As you can see (if you were logged on last night before I wiped the offending post from my blog), I wasn't lying when I told you I've been experiencing a rage problem in recent months (years). Rage is a new thing for me. Generally speaking, I'm an optimistic, energetic, happy person, and I also tend to be very accommodating and non-confrontational. 

Over the past year and a half or so my rage has taken the form of depression. People say that all the time..."sadness is just anger turned inward." I must say I had no idea what they were nattering on about until I began to experience my rage/depression cycle. Recently I've begun to be aware of the very moment when rage turns to sadness.

It happens like this:

(1) I rage out internally (in or out of proportion to the situation at hand? I don't know. Good question. What is proportional, really? That's an "I Am The Walrus" question, right there. That's a question fit for @plantinthewindow. Perhaps he will see this tag and write me a poem about rage and proportionality).

(2) I give very small vent to my rage, either online or to friends or family not the object of my rage

(3) I feel guilty and ashamed for feeling rage when I should feel lucky and grateful all the time

(4) I conclude nothing can be done about my rage and it's all my own fault anyway, and then I grow sad, and then the next day I wake up thinking, "I hate myself, I'm a terrible person."

This is one of the reasons I decided to seek therapy. I figured the therapist might know what a person should do after Step 1 to avoid endlessly repeating Steps 2, 3 and 4.

Unfortunately, the therapist keeps trying to medicate me.

You probably know (if you regularly read my blog) that I'm not opposed to medication in any way, form or fashion. Our family relies on medications of various types and styles for all kinds of ailments, and I also regularly ingest caffeine and alcohol.

But I don't particularly want to medicate my rage.

Instead, I would like to stop experiencing rage. Or, failing that, I would like to figure out how to dispel it without dragging all my friends through the muck and/or feeling guilt and shame about it afterwards.

Recently I told my husband I felt I should be more assertive in our marriage, and he nearly fell out of his chair laughing, bitterly. I take his point. I'm pretty assertive. (see: above where I said I'm energetic and happy and optimistic, which translates into steamrolling over people on a daily basis).

Nevertheless, I think I am not assertive when it comes to expressing anger or dissatisfaction or discontentment. I think I tend to figure it's not worth a fight and let it go. I'm this way in most situations. (see: above where I said I'm non-confrontational).

Last night I raged out on my blog and then texted my husband and told him how I felt (for several hours over the cell phone which sadly interfered with his plans). I do not feel guilty or ashamed this morning. In fact, I feel pretty happy and optimistic this morning. I feel a tiny bit guilty because I know it made him unhappy, but overall I feel much better.

Yet at the same time, nothing has actually changed. Everything is the same. Why torture him with my rage when nothing can be changed and everything ends up the same anyway? If I can eat the rage and live with the depression, won't we be happier as a couple?

Does that seem a little nuts?

Welcome to my world.

I've been taking some bulls by the horns lately and I'm feeling pretty good about it. It doesn't hurt that school is finally winding down and they are running out of things to ask me to do. After all, it's a long weekend this weekend. I'm going to entertain the brood with sleeping in, going to the beach, going to my mother's house for steaks on the grill and swimming, and sleeping in. And sleeping in. And maybe some cartoons and video games.

In the meantime, my anti-standardized testing crusade is moving, and I'm going to be busy with it soon enough. I'm pretty excited about it. Already I have a cursory research assignment which I think I can complete with relative competence. In fact, off the top of my head I think I know some of the answers. Or at least, some of the theories.

My prospective business is humming along, too. Got some ideas, contacts, advice, etcetera. Will I follow through? I was pretty far down the gluten-free bakery road, not so long ago, and nearly did it. What stopped me? Well, two things, really: (1) financing looked steep, for a start-up; and (2) bakery hours are hard hours to reconcile with young children. I never really let go of my enthusiasm for having my own practice/business, though, and while I enjoy my criminal practice I want something more...entrepreneurial. This advocacy thing might be the answer. Start-up costs are almost non-existent; legal advice I can get almost for free; I know someone who is looking to refer a bunch of business to someone; and it isn't too many steps away from what I already do re: my law practice. Don't have to buy any ovens. Don't have to rent a storefront. Don't even really need an office, because I can steal/buy conference room time from my law friends.

A woman in the area started a gluten-free bakery shortly after I abandoned my idea. At first I was jealous, but over time I've come to realize I'm glad as hell it's her and not me. It's hard work, running a bakery, and it involves lots and lots of baking.

I know how to bake gluten-free but I can't say I love to bake gluten-free. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't love it day in and day out, all the time, and fifty thousand more times over every holiday.

So it's good I didn't open a gluten-free bakery (and now there is one where I can buy stuff) but I still need to work. Working is inspirational for me. I feel...energized...when I'm meeting with people outside of mom/kid world. It makes it easier to write 1000 words a day. My novel is...well...it's a work of art. I don't know yet whether it's a complete piece of crap or a genuine work of genius. Only time will tell.  I continue to get regularly rejected for story publication, so that's good.

Recently I've been reading "The Conflict: How Modern Motherhood Undermines the Status of Women," along with a variety of other things, and as I've been slowly making my way through it I've increasingly been struck with the realization that I don't particularly want a man's job. Men's jobs kinda suck, really, what with the utter inflexibility and all the misogynistic assholes everywhere, making comments about what you wear and circulating porn in the office. Instead, I want a completely new kind of career, a Renaissance Woman career, made up of paid appellate work, advocacy, novel-writing, policy research and baking. 

Just kidding. No baking.

As my husband repeatedly reminds me, I don't have to worry about money, because he's doing that. I just have to bend the mom world to my will.

How hard can that be?!

The brood and I are taking a mini-trip very soon and then we are turning it into a maxi-trip by going to see Mr. OBL for several days. I'm looking forward to it. I miss him. Being apart has been very clarifying for me. I have a better idea of the ways in which I'm holding myself back versus the ways in which I'm allowing his comfort zones to hold me back. When you've lived together for seventeen years those things can begin to merge and become indistinguishable. Unsurprisingly, the majority of ways in which I'm held back seem to be coming from me. 

How upsetting.

But also, how comforting. 

It's hard work, helping each other through life, trying to help each other realize dreams while trying to realize your own. Particularly if one of you has an....um...unconventional...view of life.

Most of my life I've been comfortable, without need for food or drink or warmth or sleep.

When I'm deprived in my life, it's usually sleep I'm denied.

Today I did nothing, I said, and it's true, I did nothing. I sat and I read a book, propped up on coffee, dreading the long afternoon...which is becoming a long evening...

I should have slept, but I needed the coffee to get through the morning, and I don't crash from the coffee until 1:30 p.m. It's too late to sleep then.

My daughter can't sleep by herself when my husband is gone. He's been gone since April 9. Does he come on weekends, people ask? No, he doesn't come home on weekends. Will he be home soon? No, he won't be home soon. My daughter shuffled into my bedroom at 12:30 this morning, crying, wanting to get into my bed. I had just drifted off to sleep...finally...

She was warm and restless, sleeping beside me, tossing and turning, and I slept lightly, or maybe not much, reaching out to check her for fever or tears or maybe vomit...just in case...because you never know, when you have a young child in your bed what might happen.

To the pharmacy to pick up the photos for the memory books...and the house to meet the kids...and the pool party...and the dance practice...and now out to dinner, because I'm too tired to cook, but I'm too tired to go out, too.

Once in a blue moon I've been deprived of food or water or sleep or warmth for a brief time. It's funny how everything else recedes into the background, unimportant. All that remains is the need. Immediate things are immediate. It reminds me how completely vulnerable we are. Our batteries don't stay charged very long. We're like iPhones with too many apps...useless without near-constant recharge.

Tomorrow doesn't seem quite as busy but even the small things are beginning to seem big. Put the dog food in the dog bowl. Run the dishwasher. Wash the clothes. Take a shower. Rub shampoo in my head...eh, that sounds hard. Maybe not today. Find clean underwear. Fill up the gas tank. Find something to feed the children...again. Man, those kids eat a lot. Sign the agenda. Check the calendar.

I'm running on essential functions only, at this point. In the back of my mind I know there are second order things I should be attending to, things like work and correspondence and bills and oil changes. I'm on essential functions only right now though. Can't be worried about anything that isn't strictly required for basic survival and average parenting.

Not strictly essential. I'm still doing a lot of things that aren't eating, drinking, sleeping and keeping myself warm (or cool). I'm not sure how much longer I can keep doing the additional things.

Ah, it's not that bad. I'm just tired. Newborn tired. Dead, dog, can't sleep tired.