could have him. She was going to take Alex, but changed her mind and wanted Jordan because he is young, only about 18 months old. She then renamed him Tommy, because her roommate’s cat is Jerry. She kind of needed a pet for her mental health, and her dad and stepmom wouldn’t let her have one of theirs. I paid her pet deposit and bought her all the supplies. 

Here’s Tom duking it out with Jerry. 

Here’s a flashback picture of Anna at age 5. Facebook said this picture was posted 14 years ago today. It must have been the first day cold enough for a jacket and gloves. 

 

Kid Choking

 I just wanted to take a minute to try and raise more awareness about the story going viral right now. An 8 year old girl choked to death at school six months ago, and her parents are now exposing the surveillance footage from the school. I think they waited this long, because the Texas Rangers were investigating. This is the clip I can find that best describes what happened in the footage, but it doesn’t show all the footage. 

When I worked with kids in Arizona 25 years ago, I had a one year old toddler choke on a piece of a toy that broke off in his mouth. I didn’t do the Heimlich on him. I held him semi upside down and hit his back twice. The piece of toy came flying out. When I picked him up to give him the back thrusts, I sort of left my body for a whole minute. I was very dissociated but still hit his back. I thought I would do it wrong. 

One misconception about choking is that they “can’t cough”. They can!  The only benefit of the doubt that I would give that staff member based on that video is that she thought a person can’t cough if they’re choking. 

That video didn’t show all the footage. Adrian also went up to 3-4 other lunchroom staff members. Their body language said to me that they thought she was misbehaving. They all seemed like they didn’t give a damn and even seemed sort of abusive. The first staff member sort of pushed her towards the trash can. It looked bad to me. I saw a comment online that said “They hated her.”  Maybe 🤷🏻‍♀️ 

Adrian Thompson was 8 years old when she died six months ago. At the time of her death, she had a 3 month old baby brother who is now 9 months old.  Her dad posted a TikTok of her meeting him for the first time. She was very gentle, loving, and crying happy tears. I can’t find it now, but here is one from her mom. 😢 

I just wanted to say, that someone who is choking might be able to cough. If they are, then give them back thrusts. If that fails, Do the Heimlich maneuver. If it’s a toddler that you can flip upside down, then do that. 

Another thing I wanted to say is to please have a more positive view of the kids in your care, whether they are your own or you’re working with them. Do not always assume bad intent. Get yourself onto their level and meet their needs. Anticipate their needs. Get rid of thoughts that they might be “testing your limits” or “manipulating you”. Ask yourself what they might need that they aren’t getting. It just seems to me that these staff members at Velma Penny Elementary School were hateful towards the kids and didn’t care. 

RIP Adrian. 

Swiffer Fun and Dreading Losses

This is the swiffer pad after I mopped half of the grouphome with it.

Looking at how dirty the pad is is the funnest part of swiffer-ing imo.  

I replaced the pad and did the long hall and their bathroom. The second pad wasn’t this dirty after that -

I would say the second pad was 75% as dirty as this one. 

Tonight, I just grabbed all the throw blankets around the living room, the kitchen towels and potholders and washed them all in one load, with hot water.  A lot of them had crusty old food. 

It just seems like no one ever cleans or does anything here. And night staff is generally supposed to. So I try to.  

The supervisor here lost her husband unexpectedly, and she blames energy drinks. If she sees you with one, she’ll start preaching against them. She claims he drank five or six of them a day. Holy crap.  That’s $400-$500 a month. Plus, he paid with his life. ☹️ I only have one a day at most and almost never finish the can. For this reason I only get the small cans. She didn’t say what size cans he’d get. Still I try not to let her see me with one, because losing her husband was obviously very traumatic. Even if I throw my can away, I bury it with other trash.  Or I wrap it in toilet paper like it’s a sanitary napkin. It really must suck to lose your spouse.  People warn women all the time to “have a plan”  and I do- I have five or six backup plans that ironically, those same people who give that advice wouldn’t approve of.  But what would I do with the extreme sadness that would come over me if I lost Kevin?  The “have a plan” advice is usually only financial, not regarding grief. I can’t go to therapy, obviously.  I just have to think about it starting now, even if it doesn’t happen for decades still.  I can’t imagine trying to go to grief counseling if I lost Kevin and the therapist got judgy with me for marrying my supervisor.  I would lose my mind.  My supervisor’s husband died only a year ago (maybe less, I don’t know exactly when)  I can imagine you never get over it.  

Honestly, I would probably buy a van and do my own little personal tour of the lower 48 and do my side jobs, the retail apps. One of the apps, iVueit, posted on their facebook page a couple who is RVing across the country and doing iVueit along the way. That’s nice!!!!  Seeing new places is very healing, honestly. But- I wouldn’t take off if I had grandchildren by then. I’d stick around for them. Or, I’d make the trip not as long as if I didn’t have grandkids yet. 

Maybe I’d go in one direction, then come back and do grandma stuff then take off in another direction, come back for grandma stuff again, etc. If I make it to all 48 states, I’ll then book two cruises- Hawaii and Alaska. 

Of course, I might die before Kevin, but statistically, he will. 

Another loss that I am dreading- who I’m most likely not going to die first- is my cat Alex. Alex is getting old and just acts like the cat version of a 100 year old man. I am going to lose my shit when he dies. He was a very good therapy cat when I was going through the worst time of my life.  He’s very loyal. I was cuddling with him today, and a feeling of dread came over me. I probably only have a year or two left with him honestly. When Anna graduates from college in 2029, he’ll probably already be gone. 

Which reminds me, I have to ask Anna her preference of notification if I find myself having to euthanize him. Does she want to know beforehand so she can say goodbye, or would she prefer me just telling her after the fact?  We haven’t had that conversation. I dread so much about loss. 

Cleaning House

 I brought my own Clorox wipes to work just to wipe down surfaces. The ladies at the last house I worked at were amazing at housework, so that house was immaculate. These guys are terrible at it, and the house is a lot dirtier than I thought. The house supervisor told me that housekeepers make more than us, so she’s not doing any of it. I don’t know her medical history, but she also appears to have lipedema in her legs, so she probably can’t do it either.  The Clorox wipes come up really nasty. Last night, I looked at the mop situation. I cleaned out the mop bucket, but the mop itself was horrendous.  Some mop heads can snap off and go into the laundry. Not this one. So when she came in, I asked if I could bring my swiffer wet jet from home. She told me not to and that she would order one for the house. She ordered it with the grocery pick up. I’m not going to do a spring cleaning, but one thing per night will really help. 

Whenever I worked graveyard shift in the past, caring for people who were sleeping, I was always expected to do a lot of cleaning. These people don’t even want to stay awake at work. I’ve been made to scrub baseboards in an already clean place before, and for less per hour.  BUT, I do not let it show that I think they have audacity, and for that, they all really like me. 👍🏾 

Not Believable

 If I ever want to be in the mood to write again, I need to spill here about the two things that the therapist didn’t believe me about. 

One of them was regarding the pressure from my extended family when I was younger. I basically started working with kids when I was very young, because the pressure on me at the time was to NOT get married or have kids of my own and to pursue only career and education only. This was in contradiction to their mantras that no one would ever hire me, but the pressure was still there. I have 20 first cousins, and ten of them never married or had kids.  That’s evidence that I’m telling it accurately  

The problem that the therapist had with this is that most other women get pressured from society TO get married and have kids. In her eyes, someone experiencing the opposite is probably either lying or delusional. But, I stand by my past. The only thing that I can probably agree with now that I didn’t see at the time was that maybe it was because of my young age at the time?  However, age was rarely brought up. The pressure on me was “don’t”. Not, “maybe someday” 

 

The other thing had to do with the year I graduated from college. When I explained that I could not find a job upon finishing my degree, she assumed it was during the pandemic. This would fit her political narrative probably. I said no, it was before the pandemic. She gave me this face: 🤨 and said “huh!”

I can’t remember if I told her that 2020 was my highest earning year ever, but if I did, that probably pissed her off too. I must not have, because she would have attributed that to my degree when it had nothing to do with it. It was all the apps that I do on the side now. They paid hella good in 2020. Anyone can sign up for that, and no one cares about your degree. 

Therapists not believing my story doesn’t mean that I can’t write it down. Some of the best writing that I’ve consumed in the last few years have been about subcultures that have nothing to do with any of the subcultures I have lived in. For instance, the HBO series “Big Love” with Bill Paxton. I loved the job they did on that writing. But I have only come across a polygamist family in real life once before, when I attended high school with the youngest daughter of one. I did not get angry at the show and write them a letter saying, “I’ve never been expected to marry a man with two wives already and seven kids, therefore it isn’t realistic!”  

It’s realistic in some parts of the country. It shows a lot of strength and maturity when one is able to understand that their experiences don’t apply to EVERYONE.  

Work Update

 Tonight will be my third night working at this men’s group home, affiliated with the same company. On my last day at the ladies’ house, they all gave me a hug and were not too happy about me being transferred. That makes me feel good. 

At this house, the only other staff member besides me is the house supervisor. If I hadn’t been transferred, she’d have to be here 24/7. She’s in her 70’s and kind of unhinged, but more on that later. Staff members are leaving this company for the following reason:

This past summer, right before I got this job and moved out here, this particular group of group homes was owned by a different company. My company bought them all in either May or June. The company I’m working for enacted a new rule that they must do hourly bed checks on the group home residents. You can’t lie about doing these checks, either. You have to log in to the desk top computer in the house and click on each client name and click asleep, awake, on leave, or hospitalized. There’s even a way to do it on your phone. Each check in is time stamped to make sure you did it every hour. The other staff members are appalled at this. I’m appalled at them being appalled. I just think it’s the bare minimum. 

There were two ladies at this house who have quit over this new rule. So the house supervisor and I are basically just relieving each other every 12 hours. My regular schedule is Monday through Friday 8pm until 8am, but she also said I can work weekends if I want. She also insisted she didn’t want me getting burned out because she needs me. So I told her that my husband is going to be out of town this weekend. His job goes to Louisiana every three months for an inventory account. I said I would work this weekend since he’ll be gone, but next weekend I’ll take off. There is a floater that can come in. She was happy with that, but appeared to think that my husband going out of town means he’s cheating on me lol. That was just the impression I got from her reactions to “He’s going out of town.”  I told her that I used to work there too, and I also went to Louisiana every three months. She seemed ok with that explanation. When I worked there, there was a coworker whose wife thought he was cheating when we were in Louisiana. It was a bit of a shit show. She had him on “locate my family” app, and the motel we stayed at had a tavern in the same parking lot/strip mall. She thought he was there drinking all night. 

But back to this men’s home. 

In some ways, it’s easier and in some ways, it’s not. When I get there at 8:00 am they’re all turning in for the night. Most of them lay awake in bed for over an hour. They wake up between 5:45-6:15, which is earlier than the ladies. They have fewer medications, and none of them need help showering or grooming. They do all the same household chores as the ladies’ home, but they don’t do as good of a job as the ladies. One of them has the same first name as a celebrity, and I started calling him the full name of that celebrity. He’s all over that. 

So all I do is clock in at 8pm, see them all off to bed, tidy up a bit and do the hourly bed checks. Then only really deal with them the last two hours. I have needed to slow a couple of them down with medications- they seem to want to hurry up and take their meds too quickly, and since they’re all new to me and I haven’t memorized their medication lists, I am insisting on giving them one pill at a time until I mark it in the computer. 

So all in all, it’s very chill. I like doing this kind of work much better than I liked doing home care. I didn’t think I would, either. Taking care of elderly in their homes is often as physically taxing as caring for a baby or toddler (even harder actually, because babies and toddlers are easier to lift and don’t die).  Working in a group home like this with adults who have IDD feels more like caring for tweens or teens. It’s not physically taxing at all, you just have to constantly “remind”. And since they’re actually adults, you don’t have to impose arbitrary rules on them like you might with older kids. That makes it easier on everyone. 

I also never worked 84 hours a week with elderly in their homes. Not sure I’d want to!  

House Switch

 Earlier this week, I met the nurse and another staff member at one of the other group homes that is run by my company. The nurse went through the medication routines and the diagnostic lists of the four men who live in the group home. 

Then this morning, the manager of that house called me and asked me if I was interested in working at her house Monday through Friday from 8pm until 8am. I said yes right away. I know that’s 60 hours a week!  That will actually be good for me. I want to pay off my student loans already!  These guys are supposedly a “little harder” than the five ladies I work with now, but that’s not saying much. They’re easy compared to literally all of what I’ve done in the past. 

Then, that house manager said, “Oh good! Thank you so much!  I’m so glad you are willing to do it, because if not then I might have to kill myself!”  😮 

“Oh!” I exclaimed “No don’t do that!”  

We both weirdly chuckled. What an insane thing to say!  So that starts this Monday night at 8pm. I’m actually looking forward to it. They said two of the guys will already be in bed when I get there, and the other two will go before 9:30. After that it’s just the “hourly bed checks” until medication starts at 7:00 am. The five ladies I work with now start their meds at 6:30. I may have to help the guys more with making breakfast, but that’s ok. 

Maybe I can pay my student loans off for my 49th birthday! 

Feeling Blah

 For no reason at all, here’s a video of my cat Mitchell being a poopoo head. 

I don’t think I have it in me anymore to write my book. I’ve mentioned it here before- the book I wanted to write is called The Child Advocate.  The extremely rough draft has about 45,000 words.  It’s “based on” my own experiences working with kids and what I learned along the way. 

When I started writing it, the creative juices were really flowing. Then I started having memory after memory and I was like, damn. I have really been through a lot with this crap. It was at that point that I decided to go to therapy to process all of this.  You can read about my ups and downs (mostly downs) Here. 

I think therapy has sabotaged my ability to write this book. Every time I sit down, I hear the one who didn’t believe key elements of my story and also the one who basically yelled at me to get over it. I cannot bring myself to write and publish something that got me those reactions from therapists.  If someone actually read my book though, and either found it unbelievable or thought I was just some whiner that needed to get over shit, I would be ok with that.  Coming from therapists hits fundamentally differently.

After that, several more “free consults” proved that they have a problem with my marriage, due to the fact that we met at work.  I cannot just start therapy again, I have to constantly ask if they’re ok with my marriage. They’re either not ok with it, or they are and they insinuate that once we build trust, they can help me see how wrong it is. How about no. I do not want to lose my autonomy. 

The spark to write it just isn’t there anymore. I realized this last night when one of the therapists who I had a free consult with kept me on her mailing list for whatever reason and invited me to a free group zoom meeting called “celebrating neurodiversity.”  Now the neurodiverse label, I don’t know. I have already been diagnosed and then undiagnosed with two different things, who knows if these people would undiagnose me with ADHD if they could. Obviously they could- the only diagnostic tool used on me was a checklist that took 60 seconds. But I looked at all the other faces on the screen and something in me just knew that the past couple years of trying to “seek therapy” has drained all the creativity out of me. I don’t even want to do my quilts and wreaths anymore. When one young woman started sharing that she just doesn’t know how to establish a morning routine, I clicked exit and said screw this. I don’t have time for this anymore. At least this bullshit was free. 

Regarding morning routines- not all days are the same. You need two or three different routines that will work for different types of days. The difficulty comes when you think you failed because you couldn’t stick to ONE.  Make a few different lists for different mornings. Tack them to the fridge and decide each morning which kind of day it is. That’s it. 

I am thinking that I’ll just sit at my desk at home and compile all of what I have into one document and store it in a flash drive and then shred the rest. My daughter already knows where the flash drive is in case I die. Maybe there’s a chance that the act of “compiling” will make the inspiration come back. 

View Spike

 I made a post earlier today. It had 17 views when I left the house. I drove an hour and it went up to 133 views. This freaked me out so much I deleted the post. My posts only get over 100 views occasionally, and it’s over a few days not an hour. I have no idea what happened. Yes, more views are welcome!  I just didn’t share it anywhere that would garner that   

Brie in a Pumpkin

I hollowed out this small pumpkin and added Brie, cream cheese, fig jam, thyme, walnuts, and honey. I baked it at 350 for about an hour. I also baked bread from scratch. It’s amazing!