An itch to write it out.

I've been itching the past few days to write something. Anything, I just need to get stuff out. My life now is crazy hectic, but most of the time that's okay. Work is becoming overwhelming and my school is crazy hard. Damn statistics, no one really uses this stuff that much, right? October 8th would have been my mom's 53rd birthday. That isn't going to be easy to live with. Birthdays, holidays and her death are always the hardest. And no matter what they say, it doesn't get better with time. The heart ache is still as fresh as the day I walked over to her lifeless body. I miss her terribly. Not a whole lot of people will read this, so I'm going to put all my feelings out there.

My dad has recently found a "lady friend" (I just can't say girlfriend, too weird) that he goes out with and enjoys being with. I have nothing against the woman. There's nothing to tell me not to like her or to be weary of her. From what I've seen she's a very nice person. I just can't wrap my head around it. In the beginning it didn't really bother me, then it started to little by little and now it drives me crazy. Don't get me wrong, I want him to be happy. I don't want my father alone for the rest of his life. I'd hate to be alone. But it's just very difficult for me to deal with. Even though people aren't, sometimes I feel that people are forgetting my mother. I don't feel that people talk about her as much as they should. It's just not fair that she's gone. My mother should still be here with my father. And when I hear him talk about his friend it breaks my heart in two. But again, I don't want my father being alone and I'm not saying he can't have this. It just hurts me, but it's not about me. This is about him. I can't be selfish to a parent that has sacrificed a lot for me and my siblings. Who continued living after losing the love of his life. Who showed us how to be strong when all you wanted to do was crawl up in a ball and die with her. And if he's happy, I'll live with it. But god does it hurt.

Even though my mother's death has always upset me, it feels like its creeping back up again. I'm starting to feel pain from it like I did when she died. Like it's re-hashing and its coming back strong and hard. I've cried a lot in the past few weeks, all at random times. A song comes on, I see a picture, I speak and I hear her, I dream of her, I can smell her. She is everywhere and nowhere at all. The more time that passes, the harder it becomes. I feel like school and work has suppressed most of it, and most of the time its not in the forefront of my mind. Two days ago a friend of my mom's and her friend passed away from breast cancer. She was my mom's age at the time she died. It's not fair.

Onto more pleasant things. I've now been in a relationship for 3 months. 3 whole months. That's like a record for me in the last couple of years. Ha. He's awesome. I feel bad because I've never really had good relationships, so I feel like I don't show affection like I should. Or sometimes I can be a whiny girl. He's still with me, so something must be going right. It's weird how when you really do quit looking for love, it knocks you off your feet. My best friend introduced me to him and I was very against the whole setup from the beginning. Because I'm crazy. But when I sat down to dinner that first night and we talked the whole entire time, I thought to myself, well this is weird. And things progressed and I still thought: "okay Heather, figure out what's wrong with him" and "you know something about him bothers you." But I never did find anything. He buys me really thoughtful gifts, he says nice things, he takes me out, he buys me creepy Halloween themed things and he even hits my best friend up for advice on stuff that I want. I feel like I'm one of the luckiest girls alive. To have found someone that really loves me, no matter what. That's pretty incredible. And he'll even watch lifetime movies with me. He's also the biggest nerd, but its so freaking cute. But both of us have been through hell in relationships before finding each other. I feel terrible that he's dealt with the stupid stuff that he has. But that doesn't matter, all that matters is we finally found each other. I finally figured it out and I've finally figured it out for myself. People always say when you love someone you just know. You know how I know? Even after I've seen him days in a row, thinking about seeing him again when I get home from work or school, still gives me that weird butterfly feeling in my stomach. That's love. I think my mom had a hand in this.

I guess I'll have to buy my best friend a really really nice Christmas gift this year...

Clarity

Everyone has their bad days and then we have good days. Really good days, and they make the bad days not even exist. It's funny how you go through life accepting something that you think you deserve. You always settle and think that's just how my life is supposed to play out. It always happens to me, I always get the shit end of the stick. Those type of thoughts often plagued me many nights. Over the course of the past year and a half I thought I had done something wrong to have the horrible events unfold in my life. Especially losing my mother. Was there something I could have done to prevent this? Why me? Why did I have to lose my parent? Why did I watch the person I love the most, wither away and die before my eyes? My healthy parent. God must hate me. The universe is against me. I did something to make all of this bad stuff happen.

One day you wake up and have clarity. You realize no one did this to you. It's not your fault. You did nothing wrong to make this happen. You never set off an event that ultimately led to this disaster. It's no ones fault, not even God's. One day you realize bad things happen to good people all of the damn time. But guess what? They also happen to bad people every single day. You shouldn't wish ill will towards anyone, but some of your dark days you couldn't help but do just that. You finally understand that you don't deserve what you keep settling for. You are so much better than that. One day something or someone comes along and makes you open your eyes. And then you just change, a good change, like for the good. You stop with the bad, negative feelings. You grow into something else, something new.

Life is a constant transformation. Most of the time we don't even see it or notice it. But we are constantly evolving into better forms of ourselves. There's still pain, and it still hurts like hell every single day. You will still have your bad days, but you can deal with them. You'll get through it, because that's who you are. You weather the storm, you walk through it. And you come out unscathed on the other side. My mother always taught me these things, but I never realized how true it all is. She always told me I deserved better than I was getting, everywhere in my life. But I was content being quiet, getting stepped on, being emotionally abused. I was settling every day of my life. But I can't anymore. I've hit that clarity mark and I don't think I can go back.

Just Don't Do It.

It's amazing how much of our lives we let other people affect. We live day to day depending on what someone else is making us feel or what they are saying to us. Why do we do this? Time after time we let other people influence everything that we do. And no one will ever understand why we do this, even other people on the outside will tell us how dumb we are for certain things, but we never listen. One day you will realize that it's just not worth it. For all of the bad and sad feelings that you get from someone, one day you realize those people were never really worth it. You wasted so much time trying to be there for someone and so much time worrying about how they feel, that you lose yourself. You stop remembering what you feel. You stop being you. The sad part about this situation is it will take them hurting you or screwing you over one final hard time, to make you finally get smart about it. It sucks, but thats what it takes.

These people will always be toxic to your life. If you find these people it's best to remove them right away. If you don't they will exist to torture you until you can finally cut the cord. You will be hard headed, you will not listen to anyone else around you, and you'll keep trying. But when you finally break free and cut the cord, it'll be the best thing you've ever done.

You're strong, stronger than that other person ever let you show. You should never rely on someone else to make you feel something about yourself. You should always depend on yourself. But humans always want to see the best in people and we try too hard to pretend that people aren't severely fucked up. But people are and you can't fix or change them. So stop trying. Because it only ruins you in the end.

It's just life. And humans always tend to ruin it.

The pain is a feeling, it tells me I'm alive.

Mother's Day always seemed like a fun holiday. It was an excuse for us to go to my mom's favorite restaurant (which was also mine) and eat delicious pasta and have a great day. It was also a day that I could find my mom a cool gift, traditional or not, and surprise her with it. A few years ago I bought her a handmade thing that hangs in the kitchen with each of our names on it and a quote about mother's and their kids. It was pretty unique and she really loved it. It's still hanging there and has never been moved. Now I hate mother's day. It's just another holiday that reminds me that my mother is gone. It's another constant reminder of how much everyone loves their mother, and how mine isn't here for me to love. It's another day that twists my heart over and over again. It's another day that I'm miserable for because I wish I could have one more with her. But I get through it. This one was worse than last year. Last year it was the first one without her, that should have been terrible. But my brain was still numb and wasn't able to really comprehend it.

But today was a new day, a new struggle, a new heartache. I'll be okay, because I'm always okay. I don't really ever have a choice to not be okay. I spent the weekend in West Virginia with Catie for her graduation and had an awesome time. I love it there. It's so quiet and laid back. I really love the mountains. It was nice to have that distraction, because it kept my quiet mother's day thoughts away. But they came later, they always come.

Sometimes I just feel so stuck. Like I keep going back to the same things over and over again because they're comfortable. I wish I could pick up and move to another state and never look back. I wish I could get away and not have to worry about anyone or anything anymore. But that's just impossible. I can feel it though, something stirring deep down in my soul. Something that's warning me one day I will do just that, one day I'll walk away and leave it all behind me. I'll break free and start new. One day things will all be different. I'll no longer settle, I'll no longer let people hurt me over and over and over again. One day I'll be strong enough to say no and to walk away. But until then, I'm still here. I'm still unsatisfied. I'm still yearning for more. I'm still looking for life on the other side of loss. And I haven't found it yet.

It functions so well...

The brain is a beautifully complicated piece of organ. In some ways it's so amazing and unique. In others it's torturous and dangerous. There are many diverse minds, and not two are ever alike. It's nice though, when you find a mind that is as alike as yours. I think that's what happens when you find a friend. Your brains seem to run on similar wave lengths and you have a lot of the same feelings.

I'm not really sure what this post was going to be about. I'm trying to write more. It's my passion and I know I'm damn good at it. A perfect song has just popped up on my Pandora, Who I am hates who I've been:

"I heard the reverberating footsteps
synching up to the beating of my heart.
And I was positive that unless I got myself together,
I would watch me fall apart.
'Cause I don't want you to know where I am.
Cause then you'll see my heart,
in the saddest state it's ever been.
There is no place to try and live my life."

Such a great song. And I can feel his lyrics. It's true, who I am hates who I've been. When did I get so damn hard? Life has been making me harder around the edges. It's not a bad thing, we all need to toughen up every so often. But I used to be so soft, innocent, easy going. Now I'm a tangled, mean mess. But I did it to myself, there's no one to blame but myself. I'll admit that.

A relationship with death will do that to you. It'll also convince you that you should live life to the fullest. Which is a good philosophy to have, but it's not always the best choice. Living each day like it's your last can be damaging and destructive. I love to feel just like everyone else does. But I'm not sure I go about getting that feeling the way I should. Damn.

The mind is amazing. The brain works wonders. I love how my mind can think and take in new information. But my mind is dangerous and has the potential to screw me in the ass every single time.

Everyone's falling down, everyone's settling for less.

Why do we settle? Us human beings can never be content in most aspects of our lives, but in other ways we are more than happy to just sit back and settle for less than what we deserve. I always wonder why we do this? Many of us might feel that we aren't good enough for whatever it is that we deserve. Other's feel it's just not worth the fight and effort to get whatever it is. And the other portion of us are just reckless. Many times we don't care, we do what feel's good and we don't stop to look around and think about what our consequence could possibly be. Who we are hurting, why we are hurting them, what's the point of this?

But we, as humans, love nothing more to live in the moment. It's when we feel most alive, to make rash, impulsive decisions because they feel oh so good, but most times these decisions are oh so bad for us. But we don't mind, we'll figure that part out later. Then, when later comes, we sit in the dark, desolate place we now find ourselves. The feelings that surround us after we make these decisions just down right suck ass. Then we look back and run the scenario's in our heads to see what we would have done different. Would the ending still be the same? What would or could I have done differently? But those guilty feelings never last long, and never last long enough to convince us not to make that same bad decisions a week down the road. It doesn't matter how many times something hurt's us, something cuts deep down and make us feel desperate and alone. Us humans, we never ever learn. We aren't like a dog, which eventually realizes they can't continue to pee in the house without having a consequence. We continue to pee in the house over and over again, even after getting our asses beat every single time.

But we're only human right? And we do bleed when we fall down. We cry, we hurt, all the same. And when you try to sit down and think it through, it never makes any sense. Then we push it way in the back of our heads and ignore it until we make the next bad decision. Then another is stored back in the dark corner. We love the hurt, we love the feeling, hell most of us do the things we do so we can feel something, because some days you feel like you'll never have that feeling again.

And a small portion of us are masochist's. We hate the hurt, but we continue going back for more. It doesn't matter how bad it hurts, we always go back for more pain. Will we ever learn? Will we ever start refusing to settle?