"As the brain stem and limbic system instinctually tells the child that danger is coming and that he needs to seek safety and security in the embrace of the attachment figure, the limbic system also confronts the reality that the attachment figure is, in fact, the source of danger. Safety and danger conflated. Brain chemistry roundly fucked up ( Read more... )

Alison Bechdel's interview about her new book, Are You My Mother? focuses on her mother, and that relationship. She says that she grew up without her mother's love. And that she's in psychoanalysis now, and that she got the idea to ask her mother what the first thing was that she had learned from her mother. And that her mother doesn't seek out ( Read more... )

Figuring out weekends again. Last weekend was so hard, we could not possibly do it again. This morning I was waiting for it to happen: for one of us to get triggered. It was me. And like last weekend, I was sad and dissociated for much of the day. Last weekend, I was sad on Saturday and Kevin weathered me, then Sunday we went apeshit bananas off ( Read more... )

A month before my nineteenth birthday, I gave birth. My husband and I were young, poor, stupid, and enthusiastic. That’s probably not such a kind encapsulation, but I’m 37 now, and when I see people that age now I think, Children. My son is now the age I was when I gave birth. I shake my head in wonder or disgust, knowing full well how young ( Read more... )

( wrote this today, not sure where it will end up besides here )

My cat, Nicky, has been with me since he was a kitten, spring of 2000. He's a tuxedo tom, smart and dignified. He was born a barn cat, and I brought him to live in my apartment. He's lived with me now in four states. In all of that time, he would come to me for petting, but usually only in specific places in the house, and he wouldn't stand for ( Read more... )

I'm going on Facebook a little more often lately, since I am finding so many people there that I want to (re-)connect with. A few days ago, a woman came up to me at the meat counter and told me that she'd found me through Facebook, and that she worked in my old office. We got to bond a little over how meshuganah it is there, and I got a timely ( Read more... )