A leopard can’t change it’s spots

My dad has been stalking me via facebook for months now. He keeps sending me friend requests and I keep rejecting it. Totally not taking the hint, he sends me an e-mail today letting me know he sent me a friend request and that I should accept it. I’m not sure what possessed me to do it, but I finally just said ” ahh screw it, whatever” and I accepted. I suppose I figured we have been on civil terms as of late, what’s so wrong about a silly friend request on a silly social networking site?

No sooner did I accept the request and go to his profile, that I was reminded exactly why I had spent the last two years not speaking to him. Right there on his page was a photo shopped picture of him next to a picture of Mena Suvari, clad in a skimpy bikini with her tits nearly hanging out. Needless to say I immediately “unfriended” my dad and I am now left feeling dirty and angry.

Now, I know to most of you, perhaps the thought of some old dude photo shopping himself next to a sexy actress might be funny. But to me, it is just a reminder of all the dysfunction I have had to deal with my entire life, and the source to all my hang ups. I spent the last two years not talking to my father, in order to distance myself from his dysfunctions and addictions. I even told him exactly what he had done to bring me to the point of estrangement. He swore up and down how sorry he was, how he knew he “fucked up big time.” how he even went to confession and “cried” to the priest. He kept insisting that he’s changed. Funny how one click on a stupid facebook page can prove he’s full of shit.

Some things never change. Big surprise.

i think i’m turning my phone off for a while…

so it’s been a shit storm of drama for me this week, and none of the issues i dealt with had anything to do with me at all.

the first problem was the apartment we had been staying in, we were subletting it from a friend of mine, and well, as everyone knows, you’re not really allowed to do that. so about a week ago we go a notice basically saying ” get the fuck out now or we will kick your ass out later.” which translates to my friend getting served with an eviction. now the asshole in me said ” oh well, it’s not my name on the lease, it’s not my problem.” but the human in me said ” holy shit i have just royally fucked my friend and her ability to ever rent another place for the rest of her life!!!” one u-haul, an anxiety attack, a trip to the ER and two hundred dollars later we are (hopefully) completely done of that ass fuck apartment.

the second issue was a very dear friend of mine who is going through some fucked up shit and is handling it in a very fucked up way. this weekend her friends ( myself included) along with her therapist decided to pull the intervention card, it was not pretty and it was not fun but it needed to be done, and as long as she’s not bullshitting us, i think she’s on her way to getting the help that she needs.

there were also several minor ( at least to me) issues that came up as well and i won’t bore you with the details ( assuming i haven’t done so already) but today i realized, that maybe perhaps, i have a problem with getting too involved with other people’s shit. it is my instinct to jump in and help whenever i see anyone ( especially friends and family) in need of any sort of assistance, but i think i just took on too much of everyone else’s shit that i ended up being completely overwhelmed and burnt out within a few days. i really wish i knew how to say “no” but for some reason whenever i do, i can’t help but feel that i have done something criminal in denying my friends and family my assistance.

LONG CRANKY EMO POST AFTER THE JUMP

i hate that some of my co-workers treat me like an incompetent idiot because i don’t have a degree. one of my co workers is constantly making snide remarks about how i don’t know this or that, or how i can’t do shit because i don’t have “that professional background.” i can never offer my opinion on how to approach certain issues with the children we work with because no one takes me seriously. meanwhile, someone else could repeat verbatum what i said, and everyone would take it as gospel. do you know how hard it is not to feel useless/worthless when people treat you that way?

now i know some people would say ” well naomi, you chose not to go to college.” and that’s only partially true.

when the time came for me to go to college my father told me he would not be paying for my schooling because he couldn’t afford it. fine, lots of families can’t afford college for their kids. that’s what financial aid is for right? not quite…when i applied for financial aid it was determined that my father made too much for me to be eligible. so instead of going away to college i figured i would go to the community school and live at home because it would be cheaper. well, my father then told me that i could not live at home unless i was paying half the rent ( he said it’s what my grandmother did to him, what he failed to mention was that my grandmother took all the money he had given her and saved it so that when he was ready to move out he had a nice chunk of cash to help him out.) so i had to get a full time job to not only pay for my classes ( which i was also taking full time) but i also had to work to give my dad money. what made things even more difficult was that even after i would give my dad rent money, he would come to me a few weeks later looking for more money because he said he didn’t have the rent. we would have huge fights over this and in the end i would always end up forking over more money. half a semester in, i was totally burnt out, i couldn’t handle working full time and going to class full time, i knew if i quit my job i would have been kicked out ( or at least that was the threat) so i quit school instead, and went to working full time. so, yes i did “choose” not to go to school, but at the time i really didn’t feel like i had any other option.

i have a lot of resent towards my dad about this ( among other things), because as a parent even if he couldn’t send me to college, he should have been supportive and understanding of how important an education is. i feel like i was almost set up to fail, like i really wasn’t given a fair chance. and i know life isn’t fair and all that bullshit, and maybe it sounds immature of me to be talking like this, but whatever, it’s how i feel. i think what really rubbed salt on the wound was that when my sister was going to college he did not ask her to give him any money. and for the life of me i still can’t think of why. perhaps he realized that it was one of the many reason our relationship went to shit and he didn’t want to loose his other daughter, or maybe it’s the simple fact that my sister is a fighter and even if he had asked her for the money she would have refused.

my sister is younger than me and she has her masters, she’s got a great job and she’s really happy. and i’m happy for her, she worked hard to get to where she was and she deserves to be successful. but there’s this part of me that is also very bitter and jealous towards her, and it’s really not her fault. but it just kills me that everything seems to have worked in her favor, she’s even talking about getting married, which causes even more pangs of jealousy because she’s been with jim for about a year and half and i’ve been with ben for three years and while we’ve talked about it, we are no where close to getting married.

i’m thinking about going back to school, i could at least have a degree by the time i’m 32, which isn’t too bad all things considered. but it’s still not a plan that satisfies me.

this is just more of the shit that keeps my head spinning at night when i should be sleeping. i just keep trying to figure out, where did i make the mistake? why do i always seem to fail at everything i try and my sister has this midas touch to things. and yes i am aware that there are people out there who are much worse off than me, and yes i am aware that i shouldn’t compare myself to my sister, and yes i am aware that if things had been different i would not be who i am today ( though sometimes i don’t think it would be so terrible to not be who i am) and that i would have never met ben or any of my friends if i had followed a different path, and while for the most part i agree with that, there are some days i would love to go back and change something.

sinner

i ran into someone from the church i used to go to lifetimes ago. it was the most awkward thirty seconds of my life. she asked me about what i’ve been up to and i gave her the boring details about work and trying to go back to school and a part of me wanted to lie about living with my boyfriend but then i thought, what the fuck does it matter? so i told her and as soon as the words left my mouth, she gave me that forced smile that people give you when they clearly think you have done something wrong but they don’t have the balls to say it to your face, and then she said ” so i guess you’re not involved with any church then?” I told her I wasn’t, and even though there is nothing wrong with what i told her, i still felt guilty.

some people would say that my guilt feelings are really “god” trying to “call” me back to him/her/it but i think it’s just the foul residue of my former church life that basically said anything that isn’t centered around god and serving him/her/it is wrong and sinful and should be repented of immediately. this is why i always have anxiety attacks about seeing the people i used to be involved with, i just don’t want to deal with their insincerity and blatant judgement of me.

i hope i made her feel dirty.

love/hate and i’m an asshole

had a very uncomfortable talk with ben today. he knew something had been bothering me ( it’s impossible for me to hide how i’m really feeling) after a lot of prodding on his part, i finally told him about what i’ve been upset about, long, harsh story short, at times he’s irresponsible and immature and i have doubts that he is taking our future together seriously. this upset him a great deal, which i think was natural, but i found i was equally upset about his reaction. it was never my intent to hurt, shame or pick him apart, but it seems that this is what i ended up doing.

a part of me was angry that he was upset by what i had to say, he did after all, ask me to tell him what was bugging me. should i have lied to him?

but then i realized that just like i am entitled to my feelings, and that no one can make me “feel” anything without me first allowing them, I am not in control of other people’s feelings, and ben had every right to be sad/angry by what i had to say. but i know I hurt him, and i’m an asshole because of it. i know in his heart of hearts he really does love and care about me. why did i have to be so critical of some of his more insignificant flaws? why couldn’t i have just let it go and chalk it up to ben being ben? god knows he puts up with my petty bullshit all the time, why can’t i give him the same courtesy? this is why i feel like a shallow bitch. i say i love him for who he is, and yet it is the same qualities that i love that also drive me up a fucking wall.

what the fuck is wrong with me?

my sister in the flying spaghetti monster

a few days ago a co-worker and i got into a argument of sorts, long story short, i asked her to do something, she gave me an EXTREMELY rude response, I asked her if she was “serious” she said she was, i told her to get out of my room, she went bat shit and threatened to hit me, my boss got involved, told her i was right and we really hadn’t spoken since the incident.

today she apologized to me, but it wasn’t your regular ” i’m sorry i fucked up” kind of apology, this apology was evangelical. she even referred to me as her ” sister in christ.” i believe she was sincere, and i know it was hard for her to apologize ( she NEVER does that!!) so I accepted her apology, and we’re fine now…

i didn’t have the heart to tell her i’m an atheist,

pass the xanax please?

feeling a lot of anxiety the past few days. i’ve been telling a lot of people off lately, which is not my way. i guess you could say that i’ve reached a breaking point. i let people treat me like shit a lot and i guess i’ve just had enough of it. this applies to family, friends and co-workers. in each group there is always the one person who gets a little to comfortable using me as a punching bag and i’m at this point where i’m done with it. the problem is that because i have allowed it to go on for so long, they tend to get a little more than ruffled when i assert myself and stand up for myself. suddenly, when i tell them ” don’t talk to me like that” or simply say “no” or do anything other than stay quiet and take it, the responses i get are lest than respectful. i get yelled at, cursed at, was once even threatened with physical violence. i don’t understand it. why is it ok to dish it out but then become infuriated and defensive when it is given back to you? why don’t i have a right to treat you the way you have treated me?

i’ve been going head to head with people who pride themselves in being intimidating and in control. These are people that do not like to be challenged. and i think they are taken aback when quiet-lil’-ole-me actually says “fuck off”.

i guess the anxiety is from my worry of the repercussionss i may face in the coming days. these people are intimidating for a reason, and even though i know i have nothing to be sorry for, even though i know i did the right thing, every so often i find myself wishing i had just done what i always do and kept my mouth shut and accepted their bullshit.