Innerds & Stuff on Mothers Day

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I've been contemplating, mulling over, considering, pondering, thinking about things lately. Inner things.  I've always had a fascination with what makes people tick. What they believe and why. But lately the journey has been inward.

"Know Thyself."

That's a phrase that has defined a key to what I've found to be the most powerful of all knowledge. Knowing your tendencies, your strengths and equally important, your weaknesses.

I had some issues going on inside me. Physically and mentally. The mental things were causing physical things. The physical things didn't all show, weren't readily apparent. I was likely on the cusp of developing permanent damage or at least on the road to an autoimmune disease.

I went on the offensive and lost weight. I eliminated practices that weren't complimentary and changed my eating to primarily plant based, adopting a low-carb diet. 

The changes were a success and I now weigh sixty three pounds less. I look and feel great.  But on the inside, mentally and physically, the improvement that don't necessarily show were just as drastic and beneficial. All these pluses without much exercise, never missing a meal and eating chocolate nearly every day.

After a decade on medications for blood pressure and cholesterol, I don't have to take either now. My organs are thriving rather than struggling to keep up with an unproductive lifestyle. My demeanor is calm. I feel more at peace. I sleep better and I get more done.  

My doctors are impressed and cheering me on. I just had an Ultrasound and a CT Scan. Both reports came up with similar results, "Grossly Unremarkable."  I can't say that I've ever felt such joy hearing those to words to describe anything about me.

Today someone told me I looked twenty years younger. Another said I should teach a class on weight loss.

(Before)                                        (After)

 I think there's a slender person inside each of us. I read two books this year that oddly had to do with weight, the mental battles and physical challenges one deals with surrounding that subject. 

I enjoyed both books very much and hope you might to.

The Elephant in the Room: One Fat Man's Questto Get Smaller in a Growing America by Tommy Tomlinson


Heavy: An American Memoir  by Kiese Layman



So much of life is a battlefield of the mind. It's all between the ears as I like to say.

Recently David Hayaward, aka the Naked Pastor tweeted this graphic, which resonated with me.

If you don't mind, it don't matter is a phrase I'd heard in the Marine Corps a bit here and there over the years.

Dr. Phil tells us that we talk to ourselves more than any other person, animal or thing. More than your parents, your kids, your co-workers, your pets, your spouse, yes, even your god(s).

So that inner talk should be positive.

My wife, since being diagnosed with Myasthenia Gravis, an incurable neuromuscular autoimmune disease, blogged about talking to an enlarged and printed on canvas portrait I placed on the wall of her. She was seeking to the previous her. Missing her old self. Struggling with finding a new normal.

My great friend and fellow Marine Joe, aka "Guido," whom I consider a brother recently had to have the most invasive surgery on his heart because of some inner stuff that seemed undetectable even with a battery of tests. Thankfully his wife is a cardiac nurse and knew he needed a CT Calcium Score, even though insurance won't pay for it. Without that test, he would likely have continued to push through any discomfort he may have experienced and dropped dead in the middle of a workout or even a mundane task such as taking out the trash. He was a ticking time bomb that outwardly showed little to no signs. (Please follow the link and get this test done. The cost is usually about $100.)

We live in a reactive rather than proactive world. Government, healthcare, our personal lives are all wrapped in this mindset of if it ain't broke, don't fix it and the stats show we're reaping from it.

Experiencing all of the above, I've learned a good bit about our guts. Not the brave type but our microbiome. The multitude of bacteria, good and bad that play a more significant role in our lives than we're informed about. Hippocrates, the father of medicine asserted that all disease starts in the gut. So, with the handful of things I was dealing with and the belief that my gut was the culprit, I set out to find and incorporate a remedy. I am a fixer after all, as my wife likes to point out. 

I was super fortunate to have another great friend who'd already started down this road and she, Jacqui has been an invaluable resource for guidance. She's a great cheerleader and is remarkably savvy at finding just the right buttons to press to get and keep you on track for any personality type. I happen to be a contrarian that will rebuff everything as hocus-pocus hogwash initially until I can wrestle with it and find sufficient evidence and get my mind wrapped around the idea I don't already know everything.

Today is Mothers Day. I started this post as soon as I got home from visiting my ninety year old mother. 

She's in a home and slipping away little by little due to dementia. We've always sang songs together and it's the one thing I can do to bring her to be present. She hears my voice, she recognizes the lyric and she joins in. Less and less so lately. I miss my mother's vibrancy. I miss her good singing voice. I miss the sparkle in her eyes. I miss the wisdom she'd share when I needed it most.

Anita once thanked me for not abandoning her when her world turned upside down. At the onset of her disease she couldn't bathe or dress herself. I was fully prepared to live like that for the rest of our lives. It hurt my feelings to think she could even imagine that I'd be capable of such a thing. Inside, from my perspective, she's no different from the woman in the photo. Her previous self as she calls it. But I understand her just being thankful. And we're both thankful that she's come a long way since then and is about to participate in her first Walk for MG, to raise funds for research and awareness. (If you'd like to donate or participate, please use the link) She is also about to start an MG support group in Columbia, SC. 

And I know, though Mama is slow to respond, 

inside, she's still the amazing woman I've had the privilege of calling Mama from my very first breath...

 Through the years

No matter her outward condition,

She's always...

Mama

Happy Productive New Year - Respect Beer

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2018 brought many trials and I feel as though I/we have weathered the storms and come through in better shape. On a personal note, I stopped drinking beer and went on a low carbohydrate diet and managed to lose 41 pounds in 60 days. #Bam

I went on a trash pick up walk down our residential lake front street on Christmas day, bagging four bags of mostly beer cans but found a variety of other stuff as well. Noting too that some of the residents, all of whom live on the same side of the street, blow their leaves and other yard debris across the street into the ditch. The same ditch that catches the trash that falls off of vehicles headed for the dump and the cans of beer from those who neither respect beer or property.

Today, wanting to start the New Years with being productive, I went on another trash pick up walk in the opposite direction this time managing to fill five trash bags in a one mile out and one mile back or other side of the street trip.

I got to taking note of what seemed to be the item I found along side the road the most. Among the many items were Bud Light, Miller Lite, Natural Lite and Michelob Ultra Lite beer cans. Bud light being the most numerous with Natural Light a close second.

Shitty people drink shitty beer.

Now I am fully aware that Bud Light is the biggest selling beer in the world. Very much so here in the Bible thumping South. Seems the local Bubba's toss their stash of empties on the way home so their wives or mommies or their wives whom they call mommy in a FOX NEWS watching Pence-onian way. They don't respect beer by drinking the crap they drink and they don't respect the community or other people's property by tossing it out of their vehicles.

Education in the South is notoriously lacking. The numbers don't lie. The average is below the rest of the nation. South Carolina has jumped on the band wagon fully with Trump and contributed to the country's demise with the likes of Nikki Haley, Mick Mulvaney and the current Gropenfurher-ass kissing governor McMaster. The state song should be, "Thank God for Mississippi." Often the only other state lower on the totem pole.

I found very few water bottles. Seems Gomer's are too wise to pay for bottle water. I mean you can get water for free from the lake that's full of coal ash heavy metals from upstream. But there were plenty of Gatorade bottles. The density reasons that sodium filled colored sugar water is worthy of their hard earned cash.

I found one sippy pouch thing. I would understand this. There's no helmet law in SC and these brainless wonders tote their younguns round in the back of the truck with the untethered dawg. Surely an unenvironmentally minded kid would toss a pouch or two.

I found a Modelo beer can. There have been a few Mexican crew's doing roofing and construction in the area.  Not bad, just one can from a a few crews.

I found a few Bud Light aluminum bottles. One of them unopened/full. To this person, you too get an F but with a gold star.

To the rest of the beer can tossers, you all get an F. You are lower than a feckless c*nt. You disrespect beer and environment. You're a lot like gropenfurher, unworthy, pathetic and juvenile.

Soda cans you say? Yup, there were some of those. Not many. Guess which brand was found the most.  Not CocaCola or Pepsi, the highest selling brands on the planet. Nope. Here's a hint, we're in the South. Think density..... Mountain Dew. Yup the teeth rotting, jaw clenching energy drink of rednecks from 2 to 92.

Note that there was not one single Craft beer can or bottle. NOT A SINGLE FREAKING ONE.

Because Craft Beer Drinkers, respect beer and they respect the environment, much like the craft beer brewers.

People who drink lite or light beers, don't like the taste of beer, they just like to pee a lot. And to litter and to otherwise be unhealthy for planet earth.

Oh and you Mike's Hard Lemonade and Hard Cider drinkers, you suck too. There was one little cutesy Seagrams fruity drink glass bottle. A teen girl likely had her first drink ever and had difficulty walking much less carrying the bottle to dispose of properly. You get a pass this time but don't make a habit of it.

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Mia II

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It was love at first sight.

( 1st pic of Mia II at home)

Anita and I were out running errands and as she went to Bed Bath and Beyond, I went a couple stores down to PetSmart to get a bag of dry cat food for our two cats, Z, aka Mr Zeepers and Jazz, aka Kitty Kitty.

(Z aka Mr Zeepers)

(Jazz, Aka Kitty Kitty)

Well you can't walk into PetSmart without looking at the cats they have available for adoption. I scanned the windows and boom, there she was. The world stopped. My eyes were gazing on the most beautiful creature.

She didn't have much interest in me or anything, relaxing in her little cubicle.  I didn't even look at her name or bio, I just knew I had to have her. I snapped a photo with my cell phone and sent it to Anita, saying, "you've got to come see this cat." And while she was responding, "I'm in the checkout I'll be there shortly." I was already texting, "this cat is coming home with us."

By the time Anita arrived, I'd paid the $50 fee and was purchasing a pet carrier to transport Mia home. We call her Mia II because Anita had the original Mia, a beautiful white long haired cat.

(Anita and Mia)

Mia II had been "surrendered" by her previous owner. She was four years old which was the same as Mr Zeepers. We got home and let her out of her carrier. We soon gathered that she didn't like to be held and the other two cats came to investigate the newbie. Mia scampered off into our spare bedroom and into a closet. I set her up in that room with her own litter box, a food and water dish. The other cats didn't pursue or seem to care much.

Mia spent three weeks in her own room. Occasionally venturing out when we were all relaxing in the living room watching some prime time show on TV, the other cats resting on the couch with us. Mia would look around the corner, she was so small and so quiet. Like the poem by Carl Sandberg, "Fog."
"Fog rolls in on little cat feet."

She'd survey and if nothing was moving, she'd inch into the room, checking in all directions. We'd notice and if anyone moved, she'd go back to her room. We wanted her to join us. So we learned to not even breathe heavy.

Gradually, she made her way onto the back of the couch and if we moved, once again she'd scamper away. But little by little she got used to her new surroundings, even joining us out on the screened deck I'd built and that the other cats loved to go on and watch and listen to the many birds in the back yard.

(Mia loved to bask in the sunlight)

When Mia was finally pretty well situated, we moved... Our little family of Anita and I, with a dog and three cats packed up and moved to a much larger home on a lake. As the furniture in the old place disappeared over a few days, the cats were wondering what in the heck was going on so we decided to just bring them out to the new place and we figured Mia would find a closet and be out in a week or so. But much to our surprise, on the first evening after unpacking some of the stuff, while relaxing in the living room, all three cats were lounging about with us, like they'd been there their whole lives. We were relieved.  Mia was finally in her forever home. In fact, all three of them were as well as Scarlett the best ever Black Labrador. (Anita always says I bought the house for her and chose the yard for Scarlett, whose absolute most favorite thing ever was "get the stick" tossed in the lake.)

Much as I do with my wife, I never lost the joy my heart felt admiring Mia II.  She was quiet and had some quirks like we all do. She didn't want to be held but loved to curl up next to me. She loved to be pet and she followed me to bed every night and would purr in my ear, wanting attention.

Mia II was our special needs child/furbaby.  She had seizures and bounced off furniture and walls like a pinball. We tried medications and paid good $$ to find relief for her, but it wasn't until we stopped giving her flea treatment that her episodes became few and far between. At their peak, she had three in one day. She had them usually about three times a week. She'd be sleeping peacefully and the next minute she'd look like an acrobat flying around the room. Winding up in a heap pulsating with gagging sounds violently. We'd cover her with a blanket until she recovered. Her pupils would be dilated and any movement or sound was amplified and caused her to jerk in reaction. She'd meow and walk around re-familiarizing her self then find her food bowl and chow down a bit then find us and want some attention. It was one of the rare times you could pick her up and hold her.

She never liked to feel trapped in any way shape or form. Holding her was one. She would wait and use the litter box at night when everyone else was asleep. We'd hear her and on the rare occasion it was in the day, if another cat walked in or we walked by, she'd fly out of the litter box like a bolt of lightning. She'd tend to that business later.  I often said maybe we should have named her Squirt, because she'd squirt by like a flash of light. We don't know what happened in her previous life. If she experienced some trauma that caused this behavior and or her seizures.  We just loved her and appreciated the loveliness she added to our home.

She was the smallest of our cats and the quietest, except her purr. She had the loudest purr. Like a diesel engine. It was comforting, soothing. She and Anita, with those beautiful blue eyes and quiet demeanor were so therapeutic for me, Mr Fearless and Chaotic was learning to appreciate, "chill."

Mia would always seek to be near me. She'd bounce from one couch to the other if I moved across the room. She'd lay on the couch part nearest me if I were eating a meal at the table. She'd curl up next to me, I think her absolute favorite place to be, if I were on the couch. She'd follow me into the kitchen, morning, noon and night. As though I went in there for the express purpose of getting her favorite treat. If I were busy preparing a meal, she'd wait patiently, tail wrapped around her feet and haunches. When I'd head for the fridge, she let out a "Mayo." "Maaaayo." Which eventually became, "MAY-O!"
She wanted her little dab of mayonnaise. Hah, who'd ever heard of a cat wanting mayonnaise? I offered salmon and tuna juice, ham and cheese. All the things the other cats liked. Nope, not Mia, she wanted her Mayo. Anita would snicker from the other room. And yank my chain about "somebody" having me trained.

Scarlett passed in December of 2016.
Kitty Kitty passed in February of 2017.
Mr Zeepers passed in September of 2017.

Here are the earliest photos of them.

  

So for a short while, Mia II was an only furbaby/pet/child.

But Anita was grieving her Mr Zeepers who died without warning on September 8th, from the same tragic Saddle Thrombus, within weeks I couldn't stand to see Anita grieving so much and I had to remedy the issue.

Ever the fixer am I... On Sept the 17th we got...

(MoonDance and SugarFoot, aka Jack and Diane.)
from F.U.R.R. in Charlotte

Mia was accepting of the new housemates... In her special way, she comforted their intrusion into her uncomplicated life.

So yesterday, Mia's last day as a soothing part of our household, I was absolutely wiped out. I'd missed breakfast because early yesterday morning Mia suffered, as did Mr Zeepers, from a sudden and deadly Saddle Thrombus. I thought I could get her to the vet quick enough to save her. Her feet were cold and her gums were blue. She was dying rapidly after we arrived. The vet put a heating pad on her and she expired peacefully. I was home and making lunch at 2pm. We had supper at 430pm. I showered and sobbed throughout the day. My eyes were blood shot and dry. I couldn't pay attention to what was on TV or read. I went to bed at 8:45pm.

I was up this morning at 3:45am. Missing Mia. I fed the two cats who now get a can of wet food split two ways instead of three. I picked up the one thing that was exclusively used by Mia, a scratch pad. It was gouged out on catty-cornerd ends as was her habit.

It amazes me how the quietest and smallest of things seem to make the biggest impact. I'm crying again this morning, not by choice. I'd rather be over the grieving. I miss my little Mia. I wish I could have done something to save her. Anita says I did, that I gave her the best years of her life. I understand and accept that. I just hurt. I hurt deeply. I didn't know this would be my response. I didn't grieve as fiercely with the others. Possibly with Scarlett. But with Scarlett I'd made a decision about her quality of life and chose her end. It was loving and responsible. This was unexpected and sudden.

I'm in shock. Once again my eyes are bloodshot and at times I can barely breathe.  My chest feels a void as it heaves in anguish. My throat is wanting. wanting to call out her name and see her come padding towards me. She always responded to my calls. Always...

Not any more...


I write for therapy primarily. You put a period at the end of a sentence that expresses a thought/feeling and usually you can move on.

I wanted to write today to give justice to Mia and the impact she had on my life. She hit me like a wrecking ball and enhanced my life. When she sought my affection I felt successful and grateful.
If another cat wanted to tussle with her, I'd defend her and run them off. She was kind and gentle. She wasn't a fighter. If another cat wanted to hog her food, she'd let em. I'd notice and make up for it. But I learned to stand guard while she ate and fend off the others. No bullying in my house. Not on my watch. I'd grown up with that crap. Nothing irks me more than a bully.

So, on this cold winter morning, my first without Mia, a fog is fading on the lake as the sun wrestles to break through the gloomy clouds and warm this day. I begin to let go, here, now, as I write. Knowing I did all I could to give Mia all of me and she gave to me her precious life and love.

Others need attention...

But Mia... You'll always be the star of my show... forever 💓💓💓💓

You simply take my breath away

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Mama Mia 2018 the year of LOSS

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Sometimes you feel like life has just punched you in the gut.

It's already been a very trying year. Loss seems to be the legacy 2018 desires.

I'd been feeling like I was in a good place. The one good loss was that I've just recently lost 28 pounds in about 40 days by doing a keto/low carb type diet. Mentally I'd processed the previous issues and was beginning to comprehend and absorb the silver linings. I was free from some things and better prepared to meet the needs of other things.

But that small ache that persists told me the impending doom that's known me forever still had something for me this year.

So with just 21 days left in the calendar year, a normal morning of get up, weigh myself and send in my report via some new gadgets and an app from the VA hospital weight loss program, fire up the fireplace to knock the chill off, turn on the coffee maker, prep Anita's tea, feed the cats their daily wet food which they're always anxiously awaiting, pour coffee, take medications, have a seat and proceed to check emails, social media, watch the news and debate breakfast or exercise first.

All seemed quite normal. Then....

Mia let out one of those familiar cat low and slow morning meows, a yowl. The other cats went on high alert. Anita came out of the bedroom and I was on my way towards the alarm. Mia was in the litter box. She came out, the other cats gave her a sniff and all seemed okay. False alarm.

Then Mia did it again. She's done this over the eight years we've had her. She's 12 years old now. It used to indicate she was about to have a seizure. Those have been few and far between this past year since we stopped putting the flea control stuff on her.

Lately she's made this mew when about to yack up a hair ball or just spit up her food.

She walked a bit, then just settled into a crouch and started the yowling again. I prepared with a blanket to cover her in case she was having a seizure to prevent her from injuring herself. Poor thing would run and bounce off things like a pinball and then lay in a heap having a grand mal seizure. She'd come out of those, re familiarize herself with the house, eat and then want some attention.

This time she wasn't happy about the blanket so I took it off her and she walked into the bedroom, crouched again and was panting.

Shit.... I've seen this before. Our Mr Zeepers had just passed away last September due to a condition called Saddle Thrombus which has the symptoms Mia was displaying.

Mia wobbled a bit when she attempted to walk again and she was still yowling and was having obvious breathing issues. I was thinking a heart attack. I thought I was going to have to do CPR on her. I put Anita's bi-Pap mask on her to help force some air but Mia didn't like it so I just grabbed my wallet and keys, put her in a pet carrier and headed for the vet hoping she'd survive the 25-30 minute trip.

She weakened as we traveled, I kept calling her name. She was weakening and becoming unresponsive. I called again and again. She tried with all she had to crawl to the cage door so I could touch her, her meow was getting weaker.

We made it right when they opened. The tech felt her feet, they were cold. I noticed her gums were blue. They took her back for an x-ray... what seemed like forever they came and told me she was dying, due to the same thing that took Mr Zeepers. With him it was on a Friday night and we googled his symptoms and took him outside and mercifully put him down.

I thought I could do something to save Mia. She gave it all she had to survive. I'm afraid I let her suffer more than she should have endured. Hope is not always a great thing.

We had Scarlett, our wonderful black Labrador euthanized when she could have lived longer but the quality of her life was not worth extending. I felt it was the right decision. I felt putting Mr Zeepers down was the right decision. It saved him pain. They both lived great lives. Miss Kitty Kitty was a shocker in that she had shallow breathing one day and I took her to the vet figuring we'd get some antibiotics and be on our way home. They x-rayed her and 3/4's of her chest cavity was filled with something, She would not survive. It too was a Friday and lab results would not be back until Monday and the vet said she would not survive until then. So Kitty Kitty was euthanized mercifully on the spot.

The losses have been piling up in less than two years, we've lost three beloved feline pets and one best ever canine best friend.

I feel they all loved me and showed their appreciation in their unique ways. I loved them with a heart that now feels an emptiness in their spaces.

It was about the time of Anita's Myasthenia Gravis diagnosis that I felt Mama wasn't going to make it through to the end of the year. To prepare myself and feeling it would free some time and attention to caring for Anita and meet the upcoming needs of her aging parents.

But it was Mia. 

I didn't see this one coming and its been that way with all three cats. I'd always been a dog person before I met Anita. Dog's age like people and you know they're closing in on the end of their lives.

Cat's seem to have a different course of action. That's my lesson.

Love em while you got em. Every last thing. Be appreciative. Cherish all of it. Process and grow.

 ❤ RIP MIA ❤

❤❤ Until we meet at the Rainbow Bridge ❤❤

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End of an (BE)Era - Gluten-Free Jesus

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It's amazing how much better I'm feeling these days.

I'm a bit embarrassed to say that despite numerous health issues, I didn't take much action. But when I saw a photo of me from a night out with friends... Vanity and Ego immediately replaced Apathy with Pro-Activity.

As a result,
My BP has reduced to healthy normal levels.
My weight is dropping in a healthy manner.
My clothes fit better.
My sleeping is better.
My skin issues are gone or on the way out.
My mental attitude is improved.
My inflammation is gone.
My digestive system is better.

I'll bet my cholesterol levels have lowered as well.

Initially it was as simple as cutting out beer and bread.

I went further to avoid many carbs especially sugars. I switched to Stevia from Splenda.
I try to make everything I eat as raw and natural as possible rather than processed.
I added some coconut oil extract and honey to my coffee.

I've noticed that avoiding the fast burning energy foods like sweet fruits and breads can leave me low on energy unless I get enough slow burning protein in me. So I keep a bag of nuts in the car and plenty of water.

I started drinking herbal tea like roasted dandelion which is great for a liver cleanse.

I'm not following any particular diet like Paleo which excludes grains  but it is similar to the low carb parts of the Keto and Candida diets.

Speaking of low carb...

So the other day I go to church with my wife and it happens to be communion day. Well this particular church does communion full on with an actual broken loaf of bread and real wine poured in a chalice.

So, when the lady pastor arrives I inform her that I need the Gluten-Free Jesus today. She popped me in the arm and told me to sit down.

But, sure enough, when I faced her with the broken loaf and wine, she said, "David, this is Gluten Free Jesus' body, take and eat and this is the blood He has poured out for you, take and drink. Do this in remembrance of Him."

She brought a smile to my face, joy to my heart and likely some hope for my soul. Something organized religion rarely does for me anymore.

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Learning by Observing - What You See is What You Get

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I'm thinking back to how I learned to do things. I watched sports on TV and then went and participated by joining little league baseball and football teams. I don't remember the coaches actually teaching us anything. They'd make us exercise and practice and improve the basic skills we already had. We learned to play by watching it on TV and seeing the older kids play before we were old enough. 

I played some basketball but didn't have the height to compete and there were no little league teams. I excelled at ping pong and the only experience I had with it was watching and being fascinated by the Chinese' dominance in the Olympic games.

I played golf because I had to caddy for my Dad while he honed the skills to his passion. We watched it on television. We had golf magazines around the house and a tarp in the garage to hit balls into in the winter when the local courses were closed.

So, we're born with a skill set like good hand and eye coordination, athleticism and we pursue what opportunities exist in the areas where we have interest. We learn on our own through trial and error. We get better with practice. We build confidence as we hone our skills.

As I aged, it seemed my peers grew into young men and the girls into young women while I remained like a child. I was a late bloomer physically. So I found my self excelling at individual sports like ping pong and golf where I placed high in local competitions.

Well as we all age, there comes a time when we begin to explore our sexuality and again, no one teaches us about it. We learn by observing and through experimentation. Our curiosity leads us to find what we like and the feedback we receive lets us know what we're already good at and what we need to practice. I think we all want positive feedback. We want to be good at things. We want to be desired. We want to feel good about ourselves.

Lately, I've been wanting to read more than usual, which is very little. The only other time I really wanted to read was when I was incarcerated. I wanted and needed to be somewhere else. Books helped me with that. At times I'd have three books at a time. One I was finishing up, one I was just getting into and one on deck. I read more in an eighteen month period than all my life prior and since combined. As well as listened to a few radio programs that for me, achieved a similar escape.

So why am I wanting to read more now? 

I often find myself contemplating and reflecting on life as I am busy with other things like cutting the grass or cooking. Often I awaken from a dream and with a song in my head that's relative to the dream.

This morning the song was "Wrecking Ball."

The dream was about my first wife, whom for thirty six years I thought was the mother of my one and only child, but through DNA this year found it to not be so. 

As I went through my morning routine of feeding the cats, turning on the lights, fireplace and coffeemaker I realized that she, my first wife had been pregnant three times in the span of two years. None of them mine.

She was three months pregnant (by a friend of mine) when I married her . When that child was about one and a half years old, she was pregnant again but had an abortion (claiming it was mine but it was a completely different guy from the first, a friend of her's). This tossed our marriage into a tailspin and we separated for six months. When she got pregnant by another guy (third guy), I'd had enough and we divorced.

I woke up feeling like a victim. And I thought, who grows up wanting to be a victim? How'd I become that?

I began thinking of other things that happened over the course of my life and I saw a pattern of being victimized. Why? I thought about them and could not find the nexus for the individual events that would warrant revenge or anything of that nature.

What I discovered, the epiphany was that, just as I wrote about at the beginning of this post, I learned to be a victim by observing.

I was raised by a victim.

We all identify with one of our parents more than the other. According to Dr. Phil the same gender parent is the biggest influence in our lives. I believe I was more of a Mama's boy.

Had I identified more with my father I likely would have been an abuser. (I was and I abused me)

She was a victim. I'd seen her with black eyes and bruises. I'd watched her cry and listened to the violence on the other side of the bedroom door. I'd been a victim of the violence at my father's hands and witnessed a sibling suffer similar who then in turn victimized me with his dysfunctional frustrations mentally and physically.

There are things that have never left my memory that I've always wondered why they happened to me at the hands of what I considered friends and family.

I have to conclude that as much as my golf swing was identical to my dad's due to keen observation, that my ability to be victimized was honed in a similar fashion by keen observation of my mother.

There's another saying by Dr. Phil that past behavior is the best indicator of future behavior. 

I'm currently reading Heavy - An American Memoir

In this powerful and provocative memoir, genre-bending essayist and novelist Kiese Laymon explores what the weight of a lifetime of secrets, lies, and deception does to a black body, a black family, and a nation teetering on the brink of moral collapse.

But we grow up and we realize how foolish we've been and at some point we have to adjust our behavior if we want better results.

And at this revelation, do we burn the bridges? Do we forgive and forget? How do we move on when there are triggers and pain that lurk with further observations. 

But I'll save that topic for a future post.

2v1 Predictability.

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I've previously blogged about a couple of days while in the Marine Corps titled "Bad day part one" and "Bad day part two."  Today's title, "2v1 Imagine" is about MG. Myasthenia Gravis, an incurable autoimmune disease which my wife is diagnosed with.
Bottom line, with MG you need 2 down/restful days to have one full/eventful day, at best.

From the outside looking in, a living with / caretaker views Anita as being fully capable of handling her own affairs. And if there were no other option, she'd certainly find a way.

MG sufferers like any other battling some limiting force, find a way.

It's not necessarily debilitating but it is requiring of major adjustment.

There is something you want to plan to attend. You look at the calendar and you begin to understand with a bit of experience with MG that you must employ a 2v1 tactic.

You have to plan on a day of rest before and a day of rest after the date you plan a day out and about.

Now imagine you have the need to work, to earn income to put food on the table and pay the rent.

We're not in that situation, yet many are.

I'm sharing what Anita is sharing.

We are learning. This is a journey.

It'd be nice to believe that this is the new normal.

But we really don't know and it may be that we'll never know.

Yet all we really seek is  predictability.