Reflux

I should probably count it a blessing: 

finally some bad enough consequence

(of eating chocolate spread by the quarter-jar-ful)

if my weight and horrible PMSs and wavering energy levels weren’t enough

(which apparently they aren’t)

to stop

Meanwhile, in front of a second-hand clothes shop today

I fell into sheer panic

from the fact that the kid shall have to be clothed (?!)

I very quickly refocused on this amazing podcast

but it is a bit disturbing

it really crossed my mind that maybe I should revoke my application

Instability stabilizing :-)

I mean, I do get these crying moments still so 

they are kind of setting in

but I don't mind them too much

Today I met the miracle baby I once mentioned here

and I guess it left more of a mark than I expected

also, I’ve been having close (literal) encounters with 

unmarried mothers for the last few months

(Hester Prynne, Tess Durbeyfield, and Hetty Sorrell come to mind)

and despite their very different (17-19th century) choices and lives

(very different from mine but also from each other’s)

they all touch something in me

And then today an old-old friend called me

(to finish a call we started yesterday, actually)

and he told me that he ended up at the psychiatric ambulance

with his insomnia (that’s been going on for ages, now I remember)

and we mulled a bit over the implications of 

becoming a psych patient on 

our self-image

I wasn’t a good listener, though, had my own story in mind all the while

and a bit later sat down to apologise for this via e-mail

to which he replied very kindly

that we should continue

perhaps over a beer

and quoted me (from our "previous life") saying 

how cool* I find it when women drink beer

Now this is a fine coincidence indeed

because cool is my "word" for 2022

it found me (a shame I never wrote about it here!)

on my walk to Makó 

in the falling snow on 8th January

* For lack of a better English word — VAGÁNY is the original

Still not quite well

The psychologist warned me

that a new relational loss (namely that of hers)

might trigger some bad responses

She seems to have been right

at least sleepwise I am in a pretty bad shape

I had a long bath and then started working at 2 am

And while it is a nice and unusual feeling that I am ready with this and that which was not urgent

I am getting anxious from tomorrow's challenges

such as finishing The Remains of the Day

from 10%

or showing interest in some afternoon programme 

which no particle of mine wishes to attend

I've also eaten half a jar of nutella

(albeit fairly traded...) 

in less than 36 hours

Doubts are plaguing my mind, too

like whether I really need a child in my life

or whether any child might need me in theirs

or why some people showed no enthusiasm for the news

or whether I'll really be able to work two part-time jobs until Summer

plus the rest of my voluntary this and that:

being the Eurolink in CLC

the Migration Core Team also in CLC

Tiszavirág

the Monday morning prayers and Monday night CLC meetings

the women's club

Some serious soul-searching

is needed, I feel

because quite a bit of my 

I-am-so-proud-of(-myself) 

stability and self-confidence 

went to pieces this last week

I wonder if it is from coming off med #3

from not wanting to let go of the psychologist (the next one being our last sitting)

or from PMS

Either way, I've been crying a fair bit for these last days

sometimes quite out of the blue

while at others I chose the muds of self-pity readily

I am still bothered by lovers all around

while of course can't blame anyone else 

for my gut resistance towards any 

dedicated way of looking for someone

(well, this is not strictly true because naturally I can blame Á. for everything, any time)

And with all my growing empathy towards myself

(one of the many fruits of therapy)

I still feel ashamed

which then doesn't make me think about myself as a prize exactly

damaged goods and the rest of the same old same old

Curiously, I don't feel guilt

I do belive that my sins are forgiven

(and also that I did my utmost to save the marriage)

but that I were forgiven, made whole, whiter than snow and whatnot... 

well, that's easier said than felt

I wonder if this will once again start to paralyze me the way it used to

because that would put a lot of questions to the future

say, whether it is a good idea to 

top my feelings of insufficiency by taking on a child 

or whether it is wise to stop therapy

or whether I should just stop caring 

once and for all

...

It’s been a while

and as usual, this is a good sign

However, I am here to whine a wee bit once again

because by the end of December

there were once again

too many people happily in love around me

(or at least in a budding relationship

if I count Cs., too)

I’ve been able to be glad for all of them

(some are very young, some pretty new to the world of stable relationships)

but still couldn’t help being fabulously jealous

on hearing one of those involved (a boy of about 21 or 22)

telling the whole prayer group that in this year he anticipates

"to experience God's love through J."

(and that while she was sitting next to him!)

or when Lucas described his state as being "in a very loving relation"

I wonder if ever anyone will say such nice things of a relationship that features me

First I have to correct the previous one

the retreat is indeed for any divorcee

regardless of kids

so I applied 

we'll see whether covid permits it next March

Secondly, well, I keep procrastinating the tidying

and also getting sadder and sadder somehow

I think I disappoint myself

by not being wiser or tougher or better

even now, closer to the end of the divorce-crisis

I think the only thing I learned is that

survival is possible

but whether or not it is worth it 

is still uncertain

I mean, day by day I am fine

and perhaps that's reason enough not to complain

but I am still not needed anywhere

and though I've been doing and enjoying a lot recently

I could just as well had done them all married

and I can't really imagine anything happening

to which I'd say "this is it. For this it was worth."

Or maybe it's all PMS yet again.

another disappointment

Two years ago I applied to a 

retreat for divorcees

but by the time I did, it got fully booked

last year I tried again

but it was cancelled due to covid

and now it has been renamed to

"retreat for divorced parents"

The rest of the programmes of this ministry

seemed to have been for parents/grandparents 

ever since I first looked around on their website

(maybe there is some informal weekly meeting in Bp.

where it is not specified this way

but that's not much help to me)

so it really feels as though I fell through another web

as though I am

once again

being punished

for being barren

and meanwhile, the emotional neediness

I spent a weekend in Pozsony with S.

and then a few-hours walk with N.

(both one-on-one)

and both were great times

but like the stereotypical man, 

neither showed any inclination to share anything from his inside

I wonder whether this is something to accept as it is

or something to work on

but maybe this is what prevents me 

from falling for anyone

and if so then I should be very grateful indeed

because I do feel the itch

toward zero

This is the title of an Agatha Christie novel

which I listened to a few weeks ago on BBC

it came into my mind today as I was reflecting

that while I am more stable emotionally 

than I've been in the last two years 

(or maybe even three)

this is still just the starting point

I am not an inch farther off

I cannot say that I improved in any way through it all

or that it was worth it

basically I am more or less back to 0

having more or less wasted two precious years of my life

I am back to the old questions

(vocation, children, body -- in no particular order)

while also taking on a few new ones

(the viability/desirability of adopting on my own, 

the possibility of another Significant Other, 

the dissolution of the marriage, 

my general worthlessness, 

money issues -- in no particular order)

I heard about a new baby today

a very long awaited second child

to a great couple

(a kind of a miracle child who conceived naturally 

after long and exhausting rounds of IVF)

and I couldn't help becoming sad again

will this remain like this for the rest of my life, I wonder

on psychotherapy, for a change :-)

I told the psychologist today

about some recent events in some friends’ lives

which have little to no bearing on mine

yet still touched me somehow

the crippling perfectionism of A.

the brutal ex-husband of C.

and I found that I was crying

which was unexpected 

but not unwelcome

When at the end of the stories 

she asked me how I feel

I had to think (feel :-)) long and hard to figure out

I couldn’t give it a better name than that I feel touched

though I still couldn’t say why or by what exactly

however, I remembered two very different feelings

One was that of "the concrete sarcophagus"

that I had built around myself to try and protect myself

from the pains of barrenness

and which later became suffocatingly tight

until it eventually disappeared 

along with most of the pain

amidst the 

prayers

silence

snowfall

and maybe most importantly the 

sheer boredom

of a ten-day silent retreat in D.

The other one had been pretty much the opposite

the feeling of nakedness, maybe even skin-less-ness

when anything that just approaches me hurts

and all I can do is wish for some armor

or at least skin as thick as can be

And today (here comes the full circle)

I somehow felt as if I stroke some kind of a balance

where I am able to be touched by things other than my own pain

and I can bear them without crushing

Psychotherapy seems to work in mysterious ways

but there is no doubt that it does work  

***

Meanwhile

I dreamed about getting some insanely complicated task

that I tried to do as best I could

but was pretty much unable

I got some feedback from the commissioner on the translation

some good, some not so good

but all perfectly correct

I don’t think that my blood pressure has ever been this low

I’ve been feeling sleepy since yesterday but not just in my head 

but in my whole body, like that pleasant tingling right before falling asleep

on overwhelm, what else

One of my numerous former bosses called me the other day

and offered me a job

namely to teach Hungarian 

to two Nigerian seminarists

I told him that I am off till the middle of November

but eventually said yes to starting then

and now my head is boiling :-D

because as much as liked teaching Hungarian, I was never good at it

and this seems like a case with high stakes

also, two to three hours a day(!)

also, two people (though that makes it somehow rather less scary)

also, I haven’t told my current boss yet...

So now my mind at any given moment

is occupied with one or more of these:

- translation

- window-replacement and the very bad mess it will cause

- window-replacement and the very good order I should set up beforehand

(incl. removing the bathroom mirror and such...)

- teaching Hungarian to a couple of Nigeraian seminarists

(incl. questions mostly on methodology & 

how to tolerate the stress of not being understood – in any way other than starting to speak in English)

- how it will interfere with my other job

- whether and if so: when will I ever see friends again

- whether I can get out somewhere while the lovely weather lasts

- whether hard mental work justifies buying (and eating) chocolate

on proceding

Well, writing down my agonies proved to be a good way
to make them feel more managable

so I am happy to report that 

the funghi are cleaned and frozen and 

I even found out how to hold together my box of Sempervivum (-vivi??):

(unsightly but practical)

on the two types of not wanting to get out of bed

One is when I don't feel like doing anything

but there isn't much to either

lazy Saturday mornings

nothing exiting on the horizon

The other one is more serious

it comes when there is too much to do

typically on weekdays

when what (or all that) I should do feels daunting 

when I find it hard to even figure out where to start

in short when overwhelm hits

and it does now

it has been overwhelming for the last week

and will be for at least two more

the fact that I won that translator contest

leaves me only with traces of happiness and pride for the time being

because apparently I overstretched my capabilities with taking on this long a book

and so now all my waking hours should be spent translating

and so I don't want to do other necessary stuff

because they steal time from translating

and so now I am here 

with my hair badly needing a wash 

with my kefir-funghi badly needing new milk to feed on

with my bedlinen badly needing a change

and yet I do none of these

every now and then

I come across someone telling me about some family affair

in which I have some gut reaction

and then it turns out that they choose some completely different one

one that is a lot more loving & compassionate

than mine

and then I am ashamed 

and I feel as though in fact

I really wouldn't deserve a spouse/kid

since, see, I really couldn't do it well

on emotions & inspirations

Today’s was a very useful session at the psychologist

Last time we started talking about feelings

whether it was o.k. to express them back at home

and so on

(starting with my apparent inability to feel anger)

and then I thought about jealousy

with which I do struggle every once in a while

and then of self-pity

And then she said that jealousy is something much like anger

and self-pity like sadness

and with that, their "moral value" was at once taken away

and I find that very helpful indeed

a lot easier to manage them in my head

(or so I think now :-))

She also asked, in connection with my feeling of shame about the divorce

how I feel towards my divorcing friends

and I told her truthfully that I don't feel inclined to judge them

since both had fairly straight forward cases

with not much of a choice other than to leave

Then she asked me how I would put my own case into a sentence like those

seeing what objective reasons I could connect to their divorces

and I said "I was divorced because Á. wanted to leave"

and that suddenly felt like something pretty objective

As to the "substitute life"

even as I told her about it, I had to admit that

this expectation (the one about a family of "my own") 

exists only in my head

which doesn't make it much easier but maybe a bit still

Then at home I somehow thought I might start

the 8 week Marie Kondo challenge

trouble is, how do I strengthen my commitment...?

And in the evening we went to the cinema(!) with CLC

watched the film on the Ignatian camino

and it inspires me to go and walk it next spring

I'll have to make some sort of an initial calculation

on a substitute life

However, there was another impression

I've got after the papal mass

(and many times earlier but somehow it only took shape now)

namely that 

instead of a life of my own

I live a substitute one

It came on me while G. and T. were happily greeting rarely seen friends

and I was just standing there, not knowing what to say to whom

and although being there as a sister(-in-law) and aunt was a totally natural thing

I still felt as though I "should" be with "my own" family

that would be the "mature" thing

the responsible, the adult life

Maybe this is what I once called 

not being at home in my life

although back then

that was more a feeling of unreal-ness

while this is not

Maybe it is deteriorated by the fact

that I move among "perfect" families

so my ideals keep rubbing into my face

but then again, these lovely (and imperfect) people are my relatives and friends

and I am happy for their fortunes

It's about my attitude

about my seeing black or white and nothing in-between

(wo)man on the dam

It's been a while

as you may have noticed, that is a good sign

nothing particularly upstetting

and so it was, absolutely

the two holidays (in the Bükk and in the Őrség [goodness, that sounds bad!])

were perfectly relaxing

I came home with heightened energy level and lifted mood

and it lasted up to the last few days

pretty marvellously, really

I met a lovely little girl

14 months old Júlia

from whom I learned a lot

and who made me feel God's love more than anything this summer

the experience made me think about adoption 

once again

but I dismissed the idea for a while 

once again

Then this was a very busy weekend

theater on Friday, 1984

it was a lot better than I expected

quite moving in fact

Saturday morning I met Be. to sell him some coffee

he showed up in a Man on the Dam T-shirt

and as my face lit up, he said "it'll be tonight"

so I set up to walk the 26 km distance

on my own, having no one around to join me with such a short notice

This obviously meant that I freaked out

from every unusually shaped/coloured bush

and once terribly from a silent dogwalker

whom I passed almost without even noticing

and who later caught up with me

to my sheer horror

until I realised he was a fellow hiker

we met at the turning point earlier

and eventually walked together for the last five or so kms

All in all, it was a good thing to do

even if I weren't quite sure that I want to go

up to the time of leaving

and even if I was bone-tired 

I really felt as though I couldn't get out to the loo at night

and then came the papal mass in Pest...

but it all turned out quite nicely in the end

on hypersensitivity

PMS is wreaking havoc

no wonder after (yet another) month 

of reckless 

sugar/carbohydrates consumption

I've been having doomsday feelings for the last two or three days

such as

hopelessness

inadequacy

jealousy 

purposelessness 

slowness

laziness

and so on

Too bad that this could really be mitigated... if I cared enough to take care of myself

on loneliness

Somewhere deep

I always looked down on people

who can't bear to be alone

Well, I shouldn't have

I am as lonely as one can be

with quite a few good friends

I can always find something to complain about...

This time it is that there is no one 

to be there for granted

to share stuff with on a daily basis

to make plans with

to ask without hesitation, whenever I think of doing something

The psychologist seems to think 

that I feel I need validation from someone

and it may well be true

"the other side of the coin"

Today I met T.

after a year (or maybe even two?)

and I am just as unable to listen to her as I used to be

but seriously, she can talk for hours

without even taking a breath

and very often repeating herself

Today she said a half sentence about her bipolar condition 

about which I forgot, I think

but at least that explains this unstoppable talking

trouble is, I don't think she is being treated with it

Later A. came with the kids

and along with them

we took T.'s girls to the playground 

(they changed completely from the little devils they were at home)

A. told me about her not-so-successful days as a mother 

triggered in part by not being able to be alone for just a minute

which then lead me back to contemplate the fate of single mothers

who, of course, usually don't have more than one or two children to juggle with 

but even that seems well nigh impossible to me

and I think adoption may be a good idea?!

Meanwhile, a few days ago

I also happened to remember

something that dawned on me a long time ago

back when I was struggling with infertility:

that the way out 

is to be present and share and invest 

in the lives of my pregnant / young mum friends

I'm still not sure, why

but I am sure that it is

(Nevertheless,  T. still feels overwhelming)