been a log time OR new day same feeling????

It has been a long time since I have blogged and I wondered why.

I figured it out. It is the same reason why now that I am 40 I still get crap from friends and loved ones about writing. Yes, I have a degree in creative writing from Carnegie Mellon but I don't use it. WHY?

It is just too personal. Yep, like all other humans, I loathe feeling vulnerable. So here I am with my garbage can of feelings spilling out all over my relationships thinking that maybe I have come to the precipice where it is time to learn to be OK with being vulnerable.

Saturday night I woke up with a nightmare. I dreamt that I was 25, still in undergrad, with no prospect for finishing my degree and stuck. The worst part of this "stuck" dream was that I was still married to X. That made me wake up in a cold sweat. I have been divorced for three years, am in a relationship with a man that I love who treats me well and am fortunate to be a part of a small family business that is doing well in spite of this economy.

Why I am still having nightmares about my marriage?

Why haven't I emptied out the garbage can?

Now last year was the worst year of my life. By FAR the worst year. I have done well in my recovery. I was warned however that everything I was trying to manage at one time was impossible and this is no different than experiencing any trauma in that you are in shock and will not be "dealing" with everything for awhile. I guess this is a while.

How do I "deal" with these items? Well I have one tool, the one that I have been afraid to use because of feeling vulnerable. Writing.

So here goes. Back to the drawing board. I have to blow the dust off of my knowledge and just let things spill out for awhile I guess.

I'll start simple. I have great anxiety. I don't want to say why just yet but I will. After the nightmare I did two things on Sunday to help me.

1. Did a double at Bikram yoga

2. Downloaded Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert to my kindle

For those of you that have never done Bikram, I encourage you to give it a try, especially if you are a type "A" personality. During my very hard time last year my dr prescribed Xanax and Ambien for me to get through. Now I hardly ever used the Xanax. I am afraid of it. I have seen someone addicted to Xanax so it scares me HOWEVER I did use it a few times. The reason I mention it is that one Bikram class is the equivalent in anxiety relief for me to one Xanax. Also when I go to Bikram classes I would generally not need to take Ambien to sleep at night.

Between my Bikram classes and at night I dove into Committed. Great book. Thank you Elizabeth Gilbert for putting into words what I feel and making me feel that I am OK to experience this. What is staring me in the face is that I have not come to terms with my marriage. I don't even know what marriage means any more yet I have a burning desire to be married. ? What the hell? WHY?

So here I am with a knot the size of my imagination in my chest. I am dealing with a terrible fear that I will talk about soon and the fear changes depending on my desire to focus on the fear (it increases) or to focus on creating more positive things (it decreases). I know that I have three things that I am supposed to use right now, 1. my writing 2. Bikram yoga and 3. introspection from the book Committed. I have one of those feelings that I am starting on a journey. I guess that because I have all the sinking feelings that you get when you are afraid to take the road beneath your feet.