the other father

from age 3 to 11, my nuclear family consisted of three muskateers: my mom, my younger brother and me. when i was a wee one, my mom caught my biological father cheating on her, made a tough decision to divorce the man and did the best she could to raise my brother and i. i was too young to remember the divorce. my brother and i were still babies. because my biological father was never really around during my formative years, i never felt like i missed out. i have fuzzy memories of weekend visits with him, but i don't remember him being present in the years before my mom met my 'dad'.

when i was 11, my mom started dating a wonderful man whom she married two years later. shortly after their wedding, my stepfather adopted my brother and i so as form a more cohesive family, all sharing a common last name. by the time of the adoption, my biological father had faded far away from my life. i later found out that he remarried and had another son and daughter.

just as i assume my biological father was building a home with his new family, i, too was growing up in a loving home with a really good guy who i came to know as my only father. i never felt like there was something missing in my life. my thoughts very rarely wandered to the man who had sired me. my folks had another daughter and son, who, although technically step-siblings, have never been anything but my beloved brother and sister, whom i have loved, tortured and protected in only the way a true sibling can.

two nights ago, i got a text message from my mom. "you're biological father called - he wants to talk to you. he wanted your number, but i took his instead." first emotion that rushed in was confusion. what does he want? ugh... i don't want to deal with this. so i put the phone down and forgot about the message until yesterday. i called my mom to get the scoop. "he and his son were in san diego and drove by the house (where i grew up) and i think he probably just wants to touch base. i didn't get any weird vibes." huh. i still felt pretty unsettled about the whole thing, but pushed it off once again in favor of hemming a dress i'd been working on.

this morning i woke up with terrible, flu-like symptoms and have been feeling like shit all day. i finally managed to drag myself out of the house to go grocery shopping and when i got home, i immediately retreated back to refuge of my bed. soon after flopping down, i realized that i was psychotically thinking about the ginger ale i just bought. i wasn't hungry or thirsty and my stomach didn't feel bad, but i really really wanted to have some of that ginger ale. as soon as i realized that my longing for the ginger ale wasn't driven by thirst, i tried to just be in that moment of 'need', to quietly sit with my emotions and try to recognize what was under the 'need to feed'. my thoughts immediately drifted to the text message from my mom. but i thought i was done with this? i don't even know this guy. i don't even really care to know him. how would i address him if i did call him? i thought i was totally fine with having no relationship with my biological father. so why is this bothering me?

i wanted to call my brother to get his take, but the pressure in my ears and my aching back muscles impeded my want. so i just laid there in the twilight. then the tears came. soft, quiet tears that bubbled up from someplace inside of me that i couldn't name. i didn't particularly feel grief or sadness. the tears didn't feel like they had anything to do with abandonment issue or loss of father. but they were present nonetheless. so i cried. just let the tears come out. no trying to explain them or justify them, just let them come. and when i was done crying i just laid there a little longer. i realized that i also wasn't psychotically obsessing over the ginger ale anymore.

i'm still kind of twisted inside about the whole incident, but a beautiful lesson came out of the whole thing. i allowed myself to be guided by awareness, and was rewarded with balance. i'm proud of recognizing my age-old avoidance method - stuffing instead of releasing - and consciously opting to change my patterns of self-medicating. perhaps the future holds a relationship between my biological father and i. perhaps not. more importantly, the future - and the present - hold a much more significant relationship: one with my healthy self. and that feels complete.

reunion

i went to my sister's graduation recently. it was a whirlwind weekend for not only my sister, but for my folks, too. my dad arrived on thursday, i flew in on friday and my mom showed up on saturday. and the main event on sunday. in addition to attending all things graduation, my sis and my folks were preparing her condo to sell - the weekend was full of pomp and circumstance, paint brushes and belt sanders. i had a delightful time and even got to spend some rare, quality time with just my dad and sister, kicking around lovely seattle.

in on friday, out on sunday. a special trip to tiffany's for a little something for dad's favorite daughters. a shopping spree in nordstroms. miles and miles of walking around downtown and capitol hill. and eating to the point of pain at every meal. despite all the great memories, the one that has lingered with uncomfortable clarity is that i completely overstuffed myself at every.single.meal. all weekend long. we stopped in a cute little divey indian restaurant the first night and i ate so much that i was still uncomfortable even after the movies the same night. the next day we went to the seattle space needle for a decadent brunch, where i repeated the stuffing cycle that left me feeling bloated, tired, and immobile even through the tiffany's visit and clothes shopping. later that evening, we had pizza and champagne while we celebrated my sister and freshened up her home. the next day, we rushed off to an early graduation and then to another brunch... where i gorged myself not only on the extravagant breakfast buffet, but also had a quarter of my sister's burger.

what the fuck was going on? i haven't eaten like this in months and months. the whole thing felt sick and out of control. something about being with my family brings this out of me... there was no animosity, no fighting, none of the usual, predictable behavior that usually ensues when two or more of my family members get together. so why the need to stuff? what was i worried about? what was i trying to smother inside of me? the worst part is that i noticed my dad eating way more than he usually does, too. since his heart surgery, he's lost thirty pounds, he eats healthy, he's walking 5 miles a day. he's in great shape. and yet, there was something odious about the whole weekend that was leading us to medicate ourselves in really bad ways.

i suspect that somewhere deep down, i know exactly why i was eating to the point of pain, but in my current state of consciousness, i'm uninterested in digging deeper. i feel flat lately... like i'm just... here. and yet i'm not fully here. what i do know, regardless of my current state of mental disinterest, is that i need to resolve the visit to seattle.

the 4-1-1

blargh.

that about sums up my mood right now. this morning i woke up to five text messages from my mom. the last one said "here's my credit card number to book a flight home." let the drama begin!

after a rough nite, my dad is stable. he had double bypass surgery last night. there was an episode of internal bleeding that the docs couldn't stop for a little while. it was likely due to all the blood thinners that my dad has been on since the stents were put in a few months ago. now he is in a drug-induced coma while the docs do a risk assessment - how much do they thicken his blood to help the healing and how thin do they have to keep it to avoid deep vein thrombosis or clotting. they're going to take him out of the coma this evening.

i ended up calling my little brother on the way to work. he lives on the east coast and i figured that he was in a later time zone than me, he had probably received the run down already that morning. he's not one to get very excitable and so i figured that he was a safe bet to get some straight up factual info from. it was nice to talk to him, but i could hear the weariness and fear in his voice.

when i finally did talk to my mom i asked how she was doing and she said, "well. i'm glad i'm by myself right now. i don't think i would be able to handle anyone stirring up drama or being hysterical right now." i am not kidding. those were her exact words. and yet, here she is sending cryptic text messages about coming home and complications with my dad's surgery. sending us camera pics of his unconscious body tangled up with tubes and gauze and monitoring machines. spinning all the rest of us up.

i decided to go home. i'm going to try to find a flight this evening and stay for the weekend. i keep waffling back and forth between should i go? maybe i shouldn't go? i keep trying to figure out what the right thing to do is. my guy said "follow your heart". i can't tell the difference between what my head is telling me and what my heart is feeling. i want to retreat. retreat! retreat!! i want to go to sleep through this whole ordeal. i don't want to deal with it. i don't want to be around my dad in his current condition and the rest of my family because i know i'll want to cry, but i don't want to be vulnerable in front of them. i'm scared that they'll ridicule and make light of my feelings, that they'll turn my tears into a jokey punchline. none of my family knows how to respect grief. none of my family knows how to just sit and listen. none of my family knows how to be gentle and careful with tender emotions.

last night when i was ready to break, i thought i wanted to be alone. i didn't even want my guy around to see me all weepy and teary about this. i realize that what i wanted was to be able to cry openly, to be free to be scared, to have whatever emotions that were coming up and out of me just BE. i realize that i shied away from my guy because i didn't want to be offered a solution or encouragement. i didn't want to have to talk about it. i didn't want my emotional turmoil to be the center of attention. i just wanted to BE. i wasn't able to ask him to just be there with me. i didn't know that's what i needed. this is going to be the hardest part about going home - the inability to just be, whatever that may look like. i feel like i'll have to guard myself against the sideways jabs and funny barbs that my family tends to exchange in the face of grief. i'm worried that i'll have to compartmentalize and box up my feelings. i've worked really hard this past year to break those habits, to let it out before i eat it down.

what better way to try out my new coping skills than to go into the belly of the beast, though, eh?

scared

my mom called me first thing this morning. she said that my dad called 911 last night and went to the hospital due to heart issues. about two months ago he had angioplasty and 5 stents put into two arteries. he's been in cardio rehab since. my folks own a home in chicago and a little summer/holiday place on lake michigan an hour away. my mom happened to be at the lake house that night so my dad was all alone when it happened. she gave me the news this morning as she was driving back in a blizzard to be with my dad. she said he was fine, no heart trauma, they'll do another angiogram later in the morning to see if more angioplasty is needed. i cried quietly on the phone so she couldn't hear my tears. i didn't want anyone at work to know i was crying either. i called my dad immediately after getting off the phone with my mom. he sounded weak but brave. he sounded a little unsure and a little scared. when i hung up i started to eat. there were some mixed nuts in my drawer and a few chocolate truffles. i ate all the truffles and was putting away the nuts at an impressive pace. i felt numb. i was scared. i was too ashamed to let my fearful tears be seen or heard by my folks or by my coworkers.

soon after i got home from work my mom called to say there was a problem with one of the stents and that there was too much trauma to my dad's heart from the angioplasty. they have to do bypass surgery tonight. i wanted to break down. i want to sob. i want my dad to be safe and healthy. but my mom was being such a fucking drama queen. i'm angry with her. i don't feel safe when i talk to her. i feel like she's been spinning the situation out of control just so she can make me cry and then try to soothe me. i didn't give her the satisfaction of making me cry. soon after i got off the phone with her, my guy came home. i told him what was going on, but i still didn't cry.

an hour or so ago my mom called again and conferenced called my siblings in. she was pulling the same dramatics. i happened to make a salad right before she called so i put the phone on speaker and shoveled the salad in while she talked.

i feel a tightness in my chest that needs release. i want to stuff it down with food and drink. i want to be numb right now. i'm pissed that my mom can't behave like a normal, caring mother. i'm angry that i can't feel grief over my father's mortality. the tightness in my chest is causing pain. it's swelling. why do i feel like i can't let it out? why is it so goddamn hard to just let it erupt? i don't even want to let my guy see me cry right now.

i'm scared. i'm angry. i feel helpless. i'm sure everything with my dad will be fine. bypass surgery these days is fairly routine with great odds of success and recovery. he's at one of the best hospitals in the country. he's in good health (besides the heart). he's relatively young. he'll be fine. but what if he dies? what if he doesn't make it? what if i never get to see him again?

i'm feeling a ton of animosity towards my mother right now, too. i know she's sad. i know she's hurting and scared but i fucking HATE how she goes about her emotional crises. every time i've talked to her today i feel like she's baiting me with an overly dramatic doom and gloom picture. when we were conference calling with my sibs she directed us, "now go have a good cry. then eat. or do whatever you need to do." DON'T FUCKING TELL ME HOW TO FEEL. DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO. christ i'm pissed. i wish she could have just calmly doled out the facts, asked us if we had any questions, asked us how we felt and told us that she was scared and sad herself. instead i got a bunch of theatrics and 'you're probably feeling like this and that... it's ok. but your dad looks exactly the way my dad did before he died of heart failure.' seriously? no. i don't need the dramatic punctuation. instead of acting like the glue that binds us together, instead of soothing us with her own come from, she's spinning us all up like fucking whirling dervishes - trying to see how much dirt she can kick up, trying to see just how frenetic she can get us.

the tears are coming now. hot, moody tears of release. now i'm worried that my guy will wander into the office while i'm sitting here, furiously typing and quietly crying. i don't want him to see me like this. it feels too vulnerable. i feel like this is too raw... like i have to mete out my emotions in front of him on this one. this sucks. i'm not ready to deal with the death of a parent. i'm sure my dad will be just fine. but still... i'm unaccustomed to letting the grief in. i'm not comfortable with letting it have time and space in my heart and head. i'm comfortable with finding my way to the bottom of an oreo bag.

whew.

i feel quite a bit better for having gotten all of this out. i feel exhausted now and my eyes are swollen and heavy from crying. my chest feels a little less tight. i don't feel the psychotic compulsion to sneak attack the kitchen cupboards. i think i'm going to wander off to bed and maybe cry into my pillows a little more...

whaddya expect if you never take a risk?

not too long ago, my guy and i were fondly recounting his success in the last couple of years - he's worked really hard and has quite a bit to show for it - music that's noticed, a funny website, a fantastic dream job. at some point in our conversation, i wondered why i couldn't count the same kind of successes for myself- i mean i, too, am really passionate - and about so much! so why is it that my repertoire of worldly talents has gone unnoticed?? i mean i AM fabulous for cryin' out loud!

"whaddya expect if you never take a risk?" my guy innocently asked me.

blink. blink.

"you have a lot of projects and you are talented at so many things... but the difference between you and me is that i actually take the risk and put my shit out there... out there to be seen, to be judged on my creativity by an elusive anonymous." weisenheimer. ok. i get it. my guy is talented AND sensible. i'll show him i can take a risk... right after i prove it to myself...

so here i come, risk. here i come. here's my attempt at openness and blatant honesty in the face of unknown judgement. and yet, before i can start taking risks with my fashion or photography or jewelry making, before i can display those projects to the world, i've got to start with baring that which is closer to home. here's my attempt at finding peace, at gingerly tending a beautiful blossom of self - even in the dead of winter. i'm ready to be visible. i'm ready to take the ultimate risk and bare myself right down to my big ol' belly...

i have spent A LOT of my life in the throes of recurring negative thoughts about self and body... mostly, my not nice thoughts target my stomach region. i am an emotional eater. i carry more weight than my bones should have to bear. since i can remember, food has served secondarily as fuel, a means of life, and primarily as a means to sanity, safety, discomfort, and psychosis. i stuff, therefore i am. i stuff and stuff and stuff. and my belly takes it. it takes all the food and emotion i can shove down. and it holds it. my belly stretches and expands and adapts to all my neuroses. i have spent far too long hating and shaming myself, specifically my big, beautiful soft belly - symbol of feminine, mother, center of my self.

for holding me in your soft embrace for so very long, Belly, i am ready to risk vulnerability, shame, fear, and embarrassment in the name of release, in the name of health. you deserve a much needed break from holding me - holding me in, holding me up - while i've been holding you down, Belly. you deserve love and appreciation.

today i accept change. i welcome my feminine. i cherish the center of my self. i seek to nurture my self. this is the challenge i accept - to use my voice and my words to heal, to resist using food to choke. today i honor my body, my belly and will continue to so through daily posts, songs from my truest, depth - notes from my belly.