From the Hat Hotel to Psychotherapy

Recently I made some changes to my bedroom. You may not know that I have a huge passion for purses and hats. It was starting to get crowded:

To the right is my "purse tree" and of course my stack of hat boxes.

Afterwards I had what hubby called "purse tower" and "hat hotel."

Thanks to everyone who gave me fantastic feedback with the issues I was having with Beav. I certainly don't want to discourage him from doing anything he wants to do. I did buy him a book called "You Are Not Alone Seeing Your Struggles Through The Eyes of God." It's geared towards teenagers and each chapter deals with a different feeling, for example 'Sometimes I feel disappointed.' The chapters are small and give the reader verses and reassures the reader that what they're feeling is normal and how to pray about it. He really appreciated the book and is in better spirits, although he still wants to quit choir.

Of course before the incident with Beav, I talked about this. As I mentioned in my last post I could feel myself completely getting stressed with what happened and I had to give myself a time out. I went into my room and I could feel the familiar pain start up, the inability to breath started and then I looked at the clock. I had thirty minutes to get myself to the dojo for kickboxing and sparring, I needed to pull it together and get ready.

Then the lightening bolt hit. This is exactly what I've been doing the past five months. Instead of dealing what I'm feeling I push it aside and go about business. NOT THIS TIME. I picked up the phone and called my sister. I've always hesitated to do this because she is a stay at home mom with eight kids and really, does she have the time to hear me whine? But she answered and immediately knew something was up. She put everything aside and let me talk, or I should say cry, because I just let it all out. I told her everything I was feeling, what the psychologist said, why I don't talk about how I feel, everything.

My little sister, she's pretty smart and unfortunately familiar with grief as she has had a miscarriage and a stillborn. She recommended I read books on grief. We both love to read and she felt that my biggest issue was needing to know that what I was feeling was normal. She joked that she had her own grief book library and recommended a few. I have to admit I felt amazing after we talked. I was laughing and smiling and I really never knew that sharing like that could be so helpful.

The best part was that it wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. That doesn't mean everything is champagne and roses, but I really felt as if I had a victory. And I really started grieving.

After last weeks success I felt good about things. I knew that it was still an uphill battle but I was optimistic. I even went back to church. I avoid church when I'm wrestling with something that yesterday my pastor referred to as a "secret sin.". Something that as a Christian I've allowed in my life and it doesn't belong.

Sunday the pastor spoke on the very subject. It was weird because he mentioned so many things that had crossed my mind over the last two weeks. He spoke about how we try to justify behavior that we know is wrong. How we try to tell ourselves that its just our issue and it doesn't hurt anyone else. I said those very same things to myself all of last week and yesterday was reminded that I've just been feeding myself a line of crap.

Its not as if, though, you decide 'ok, I am ridding myself of this' and then your life becomes perfect. I feel unburdened by a lot of the things that were weighing on me before however, there are reasons I started to travel down that road and those reasons still exist. My life doesn't suddenly become perfect because I've decided to do the right thing. For me, a day can go from good to bad in a blink of an eye. Some stressors are just too much right now and I can feel negativity and anger cover me like a blanket. That's when the justification starts. That's when I start to tell myself 'well, I'm upset and if I do abcde that will make me happy and don't I deserve to be happy?' This is a familiar refrain and not one that I just say to myself but one I hear from others as motivation to continue down the wrong path.

It's obvious that psychotherapy puts me on a new journey. Hopefully it's a journey full of enlightenment, self-discovery, a better relationship with God, a better relationship with my family, and regained self-confidence.

Thursday Ten, The oral and anal edition

I spend a lot of time on the internet. Between the blackberry and the laptop....I spend most of my day on the internet....twittering, reading blogs, email, the list is endless. There is no denying that I LOVE technology. However, I don't understand how it works and I don't feel I need to understand how it works. All I know is that if I push the little button under the word Dell on my laptop, it should come on. And that little 'e' at the bottom, if I hit that it takes me to the internet. If none of those things work, I get a little crazy.

Last night Einstein came to me and started going on about servers and his xbox and his friends and he wants to buy a server, yada, yada, yada. I believe my eyes started glazing over at the first mention of server. I finally told him to cut to the chase and he explained that he and his friends would pay for the server but they needed a credit card. Nice to know I'm useful. So, I gave him my credit card and asked when the server would arrive. Hey, I like to mess with the kid's head.

So, after all that technology talk I thought that for today's Thursday Ten I'd share some of my favorite URL's with you.

1. I love to cook and I utilize two website a lot for recipes. Of course, food network is one of them. Initially I shied away from this site because some of the recipes were confusing and complicated. However,either I've improved or the recipes have gotten easier. When I'm having a party or trying to work a theme meal it's a great resource.
2. The other site is allrecipes.com. I like this site so much that I even buy their cookbooks. One of my favorite features of this site is that let's say you have a pantry full of spam, you can do a search based on ingredients. Spam all week long! (I actually hate Spam and I do not endorse it's use).
3. I love to shop online, mostly because I don't like the mall very much. If you have a need to increase the size of your jewelry box ex-boyfriend jewelry is a great place to go. This site gives people the chance to sell those unwanted pieces of jewelry that were gifted to them by, well you guessed it, exboyfriends. Seriously, there is some nice jewelry on here and the stories are great!
4. I love to read and recently some of my friends turned me onto the goodread site. This site allows you to list the books you've read, make reviews, and recommend them to others. It also gives you the option to offer the book up for swap or sell. You can also list the books that you plan to read, connect with others, and get recommendations.
5. As much as I love to read I HATE paying for books. I recommend using your library (insert the url for your library here). I love our library website. I can go to the website, search for a book (usually one that's been recommended on goodread), request the book, and have it sent to my local branch. And then, and this is the best part, the library calls me and tells me the book is waiting for me. HOW COOL IS THAT? I'm shocked at how many Long Beach residents I talk to that have no idea that you can do this. Of course, there can be drawbacks. Recently I requested the new Michael Connelly book and I'm 91st in the queue.
6. If you are involved anything where document sharing is necessary and you aren't using google docs, you're a fool. Google docs allows you to upload files, (word documents, spreadsheets) and then share them with others. No more emailing spreadsheets back and forth. You just upload the file, share it with those that you want to have it and you can control what they do, edit, etc. It's a huge timesaver. The best part is that you're not wasting any of your memory on file.
7. I read a lot of blogs. For a lot of different reasons. Although I must admit most of them just remind me of my failings as a blogger. I do learn interesting things though. For example, do you know that the richer the man...the better your orgasm? Yep, that I learned from sex secrets. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, 'but Diva, I thought you were the sexpert.' I hate to disappoint you folks, but I've just been faking it. (the expertness not the orgasms) Seriously though, this is a great site. During my parties the women seem to respond well to fun facts about sex and this is where I get them. Questions about anal sex, oral sex, positions? This is the place to find the answers.
8. Almost all the blogs I read are awesome, but there are two that when I see that little feed light up, I light up. One makes me laugh so hard I almost pee my pants. I would give my firstborn to have even a smidgen of her wittiness. That would be the bloggess. And if you don't follow her on twitter well then you've missed today's lesson in fisting. Seriously this woman can make a post with one long run-on sentence. I find myself reading them out loud to my husband and even he starts to laugh.
9. The other is only updated once a week and I wait for it anxiously every Sunday. That would be postsecret. Some of the secrets make me tear up and some make me laugh, and some touch my heart. I'm often tempted to send in one myself. If you have a chance check out the ones from this week, I think you'll figure out my favorite right away.
10. Ok, one more blog, although I don't think of it as a blog. If you don't have LOTD on your feed, you're missing out. Great videos. lists, and other fun things that will remind you that there are those out there who are more stupid than you are (and I mean that in a nice way).

That's it folks. Have fun and remember surf often and surf safely.