Sometimes, you lost something so devastating that you don’t know if you’re going to be able to breathe. The Band is paying tribute to the losses you’ve had. Please share with us a loss you’ve experienced (doesn’t have to be a person, can be a dream, or a pet, or an item).
We have been trying to have a baby for years to no avail. I will spare you the details, but I was approached by a potential birth mother who is a friend. She is pregnant, doesn’t want the baby, was going to have an abortion and decided she didn’t know if she could go through with it. She asked if we might be interested in private adoption.
YES, oh YES, it would be a dream come true.
I did it. I got my hopes up against all logic and warning from everyone.
Sometimes we all need a little bit of advice now and then. Do you have a burning question you’d like to ask us?
Do it! Ask the band.
The Band, I’m in a terrible funk right now.
I’m having some kind of weird mid-life crisis, though I don’t know if being just shy of thirty counts as “mid.” Either way, my main problem is that I just want to be left the hell alone. Of course, wanting to be left alone and actually being left alone are two completely different things, and the sad truth is that I will never be left alone.
It’s not due to the bipolar depression, although I know damn well it’s a contributing factor on my worse days; it’s simply because I’m tired. I’m tired of going through the motions of my daily life, getting up early to tend to all manner of things. I’m tired of everyone in my household demanding something from me at all times, whether it’s my daughters, who want/need all of my attention since they are both so young, or my husband wanting to constantly have sex, or even the damn cat for bitching about not having food even though his food bowl is completely full. (The cat is an idiot.)
I have no friends – all of them live in a different state because we moved away 2 years ago in order for my husband to pursue a new job opportunity. We have family not too far from us, but we barely see them as it is, so they wouldn’t dare step in and watch the kids in order for me to get the hell away for a little while.
A few days ago, one of my friends told me to come visit her so we could go on a bender, and to be honest, I would fucking LOVE to! It would be an opportunity to get away and have some fun for once, since all of my hobbies have gone to shit since becoming a stay-at home-mum five years ago. However, even if we still lived close by, that bender would never happen because my husband, while a great guy, is insecure as fuck, and at times errs on the possessive side of things. He would be paranoid about me cheating on him even though I’ve been a million percent faithful.
Pretty much all of my time I try to reach some semblance of reprieve by burying myself in my laptop: reading the news, blogs, messaging friends or (my secret shame) reading and writing fan fiction. (Now The Band knows my horrible secret!) Sometimes I listen to music. Music is a major way for me to unwind, and the advent of Spotify has been very useful since I can listen to stuff that I’m too cheap to purchase via iTunes. My husband thinks that I have some kind of bizarre internet addiction, but that’s so far from the truth.
I know this is a form of escapism.
I’m grumpy, I’m exhausted, and I’m just flat-out sick of everything.
This is my dilemma. I just want my family to back the shit off, but at the same time, it makes me feel like a terrible person. I don’t want to play with the kids. I don’t want to engage in “sexy time.” I don’t want to do the goddamn laundry or feed the goddamn cat.
We haven’t been “together” since I was three months pregnant with his daughter. That was when he decided to back me into a corner and scream in my face over something silly. That was after he broke my phone in half. My two older kids were asleep in the other room, and he refused to leave MY house. The next day, I took my kids to my aunt’s house with me. He got pissed and started screaming at me again.
I called my aunt behind his back and he tried to slap me, with my terrified children at my feet. I moved out in three hours, after he went to work one Saturday, with the help of some amazing friends.
I missed grabbing some things in the shuffle and he refused to give them back. After I told the landlord I’d moved, he finally moved out; then he moved in with a mutual friend. The friend called me one day so I could get my things from his room while he was gone.
You should have heard that fight: What right did I have going into his house and taking his things? He never did understand that it was NOT his house, and I was invited by the homeowners AND didn’t touch his stuff. I only took mine.
Shortly after that, he amazingly made up with one of his “mortal enemies” and moved in with them. The best part? The house was three houses away from my grandma’s – where I’d moved with my children. He’d call every time I left the house or returned home – every time there was a car in the driveway. Sometimes, he’d call over 10 times in one minute.
One night, I called the police. The next day I got: “I don’t know which of your boyfriends you had call me, but I know you’re a liar and that was not a cop. A cop wouldn’t have restricted their number.” That is the level of stupid I deal with.
Our daughter – who is now four – was born and things are just as bad. If he even THINKS I am seeing someone he says, “We need to talk.” One time, after he found out I was dating someone, he refused to give my daughter back after a scheduled visitation.
I called the police.
They showed up and he said, “Oh I’m sorry officer. I never told her she couldn’t take the baby. I was just going to get her when she called.”
Mind you, he pushed me out of his way because I was just going to go in the house and take her. My other kids again, right there, saw it all.
If I make plans, he wants to know with whom, where, and when. And if he can watch the kids, which he doesn’t seem to understand will NEVER happen.
The one time I allowed him to watch all the kids, he decided to take a bath with my daughter – my daughter from a previous marriage. During this (naked) bath, he talked to her about his flaccid penis floating in the water. The detectives couldn’t prove anything, other than suspicions that he was “grooming” her, so everything was dropped.
This is the ONE thing I said would never happen to my kids, and I just handed it to him. Let the courts handle it instead of letting every single person I know kick his ass. And in the end, I should have just let them. Maybe then he’d understand.
The controlling goes on and on. I’ve told him to leave me alone. He always threatens custody, which, okay, I know I can’t afford that fight. He can because his mom always backs him up. no. matter. what. So, I stay quiet.
He makes sure our daughter has what she needs and I’m grateful for that.
But part of me wonders if it’s another way to control me – every time I refuse to tell him what I’m doing, he asks our daughter about me. Every time. Never fails.
He will buy me underwear or swimsuits, and he won’t take “no” for an answer. When we drop off or pick up our daughter, he backs me into a corner and kisses my neck. He makes inappropriate comments. I absolutely know this tactic. But I’m so tired of fighting – I simply don’t say anything.
Pervert is sometimes easier to deal with than asshole. In doing this, I know I’m letting him win. My depression will never get better with his behavior – I simply don’t know how to stop it.
He’s been blowing up my phone for two days because I didn’t tell him good morning or answer a rhetorical text he sent.
I love my daughter to pieces – don’t get me wrong…but sometimes…nope, can’t even write it. I love her too much.
I just want to take my children and run far, far away.
I don’t know what to do, The Band, and I don’t know how much longer I can keep doing this.
I apologize in advance for my terrible writing, but I’m like 14, y’all, and I don’t even know how to say this….
I have weight issues. Serious weight issues. “So?” you ask (or I assume you do). “So do most women.”
Well shut up and listen (I say lovingly). I’ve dabbled in quite a few self-destructive behaviors in my lifetime, but I’ve always been obsessed with my weight. I’ve starved myself for days, chewed-and-spit, and tried countless times to make myself throw up unsuccessfully (my hidden talent? I can touch my uvula without throwing up!).
I know I have no justification for this. I am not fat, or even a little overweight. But being skinny, really, truly skinny… it’s like a shining beacon of light in the distance. In all the things I deal with, this is by far the least serious (…isn’t it?), but I’ve never told anyone and I feel like I have to.
And isn’t that what The Band is for?
Quite honestly … I’m scared. I’m scared it will never go away. That I’ll forever spend my nights in front of a freaking distorted full length mirror, analyzing every single thing about my body. That I will always compare myself to every single pair of thighs I walk by, wondering if mine are fatter or skinnier, because I can’t tell anymore. That I’ll never stop taking videos of myself walking around, and watching them over and over trying to see if my butt is too big.
I’m asking for your help here, Band. What should I do? Is this normal?
I know it’s not that bad, I just can’t live with it as a secret anymore. Thanks for reading this, The Band!
It all started when I was a teenager. Or maybe that was the end. I still don’t know.
Before that, life was good. I had a great mom who took good care of me and my brothers.
Then she married a monster.
He molested me, scared me so much that I couldn’t tell anyone, especially my mom. She went to her grave thinking life was good and fair – and I’m glad for her.
But I paid for her peace of mind. God, I paid.
I lost track of how many times he molested me. There were just so many. Three years of that man forcing me to do things I’d never heard of, threatening to kill my mom if I told anyone he was abusing me.
It took me nearly three years to do just that – tell someone.
Then I married, and acquired an instant family. I thought life was going to be better.
That’s when it started.
At first it was little comments, “That swim suit shows too much,“ or, “You shouldn’t wear that, because your legs are too fat.”
He knew what I’d been through with my step-dad, yet he was doing the same thing – he raped me. I felt like this was just how men treated women. I was afraid to leave, and afraid to stay.
By then, I had another wonderful daughter. She was, and still is, my best friend in the world.
