It has been a long time.

It has been some time since I have posted. A lot has happened since then. I have been through the hottest summer on record and the worst drought the state has had in 50 years. It has also been a summer of self acceptance. My mother is not well. She has COPD, early stage emphysema, breast cancer survivor of 16 years, and depressed. She has given up on life, so I decided a road trip with my girls to visit her would do her and me some good.

I spent 3 weeks with my parents and my sister and her family. My mom has given up on life because she is depressed. Yes, she is sick, but her depression just makes everything seem worse. She is lonely. I do not live close by any more, my sister can not stand her depressive mood, and dad does not know what to do. I can see where they are all coming from. My sister is looking at my mom and seeing what she is turning into and does not want to face the fact she needs to change or she will end up like mom. I have to give her credit she tries, but she has her own physical problems she needs to take care of and does not need mom's negativity dragging her down. Dad, he has never been able to understand why the world is not perfect for every one, because it is for him. That is the way dad has always been.

I am a cross between both of my parents. What a sucky world it can be. Dad's side of the family all have genius IQs, they are high functioning people and expect everybody to be the same way, myself included. This is great if you are a member of this club, but if you are not, it sucks to be you. I know that I have a hard time when I am manic dealing with people who are normal even smart. To me they seem slow, stupid, lazy, like they have no common sense. I get frustrated and aggravated with them real easy. It is not their fault, and I whish I could slow down my brain so this did not happen. The only way is if I am drugged out of my mind and I can not function myself or drunk. Either way, I can not live a productive life. I was watching an episode of HOUSE the other day, and one of his patients

Said how it feels perfectly." It is lonely, isn't it? It is hard to find someone you can relate to". Yes you can have friends, but not friends that you can sit and hold stimulating conversations with. This fits well with the depressive side I get from mom. I get her being lonely. I get not having a lot of friends and needing family to keep you company. I am younger, I have a job right now, and my kids are at home. I have a larger support system keeping me busy so I do not feel isolated and lonely now. But that still does not stop depression; it just gives you motivation to try to get out of it.

During the time I spent with my family, mom kept saying she whished she knew about her mental illness before she had my sister and I because she would never have had us. She blames herself for passing on the manic depressive disease I have. I am pretty sure my sister has some form of mental illness herself, but I am not a doctor. I kept telling her that it was not her fault and to not blame herself it will just make her more depressed. Genetics are a game of chance. You have a 50 - 50 shot that you will pass the trait on. The icing on the cake that she said to me was;" Now you have given it to your children.” Great way to drag me into her pity party and stick a knife through my heart at the same time. So I decided the rest of the time spent with my family was going to be positive and if she did not want to listen and participate, that was her choice.

After a few days she came around and the entire family spent time doing things together we have not done in many years. We went to the beach, shopping, amusement park, and out to dinner. It was nice to see every one happy and getting along. All good things must come to an end, that happened the day before I had to leave to go back home. The realization that her support team was breaking apart sent her back into her depression. I told mom you need to see a doctor and take medication. If you choose not to do this, no one will be able to help you but yourself.

I spent the next week traveling cross country with my children. They are great kids. I may have passed on my mental illness to them and maybe not. We had conversations about my illness and how I do not look or act sick, but I am. They now know why I am funny crazy all the time. Why I do things other kids moms would never do or say. It is just me. They love me for me. I do a good job of embarrassing them in public like a mom is supposed to do.

When I got home and saw my doctor, he asked how I was doing. I said ok. The depression is better. The road trip did my soul some good. I still have no self esteem and feel like I have failed my family. I am thinking of going back to school, what do you think? He said. You know, you have a disability don't you? You might be able to get some financial aid for your education. I said "I have a disability?" he said," Yes you do”. That was the first time in my life that I realized that I have a disease. That being manic depressive is not normal. It has been a way of life for so long, I do not know any other way. It is time to practice what I preached to my mom. I have not failed my family. I have done the best I can with the disease I have. When I am at my best, I do my best. When I am at my worst, I the best I can. I was dealt these cards, I have to play them the best way I can.

Signing out for now

Feeding Time

Feeding time at the barn, you can call it torture or an escape for every day life. This weeks was more on the torture side. We have been doing the Saturday night feedings at the barn for as long as I can remember. It has been in exchange for different reductions off horsey rates depending what we needed at the time. My kids did working student when they were younger and had more free time. But Saturday Night has become a ritural of sorts now.

When we first said we would take on this chore, it was not bad at all. There were 12 horses. Only 6 of them had to caught and brought into the barn for feeding. We gave them water, treats(we like to spoil them) , and give them hay. It was great to get away from the house to the peace and quiet of the farm.

Well, they out grew the little farm quickly, and bought 70 acers with a house, small barn, and all purpose building on it. They built a 16 stall barn with a tack room and tacking up area almost as large as the stall area. They built out the multi purpose building into a feed room on the bottom and office,restroom/laundry, and lounge on top. Two large arenas for jumping and one for dressage. The small barn was turned into an 8 stall barn with garge/workshop. Right now there are 8 pastures that are being used. There is still more land that can be expanded if needed. This year they added a large pond to help with drainage. Wouldn't you know, we are having the worst drought in 50 years.

As you can tell the little farm is now a large working farm. Momma, as we like to call her, had a little filli this spring. We call her Sophie. Libbi and momma are expecting again. It is nice to have the little one around. Her last one was a butt. We called him Twister, because he to this day runs around in circles at feeding time. Now we are upto 50 horses. Feeding time is not as simple as it used to be.

This week it was 102 degrees out and there was a whipping wind to make feeding a pleasurable job. First starts the round up. We have to get 24 horses into their stalls form all the different pastures. My daughters do a great job at that. In the mean time, my husband and I load up the eletric cart with hay and all the feed buckets and drive them upto the main barn. Hubby will help the girls round up a few of the horses that are left. Now I have the job of dumping the grain into all the feeders. By now I am sweating Bullets. My shirt is soaked. My hair is dripping, and I am whishing it is winter. Every one is back to the main barn. Hubby and the oldest take the buggy to go and feed the horses in the pastures while my youngest and I finish in the barn.

She gets the easy job. Filling water buckets. You can pour the cold water over your head and cool down. I get to hay all the horses. What a fun job when you are sopping wet with sweat. The little pieces of hay get stuck in places you forgot you had. They get stuck in the connorsof your eyes and when you try to wipe them out with your hand, you end up puting more in because your hand is covered too. Now I look like a scarecrow. I figure, I am going out into the wind in a minute to walk one of the horses out to his pasture, it will blow off.

So Hammy and I head off. We are walking along having a nice conversation and a dustanado comes along. It is like a tornado, but all dust. Now I am not only cover with hay, I am also covered with dirt. It is kind of like being tared and feathered. Hammy and I make it to his pasture and he heads for his water trough. I love Hammy. You can have a conversation with him. He shakes his head like he understands every word you are saying. I asked him if I could jump into his water and he shook his head no. I asked him if he was going to stick his head in the water and he said no. He just took a big drink and walked away.

Now my favorite part of the whole process, filling the feeding buckets. Off to the feed room I go, all coverd with sand and hay. I open the covers on all 5 types of grain we use only to find 4 of the buckets are empty. Yea!! I get to throw around 50 pound bags of grain. Filling the buckets at night means you also have to add the morning supplements to the feed. Thank God most of the horses do not have them. Tonight there was a new one to add. It was a pump liquid. Not good considering my present sandy hay covered condition. Yes, I pumped this disgusting red liquid all over me. I had no idea it was going to shoot out as far as it did. The second and third pump was much better.

Actually some of the supplements smell quite good. One of the reminds me of "cookocooko fo cocoa cocoa puffs", one smells like pepermint, one reminds me of pizza,and one looks like a bunch of mini roaches. The rest are just pellets or powders that do not have much of a smell. It never amazes me what people will feed their horses. After filling 50 buckets with feed and supplement, I was hoping that I would sweat away some of the dust and hay, but no luck, I was still covered.

The family returned from feeding and turning out who needed to be turned out. They were also nice and dusty and sweaty. We were all wishing for winter tonight. The up side of the 102 degrees, dust, and wind was that we got to spend time as a family with the most magnificent animals and enjoy the peace and quiet of the farm.

Animals

Animals have always been in my life since I was a small child.  Growing up we always had cat, a dog, and a bunch of rabbits.  Mom and dad tried to keep the rabbit population under control, but the male rabbits would always chew through any barrier her would build.  So we always had quite a few hopping around.  The cats were the same.  Every time mom would take them to the vets, they would be pregnant again, and we would have to wait.  The good thing about having babies around, there is no questions on how they are made or how they are born. 

After a while we did manage to get the cat and rabbit population under control.  As my sister and I grew older, we started to bring home the sick and the injured.  We had birds, snakes, raccoons, skunks, ducks, frogs, and lizards.  It was great when they lived, but not so great when they died.  My parents only let my sister and I do this for one summer.  They could not take the emotional toll and I am sure the financial toll of playing vet to the neighborhood animals.

Next Christmas they decided to get my sister and I some gerbils and fish to keep us occupied in our obsession for caring for animals.  Gerbils and cats are not the greatest pet combination we found out.  The cats tried to break into the cage for a tasty snack all the time.  One time my sister got bitten by one of the gerbils and she dropped him.  We looked everywhere and could not find him.  Just when we thought he became a snack, I noticed all the cats jumping at the ceiling on my parent’s bed.  The gerbil was running between the subflooring!  We finally caught him and put him back with his friend.  They lived out their remaining lives uneventful.

Now that I have children of my own, small animals just do not cut the cake for them.  Yes, we do have 3 cats that are spoiled, but they were not enough for my girls.  Horses are their calling.  I do have to admit, when I was in my teens, I did spend some of my summers working at a barn taking care of these wonderful animals.  There is something about a horse.  They can sense your moods.  They pick up on if you are having a good day or a bad day.  They are like very large, very expensive dogs.  So when we moved, I promised my daughters that I would give them riding lessons.  I was hoping they would not catch horse fever.

I was totally wrong about that.  When they first started to ride, it was cute.  They would walk, trot, and canter.  They would go over canter poles and small X's.  The first time they fell off it was scary, but the ponies were small and it was not a long drop to the ground.  But as the girls grew in size so did the horses and the jumps.  The horses were no longer the point and shoot kind.  Now they had to tell them where to go, when to go, when to jump, and when to stop.  My youngest had the first scary fall.  We called it "The Fed Flintstone Dismount” She basically slid down the horse’s neck and took his bridle off with her butt.  Only injury was her pride.  Her next fall happened in a field when the horse took off on her and she bailed.  She got her fingers caught in the reins, but no broken bones.  

Then we changed barns and bought our own horse.  The oldest daughter took a bad fall off a trial horse while looking for ours.  She sprained her ankle badly.  But thank god no broken bones.  Needless to say we did not buy him.  We found our old man (17 at the time).  He is a great guy.  We had some great time with him.  The girls learned a lot about taking care of horses, healing injuries, and just loving them to pieces.  But the girls skills out grew the old mans.  My oldest decided she wanted to run and just rides every now and then.  But my youngest is competes every chance she gets.

Eventing is what she loves.  It is a very demanding sport for both the rider and the horse.  Unfortunately many spills happen.  She has been thrown through a fence, into jumps, into trees, and on the ground.  As a parent is sucks to watch your child get thrown off.  Yet you cannot help but feel proud when they get back on and finish the course.  It always amazes me how the horse stops and looks for the rider to make sure that they are ok.  That they did ok and they did not mean to hurt them.  It is a unique bond that forms between a horse and a rider.  If they are a true pair, they will take care of each other.  Like today, the horse she was riding lost his footing and started to do a summersault on top of her.  But he managed to get his footing back and only kneed her in the back.  This could have been a disastrous fall for both the horse and rider.  Because of the bond between them, the horse did everything in his power to keep my daughter safe.   She got back on and finished her course.    This just strengthened their bond even more.

Tears of joy, tears of pain, tears of pride, and tears of love were all shed today.  It is amazing how animals can affect our lives.

Music for the soul.

I have always found that music makes me feel better when I am down in the dumps.  So I asked my kids to download some of their music on my MP3 player.  Well needless to say, I have recieved quite an education today as well as lifting my spirits.

I have always been progressive in my music tastes.  Heavy metal when I was a"tween" due to growing up next to 8 boys.  They all wanted to be rock stars and there were enough of them to form their own band.  So I grew up with Ozzy, Iron Maiden, AC/DC, Black Sabth.  Scared my parents to death, I think they thought I was a satin worshiper.

Then the 80's came and I got in to the Punk Rock scene.  Mohawks, mini skirts, fishnet stockings.  Scared the parents again when I came home with body piercings.  I think by now they were figuring out it probably was a phase.

The 90's hit.  Grunge, Alternative rock ruled my radio station selections.  My poor husband had no idea what he was getting into.  He thought I was cool because I like heavy metal.  Unfortunately he has got stuck there in his musical tastes and dress code.  My kids grew up listening to my kind of music.  I was the cool mom.

Now they are teenagers.  I have never not let then not listen to what they want.  I have never baned explicit lyrics from music they listen to.  I have know for some time they like some of the mainstream rap.  I have to admit some of it is pretty good.  I can do with out Little Wayne.  Kanye West, Drake, Eniinem are really good.  When you listen to the lyrics, it is some scary stuff.  I hope this is a phase my kids are going thru.  I am glad my kids feel comfortable sharing what they listen to with me.  Now I know what I put my parents thru.

I am going to continue enjoying what they have downloaded for me to enjoy.  I am glad they jnow I love them enough to give them free reign to lidten to what they want and do what they want.  I must be doing something right.   Till next time.

Week of ups and downs.

Well it has been a week of ups and downs.  I guess it is to be expected.  The good news is I think the depression is starting to go away.  I am not crying for no reason, not having as many moody out bursts, but I am still not sleeping.  Looking back on my last bad depressive episode, the symptoms are very similar. 

Right now I feel useless.  I know that I am not, but when you get depressed, your sense of self worth goes down the drain.  Now I need to focus on what makes me feel good.  To hell with every one else.  I need to take care of me.  My kids and husband can take care of themselves.  But this awful thing called guilt always seems to kick in just when I start to do something for myself.

I do have an awesome family, and I know they want me to do what is best for me.  My oldest daughter just asked me the other day if I was going back to school, because she knows that will make me happy.  She also thinks it will be cool if both of us are in college at the same time.  Her doing undergraduate and myself working on masters.  If we can financially make it work, I am going to do it.

Most bi-polar people are very inteligent people who for some reason or another never finish projects that they start.  I used to be like that.  I always thought that I was just a quitter.  But it is not that.  It is because we get bored, or our self esteem gets destroyed during a depressive episode.  So we move on to other things.  I have managed to get a BS, stay married for 19 years, and run a business for the last 5 years.   I am not a quitter, but I do get sidetracked.  Right now I am in sidetrack mode. 

I read an article the other day about the best time to quit a job.  It was written just for me.  It said sometimes you need to leave a job that you just do to find a job that you love.  Even if that means you have to work part time and go back to school to get the degree for the job you will love.  I want to help people who have mental illness and learn more about my own.  I want to help break the stigma that goes along with having this lable attached to a person.  So I am on a new quest to get my dream job of helping people over come and understand their mental illness.

Off to try and get some sleep. 

Yuck!

Yet another sleepless night.  I hate it when the depression part of the manic depressive disease sets in.  My brain is torn between wanting to crash yet it wants to stay awake and process everything it can.  My body is in agony, it wants  sleep, food, a hug.  You know, any thing that reminds you of safe comfortable place in your life.  Yet my crazy brain is running haywire.  It wants information to process, digest, gobble up because that is what makes it feel better.  No wonder soo many manic depressives self medicate.  May it be food, exercise, internet, drugs, alcholol, work, what ever obcessive behaviors they do to help forget or make the pain go away.  It is kind of like having two people in your body at the same time.  I am not talking multiple personalities, because it is the same person just on opposite ends of the spectrum.  I guess I must be different than most, because I am never just depressed.  I am always manic at the same time.  They call it a mixed episode.  It is frustrating because I want to get out and do things but I am afraid that I will have an emotional breakdown at any moment.  But staying cooped up is not good either.  Kind of like starve the cold, feed the fever.

So today I will stay home and try and compromise to keep both ends happy.  I will cook the family some comfort food they love and spend some more quality time out on the deck with the wild life and my daughters.  I will also feed my brain all the information it can possibly handle.  I will try to fry it with soo much information that it has no choice but to shut down.  So, TV, internet, movies, books, and yes video games here I come.  I am determined to get some sleep tonight so tomorrow may possibly be a good day.

Mothers Day.

Hope all of the moms out there had a great day!  Not a bad one on the funny farm.  As usual the family had no idea what to get me for Mothers day, so we went shopping.  Last night I came up with the great idea of getting new lawn chairs so we could actually sit out on the deck and get some fresh air.

   We went to Garden Ridge first because of their large selection of patio furniture.  I do not know how many of you know what this store is, but it is kind of a low budget cross between Michael's and Target.  While my husband and I were looking at the lawn chairs, my two teenage daughters were roaming the store up to no good.  My oldest came back with this plastic tube thing in her hand and said, " Be prepared to be amazed!"  She began swing it above her head in a circular motion, and it made this god awful sound like we were being invaded by aliens!  The whole family just started laughing and the entire store stopped what they were doing and looked at us like we had two heads.  We just had to buy a bunch of these tube things because you never know when they may come in handy at a sporting event to embarrass the crap out of your kids.

Since we  had no luck there, we moved on.  Lowe's was our next target on the list.  They had a bunch of chairs set up for us to try.  The problem was, I think alot of peole must have been using them and loosened the nuts and bolts.  Because when I sat down on this real comfy looking one, it collapsed.  I am not a small woman by any means,  but I am not the size of a line backer either.  After the kids finished laughing at me, we snuck out of the store.

Walmart was next on the list due to the fact it was getting late and we needed to go grocery shopping also.  My least favorite chore of the week.  By now I had pretty much given up.  So we headed out to the lawn and garden section.  This time I gave my husband the honors of trying out the chairs first to make sure they were sturdy.  One collapsing chair a day is enough for me.  To my surprise, we found chairs!  They reclined!  They did not break!  Best part they were on sale!

Tonight my youngest daughter and I spent quality time out on the deck with the birds, wasps, ants, and lizards.  Maybe we should have gotten some bug spray also.  But, we were outside talking not watching television and enjoying the sunset.  If you are wondering where my oldest was,  well she was studying for her AP World History exam.  What more could a mom want for mothers day?