Confessions of a Stupid Smart Girl

Valentine's Day

2010-02-14T10:49:00.000-08:00

So my husband doesn't do valentine's day. He says it's over commercialized and he hates that a man is expected to prove his love by purchasing overpriced flowers and gifts. So we don't celebrate it. Don't decorate for it. Nothing.

This year, I decided i wanted to change that. We've been going through a hard time, and I wanted to do something fun to mark the occasion. So I bought him a little something. It cost five whole dollars. I told him about a week ago, that I was going to give him something small.

Now I'm feeling foolish. What seemed fun at the time just sounds stupid now. I don't think I'll give it to him after all. He probably wouldn't like it anyway.

So instead I cut out lots of paper hearts and pasted them to his bathroom mirror. Simple, inexpensive, but a tangible thing. It took some time. It took some effort.

I am wondering if he will do anything at all for me. I'm trying not to hope. I mean, surely with over a week's worth of notice, knowing that I was planning something special for him, he will take the hint, right?

I wish it didn't matter.

When the husband is jealous

2009-12-08T19:16:00.001-08:00

I have a girlfriend I'm super tight with. We do everything together during the week; shopping, cooking, help each other with housework, tend each other's kids, etc. She's my bff. She's cute, talented, funny, and I love being with her.

My husband hates it.

For some reason I don't understand, he is jealous of the time I spend with her, even though he's at work when I do it. He seems to feel threatened by the fact that I have a close friend. I don't really understand why.

I have some ideas though, based on what he's told me.

* he feels like I talk to her all day and get all my "talking needs" fulfilled, and have nothing to say to him when he comes home.

* he doesn't want anyone to know anything about him, and he doesn't want me telling her anything about my marriage.

*he is afraid that I won't need him anymore, or less, or something, because I have someone else to confide in.

So basically, he's ok with me having a friend as long as I don't like her too much, don't tell her anything about me that would give her any info about him, and am still dependent on him for my every emotional need.

It causes some tension between us, because he doesn't want to be around her, and as a result of his veiled hostility, she knows she isn't fully welcome in my home. I feel frustrated that I can't invite my friend over for any activities when he will be home because they are both uncomfortable.

This has become a real battle. He resents that I have a bff, and I am not willing to give the friendship up to soothe his ego.

FWIW - her husband has an almost completely opposite view. He sees that this friendship is good for his wife and that she's happier, and he's fully supportive. She tells me everything, and he is ok with that. I am welcome in their home, and as a result I spend a lot more time there than she does at my house. It's almost like I have this second life that my husband is not a part of, by his own choice. I find it kind of ironic.

He calls my affection for her "an obsession" and even "addiction". He has even accused me of being emotionally unfaithful. It hurts.

My relationship with him is suffering, not because I love her more than him, but because of his insecurity and jealousy that there is another person that I care deeply about.

Marriage and individuality

2009-11-29T16:44:00.000-08:00

When I got married, I threw myself heart and soul into my new life with my best friend. "I" was replaced with "we", and it was bliss. For a long time. He was the perfect man for me, and he thought I was pretty neat too.

Then life happened.

Somehow over the years of baby-having and child-rearing, things changed. I realized that I had kind of given my identity over to the marriage, and I was just Smart Guy's wife and Cute Kids' mom. Where was the smart girl? Somewhere in there, she'd gotten stupid.

So I started changing things. Doing what I wanted sometimes. Hanging out with friends more. Not always pleasing the man. And guess what -- he doesn't like it. He's annoyed with me most of the time, downright angry some of the time. But guess what: I'm less depressed than I was before. Isn't it interesting that I have more turmoil in my marraige than I used to, but I'm happier than I used to be?

Sometimes I worry that he's right and I'm wrong; that I'm not keeping up my end of the deal we made when we got married. It's hard to be willing to give up the freedom I've gained. I don't want to go back to the way I was before. I can only hope he'll come around someday.

At least for now, i don't know how to strike the balance between the twoshallbeoneflesh commandment and inidividuality. It seems like one has to give way to the other. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Who Am I, Really?

2009-09-27T15:10:00.000-07:00

I realize that I haven't posted in so long that it may be awhile before anyone reads this, if they ever do. That's ok. I'm mostly just writing down my thoughts before they disappear into the ether of confusion in which I reside. But if you do happen to read it, I would love a comment, just to get another perspective. I feel like I need some objective input from someone outside of the situation. Thanks.

Have you ever noticed that you are a different person depending on who you're with? My husband made this observation about me recently, and I am unsure what to think about it. I don't feel like I change who I am... but if I do act differently around diferent people, is that necessarily a bad thing? Does that mean I am disingenuous? That I'm a hypocrite? Is the goal in life to be the same person regardless of whose company I'm in?

He said he doesn't like the SSG who is her parents' daughter so much as he likes the SSG who is his wife. Who I am when I've spent time with my best girlfriend isn't his favorite either. So now I wonder... who am I when I am with them, versus who I am when I am with him? What qualities about me does he like, and which traits that are influenced by them does he dislike? It is interesting information, this observation of his... but it only adds to my self consciousness. Now when i'm with him I subconsciously try to be the person he wants and not the person he isn't so crazy about.

And I've just discovered something else that bothers me more than a little bit. I think I like the person I am when i'm with my favorite girlfriend more than the person I am when I am with my husband. What does that mean?

Maybe it only means that I think too much.

Ski 2, This Is For You

2009-04-11T10:06:00.000-07:00

A fan I didn't know I had asked me to post something -- anything. Wow. After three months, I'm shocked that anybody remembers this pathetic little blog, let alone misses it.

So just for you, Ski 2, here's a post.

When last I wrote, I had started counseling and was working on some closet cleaning. It was fairly messy there for awhile, but I am happy to report that I made a lot of progress. I threw out a fair amount of junk and got the things I decided to keep organized, and my closet is looking and feeling much better these days.

I wish I could say that we all lived happily ever after, but alas, a funny thing happened on my way to happiness; my husband started feeling worse. As I rose up out of the ashes of my depression, my husband began feeling sorry for himself and all the years he had lived with a less than enthusiastic wife.

So he started counseling for his own issues, and we've just started going as a couple as well. All that money I was saving towards a new kitchen remodel is now being spent on healing our wounded inner children. Who needs granite countertops anyway?

Giving Up

2009-01-29T18:03:00.001-08:00

Today I said goodbye to my father.

He's a rageaholic who has emotionally and sometimes physically abused me and my siblings our whole lives. I've worked at forgiving and trying to have a relationship with him my whole adult life, but I finally became too weary to keep doing it.

I wrote him a letter asking him not to contact me anymore.

I feel incredibly guilty for giving up and at the same time relief at the prospect of not having to shovel his crap anymore.

Mostly, though, I just feel tired. Tired and incredibly, immeasurably sad.

Envy, revisited.

2009-01-23T06:15:00.000-08:00

Awhile ago, I posted about my barbie doll friend.

My friend is now pregnant and gaining weight. Not a lot of weight. Aside from the now obvious bulge in her midsection, no one else would notice that she's gaining weight. But as the best friend, I hear about it all the time. "I'm such a whale!" "I am eating everything in sight!" "My butt is so big!"

Uh, no honey. It isn't.

I realize that she's talking about herself relative to how she used to look. And by comparison, yes, she's gaining some weight. I know that she's not referring to me in any way. I know that she doesn't understand that her claim to being fat when she really isn't does not help my envy issues, since even at the apex of her pregnancy she'll still be lighter than I am now. Her self-centered pregnant mind has never stopped to think how any of this might make me, the truly fat one, feel.

I just try to shrug it off, and remind myself that it's about her and not about me. It still stings.

Will the real therapist please stand?

2009-01-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

So back when I was a big fat Liar, I claimed to be a therapist. Heh. It's not something I'm particularly proud of, and sometimes I'm tempted to just delete all evidence that I was ever that stupid.

Turns out I wasn't lying. I was just confused. When I said I was a therapist, what I really meant to say was, I need to see a therapist.

Funny, right?

I didn't think so either.

Turns out I'm stupid because I'm depressed. And I'm depressed because I'm emotionally damaged. Maybe. Or it could just be that my brain is broken. Whatever the cause (yet to be determined), I'm now taking two different antidepressants and going to therapy once a week.

It's expensive and time consuming. Self discovery isn't the most pleasant thing, I've decided. I'm so consumed with all the crap I'm learning that it's hard to concentrate on anything else. I'm having trouble sleeping and eating, I'm so tied up in knots over all of it.

It feels kind of like when you clean out a long neglected closet. There's stuff in there that really needs to be thrown out, but you just keep the door shut and try to ignore it. But every time the door is opened to put something away, other stuff falls out and it's a challenge to get it pushed back in again. Finally you decide you really need to take care of the mess, so you open the door and start pulling things out. And before you know it, you have a huge mess all over the floor that you have to live in until you can haul off all the trash and put everything worth keeping back in order again. The mess gets worse for awhile before it gets better. And when it's done, you're glad.

At least I hope I'll be done someday. Right now I can't see the end and I'm a little worried that I'll be stuck here forever. That's when I remember something I read somewhere: "When you find yourself walking through hell, whatever you do, Don't Stop." So I keep slogging through.

Wish me luck.

Do I Dare?

2009-01-12T09:20:00.000-08:00

I created this blog so I could say whatever I wanted without being embarrassed. And then I stopped posting on it because everything I could think of to say was embarrassing. Plus most of the embarrassing stuff I can think of to say is negative. And nobody likes a Debbie Downer. Except that although nobody likes negative people, I think a lot of us feel that way but we're too embarrassed to admit it so we pretend to be all happy and cool so other people will like us. Of course some people are truly happy and cool and whaddyaknow -- people like them!

But not me. I'm not happy and I'm not cool. I have a lot of negative thoughts. And this is where I dump them. When I'm not too embarrassed. Which is most of the time. Which is why I haven't posted since... what, early December?

So I'm going to try an experiment. I'm going to try posting my thoughts of the moment, without editing (except for spelling and grammar, because I'm a little OCD about that kind of thing). I'll just lay it all out here. If you don't like it, don't read it. If you read it and don't like it, well, you were warned so don't whine about it.

Oooh. How am I doing so far? Have I offended you yet?

A Game I'm Not Very Good At

2008-12-01T20:51:00.000-08:00

I just don't get communication games. You know, where people say one thing but mean another. I'm not good at deciphering the language, so I just refuse to play. I say what I mean, and I take people's words at face value. Sometimes that means I offend people. And sometimes it makes for awkward social situations.

This year we were invited by an extended family member to celebrate Thanksgiving at her house. All of my siblings were invited as well, meaning it would be a large group. I asked what I could bring to offset the costs of putting on such a big shindig. The hostess poo-poohed that idea, insisting that she enjoyed entertaining and we really didn't need to bring a thing. I talked to her again the week before Thanksgiving and offered again. Again she refused.

So I believed her.

Come Thanksgiving Day, we drove the three hours to her house, and were the first to arrive. My sister came soon after and her husband and three children trooped into the house. Each bearing a beautiful flaky homemade pie.

Awkward.

I felt like a freeloader, even though the hostess had insisted (twice) that she didn't need/want any help with the meal. Somehow my sister either got different directions or just insisted more convincingly that she was going to help.

I guess taking people at their word, face value and all that, is naive and foolish.

But it sure is cheaper.

I just don't get women

2008-11-24T08:33:00.000-08:00

What is it with women and compliments? If we get them, we play them down, or outright reject them. If we don't get them, then we're all insecure and wonder if something is wrong with us.

Whatever happened to just saying "Thank you" when someone says something genuinely nice?

Once, at the end of a girl's night out, I said to a friend, "BTW, You look nice tonight." Her response: "You're full of crap, you know that?"

Ouch.

The thing is, I don't lavish compliments on people. If I tell you you're looking good today, it's because I meant it. When you throw it back in my face, it hurts. It feels like a personal rejection. And I make a mental note not to make that mistake again.

So if you're feeling sad because your husband never tells you you're pretty anymore, maybe it's because you trained him not to.

Love thy neighbor as thyself

2008-11-21T12:53:00.000-08:00

Society is over-rated, in my opinion. People annoy me. Well, not all people, of course. I have a few favorites. But by and large, in general, and overall, the less I am required to interact with human beings, the happier I am.

My telephone is on the fritz lately. Lots of static, dropped calls, and just generally poor connections. This means that when people call my house, sometimes the calls don't get through, and when they do, often the connection is so poor that the conversation is kept to a bare minimum required to exchange the needed information.

I find that I am not in a terrible hurry to get this fixed. The few people I actually like know my cell phone number, so they can just call me there. Everyone else can just take a number, or better yet, eventually give up and leave me alone.

Is that bad? I think it's probably bad. In fact I'm pretty sure that somewhere it's written down that people who don't like people go to hell.

That doesn't sound so bad to me, as long as I get to be alone there.

TRUE Confessions of a More Stupid than Smart Girl

2008-11-11T07:36:00.000-08:00

I am so stupid. Here I went and started this blog so I could be honest, and almost immediately I started lying.

I thought I was so smart (I know: stupid). I wanted a place where I could vent about the real me and all my socially unacceptable thoughts and feelings without worrying what irl friends and family would think. I wanted it to be anonymous. And then I created an extra layer of lies to really cover my tracks so there'd be no chance anyone would ever guess it was me.

The TRUTH: I'm not really a therapist.

There. The awful truth. It seemed like a good idea at first, because I really did study psychology, and I've thought of going back to school and getting my credentials so I could be a therapist. Sometimes I FEEL like a therapist; my irl friends think I'm this great listener and they're always coming to me with their problems and they say that I help them. It didn't seem like too much of a stretch to actually claim to be a therapist on this obscure, anonymous blog, and since I wanted the privacy to really speak my mind I thought it might give me the distance to feel safe doing that. Instead of coming out and saying "this is MY problem", I could say "I had this patient once who had this problem".

I know. Stupid.

Especially when I became a flaming hypocrite after I wrote my criticism of the Super Hopeless Romance scandal, and then that nosey Crash Test Dummy directed a lot of traffic over here (ack!), I realized that the extra layer of anonymity wasn't worth sacrificing my integrity and sleep.

Because I need my sleep. I need integrity too, but I need sleep more, and since I can't sleep without integrity, it's kind of a package deal, you know? Okay yes, again: stupid.

Hello! That's why I started this blog: so I can say all the stupid things that wash across my brain. Love me or hate me, it's who I am. I'm like an M&M: bright shiny smart exterior, filled with a decadent tempting stupid center.

Last night I started thinking: Now that Crash has exposed me, what if this blog actually became popular, and people start coming to me for advice, thinking I actually know what I'm talking about? And that sounded like a nightmare. So I figured I'd better come clean early, before the guilt ate me alive. And then I realized that if all THREE of the people who read this blog decide I'm a complete loser and never come back... well, then I can be honest to my heart's content and since no one will read it, I won't have to worry about anonymity, right?

I'm sorry I lied.

So maybe I should change my name and just be The STUPID Girl.

Super Hopeless Liar.

2008-11-10T12:07:00.000-08:00

I help a bit with the Young Women in my church, and so I am kept abreast of the latest fads. I listen to their music, read the books they're raving about, watch the movies they love. They think I'm incredibly cool to be interested in the stuff they are. The truth is, that I'm not really interested in the "stuff", but I am interested in them, and when it comes to teens, if you don't share their experiences, they don't share their thoughts.

In October, all they wanted to talk about was the "My Super Hopeless Romance" blog. You've heard of it, I'm sure. I don't even need to insert a link here because either y'all have it on your blogrolls or you're a follower, and if you're too proud to admit your addiction publicly, it's at least bookmarked. It seems that EVERYBODY (well at least every female) has read this blog, at least in part. Because admit it, ladies, this blog fed not just drama addicted teenager's appetites for a good romance story, it also fed a lot of grown Mormon women's appetites for a good romance story. It was sad, it was sweet, it was funny, and it was even real, the poor girl!

Except it wasn't. Turns out a very influential Mormon mommy blogger with romance novel aspirations made it all up, just to "test the market", then after a month of deceiving the entire m.m.blogging community, gave in to the mounting guilt and confessed. The Sunday afterwards, that's all the girls wanted to talk about. Some of them were angry that she had lied, a few were disappointed but indifferent, and one girl was devastated. She had identified with the main character to the point that she felt terribly betrayed and despondent over the revelation that the blog was fiction. I worry about her a bit because she's not terribly emotionally healthy in the first place. Of course, what teenager is, right?

It made me sad, and more than a little angry at the blogger and her fabrication that had hurt my young friend so much. So I laid my prepared lesson aside and we spent the remainder of the hour talking about popular media and how we have to be careful what we believe about the things we read/watch/listen to, because they can deceive and hurt us. We talked about the consequences of dishonesty, and how not only had the author of the romance blog hurt many of her readers with her deception, but she had also destroyed her own credibility; people will always wonder if she's lying to them as a result of this. We discussed what the popular definition of love is as opposed to the scriptural definition. We talked about how the messages taught by current pop music and movies aren't always healthy: "I can't live without you" and "If you leave me I'll be nothing" are not only false statements, but they aren't even about love, instead indicating unhealthy obsession and low self-esteem.

Near the end of our time together, one of the girls asked me if I personally was disappointed that the blog wasn't real. I replied, intending humor, that I never believe anything anyone tells me; that way I don't get hurt. She missed the joke, and said, "Gosh, Sister Stupid, that's a pretty sad and lonely way to live, don't you think?"

She has a point.

Tales From the Crypt... er, Couch

2008-11-08T13:14:00.001-08:00

The Crash Test Dummy is hassling me for stories about all the loony people that visit me on a daily basis. (Edit: except they don't actually visit me. Go here for the explanation.) Where she gets off being so bossy has me a little puzzled. I don't even know her. I made the mistake a few weeks ago of signing up to "follow" her sad little blog, and now she's stalking me.

Which actually isn't anything new. Working, as I do, with people of questionable mental health (think The Office is fiction? You've never been to my workplace.), I've actually been stalked before, in real life. My first stalker was a passive-aggressive, extremely co-dependent woman, who developed an obsession with me, her co-worker.

One evening, she followed me home from work. And then she drove by my house several times a day for the next week, even when I wasn't home. One of my neighbors actually alerted me to this fact when he asked me if I'd noticed the white Toyota Camry that was frequenting our street. I asked if he noticed a license number. He said the number was obscured by a strip of duct tape.

Then packages began arriving in the mail, once per week, and the contents varied: on a week when she was happy with me, candy; the next week when she was angry, a dead mouse.

One Sunday she showed up at my church meetings. She sat in the overflow seating, and since my family sits in the middle of the chapel, I never would have noticed she was there except that a small child near her did a swan dive off his chair and landed on his head on the hard wood floor. The piercing screams that ensued turned many heads, including mine, and my eyes locked with the startled eyes of my stalker client. At that moment, all the puzzle pieces fell into place in my mind, and I gave her my best "you are sooo busted" grin and wink.

She quit working at my office soon after that. The white car wasn't seen again in my neighborhood. And I received one final package from her: a used messy diaper.

Is it just me, or are you boring?

2008-11-04T15:00:00.000-08:00

What do you do with a friend that natters on and wastes your time with meaningless chatter? I have a friend who lives in another state whom I sometimes chat with on AIM, and while occasionally our conversations are interesting and valuable, more often she just wants to tell me about the minutiae of her day -- "I'm helping my daughter with her homework" or "today I cleaned the kitchen and then I pulled some weeds, and I think maybe I'll make stew for dinner, except I don't have any carrots so I'll have to go to the store for that, so maybe I'll do something else."

I find myself simply not caring whether she cleaned her kitchen or what she's having for dinner. So I often avoid talking to her. I keep my status offline most of the time so that I don't get sucked into pointless chats with her. I feel guilty about it sometimes. But only a little.

I guess maybe we've been friends long enough that all the "important" conversations have already happened. Perhaps the problem is solely mine: I spend my afternoons and some evenings listening to other people natter on about their problems and sometimes I want to shake them and say "Grow up and actually TRY to solve your problems instead of just come here to whine about them!"

Maybe I just don't comprehend friendship. Or maybe I don't want to work hard enough to maintain a friendship. Maybe I'm intolerant. Or maybe she's just boring.

Does this envy make me look fat?

2008-10-28T01:07:00.000-07:00

I am overweight - about 50 pounds to be exact. But who's counting?

I am, obviously. (Duh.)

I have a friend who is thin. She looks like I used to look. Like I want to look.

Here's the embarrassing part: I hate her sometimes, for being thin. And then I hate myself for being so petty and small. (Small of mind, not small of body. If I was small of body I wouldn't hate my friend or myself in the first place. Capiche?)

I hate feeling this way, but I can't help it. And I don't know how to change it.

A little help?

Walking the Tightrope

2008-10-25T20:00:00.000-07:00

If you're wondering why the text in this post is struckthrough (is that even a word?), it's because it is a lie. Here's where I come clean.

I work as a mental health specialist. I counsel people who struggle with issues such as addiction, depression & anxiety, abuse, marital conflict, etc. Mostly I counsel women. It's a challenging and interesting job, but it's hard sometimes. Honestly, it's hard every day. It's hard watching people who's lives are messed up because of the bad choices of others and made still worse by their own equally bad choices. It's heartbreaking seeing an addict who has made so much progress relapse and end up worse than before. It's frustrating working with people who could help themselves, but spend all their time and energy shifting blame and therefore just stay stuck.

I spend my days listening to problems. These people are not happy to see me, in general. For the most part they are embarrassed that they are even there, and they are only there because they are desperate or they've been ordered to be there. Sometimes they're downright hostile. For my part, while I greet them cheerfully and treat them with respect and love, I must maintain a professional detachment for my own self-preservation. In other words, I cannot allow myself to care too much about them personally. The prime occupational hazard of mental health workers is depression caused by over-empathizing with clients. Ironic, don't you think? In a climate of bad news followed by worse news, with success a rare and often fleeting thing, caring will get you sucked in, chewed up, spit out, and stomped on. It isn't healthy for the client either, since many clients already struggle with boundary issues and tend to get over-attached if encouraged at all.

Every day I walk the tightrope, trying to find the balance between professional detachment and compassionate listening and counsel, in order to help these poor lost souls find the path to a healthier way of life.

Frankly it's exhausting. Ah, but the stories I could tell. I think I might do exactly that, here on this blog.

Beginning

2008-10-22T16:54:00.000-07:00

I always figured being intelligent was a good thing. Academic achievement came easy; listen to a lecture or read a book and the information was mine for a lifetime. To see a word was to know how to spell it. Mathematics, foreign language, philosophy, literature, economics, chemistry, physics; I loved them all. I pulled straight A's through high school and college without hardly breaking a sweat. My biggest dilemma was deciding what to major in. I spent the first three semesters of college taking classes from nearly every discipline, trying to decide what I liked best. In the end I went with psychology, because above all else, human behavior fascinated me. What makes people do the things they do? Are we a product of our environment or our genes?

I thought I was so smart then. I had no idea how stupid I really was.

Here commences an attempt to chronicle the really dumb things that go through the head of an individual who appears to have it all together. I'm keeping it anonymous because I'd like to be able to say what I truly think without worrying about shocking my family and friends.

You see, deep down I have one basic, irrational fear: that if my friends knew everything about me, they'd disappear.

Hence this anonymous blog. Maybe I'll have a lot to say. Or not.