Long Time, No Write

 I'm still alive. I survived what I feared I wouldn't, only by the Grace of God and anti-depressants.

I wish I could say that life is hunky dory, as my mama used to say, but it's just a never ending limp through the world where I'm dragging my bum knee and depending way too much on coffee shops and retail therapy to keep me from spiraling too far back into the abyss. Anti-depressants can only take you so far and the Grace of God, while perfect, only truly works when I let it. 

While I doubt anyone is still monitoring this blog, let me catch you up on what's happened since I last checked in two years ago. If nothing else, maybe it will be good for my mental health to finally get it all written down.

A month and a half after my last post here, Sis1 woke me up with a phone call one early Saturday morning. BIL, the brother-in-law I considered a brother, and have loved since I was 17, left her. She came home from a hair appointment the night before to find most of his things gone and him standing in the kitchen telling her that while he loved her and would always care about her, he just couldn't live with her anymore. He wanted to stay married and provide for her but he was moving out.

He, we would learn quickly, is a manipulative, gaslighting, narcissistic, lying, cheating son of a bitch. (His mom, as it turns out, is, indeed, a bitch. haha) 

In the weeks after he left, he moved money out of their account, gave her a pre-paid visa, and promised to re-load it every month with enough money to cover groceries and incidentals. He kept the utilities and insurances paid but was often slow to re-load the card and if she purchased something he didn't approve of, he lowered the amount he loaded on there. Basically, he was controlling her with money. Financial abuse, emotional abuse...

Honestly, the signs had been there most of their marriage. But that's another story for another time.

She was hurt, angry, and scared--as you can just imagine and unsure what to do. He kept discouraging her from filing for divorce, insisting that he wanted to continue to take care of her and wanted them to remain a family even though he couldn't live with her.

Then some incriminating photographs came to light. Yep, he was cheating on her--HAD been cheating on her for quite some time with a woman he met in Arkansas when he worked for a medi-vac company for a couple of years.

After Sis1 came to her senses and filed for divorce, the monster in BIL really came out. He gaslit her every which way he could, called her selfish and hateful and blamed her for the end of their marriage. At the risk of going into too much detail, he provoked her into nearly completing suicide and then begged Sis2 and I to have her committed to an institution.

Thank God she was stronger than him and didn't pull the trigger and Sis2 and I are not as stupid as he thinks we are.

It took her nearly a full year to get the divorce finalized because he kept fucking around with the financial settlements--"forgetting" to send in paperwork, threatening to tell the judge about her near suicide attempt, and a plethora of other manipulative and gross things that made me so mad I wished I could bury him in a swamp. But she is finally divorced, living in an apartment of her own with a new job she loves and a sweet little tootsie roll shaped mini-dachshund named Remi. It's still a struggle but she's getting her groove back one day at a time.

In the middle of all that, Emmy got married! I pray it wasn't to escape the madness of her parents but he seems like a mostly nice guy and she seems to love him. They celebrated their first anniversary in November with an actual wedding, as they were originally married at the courthouse. They bought a house and a new car and she has a great job as an MRI tech at a hospital. 

February of last year, a few days after my last post, actually, we lost our beloved Granny. She was just shy of 92. Her mind had been failing her for quite some time, Daddy's death having affected it even more so. She contracted a UTI around Christmas and couldn't seem to get it under control. She ended up with pneumonia that turned into sepsis. I was on my way home from having been to visit Sis1 when my cousin called and told me if I wanted to see Granny, I needed to come right away. So I sped home (broke a few laws) and when I got to Granny's house, she was pretty much in a comatose state. Why they had not taken her to the hospital, I don't know. It would be an hour or so later before my male cousin and his husband arrived and loaded her into the car and took her to the ER. My aunt was in charge or I'd have called an ambulance when I got there and saw the state she was in.

The ER doctors worked on her all night trying to save her but in the wee hours of the morning on Feb. 10, she slipped away from this life and moved on to the next. I can't really explain the days/weeks/months after that. It was just such an empty feeling. My parents both gone and now the last grandparent was gone, as well. 

Two days before Granny died, my other brother-in-law's mom passed from stomach cancer. While I didn't care much to be around her, I grieved for my brother-in-law, Lyssa, and Efan.

A month and half later, my aunt--Daddy's sister--lost her husband to cancer. Seeing her and my cousins go through that loss so soon after the loss of Granny broke my heart even more. Everything just felt so unsteady, so dark, and so lonely. Would all we knew from here on out be just loss and grief? It all felt and still feels so heavy at times.

But of course, there is still joy to be found. I find joy in my nieces and nephew. I find joy in my sisters, my friends, my home. I find joy with my fur-brother, Milo, who is 18 this year.

Lyssa graduated high school last May and has had her first "big girl" job a bank. She was able to buy her first car and has been with her boyfriend G for nearly 3 years now. 

Efan is in the 10th grade, making excellent grades and has his own gaming YouTube channel that he's very excited and proud of. He has a great group of misfit friends. He has some other issues, private things I won't share here, but for the most part, he's thriving.

Milo is completely grey in the face/head, grey legs and even has a grey patch on his booty. But he's still trucking along, playing with his favorite toy, running around like a big dog in the back yard, and driving me crazy. 

Sis2 and I have been working diligently nearly every Saturday for the past year trying to get my folks' house cleaned out. 40-something years worth of stuff is no joke to sort through. But we're getting there. We see the light at the end of the tunnel and hopefully by the end of summer, if not before, we'll be ready to start some minor renos so I can get moved in and sell my house. I'm so ready to get my mortgage off of me so I can breathe a little financially.

I know there's a lot I'm forgetting or leaving out. Life just feels so crazy, what with the war in Iran, ICE terrorizing the streets, pedophiles scrambling to cover up their sins, Trump worshippers making me question my own faith, and all the other insanity going on. 

But this sums up the past two years in a nutshell: continued grief, new types of grief, joy, and growth. 

I hope anyone who stumbles across this post knows that they are loved and if they find themselves in a dark place right now to hang on tight...brighter days really are ahead. I know because I'm staring at the light from my dark little hole right now.