Thanksgiving is done. Preparing for Christmas I’m going through and sorting out dishes and the detritus of thanksgiving. I pile leftover plastic cutlery and notice a lack of forks and a plethora of spoons.

Spoons everywhere. Even more than knives.  But the forks, they are few … I am the fork.  Used up, moved from plate to plate, turkey, dressing and then dessert.  Not yet done, a second
plate, sandwich with cranberry sauce and gravy, scooped up between my tines, some sustenance lost, but not all.

Dinner is done, some forks find their final home in the trash bin, others make their way to the sink to be washed and reused.  I sit in the drawer, my plastic sides scarred, one tine chipped, but still serviceable … until I finally join my companions in arms … a new life.

Well it looks like I have a lot to work through this month.  Trying to figure out why I am stressed I came up with the following list.  Maybe y6our list is longer than you think too.

My grown daughter Lori has moved back home after ten years living in California.  Glad and cautiously optimistic.

I discovered that wanting to be included in an event does not necessarily mean I want to attend.

I'm trying to finish my screenplay but not motivated to do so.

I'm motivated to work through my poetry but partially blocked.  Unwilling to work through it … there's something there.

I finally reorganized my old bookroom (a new guestroom) and my new bookroom.

Reading a book on reprogramming your brain … involves working through issues.  Not everything is about what everyone/anyone else does.  Some of it is mine but it's tangled together.

I'm going to Israel next month.  Anxious and nervous about traveling after a stroke and with new memory and physical issues.

I'm having communication issues.  What I hear is sometimes garbled.

It's hard to determine what stresses me out, I'm used to avoiding what I cannot fix or feels overwhelming.  Right now everything seems overwhelming.

My friend's mom just died and I have a memorial service on Saturday for a man I used to work with.

I'm insisting on transparency from the companies I do business with.  Should I not also require that of myself or I would be a hypocrit.

Death is such an integral part of life.  As I approach 70, time seems peppered with condolences, memorials and funeral services.  I don’t expect it will slow down much at this point.  At first my question was “Where are you?”  Followed by, “What are you doing? Who are you seeing? Are you at peace?”  My friend Julie started this grand exodus.  After our trip to Ireland.  I got my news first followed closely behind by hers. We shared stories of chemo, rads, and surgery.   A year later her diagnosis turned.   The last time I saw her she had very little time left. She showed off a new size 2 wardrobe and an iPhone ... early 40th birthday presents. We giggled and shared funny stories.  She got serious as it was time for me to go.  “No offense but it’s not fair”, she sighed.  “I’m going to die and you’re not.”  I thought for a moment and replied, “No, it’s not fair at all.” She was only 39. I was 62, and no,  it wasn’t fair.  We hugged and I left.  A few weeks later I got a message from her mom and a call from her husband.  She was gone.

Sitting in my book room that night I went through the pictures of our Ireland trip to put an album together for her husband.  The last picture was her walking towards the waiting train in Dublin, backpack slung over one shoulder, half turned, calling me to hurry as she ran to the open door.  “Where are you,” I whispered.  The still air held no answer.  Just gone.

Looking at a recent article about "The Tyranny of the Ideal Woman" I can see that over the last 50 years not much has changed.  In other words, there really is "Nothing new under the sun."

The Ideal woman is portrayed as a physical manifestation of what some men and women perceive as the ideal woman; perhaps based on what their personal desires are for themselves.

So here is my perception of the ideal woman.

1.  She does not exist.  We are women who do the best we can under our own circumstances.  So having said that, may I for a moment, encourage all of us to:

Be comfortable in our own skin
Accept ourselves as we are, uniqueness is a gift.
Accept others as we accept ourselves
Explore, discover and use our gifts in any/every w
Never hold a grudge ... it always backfires
Turn away from the past, pain, hate, anger and disappointment
Look to the future, ever day is our future
Not worry about who we are, just relax and be; that's who you are
In the midst of turmoil and stress
Love
 

Using the largest text makes me feel as though I'm shouting.  That's weird.

So Today I'm looking inward.  Yesterday I was looking for affirmation in a conflict I have with my youngest sister to a friend I trust. Instead of affirmation I got a different perspective based on my friend's problem with our relationship, the fact that I'm untrustworthy when it comes to keeping  scheduled appointments.  I bail.  I don't know if I can trust her advice because as we talk it becomes evident that her advice is colored by her disappointment with me but her perspective gave me interesting insights.  One insight is that I hate disappointing people so I say yes when I really should say no and then I hate bailing so I wait until the last minute.  One problem heaped onto another.  Yes, I am codependent.

My friend suggests that my sister is right to avoid me since my co-dependence is unhealthy for her.  Unhealthy for me too; because it leads to my sister's pattern of anger and disappointment, leading to blocking me, leading to reuniting with me in hopes that I've changed, leading again to anger and the cycle continues.  My friend has opted to accept my inconsistencies, although she admits that my habits of being late and bailing would have ended our friendship when she was younger. 

How am I feeling about this?  Depressed and frustrated and not sympathetic or empathetic at all.  After all, shouldn't my good qualities measure against my failings?  And as Christians we are commanded to love ... she says she loves me because that's the command but she doesn't like me and she doesn't have to like me. She's only human ... but so am I.

So today I went online looking for information on people who don't feel empathy.  I don't think I'm an empathetic person.  According to the quiz I am.  So I looked at more quizzes.  

The next quiz was on mindfulness.  I ranked in the middle, kind of mindful but needs work.  It hit me that I am actually not mindful at all when it comes to being aware of how other people feel or rather life from their perspective.  Not their point of view but how life looks through their eyes.  I just don't see it.  I've never thought of that before.  It was kind of shocking.

The last one was on relationships.  I chose to focus on my husband.  Although I trust his faithfulness I'm not sure that he cares for me in a way that I assumed he did.  But not like my family where it was 'every man for him or herself'.  So I search on, what is the healthy way?

So a bit of history.  I grew up in an alcoholic family with PTSD and abuse thrown in as chasers.  The second oldest of four girls, I learned how to be hyper-vigilant to stay safe.   My world revolved around taking my family's emotional temperature and watching for any signs of my father's impending rage, any evidence that his  good mood was going to turn sour.  I learned to pay constant and close attention as I watched how anger always led to violence.   I tried to do whatever I could to control my family's feelings to protect myself.  I became codependent.

I graduated and left home but took with me the codependent lessons I had learned.  I learned to ignore my own needs and take care of the emotions of others ... my survival had depended upon it.  The moods of others continued to  dictate my emotions; it was exhausting.  When anyone was upset, especially with me, I couldn't relax until they felt better and I felt safe again.  I had to fix them in order to de stress.   But fixing them often didn't work and even when it did, it was only temporary.   I felt let down, unappreciated and then angry. I heard about recovery from codependency.  The first step was to be aware of what's known as the 'drama triangle', how I was using survival techniques that were no longer necessary to survive.  

I needed to change my response to the feelings and needs of those around me.  In the first part of the triangle as soon as I felt someone close to me was getting angry or upset, I would try to rescue them ... a fight or flight response.  It could be from their own responsibilities, troubles, issues, etc.  I would try to fix the problem which would fix my problem (fear and stress over their problem).  It often didn't work.  Moving to the second leg of the triangle, I would become angry because in order to fix them I had often agreed to do things I didn't want to do, ignoring my own wants and needs.  The person I helped not only didn't appreciate what I did, they got angry at me.  I would then move on to the third leg of the triangle; I became the victim where I felt used and sorry for myself, I felt like a martyr.  

To stop the process I had to be aware of what I was doing.  I had to change my response.  I needed to start saying no.  I needed to address the fear that saying no would make them abandon me.  I had to stop trying to manipulate people in order to protect myself.  I had to stop trying to guess what other people needed and offering it before they asked.  So I also had to stop expecting others to know what I want.  Finally, when I'm feeling overwhelmed I needed to ask myself what I need to take care of myself, and then do it.  

It means I needed to be in tune with my thoughts, feelings and needs.  I needed to take my attention away from what I think I need to do to meet the needs of others in order to protect myself ... a habit that has long outlived its usefulness ... and put my attention back on what I need.