This Mama’s Dharma

As I hear my ex’s car pull up to drop off S, I open the blinds. The light goes on in the car.
She is sitting there. I don’t see her face, I have never seen her face…but I see the toss of a head. Long curly hair.
I feel sick. I feel my aloneness, my acute [...]

Ah, the bitter irony of this life. I was to have a full five days to myself while Sami was at his father’s. And what happens? The Snowpocalypse of 2009. All my plans to be a whirling dervish of activity, dashed.
It ended up being all good. I just so happened to have a wonderful house [...]

Not partying, not smoking, not drinking, not dating, not indulging in my addictions, I am feeling raw emotions bubbling up to the surface with ferocity. Mostly guilt, sadness, shame, confusion…grief. Boatloads of grief. Trying to love myself through it all - my so human, so flawed self.
I have made so many mistakes in my life, [...]

On August 2, I turned 34, and soon after, had a mini breakdown. It could have just been really bad PMS, but it felt like more than that.
I am perfecting the art of the mini-breakdown. It involves a few days of intense crying jags, not feeling real, barely being able to work, calling all my [...]

I hate the word “depression,” as I detest all clinical phrases. They serve to dehumanize and they also don’t get at what is really going on with people. A neat label does not begin to encapsulate the complexity of human existence, and I feel does it a disservice. But looking at the word depression in [...]

[I need to preface this to say that I don't hate my individual married friends, just married people as a group. It's a form of bigotry directed at the wedded.]
Today I am in just that kind of mood.
I took Sami to the pool today, and as it was Sunday, the pool was jam-packed with dads.
Married [...]

A good friend remarked to me today that she thought my challenge was not single parenting, but relationships.
I do believe she’s right.
Not that single parenting is not without its challenges. I’ve wrestled with how much to write about my child, when he is too young to event understand the concept of consent?
For this reason I [...]

The other day I listened to an NPR segment about “hooking up” - according to the report, the trend with many young people (they were talking about people in their 20s, but hey! I’m in my early 30s) is no dating, no relationships. Just a text, leading to sex. Rinse, wash, repeat. 
For these folks, emotional [...]

I know I’ve been pretty weepy/whiny/negative on here lately…and am not meaning to be…but shit is hard right now. And this feels like a safe place to write about the hard shit.
I am needing to travel a lot for work lately, and I’ve been leaning heavily on Sami’s dad…he’s been really good about stepping up [...]

I’m tired so tired not a fan of this feeling that life is passing me by and my child grew an inch I swear while I was gone for four days in CA and sometimes I feel like when I am with him I am not really with him because my mind is always wandering [...]