This will be my final post on this blog. This fall, I will be receiving the rights to my book back and I have decided to cease any further publication.

I am doing this for a couple of reasons: the book has served its purpose for me allowing me to close the chapter on a very difficult time in my life; however, in my own healing I have hurt people I once loved. That was never my intention.

By no means am I referring to my estranged family members. As far as my sister and father are concerned, our relationship was already built on a house of cards and its destruction was inevitable…book or not.

I leave you all with this thought: you will never find happiness in seeking the approval of others, you can only achieve true happiness in finding approval with yourself.

Don’t let a religion, or a family member, or a group of popular girls, or the boy you love have that kind of power over you. I am moving on to bigger and better things. My first two fictional novels will be published next year. I have two more waiting in the wings. These books will be published under my married name–a new beginning for all of us.

One more thing…(and most of you will not understand this)

I will be by your side if ever you fall,

Deep in the dead of night, if ever you call.

And I won’t change my mind.

No I’ll see you through.

And I won’t give up…

No I won’t give up…

Oh I won’t give up…

On you.

–Jana Kramer

My definition is quite a bit different: a family is a group of people who accept you for who you are, love you even when you are unloveable, and stand beside you through the good and the bad.

To be quite honest, my family is hardly related to me by biology. In fact, other than my children, I only have one person left in my life that would be defined by the dictionary as my family. I do, however, have a childhood friend who I consider to be my sister. My mother’s best friend growing up I call “my other mother” and her husband has been a father figure to me in the past several years.  I have a family–and I think it’s time that the dictionary changed the definition.

I have been thinking about family a lot lately. Life is ever-changing and if I could add a footnote to my book, I would say that the final chapter in my book was not the end of the story. I said in my book that I will never be too old to need a father, but as it turns out even though that may be true, my father didn’t want to be in my life after all. As a parent and witnessing what true fatherhood looks like through the examples of my husband and even in the example of my ex-husband, I was finally able to see that my mother was indeed right all those years when she told me that my father didn’t want the responsibility of being a father. That is why he left and I am no longer hiding from it or feeling badly about it. Men leave…fathers walk away from their children….and so do mothers. I am lucky that my mother chose to stay when my father left. Either way, I am not responsible for my father not wanting to be my dad. I will not feel guilty for something that I cannot change. I did nothing wrong.

I was a child and he was the parent…but that does not make us a family.

Please don’t think I am angry with my dad, because I am not. Some men aren’t cut out to be dads. Some women aren’t cut out to be moms either. But I am lucky to have had children with two men who want nothing more than to be dedicated, loving dads to their children. At least I did something right there, right?

Going off on a slightly different direction…but one that is still relevant, this week I had dinner with a man who was supposed to be my brother-in-law. He was supposed to be a part of my family, yet twenty-four years ago he disappeared from my life. I was surprised to hear all of the things he remembered about his engagement to my sister and his memories of me. I had blocked most of it out and it made me a little bit sad to think about how life might have been different if things had worked out all those years ago. The kids he spoke of whom I’ve never met, should have been my neices and nephews. And…he should have been an uncle to my children. I know that life works out the way it’s supposed to, but it was still a bit sad to think about “what if?”

It also got me thinking that if he had been my big brother back then, would that have made a difference in my life? I would have been at a wedding in Montana and Idaho that summer in 1987 and probably would have never met Raul. Would things have turned out differently?

What would my family look like today?

So…I ask this question of all of you: what is your definition of a family? Who are they to you?

I am excited to hear what you all have to say.

I will be at the Northern Arizona Festival of Books in Flagstaff, AZ next Saturday, April 16th. If you are in the area, I hope you will stop by and say hi. I regret to let you all know that I will not be in attendance at this event. I apologize for any inconvenience. If you would like to purchase a signed copy of my book you may do so at the following link on Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/1585011207/ref=dp_olp_new?ie=UTF8&qid=1302644665&sr=8-1&condition=new (Purchase from Sisterexmo).

I have had a very busy Spring so far. I am teaching about twelve classes right now and just finished up the edits on my fourth book. I have very little time for blogging but I hope you will check back often because the semester is almost over and I have lots to share.

Recently, I went to New Beginnings with my daughter at the church….and surprisingly, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. The church is still standing, so that says a lot.

Take care everyone and I hope to see you next week in Flagstaff!

I had a great time at the Tucson Festival of Books. I signed some books and got to meet a lot of other great authors! It was a good day!

I will be at the Northern Arizona Book Festival on April 16th. Hope to see you there!

I would be remiss this week if I didn’t write about the events that have happened in my own back yard. The shooting in Tucson was preceded by a shooting at the Chandler Mall. This is my mall…this is where I take my kids shopping…this is where I get my nails done and where we go to the movies. In fact, that morning I had decided at the last minute to put off getting my nails done or else I would have been there.

I posted on Facebook that I would love to get locked in the mall…I was trying to make light of a situation where no one got hurt and the cops got their man.

However, just a few short days later a crazy young man opens fire on a crowd of people. In what world is that okay? In what world is killing a nine-year-old girl as well as a judge and several people in the twilight of their life an acceptable thing to do?

I will tell you in what world…our world.

We are a world who watches people beat the crap out of each other for sport–pick your sport: boxing, WWE Smackdown, UFC, and the like. We condone violence against women every time we buy movie tickets to films like Law Abiding Citizen or Last House on the Left. Since when is raping a woman entertainment? We pick up a game controller and enter a world where stealing cars and shooting police officers is sport and tell ourselves that it’s okay because “it’s just a game.”

We put people like Michael Vick in federal prison for dog fighting but laugh as we watch Snookie and her pals pull each other’s extensions out on The Jersey Shore.

What on earth have we done?

The world can hate Jared Lee Loughner all we want, but we need to take a good long look in the mirror and ask ourselves who created people like him?

I have your answer….we created Jared Lee Loughner.

The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to stand by and do nothing.

I will admit that it’s nice to have it finished. I have been working on it for almost a year and have restructured it several times. On the other hand, sometimes it’s difficult to come to the end of a book because I get attached to the characters and when I am done, essentially it’s like saying goodbye. I know that sounds weird but I know I’m not the only one who feels this way. J.K. Rowling said she had a very difficult time saying goodbye to Harry at the end of the Harry Potter series.

But back to my book…it is a sense of accomplishment to have it finished, even if it does need some editing. As Richard Castle tweeted: you can’t edit a blank page.

My fourth book is essentially about choices and how they can change our entire life.

Coming to the end of this story…I got to thinking. If I could go back and change one thing in my life it would be? And furthermore, if I could have one person that I have lost back in my life, who would it be?

For me, the answers are intertwined. I would go back to July 28, 1988 and not sign the adoption papers and take my son home with me…no matter where that home was and no matter how difficult it might have ended up being. But I say that as a grown woman who has a home, a job, and other children now. If I had to go back to that scared seventeen-year-old who was completely alone, would I make the same decision again? I can’t say for sure. It’s easy to look back now and tell myself I could do it, but that’s because I’m capable now…was I capable back then?

It’s a selfish response…I get that.

And if I had a second mulligan in my life…well…that person knows who he/she is.

Now I pose the same question to you…if you would like to answer me or just think about it in your own mind…if you could change one decision in your life and/or have one person whom you have lost back, what would you do and who would it be?

I’m excited to hear your answers. Leave them as comments or feel free to email me.

See you all soon! I’m off to edit my fourth book!

My husband said that I must have made a new year’s resolution to be a “glass half full type of girl,” because I’m so optimistic right now but really I just feel very positive. I have a lot of positive energy and I plan on using it for the greater good!

2011 is going to be a good year….

I am almost finished with my fourth book. I have three chapters left to write and they will be the most difficult. In these final chapters, mother will meet son and son will meet mother. It’s difficult for me because I’ve envisioned the reunion with my own biological son countless times but life never works out the way we imagine it, does it?

No, this reunion needs to be imperfect…messy and tangled…just like real life.

If anything my own life is a testament to things not working out the way I planned and that is how I am determined to write.

Best wishes everyone…

Deb

I just wanted to check in and let you know that an excerpt from my book was recently printed in The Gila River Review.

Here is the link:

http://www.cgc.maricopa.edu/academic-affairs/humanities/GilaRiverReview/Pages/Enter.aspx

It’s in the non-fiction section.

Have a wonderful day!

I decided that I’m going to take a little time off from blogging–most likely through the end of the year. I think I need some R&R. I have been putting myself out there a lot lately–trying to find my purpose, asking for forgiveness, trying to say those things that needed to be said–and I’m wiped out. It’s time to take care of me for a little while.

Also, with everything going on I kind of feel like I got away from what I started out to do and it’s time I found my way back there: writing.

I’m going to be traveling to some of my favorite writing spots this winter–mainly the cabin in northern Arizona–in the hopes of finishing up my fourth book and beginning my fifth manuscript. My fictional books will most likely never get critical acclaim or win the Pulitzer, but what I do is take an event in my life and I work through it to the end. I have several open chapters in my life–the most prominent would be my son that I placed for adoption–I will most likely never see him again. Book #4, takes that situation and allows me to write my own ending. It may sound corny, but it’s very cathartic. I have stopped and started the book several times–pain, fear, and anger have thrown up blocks in my path–but I am now ready to finish it. I have come to terms with the fact that my first son is lost to me forever…and although I will never stop hoping and praying…it is time for me to let go of that dream.

I have lost a lot of dreams in my life…and realized a few I never knew I had.

On the professional front, my publisher is creating a website for my “Confessions…” book along with a blog and book trailer. I will also be traveling to several book fairs to do signings in the Spring of 2011. It should be very exciting. I will keep you all posted.

In the meantime, have a wonderful holiday season. Enjoy your friends and family during this time. Please make sure to tell those whom you love that you love them and how important they are to you. Don’t wait…don’t put it off…even if it’s scary or foreign to you, tell them.

See you all very soon.

It’s Friday night and I can’t really say that I am feeling much better than the last time I wrote.

One of the side effects to walking away from your religion is that you lose your support system. Oh, I painstakingly wrote to each one of my close Mormon friends and explained that even though I was resigning from the church, I still wanted to retain their friendship. You know how many Mormon friends I still have?? Zero. Zilch. Nada.

I have Facebook Mormon friends…thank God for Facebook or I might not have any friends at all, right?

So, I have no one to talk to.  I miss the family you get to belong to when you are part of a church. There are bonuses…I never said it was all bad. I miss belonging to something. I belong nowhere. I am a religious transient. I have no home, I have little belief, and I have absolutely no idea where I fit in the world any more.

You might think that I belong in my family. Family is a funny thing…children are transient as well. Tonight, I attended senior night at my son’s high school and was honored as the mom of a senior. My children are leaving me. They are going out into the world, as they should; they have their entire lives ahead of them. And when they are gone…where will that leave me?

I never said at the end of my book that the job was finished. I am a work in progress…

But I have decisions to make–big ones. I am still trying to find my place in this world. I am still trying to find my purpose.

I have identities: mom, wife, teacher, author.

But where did Debbie go?

If you find her, will you let me know? I’d sure appreciate it.