Punch Diego

"Wake up, sleepyhead" I whispered into Liv's ear.

After some moaning, groaning, unintellible murmerings, out comes her little voice, thick with sleep, ringing like a sweet, little bell through the morning:

"You're stupid. Leave me alone. You're a stupid one."

That's her new special nickname for me, "stupid". It used to be "bitch". Now she just uses that word to describe anything that's annoying her, like "Mom, this candy is being a bitch. Open it for me, please!" I know I should lay down the law, try for one second of my life to be a good mother, and put her on a time out or something for the disrespectful language. But the truth is, I'm really not all that upset by it. I'm a lot more annoyed by her constant, improper use of the feminine pronoun "her". Like, "Her told me to share." Now, that gets my spanking hand itching to go.

Obviously, I don't spank my daughter for using bad grammar. She's only 3, for Christ's sake. What kind of person do you think I am?

The kind of person that I am is actually what's concerning me lately, though. Raising this child, watching her personality unfold, is the universe's furtive way of forcing me to analyze myself, in all my dysfunctional horror. Being a mother to Liv is making me confront the truth about everything...it makes me look in the mirror.

These days I've been avoiding mirrors as much as possible. And when I am faced with one, I do whatever needs to be done as quickly as I can and get the fuck away. My avoidance of reflection is not just about my recent weight gain, although there is certainly an element of vanity and shame in me about that. No, I'm just having a hard time meeting my own eye. Because the person I'm looking at is 33 years old and hasn't done a single damn thing of importance in her entire life. And yet, she looks at everything and everyone in the world with the harshest of criticisms, as if she could hold a candle to anybody's accomplishments. Truthfully, I judge nothing more harshly than myself. I am an eternal pessimist, raging against human nature, and the mundane things of life. Who else spends three hours preparing a treatise against the dangers of bumper stickers? What kind of person does this? I complain, I swear, I bitch, I pontificate as if my opinion actually mattered. And all of this would be fine, I suppose, if I was not a person responsible for the molding of another human being.

How much of what is wrong with me is being passed down to my child? How much of what is right? And of course, it begs the question, "How much truth, how much ASS, should I be showing to my child in these, her formative years of life?" Am I mortally wounding her by exposing her to my own twisted brand of humor, or by giving her a peek into the brutal window of mommy's soul? Or, by my unflinching honesty and lack of censure, am I empowering her to find her own path, embrace her own perfect and equally beautiful pleasant and wicked parts? I mean people talk a lot of shit about letting kids "be themselves" and "find who they are", but how often do we really see parents doing that? How often do most parents allow their children to say what they are really thinking and feeling without demanding they turn on the filter in the name of "respect", or "kindness", or "appropriateness"? I'm not saying we shouldn't set any limits. I'm just saying maybe we can move the line, just that much more, to allow for freer expression of emotion and ideas. Because I can tell you one thing: growing up in a religious household where expressing doubt or rage was a punishable offense really fucked me up for life. This blog is the evidence.

I want to make perfectly clear to anybody reading this that I am actually an outwardly calm, relatively pleasant individual. Anyone who knows me in regular life can vouch for the fact that I do not yell or scream, I do not throw objects, hit people, argue loudly or unnecessarily. What I'm talking about when I speak of my flaws, of which there are too many to count, is my undying pessimism, my vision of the world as a constant trial of the spirit seen through scratched up, grey colored glasses, and, of course, my constant and absolute disappointment in human motivation and action. I am just not sure I would wish the burden of this personality on anyone. Some people have said it's fun to know someone like me, but I highly doubt that there is anyone alive who would want to actually be someone like me. Most days, I don't want to be someone like me.

I've written before about my daughter's astonishing rage and overwhelming anger. Aside from having her "draw her mad", there are other tactics I've been using to facilitate her release of that enraged beast. One of the favorite games in our house is "Punch Diego". Todd bought her one of those boxing thingies (bop bags I think they're called) that's bottom heavy but top light so it comes back up immediately after you knock it down. (Sort of like me, hee!) It has a full-body image of that character Diego from Nick Jr's "Go, Diego, Go". Whenever Liv starts manifesting her rage inappropriately at me, or say, the cat, I say, "Go Punch Diego!" I love watching her punch and kick his stupid face with glee. Sometimes I even join in on the fun. Yes, Jackson family fun time sometimes includes drop kicking a plastic effigy of Dora the Explorer's smarmy cousin.



It's nice to have a scapegoat for all of life's ills. If Liv hits her head on the coffee table, blame Diego. If I burn Todd's grilled cheese sandwich, blame Diego. If a car bomb goes off in Iraq, blame Diego. Blame Fucking Diego.

Obviously, I'm not a good mother, by anyone's definition. But I love my daughter with unparalleled intensity, a positive intensity that I never knew existed in my heart before. My only hope is that she'll grow up strong and opinionated, without the taint of my cynicism and the sadness which gave it birth. At the very least, she seems to be finding her real voice sooner than I did. I mean this blog is about the only thing I've ever done that's completely honest, that's completely me. And that's pretty sad when you really stop and think about it. The ten people who take the time to read this blog are the only ten people in the world who know the real me. Lucky you.

I have high hopes for my girl. She is full of sass and confidence. She is blazing with the energy of a thousand coked up sorority girls. She has a wit that makes me laugh so hard I practically pee in my pants. The other day she said to me in a moment of annoyance at my denial of her earnest and polite request for a glass of soda, "I messed up my room so that you would trip". God, I love her for saying that. She's my hero. Bless her tiny, baby, evil heart.

The Bitter, Early

I see the bitter, early. It is a brutal inheritance I am unhappy to bestow. In the face of an angel, eyes sharp as razors, cheerio mouth howling long and full of anguish. Feet clad in princess sneakers, the kind with the blinking lights, kicking harder and stronger than I ever thought they could. This is nothing, I say. This is only an adult sized anger, teeming like a million fishes in a tiny bowl, over a question about apple juice. If she could access the words in her little brain - No I don't want fucking apple juice, you annoying bitch.

Then the other day. "I hate you." Calm and eerie, unsheathing a new sword.

"Why would you say such a thing, Liv?"

"I hate you."

"Silly girl."

It is hard not to react...hard. But there is nothing about hate that she can possibly understand. Is there? Do any of us really understand it, or are we conditioned by the reaction? All my "hates" are really only sadness, regret. It's easier to say I hate something, because it makes it other than myself. It separates me from the source of that particular pain. It's a detour, but it gets me where I'm going so much easier.

I have to say that I love the truth in my daughter. Everything is raw in her world. Every emotion is okay. When she says, "You made me mad", I get a chill of delight. For me its not about the "Why", but the expression of the feeling, so plain and entitled. So I say, "Let's draw your mad."

Picture after picture of the same face, each eye a sharp line, the mouth an "O", drawn by the unsteady hand of an angry toddler. Eventually the faces become happy ones, and she bounds away saying "My mad feels better, mom." I love this new ritual. I hope she can always "draw her mad" in healthy expression of unhealthy rage.

Otherwise, what will she do with it? The years of false injustices, unexplainable annoyances, petty disgusts, will amount to a bitter existence. And eventually all those pointy daggers will have no where to go, turning inwards, stabbing her own soul. No Outlet. It is an end I couldn't bear for my Olivia, my olive branch, my peace offering, my sculpted, tender avenging angel. Draw your mad, baby. Fill your notebooks. Kill a million trees with every harsh thought and despair. Damn, I hate trees. Always falling down on my dad's house and shit. The other day, another tree fell on his swingset. Now trees are trying to murder children. When I see those tree shredder trucks, it makes my toes tingle. Even in Lord of the Rings, I wanted all those tree people to get killed by the Orcs. Or whatever the fuck those creepy, hybrid beasts were called. Christmas is the best...tree after murdered tree. And then we decorate them with little balls and top them with angels and stars. Arbor Day is the worst. The trees have everybody fooled. But I know better.

These Days Are Dark

These days, they are dark. Menacing and painful, mocking me sometimes about decisions I can't undo even if I wanted to. But I don't. The hardest part about being human, I think, is fully accepting ourselves as we really and truly are. Not the image we see in our heads, not the person we portray to the world at large when we are in full on pretense mode. No not that person with all the bells and whistles and trappings of cultured politeness who says "please" and "thank you" and "how are you? I'm fine" to passersby and coworkers. I'm talking about complete and absolute acceptance of that person who wakes up in the morning and looks like shit, who's hair is a frizzy array of strands made so from a night pushing up against a pillow, that person who's breath is in dire need of Colgate, who's every pore is crying out for cleansing. This raw, unadorned woman that only those we trust most of all get to see (oh lucky "we").

Yes, I believe it is the hardest task to get to that place where we are completely and fully accepting of the thoughts in the head of this person, no matter how dirty or strange or hateful or even good, or sweet, or kind. It is all uphill. But I had finally arrived there, I think, to that point of accepting me, as I truly was, and not always waiting to turn into that version of me that I had always wanted to be, instead. That version of me, which essentially was the best parts of everyone I had ever known combined with the best parts of everyone I had ever read about or saw in a movie or on TV. This undisputable beauty with natural talent at well...everything, who never had to contend with any of the following: body odor, body hair, acne, constipation, PMS, loneliness, liking a person who didn't like her back, being made fun of, being unpopular.

I hope you are bearing with me here, because somewhere in this incoherent tangled twine of words there is a point, I promise. Anyway, I've always hated my body. I've told you all before just how much I hated my body. The ways in which I punished my body just to get through every day living in it. Starving, cutting, burning, loathing, pinching, weighing, cringing, measuring, pushing it to the point of exhaustion, and,(only those of you who have ever had an eating disorder will understand this one), checking.

But as you know, I tried to make peace with it through the years. Through therapy, through finding love, through making love, through discovering there exists such a thing as unconditional, all-encompassing love, through finding out I was love, namely a lovable person (body and soul) who could give it as well as receive it, through getting a kidney stone and enduring a painful surgery, through losing religion and finding God in the process, and then the ultimate turning point - getting pregnant and making a beautiful human life inside of this body, this same body that I'd always hated and tortured so much. I did all these terrible things to my body and yet, despite all I had done, here it had given me this beautiful gift anyway. This healthy, perfectly formed, perfectly wonderful human being. This glorious, miraculous baby girl. And I was awestruck by the fact that - my body did that work. This child, this work of art, was a peace offering. She was the proffered olive branch, my Olivia .(Oh, do you see? )

So we made a truce, sort of. My body and I. I learned to love me, even the parts of me that weren't aesthetically beautiful took on a certain charm. I would never be beautiful. But I was okay with that. I really and truly was. I liked how I looked anyway. It was a nice couple of years. And then it happened. I found out about my BRCA2+ status. My body turned on me, betrayed me. It declared war on me yet again. It forced my hand. I had to make this decision to mutilate myself. I had to do it in order to save myself. Not that I was even worth saving. Self hatred is sneaky that way. It never really fully goes away - it just goes into hiding. And it waits. Oh how it waits. Self-hatred is very patient. And when you turn your back for one minute, once you start pinching an inch in the mirror, once you start berating yourself for never finishing school, for eating a bowl of ice cream, and then another after that, here it comes like an avalanche in your head, impossible to stop - you loser, what have you done with your life? And now you're going to die a horrible death having done nothing of importance or value and maybe you should, maybe you deserve it, you lazy, worthless, unfulfilled potential pile of nobody likes you anyway and thats why you are alone tonight while Todd is out for a drink with his friends. You have no friends, because you have nothing to offer anyone.

And guess what? You're a rotten fucking mother. Your daughter was just playing with a pack of matches and you were watching America's Next Top Model as if you could ever hold a candle to the beauty of those woman. Eat some more Oreos you fat, lazy poor excuse for a woman. Your sister is more valuable a soul than you'll ever be and she's sick. What makes you think you shouldn't be? Why isn't it you? It should be you. Why don't you call her? Why don't you answer the phone when she calls you? Because you're afraid. A coward, actually, of the worst kind because you don't even have the disease yet. She does. And yet YOU can't handle it. Poor you. You're a horrible daughter too. Useless, disgusting waste of space in the universe.

This is the dialogue. This is how bad it can get in my head. And it took literally YEARS to make all of that shit go away. To quiet it down and scare the self hatred enough to go into hiding. So when I found out I had this mutation, here it came again after a few years of reprieve. Up it rose, out of its pit like a phoenix, winged, strong, and ready. Something had to save me.

No...someone. And again, it was this baby, this adorable creature looking up at me with eyes full of innocence and need. Olivia looked up at me only with love. She didn't know about the hatred, about that part. But if she did, I don't think she'd like anyone saying those things about her mother. And then there was Amy, too, who had gone through so much and said to me "Have this surgery because I didn't have the chance to" and she made me promise that I'd do it. This Angel on earth.

Amy wasn't perfect, by any means. And she wasn't a saint, by any means either. But she was there when it counted, and she saved my life so many times over the years, and this time was probably one of them. I had my husband, who's love surprised and continues to surprise me. But when I asked him what I should do, he was pretty clear about the fact that he wanted me alive no matter what the cost and anything that would keep me alive as long as possible had his vote. So ultimately I had to undergo this horrible surgery to ensure my longevity, which was something I had to do for my daughter's sake. And for everyone else in my life who for some reason I can't fully understand and maybe never will, love me in a great and powerful way. I underwent this surgery for them, because they believe I am worth it.

But I couldn't do it for me. I was not enough of a reason. Aside from the astounding sadness of that statement, I mostly can't help but think how ironic it is that the gift my body gave me, Olivia, ultimately became the main reason for me to do this painful mutilating thing. But like I said, self hatred is a sneaky, wily thing. And now I feel like I'm back at square one. I'm angry and hateful at this flesh, this disgusting flesh, this body that I can never trust again. I feel so betrayed. Self hatred is speaking again and saying the horrible things.

I know this is shallow mostly. But having to look in the mirror and see slashes where my breasts used to be is a brutal experience. And another irony, is that my breasts are about the only part of my body that I always actually liked. I thought they were lovely. Small, but lovely. But that doesn't matter now. Because they are gone. That precious part of me, that entertained my husband, that nurtured my daughter during a year of breastfeeding, gone and dissected in a pathology lab like meaningless blobs of flesh.

So now I have this monumental task ahead of me. To not only heal physically, but to learn, yet again, to accept this alien person. To learn how to love this new, even more ugly version of myself. It was hard enough the first time, without all the scars.I hope this blog wasn't too heavy or too personal for any of you to handle. I just know that whoever already reads this blog expects truthful words, honest words. Anything less would be unfair. I do have good moments now. Accepting moments. They are brief and interspersed among a lot of terrible, torturous thoughts. I wish I could make you laugh again. I wish I could report only optimistic things, with fluffy anecdotes about annoying check out clerks at the grocery store. But this is the journey, folks. This is the truth. And that truth is that I don't think the story goes in a perfect arc, like in a book or movie. I think this story is like the scar lines on my chest, jagged and uneven. And for damn certain the story line is not a circle. I will never, ever again be the same girl that I was. But whatever the story, I want to share it with you. If you will listen.

I know that life is good and bad and meshed into one glorious twisted mess I am just trying so hard to find the place of beauty and peace in that mess, the beauty in me again. Its so hard to find it once its lost. At least I'm in familiar territory. I've been here before...in this exile. The map to the good place, I buried because I didn't think I'd ever need it again. The good news is that I buried it inside of me, so I have a pretty good idea where to find it.