it's my birthday and i'll cry if i want to...

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAA...

what a baby i was yesterday. much of it was real and important - but the drama that it escalated into was so unnecessary.

i'm feeling much better today. and i think i owe you an explanation. maybe by typing it out i'll have a better handle on why it got so bad. venting last night to hope helped a lot too.

as liam left for work yesterday morning he mentioned that he was taking his group clamming today. i thought 'oh nice, hope it stops raining...' until he left. then i realized 'hey, you have one social activity planned this month and you chose to place it directly on my birthday. wow. that hurts.'

liam is one of the most unintentional people i know. his a.d.h.d and personality are such that he is really a kind person, rarely motivated by trying to ever hurt me or anyone else, but the hurt that comes from little intention can wound me deeply.

yesteray was that kind of a day. when he came home for lunch i had worked myself up into a lot of pain and frustration, and even anger at myself for feeling that way. i wanted to honor my pain, and not attack him but be able to tell him of it without loosing myself along the way.

my love language is time - but it is a small branch of that which speaks deeply to my soul. being chosen, planned for and having time carved out for is what really nurtures me. not presents, not money, not big events even. just time. can you see the rub? it is his weakest impulse. he arrived home and i was in the bedroom with the little heater on reading. it was a blustery day here on the east coast, the damp and rainy outside looked very like my damp and rainy insides.

as he approached me he knew i was emotional. his back went up and when i explained i was upset he heard angry. so many times things are lost in translation. if he could have just owned this, or sat with my emotion it would have been such a different day. but he has a knee jerk reaction. i call it teflon-ing. if i took his inventory (which i do on occasion...) this would be a the top of the list. it is the immediate response he has that says 'nope, none of this is my responsibility, i am not to blame.'

i know it comes from the home he was raised in - i know it stems from being first born in a rage filled home. but the part of this that touches the 'not being heard' place of my own childhood meets it like a warm weather front colliding in the sky with the cold, cold north wind. they feed each other and we escalate something small and wounded into something major, loud and intense.

hours were spent yesterday trying to unravel the good from the bad, the pain from the emotion, the truth from the lies. hours. it was exhausting. i feel so badly for the young couple in the flat on the first floor. they are getting a masters in marriage while they finish up their masters in ministry here... but we faced it together - like looking into a wind tunnel, sorting through the debris left after the storm and picking up the pieces together.

marriage is still the hardest thing i've ever done. i know it would be easier to withdraw, to disengage, to not care and pretend. but i just can't do it.

we're better now, better than even before. it's worth it, and we're worth it, and pink and buck are worth it. but it's work. a lot of real, hard work.

and so far today i have had some wonderful surprises and gifts along the way. while writing this i was asked by our church to speak at our women's retreat at the end of november. me. i'm just tickled. it really was the best present i could have received. beautiful.

so, yes, i did cry, gnash my teeth and feel some deep, deep emotions yesterday. i don't think they were wasted and i know we learned from them. thanks for listening.