Hoarding II
There is a crisp, cool breeze blowing gently through the windows of the dilapidated old farm house this morning. It is energizing enough to make me want to get up and do something. Cleaning out the toxic hoarding residue out of the reposessed vehicle remains a top priority. The abused young gelding is the only transportation I have up here right now. If I don't get him road worthy, I'm stranded with a 10 mile walk to the nearest grocery store. Gots to do what I gots to do. Alas, I am still psychopating like the damaged soul that I am. It would be lovely if I was still sane enough to drive safely after I scrape the crud and hoarded trash out of the interior and begin the mechanical and legal portion of the reclamation.
I don't know if "Hoarding" is a fair chapter heading for the psychopations blowing through my mind as I untangle this snotty knot, but I don't have a good name for ^it^, so one name is as good as another. I call it, "Hoarding" because this particular psycho thread begins with my mother and the intense mother flashbacks I get from my son's wife. There is zero doubt that my mother was a hoarder. Packing and moving her precious thing piles through the endless succession of houses was. . . A royal mind-fuck. In addition to the many physical similarities, DIL's housekeeping/colleting/self-isolating styles are remarkably similar, as well.
Yes, I need to process all that, but I don't believe it is the meat of my current psychotic episode. I believe the meat of ^it^ is the family dysfunction which has me running from my time honored place in the Urban Homestead. My personal favorite definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. I have cleaned up one or twenty too many of these toxic build-ups for Hubs and sons. Something's gotta give. *Simply* walking away from that body of yaddahs is the most functional solution I have found so far, but. . . Love is a powerful pull. Whatever the dysfunctions attached, I have no doubt the love is sincere and flowing in all directions. Can love really move mountains? Not without involving the body parts.
Nudge, nudge. . . Don't wanna push myself hard enough to break, but the job must be done.
Small steps, big faith and lots of prayer.
Replies
Processing pause. . . Let me begin with a bit of positive affirmation. Yay me for reaching the carpet and leather in Tiggy's back seat. I even got it vacuumed. It still doesn't feel safe for children, but I am a solid step closer to not vomiting when I get close enough to smell the interior. I have yet to decide if I will move on to leather, vinyl and carpet cleaning or work on getting the hoard layers out of the parental seats. Don't believe it much matters. I'll let that decision be impulsive.
I believe I am doing some complex processing here. Maybe even integrating some of those "Puppet Shows" in my head? Maybe. . . It is too early for clarity, but my flashbacks are ranging from the long, treacherous hours/weeks/months in the back of a 1960s station wagon with 10 siblings to the engineering traumas and confusions triggered by the daring dream of a mechanic's bay to the formation of the family dysfunctions down in the Urban Homestead to. . . Well. . . I donae like to get too lost in the shifting shapes of my psychotic fog banks. There's no telling what might jump out of those fog banks. My strictly personal herstory has got some mean assed trauma that are likely to haunt me forever. Yea, I need to process them, but easy does it. Small bytes and long chews.
The detail which I find most encouraging is that I amnae getting lost in thought loops or finding myself frozen by flashbacks to past horrors. Persilly is calm. I take that as her way of saying, "All is as it should be."
One of the most intense flashbacks I am experiencing in this project is of the very first set of knock down, drag out fight series in my marriage. This was where I realized the fatal flaw in our prenuptial agreement to not nag about housekeeping. His mother was a germ-a-phobe intense level nag. I like living clean, but "Clean enough to be healthy, dirty enough to be happy" is my personal housekeeping standard. The part I over-looked in the pre-nup was his definition of "Clean enough to be healthy." What's wrong with climbing over piles of mixed laundry and bed-time trash to reach my bed?
Eat my dust, Bubba. . .
We've come a long way since then, but I remain convinced that I am still cleaning up the next generation of those same piles. Hubs has learned allot about what is wrong with those crud piles from cleaning up after the middle aged children after I fled from the job.
Sorting. . .
I went for tackling the leather and vinyl in the back seat. Still a long way to go, but the smell is better already.
ES would have been less than a year old when Hubs and I began this long, still going domestic dispute. Those early rounds were as bloody as domestic disputes get on the safe side of physical violence. Got the divorce advocates advocating, big time, complete with lawyer referrals.
Today it shames me to say I have no clue what our infant son was doing during those vicious skirmishes. For sure, he witnessed most of them.
The fissuring started getting intense while I scrubbed at the worst of the leather and roof stains in the back seat. HALT. Am I Hungry, Angry, Lonely or Tired? Hell yea, I'm angry, but that works is already in progress. . . I was also hungry. Everything in life should be so easy to fix. I just finished a huge-for-me breakfast and really do feel calmer, but am still not ready to get back to the job at hand. Think I'll ply some more therapy tools.
Poor Tiggy. . . It's hard to believe he is only 2 years old and already a poster child for the difference caring can make. . .
I am glad you are applying your therapy tools. don't know if it is healthy to imagine me there to help the lonely factor but memories of our lunches together help me through my days till we are together again
loving support
We can do this.. We can survive another round...
Don't know how healthy it is to imagine that, but. . .
Can you grab me a bubbly while you are up at the house? I'm so glad that you left as many actual memories of what that means as you took with you. Miss you DOSly. . .
triple hugs my friend as you make your way ~
Sending big hugs & comfort & support your way, Arfie. Seems like so much to process & sort all at once. Hopefully healing comes with it.