Earlier this spring my favorite cosmetics company, Tarte, launched a brand new sister brand called Sugar Rush. You may be wondering why I care. I’m already devoted to Tarte but as in all things, there is always room for improvement. I’m not just looking at cosmetics for me anymore, after all, I am raising two young ladies. I’ve got a tween and a teen who want nothing more than to raid my makeup drawers.
Disclosure: I was provided some products in the Sugar Rush collection by Tarte but all opinions are my own.
The thing is it’s always been my belief that makeup isn’t necessary for girls that young because they are so absolutely beautiful, as is. Ah, remember when your pores were that small? Remember when you looked that rested? Oh and let’s not forget about the creaseless, voluptuous faces of the youth. But, I remember even then wanting to use makeup as a creative way to express myself and I know that’s what our young girls want to do too which is what inspired me to be part of the body shop consultant.
Tarte’s Sugar Rush is made especially for Generation Z. The packaging is cute and fun, like the girls using it. However, it’s vegan and cruelty-free which makes me feel better about spending my money on it and allowing my girls to use it.
Did I mention everything in the Tarte Sugar Rush collection is under $30?
The thing is that it’s make-up and skin care made with good-for-you ingredients. Even though it comes in super cute packaging and is perfect for your favorite Generation Z girl, the quality is just as good as what you’ve come to expect from Tarte over the last 20 years.
Can you even believe that Tarte has been around for 20 years? Tarte has always been committed to cruelty-free cosmetics so what better way to celebrate their 20th anniversary than by evolving the brand with the launch of Sugar Rush.
This colorful new collection uses quality ingredients to create long-lasting wear, skin-loving formulas with recyclable packaging that aesthetically pops. Everything in the collection is cruelty-free, vegan, naturally derived, dermatologist-tested and hypoallergenic which is perfect for my girl with sensitive skin!
The collection offers a nice variety of skin-care and makeup picks including two eye shadow palettes, lip products and facial products. Sugar Rush also has a few cute skin-care and brush sets and sweet, summertime scents that conjure up memories of the beach.
Sugar Rush may be “powered by glitter and good vibes” but it’s also backed by the high quality and reputation of Tarte. My girls are in love with the collection and so am I.
I can’t get enough of the Sugar Rush vacay day rollerball and Sugar Spritz body spray. Bella is loving the cake butter whipped body butter and Sugar Rush sweet slice eye and cheek palette. Gabs can’t get enough of the Couple Goals double-ended lip gloss, squeezy clean face wash and star factor cleansing face brush.
Overall, we love Tarte’s Sugar Rush collection and, more importantly, I feel good about letting my girls put it on their face.
Last week, the Big Guy had an unexpected job interview. Unexpected because he loves the job he has, it’s his dream job. The past three years have been insanely chaotic for our family. I started this blog, the spring that my husband first had to leave us for a job; my daughters we’re 2 and 4. They are currently, almost 5 and 7. Many of you know the story of our two-year commuter marriage and all the upheaval that has come with that. The moving, the separation, the hurt and finally, the reunion, we have survived as a family. It’s been really hard. (more…)
Do you work at a desk like most adults? Ever have trouble reconciling how to get healthy from your desk and still maintaining your career? It’s so easy, as we get older to blame our out of shape bodies on kids, business and sitting at a desk all day. We’re tired. I get it. I’ve been doing the same thing for years and guess where it’s gotten me? It’s gotten me a muffin top around my waist ( way less cute than it sounds) and looking like a linebacker for the Bears from behind.
We all love to imagine ourselves as outdoorsmen. We say we hike and do yoga, maybe even barre or spin. What that means to me is I walked to take the garbage out and pick up the mail (hike). I almost fell and killed myself but I caught myself (yoga). I got ambitious and tried to do barre with my two girls and got stuck and my back went out (Barre). I rode my cruiser around the neighborhood at a leisurely pace wherein my neighbor’s 100-year-old dachshund outpaced me (spin). Things are not what they always appear. And no matter what lies I want to tell myself about my health, the hips in the jeans don’t lie.
Hey, I’m with you. We’re part of a society who wears yoga pants as everyday clothes. Little honestly for you, my yoga clothes have been to one yoga class. I am trying to change that. I am not happy with the status quo. I don’t want to die in my 60’s because I was too lazy to do anything about it today.
I used to work out, hardcore. I loved it. I am an endorphin junkie and I love being proactive in my life. If you know me, you know I am a planner with end results in mind at all times. My goal is to live to 103 years old. No, I’m not joking. My grandpa was 99 when he died. 103 is not out of my realm of possibility for these genetics.
But I’ve got to get off my derriere and do it. You see, my brain has done the math and while it’s totally possible to live to be 103, it becomes exponentially harder when your job is sitting on your bottom all day long. Add to that insomnia and a trash fire diet and well, in my current state there is no way I am hitting my goal and people, I am no quitter.
Here are my list of how to get healthy from your desk
Worry Less
I am serious, worrying is a useless emotion unless your goal is to stress yourself out, have your body mutiny and release cortisol and make you gain weight. It’s also not good for you mentally. It’s just one more thing to overwhelm you. Worrying never made anything go away or get easier. It only ever makes things worse so stop doing it.
Eat cleaner
Be aware of portion sizes. Try to eat more naturally, less low fat, less processed and refined sugars and more organic. More fruits, veggies and lean proteins and whole grains. Less red meat, rich sauces and salt.
Be Aware
I know some people say to throw your scale away. I personally need accountability. Pick one day every other week and weigh yourself. I am currently using the WW scale; it tracks weight, BMI and body fat.
I also like to monitor my food intake so I use a food scale to keep my portion sizes honest and an app on my phone to keep track of the foods I am eating.
Last but not least, I use BEEM UNITED: BeActiv S100. They are an in-ear precision heart rate monitor. They not only monitor your heart as you workout, they allow you to have clear hand free calling for up to 8 hours of use. It has a built-in personal health management app and are waterproof.
Through the BEEM Sport app, listeners can choose their preferred workout, including running, jogging, indoor or outdoor cycling and more, and receive real-time heart rate data as they workout.
Sleep
I’m an insomniac and it’s not fun. It’s also unbelievably unhealthy. I feel a zillion times better when I go to sleep at a reasonable hour and get enough sleep. When I only get 4 or 5 hours of sleep, I feel ruined for the rest of the day. But when I get at least 7 hours of sleep, I feel invigorated and equipped to face life. I’m more tolerant and generally, more pleasant and clear minded.
Move More
Going for a bike ride or walking 30 minutes a day can do wonders for your health but if you can’t manage that, I have the next best option for you the Flexispot bike. It’s so simple but it allows me to work out while I work. In fact, I burned 300 calories writing this post.
The Flexispot bike is height adjustable, stationary bike with a desktop built on it so you can stay sedentary even when you are doing sedentary activities, like checking your emails, working remotely or even watching television. It’s whisper quiet and has 8 adjustable levels. It’s great for the entire family. My girls love it as much as I do and it even won the 2018 CES Innovation Awards.
Disclosure: I was provided a FlexiSpot bike for review purposes but all opinions are my own and the 300 calories I burned writing this post, all mine.
Drink Your Water
I am a water addict. It’s probably the thing I drink the most. When I was younger, I loved Coke, juice and cocktails. As I’ve gotten older, my favorite drinks are water, iced tea, an occasional iced coffee and the rare, blood orange San Pelligrino or martini. Water is good for your skin and keeping you free of toxins.
Take Your Vitamins
I always made sure to give my girls their vitamins. I even started giving them Vitamin-C to boost their immune systems because, let’s face it, schools are cesspools. But what about me? I need to be around to take care of them so that means, stopping, breathing and caring for myself.
I read your piece about good girls today being as illusive as the unicorn; non-existent. I hope you are wrong. I am a unicorn who is currently raising two unicorns (as you call them). I am teaching them to have respect for themselves and do what makes them happy in life. Life is too short to live by other people’s rules; especially when the rules are not clear and ever changing. Good girls are not extinct, maybe you are just too pompous and stupid to see them because you are so busy going for the easy piece of ass and then disregarding the girl who showed you charity.
I agree that we live in a world where more women are sexually asserting themselves. We live in a world of selfies and social media gone wild. People taking nude photos of themselves and uploading them to the internet or sexting them and having them end up in the wrong hands has become common place. The world has become so small that sometimes we forget that we are not alone with our computer, camera or phone. We forget that the Internet is vast and permanent. Forever. Talk about never being able to outgrow the sins of your youth.
Women have not lost all morals and respect for themselves, you are just more aware of their indiscretions thanks to social media. Men and women have been making mistakes since the beginning of time. We still have dignity, only now we also have the Internet and our every mistake can live on in infamy. What’s so wrong with a woman enjoying sex, anyways?
Mr. Waters you are complaining because men have finally gotten everything they ever wanted, women who are willing and able to have consensual sex with you on her terms. No more begging, no more bullying her into it; nope, now women realize that they can choose to embrace their own sexual appetites without being a whore. Still, your misogyny won’t let you accept your gift. We’ve finally broken free of the shackles of patriarchal approval. We finally care more about what we think about ourselves than what you think of us.
The story has not changed. Men have always liked the chase more than the actual prize. Women figured this out a long time ago. This is why I was a virgin until I was in college. You’ve always wanted the good girl who plays hard to get but is a complete freak in private. But you don’t want to believe that she has ever been with anyone else, ever. So, we’ve let you believe what you wanted.
“Then you have drugs, uppers being predominant, and many women are addicted to prescription pills to help their “anxiety.” In short, women have become easy, but they have also become broken — and eventually become undesirable because no one stays hot forever. Sure, we men are to blame for this as well, but that is because we are idiots.” Well, you got one thing right.
Mr. Waters, I don’t think that you would know a unicorn if it bit you in the ass. All women are born unicorns. If they are broken, it is life, full of it’s double standards,painful situations and callous men who treat women like whores that have broken them.
The problem Mr. Waters is not with the unicorns, it is with assholes like you who put women into categories; whores and virgins. We are more than what resides between our legs. Maybe you need to become a unicorn yourself if you want to attract a unicorn because unicorns don’t want to marry assholes; we prefer unicorns too.
Happy Throat Punch Thursday to all who celebrate (shhh! I know there’s a lot of you.I saw your DMs)! I’m here to announce that Throat Punch Thursday is coming back, baby! This Maycember shit is for the birds and personally, I’m glad it’s just about over. But, bitches I was harshly and disrespectfully scathed. The past week has been a gut punch to my mama heart and that was hard but expected. But, ladies, the last 24 hours feels like the universe punched me in my throat. By the way, I can tell you from my perspective, I’d prefer to go through my mom life transition without the side of empty nest syndrome. Anyways, now that my very important PSA is out of the way, I’ve got even bigger news.
June is for new beginnings and I’m rebranding. Not the SOSDD (same old shit, different day) superficial update. I’m reinventing the blog ( mine, not the concept).
Sadly, as of 8:38 PM on Wednesday, May 21st, in the year of our Lord and Savior 2025 I can no longer officially hold my title of “mom to a child”. She is de facto an adult.
GASP* ( I fucking hate it here sometimes)
Go ahead and be shocked. I am. I might throw up. Maybe I already did. Maybe that was the Mounjaro. Maybe it’s my allergies. Maybe it’s my Sunday Sads on a random Throat Punch Thursday. Girl, maybe it’s Maybelline. I don’t know. I just know that my eyes have been leaking a lot lately.
My baby girl, Gabs, turned 18-years-old (tbh, in a Latina household “adulthood” doesn’t mean anything but more responsibility. We’re not so good with the “letting go” parts of parenthood and forget about this whole empty nest syndrome shit. I’m not about it -training wheels, rememba? In fact, as a culture, we welcome our kids to live with us for as long as they want so…girls, you have it here in writing. If this is what empty nest syndrome is all about- that’s a hard fuckin pass. I tried it. I’m not sure I like it. I prefer to think of it as launching adult children. I’ve always been a training wheels mom but I feel my inner launch pad mom begrudgingly making her way to the front.
Then, on May 23rd, just to make the point crystal clear, she had the friggin ( why do I always imagine myself to sound like Joe Pesci in My Cousin Vinny when I say that word) AUDACITY to graduate from high school (that’s a different post for another day when I can get my shit together long enough to not be a verklempt cry baby. For now, I’m just going to bite my lip, turn my trauma into comedy gold and vagina the fuck up! YEEHAW Mothafuckas!)
Yeah, I said “AUDACITY” ( I also said a lot of other out of pocket words in the previous sentence..oopsie #NSFW). Guess what else? All of this motherhood business is going too fast and I’m not ready for retirement so I’m gonna do what every ADHD woman, man and child knows to do….
PIIVVVOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!! (IYKYK)
I’m not going to give away all the goodies right here, right now…you know I’m a blog tease. J/K I’m a little touchy feely at times but I’m no tease. I always deliver with my whole ass in it.
My children and I were raised right here, on this blog. They grew up. I evolved from a brand spanking new wife and “mommy” into this seasoned warrior mama bruh bear. I don’t often wear a cape but when it comes to my girls, there’s not much I can’t or won’t do. Leap tall buildings, lift semis, do TikToks in matching pajamas ( in public ) just because they wanted to. Y’all didn’t think I was just born a (neuro) spicy, Latina Trad wife from Chicago, did you?
I feel like I’ve graduated to the next level of motherhood. You guys, I raised really good human beings and I am no longer “mommy” on most days. I’m so proud of who my girls are becoming and more importantly, they are chasing their dreams.
Let me reintroduce you to myself, “ Hi, my name is Brah”, ( my girls think that joke is UBER funny because 1. They made it up. 2. This one time a cast member at Disney World asked me “Why do they call all Deborah’s Deb? Why not just Brah?” Cue hysterical tween laughter and here we are years later, left behind – like the discarded “brah” I am.
Let’s just say we’re going to be The TRUTH about Motherhood 2.0 Life perspective through mom goggles from conception to college and beyond. Because, ladies, ( come in closer so you can hear this) its. Not.just.about.them! YOU MATTER TOO! This is going to be my ME Era.
What does that mean for the blog? We’re shifting towards sharing more about where we are now ( a mother fucking motherhood cross roads, in case you’re wondering.) Who am I? Where am I? What in the ever loving shit am I supposed to do with all this motherhood to give and no “children” who need mothered?
It feels like I’ve been sent to the benches— by my own kids, no less ( the fruit of my womb). Retired. Expired.
What am I supposed to do with all of this fucking “me” time? I haven’t had “me” time since 2005! Wait, no, that’s wrong. I haven’t had “Me time” since that 1 month in 1997 when I was single and lived alone.
ONE WHOLE MONTH.
This is my mom life transition and I’ve chosen growth and evolution because apparently, revolting is frowned upon. Unfortunately, that may be easier said than done because I don’t believe that my ADHD brain was built for boredom ( or letting go). I wish people would stop talking to me about empty nest syndrome. Hopefully, my object permanence swoops in and saves the day.
Ladies, we’re still young. I’ve got at least 53 more lives to live. I need a new purpose and to get back to ME ( the unfiltered original — yes, believe it or not, I have been using my inside voice all of these years) the woman I was before the Big Guy and our girls came along. Where the fawk is she? What happened to her? Did I leave her at Purdue? Maybe I lost her somewhere on vacation? Nope, I’m still here buried beneath the rubble of years of martyrdom and servitude.
I set the bar so high for myself in everything I did in life that I only ever felt like I was failing. I realize now that I wasn’t failing; I was doing my best ( and according to my husband, that’s better than most).
It only took 26 years of marriage, 20 years of motherhood, perimenopause, my impending induction into the “coolest mom ever”( according to my teenager who wanted Starbys) parenting hall of shame, zero fucks left to be given and my headfirst deep dive into my dreaded season of letting go.
I can see the headlines now, “Training Wheels Mom Exchanges Her Wheels for a Launching Pad, Dies in the Process”
Oopsie, I guess today’s Throat Punch Thursday post will be going live later today. Stay tuned. And, now that I’m back, remember to subscribe for more straight up truths about navigating this next beautiful season of motherhood/ womanhood/sisterhood. Time to step into our power, bruh! We ride at dawn.
This is part of a sponsored campaign with DiMe Media and Coca-Cola but all opinions expressed about my mother are my own.
In a Latino home, Papi may be el Rey but Mami is the glue that keeps the kingdom together. The women in the family are the caretakers; the nurturers and we all stick together. My daughters love their grandma and their aunts, almost as much as they love me and vice versa. There is a special bond between children and the women who nurture them, whether it is their biological mother or the mother figure that helps raise them. The bond is the same.
The most important person to any child is his “Mama”. That relationship is inseparable. No matter how you look at it, the love shared between a mother and her child is amazing; an amplification of the miracle of motherhood. It is the embodiment of true and unconditional love.
Unfortunately, eventually children grow up and move away. That’s what we work so hard for, to make them strong, independent adults who want to go out and explore the world. Of course, it hurts a little bit being left behind so we live for those special occasions when we know our children will call, like Mother’s Day. But what if the only thing that stood between us and our children or us and our own mother’s for that matter was distance? Would we let that stop us? What if we had no choice?
What better day to let mom know how truly special and inspirational she is than on Mother’s Day? I am lucky, my mom only lives a couple hours away but some people’s mothers live across the country or even in another country. I know a little bit about that too, my father lives in Mexico 8 months of the year. It’s hard when someone you love is so far away and even harder when it’s so expensive to call another country on a landline.
Remember those old Coca Cola commercials about having a Coke and a smile? Buying the world a coke and keeping it company? Coke cares about people and this year to make us happy; Coke is helping us keep our Moms happy on Mother’s day by calling her.
Coca Cola is making it possible for everyone to speak to their mama on Mother’s Day for free! FREE!! Coca Cola wants to make sure that you and your mother are #Inseparable
Here is how it works:
Once you watch the Mother’s Day video you will be prompted to input your DOB (Date of Birth), phone number and your mother’s phone number. A California number calls the user, they pick up and it begins calling their mom. The mom also will see a California number.
This year, my youngest daughter decided that she wanted to try something new and she doesn’t want to dance anymore… for now. She wanted to try cheerleading. She’s been dancing since she was 2-years-old. I started to feel her pulling away from dance last year. I tried to resist. If you could see her do ballet, she is a natural; graceful and refined but she longs for something different.
She’s trying to escape the shadow of her sister and is tired of being referred to by most as simply, “Little Bella”. At school, everyone constantly compares her to her big sister. They mistake the 2 of them all the time. They call her by her sister’s name. People have asked if they are twins, despite the fact that they are 2 years apart and look very different and have even more different personalities. I don’t see it. I never have. I see Bella and I see Gabi.
But Gabi has been feeling dwarfed by her big sister’s shadow. I was the big sister so I don’t know exactly how this feels. But I am sympathetic to her challenge.
Bella in the past 2 years has been diving head first into the deep end of ballet. She loves it and she wants to move forward. She’s in the youth company and she’s dedicated to the point where she has dropped every other extra-curricular activity that she was involved in. Bella knows that ballet is a sacrifice but she doesn’t mind.
Last year, Gabs wanted to do the same. Well, she wanted to be with her big sister. She joined the company and she was there a lot of hours for a ten-year-old. I was afraid it would overwhelm her. Yet, in the deepest recesses of my heart, I had daydreams of the two of them dancing Russian in Nutcracker together. I know it sounds stupid.
By the middle of last year, Gabi was overwhelmed and she quit the company before the 3rd production. I had to let her because she’s the one doing all the work but it hurt. It wasn’t what I had seen for her future. I know ballet is not forever for them but I really wanted to see them perform together on stage.
Then this summer, she told me that she was not doing Youth company and she wasn’t sure that she even wanted to dance. She wanted to cheer with her friends. Bella used to cheer but she’s always been more of a ballerina than a cheerleader. There is a big difference. Both take a lot of work but it’s different.
Anyways, Gabs told me that she was only going to do 1 of her recommended 3 classes and she was going to do pointe and tap. I knew, in my heart, this was letting go. She had one foot in each world. I’ve been watching her cheer and she loves it. Whether it is being with her friends or just the freedom to be loud and unrestrained, she seems happier. She looks like she can finally exhale.
But she is such an amazing dancer. She is one of those people with so much natural rhythm and grace that it is almost a shame to not dance. She is one of the most beautiful dancers I’ve ever seen. Her lines are exquisite. Plus, when you are dancing, you are the star. Even when you are part of the corps, you are still dancing in a spotlight. Cheerleading is being the support for a team. It’s being the woman behind the man and that makes me cringe, just a little bit. But she lights up.
She was doing both. In fact, she insisted that she audition for the Nutcracker this year when I was sure that she would want to sit this one out. She cheers at games a couple times a week and then there is practice plus her dance classes. But she was adamant about auditioning.
Recently, the cast list went up and when she saw that she was assigned a part that she has done twice previously, one that she did not do last year because she had leveled up, she was heartbroken and there was nothing I could do.
I tried to explain to her tiny heart broken into a million tiny pieces that when you straddle too many worlds you do them all disservice. You can’t give half the effort and expect twice the results. You have to give the dedication and hard work to move forward; to move up. It’s so hard to explain this concept to someone so young.
After a long, long cry she came to me and told me, very maturely, that she doesn’t want to dance anymore for now. She feels overwhelmed doing cheer and ballet because both schedules are demanding.
On the inside, my heart was breaking because I feel like she is making a mistake. I feel like she has a gift for ballet and she is throwing an opportunity away but then I remind myself, it is her gift to do with what she may. I can’t force her to do the work and I don’t want to make her hate it.
So, I told her that she can take the year off. She will still be doing barre work and bands at home and at the end of the school year, we will reassess. Maybe she’ll realize that she misses performing and dancing. Maybe she will be glad to have it off of her plate but either way, I will always be here to support her and love her.
But, in my mamma heart, I still have big dreams of my girls dancing Russian together on the stage together. For now, you can find me on the football field cheering on the cheerleaders, at the ballet cheering on my ballerina and at home telling them both that they can be anything they are willing to work hard for and nothing worth having is free. I’ll keep leading by example and hope that’s enough.
Either way, it’s not about me. It’s about them. My hope is to raise good, hardworking, honest, self-confident girls who feel like they can come to me and talk about everything when they need to. I will listen and try not to judge. Make good choices girls but also, I will be here to guide you because that’s what moms do…even when we’re letting you choose. We let go, even when we want to hold on tighter.
The bottom line is we can’t force our children to do anything that doesn’t bring them joy and expect them to excel at it. They have to do the work and we have to respect that. But we can hope.
What have you had to let go of and let your child make the decision for themselves?
Before we had children, the Big Guy and I were all about Halloween. It was all about the haunted houses, getting the cream filling scared right out of us, picking out a cute costume and having a great party to celebrate.It was always over the top and spooky and we loved it.We lived for it.
Halloween 2008
Now things are different. Now, we have our girls. Halloween is all about dressing up like your favorite story book character, walking around the neighborhood and hearing people ooh and ahh over our girls as they tell them “Here, you’re so cute. Take a couple more pieces!”I find it quite hilarious. I told my husband last night, this whole being cute making life easier thing starts early in life.I’d never noticed before. I couldn’t believe how many houses the girls went up to and some elderly gentleman ( Grandpa like) or Daddy type would tell my girls to take an extra helping from the goodie basket. Really, maybe I was over analyzing the whole thing, maybe it was my sickness impeding my senses but we tell our kids not to talk to strangers. We raise them to never take candy from strangers. I try to raise my daughters to know that their worth as a being has nothing to do with the way they look.Yet, we go out on Halloween trick or treating..begging for candy from strangers.Cohorting with strange adults for candy.Smiling and kowtowing for a piece of candy. Then on top of all these mixed messages, they are actually being given more candy simply for being cute.I guess this is where it all begins. This is where little girls learn that being attractive makes life easier for you; that it makes the world respond to you in a more attentive way.
Halloween 2009
What kind of message am I sending to my girls? I’m sure this went on when I was a kid too but I didn’t pay attention because I WAS the kid.I was just ecstatic to get the candy.I didn’t think of mixed messages or talking to pedophiles but now all that comes flooding to my brain when I think about my girls.Funny how, my biggest concern at Halloween was razor blades in apples and cyanide ridden popcorn balls ( remember, Mom used to toss those things directly into the garbage?)now I have to consider pedophiles, non politically correct feminist squashing candy tactics, and how to explain how it is wrong to talk to strangers ever..except for on Halloween night.Life was so much simpler when my biggest worry was whether or not I would get scared enough.Then, I had children and what scares me the most is that the worrying will never cease. Having your heart walk around outside your body is hard work.Happy Halloween!
Seems lately, I have been spending a majority of my life in a never ending holding pattern. Think about that for a moment. Really think about it.Not moving forward, not achieving anything….just holding steady; making noise. On but not functioning. I think a lot of moms feel this way sometimes. Like you are not living up to your potential but at the same time, you are doing everything you can to get by. Using ALL of your effort, just to get through a day. Well, now take that and multiply it by about a 1000 and you will be closer to the place I have been for the past few months. It’s starting to take its toll on me. I can feel myself slowly becoming weaker ; more vulnerable. On some days I feel like I’m walking around my life like an exposed nerve. Just waiting for the slightest breeze of change to send me into a tailspin. I feel like a broken record ,s o if you feel you’ve heard it before..walk away now.
Many of you are familiar with the situation that has consumed our lives for the past year and a half. There was May 2009, January 2010, and Now; life has been really rough with all this going on. I have been trying to hold it all together with minimal meltdowns and a stiff upper lip. It’s not always so easy. It’s very hard to run a household, take care of the children, pay the bills, run all the errands and keep the schedule with no respite; no help whatsoever. But it is much harder when you have a husband that you are happily married to but, due to circumstances beyond your or his control, he is not there. It makes me angry to know that I did all the leg work to have this marriage but I receive none of the benefits. We’re not divorced, we truly do love one another, he’s my best friend, he’s a good father, and thanks to our economy he is pulled away from us. I think it’s a completely different feeling than if I were a single Mother or we were divorced because its like having money and not being allowed to spend it versus just not having the money. It’s sort of like that you don’t miss what you never had. Well, I had have it, but I don’t have access. Which is possibly the most frustrating scenario ever.
Anyways, aside from all the other craziness, now we are getting ready for school to start. My eldest baby ( yes, she is still my baby) is getting ready to start kindergarten on the 19th. This will be a difficult day for me. I know this.Exposed nerve alert! Just the thought of that impending doom makes me tear up. It’s very emotional to let your child take that first step into growing up. It’s bigger than any first step thus far, at least that is how my heart is feeling right now. Due to this situation we are in, I am not sure that my husband is going to make it to the first day. It’s our first child’s , first day of kindergarten! You know, the first day of the rest of her life. This day will never come again. I feel that it is crucial that he is there, for all of us.He has missed a lot these past few months because of his job and I think this is unmissable; not just for her but for him, as well. So, to catch you up to speed; Mommy is in an emotional state of an exposed nerve; eldest girl is nervous about kindergarten and new school and her life completely changing; little sister will have a breakdown ( On the first day of her sister’s preschool, she screamed and cried as we left “BELLA!BELLA!” ( Just imagine Brando saying “Stella” but in the voice of a distraught 2 year old.) and me..trying to hold it all together. I don’t want to do this alone. I shouldn’t have to. This has me filled with trepidation and sadness. Is it wrong for me to want my family to be able to cohabitate like a normal family? Is it wrong to want my husband around for support? I mean, I don’t want to be a pain in the ass but when is it going to end? It all just keeps getting piled on! So, this is where I am..an exposed nerve.
Then, good news..great news. He’s been interviewing for about a month ( yes, you heard me right) with a company that would put him in a position that he would love. We get the call, with an offer that is acceptable. Great news, in theory. It means yet another move. It means its too late to get into a good school at this late of a date. It means having to try and sell our house (nobody buys in the Midwest after Labor Day) meaning we are screwed until next spring. It means finding all new schools, it means finding new doctors, dentists, ballet schools, friends and the list goes on and on. It really is good news but we can’t move until the house sells. What does all this mean? It means my husband got a great new job at a horrible time of the year for putting our house on the market, it means the taste in my mouth from trying to sell it last year on our previous move is still fresh in my mind and it scares the hell out of me, it means I’m still alone until at least next spring. I am trying to be positive and hold it all together but its hard when you’re an exposed nerve and there is no relief in immediate sight. Nobody ..NOBODY understands how this feels, unless they’ve been in this position ( for this long) and I don’t know too many people who have been in a holding pattern for this long. I know, in my mind, that when it is all said and done we will be in a much better position in our lives but the hard part is trying to survive the meantime. I deserve to be moving forward in my life,with my children, with my husband, with my dreams..not holding steady; holding on for dear life. I want to enjoy my life not just survive it. I think I can, I think I can….
My feeds are full of the news of the sudden death by suicide of Stephen “tWitch” Boss. Everyone is shocked that he’s dead. It’s a travesty. Simultaneously, the world is knocked off its axis by the idea that a seemingly happy man/father/husband/celebrity who appeared to be living his “best life” with everything to look forward to, in fact, committed suicide.
But, I’m not shocked that anyone commits suicide anymore. Life is hard. Many of us contemplate it, some of us go as far as to meticulously plan it, still others attempt and too many succeed. As someone with Bipolar 1 disorder, I’ve become intimately aware of the statistics that 20-60% of all people diagnosed with bipolar will attempt suicide at least once in their life and 4-19% will succeed.
Depression does not discriminate. It gives no fucks about what you or anyone else thinks your life should feel like. Mental illness doesn’t care how wealthy you are or how charismatic you are. It strikes and it’s a cruel, clingy and unjust bitch. Once she has her greedy hold on you, she doesn’t want to let go. Wave after wave of sadness, grief and melancholy battering every inch or your heart, soul and body. It’s no wonder we start to drown in the seas of sadness. Survival is not guaranteed. Only by the grace of the universe, holding on for literal “dear life” determination and the support system to keep fighting through immeasurable pain, self-doubt, loathing and loneliness until the storm passes do we get to see another day.
To the outside world, Boss seemed like a man who had everything; a beautiful wife and 3 lovely children, a loving marriage and a career that was glowing up in all the best ways. He looked his happiest when he was with his family. He literally seemed to radiate from within. However, the truth is that we have no idea what was really going on in his heart and his head. He was beloved on the internet for his big personality, devotion to his family and all the good he brought to the online world. He was someone we needed; he was light. But even the most optimistic person has worries and weight. Most importantly, who did he see in the mirror? How did he feel in his own skin? Who was the real him to tWitch? The public is left bewildered and maybe even a little scared because if “it” could happen to him, it can happen to anyone, right? I feel this deeply because I’ve been on the precipice of eternal darkness before and it’s a terrifying and out-of-control place to be.
In my weakest moments as an adolescent, I spend many hours lying awake in the night, quietly full of despair silently sobbing into a pillow because I felt trapped in an inescapable hell, completely and utterly alone. Part of me wanted to disappear and another part of me wanted to be noticed and saved but that other part wanted to cease to exist and quietly float off into the ether. I wanted the peace that could only be found alone in the silence and darkness. These were my constant, ever-pervading thoughts throughout my early teens my early 20s.
But if you were to ask 99%of the people who knew me then, they would describe me with words like “nice,” “sweet”, “smart”, and “FUN” (yep, bipolar mania, professional and consummate compartmentalizer skills), and “funny”. I laugh a lot and I like to make others laugh even when inside, I’m falling apart. I’m one of those people who always holds it together; the deeper the pain, the quieter I get about it, and the less I scream and yell about it. I retreat into myself. I hide in plain sight. If you know, you certainly know what I’m talking about. Feeling sad sometimes feels shameful because where the hell do I get off feeling sorry for myself when so many others have it so much worse? That’s what I told myself.
In high school, I was the smart, quiet “girl next door”, the “most likely to succeed” type. I got up, went to school, did my best, and got through my days pretending to be happy and good-natured; friend to everyone. I was the type that teachers and other people’s parents loved. But my thoughts were dark. I was sad, scared, anxious and angry. No one knew what was going on at home. I never told them. I was ashamed. At home, I was the victim of physical and emotional abuse from an alcoholic father. Every moment, of every day was erratic and school was my solace. From 8-3 pm every day, I was safe. I was normal.
By the time I got to college, I had become comfortable with pretending. I was on my own for the first time in my life, I was away from my boyfriend and friends, everything was new and overwhelming. I felt out of control. In the beginning, I was scared and felt swallowed up whole by the experience but then I just let go or rather I broke under all the weight of bending. Let me explain, I pretended to be care-free. I pretended to be cool with a lot of things I wasn’t. I pretended that being completely alone in a new place, wasn’t scaring me to death. I pretended that waking up with a guy (I thought was a “friend”) on top of me, slithering off like a thief in the night while I slept…never happened. I pretended that I was tougher than I was. I pretended to be happy. I pretended to be the life of the party. None of that was true. It was quite the opposite.
What the world saw was not me. It was some version of me. She was the only reason I survived. She was the fake it until you make it Debi. Or maybe I was the push it til you break it Debi. Around this time, my eating disorders kicked into high gear. At one point it was so bad that I was consuming roughly 200-300 calories a day while purging (without the binging) sometimes up to as many as 10 times in any given 24-hour period. I felt trapped inside my own body and mind. Never free to be the real me. No. I couldn’t handle that rejection.
In those days, I survived on 3-5 hours of sleep a night, worked full-time, went to school full-time 1.5 hours away from where I lived and had to drive back and forth every day and still maintained a boyfriend and robust social life. I lived like a frat boy, drinking into the early hours of the morning, satiating my id and sleeping on the sofa at my best guy friend’s house. Pretending to be okay. No one met the real me then.
There was a Debi for school, one for work, another for the boyfriend, one who pretended to fearlessly sleep on the sofa of a house full of guys, and even one more Debi for nightlife. I felt like a little girl playing dress-up. I was not ready for any of this. The time I was the most myself was in the 3 hours I was in the car alone, blaring Alanis Morrisette and Mazzy Star, singing at the top of my lungs. No one knew me. I was a lot of people for a lot of people but I was almost never “me”.
I was tortured but when I was doing what I needed to do, when I was chin-upping it I could avoid reality and the reality was that I wanted to die. Living was too painful. Breathing was a chore. Slipping on and off personalities like comfortable coats was exhausting.
It felt like everyone wanted a piece of me but only the palatable pieces. No one wanted or cared enough to move past the “me” that they needed to really see the “Me” that I actually was. This explains how the body dysmorphia got so bad. My therapist once told me that my perception of myself is so skewed that I can never trust my own eyes to know what I really look like. So, the cost of the chameleon life I led, straddling reality and pretending to be everything to everyone is that I no longer get to see the real me. I’m gone, vanished from my own sight.
As you may surmise from the previous paragraphs, I was chronically and acutely depressed with suicidal ideation and I had a plan. I even had the opportunity and motive. My point is that to the outside world and even to those closest to me, I seemed okay. Some people even called me the life of the party. I was good at hiding the darkness. I was great at pretending to be happy and go lucky when inside I was breaking. I compartmentalized my life in such a definitive way that I built a fortress around my innermost me that cut myself off from everyone and everything I loved. I lost my joy. Even when I was smiling, I was probably actively planning how, when, and where I was going to give myself over to that eternal quiet darkness that I was longing for. I was done but I couldn’t share that part of me with anyone. I didn’t want them to console or stop me. At the time, I felt like there was no way out and I was destined to a fate of pretending to be alternate versions of myself to be loved by others. The burden was too heavy but I wore it like a dress with pockets and no one seemed to notice the gravity of it all.
In the end, we see what we want to see. We choose to believe that some people have it better than others. It’s the lie we tell ourselves to help us make it through the days. To be fair, we only see what people allow us to see of themselves and they only see what we give them access to of ourselves. In a world built on flawless filters where people are so busy that they seldom look up from their screens to see a sunset, how can any of us be expected to check in on our friends who seem to be okay? Or worse the ones who seem to be good? And that, my friends, is the problem.
We live in a world where we don’t have the time or bandwidth to care about others the way that we’d like to believe we do. We’re a society saturated in our own woes and even when we want to, it can seem futile. But we put on our brave and happy faces and we soldier on until we can no longer endure.
I don’t know what happened Monday to trigger and escalate the situation for Boss. I don’t know what his “no longer can endure” breaking point but I know the pain it feels to be there in the thick of it. I know the sorrow and thick melancholy that makes it hard to breathe and even harder to live. My heart goes out to Boss and his family. It breaks my heart to think of how alone and desperate he must have felt in those final moments when no longer existing seemed the only option.
People always want to know how and why someone could do such a thing, especially when they seem to have it all. The thing is “having it all” is worthless when you feel completely alone and unworthy of your blessings; when you hurt so much that you can’t even find joy in the things that used to make you profoundly happy; you can’t function normally under the heaviness of the sadness. You begin to doubt the point of your existence and wonder if removing yourself might actually be better for your family and friends. I’ve been there and now; my daughter is there. Sometimes, I think I survived just for this moment. I’ve been on both sides of the darkness as someone’s child and now, as the parent of someone mired in the darkness and it’s worse than you can imagine.
If you or someone you know is feeling alone in the darkness, having suicidal ideation and/or making a plan, reach out for help. You are not alone. There are so many of us who have survived. There is no switch to turn or pill to take to be all better. It’s painful to survive BUT it’s worth it. Take it day by day, hour by hour or even minute by minute. The pain seems unbearable and the crisis unsurmountable when you look at the big picture, so look for the tiny moments to get you through to the next.
If you’re in the United States, you can call the suicide and crisis lifeline at 988, available in Spanish and English language, 24 hours a day. Someone is always there to listen. You are worth saving. You matter.
