what i need

- my mom asked a couple of weeks ago what I would like for a birthday present. I said that there was nothing I really need, and that a donation to the rehab centre or to CLAW would be good. We spoke earlier this evening, and she said again that she wants a present idea, that they donate to charity and people often anyway.

I couldn't think of anything, but promised that I would try. It came to me just now, as I reread Pat Conroy's book 'Beach Music', and the characters are talking about the nature of love. Jack is so scared that his own inabilities will come back to haunt his child as she grows. I have none of that in my life; my family and friends have always loved openly. I have always known what love is. My failures are mine alone.

Forgiveness, mommy-bear. Think that is what I will need as a gift this year. God knows that I can't forgive myself for loving someone the way I love the dude. Not wisely, not well, but overwhelmingly.

A life without love is not a life that is worth enduring.....

not yet

have so far failed completely at my not-likely-anyway wish that I would die of swine flu, and failed equally at dying of shame and pain over the dude's behaviour.

But! Not too late! Still another chance! Yes..worlds dumbest ugliest loser chick is somehow still seeing the dude. And worst of all, still loving the dude. So when the next hurting discovery comes, it could be the one where I just lay down and stop breathing. If only I pray hard enough in the meantime....

I have always felt sympathy for people tied to toxic relationships by economics, or lack of awareness, or even by their own stupidity. I have never seen myself becoming part of that group, but for the past year it seems that I am. In this case, I am trapped by love, and it seems that cheating, lying, spoiling most of my semi-celebrations, the aloneness for nights and holidays... none of it stops me from loving him anyway. Every day of those marks a new level of internal degredation and hatred for myself.

And I still can't walk away...

zombie time

- as if the whole dude-crisis wasn't enough to nail me this week, I started coughing yesterday, and woke up every hour or so last night. Chills and fever, coughing and blocked sinuses...

God if I am lucky it will be swine flu and it will be fatal :-(

and she does it again!

- another stunning performance from Susan Boyle in the weekend's semifinal, sees her through to the final. Go, Susan, go!

Memories - Susan Boyle

bush weekend

- going away with the rehab centre admin lady, for a 3-day weekend in the bush. She is an honorary ranger at one of the medium-sized reserves, which basically means her job is to drive around and steer visitors in the right directions, keep them out of trouble and make sure they leave at closing time. Plus other fun bits like counting animals, monitoring them and anything exciting that happens. She is 69, and my greatest worry is that I won't be able to keep up with her! Her holiday last year was climbing volcano slopes in the Congo to see the gorillas. I'm really looking forward to it though, as she is great fun to be with, and it also means we go to all the closed areas of the reserve that the public is not alllowed in.

- the downside is that it means no dude for 3 days, and he has been sick this week as well, with flu. We met for coffee today, and I suggested to him that he take up some bad habits. I smoke, drink, don't eat properly, don't exercise enough, am fat - and am generally in amazingly good physical health. And he, who does all the right things has been sick numerous times in the last year - flu, colds, sinus, major gastric problems.... maybe there are merits to being a bad person! And, my friend Duckling is having a major psych meltdown at the moment, and is back in hospital on strict suicide watch, and feeling very unloved at the moment. I haven't helped much by being so chaotically busy this week that - although we have chatted lots on Facebook, I haven't been able to visit her in the 3 or 4 hours of the day that she is awake enough to register a visitor.

- great news though, is that my long-distance buddy Aqua, who I've been worrying about for the past month is OK, and is posting again. Her life is undergoing huge changes at the moment, so mention her in any prayers you might make, but I believe she is strong enough and smart enough to make good choices for herself. But it would be nice to be close enough to give her a big hug....

the end of the world......

....is surely coming. Or at least that's what it feels like. I am worrying about special friends in crisis and don't seem to be able to reach them or help. And I feel like I'm in terminal meltdown as well, with the dude. There are only two facts there; 1. he doesn't love me, even if he loves being with me and all sorts of other crap, and 2. I love him, absolutely, completely, without reservation. I know he has faults, and I am very aware of many of them, but it doesn't change things - I love him anyway.

I can't sort myself out, I can't help my friends, I don't seem to have any control over anything anymore. And I don't see any of it ending well either....

sweet wedding

- spent most of the day at/travelling/returning....a wedding between two of my fellow rehab volunteers. They are one of those lovely couples that proves the saying about every pot having a lid. Completely different in almost all ways, but wonderfully happy together, and a lovely example of how a relationship is built on mutual respect, mutual caring and mutual support.

Even the wedding was perfect for the two of them - it was held outside, next to a river, about an hour out of town. She designed stunning and unique invitations, he did most of the catering. They came up with a number of lovely touches that will make their wedding memorable for eveyone who attended.

I have an extra memory, as I'm looking after their pets for the week. One very large and lovable rat, and seven parrotty things, 6 of them being conures of various types. Gotta give them credit...those birds really love the sound of their own screams :-)

brilliant!

- thanks to the Cranky Professor for the link.

News on the swine flu epidemic : link to news report

Me personally, I'm betting that this might just be the promised plague that the avian flu failed miserably at being. Apart from the fact that I reckon the world is due for a good plague on Biblical levels, I'm also so relieved that it is being blamed on things that have nothing to do with me. At the height of the bird flu outbreaks, we had soooooo many phone calls along the lines of this:

Rehab volunteer: hi, how can I help you?
Concerned member of the public : I have a sick bird in my garden!!
RV : ok, can you bring it thru to either me or the centre?
CMP :NO!!!
RV : umm, can't you catch it?
CMP : NO!! And I'm not going to try! It's lying there on my lawn!
RV : could you maybe throw a cloth over it and put it in a box, and I'll come and fetch it?
CMP : NO!! I'm not leaving the house and I won't allow my family out either!
RV : umm, why not?
CMP : it might have bird flu! I want you to come and pick it up RIGHT NOW!!

- concerned RV heads there immediately. Lying on the lawn is a dead sparrow with fairly life-ending injuries of the feline type, and said feline lurking in close proximity......

At least, if any flying pigs are dead in their environs, they are a lot less likely to call a wildlife rehabilitation centre :-)

oh dear, oh dear, oh dear....

... so sunday's amicable parting was followed by tuesday's incredible sex. As well as lots of time just spent sitting next to each other doing separate work. And today's friendly visit, where I was working and he was studying, and nothing "serious" was mentioned. Maybe it's because I'm a girl, and maybe I invest too much emotion in stuff. But I find it hard to understand how we can both enjoy everything together so much, and yet for him it ends there. It's not imagination on my part about the enjoyment - he admits to that much. We can talk about everything, and even if we don't agree entirely, the differences just make for more enjoyable debates - and we pretty much share the same basic beliefs anyway. We laugh at the same things, we find the same things poignant. We have the most amazing sex....

Last week he asked what I would say or do if the circumstances were reversed, and I said that it would probably be much the same as he has. I thought about that one a lot, relating it to previous relationships where I was the one who was loved, but didn't return the love. And I don't really think that I would ever be able to take on the enormous strain of living with someone if I didn't love them completely. So I can't disagree with his actions, but it still leaves me wondering how everything can be so good and yet put us in such varying positions.

On a lighter note, I received a mail just now from a man who is hoping to relocate some dassies from a place with a population explosion to a game farm with a scarcity, and wants some advice on how to go about it. Dassies, also known as hyraxes, or rock rabbits, are a strange little animal about the size of a large domestic cat. Their closest living relative is - amazingly - the elephant. They are wide-spread in South Africa and Africa in general, living mainly in areas with hills or rocky outcrops. They are primarily vegetarian, and spend a lot of time lying around in the sun. They also bite like hell, and can be quite aggressive when cornered, and have a complex social structure of family groups within colonies. The man concerned is hoping to relocated a small number, and is worried about maintaining the family balances. One of his questions was:
"Can a lawyer sex these animals easily or does one need to be a sex expert?"

If I ever meet him I am going to battle with keeping a straight face.......

photo credit wikipedia

same pain, different day......

- we are trying the breakup on friendly terms. It can't hurt worse than last week, but I just don't know if I can handle it. He called earlier just to say hi, and the way my heart leaps when the phone rings in case it is him, and then soars when it is... doessn't exactly make me feel like I am moving on at all.

- words from Les Mis, as per my last weeks awed discovery of Susan Boyle:

"And still I dream he'll come to me
And we will live our lives together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms
We cannot weather..."

i just don't learn from the past mistakes i've made..

...subtitled : confusion runs rampant, again...

- needless to say, it's the dude. We had long text conversations yesterday, which basically boiled down to:
1. me wanting to know what I do wrong
2. him saying that I am an amazing person in a whole bunch of ways
3. me asking why we are in the same position again
4. him saying that it's not my fault
5. me saying it must be, otherwise we'd be together and happy
6. him saying that he wishes he could give me what I need
7. me asking what is wrong with me that he can wish that but not do it
8. him saying that he cares about me a lot, but that he just doesn't love me
9. agreement that it's better that we be completely honest, even tho it hurts...

- ok, so I'm bipolar, and more on the depressive side of that. But there are very few people in RL who know that, or who ever see any of it. And in the time that I've known him - and also because of him - it's been really well managed. He doesn't see the miserable bits, because mostly they happen when/because he isn't here, and I go to a lot of effort to hide it. This blog is the raw bits, the bits my tdoc knows - apart from that, the most that people generally know is that I have had major depressive episodes, and am OK now. Some people know that I still get seriously down, but none of them ever see anything of it, apart from not seeing me for a short while - and I always have enough reasons that everyone thinks I am hectically busy with everyone else.

- but there is something worse that is wrong with me. There has to be. He says that he loves spending time with me, that he loves chatting to me because we can talk about absolutely everything and it is always interesting to him, that he still finds me very attractive physically (which is one thing that amazes me but that I know is true. He knew exactly how fat I was before we ever had sex, as in, he'd measured every damn inch of me, and he still wanted to do it. Even now, after 14 months of making love, when I'd have figured that the newness was well gone, his body still makes it obvious that he really wants me) and it is still always good for both of us. But with all that in favour, he doesn't love me. Not even enough to want to try anything more serious. There has to be something so awfully wrong with me...

- he wanted to visit today. I agreed, because I'd rather we part on good terms. The whole day was surreal, because it was just so good and so comfortable, for both of us. We even got round to a bit of bedroom action in spite of the fact that he'd pulled a muscle running sprints and was in obvious pain. And now I'm wondering whether I should just settle for what there is between us, even knowing that that is all there will ever be. If I keep seeing him, I am never going to stop loving him, I am never going to be able to look at anyone else, and (it's already borderline) the longer I see him the less chance there is of being with someone long enough and soon enough to think about a child. And I really want to parent one, with him.

- how does one know when not enough is more than one will ever have otherwise?

election day

happy fucking democracy...

Yeah, I did vote, although there isn't much point in a one party state. At least we do still have opposition parties unlike our neighbours to the north. Two hours in the queue, but I did it.

Thats all I really did today apart from cry and miss the dude.

over. i think. again...........

so on saturday night someone anon sent the dude's wife an sms, saying, apparently (seeing as he didn't get to read the whole thing before she deleted it, and neither did I) a whole lot of stuff about she should grow up and get a job etc, as well as that he had been having an affair for two years with someone who fetched him at the local shop in (my car type).

I was really taken aback by that, not only that someone would send a half-assed message like that, but also by the thought that someone I don't know has been watching him, and therefore me. All he was worried bout was poor little wife, and how untrue it is because she has a job. Yeah right. She works in some kind of pretend thing for her mother, and doesn't earn enough to pay any of their bills. And that I know, because I have been paying most of them, including doing the grocery shopping with him for the last 5 months.

We sat in my car for an hour or so talking, instead of the normal sunday morning in bed bit, then he wanted to go look at TVs. His is broken, and I gather wifey can't survive without being able to watch the kids cartoons. Seeing as he hasn't returned the last money that was distinctly a loan not a gift because I really don't have it spare this month, and seeing as I paid the rent, health insurance, groceries, fuel and car stuff already, I've been kind of deaf to the TV stuff.

And then I came home, alone, for a change. And thought about all sorts of things, including that he really didn't seem to give a damn about how I might feel about any of the crap that could result from what happened. And sent him an email that is about as nasty as I can ever get to him. Like, not very much, compared to what I should probably be saying.

Only sensible thing in it was telling him not to contact me at all unless he has his suitcases and some intent to commit along with him. Haven't heard anything since, not that I really expected to. Guess he is at home telling wifey that I changed overnight from being Santa fucking Claus with an excess of gifts to the dragon. And that he has no idea on earth why......

And me? I lie on the couch with my eyes closed and count backwards from 1000 in the hope that it will stop me from missing the part of me that I just ripped out without anaesthetic, and that I will sleep for a few hours to stop me from thinking of him all day. When that doesn't work, I get up, drink my allowed (by me) 1/2 bottle of vodka, cry a lot, take 3x the amount of sleeping pill that I have taken in the last 3years, cry for another hour or two, and then the combo finally knocks me out for a couple of hours.

I wake up crying in the dark of midnight

give yourself a real treat....

....and watch the most unexpected and unlikely new hero. It's a lady called Susan Boyle, on a British talent show, and she will absolutely blow you away. Kind of solid, middle-aged, plain, strong regional accent....and then she opens her mouth and sings. Wow. She should be famous, make millions, have men throwing their underwear at her on stage, sing for the Pope. All of it, and I hope she gets it.

Here's a Youtube link to the show excerpt:Susan Boyle

long weekends

It seems as if everyone else is having a great month in April, which in SA is full of public holidays and long weekends. I hate them, because it means that I get to see very little of the dude, if at all. And to add to it, he has been sick with flu for the last few days, so apart from a croaky phone call today, I've had even less contact with him.

Makes for a very grumpy and miserable cat :-(....

rehab keeps me busy...

...and the dude keeps me insane. Totally off balance, totally in love. He makes me go from one extreme to the other, all because of a message or two, or the absence of them. At the end of it all though, being with him is almost always so good. I hate the emotional rollercoaster, and I still hate the subterfuge and the limits of the time and contact I have with him. And I just can't stop seeing him, even so....

At least the birds and beasts have been keeping me busy in between. Apert from the visitors, my one boy-cat has had a major eye-infection. For a pure white cat though, having weepy, swollen eyes for 4 days does not improve his appearance. Especially seeing as I am so not allowed to clean his face, and have settled for just getting the eyedrops in. His eyes are now back to normal, but he still has 'eye-liner' from the drops and the tears, and it has made dark circles around his eyes. A boycat with make-up...have been calling him Emo-cat instead of Sam :-)

birds and pain

on the rehab side, have just read an interesting blog post by Dr Dolittler on pain and the use of NSAIDs and/or other drugs for pain relief. It's a subject that intrigues me particularly, because the views for humans and animals seem so diametrically opposed.

Human medicine seems to be focussed on prolonging life at all costs. I know, having seen a much loved aunt go through years of treatment for a non-curable cancer, that the quality of the life that is prolonged doesn't seem to be an issue with many doctors. She went from being a woman with so much caring and warmth for everyone, to a shrew from hell, depending on how much pain she was in, and the pain lasted for months at a time until she was hospitalised for hugely expensive and short-lasting treatments. But she trusted and respected her oncologist so much that she didn't want to hurt or disappoint him by saying that she had had enough. And so she suffered on for years, so that he could write journal articles on how he was managing her care.

Veterinary medicine on the other hand seems to have far more practitioners who value the quality of life. Perhaps it is because humans will almost always have a longer lifespan than their animal companions, perhaps it is because human doctors are legislated out of offering a similar level of compassion. I'd rather give the animals I love the best possible life for as long as that is achievable. And when it isn't, then I am able to gift them with the most comfortable death possible.

I wish that the same choices could be available for people.

However...the good doc's post is on the use of NSAIDs and other pain relief in vet practice. If you are interested in animal care at all, it's worth reading, especially the comments. I'm a definite believer in palliative care for animals, and in the rehab work I see, we have seen the benefits for mammals. Pain relief for birds though is a less-accepted or studied topic. We use homeopathic remedies such as Rescue Remedy and Traumeel on almost all our injured or stressed patients, and where more traumatic injuries are involved, we use small doses of pain-relief. Pain causes stress. Stress causes death. Or at least, that is our view, but it is one not always shared by vets and other avian specialists.

Anyway, the link is Dr Dolittler - if you have an opinion on this, let me know?

abba overdose

- went and bought 3 Abba CDs because I keep hearing that horrible remix mess of 'knowing me knowing you' in shopping centres and crying every time. I am so scared that the dude and I are almost at that point, and if we are I just don't know where I can go from there.

So it's lyrics time again...the bit of misery where you feel that someone wrote that song just to describe you...and both are from Abba.

Knowing me, knowing you

No more carefree laughter
Silence ever after
Walking through an empty house, tears in my eyes
Here is where the story ends, this is goodbye

Knowing me, knowing you (ah-haa)
There is nothing we can do
Knowing me, knowing you (ah-haa)
We just have to face it, this time we're through
(This time we're through, this time we're through
This time we're through, we're really through)
Breaking up is never easy, I know but I have to go
(I have to go this time
I have to go, this time I know)
Knowing me, knowing you
It's the best I can do

Mem'ries (mem'ries), good days (good days), bad days (bad days)
They'll be (they'll be), with me (with me) always (always)
In these old familiar rooms children would play
Now there's only emptiness, nothing to say.....


my love my life

I've seen it on your face
Tells me more than any worn-out old phrase
So now we'll go separate ways
Never again we two
Never again, nothing I can do

Like an image passing by, my love, my life
In the mirror of your eyes, my love, my life
I can see it all so clearly
(See it all so clearly)
Answer me sincerely
(Answer me sincerely)
Was it a dream, a lie?
Like reflections of your mind, my love, my life
Are the words you try to find, my love, my life
But I know I don't possess you
So go away, God bless you
You are still my love and my life
Still my one and only

I've watched you look away
Tell me is it really so hard to say?
Oh, this has been my longest day
Sitting here close to you
Knowing that maybe tonight we're through

Like an image passing by, my love, my life
In the mirror of your eyes, my love, my life
I can see it all so clearly
(See it all so clearly)
Answer me sincerely
(Answer me sincerely)
Was it a dream, a lie?
Like reflections of your mind, my love, my life
Are the words you try to find, my love, my life
But I know I don't possess you
So go away, God bless you
You are still my love and my life
Yes I know I don't possess you
So go away, God bless you
You are still my love and my life
Still my one and only

hard-working week and then a bloody owl bit me too!

- so a while ago I volunteered to do the membership admin for the rehab centre. We ask people who bring in birds if they'd like to become members for a small amount, and in return we send them magazines erratically, and will soon send smaller online articles and pics. The actual adding of new members, sending renewals and deleting ex-members isn't a huge task, but of course, once I looked at it, I started picking up all sorts of people who should be honourary members because of support they give us, plus people who donate but don't always sign up etc. So for the past week, the finance lady and I have been sending lists back and forth, of queries and addresses and more queries etc....could take a lot of work before it gets to be a list that I am happy with :-)

- and today I did another shift as senior volunteer. Our assistant manager resigned last month (think we just plain wore her out...), so a few of us have been standing in as weekend shift leaders. Today turned out to be a full house in the clinic, with a regular supply of new admissions, all of whom needed time-consuming treatment to test for possible illness, treat wounds, strap or splint limbs. Thank God for little old ladies - one of my favourite volunteers, a lady in her 70s, did the shift with me. She made it a pleasure, by doing half the clinic in a calm, relaxed and (above all) competent way, and it ended up being a really nice afternoon.

- it's also been a nice dude-filled week, because for various reasons he has had some extra free time. Most of it has been spent with me, including catching a snake (at which he is waaay more skilled than me!), working quite hard here while I do the rehab stuff and cuddle him every few minutes, and some more awesome sexy bits. And once again, I'm reminded that there is no such thing as bad time with him - the good bits are mindblowing, but the rest of it is always nice as well. I guess from the end of the month things will change a bit, as he is starting a new job. It's the kind of job where not too many questions can be asked about where he goes and what he did there, which means I will probably worry myself sick most of the time, but it will also bring him in a living salary for a change. And maybe not stressing about finances all the time will relax him a bit, and also take quite a burden off me. Am keeping my fingers crossed that it all works out....

confusing. confused. just don't know anymore...?

...so, I guess the first question is whether this should be a dude-blog post or not, but I reckon it's probably generic enough to stay here. Which answers the next questions too. Yes, there is still a dude. Yes, I still love him completely. Yes, I still believe that he loves me as much as he possibly can. Either that or he is more of a total sociopath then I can concieve of. And yes. Months and months of highs and lows and we are still no closer to any kind of equilibrium.

In all fairness, I don't think that he really has any clue about how tenuous any interest in living that I have really is. We knew each other for two months before starting whatever kind of relationship we currently have. After that we went through a while where I was definitely not going to show him any kind of downside, then through the bit where I was trying not to see him but was not going to walk away when he needed me. I think we have been getting a lot more honest with each other - at least, if you look at what we almost-fight about, and how often it happens, i think so.

I can only say almost-fight, because even after more than a year of involvement, and some really sore bits, I don't think we have ever had a knock-down fullout fight. I don't think we ever will, actually, because it seems that neither of us actually do that. Ever. And while it could possibly be a lot healthier for us both if we did, it also works that we say moderately hurtful things and then go away and breathe deeply while we think about what it would really be like to say fuck off and die and then actually never never see each other again. Somehow it seems that at that point, the never never bit is too much, and we both take a step back, followed by a couple forward in terms of vulnerability. And hey chickens, we carry on again....

I cry an awful lot about him. He knows that. The most he has and probably ever will say, is that it 'breaks his heart that he cant give me what I need and want'. He knows that I can tell him to go, and mean it, but that when he sends a msg to say have a good day that I truly want him to have a good day and a good life etc, regardless of what has happened. And somehow it seems that after that we keep seeing each other anyway.

The last two weeks have ended up, I think, with both of us being as open as we can, and taking a few steps forward in the kind of relationship we have. It's never going to be perfect. But I guess it's still a few thousand degrees better than either of us have ever dreamed of.

I ended up having dinner last night with p-doc's ex office administrator. I used to give her a hard time about calling to find out how I was, because - as I told her repeatedly - she didn't know me, so how could she possibly care whether I was suicidal or not. She kind of disproved that by staying in touch over the 5 months since she left him, so last night we ended up having a purely social evening, and it was so much fun. We seem to share a whole lot of bad habits and irreverent attitudes, and it ended up being a late, raucous and really enjoyable evening. Turns out that she has been having a long-standing affair with a man, that there was a point or two where they could have gotten permanent, but that she is the one who turns it down. She said that apart from thinking that she actually has a pretty good life on her own already, she doesn't want to stuff up either of the rest of their lives. And that when she gets to missing him at the same kind of moments that I am already so much missing the dude at, she kind of kicks herself in the butt and remembers that actually she already has the best of her guy, that she has so many of the happy and special times. The circumstances are very different, but I guess that is something that I should remember more often.

I do have the best of the dude. I have so much of the intellectual bantering and quick-wittedness that both of us delight in; I have the most amazing physical closeness where - in spite of me being really fat and ugly - we share a mutual satisfaction in the things we can give each other, and the pleasure we get in return; we laugh so often, and we both seem to want to encourage and give strength to each other as much as possible. Maybe these things will not last for ever, and there will be no enduring legacy. But for now, maybe I should be counting the chickens I have, instead of the eggs that will never hatch...