We're making this up as we go along. @whathappenshappenswithpurpose - Tumblr Blog

We are losing her this week.

I have nowhere to put the grief.

I finally have made regular customer “oh hey!!!” Status at my local Gen z coffee stand and I am very proud of this.

Also though 45 year olds tip so there might be that….

I keep bouncing in and out of this space. This is the ninth year of Tumblr. I'm not done, but it isn't a season of any consistency.

Thanksgiving was ok. It was fairly hectic and family is largely complicated. We have a family member who has a child who is most likely neurodivergent, but the narrative the parents have of this child is that they are "stubborn" and a "genius." That creates a narrative for the rest of the family that the child is just being difficult. But if it's a narrative of neurodivergence, the feeling about this changes, right? Then it's not "this child is being a brat (parent's words)"; it's "this kiddo has different sensory needs right now."

My MIL, of course, told the parents this, which did not go over well.

We're home now. The Christmas tree is up, but the pre lit top part is now malfunctioning. My sister is coming from ATL over New Years weekend and my mom is being weird about it. My SIL is throwing her annual holiday party but that part of the family is feuding. Spouse and I were supposed to go the bar party (the county bar [legal] association) next weekend, but he is in a weird mood space and not feeling much. Kid is going through some intense, unprecedented separation anxiety from me.

Is something in retrograde?

When a farmer in a field hits a main gas line with an excavator, multiple towns across two states lose gas. Our furnace is the only gas powered appliance in our house, so this weekend was a revolving door of sharing our shower and having folks over to eat. Of play dates and phone calls and texts to make sure we were all doing ok. Kiddo has believed this is the most fun thing that could have ever happened. I'm glad she's riding the vibe of relational closeness when things get tough. I think that's one of the things that Covid taught us.

Five days later almost everything has been restored.

Kiddo has a 2 hour delay this morning while they let the school warm up a little. We were lucky to have regular November cold but not cold snap cold.

And next week is Thanksgiving? What the heck.

November!

I am starting to chart this year's elf calendar (trust me, the ounce of preparation helps those nights were I rue the day that we even started any of this.) (Our elf just has fun. We don't do Santa for behavior modification.)

The space between Veterans Day and Thanksgiving Break is always super busy as patient hours get smushed into just a few days. We're traveling back to Seattle this year for Thanksgiving for the first time since the shutdown. We're taking hubs' mom and my sil's mom will also be there. It's going to be a chaos goblin of differing energy levels and emotioanl needs but I"m strangely looking forward to it? I dunno. Ask me again that Saturday.

I can't keep uuuuuuuppppp with everything. Life theme right now.

Happy Halloween!

Kiddo is, of course, beyond excited to trick or treat. And as a special added bonus, my mom is driving up to spend most of the week with us. (No sarcasm - we're excited to have her here.) I am going to have to come up with meaningful helpful activities, though, as she believes we're pretty burned out and it coming "to help." Which means I have to generate things she can help with....

I wonder how she feels about becoming my billing specialist?

It's fun to take this day back after years of Evangelical eekiness re: witchcraft. We're dressing up. We've put an inflatable in the front yard. I have a massive plan for next year's yard. Kiddo is growing up without pervasive guilt. I'm here for it.

It feels a little early for this…

Kiddo is playing with her Barbies before I drop her off at school and I just heard her softly sing, "Bubble gum, bubble gum in a dish ...."

Watching her kidhood is amazing.

Do you know what we're doing this weekend?

Nothing. Nothing, nada, zip. I am so excited to wake up late and do whatever it is we want to do. I'm not working. We're not traveling. Kiddo has put in a request to find an inflatable Halloween yard decoration and, funnily enough, while hubs and I have not been into this before - ever - we're considering it now.

Kids make you excited about weird things.

Last weekend's wine tasting was perfect. Sweet, easy going friends, beautiful fall setting, just a couple of bottles purchased (we're on the cusp of receiving our wine club membership shipments.) I'm beginning to realize I know a lot a lot about WA and OR wines, but now I'm on the lookout for classes about other regions.

We are leaving for fall wine tasting in 1 hour and I need to shower, hair, make the car snackle box. Ready set go.

Waiting for kid to fall asleep and going through old photos of her. We all feel this way about our kids but it’s mind blowing how much I love her. Absolutely unreal.

This might be the first morning I've woken up and not felt like absolute garbage. It's also the last day that the CDC recommends masking around others.

A few clients today, but mostly, I have a bunch of catch up on random things to do that I just put off until later: organizing my PT exercises, charting, a bunch of random PTA things. Kiddo has gymnastics this afternoon and I'm going to try to be the one who takes her. I moved support group to meet virtually tomorrow. There's a spicy home game tomorrow that I Had really, really wanted to go to, but I've been going to bed at 6:30 and I don't think I can do a 4:30 kick off time.

I think I might be maturing in my old age. I'm far more willing to pull back and keep resting. A much younger version of me would have still felt the need to be all the things to all the people and do all the things because we can't disappoint anybody.

Today I'm going to practice a lot of softness and reduced expectation for myself. In addition to still feeling wiped out due to Covid, it's the fourth anniversary of my father's death. Four years ago I kept vigil at the bedside of a man whose demons won. They killed him. We were basically no contact at the time of his death. I don't regret that decision, and the grief I feel is not due to the loss of his personhood. His personhood was deeply traumatized, and in return, was traumatizing to others. The grief that returns every year is the grief of opportunity. The grief of what could have been. This year I'm understandably especially tired and it feels especially difficult.

I had a dream last night that my husband and I attended a fundraising gala and he casually informed me that he had created a Hinge account because ... shrug ... he wanted to.

I woke up so mad. When I told him about it he said, "What the f* is Hinge?"

These Z Quill dreams are so weird and vivid.

It's been a slow start to the day. I masked up and dropped kid off at school. Cough is mostly gone and I'm in the CDC zone of mask up if you're going out. Just all the way tired. Last night I cooked dinner and it was so good to have kiddo choose music on Alexa for our nightly dance party. (I didn't eat with the family. I'm masking around the family.)

Four clients this afternoon. Early bedtime tonight.

If my Covid math is right, this is day 4 of isolation. After 5, per CDC, I can stop isolating if "symptoms are improving" or I test negative.

That sucker popped positive immediately this morning and the cough and congestion persist.

Also, RIP to taste and smell. I can barely tell that unsweetened black coffee is coffee.

We'll see what tomorrow brings, and I'm going to continue following CDC guidelines (again, we have privilege that allows some ease for that), but this is starting to really mess with my mental health. I cried until 11:30 last night and then to numb myself watched so much TikTok I got the Headspace partnered ad that maybe it was time to stop watching TikTok.

I don't like being by myself for this long. I really don't like being away from my kid for this long, and I"m grateful she's old enough to understand what's going on. We've been Facetiming, or, I sit in the yard, masked, several feet away from the upstairs deck and she sits on the upstairs deck to visit.

I feel well enough to resume seeing clients, and I am so grateful for the grace that I have asked so many of them for in rescheduling or asking to move to telehealth. They have generously shared so much tenderness with me - and it is 0% their job to care for me.

I think the thing that is starting to eat at me just a little (and no doubt this is exacerbated by the fact that I have very little to distract myself with right now and so much time to ruminate) is that my IRL folks (not you guys. You guys have been so sweet with your check in messages) have not really checked in.

Caveat: I know exactly who I would ask if we did need something and I Have absolutely no doubt they would come rushing to help (and they have in the past). They haven't checked in, either, but that literally doesn't bother me. I literally feel knitted together with these women and I don't doubt at all their love for me or my family. And that should be enough. That's who you call in the middle of the night. We have been there for them as well in the middle of the night. During 2020 one of the husbands spent 3 hours looking for Children's Tylenol in town for kiddo and I while husband was out of town.

But I'm thinking about other local friends that I have poured so much love into - watching their kids during miscarriages, being the friend on speed dial, dropping by food when they contracted Covid, texting frequently to see if they needed anything during their Covid bouts. And nothing. Crickets. An "Oh no!" from someone I sent a cheeky pic of the positive covid test to. A different one sent paragraphs upon paragraphs of unsolicited angst about their workplace drama in response to the news with an added "Be sure not to get your family sick LOL." I'm not sure how to feel about that. I didn't support them in the first place expecting anything back, and even now I don't feel like I am owed anything, but I feel ... forgotten? Unloved? All of a sudden I hear my therapist's voice in my head reminding me that the part that is talking is a very young part and she's asking for some reassurance.

Barf.

I'm going to mask up and take the dog for a walk on a trail. I think that will probably help. I might take my acidic burn your stomach barely taste like coffee coffee with me. ;)

I am back to partially seeing clients today. Today is the 4th day of congestion, cough, and fever - but today to a much less degree.

Spouse has been holding down the fort in terms of taking care of kiddo. I'm still hanging out downstairs and I'm so lonely. Even in this digital age of facetiming kid and social media and yelling upstairs to spouse and kiddo. It's just not the same as hugs and cuddles.

Sometimes the dog comes down to say hello and give me happy barks.

I doordashed a pumpkin cream cold brew.

I started watching New Amsterdam.

I've done a lot of charting.

I try to nap but I suck at napping.

I want to take a bath but the bathtub is upstairs in no no territory.

I had really wanted to purchase season tickets for this Spicy Spicy season of college football but because all of THIS appears to have originated from the fieldhouse, I am no longer super enthusiastic about this.

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We're making this up as we go along.