Wherever

I am now

I wrote an email to the stepsister who was horrible to me during my mom’s dying. I was advised not to write it, to write it and keep it, etc. Every week I talked to my therapist about the letter. She was among the “what if you just write it and keep it?” crowd—not that she thought it was bad to share my feelings, but because of the obvious: What did I think would happen? I knew there’d be no reply, so what’s the point?

The point was I wanted to say a fucking thing. I am so sick of no one saying anything that is actually real. I was treated truly horribly by someone who’s generally kind of a mean girl anyway, and it added fuckery to what was already fuckery. So, whatever.

She didn’t reply. I didn’t think she would. But I’m glad I wrote to her. I did sit on the email for a week or so, and sent it right before a long weekend visit to my solid beloved T, the outward bound flight on my mom’s birthday. Done, and done.

In the meantime, new half bro is more silent than usual. His baby grandson is in town and he is appropriately smitten. I told donor of my mom’s death and he thanked me for telling him (I may have shared this already) but nothing in response to my reply, which was brief and cordial.

My dad said he was glad to hear from me because it’d been a while and he was giving me space because of my mom. I don’t think it’d been that long and I told him that it was fine to call or text more than once (though I don’t think he did), that I don’t mind being bombarded right now.

Job—it is still super fucked up. I’ve been there long enough, and have had enough jobs that I’ve had to jump into scrappily and done so fairly quickly. This just keeps snowballing, and looking back it is disheartening to see that there was some deception, even if it was by kind people.

I am way too tired to manage all of this. I am fraying, I am frayed. I am worried that the two hopeful parts of my job—the return of someone on leave, and the retention of our new hire—are in jeopardy. It’s a very unstable place with a huge misallocation of labor and resources. The hiring freeze just lifted and I can start looking again. I feel bad, because I do feel responsible to hold things together. But I do not make enough money to remain in a state of uncertainty and scarcity.

Frayed. That is it. I repeat it, and it’s how I feel.

Being with T was great—he was doing a project with his brother, so there was no planning or visiting or socializing. I could just be there, lying around with his dog and cats. It was just was I needed. Natural connection and no choices to make on my part. I didn’t have to withhold or give. It was the first time in as long as I can remember that I could just be. No one was expecting anything from me, asking me something, waiting for something, or even looking at me in that way I don’t want to be looked at. I exhaled for the first time in so long. Literally, I mean. It is, still, so hard to take a breath.

I can’t really think or talk about my mom other than to say “my mom died” or “oh, she’s dead”, to people who don’t know. It’s fun, and removed. But nearly every night I dream either of her—that she’s alive, that I ask for what I want, that I’m there with her while she takes her leave of life—or I dream of something horrible and shameful—inadvertently killing my friends’ pets while housesitting during their sabbatical in Japan. (I don’t have friends on a sabbatical in Japan, by the way.) Some of the animals belong to their child who died not long ago. I wake up feeling like such a terrible person and I want to run away. I am so sorry for what I neglected and can’t believe that I didn’t remember everything.

There are messes I leave everywhere, unbelievable messes. I cannot fathom how I do such things.

I guess my mind is processing as I sleep. But I wake up so sweaty, exhausted, terrified, doubting myself.