Sometimes you get the blues . . . keeping it real

I confess . . .  I have been feeling a bit blue lately and it's somewhat inexplicable.   I can't really pin point a reason for it.  I think everyone feels a bit blue from time to time.  Normally I can just shake it off, but this time  . . .  its been a little bit harder.

I guess I just feel a bit bruised sometimes.  Maybe everyone does.




A couple of days ago one of my sons posted on facebook did anyone in the family have any pictures  or negatives that he could have . . .  because of parents divorces, etc.  he only has a couple and he would like to have some more.  I immediately beat myself with the guilty stick.  He is from my first marriage, which didn't really last very long at all . . . my second one lasted 22 years . . . and when that one broke up I was handed a torn envelope with a bunch of old negatives inside, some stuck together,  some mildewed, most of them useless . . . not much to show for 22 years of your life, but all I was allowed to take with me when it ended.

I have shared any photos I have with my son . . . most of them I have stolen from various spots, or kind people in my family have chosen to share with me.   But that started me into feeling sad . . .  when I read that post from my son.    His wife has lots of photographs of her childhood . . . and her parents were divorced too.  But obviously not all divorces are equal.  It made me feel sad that I had nothing much to share with him.  It made me feel like I had let him down  . . . not once, but twice.




This morning when I got up . . .  I said my prayers and then I turned the computer on, checked some e-mails, then I checked facebook.   My kids are notoriously bad at communicating . . . so that is usually where I find out what's happening in their lives.  The first thing that slapped me in the face was that my baby boy is now engaged to be married.    Happy for them, but sad that it was something I had to find out on facebook.

Which is kind of a statement about my life I guess.  And it makes me feel even bluer.  I will be 60 in August.    I have lived most of my life on the fringes of my family.  I never felt like I fit when I was a child.   I never felt I fit for most of my adult life.   I was always surrounded by family . . .  but lonely in a crowd.  I just always felt a bit sad and like I didn't belong.  I am not saying that so anyone will feel sorry for me, simply stating a fact.

I have found my happy place and my home now . . . but sometimes I just wonder why I had to pay such a hefty price to find it.  And that makes me feel blue . . .  bruised . . .  a bit bereft.




No mom should have to find out these types of things on Facebook.   When my youngest daughter was engaged to be married . . . I was only told by her a few months before the wedding, even though the last time I had seen her, they were already talking marriage.  When my oldest daughter got married, I got an e-mail from her saying she didn't want me to spoil her wedding day.  I knew she hadn't written it by herself,  but I decided not to go, because I felt that in going, it would actually ruin the day because of other people's  attitudes towards me being there.    I did eventually let myself get talked into going, and it was great,  but then . . .  the last time I was home I was looking through her wedding album and there are no photos of me in it.  Literally none.  I was there . . .  at the wedding . . .  but for all intents and purposes it looked like her parents were my ex and his wife.  C'est la vie.

When my youngest daughter was expecting her second child . . .  I only found out a couple of months before he was born, and then it was only because her older brother found out she was pregnant and told her she needed to tell me before I found out on facebook.     Found out the end of March . . .  the baby was born in June.  Then when the baby was born, I was so excited that I shared the news . . .  a bit vaguely in a private facebook group . . .  saying . . . "This grandmother is just gagging to share some news but waiting for permission to do so, lets just say blue blanket."  I was forgetting of course that the stepmom belonged to the same group, and she very kindly took it upon herself to share what I had said with my kids.  I got a nasty message back from one of them saying I was lucky that anyone had even told me my daughter had had the baby . . .

Why??




Every occasion which should be a happy occasion concerning my family is always tinged with shades of  blue.

And you know . . . sometimes that makes my having done the right thing feel like I did the wrong thing.  I sit in church on Sundays surrounded by families . . .  parents with their children, grandparents surrounded by their children and grandchildren . . . and I feel the loss keenly.  Why did my choice to worship my Heavenly Father the way I wanted to, and the way I needed to . . . cost me so much?  I can never sing the hymn "Families Can Be Together Forever" hymn without tearing up.   It just breaks my heart each time.  And I know it is wrong to put limitations on the power of God in that way . . .  and I know that I don't know the end of the story . . .  and I DO have faith that one day it will all be different . . .  and all things will be put right  . . ..  but in the meantime . . .  sometimes it just makes me feel sad.

Because it isn't supposed to be that way.    I guess sometimes life just sucks.

Excuse me while I go bury my face in a chocolate cake or something. 

Don't worry, tomorrow will be a much better day

Keeping It Real . . . .

This is the latest Mormon Message.  It's entitled "Sitting on the Bench." It's about suicide and thoughts on what we can do to help prevent it.  When I was watching it, tears were rolling down my cheeks.

I have been there.  I have been sitting on that bench feeling utterly and totally alone.  I have felt lost.

I grew up in a home where I can remember laying in bed at night and hearing my parents argue downstairs.  I can hear my father saying he was going to kill himself and cocking his rifle and my mother begging him not to.  I had a sister who attempted it several times in her teenage years.  I attempted it myself when I was pregnant for my eldest child, but not seriously . . .  I was too chicken to go through with it, and I was pregnant and thankfully I realized that in taking my own life I was also taking someone elses.  My mother attempted suicide after my father left her.   Thankfully she did not succeed.

I spent most of my life feeling like a square peg trying to fit into a round hole.  There were several times over the years when I felt so lost and helpless and useless and unloved that I have gone down to the basement of my home and looked at the rafters and thought about hanging myself, but once again, thoughts of what my children would do prevented me from really doing anything at all.  Thank goodness.

I know a little bit about how hopeless someone can feel and how desperate for help.  I have suffered with depression and with post-natal depression and had suicidal thoughts.  I know that it is not a nice way to feel.  Thankfully I have not felt like that in a very long time now.





I don't think that anyone really wants to kill themselves . . .

I think they feel alone and helpless . . .  and . . .   hopeless and worthless . . .  and they don't know how to talk to anyone about how they are feeling . . .  or . . . for whatever reason . . .  they feel like there is nobody that cares.  Or they are in so much pain and anguish over things in their lives, or the holes in their lives . . .  that they feel like they just want to curl up in a ball and disappear, or want the pain to stop . . .  or they feel like they are a burden to others.

Suicide or attempted suicide is a cry for help from someone who doesn't know how to ask for help.  A final act of desperation from someone who is so totally lost and removed from those around them that they just feel like they cannot put one foot in front of the other again . . . they just want the pain to end . . . and ending it all feels like their only solution, because . . .

They don't want to bother anyone else with their problems.

They don't want to be a burden to anyone else.

They cannot find the hope  to enable them to keep going.

They cannot find the arm of love to lean upon.

They cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel.

They want the pain to stop.




I was talking to one of my children one day and they expressed to me that they were struggling with depression and my heart broke.   I have never ever wanted any of my children to struggle with depression.   I love my children and I wondered was this my legacy to him?  I tried so hard the whole time my children were growing up to make each of them feel loved, and wanted, and important.  Like they mattered.   I felt like I had failed my child.  I feel like I have failed my child. As parents we want to kiss all of our babies boo boo's and make them go away.  Thankfully he will be getting counseling for his depression and I pray each day that it will be helpful to him and that he would know and somehow be able to find his way to knowing that he is special, and wonderful and loved  . . .  to his Heavenly Father, to his wife and children, to his Mother, and most importantly of all . . .  to himself.  I pray each day that it will be a day in which he will not feel alone or helpless . . .  or hopeless.




Life is a struggle.  It is meant to be.   The rain falls on the righteous and the unrighteous alike.   Good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people.  Life is not always fair, nor was it meant to be.  Life and experience has taught me that nothing worth having ever comes easy, and that it is through my struggles that I have been able to gain strength . . .  and become stronger, and better . . .  and it is through my struggles that I have been able to find and embrace hope.  

Life and experience has taught me that . . .  as dark as the tunnel may be and as frightened as we may be when we are travelling through it . . .  there is always, always light waiting at the end of it  . . . . and that Grace isn't so much the light waiting at the end of the tunnel as it is the strong arm of love which helps to get us through the tunnel.  We need to learn of   and embrace the freedom which comes from hanging on to it.  Needing to grab it, or reaching out for help does not make us weak, or a burden . . .  it empowers us.  We DO matter, and we never matter more than when we are in our weakest moments.  Life is not and never will be meaningless. 

Each of us is special and unique. 

If you are struggling today, I pray that you will reach out to those around you.   Don't be afraid to tell them you are struggling.  You may be surprised as just how much they really DO care.  If you see someone you think is struggling, reach out to them . . .  show them that somebody DOES care and . . .  mean it when you do so, follow through on it.   BE THERE.

All anyone in this life really wants is to be loved by, and to matter to  . . . somebody outside of themselves.

Just my thoughts  . . .

There was a young man stabbed at the entrance to the park at the end of our street yesterday.  They had several police vehicles there and forensics and detectives etc. I do not know if he died or not.
 
 That is the park that Todd walks Mitzie in every day.  He always carries a big stick with him.   I have been having nightmares for several weeks.  One of them was about someone trying to cut his head off in that park.   I have convinced him now not to walk there anymore.  It is far too secluded.  If this can happen in broad daylight at the entrance to the park, how much more dangerous is it to be inside the park which is very dark and hidden.

 

And on a brighter note, here is what is baking in The English Kitchen today  . . . 
Almond Glazed Poppy Seed Bread.  I used to make this quite often when I worked at the Manor.  It was one of the Mrs' favourites.  

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May your Saturday be blessed and may you feel the love and acceptance of those around you.  Always.

Keeping it real . . .

 I had another negative comment on my Spam post over at the food blog during the night.  One positive one and one negative one.    This one kind of reminded me of my ex boss in that it was cloaked in a smile.  She used to smile while she was slagging you off and knocking you down too.

I too have noticed the increase of product(s) endorsements on your blog. You kindly buffer it with lovely recipes and pictures so thank you for that. However, in a world riddled with ads, I wanted the comfort of a friendly blog with lovely doable recipes which you have long provided. I will accept your invitation to stop reading your blog, with regret.  

And so I thought . . . is my blog riddled with ads???    I went back over these first eighteen days of June and this is what I discovered.  

In eighteen days I have posted thirty five different recipes.  There has been one post which has been a give-away post offering people the opportunity for people to win their own Tefal Opti-grill.  The Tefal people, as you know, sent me a grill to try out and when they asked me if I would post about their give-away, I kindly said that I would.   This is a fabulous grill and I love mine and I thought it would be nice if my readers could have an opportunity to win one.  It's an expensive piece of kit!  Seven of my recipe posts have been product reviews, only three of which did not have a recipe included.  I did not count the Farmer's Choice ones as product reviews.  I am a guest author on their site and I provide them with three recipes a month for people to make, recipes which I think my readers will also enjoy and so I post the photos of the recipes and links so that they can go and get the recipes for themselves.  So, bottom line, out of 35 posts, only three were product reviews only . . .  without recipes, one of which was for a coffee coconut water drinks, which I honestly told people that I had been unable to taste because we don't drink tea or coffee.   The second one was about these delightful little tea wands I had been sent that I thought were fabulous and wanted to share.   The third was for some really delicious juice drinks which I had been sent that I wanted to tell you about.

 
















 



Truthfully I like to try out new things and I like to share with my readers my findings.   There are a lot of bloggers who take the free stuff and then just post what is written on the box, or on the back of the book, etc.   I actually try everything I am sent and then talk about my experience in using it, and I endeavour to be honest with what I share with my readers.

Most of you will remember when I lost my job four years ago now.  I began my food blog when I was working at the Manor.  I wanted  a place to write about cooking that was completely separate from my every day thoughts.   It was easy to do because I cooked in two locations every day, and both meals were completely different.   Dinner parties gave me the opportunity to share a LOT of new recipes and classy out of the ordinary ones as well.   Then I lost my job, which in retrospect wasn't altogether a really bad thing.  But it did leave me unemployed and with the present economy I have never been able to replace it.

In all truth, without those Farmer's Choice posts I do each month, and the few cook-booklets I manage to sell,  I would not be able to pay off my credit card.  Yes, we were foolishly in debt when I got made redundant.  We live now on my husband's basic state pension.  We had a brand new car, which I had worked really hard for, but which had to go.   We now drive an old banger which we hope and pray will last us until we have our debts paid off and some money in the bank to buy another old banger.   Without the Farmer's Choice posts . . . I would quite honestly have to go bankrupt and I don't want to do that, and so I try to pay off my debt as best as I can and I work hard to do it.

In all truth, those food products which I get sent help us out a lot.   Without them our food storage would end up disappearing at a much faster rate and I wouldn't be able to share the many recipes which I do share.   The cost of groceries has sky rocketed over these past few years and there are some weeks where all we can afford to buy is bread and milk, and maybe eggs.  That's the truth.

Every eight weeks we make the choice to buy food or have the dog groomed.   We have the dog groomed because she has to be groomed, and we make do by eating what we have stored.  Oh sure, the church would help us if we asked.  But we don't ask because it is our own fault we are in debt.  We didn't heed the advice our leaders had been giving us to stay out of debt.  We foolishly thought I would be in work for at least another ten years which would enable us to pay off our debts.  It's not the church's responsibility to help us now.  It's ours and we bear the burden of that on our own shoulders.    

At first we were very optimistic and thought I would get a new job right away, no problem.   I could have gotten a job doing the same thing, but having been burnt I didn't want to risk everything again like that.   My husband is in his mid seventies and I didn't want him to have to go through the lose your job/lose your home scenario again.  At his stage in life that is far too stressful.  But I am 58 years old now and nobody wants a 58 year old cook whose body is riddled with arthritis and whose wrists cannot bear the weight of a large pan full of food, and who can no longer stand for 8 or 9 hours at a time.  In reality there are thousands and thousands of young people pounding the pavements looking for work.  What hope do I have?  Slim to nil.  Reality bites.

 



And so I do what I can to supplement Todd's pension and that means that sometimes I have to post something that isn't entirely off my own back.   That sometimes I have to write about things that aren't necessarily totally food based, and I am sorry about that, but life is what it is.  I'm dancing as fast as I can.   It makes me really sad when people feel they need to denigrate what I do . . .  when people think they have the right to tell me I shouldn't be doing this or I shouldn't be doing that.   When people overlook all the good things that I do and dwell on one post about Spam, and use that to judge me and then discard me as worthless.  And the truth is . . . I didn't get paid or sent any spam for that post.  I simply did it out of the goodness of my heart because the Spam people had been good to me in the past.

Reality means that, yes . . . we do have to eat spam sometimes and hot-dogs and tinned corned beef.   We eat more pasta than Todd would like to eat.  We don't get to go on days out much these days because of the cost of petrol.  I don't go into town because I don't have a bus pass and I don't have the £2 to take a bus.  I don't have the money to buy more cardboard mailers to mail out my artwork, or to buy more business cards,  or more paints, or to do a lot of things.    But I live in hope.

Know what . . .  sometimes life sucks . . . but most of the time it's really really good.

Life will go on.  Thanks for letting me vent.

Now back to my regular programming.

 

Cooking in The English Kitchen today  . . . Cheesy Smoked Sausage and Corn Skillet Supper.   A delicious store-cupboard meal.  Quick and easy.  Simple ingredients, wow flavours.  

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Have a fabulous Saturday!  Stay happy and stay safe!