stand in the rain.

i havent written in a while. im going to try and write more often, even if it is just a little. so, here we are again.
today is mothers day. mothers day is a very emotional day for me, as i know it is for many of you. every year on mothers day since grammer school, i have walked with my grandma, mom, and her 5 sisters in the y-me race against breast cacncer. the past several years we have walked in the southside walk (it branched off years ago because the advocates for the cause is so strong in the area, there was enough crowd to start a race closre to home). as you know i lost a great hero, my dad's mom to breast cancer, and every few years the walk hits closer and closer to home. next my mom's mom was diagnosed and later my mom's sister (who's cancer has just recently come back for the 3rd time, please keep her in your thoughts). seeing my aunts 6 kids walking for her is inspiring and so heartbreaking...especially bridget, the youngest, who is only 9.
today was absolutely miserable weather wise. we went to mass at 7am and went out to the route through the freezing rain that didnt let up at all throughout the 3 mile walk. my grandma has alot of health problems due to her cancer, but she walked. my aunt's white blood cell count has been too low for chemo until she was able to recieve her most recent chemo treatment 2 days ago. as you can imagine she was sick and tired. but she walked. i, was crabby about the cold and the rain and my very wet socks (stop whinning here, obviously i walked lol).
its funny how nearly every year in the past, mothers day has been just beautiful for these walks...no one really knew how to react with todays near monsoon. we didnt know if it would be as crowded...it was. i walked most of the walk sharing an umbrella with my cousin cate, my aunt's second oldest (who just recieved word that she is going to notre dame this fall...whooohooo!! GO IRISH!!). it was a great time. we laughed and chatted and tried desperately to avoid the small lakes that had appeared thanks to chicago's very poor drainage system and aging streets. we both had makeup running down our faces natural curls (that run in the family) that we both straighten sprang up wildly, and everyone carried about 15 extra pounds on them thanks to very figure flattering ponchos. lol.
i know the people who read this blog, so im not going to bother pointing out the obviously and dare i say, cliche symbolism of todays blog. but i reminded of the song...
"stand in the rain, stand your ground, stand up when its all crashing down..."
pretty perfect, huh?
i know that the breast cancer scare isnt really a "scare" for my family...more like a question of when and how you are going to deal with it. today was a great reality check for me. even though my aunt was sick from chemo which she now has to start all over again for the third time, SHE WALKED. everyone would have been falling over themselves to take her home and walk for her... but this is a big part of the pride that i take in my (extended) family and something i know that i share with them...you wouldnt even know she was sick again. and most people dont. because for her, the fight is the same whether it be in the public eye or in the intimacy of her family and close friends. no amount of pitty or attention is going to take cancer out of her life...it would only make her play the patient role. which she refuses to do. my cousins and uncle also refuse that role. and i love them for it.

for lent.

last week a girl who is just beginning treatment asked me a question. i didnt really think much of it at the time, but it has stuck with me throughout the weekend. she asked me "is it worth it?".

lately i have been writing things like this question off as gamey-ness and have had very little patience for people who play the games...who cant just say yes to recovery...who are so tangled in the web of sickness that they cant see, or talk about anything else. when things like this question are said to me (i call it a "movie moment") i feel so awkward that i immediately laugh or give a quick answer...but i wonder, have i become so jaded that i cant have a genuine "moment" with a person?

so as i sit and think about her question, i am trying to see it from her point of view. i think i have lost sight of what it was like to be sick and in losing sight of that, i am losing something huge that helps me speak to people and reach out. if i look at it through her eyes, she is this little, confused girl who has the opportunity to spend some time with the girl who did recovery night 2 months ago...thats an opportunity i wish i had when i started treatment.

i havent given anything up for lent yet (i know, i know...) so i think i am going to give up judging people so quickly and on the flip side of that, really work on having more patience. i talked to some girls yesterday to help them with their treatment and felt so good about it afterwards...if i want to keep doing that i have to keep my eyes open and remember to remember (haha thats alot of remembering...) what it was like.
i know there are some people who will pull the sick act...and for those people an eating disorder is probably the least of their mental health issues...but for the most part, what if it isnt a game? what if my recovery has brought along with it some cynicism? yikes. so i am really going to try and take a step back and try to really listen and believe.

and yes, it was worth it...a thousand times over.

battle wounds.

i have been searching the internet, books, and magazines for a few months now on ideas to help me accept a flaw. you can find alot of inspiration on accepting yourself in pop culture but would you believe i did not find 1 ARTICLE on accepting this flaw? so here i go...trying to talk myself into accepting and being at piece with a part of myself that i see everyday, that i have beaten myself up about for a while and that i am very very ashamed of.



i have...stretch marks.



what i have found in my research is every "cure" in the book for these lovely lines. every home remedy...every lotion, herb, mineral, and treatment. but quite frankly, i am not in the financial position to spend hundreds of dollars on experimenting with things that may or may not remove the new artwork on my body.



do i like them? no. do i wish they would disappear? yes. do they make me self conscious? absolutely. am i sick of being mean to myself because of them? FOR SURE.



so this is an attempt to justify them and to make it ok. please excuse the cheesiness of this blog, but hey, looks like im the ONLY one to attempt this...one giant leap for womankind...



i spent a little less than the majority of my life trying to shrink my body down. i dont even want to calculate the hours that i have spent agonizing over every calorie that i put into my body and strictly punishing myself for exceeding what was acceptable. did i have flaws at my lowest weight?

yep.

i had the driest skin youve ever seen and no moisturizer worked...trust me, i tried them all.

i had scabs all over my mouth like some poor child from a 3rd world country. but i am pretty good at the art of makeup and covered up most of those things...so did i look good in pictures?

sure did.

looking back at those pictures(they are few and far between) do i remember what was happening when they were taken?

...no...

it is interesting to me that we have developed all of these "accepting your body" campaigns (i am reminded especially of tyra banks and her pathetic excuse of a show). have you ever looked at the girls in those campaigns? they are beautiful. the only thing different about them is that they might be a size 6 instead of a 00. have you EVER seen stretch marks on one of those girls? i havent...

i have cellulite. i have stretch marks. but i can eat a whole meal without throwing up afterwards. my mind is free to think about everyday things without being clouded with numbers and lists of the calories i have eaten in a day. i can sleep on my stomach and not wake up with bruises from my hipbones. i have a full head of very thick hair. and swimsuit season? i may not have the best body on the beach but i can jump and swim and play and not worry about drowning because i passed out or got too many leg cramps.

i have heard alot of mothers complain about stretch marks after giving birth. i say EMBRACE them...your body housed a CHILD for nine months...and your skin allowed your body to stretch in the way it needed to to protect your baby and allow it to grow. at the same time...*big sigh*...i made my body shrink in a way that was not natural for so many years . my body was never meant to be that size. my stretch marks didnt come from treatment or from my meal plan...i first noticed them after residential. ironically, it was then that i finally relearned to eat like a normal person. NOT like someone in recovery, following my meal plan. but to eat what i wanted when i was hungry. this is an incredibly liberating concept. feeding myself what i felt like eating when i needed to....and when i finally allowed this to happen, my recovery really took off. and if having a few lines on my body is the price i have to pay for that, then so be it.

so my stretch marks...yeah they're kind of ugly and yes i will probably try a new cream here and there over my lifetime...but hey, my mind had to grow ALOT to get me to this place, and i guess my body was just catching up. so i would like to thank my skin for allowing me to grow the way i needed to to recover.
i fought a war inside of my mind and body for 8 years.
i dont have stretch marks...i have battle wounds.

irish girl in the ghetto

i had to do laundry tonight. but my fanciful laundromat closes at 6 and i wont go to my building laundry room (it wasn't available anyway). so i look up the closest one to my house and go there.
this place was nothing like my romanticized laundromat. fluorescent lights (that make my head hurt) TONS of people (it was 8 at night) lots of noise and new fangled washers and dryers that i didn't know how to work. the best part was that all of the directions, the tvs, and reading material were all in spanish. as i learned tonight, "no habla espangnol". FUCK. so i start to cry and decide i had embarrassed myself enough and go back to my car, avoiding the car of 6 creepy boys who were clearly smoking up parked next to me (really, are cat calls necessary when some one is coming from doing laundry...and i know i looked hot with my hair in some crazy knot, glasses on and wearing my "laundry day sweats") . i drove to a different place and just got home with my basket of wet bedding (did i mention the dryer i used didnt work?).

i came home to smoke coming out of my floor by my window. so i think my apartment is on fire and 2 thoughts go through my mind:1. wheres gracie...and 2. i couldnt cough up the extra cash to get that damn rental insurance.
not to worry, my apartment is not on fire. it is just my heater. so now i sit...in a sport bra with my juice and caramel rice cakes (they were on sale...1$ for a whole bag can you believe that?! :) ) window open and laundry hanging over all of my furniture. at least everything will dry faster with the gusts of winter air blowing through here every few minutes.
*BIG SIGH*

but i have not graduated college...

i have celebrated 22 years of life. i have mastered a song perfectly on the piano. i have looked deep into my soul. i have questioned life. i have raised a child. i have been swimming with dolphins. i am a fashion and style connoisseur. i have auditioned for a broadway show. i have fallen out of a second story window and lived to tell about it. i have won a war. i have counted how many licks it takes to get to the center of a tootsie pop (366). i have saved a life. i have had my life saved. i have been in the presence of true evil. i have been immersed in unconditional love. i have been swept away by an undertow. i have cheated death. i hate oprah. i have changed a tire by myself. i have learned to pray in 2 different languages. i have converted a democrat. i have been to hell. i have been to heaven. i have been electrocuted. i have visited the statue of liberty. i have climbed a mountain. i have lost a friend. i have discovered the meaning of life, but i forgot to write it down. i have learned to surf. i have read every book ever written about judy garland. i have had a perfect kiss. i have experienced the perfect sunday afternoon. i once made friends with a school of fish. i have won the respect of intelligent people. i have talked to an angel. i have been in over 30 theatrical productions. i have competed in figure skating and won. i have read vogue cover to cover (that actually happens monthly). i write reports on random topics for fun. i have memorized the calorie content of almost every food on the planet. i dont care about content. i once embarked on building a sand castle to the sky but had to stop to go in for dinner. i have loved until i thought i couldnt love anymore (and then found out that love is infinite). i have learned to cook a turkey. i have been at the top of society. and the bottom. children trust me.
...but i have not graduated college.

finding humanity at the laundromat

i headed out to my laundromat this morning in a pretty grouchy mood. i hate doing laundry and having to do it with one hand was not an adventure i wanted to be apart of . i got all settled in at my store-o-washers-and-dryers reminiscent of the 1960's and started to people watch. there were 3 blond little girls dancing around the place with their ipods and belting out random songs ranging from Hannah Montana to Carrie Underwood to the copa cabana. their mom was doing what looked like 4 loads of laundry at once and years of worries and troubles showed very clearly in the deep wrinkles on her 30something face. it was obvious that this little family wasn't in the best of times. but still, the little girls fluttered around sharing the earpieces between the 3 of them, laughing and singing and playing without a care in the world. a little later an older couple came in and set up camp at a set of washers and dryers right next to mine. the man was amused by the little girls and struck up conversation with them, asking them about what they were listening to and asking if they knew music "from his generation". the girls thought that this was hilarious and an immediate friendship was formed. and so i sat, half reading my book, and half watching everyone else. i watched this man (i found out that he was 79) engage with his wife and my whole heart felt a little warmer on this 10 degree Midwestern January day. the two of them laughed and reminisced and played with the little girls and while the woman was sorting her colors from whites, he gave her a kiss on the cheek. i then looked over to the sisters who were still dancing to the beat of the tumbling dryers and sharing their headphones 3 ways and i felt so much love in that little place. sitting for 2 hours listening to the soft rattle of the 1981 Maytag dryers, breathing in the downy-scented air and feeling that perfect, genuine love was a nice break from the bitter cold.

"if you look for it, I've got a sneaky feeling that love actually IS, all around."

here we go...

so this is my first attempt on a public blog. i hate journaling, but found that i really enjoy blogging...i guess i like the feedback and it feels more like talking. bare with me in this. i write like i talk. i do not capitalize. and i am usually spelling things incorrectly.

i am in the process of putting together my autobiography as well as a series of childrens books and blogging helps me keep my thoughts in order so i plan on being very open and honest on here.

my recovery night is in 8 days. 8 FREAKIN DAYS!! how did that happen? i am so nervous but really really pumped. if anyone reading this is interested in coming and doesnt know the details, shoot me a line and i will be happy to fill you in.

ok, so first blog down...i felt like i needed a little introduction one...now i can just write. haha.
peace.