THIS PAST MONTH SUCKS

Ok, perhaps all caps is unnecessary.
But truly come on universe.

I sat down with a friend yesterday for a cup of coffee (and wine, whatever, don't judge) and told her all about my life lately.
It's incredibly jarring.
I hate opening up to people because it's just very depressing.

Not that my friend would have in a million years expressed that. But really, when you are dealing with some crappy things in your life, you hate to scatter your crap everywhere. I almost want to lie or just omit the truth because it brings others down.

"How are you?!"
"My husband lies to me about his drinking!"
"Whelp see ya later."

See? Not very fun.

"How's the job hunt?"
"I've applied to over 30 jobs in the last 2 months and the only people who want to hire me offer $10/hour. I can't get a babysitter for that."

Or even more fun,
"How are your kids?"
"You mean the one that I just miscarried or the two that have been clinging to a respiratory virus for the past 3 weeks keeping us homebound?"

Who wouldn't want to hang out with me?

And I keep buying wine with the expectation of partially drowning my sorrows but then my damn husband drinks it all before I can.

I told my friend I want to start a church for broken people, for honest people.
I'm tired of fake.
I'm tired of lying.
I'm tired of people acting like everything is grand so they don't give a bad image to Christianity.
Well guess what? Anyone can have crap happen to them- good people, bad people, saints or satanists. It is inhuman to smile while suffering. That's why it's called suffering. Isn't it better to reach out to people instead, to say "I am hurting" and "I need help" instead of pushing them away and trying to rely on your own strength?
Whatever, I should take my own advice.
Instead I have been hibernating in my house so as to not cough on people, wondering if the bleak winter will swallow us whole for another 4 months, and whether or not I will reemerge with the will to try this all again, to put myself out there, to have hope.
I'm not suicidal. I'm not depressed. I'm just slowly being drained of optimism.

What I am, apparently, is a product of a controlling household. Who married a control freak. Who can't do anything without being told what to do or how to do it.
I ask God for guidance and have no way to proceed.
I'm in a maze and paralyzed by indecision.
I'm a bad metaphor.

I also saw a psychiatrist who said I don't fit any of the classifications for disorders. So I'm just anxious and depressed enough to be a joy to be around (ask my husband who leaves work early to go drink and not be around me), while not being quite crazy. He suggested some drugs for me but I cannot cope with side effects at this stage of my crazy. He suggested yoga.

Here I go trying yoga.

Gender and The Today Show

Some days, after the kids have had breakfast and potty breaks/diaper changes have been given, they run off and play (and by play I mean tear apart their bedroom and hide under pillows) and I have a moment of adult time. I was drinking my coffee, watching The Today Show, and I saw something that raised my heckles. Most of their stories I take with a grain of salt, as the show skews more towards fluffy news pieces and frequent weather updates. I can leave it on as I put away laundry or do the dishes, and if I miss something it’s no big deal- every 30 seconds there’s something new on the screen.
This morning they decided to do an investigative report where they had a couple of young looking adults stand outside a liquor store and ask people going in to buy them a 6-pack. And the conclusion this hard-hitting investigation found? No men bought these young adults alcohol- only women. They went further to chase these women down and speak to them about why they did it. One woman said guilt. Another was so angry she wouldn’t even speak. The story showed 3 woman buying beer. And it showed a few women rejecting the request, and even more men saying no. Then they spoke with some spokeswoman for Mothers Against Drunk Driving who was aghast at the results of the investigation.

Here’s where I became livid- and maybe it’s just me, having taken classes that focus in on how to properly conduct a study and what factors are important in a proper study. What are the facts for this study? How many people did they ask? To make such a grand statement about no men buying booze and women being complicit, what are the numbers to back it up? How many people were asked to buy booze? How many men versus how many women? What time of day did you conduct this research? None of the individuals shown on tv looked like business professionals- it appeared that they had stationed themselves at a liquor store during the weekday. What type of people would you say would frequent a liquor store during midday? To me, this appeared almost as a sting or entrapment of sorts. Perhaps this was the only market that produced people consenting to buy alcohol. But wouldn’t that make a better story? “We stationed ourselves at 3 other liquor stores and no one would buy our young actors beer until we went into the poorer community or went during the day”? No? Because that’s classist and profiling.

I just wish The Today Show would have said exactly how many people they asked to buy beer and how many women total actually purchased beer, where they were stationed and what time of day. Instead, I am left with a bad taste in my mouth about the generalizations made about my gender.