I keep deleting what I am going to say. I took a free Enneogram thingy last night and I think I am number 4: "The Individualist" which could explain why I rarely write on here or share my true self with that many people:
The Individualist: The introspective, romantic type. Fours are self-aware, sensitive, and reserved. They are emotionally honest, creative, and personal, but can also be moody and self-conscious. Withholding themselves from others due to feeling vulnerable and defective, they can also feel disdainful and exempt from ordinary ways of living. They typically have problems with melancholy, self-indulgence, and self-pity. At their Best: inspired and highly creative, they are able to renew themselves and transform their experiences.
Who knows if anyone reads this. While I write, I simultaneously and desperately hope and fear that people will read this.
I am in Wausau, Wisconsin visiting my parents. In the last few days, old things have come in to haunt me. In many ways I am healthy, thanks be to the Only One who can turn Ugliness into Beauty. I praise my Savior for changing me, even though I highly doubt anyone in my life really notices. For the first time in 9 years, I am not on an antidepressant and have felt more emotionally and physically healthy than I can ever remember! (Although maybe not a lot of people realize it because I unfortunately tend to complain a lot...at least I am aware of it!)
Despite my freedom (overall) from depression, things from my past still have their wretched claws gripping my heart. It seems everywhere I look I hear and see babies, engagement rings, people kissing, and white dresses. Is that ever going to be me? I feel like a few different people because while I have no desire to date and could not imagine having a couple of kids and being forced to cook and clean for a man...I am aching to at least HAVE THE OPTION of doing those things. And I don't. At least at the age I am now...because if any of that happens I know in my heart it won't be for at least 5 years. What's wrong with that you might ask. Most of the time, I encourage myself with that very thought: "It's not too late." and "It WILL happen for you. It just may be ten years later than you've always dreamed." But then some weird thing inside me says, "Look at how you have failed. It won't happen." Then my combating answer, "You're right-it won't if I keep repeating history. But with God's hand, there will be a miracle. I will learn how to love." (Because that's what I think the problem is with me and men. Granted I know, I am not totally to blame in my failed relationships but there's one common denominator in all of them: me. And for some reason I can't love a guy because of all my negative thoughts toward him and it needs to change!)
I feel like I am going in circles. Today in my personal journal I was reflecting on how I don't want to open my past because it's too painful, but yet I NEED to in order to figure out what my problem is...because it will just come out and continue to haunt me if/when I decide to date again (it already does and I'm not even dating).
I felt like I was getting closer to being free of this lie that my self-worth is dependent on my marital status. Overall, I am. But the last few week old memories have fluttered in (being in my hometown does not always help) and I've been feeling angry at myself for not being "over this" and content with who I am. But does being content mean stuffing the crap in your closet? In comparison to what others in my life are dealing with and the disaster in Japan, why would anyone freaking care about my problems?
If you don't see this posted, it's because I deleted it. I am "withholding [myself] from others due to feeling vulnerable and defective" but hopefully one day I won't be this way.
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Monday, March 14, 2011
Thursday, March 18, 2010
What is on my Mind
Well, I had an interesting day today. A friend of mine, Bethany, ended up subbing at the same middle school with me and we actually team taught (I was the regular math sub and she was the ELL sub) just for one period. It was fun to see her and have someone to eat lunch with! Bethany and I go way back, but anyway, that's for a different day. IT was very bizarre for me to be "working" with her...She said the same thing.
Unfortunately, my day kind of went downhill after that. It is a very hard school, with students that are ethnically diverse and have lots of behavior problems. That probably would not be an issue if the periods weren't 85 minutes AND I did NOT recieve a prep (break) period NOR did I get paid for it. But I stuck it out and now I am fried. The last period was so intense. Kids talking, shrieking, laughing, yelling, coming in and leaving, throwing things, breaking things, all the while, I am trying to keep them on task. Luckily, there were kids from the high school that were helping. But I still felt like everything was going crazy. I spent the entire day taking huge deep breaths, but, of course, I messed up a lot. At the end of the day, a very large boy really scared me and ended up acting really inappropriately with a female student, so I got him out of the room. For the last fifteen minutes of the day, students were supposed to be cleaning up the trashed room. There was a broken sharpener smashed, little blue pieces all over the floor. Ripped papers. One student dumped a pile of ripped up papers over the head of another girl. Another girl dumped a bunch of little pieces of papers from her desk onto the floor. No idea why. It was-to say the least-chaotic. I found myself going into my usual out-of-body state. Like I was watching something out of a movie. I can't control it, but it is definitely real. The best part was getting my name changed from Ms. Bettger to Ms. Butt. Like they literally erased my name on the board and wrote that. Haha. I am just glad no one got seriously hurt and that my day is over. I made sure to leave a nice long note for the teacher, as I usually do.
Even though it was hard, I am now home and can laugh about it and know that I don't have to go back if I don't want to. (But I probably will.)And I was able to sit and relax on the deck on a beautiful afternoon with my roommates! And, believe it or not, the hardest days I have subbing, usually CANNOT compare with how EVERY SINGLE day was for me as a teacher of inner-city Kindergarten last year, that being, COMPLETE HELL. Yes, it's hard to believe I made it through nine months alive! THat's why I try to take these days as a treasure, these days I can come home, with no lesson planning, grading, classwork, parents to deal with, awww, yes. I can just relax, at least try to! Although I still feel like a failure a lot of the time as a sub and want to do a perfect job, I usually forget about it, whereas last year, I had a very unsupportive principal to deal with who was always breathing down my neck. (No wonder I didn't last at that school).
Another thing on my mind is, as always, marriage and babies. Yes, I found out when she showed up today, that my friend Bethany is having a baby. She and her husband got married last July. I am happy for them. I just still cannot believe it...(you would have to know the history behind me and Bethany but that is a book to one day be written !) A few years ago, I never would have guessed where she and I are today.
Besides just the wierdness of being with Bethany in a school classroom, I have to say I had a very familiar feeling of ... envy (that she is pregnant) ... creep over me subconsciously and tried to push it away. Again and again.
In fact, I laid in bed last night and thought (again) of all the young women in my life who have found their "perfect someone" and are now trying to or are having children. I tried so hard to pray for forgiveness for perhaps having negative thoughts toward them, but I could not help but feel the intense but very familiar pain. OF not measuring up. Even though, in my MIND, my worth has nothing to do with my status as a single, it will take maybe til my dying day to understand this in my heart. Especially when you work in a profession in which everyone is a woman, and all they talk about is marriage and baby raising...
Bleh. Deep breath. I need to find some single women who share my pain! Luckily the tears aren't burying me alive like they were last night.
Unfortunately, my day kind of went downhill after that. It is a very hard school, with students that are ethnically diverse and have lots of behavior problems. That probably would not be an issue if the periods weren't 85 minutes AND I did NOT recieve a prep (break) period NOR did I get paid for it. But I stuck it out and now I am fried. The last period was so intense. Kids talking, shrieking, laughing, yelling, coming in and leaving, throwing things, breaking things, all the while, I am trying to keep them on task. Luckily, there were kids from the high school that were helping. But I still felt like everything was going crazy. I spent the entire day taking huge deep breaths, but, of course, I messed up a lot. At the end of the day, a very large boy really scared me and ended up acting really inappropriately with a female student, so I got him out of the room. For the last fifteen minutes of the day, students were supposed to be cleaning up the trashed room. There was a broken sharpener smashed, little blue pieces all over the floor. Ripped papers. One student dumped a pile of ripped up papers over the head of another girl. Another girl dumped a bunch of little pieces of papers from her desk onto the floor. No idea why. It was-to say the least-chaotic. I found myself going into my usual out-of-body state. Like I was watching something out of a movie. I can't control it, but it is definitely real. The best part was getting my name changed from Ms. Bettger to Ms. Butt. Like they literally erased my name on the board and wrote that. Haha. I am just glad no one got seriously hurt and that my day is over. I made sure to leave a nice long note for the teacher, as I usually do.
Even though it was hard, I am now home and can laugh about it and know that I don't have to go back if I don't want to. (But I probably will.)And I was able to sit and relax on the deck on a beautiful afternoon with my roommates! And, believe it or not, the hardest days I have subbing, usually CANNOT compare with how EVERY SINGLE day was for me as a teacher of inner-city Kindergarten last year, that being, COMPLETE HELL. Yes, it's hard to believe I made it through nine months alive! THat's why I try to take these days as a treasure, these days I can come home, with no lesson planning, grading, classwork, parents to deal with, awww, yes. I can just relax, at least try to! Although I still feel like a failure a lot of the time as a sub and want to do a perfect job, I usually forget about it, whereas last year, I had a very unsupportive principal to deal with who was always breathing down my neck. (No wonder I didn't last at that school).
Another thing on my mind is, as always, marriage and babies. Yes, I found out when she showed up today, that my friend Bethany is having a baby. She and her husband got married last July. I am happy for them. I just still cannot believe it...(you would have to know the history behind me and Bethany but that is a book to one day be written !) A few years ago, I never would have guessed where she and I are today.
Besides just the wierdness of being with Bethany in a school classroom, I have to say I had a very familiar feeling of ... envy (that she is pregnant) ... creep over me subconsciously and tried to push it away. Again and again.
In fact, I laid in bed last night and thought (again) of all the young women in my life who have found their "perfect someone" and are now trying to or are having children. I tried so hard to pray for forgiveness for perhaps having negative thoughts toward them, but I could not help but feel the intense but very familiar pain. OF not measuring up. Even though, in my MIND, my worth has nothing to do with my status as a single, it will take maybe til my dying day to understand this in my heart. Especially when you work in a profession in which everyone is a woman, and all they talk about is marriage and baby raising...
Bleh. Deep breath. I need to find some single women who share my pain! Luckily the tears aren't burying me alive like they were last night.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
On Being Single
I am going to write about something quite personal. Not that anyone reads this, but I hope it encourages maybe at least one person. I have recently decided to stop dating. At least at this time in my life. So here it is: I am single, and increasingly, I am proud of it.
This is how I ended my personal journal/prayer today: "I never dreamed I'd be here. Sitting alone on my bed age 25 1/2, no husband or kids, no full time job, college loans not paid off, living in a dark, warm, rattly basement room with two single 30-something women. And I'd never dreamed that I'd be, what was that, content?"
That is, almost content.
I am so sick of mommy blogs. Okay, so when I find myself not working like today (again), I read blogs, a lot of them written by married women with young children. I have some favorites that you can find on my blog roll. I like them because they are entertaining, yes, the kids are adorable, and I like getting ideas for cooking, crafts, etc. Some I read so often, I feel like I almost know the people. But when I look at these blogs, bad thoughts play in my head at times. Bad thoughts I have come to find quite common.
That is me, that is supposed to be me.
Who ever said I was supposed to be them anyway? Well, this is a very touchy subject. But the pain, thanks be to God, has ever decreased over time and I can talk about it now.
It goes back to what a lot of you women remember growing up. Well, for as long as I can remember, I wanted to have babies. I've come to realize it's because my mom was the oldest of five kids, my dad in the middle of four, and so there were always women having babies in our family. I just loved them. I remember for a long time, there was a new baby every year in our family (on either or both sides). I was a typical little girl, with lots of dolls. As I grew up it turned into, my goal in life was not only to have babies, but to find that "perfect someone" to have babies with. Okay, so it wasn't my number one goal, but it was ALWAYS in the back of my mind in my early teens, then into high school and college. Especially as I came to realize when many of the women (grandma, mom, aunts) met and married their spouses. Quite young. Met in their teens and married by age 20 or 21.
As a child, I idealized women and, regrettably, I still do. (That's why this blogging business can be dangerous.) My mom, aunts, cousins, grandma, teachers, babysitters, and all the women in my favorite movies and shows, especially Dr. Quinn, Laura Ingalls, and Anne of Green Gables.
With all these women, there was usually one similarity. They had a man. And if they didn't (by a certain age), something was wrong with them. You see, one of my biggest fears is that people might see me the way I saw single, unmarried women. AS a child, I remember feeling pleasure that a teacher was "Mrs." but if she was "Miss" or "Ms." something must be wrong. If the teacher was "Ms." that meant she was divorced and if she was "Miss" and not reasonably young I would think, "Why is she not married? Is she not pretty enough?" blah blah blah.
Somehow in my thoughts and observations as a young girl, I came to believe this is what it means to be beautiful and worthy: to have a wonderful man at your side and to have his babies. While I still struggle now to dismiss this as a lie, I am so proud of how far I have come!
I still wonder when I see beautiful women how or why they are single. But then I am reminded, Oh yeah. I'm a beautiful woman and single. (In fact, I've been asked this so many times in my life.) So in a way, it's kind of nice to have support and be supported by people like me.
That brings me to a point of frustration: I wish there were more blogs out there that are written by people like me: mid 20s, single, and not that content about it! It seems almost every blog is young, married and trying to get pregnant; young, married with kids; or older 30s, married with kids. There are a few that are young and newly engaged or married, and even fewer that are college age. Even less I have found are older than 40. Okay there are a few that are single and 20s, but they seem more the partyer hard core type, not the traditional-at-heart like I am. While I enjoy reading all different types of blogs, it would be nice to find a few like mine! (But at least I have my friend Becca's blog. She and I are kind of in the same boat, I think!)
Thanks for listening to my scoop on singlehood. If you're there, hang on, I understand!
This is how I ended my personal journal/prayer today: "I never dreamed I'd be here. Sitting alone on my bed age 25 1/2, no husband or kids, no full time job, college loans not paid off, living in a dark, warm, rattly basement room with two single 30-something women. And I'd never dreamed that I'd be, what was that, content?"
That is, almost content.
I am so sick of mommy blogs. Okay, so when I find myself not working like today (again), I read blogs, a lot of them written by married women with young children. I have some favorites that you can find on my blog roll. I like them because they are entertaining, yes, the kids are adorable, and I like getting ideas for cooking, crafts, etc. Some I read so often, I feel like I almost know the people. But when I look at these blogs, bad thoughts play in my head at times. Bad thoughts I have come to find quite common.
That is me, that is supposed to be me.
Who ever said I was supposed to be them anyway? Well, this is a very touchy subject. But the pain, thanks be to God, has ever decreased over time and I can talk about it now.
It goes back to what a lot of you women remember growing up. Well, for as long as I can remember, I wanted to have babies. I've come to realize it's because my mom was the oldest of five kids, my dad in the middle of four, and so there were always women having babies in our family. I just loved them. I remember for a long time, there was a new baby every year in our family (on either or both sides). I was a typical little girl, with lots of dolls. As I grew up it turned into, my goal in life was not only to have babies, but to find that "perfect someone" to have babies with. Okay, so it wasn't my number one goal, but it was ALWAYS in the back of my mind in my early teens, then into high school and college. Especially as I came to realize when many of the women (grandma, mom, aunts) met and married their spouses. Quite young. Met in their teens and married by age 20 or 21.
As a child, I idealized women and, regrettably, I still do. (That's why this blogging business can be dangerous.) My mom, aunts, cousins, grandma, teachers, babysitters, and all the women in my favorite movies and shows, especially Dr. Quinn, Laura Ingalls, and Anne of Green Gables.
With all these women, there was usually one similarity. They had a man. And if they didn't (by a certain age), something was wrong with them. You see, one of my biggest fears is that people might see me the way I saw single, unmarried women. AS a child, I remember feeling pleasure that a teacher was "Mrs." but if she was "Miss" or "Ms." something must be wrong. If the teacher was "Ms." that meant she was divorced and if she was "Miss" and not reasonably young I would think, "Why is she not married? Is she not pretty enough?" blah blah blah.
Somehow in my thoughts and observations as a young girl, I came to believe this is what it means to be beautiful and worthy: to have a wonderful man at your side and to have his babies. While I still struggle now to dismiss this as a lie, I am so proud of how far I have come!
I still wonder when I see beautiful women how or why they are single. But then I am reminded, Oh yeah. I'm a beautiful woman and single. (In fact, I've been asked this so many times in my life.) So in a way, it's kind of nice to have support and be supported by people like me.
That brings me to a point of frustration: I wish there were more blogs out there that are written by people like me: mid 20s, single, and not that content about it! It seems almost every blog is young, married and trying to get pregnant; young, married with kids; or older 30s, married with kids. There are a few that are young and newly engaged or married, and even fewer that are college age. Even less I have found are older than 40. Okay there are a few that are single and 20s, but they seem more the partyer hard core type, not the traditional-at-heart like I am. While I enjoy reading all different types of blogs, it would be nice to find a few like mine! (But at least I have my friend Becca's blog. She and I are kind of in the same boat, I think!)
Thanks for listening to my scoop on singlehood. If you're there, hang on, I understand!
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