I've worked out what my problem is

...well, the latest one, anyway.

I have a long list of things going on that the back of my head is telling me ought to make me really, really worried or angry or guilty - you know, things that really should give me that sick sensation like walking to school for a public dressing down because I got an extension on my homework project and still didn't do it.

I OUGHT to be wailing, whimpering, gnashing my teeth and possibly resorting to eyelash fluttering or fainting spells. Puke.
I just can't be bothered.

Do you get that? Its like watching life happen on a big TV screen.

The question now is whether I am either dangerously disassociated, or floating in a little calm puddle of faith and trust in God. Interesting conflict of opinion, that, and its all going on in my head, like two Einsteins across a table. I tell ya, theres chalk everywhere.

No its not schizophrenia - possibly split personalities, because it seems that my two lines of thought are battling it out between themselves and my own front brain is disassociated even from that, the conscious me just getting on with getting on. Oh, and they don't get let out to play in the real world, so I guess that means they are safely metaphorical.

Can you imagine having split personalities, all of them called Einstein, all of them identical barring driving principles? That would be the final condemnation of an uncreative mind. No, if I ever lose it, there'll be a Lola, a Candy-Mae, a Cruella, a mousey librarian and all the facets of my character that never get a day out. At least.

Hopefully Bulb won't stop by in his role of Psychiatric Nurse, because, to quote him, "psycho nursing involves telling psycho's they are weird and forcing medication down their throats." Nice.

What is weird, anyhow? Surely the most unstable and scary person imagineable must be one totally convinced that they are NOT weird - that they have all the answers, convinced they are the solitary professor in a worldwide loony bin.

We're all damaged and different - give me the people that know it.

The whole point of this post is/was to explain the last one. I am surprisingly, perhaps scarily okay. I really want to get stressed about finances and bad debt and potential for court cases and all that, I WANT to open a red and rude letter from company X and get aeriated and panicked, I just can't. The only thing that makes my shoulders sag under the weight is having to choose my words and play nursey to the men in this house.

Gary is the son of a policeman. His dad is a good man, not a dyed in the wool wife beater (although, surprise, the police force apparently has the highest proportion of them), but like the entire force, he spent his days taking flak from oiks and replying politely, taking any residual resentment and potential for ulcers home to the family. He was also threatened (again, as were they all) with demotion or, more subtly, lack of promotion, if his kids didn't lead exemplary lives. It doesn't look good trying to wear a uniform that says 'pillar of society' when the whole block know what your teenage son did last Wednesday.

Gary as eldest child had more than his fair share of dire warnings and strict admonishments, amounting to a very Victorian upbringing which, to be frank, is tiresome. 'We' don't have problems. In his little world, only 'he' has them. Its all about him and we are never ever a team where money is concerned, because he has this silly thing going on that the man should be able to provide for his family, that the entire burden is his preserve. He is the one that suffers from this lack of sharing - I could do with a hug, someone to share plans and methods to change things, for sure, but Gary could do with someone to share the guilt. It doesn't matter what I say, he wont see that in me, and goes off in a corner to mentally beat himself up.

I gave up feeling sympathetic years ago.

Then theres Lewis, the ten year old poster boy for Aspergers syndrome.

The last real clash Gary and I had was a couple of years ago when Gary would get up for work without me, and watch the world news while he ate breakfast, whether or not Lewis had followed him to the living room.

He would then wake me just before he left the house and I would fumble to the kitchen to be confronted by Lewis, fully awake and running on overdrive, with plans (that I simply HAD to hear in detail) to get the SAS to hide behind the fence at Saddam Hussein's house.

By the time we were nearly at school, and his little sister was dragging her heels behind us, unable to get a word in, the plan would have moved on to include giant lasers, or ways to establish British world domination without bloodshed, using equipment which Lewis would have to design and create because it didn't exist yet.

I have a picture on my wall that Lewis did at school during that time, entitled 'my dream house.' His dream house has:

• guinea pigs
• lizards
• soft toy lizards
• a cat
• a swimming pool
• a bouncy castle
• perimeter laser guns with sensors.
  

And that, dear readers, is why I don't, perceptibly at least, indulge in worrying. Too many people do it too well already, it would be overkill.

What I do is simpler, I change things. Yes it means I'm like a puppet on a string, waiting for the worry to erupt into verbal acknowledgement, or for other people's attempts to change things to go belly up and make it worse, but like a Stepford Wife on valium, I step in smilingly and sort it all out, or if the damage is done, lead by inspirational example as we all learn to be cheerful with less.

Just know this, take away my cigarrettes and I'll probably kill you.

Hic

durr

dribble.........................



Note: Humungous thanks to Allposters for turning a blind eye to me using the piccies from their brilliant fridge magnets, again, and not slapping my wrist :-)