I don't have to hide my bags in the car after I go shopping :)

I used to think that I hated being single. I can't believe I just wasted the last two years of my life. Okay, let me re-phrase that... In no way have I "wasted" the last two years. But I spent about 50 % of my time either feeling sorry for myself, missing my dumb ass ex boyfriend, looking for someone to cuddle with or crying. 50% of two years is 1 year. So I wasted 1 year of my life....but not really because one thing i've learned is that going through absolute heartbreak is a necessary evil. I can't IMAGINE what I would be like if my heart hadn't shattered into a million pieces and I hadn't learned to wake up every day, get out of bed, and put one foot in front of the other (even if what came next was drinking Coors light in excess). Really, I thought I was going to die. I really did. But guess what, I didn't. And sometimes I worry that I'm going to be the crazy cat lady or that I'm going to be living with Ashley and Andy in their spare bedroom being their nanny for their kids in lieu of rent, or making pot stickers for Taylor and Patrick, or worse yet...that my 1 year old Goddaughter is going to be giving ME dating and financial advice. But most days I'm excited because I have no idea whats coming next, but I have a feeling its going to be good. I think when you're single, you miss the good parts of a relationship. The cuddling, the hand holding, the date nights, the i love you's. It's easy to forget the bad parts. And even people in relationships tell you over and over and over again that having "another half" is not what it's cracked up to be. You think to yourself that it would be different for you. That your relationship isn't going to be hard, that you will never want out, that you would never hurt him. But guess what, it probably will be hard, you probably will want out at some point and you will hurt him. If you want something real, these things are going to happen. So might as well make the best of being single while it lasts. I've made a list:
1. I can eat Ice Cream for dinner
2. When the left side of my bed is squished down, I can sleep on the right and its a whole new experience.
3. I toss and turn...A LOT...so i don't have to worry about causing injury to anyone
4. I get to go on spur of the moment vacations wherever I want, with whomever I want, for as long as I want and no one cares.
5. I can watch whatever I want on TV and no one makes fun of me for it or makes me change the channel (this is only partially true...but it was true at one point and Andy can watch whatever he wants because i don't care)
6. I can go to yoga, i can go hiking, running, or swimming all day long and no one (really) cares!
7. I don't have to ask/tell/warn/plan for anyone else but myself.
8. I don't have to hide my bags in the car after I go shopping, or pretend that something was "on sale"... you KNOW what i'm talking about.
I could keep going, but i'm not going to. Because if you are reading this and you are in a relationship I don't want you to get jealous...lol. And if you're single and you are reading this you should come up with your own list of reasons. There are good things and bad things to both sides, like with anything in life. Someone is telling me that I'm not ready for it yet, and that is just fine.

Secrets, Secrets Don't Make Friends...They make best friends. And my chicken enchilada recipe!

So it's been awhile... ok thats an understatement. Per request, here is another blog entry. I should really keep up with this, I don't know why I stopped. Perhaps its because I stopped seeing Marilyn for awhile and in the beginning, I associated my blog postings with her. I had a check in meeting with her a month ago, and i'll be starting up with her again soon....I know how you love her.

So secrets. Everybody has secrets. I have a lot of secrets, and I know a lot of secrets. People tell me things. Maybe because i'm so good at keeping them in my head. Some of my secrets are good secrets. Some are bad, and some probably aren't secrets at all. But I like to think that they are. I'm not going to tell you them, but I think that there is something to be said for being able to keep them, and also for having them. I don't know why I was thinking about secrets tonight. But a person who used to be special in my life used to always say to me....secrets, secrets don't make friends. And then someone even more special to me would add, they make best friends. We all need people in our lives who we can share things with. Things that we can't tell the whole world through a facebook status update or a blog. We pick and choose who we tell what based on trust, and also relevance. You have to pick and choose who to tell what. I think because I know this, I'm good at having them.

Speaking of facebook, I went and saw that movie tonight, Social Network. Everyone couldn't stop talking about how good it was. I kept wanting to check my facebook page throughout the whole movie, and I didn't really think it was that good. First of all, the main character irritated me. Right from the beginning. I kept thinking about how annoying it would be to have to have a conversation with him. It made me realize how I picked the right career. I could never be involved with business. It's too shady, too many people are looking out for themselves, there are too many SECRETS (do you like the tie in?). I'm just not competitive like that. The reason I love my job is not because of the actual work, although I do like helping people and also ever since being in the PICU I do realize that I enjoy the challenge and the mental stimulation of figuring out problems and learning new things on a daily basis. It's because I get to be social at work. Maybe this is looked down upon, but I don't think that I could do my job if I weren't surrounded by great people. People who can laugh despite a horrible circumstance. People who have the same desire as I do to learn and teach. Every night I find myself learning something new. It could be a simple skill, or a complex concept that I kind of learned about in nursing school, but now that I'm actually seeing it clinically, am able to grasp. Co-workers take time to explain things to me and because of this, I find myself explaining things to less experienced co-workers. It inspires me to help someone understand something that I once didn't understand.

I remember when I was going through the worst part of my break up, work was a relief. I could just go to work, do my job, and get wrapped up in someone else's problems. It reminded me that there are bigger things in the world other than what I was going through. Now that time has passed, and I am a happier person, sometimes I don't want to go to work. Because I'm tired, or because I'd rather be doing something else.... like lying in my bed. But as soon as I get there, and have a few laughs with my friends and absorb myself in the tasks that I need to accomplish for the night, 12 hours goes by pretty quickly. I find myself enjoying myself, and for that I'm thankful.

Recently I've moved and I felt like with that change in physical space, a part of me has changed as well. I can leave behind the crazy person on Camino de la Reina and start living my life again. As silly as that sounds, I felt like I wasn't really living my life for the past couple years. I was running away from it. I was trying to get through it because one day it would get better. And it has. Reading through my past blogs is funny to me because I was a different person back then. I mean, not completely, but I was so sad. I mean....I couldn't even stay home on my nights off! Now I look forward to getting into comfy clothes and watching tv with my pals. I used to be afraid of leaving myself alone with me. I love it again.

So I feel like I'm at a crossroads, and to be perfectly honest, it's a good place to be. I'm giving myself time to relax, to sleep, to regenerate and to figure out where I'm going next.

Living with ash and andy and becky has been amazing so far. Even though I know its temporary, I don't feel anxious about whats next or the fact that I will be moving again. We call the house "The Schmit household, helping girls become women". While it's ashley and andy's home, it's becky and I's halfway house. Poor Andy has to deal with three women, talking through tv shows, all on their periods at the same time. But secretly he loves it. We call ourselves the sister wives.... it sounds creepy, but its not. It's like a commune, or family. We take turns cooking and cleaning and we're all there for each other emotionally. And Andy fixes stuff for us. It's really nice, i'm thankful for my pals. OH yeah... I also went to the dentist finally. That was one of my goals for this year, and I made it happen. I'm proud of myself because I was physically scared. NOW....here is the best recipe for enchiladas ever. And it's super easy! Shout out to Sam the cooking guy!

Ingredients

• 3 cups shredded cooked chicken - one of those deli roasted chickens is perfect for this
• 1 cup Salsa Verde (green salsa)
• 1-4 ounce can chopped green chilies
• 1-2 tablespoons chopped chipotles in sauce (more if you like it hotter)
• 8 - 8 inch flour tortillas
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 2 cups whipping cream
• 1.5 cups Monterey Jack cheese, shredded

  Steps

  1. Mix first 4 ingredients in bowl.
  2. Pour 1/2 the whipping cream in the bottom of a 9x13-baking dish.
  3. Pour chicken broth in bowl and one by one submerge each flour tortilla.
  4. Place approximately 1/8 chicken mixture in each wet tortilla and roll up.
  5. Place all 8 side by side in dish, sprinkle with cheese, and pour remaining whipping cream over top.
  6. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Would it be better if lying didn't exist?

I watched the Invention of Lying tonight. In it, nobody in the world lies to each other. If I think you're unattractive, I would say to you I think you are unattractive, and I am not interested in you. If I was depressed and you asked me how I was doing today, I would tell you I was doing horribly. I would not tell you I wasn't ready to start dating and it would be best if we were just friends, or that I was doing fine. The main character discovers lying when his mother is dying in a hospital, and she is scared. He tells her that everything is going to be fine, that when she dies, she will see everyone in her life that she ever loved and that she would live in a mansion. This made her happy, and she died.

So is it better to lie, or is it better to always tell the truth?

Lying. I on occasion, will tell a white lie. Usually it will be in a circumstance where I don't want to hurt the other persons feelings. I don't want to make them feel bad. When I think about this, its silly, because I am lying to them because I don't want them to feel bad about a decision I made for myself. So, in the end, I am making excuses for myself. Another instance, would be if I had information about a particular event, having nothing to do with myself- or maybe everything to do with myself, and I choose not to be honest with the person who would be affected by this information, again because I don't want their feelings to be hurt. And then I think about instances where I've been lied to, and think about if I would have wanted to hear the truth. Most of the time, the answer is yes. I think about why. Because when you know the truth about a situation or event, you know the facts. And those facts might hurt, or make you not feel good, but they are real. When I was younger, maybe the answer would have been no. I would rather not know. It's not worth the pain or sadness. As I've gotten older, It's the opposite. Because if you are sad, you learn ways to make yourself happy. And if you start with the bad stuff, it can only get better. But its still harder to be the person who is telling the truth. And thats why this movie was so interesting, because everyone just told the truth. And then they learned how to lie. But in the end, telling the truth and being true to yourself is what mattered. If you tell me I look fat in my jeans, I will go to the gym. If you tell me that yellow looks really bad on me, maybe I will not wear yellow as much unless I absolutely loved wearing yellow. If you tell me that you don't love me, I will believe you. The point is, people can tell you the truth until its coming out of their ears, but it will only affect you if you make the choice to believe them. So we will never live in a world where lying never exists. And everyday, we have to make the decision to believe what other people say to us. We have to choose whether people are saying things that are true, or if they are saying things because of other reasons, because they are jealous, or sad, or happy, or because they are just simply trying to make us feel better.

Me, Myself and I need to have a conversation

I saw Marilyn today. That lady is so smart. She should have her own TV show. As you probably have read, I've been having really crazy, intense dreams lately. They are driving me crazy and making me not want to sleep. I told her about my night terror. First, I told her about work. So i've been in the PICU for two weeks on my own. And last week, my patient was very sick. I should say she became very sick on my shift. I had her two nights in a row, and on the second night she crumped in the last four hours of my shift. I felt proud of myself when I went home that day. I stayed in the situation, I didn't freak out or cry, I asked for help. I did everything in my power I could have done for the patient. The only frustration that I had about the situation was the fact that I was doing everything I could think of to make her better, and nothing was working. I left that morning feeling good about a bad situation. And then two nights later, I had that horrible dream. It wasn't specifically about her, but it was about work. I knew immediately that the reason I had the dream was because of what had happened at work. But I still didn't understand. If I wasn't upset while I was awake, why was I upset while I was sleeping. Obviously, there is a bigger issue presenting itself. I almost called Marilyn for an emergency session because the dream really f'd me up. But I didn't. I worked through it knowing that I would see her soon. So today, we talked about it. She said that the reason that the situation that I was dreaming about was of course, related to what had happened at work. That I felt like I was out of control of the situation, of the patients health. There was nothing that I could have done about what happened to her. It was out of my hands. She told me that whenever anything like this comes up for me, Derek may be present. As he was in my dream. He didn't play a significant role, he wasn't the reason why I was upset. But he was there. The situation with Derek is and has been for a long time out of my control. I did everything I could to make the situation okay, to resolve it and move on. I've done my healing, my moving on, my acceptance of the situation. The rest of it is out of my control. The rest of it was on him. And he chose not to deal with any of it. That makes me uneasy because I am not in control of the situation. His decision to deal with (or not deal with) the end of our relationship was not my ideal situation. It's not how I would have picked for it to end. And that makes me feel out of control. So the two situations are parallel. And because I felt so out of control for so long, anything resembling me being out of control may take me back to that place.

We also talked about the decisions I have been making lately. Before Marilyn (BM hehe), I made poor decisions all the time. I put myself in harms way. We don't need to go into what they were. The difference between now and then is that I didn't give my choices a second thought, or think about them before they occurred. I just did whatever I wanted to do whenever I wanted to do it. And now, I think about things before I do them. And I actually say to myself, "This is not a good idea. I shouldn't do this", or "I know I don't need ANOTHER hair product, I should put it down and walk away". Half the time I make the right choice. Half the time, especially if its really enticing, I make the choice I know I shouldn't make. And sometimes, after making the wrong choice, I actually feel guilty or ashamed or mad at myself. This is something new, because for a long time I had a no regrets type of attitude. But its frustrating! I told her that I feel like myself is split in half. One side is a 26 year old responsible girl who has everything going for her. The other side is a 19 year old girl who is lonely and thinks she can make herself happy by quick fixes. I know I'm making bad decisions and I know what the right decision is, but I make the wrong one anyway! What the F? So, this is what Marilyn had to say. When we are kids our parents tell us what we can and can not do. There are rules, curfews, and someone telling you no. When you start becoming an adult, you are making decisions for yourself for the first time. You suddenly realize that you can do whatever you want to do whenever you want to do it. And then you start realizing there are consequences for your actions. Yes, you can stay up until 3 in the morning. But if you have to get up for work at 7am, your life is going to suck that day. You are going to be tired at work. So you learn the consequences, and you start making the right decisions. You don't stay up until 3 am on nights that you have to work in the morning, because you don't want to be tired at work. And this is what I said to her (because sometimes I'm smart too). "Sooo...marilyn, you know how I always have said that after my break-up I reverted back to my 19 year old self"

M: "yes..."

L: "During my relationship, It was kind of like having a parent. I wasn't able to spend extra money, because I always had to absorb his living costs. And I couldn't have sex with other people, because I was in a relationship (and didn't want to). I had to be the responsible one in the relationship, the one making the right decisions, the one reminding the other to pay his parking tickets or call his mom. And so, once i got out of that, for lack of a better phrase, shit hit the fan."

M: "Exactly. So now you are beginning to head in the right direction. Lindsay, this is a process. It takes time, and like we said before, you have to be patient. You have to be patient with yourself, and the process of learning and growing. How many times did you stay out drinking with your friends even though you knew you had a class in the morning? How long did it take you to learn the lesson that you don't want to feel like crap in the morning?"

L: "So I need to just continue having that dialogue in my head then, and one day it will click. I need to sit down and have a conversation with me, myself and I".

Today was our last session for now. Unfortunately Marilyn needs to get special approval because she is not within my insurance group. She thinks that she can get 3 or 4 more approved. And thats scary to me because I feel like I have just started, that I still have so much to work on. And that I need her advice. I've been to therapy twice before, with two different therapists. And I have lied to every single one of them. Because I thought i would be judged. I don't lie to Marilyn. I tell her everything. She is probably in her 50's, and we talk about sex frequently. When I do something I don't want to tell anyone about, I am afraid to tell her, but I always tell her. She helps me understand why I do some of the things that I do. We have a very professional relationship, that is also very personal. Sometimes I wonder what she really thinks when she goes home at night. I know she probably is used to the stuff that I talk about with her, but I can't help thinking she might think I'm a little crazy. But in the words of a good friend, "a little crazy is perfect".

I don't want to dream anymore.

It's 4:41 am. I went to bed at 2. I just woke up out of breath and sobbing. I needed to go outside on the balcony for air because I couldn't breathe, I freaked rooms and the cow out, and probably my entire apartment complex because I couldn't stop crying. Not like, normal, I'm sad crying. But like somebody died unexpectedly crying. I don't want to dream anymore. The dreams have been building and building lately. They aren't happening every night, but when they do they seem so real and I wake up in the mood of the dream. I knew this one was going to come. On valentines day when I got off in the morning, I slept all day at my friends house because I knew that one of these was coming, and I thought it might come that day. It didn't.
Tonight I was at a fourth of July picnic. Everyone I knew was there. Everyone, even derek and his gf. He wouldn't talk to me, even though I kept trying. My parents were there, people from work were there. It was in someones house but their house was on a marina. And there were boats going by and fireworks. But the backyard was set up like my grandma's house, with two levels. Inside the house there were lots of kids. Wine glasses kept getting broken and there was broken glass everywhere. Part of the house was set up as a hospital because there were two little girls there with heart defects. They were twins, and their parents were michael douglas and catherine zeta jones. Suddenly someone told me that I was going to be the nurse now and that I was going to take care of one of the little girls. When I walked in the room, she was so sweet. She had glasses. But she was really mottled, and she was sweaty, and she was having shortness of breath. She was on a monitor, but she kept wanting to go out and play. Her mom thought I should take her to the ED, but she wanted to let her ride her bike. So I drove in my car, and she rode her bike, but traffic was going too fast so I was ahead of her. I was scared so I pulled over into a no parking zone to go meet her. As I parked, there were three dead racoons. Really scary racoons, with white eyes, they were just lying there, like roadkill but almost propped into positions. I got out of the car fast and went to look for the little girl as she rode up to me on her bike. As she got off she collapsed amd started to have a seizure. She turned blue. I tried to stimulate her, but knew that the ED was right across the street. I picked her up in my arms and she held on so tight to me. She woke up but her eyes were rolling in the back of her head, I ran and the nurses in the ED took her. A few minutes later she was awake and her normal sweet self, sitting up in bed. At this point, I turned to the window and my car was gone, it had been towed. I told someone sitting next to me and she laughed it off. I kept repeating to her that it wasn't funny. I started to cry and put my head in my hands. And then I woke up crying with my head in my hands.
I don't want to go back to bed because I'm scared that I'm going to dream again. I needed to write this all out because I thought if I got it out, I could sleep. I'm so tired. I just don't want to dream anymore.

Dream a little dream

I want to remember this. I want to document it. I had a dream last night. This is not unusual, however, the dream had a lot of significance. Frequently I used to dream about derek. There were two versions of said dream. The first was that derek and I would spend time together, and I would be happy, and I would ask him to let me go, and he would tell me to please just hold on a little bit longer and when I would wake up, there was always a number associated with the dream, 6. 6 what? 6 days? 6 months? 6 years? Is this how long he wanted me to wait? I don't know. The second dream was that we would be spending time together doing something, and he would have to go to the bathroom. And I would beg him to stay. Plead with him. I didn't want him to leave me alone. And he would always go. And he would always go with her. And I would be so sad again. I haven't had one of these dreams in awhile. Last nights dream was different. I was at a friends house. Derek and his significant other lived across the street. I didn't want to go over there, I was insistent on not talking to him. But I kept looking out the window. And I saw one of his friends pull up in the driveway, so I knew that he was home. And then my friend told me that him and Pam had gotten married. So at that point, I said F it, I'm going to go talk to him. So I went over to his house, and they were having a party. I let myself in. When he saw me, he came over to me and hugged me. We went outside and sat on the steps and talked. His presence was calming. Pam saw us together and gave us the opportunity to talk. I asked him why he got married. He said his sister gave him the money to propose and strongly urged him to do so and this was largely the reason he did it. I was okay with it. I wasn't hurt. Then I told him I needed a kidney. I needed a kidney transplant and no one was a match. Would he go and get tested and if it was a match, give me his kidney. He said yes.
That was it. That was my dream. I think it shows my acceptance of the situation, and in the dream he was giving me a tangible gift of thanks. He was helping me. He was showing me that he cared about my life. He was saving my life. He was giving me what he owed me. He was giving me a body organ.
Now the weird part, I went to my friends house today. And this is a friend I met because of derek. And he happened to be out with her husband. And all of the sudden, he was coming over to their house. And I was there. And in a year, we've managed to avoid this particular situation. And when they got there, we escaped out of the house. And I didn't see him or talk to him, nor did I want to. It was weird because of my dream last night. I was talking to her about it, and I told her that it made me nervous and my stomach upset. But I wished it didn't have to be that way. I realized that I'm not the one making it that way. I would be able to handle myself. He doesn't want to see me because of the fear that if his girlfriend found out she would be mad. And thats silly and sad. Because it doesn't have to be that way. But it is. I suppose I will never get a chance to tie the relationship up in a package and tuck it away in the closet. I won't get the chance to tell him what I want to, that I am happy and that I look back on our years together with a smile instead of with anger and hurt. And that sucks, because I think it would make things easier, maybe better for him. He could feel better about himself knowing that he didn't ruin me. Or maybe he just doesn't care if he ruined me or not. And I guess I have to accept that. I don't understand it. But I have to accept that I didn't know him at all, ever. He wasn't the person I thought he was.
So to him I guess I just have to say, I'll see you on the flip side...for now i'll catch you in my dreams.

Patience is a virtue

I am not a patient person. I can be patient. I can patiently wait to get my oil changed. I can patiently wait for my clothes to dry in the dryer. But if it is something that I really really want, I am not patient. For instance, the other day I used my friends hot rollers. After I used them, I really wanted some for myself. So even though I didn't have a lot of money in my bank account, I went out and bought them the next day. I should have patiently waited until my next pay check and bought them then. I am so inpatient when I want something I will go to extremes to get it. When Derek and I broke up, I wanted SO badly to be over it, to be done. When I found out how many girls he had cheated on me with, I gave myself one week to get over it. One week to be sad. HA! That worked out well for me, obviously. Now when I go out on dates, I want to feel comfortable. I want to really care about someone, I want to have that closeness again. And if I don't have that right away, I'm done. I move on to the next person. Needless to say, constantly disappointed. I don't want to wait. I want it now. Marilyn says that this is the little kid in me. The portion of myself that is still immature. We talked about this the other day. I realized something important. Every meaningful relationship I have in my life with my friends, has taken time. Many of my friends I have had for years and years. These are the people that I can depend on. That are there for me when my car breaks down, or when I need a ride, or when I need to eat dinner, they feed me. I visited the family I used to babysit for, for many years. They have six kids. The triplets were eight months old when I started working for them, and they are about to turn five now. I haven't seen them since October. I know there is a reason for that. Derek was really involved with their family, he used to take the boys to the skate park every single weekend. There were a lot of memories there. Every time I went up there, the boys would ask me about him. The triplets would say to me "Li Li, where's derek?". Heartbreaking. How do you explain that to them? They aren't my kids, although they always felt like it. But, they knew us as a couple. I got tired of saying that I didn't know where he was. So I stopped going up there. They are my second family down in San Diego. I can count on them for anything. But I couldn't do it anymore. So with my new found happiness, I went over to their house. I'm laying on the couch with one of the babies (they are five, and I still call them babies), Aubrey walks up to me and a smile comes across her face, "Li Li, you're here. I missed you. Where have you been?" I say "I know love, I miss you too, I've just been busy." She says "well it makes me really happy that you are here now." It makes me really happy that I am here now too. My relationship has evolved with their family over the years I've known them. I went from being an employee to a family member. My point here is that it takes time. You don't trust someone, love someone, depend on someone overnight. What if I had wanted my relationship with their family to be what it is now, when I first started? That would have been weird right? Well, this carries on into my life now. I don't know how to date, because I don't know how to be patient. I don't know how to learn to love someone. I feel like it is something that should just happen right away. But it doesn't. So this week, I told Marilyn I wanted to work on patience. She said to me "With patience, comes difficulty. So be prepared."