That is what I am feeling.  I haven't written on my blog in a long time.  Why?  I don't know.  I guess life and the dreaded Facebook has kept me so busy that the blog fell by the wayside.  I am back now, though.  Even if it's intermittent, i will post more.

I'm feeling lost today and have a question that no one can really answer for me, I suppose.  But, how do you love someone but let them go?  I am trying meditation, distraction, wallowing... you name it.  I cannot seem to find a way to not want, deep down, to hold that person and have them for myself emotionally.  I keep hearing that hideous "if you love someone set them free and if they come back to you blah blah blah" but how do you set them free?  Seriously?  How does a person, deep in their heart let someone go when you love them?  Am I the only person incapable of this?  is there some trick to it that I don't know? 

Get back to me if you know an answer. 

Is it ok to not be ready for 2009 and yet be really happy the last year is finally done?  Two thousand eight was unbelievable for more reasons than I care to blog about right now, and boy did it finish with a bang, but it's finished.  And so are many things in my life that have been around a long time.  Now it's on to "unlearning" as my sister-in-law so aptly put it and learning how to live an even better life.  So much has changed over the last 5 years.  So much.

Here's to a fantastic New Year. 

So much has been going on that I have not been able to update like I'd have liked.  The short version is that there has been mucho family drama that has been exacerbated by outside forces.  I am washing my hands of it all.

I hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday season and may our new year be full of promise, joy, love, peace, companionship, friendship, creativity, new adventures, travel, and anything else our hearts desire.

Thank you. 
Thank you for thinking I'm strong and resilient. 
Thank you for thinking I'm "pretty" now or way back then. 
Thank you for loving me now or way back then. 
Thank you for thinking I look like Catherine Zeta Jones or Anne Hathaway or that I remind you of Chelsea Handler instead of Natalie on Facts of Life, Rosie O'Donnell or Roseanne Barr. 
Thank you for considering me as something other than just a "that crazy Marlene" or a just a pal.
Thank you for being such an amazing friend through thickest, thick and thinner. 
Thank you for keeping me close to your hearts each and every time I get close to a scalpel. 
Thank you for taking care of me when I needed taking care of the most.
Thank you for being my family and my family of choice. 
Thank you for thinking I'm even remotely an inspiration for whatever reason you think I am. 
Thank you for absolutely everything. 

Just when I think I'm going to feel really sorry for myself or get really angry about something in my life, sometimes something reminds me of these things.

Thank you.

Check out this month's Birmingham Magazine.  FINALLY someone did a nice long article on Bare Hands Gallery's beautiful celebration every year.

Read it, absorb it, make something, honor someone, and then come have fun with us.  I dare you.

I lost it. My so very important ring that reminded me that there is always a me yet to come.  But last night, when I went to fondle it like I have for 4 years, I looked down and it wasn't there.  Since I've lost weight it has been loose, and when it's cold it will fly off very easily but last night it made me so damn sad.  I've always liked the theory that when you lose something like that it's because you no longer need it.  In this matter, however, there will always be a me yet to come, so I ordered a new one in a new size.  And on top of that, I found an artist on Etsy that does smaller rings like mine and ordered one that says "avere fiducia" which translates to "Have Faith". 

I keep thinking about Dr. G asking me "Where is your faith in yourself?" and I'm ready to find some.  I berate myself for my weaknesses and my failures and then today, when telling a co-worker about having had surgery awake AGAIN, this time far more intense, my co-worker and her client just stared at me like an alien and they both said "You are one tough cookie".  It's amazing what kind of torture I can withstand that others seem to not understand at all:  incredibly invasive surgery on rather private parts or on my eyes while wide awake... hearing your skin get cut with scissors, or smelling and feeling your skin get cauterized for about an hour, or feeling the tension of stitches being placed in tendons and then attached to very sensitive skin... yes, I had local anesthesia, but you can still feel cauterization I found out (the mighty hard way) and you can always feel the pressure.  I will never forget getting a vena cava filter implanted over 4 years ago and feeling something snake inside a major artery... feeling the doctor wiggling and jiggling it around trying to snake it up the artery.  I thought I would lose my mind.  Now, that seems strangely silly.  I've heard my eyelids be cut with scissors, I've felt them slice and dice me, filet me and pull me as tight as a drum, and here's the funny thing:

I cried about losing my ring. 

I never shed a tear over the pain last week, though I did cry a bit when I blew a stitch because it reminded me of the misery of January through, oh, about April of this past year.  But losing that ring tugged somewhere that no doctor can poke, stick, cut, burn or remove.  That ring was a shiny reminder that I'm becoming a better me every day, even when it may look like I'm becoming a worse me.  Every day I learn something about myself.  As incredibly superficial as it sounds I'm ready to begin a fashion journey.  I've never explored it because it was never really an option for me.  I think I'm ready to and even though this sounds really stupid, it's a big step for me.  It's actually acknowledging that I have changed... that I am in some way, some how, somewhat ready to embrace that I'm not exactly what I once was:  the girl who so desperately wanted to be noticed but did everything to become invisible, or repulsive, or unattractive.  What we think we want isn't what our scared phsyches want.  I dreamt of being attractive, thinner, etc... and yet am completely unwilling to comprehend and am scared shitless that someone might think that of me. 

Words that I longed for... to hear... to have someone think of me... now, when mentioned leave me dumbfounded.  Thin?  Me?  No.  I'm thinner than I was, but I'm still fat.  Beautiful?  Me?  God no.  I mean I know I look better than I used to, but... Desireable?  Me?  WTF, are you crazy?  I mean, I'm not exactly a leper anymore, but desirable?  Are you on crack?

This is my dialogue, 24/7.  And to think that I am probably at least 25% more mentally grounded and healthy than most women... well, that's just scary. 

So, with my new rings come new journeys.  I'll be dressing differently.  I might look like a hobo one day, or an executive the next, but I have to figure out who I am.  In all ways.  I will always be Lena.  Fundamentally, I haven't changed.  (Or so I've been told by most who know me pretty darn well.  But if I have, please alert me... I like the me I have become thanks to all the shit, good and bad, that I've experienced, but if I've become something unpleasant or bad, by all means, slap it out of me.)  I also know it might be a long journey to figure out who I am... whether it be what my style is, or who I am to become spiritually, or what kind of lover or wife I am to be, what kind of mother, friend, sister, aunt, hairstylist, etc...  This journey will never cease until I cease to breathe. 

And if I am the kind of woman who doesn't cry when her thighs are sliced open and tendons are poked and yanked, but cries over the loss of a ring that she had printed with the word 'The Me Yet To Come", I think I'm ok with that. 

This Lena has had 4 hours of sleep in two days, and considering the journey is a hard one, me thinks I need to sleep.  I love you, my friends, who loved me when I was miserable on the inside, looked miserable on the outside even though a grin was always plastered on my face, but no matter what, always knew she was blessed for having people like you all in my life.  I love you for the fact that you are amazing people and that we all somehow found each other and each of you have made my family of choice so amazing... so incredible... so rich.  I wish I could buy each of you a ring and have it embossed with "I saved Lena's life". 

Because you have.  And I thank you for it.  Now it's my turn to save my own.  And so far, so good.

I'm very sleepy due to Percocet so I am apologizing now for any typos or crazy talk that may happen.

I've had an experience lately that has really boggled me and as usual, I have attempted to dissect it and also see why it has affected me so strongly.  I have been so lucky in my life to have ended up being surrounded by people who want to learn about themselves and improve.  It's a slow process, one that takes a lifetime but I'm so happy that my nearest and dearest are all people that are either in therapy, have been in therapy, read for self-improvement, or are in recovery where they have and always will learn about themselves. 

I met someone recently that is in a rare category for me... not one that I run across very much.  They acknowledge their dysfunction but instead of working on it, they want everyone else to work around it.  It seems to allow for the occasional lack of politeness and basic human skills like saying "Thank You" or acknowledging when someone does something nice for you.  I am quite familiar with the concept of feeling unworthy of things:   gifts, people's kindness, compliments, etc... but I've never come across someone so strangely adamant about being rude when someone is being nice.  I find it to be the strangest response I've ever encountered. 

My feelings are not hurt, there's definitely no love lost, and friendship seems impossible when one can give gifts but not receive them.  It seems a strange combination of lack of self worth and complete selfishness.  I wonder what the Meyers Briggs would say about that combo.  I must admit, it's fascinating.  But only from a distance.  I don't do well with rudeness, no matter where it comes from.  It's an unnecessary response to anything I've done.  I hope eventually they are able to take stock and recognize how limiting that behavior is.  Then again, maybe it's none of my concern and all I need to worry about is bettering myself and being a friend to those who want my friendship and enjoying the wonderful friendships I have.

Yeah.  I think that's what I should do.

Well, it's official.  Dr. G saw me cry today.  A year and a half.  That's how long I made it.  Not that I am proud or not proud of that.  Just an interesting Lena statistic.  To Lena, anyway.

Today was pretty intense.  He really helped me see today how little faith I have in myself.  It was never really shown to me by the person I needed to learn it from.  It's amazing that no matter what words were said to me, it seems that it was always what was shown to me that mattered.  As they say, saying and doing are two different things.  The doing is the important stuff.  And I was shown the most fucked up way possible. 

I learned to cope in all the wrong ways and was never really given a background of raising my faith and belief in myself.  Today, with his help, Dr. G helped me see that I had completely surpassed any idea I had of how my life was going to be beyond my surgery 4 years ago.  I really never expected to be this size.  I shop in the "mediums" for Christ's sake!  I never imagined a medium.  I imagined that I would always be overweight, just less overweight than I was.  I never expected to weigh what I did in junior high and one time in high school.  I was as prepared as I could be to be "less overweight" but was completely unprepared, no plan devised, for where I am now.  A medium.  I don't get "medium".  And I'm freaking out. 

I had no plan beyond the plan.

When I was asked what weight I would like to stay, I said a number that is about 10-12 pounds less than I am now.  He said "Do you think you can do that?"  And I blankly stared at him and finally uttered "I don't think so."  He looked just as blankly at me and said "Hmmm.  Interesting.  Where's your faith in yourself?"

I told him I "checked it at the door".  When?  I don't know.  It seems that if you challenge me... tell me I can't do something, well damn it, I will prove you wrong.  But doing something for me?  Something I want?  Eh, not so sure I can.  Where is my faith in myself?  Where can I buy some? 

Having undergone this massive life-changing event in front of so many people is really really intense.  And I don't mean cyberspace.  I mean the hundreds of clients who watched it, my friends, my family, people at the gallery, at my hang-outs, etc... I've done this incredibly intense thing in front of everyone and everyone has been so amazing.  I never thought I'd hear people tell me I was their inspiration.  When someone says that to me my head drops.  I almost can't bear to hear it.  Who am I to be someone's inspiration?  Yes, I know I've lost as much weight as two not-so-small human beings and yes, I realize that I was filleted like a fish and have survived to talk about it.  I rationally know this is amazing.

But I have no faith in myself losing 10 pounds.  I have no faith in myself, period. 

Mind boggling, isn't it?

One of my fave quotes is "Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge". 

I aim to know.  I want to have faith in me.  And I don't want to disappoint anyone who thinks I am an inspiration.  Though right now I don't feel I deserve to be anyone's inspiration, hopefully I will one day. 

That's all, really.  Just *sigh*.