lilashakti's blog

havent been here in a year (ish).

about this time last year i was making major life changes. left my marriage, my home, and fled to my hometown with my two daughters. went from pregnant to not pregnant. went from severely depressed to starting over. left the abusive man. my patterns repeat themselves with him and have for 12 years. i am not myself with him. i am a nodding, pleading, bitchy, needy former shadow of myself when i am with him. i wont get into why i stayed for so long. i still dont know.

fast forward to now.

i did it. i left. its over.

well, ok, almost.

i have been looking at apts from orange county to san diego, trying to figure out what is best for my two young daughters.

and i kept coming back to this:

hi, mamas. its been a long time.

the last time i was here, i had left my husband and was pregnant and i didnt know what to do with anything, myself, my two daughters, work, money, etc.

i am not pregnant any longer, and i am staying with my mom. the girls are being shuffled back in forth between me and their dad, (95% me, 5% dad) and pretty much that is ok with me.

i am looking looking looking for work and and keep praying that SOMETHING finds me SOON. i counted, and i think i applied for no less then 8 jobs a DAY. ask me how many interview i have been on in 6 months.

two.

the last time i was back home, my girls dad was there to pick them up and he was trying to hug me- i didnt want him to hug me, and so as he was trying to hug me and pulling me forward towards him, i was moving back- and i felt something "snap" in my neck. two days later had me crying with pain in the urgent care and then i landed myself right smack dab in the emergency room. turns out i had a torn ligament in my neck- basically, i had whiplash.

yes, thats right, i got whiplash from MY EX. there is so much wrong with that whole situation i cannot even begin. thus, i was severely medicated and in so much pain for days upon days, i thought to myself, damn. without the use of your neck, movement is seriously encumbered.

he feels bad, of course. blah blah fucking blah. he always feels bad. but not being rude/abusive/violent/rough in the first place has more moral merit then contrition- feeling remorse basically is just saying that you are not a complete sociopath. i am not giving him an award for feeling bad because his temper got the best of him and he thought, in the moment, how DARE SHE PULL AWAY FROM ME, i am going to JERK her towards me in one swift, violent motion on either side of her spine hard enough to put her in the hospital- no, his remorse is really for himself.

and yet, the girls ask for him. say they miss him, they want their house, etc etc.

we have already pulled my oldest out of her wonderful private school that we cannot afford- and i have made a decision.
ideally i would like to live in portland.

but that is going to have to wait.

i am, once again, for now, going to live here. land of trophy wives, lamborginis, and men who wear italian loafers with no socks.

an hour south of hollywood and and hour north of san diego, this is the land sparking oceans, tourists in the summer, and driving. you drive a LOT here. yes, you can walk, but you would be walking next to freeways.

but the pluses are bigger then the negatives. my mom is here and she loooves being a grandmother. my best friend and her kids are here, and her kids are like my kids, and mine hers.

because i do makeup, there are better opportunities here for me then in san diego because of its proximity to l.a.

but, the biggest sway is that i do not think i would entirely feel safe in san diego, because he is there. and if here were paying any type of child support, he would automatically think my house was "his" because he is helping to "pay" for it. just by being the mother of his children, he wants to own me completely.

if i live here, then the hour away or so is enough of a buffer that he cannot just come over.

and, there is a charter school here that is FREE but based on the same model that my oldest was in in san diego. but free. did i mention, free?

please hope and wish and pray that they have one available space in their kindergarten for my daughter. that would be fabulous.

otherwise, i am trying to heal and move forward. now that i am out, i wonder how i was ever IN for so long, so painfully. there is no moving back, only moving towards my future.

i realize that living in a place i dont neccessarily want to be in forever does not mean i should discount what IS good about said place.

besides, i have sacrificed a lot and not a lot of it was positive.

i can sacrfice a bit of something to help foster good things for my kids. we do not have to live here forever.

on another note, i did a shoot yesterday for the first time in 6 months, and heres a shot of it:

thanks for listening...

shakti

i hit my all time low.

i am a pretty good cook. but i made a revolting stir fry last night because i made the mistake of using coconut oil instead of olive oil for the broccoli. i have never cooked with it before, but i am trying to do cow dairy and gluten free for me and my girls, so im like, oooh, coconut oil, healthy!
well, maybe healthy, and maybe i didnt do it right, but that shit was inedible. both my girls refused to eat it and i couldnt eat it either.
ok, moving right along. i covered the wok so he wouldnt see it. today, in a weird, secretive, abused woman kinda way, i did the dishes and thought "oh my lord, i cant throw the stir fry away, he will get on me so hard! i know, i will put it all in the GARBAGE DISPOSAL!" seriously, i wanted to dispose of the stirfry evidence. so he wouldnt get mad. WHAT THE FUCK???? WHO AM I?????

but pregnant me forgot that our disposal is kind of old- and has been leaking water underneath the sink for the last week. and probably cannot handle a half a head of broccoli, a half pound of glass noodles and some tempeh.

so im disposing, im disposing, im disposing, and all of a sudden water starts coming up both sides of the sink.

fuck.

so, i roll up the ol' sleeves and get down underneath the sink and unhinge all the pipes and put pots and bowls and i start unscrewing, and GALLONS OF WATER, including all the ground up noodles and shit start pouring out of the goddamn pipes.

and then it hit me.

i was HIDING the food so he wouldnt get angry. i was hiding. from his anger. our marriage is like the nasty, putrefied water spewing from the pipes and me hiding a botched dinner because i am afraid of his temper is really, really wrong. its a low for me, sure.

fast forward to him coming out and being a fucking asshole and him telling me that he has "told me a million times not to put food down the disposal and ever since hes known me i fuck up disposals" and on and on and on and on.

so. i started packing for my moms and kneew i only had a very small window. he is yelling and the girls are so used to it they dont even flinch. this broke me. i am crying and snotting and sniveling and i am trying to pack and hes following me around from room to room being mean and nasty and abusive and i know i dont have time to get important papers, etc. i pack the bare necessities. he said, "fuck you and fuck your family"

???

i dont know any men who speak to their pregnant wives like that, but i dont want to be married to this man, who speaks to me that way.

he does everything but hit, but i am here to say that i am definitely in an abusive relationship.

fast forward to now. i am at my moms. i am not going back unless i have someone with me and it is to pack the rest of my things. i have no idea what is going to happen, where i am going to stay, money, the baby, my five year olds school, jobs, benefits, nothing.

but i am out.

and thank you for listening.

shakti

my whole family is sick. again. health care rant.

i am so tired of being sick. i have been sick, on and off since EASTER. my two girls got sick on the second day i was gone, and i had to come home after three days because my youngest could not hang with daddy. i dont blame her. she just got weaned, is only two, and really, if i were a child and sick, i would want my mom too.

will i ever get there?

i dreamt about manhattan TWICE in a row. i have never, that i recall, EVER dreamt of the same subject twice in a row.

heres my theory-

i have never been to new york city (or state for that matter)
and even though there are a lot of things that dont appeal to me about it (the amount of people, for one) it is symbolic of the inner artist life i have always wanted and do not have.

will i ever get to go to new york city?

i hate him.

oh, i know, hate is a bad word. we are not supposed to hate anyone or anything because it fosters negativity and makes us look and feel bad.

but how do you change such a strong emotion?

holyfuckingnauseaallthetimeandtakingcareoftwokidswhilemyhusbandisawayforaweekSHIT!

we traded. i told him he could go on a surf trip with his brother, and he said i could go back to portland for a week.
ALONE.

i didnt know i was pregnant yet when we shook hands...

around 7 or 8 weeks along, and i have been taking care of my girls and trying to figure out how not to puke while i make dinner.
getting my 5 year old out of the house, trying to deal with her behavior issues and having a toddler who can run faster then i can, all coupled with a FIVE pound weight gain in the last few weeks makes me feel insane.

well, ladies, i pretty much just nailed the last nail into my own coffin. so to speak.

things have been better in my world-my husband and i have been trying harder for the kids sake, hes been getting some professional help, and that has been pretty great, and we have been spending a lot of time together as a family, which the kids love- and improves their behavior.

and i found out i was pregnant last week.

sigh.

the truth?

this is the least traumatic pregnancy i have ever had- meaning, i am not attempting a divorce, i am not in another state, positive things are happening for me career wise, etc.

a confession of sorts.

he was in mexico for ten days and i scraped and borrowed just barely enough to move out during that time.

except- no one would rent to me.

meaning, because i have two little kids and no way to prove income since i work freelance, no one would rent to me because of it.

i actually had one landlord person say, well, if your HUSBAND can co-sign for you we may consider renting....with proof of income, of course.

i applied for any and all aid possible and am waiting to hear back on that. again.

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