I now have five books I have begun reading. I have owned Natalie Goldberg’s Thunder and Lightning since it first came out, but I never read it until now. Natalie’s other books on writing helped fuel a lot of work I have done in the past, so today I decided to pull this book out and read it. It is superb.

I think my creative block has a lot to do with not being brave enough to expose myself on the page. I am not as comfortable with myself as I should be. I tend to denigrate my work. I hoped that writing here on my blog would ease me into creative work, maybe it still will. I don’t know.

What seems most true for me is that writing helps me stay grounded. I can look at what I have written and understand myself more intimately. Yet sometimes when I write creatively and come back in a while I do not recognize my work as my own. It seems like something written by someone else. This disjointedness is disconcerting. I have even had some friends read some of my poems to me years after they were written and not realized they were mine. Sometimes things just come and I am the vessel pouring creation out. I am grasped by inspiration then left alone to my own devices. It is a mystery to me.

I am going to free write and explore a prompt from Just Journal For Fun:

You have a purpose… what is it?

That is a huge question, and I do not have a definitive answer.

I am a mother, so I have the responsibility to raise my son, but that is almost done now. I do not know how to measure the accomplishment. He seems to be a wonderful human being, but I do not think I can take credit for that.

I am a daughter, so I have a responsibility to help care for my mother as she ages and becomes less able to care for herself. I try my best to accomplish this.

Back to the question of my purpose.

I am a creative person so I must create, but sometimes I do not produce anything of merit for long periods of time. What good are the meanderings of my mind anyway? I do not think my writing or art could be considered a real purpose. A purpose denotes importance, and I really do not see where my creative work has any validity beyond myself.

Purpose?

I know I must have one, because otherwise I would not be here, but a definition alludes me. I know I try to be a kind, loving person who does at least some good in the world, but I make many mistakes. Sometimes despite my good intentions I am misunderstood and my plans do not work. I strive to learn and grow, but that is just life. You keep developing or you die.

I guess I just have to accept that I do have a purpose and hope that I accomplish something of worth in life, because right now I can not come up with a definition.

Well, I guess that is all I have to say just now.

TTYL,

Jo Ann

Feminine hygiene products are difficult for me. I think it all relates to my first experience with them.

I was very young, maybe five. I don’t remember how long my father’s touching me and having me touch him had been going on. I really don’t remember my younger years too clearly. I think I blocked a lot of it out, to be able to cope. I know it has taken lots of therapy and hard work to be able to express anything about the sexual abuse I survived. I could not talk about it much until after Daddy died.

One night he had been touching me and I got up to go to the bathroom. When I looked down I was bleeding. I know now that he had probably penetrated my hymen with his fingers, but at the time I was scared. I called Mama and she came to the bathroom, when she saw the blood she must have been very confused. She told my father and he said that I must be starting my menstrual periods. Mama thought I was really young, but she was naïve enough to believe this story. She went and bought pads and a belt for me to wear. I remember how uncomfortable it was. I also remember how that box of sanitary pads stayed in the closet for years, with me seeing it from time to time and feeling ashamed.

 Shame is always what I feel when I buy such things. I wish I could get over it, but that seems impossible for me. I do not really feel good about myself even after so many years.

I found out a few years ago that my father also abused my nieces. I did not know this. I knew I was not the only one because in the 80’s he was convicted of child molestation and had to do some time in jail, but I never told anyone what had happened to me and continued to be done to me until the man’s death. See, I loved Daddy, and did not want him to be punished. He had so often told me that there was nothing wrong with what he did. I did not believe him because I knew it made me feel dirty, but I wanted to protect him.

A few months ago Alex came to me and told me that my father had done inappropriate sexual things to him too. I was so angry. For the first time in my life I hated my father. Now, I am back to forgiveness, but it tortures me that maybe had I said something others would have been spared abuse.

My brother who is father to my nieces only learned about the abuse that happened to his girls recently. He wants to kill my father, but he is dead, so revenge on him is out of the question. He got the idea into his head that my mother knew what had gone on, and he wanted to punish her. I had often wondered if Mom knew what happened to me, but I doubted it, because I could not imagine her letting it go on. When my brother threatened to confront mother about his girls, I finally went to Mom and told her what had happened to me. I asked her if she knew, and she told me no. I do not understand how she did not know, but I believe her. I stood up for her with my brother, and now he no longer speaks to me. I hope one day he can forgive, and move beyond his anger.

One of my counselors says that my schizophrenia is the diathesis stress model of the disease. She says part of what I suffer from is post-traumatic-stress-syndrome, and this makes sense. If I had not been so horribly misused maybe I would never have gotten sick.

I still love my father, but there are a lot of ambivalent feelings attached to my thoughts of him. Sometimes I have thought of him as the devil, but I know he was just a very sick mortal man. Sometimes I have difficulty with the concept of a loving father God, because my concepts of father are so skewed.  I forgave my father long ago for what he did to me. I kept the secret to protect he and my mother, and because I felt so guilty myself. I wish no one else ever had to go through the torture I have lived through, but it still happens and unfortunately sometimes no one knows except for those involved.

I hope I offended no one. This is not an easy story to tell, but if it could help one person, it is worth it.

I’ve been debating writing this a while. I hope I was not wrong.

Always,

Jo Ann

I am reading The Road To Reality, and quite enjoying it, even though the mathematics is way over my head. I am not a math person. What Penrose is saying does however make some kind of sense to me somehow, even though I can not prove his assertions. I wish that geometry was something at which I was good. I should probably take some time and brush up on my math, but it is not pressing to me. I do have the desire to understand all this because I am very interested in physics. Especially the part of it that deals with time. I have been fascinated with this quantity for years.

I haven’t anything witty to say tonight. I do hope that your Sunday is wonderful.

Always,

Jo Ann

Well, she finally left and I got something to eat. Mom says that my ex-sister-in-law is sorry about how she acted, that she did not realize I have tried to get a job, that she did not know I was cooking, but I don’t feel those things should have any bearing on her mistreatment of me. She should have never said those things and attacked me physically no matter what I was doing or not doing. Performance does not make a person an object of ridicule.

I am not ready to be accepting of an apology yet. I have to work through all the feelings surrounding the issue and get balanced. This will take work. I know it is possible to resolve it in myself with time and effort. I am doing it for my well-being. I must learn to deal with opposition without letting it destroy my sense of self.

I finally figured out a way to attach our session notes to the last entry. I just could not import them as text because they reformatted in transit. I wound up taking screen shots and saving those as jpeg files. Worked well.

I think I am going to relax a while now.

TTYL,

Jo Ann

I went to bed at 2:00AM and woke up at 8:54AM when mother called me. I wanted to stay in bed until the alarm went off at 9:00AM, but Mom persuaded me to get up. I ate some of the bread that was leftover from Outback the other night. I packed up a cooler with Diet Cokes and put The Road To Reality by Roger Penrose in my book bag so that I had something to read while waiting on my appointments. I left the house about 9:30AM and stopped at a gas station to fill my car. That took almost $21.00 because the gas is now $1.89 a gallon. Bush economics! I protest!

I drove on the Atlanta Speedway at racing speed. Made the thirty-five mile trip in about thirty-five minutes even with heavy traffic at some points. I signed in to see my counselor and psychiatrist and sat down to read the new book. I was a little surprised it is so enjoyable, physics interests me a great deal, but I am not much for mathematics, but the author makes it palatable. I may even learn something with his supportive attitude. That would be a plus.

My counselor and I did a lot of work today. I will attempt to denote some of it here though I am not sure how it will show up on the page. She made tables and I told her what should go in each category. This was hard work. I attempted to import our charts here but I cannot get it to work.

That was our session and it was very intense. I am glad I had some time  to sit in the waiting room before seeing my doctor. He said that I was doing fine, not to worry about my lack of dexterity that it would improve. Then he told me to try to relax and have some fun. This has been his consistent advice for many years. In my experience fun often entails expense, so I do not get a great deal of it.

I came home and as I got out of the car mother told me that my nemesis was coming to visit. I did not want to leave so I shut myself in my room and turned the music up loud enough to block out their voices. I have been here over three hours now and I think she should leave so I can have lunch, but seems she is going to stay all damn afternoon. I am feeling angry, abused, put upon, and overall hungry. This shit is so unfair that I am a prisoner in my own home because of her disregard for me and rudeness. I need some food. It is after 5:00 and I have not had an opportunity to have lunch. This sucks. I may have to go out of here and I am not sure what will happen. I would prefer to ignore her, but she is so inconsiderate she may say something to me. WTF???

Well, that is all I have for now.

Always,

Jo Ann