I will never have Abs, but that's not even my Main Hang up on my Stomach

When I was four years old I was taken to the ER by my mom because I had a really high fever. She had taken me to the doctor multiple times for the pain and fever but 1 - I was a happy bouncy child and 2 - she was a single mom. So the Doctor diagnosed me with needing my mother to stay home and be a real mother and that it was all just for attention. The ER docs diagnosed me with something different.

They told her to take me home and get my favorite stuffed animal and be back at the hospital at 6am. They weren’t sure what was wrong, but they needed to perform surgery. So the next morning I went in for the first of what would be six (I think it is six, I should know this but I would have to look it up) surgeries. They did an exploratory surgery that cut me open from my chest to my groin. They found a large durmoid cyst, stuck under my rib cage and removed it, along with a few other things. I had really weird dreams that included a dream were I was much older with a child and two that were apparently about purgatory. Yes, I acknowledge how weird that is, but anesthesia is some weird stuff. The doctors were caring, the scar was massive and keloided, I learned many things about myself and I had my first real awareness of death.

A lot for a four year old. But I am who I am because of this.

I have only once worn something that showed my stomach, a bathing suit in 6th grade that was what would be classified as a tankini and that is it.

See, as the years went on, and my body, specifically my stomach, became a tableau of the changes in modern medicine, I was always super self conscious of my body. First and foremost because of the scars. Change for gym class, I would get asked about the scars. It was never mean in the asking but it just drove home I wasn’t normal. I didn’t look right. I was flawed.

I also still have an intense fear of my body betraying me. Trying to kill me. Preventing me from doing what I want to do. I used to love to dance. But it is REALLY hard to be flexible when the scar tissue inside you is ripping as you grow and when you move certain ways the pain is so intense it can make you throw up.

I feel stunningly uncomfortable being naked. By myself, sure. But with others, especially someone I want to be intimate with, I can’t help but feel like they must think I’m a freak. That they are questioning why they are even with me. My body shows my failings so fully I can’t hind them in any way. It is there for full display.

Now intellectually I know this isn’t true. We all have failings, and now I have fat in the mix too and a ton of other people have that. But yet, emotionally, I just don’t feel beautiful. To be beautiful in this world physically you need to look healthy. I will never look that way. the scars will always be there, betraying that my body is not.

I have tried to overcome everything my body throws at me and I joke that my body tries to kill me every five years or so, but deep down, it scares me and scars me. Because I have known since I was four how true that statement really is. One day, my body will kill me. It does everyone. That is the definition of life. And every day I see the scars reminding me of this.

Now, I know, this sounds depressing and in someways it is. But it is also something else. It is a reminder of the battles I don’t talk about and how I have won them. But that isn’t enough to overcome the fear of showing the scars to others.

I will never have abs because my abs were sliced and scar tissue limits their ability to become tight and toned. I will never have those 11s models will have no matter how much I diet and how many crunches I do. Heck, doing a full sit up is difficult (though I used to be able to do a plank for minutes so that would be awesome to be able to do again). But what I really want is to be able to show my stomach and not be riddled with fear. Fear of rejection, fear of loathing, fear of pity. I want to be able to be like the women who wear a two piece even though they are thicc and yet still are rocking it out there proud and comfortable.

I don’t know if that will ever happen. But I need to focus on trying to make it happen. Maybe if I could, I could come to terms with the failings of my body. And that, that would be one of the greats battles to win.

Ride or Die Chick - Why I Claim It though with a Slight Twist on the Meaning

For those who don’t know, a ride or die chick means a gal who is loyal to her partner regardless of the cost, even if it endangers herself. I get this, but not necessarily in terms of a partner. To me there is something a little off about that one. No, I change it a bit to mean a gal who is loyal to her family regardless of the cost, even if it endangers herself. This I completely relate to. I normally live by one rule, you can say and do whatever you want to me, I’ll handle it. But you do F with my family. Nothing gets me more upset than someone messing with someone I love. Call me names, it will slide off my back. Call my mom something, I just see red. And for me family is not just blood. As I previously have written one of the most important people in my life I shared absolutely no blood with. I have friends who are very much my family. And if I get a phone call in the middle of the night from one of them half way across the country and they need me, I will be there.

So this idea of a Ride or Die Chick appeals to me because it is very much how I feel about those I love. But it is not limited to a guy and to be honest, I don’t know if I have ever had a relationship with a man that has ever made me feel that way other than he is my family. Apparently I am already built for it so why wouldn’t it naturally happen to the level were I was also a more traditional ride or die chick. And I think it is because there is something a bit sad about the traditional concept.

So both types are referenced in the Fast and the Furious franchise. Letty and Dom are the ultimate traditional type of ride or die for each other. And I love me some Letty and Dom. But it is also a bit rough because though they have each other backs, they are ultimately bringing each other down in the process. They don’t question each others actions. They don’t encourage each other to be better, just to be safer in the execution of what they are trying to do.

My kind of ride or die is a bit different and that is VERY much on display in Fast and Furious. Ride or Die for your family. Dom will do anything to protect Mia, but he also wants the very best for her. Brian, who starts off getting to be traditional ride or die as a friend with Dom, becomes a family ride or die because of his love for Mia. He wants her safe, he wants the baby safe, and he wants them to have the opportunity to have a better life than the life they are currently living while on the run. Letty and Dom, come around to the family ride or die view because of their love for their family, but if left to themselves would Bonnie and Clyde it up without any hesitation.

And that is where the problem to me lies. Bonnie and Clyde were betrayed by their friends, split up by their family and ultimately died because they truly only had each other. And in this world, that is simply not enough and frankly selfish. Bonnie’s family had to deal with a lot when she ran off with Clyde, and they hated Clyde for it so much they did not allow them to be buried together.

I love the F&F franchise a lot. Like damn, a lot. But I think that is because it gets my world view so much. Family first. And family is not just by blood. There is a certain young man, now married and a dad, who we could not speak to each other for the next twenty years, where he now governor of a colony on Mars and I am building algorithms in a massive super computer deep underground in order to keep its servers cool, if he called me up and said “Hey, I have a political opponent who is messing with me and going after my family, I need help” it wouldn’t even take a heartbeat for me to book the travel and start doing research to find a play to help. That is the other twist, ride or die implies a level of violence but for me, I know where my strengths are. I know where I would help the most. Yes, I guess I could get all grr and such, but lets be honest, a fist won’t solve unemployment or determining if an opportunity is right, ensuring medical care is timely and appropriate while in an ER or even just figuring out how to do their taxes. No, I know how my ride or die is best executed for those I love.

So odd topic, I know. But As I have watched the new trailer for Hobbs and Shaw for the 18th time, I felt the need to talk about this.

He Chose Me - Why Stepparents mean way more than Society is willing to Acknowledge

Three years ago Joe died.

Joe was my step-father. He adopted me when I was in 5th grade and I went from one ethnic last name my elementary school principal couldn’t pronounce to another. My baby sister had been born and I remember the day of the adoption so clearly.

My newly legal grandpa was there, I was wearing a red and white little girl suit (I have always loved suits and Joe had amazing taste) and Judge Glavas is the one who signed the paperwork making me officially Joe’s daughter.

My Daddy and Me

Joe was a hard man. He didn’t hold back on criticism and firmly believed in tough love. I have had six surgeries in my lifetime (I think, sometimes they blur together) and Joe was there for four of them. I remember coming home from the hospital when I was fifteen, still incredibly groggy from anesthesia, first time I had had an outpatient surgery (three had been before this and all inpatient for a long time) laying on the couch in the living room. Joe dropped a basket of laundry next to me and said I needed to fold it since I was just laying there. Yep, not always the most compassionate man when you would think a person would be.

But that’s the thing. He was actually compassionate but it came in really weird ways. When I was 25 and having a surgery, he stayed with me all night in the hospital. The doctor said I had to stay elevated and on my back. I sleep with the flatest pillow possible and on my side. He kept moving me so I stayed in the right position all night. I was a grown ass woman, married with a kid and yet my daddy would not leave my side. Now when I was awake and went home he told me I should put away the dishes that were out, but see, that is were the interesting aspect of his personality came in.

My dad taught me many things but he fundamentally taught me three HUGE lessons.

“If you can walk, you can work.”

I heard that so many times growing up from him that when I think of the phrase I hear it in his voice even still. Joe lived with pain most of his life. Some he caused himself, some was simply his body being a dick. I can relate to that. And I think Joe saw that I was going to be in for a lifetime of that kind of problem as he had. So he instilled in me the ability to push through. I can be tired, sore, have a migraine that is making keeping water down a problem, doesn’t matter, shit still needs to get done. Life doesn’t care. And whining about it doesn’t do fix the pain or get stuff done. So just get up and do it.

“I know you’re smart. I know not because of how well you doing things but because of how well you get out of doing things”

Joe didn’t like people. There are very few people he liked in any real way. Most of them were fictional. My brother is named after a John Wayne character so I think you can guess who one person might be. He preferred nature. He preferred westerns, mysteries, wrestling and B level action movies. I might get some of my taste in that aspect from him, to be honest. But what he didn’t like was people wasting time and quite often that involved societal expectations that might force him to have to deal with stuff longer than what he wanted.

A girl growing up in the 80s and 90s, I had a LOT of mixed messages. I can be anything but don’t be too smart or guys won’t like you. You should have a career but children, marriage and your husband’s career need to come first. Geeky girls who are good at math, science and like things like sci-fi and comics are the comic best friend of the guys but not the ones they date. Oh and course, you are all going to die young from AIDS, cancer and the hole in the Ozone layer. Like I said, weird times. I had a math teacher who would make fun of the girls in the class when they made a mistake but praise the guys for trying even when they failed miserably. Role Models were hard to come by and 80s teen movies that were now being played all the time on tv like 16 candles drove home a lot of those lessons (oh Jake Ryan, that movie is so problematic and yet to have a guy sit on a kitchen table - probably more like a blanket in the living room because now I don’t want butts where food is going to be - with me and a birthday cake is still one of my fantasies).

Joe saw all of this. He knew I was smart, my test scores showed it (even when my grades didn’t always hahaha). But he saw me floundering. I was being torn between what I thought I was supposed to be and who I am. So he yelled at me one day. I don’t even know what I was supposed to be doing but I wasn’t doing it and there is a good chance I had figured out a way to not have to do it or get someone else to do it. And that’s when he told me I know you’re smart. I know not because of how well you doing things but because of how well you get out of doing things. Then I am sure he probably made me do what I was supposed to be doing.

In that one statement I learned two things. One, I was smart. And not just book smart but actually smart. Yes, I had been told this by other people but it was normally in a you need to apply yourself, do great things or what you future holds way. Not a No dude, you are smart regardless of what you do. And there wasn’t a but. It wasn’t followed by you need to calm down and let other kids have a chance to talk about it or you are too aggressive or a know it all or just tone it down or you need to smile and be nicer. These are all things I had heard when I was little, I have always been hyper and talkative, that never changed.

But what he said was just put out there. You are smart. Period. It wasn’t an excuse or a call to action or a you need to blend in more. That was odd to hear. But it was needed. To this day I don’t doubt my intelligence. It took a bit to realize that it was okay to be ambitious (like my 30th birthday, lol) but I have never doubted my ability to learn, adapt, grow and change through the pursuit of knowledge.

The other thing was that I am not traditional. The whole “how you get out of things” part of the statement. Now that took a bit longer to fully sync in but it did. And he was right. I love to automate myself out of jobs. I often refer to myself as a pragmatic lazy person. I would rather just put the time in to write the algorithm so I never have to touch the damn thing again than do what most people do which is procrastinate which ultimately takes up more time than if you even just did it right away. I mean honestly, that isn’t lazy that is just inefficient time wasting.

But he saw that in me before I ever saw it in myself. And as I got older I did start to see it. And the more I saw it the more my bosses did too. By it’s very definition I am okay with change, it doesn’t scare me. Because as long as the change means less boring work, it is in my favor. And that is an asset.

Dad with my niece

But through all the things he taught me there is one thing above all others that he did that words can’t even begin to express how much it means to me.

He chose me.

He didn’t have to adopt me. He didn’t have to refer to me as his daughter, to treat me as if I was his own, to fiercely protect me, to hold me when I was scared, to even love me. It is sad that these are true statements yes, but they are. And there are PLENTY of people out there who have stepparents who these statements are true for. But they weren’t for me.

And for a little girl who though has a huge family filled with many loving people, most of them strong confident women, you would think it wouldn’t matter that much. But it did.

In a world where I felt abandoned by people who left or died, betrayed by my own body a lot of times, unsure of so much, there was always Joe. I was in a car accident when I was 17. I skidded on a patch of ice and slammed into another car. Not that big of a deal but in the moment it was huge. My mom picked me up and we went home. The first thing I did was climb into my daddy’s lap and cried. 17 years old but I needed to feel safe. I needed to be weak and he was the ONE person I knew that no matter what I could be weak without judgement or reprisal. Over two decades later that is still a true statement, which is actually quite sad and probably says a lot on why his death still weighs on me so much.

Was he the best dad ever? Oh God no, I would never claim that. Ever. There was a lot of stuff. But he tried. He sincerely tried. With a little girl who was kooky, hyper but introverted, strong-willed and passionate but scared of so much who happened to be sick a lot. And for that, I feel special. Because he didn’t have to do that. But he did.

He loved me for me. And to have someone do that, truly do that, who isn’t obligated because they are biologically related to you. It makes all the difference. Especially to that little girl.

On the way home from vacation in Cinci, asleep on my dad

I Don't Believe in Horoscopes but I am a Total Virgo

I have never really invested in horoscopes but I have always loved the whole Virgo persona. So the “traits” of us September babies are:

Strengths: Loyal, analytical, kind, hardworking, practical

Weaknesses: Shyness, worry, overly critical of self and others, all work and no play

Virgo likes: Animals, healthy food, books, nature, cleanliness

Virgo dislikes: Rudeness, asking for help, taking center stage

(from - https://www.astrology-zodiac-signs.com/zodiac-signs/virgo/)

Yes, I know these are purposefully general in order to relate to me but yet I look at that list and go, yep. Well…except for the healthy food. I do devour all sorts of berries and do love soups and salads, but I love beef. A good burger or a steak? Of course! My Wela’s red rice and beans, that is my one island food answer. But the rest, very much so.

Well cleanliness, technically that is true. I hate dirt, germs, etc. Now clutter…well, sometimes my kitchen table will go all weak without having space and I do fit the Puerto Rican mom stereotype and there are currently cookie sheets in the oven.

That said, I think there is more to why I love the concept of Virgo. I am a mythology buff. Shocker, my name comes from the goddess of the moon. And though the Virgo constellation originally was the Sumerian goddess Shala, the goddess of compassion and grain, it is most identified with the Greek goddess of Demeter and her daughter Persephone. Demeter, the goddess of the grain was also the most dedicated mother. Her daughter, the queen of the underworld, when married to Hades leaving her mother, caused the seasons to be created. Her mother was so upset that her despaired caused the crops to whither and die and winter to start. Persephone, trying to be both a good wife and a good daughter, splits her time so that way we can have Spring and Summer. Yes, Virgo is also related to the Roman goddess Ceres, but the Greek ones are my favorite. Hades, is a pretty cool guy who is just trying to make the best of a bad situation. As the oldest, he had to deal with all his siblings, took the worst job and had a dog, Cerberus, whose name translates to Spot. I mean, not that bad.. So the characters involved are some of my favorite besides my namesake and of course, Athena.

Then there is the iconography related to Virgos. Often a woman with dark wavy hair, holding grain and surrounded by the stars, often the moon is also in the mix, which I like because it hints at my name. I love the grain imagery because I do love to bake and feed people. That is a familiar trait, there is a deep seeded fear that is passed down through the generations that at any moment people will be hungry and you have then failed them.

So pretty adjectives I like to think pertain to me, cool myths that appeal to me and awesome pictures that looks like someone I would look like if I grew my hair out and wore more free flowing clothes with cool symbols. I just can’t help it. I might never look up what my horoscope says for the day but damn it, I am a Virgo.

So yep.

Let's Get Started or How Sims Made Me Start This

I have been wanting to do this for a long time and have tried and then stalled multiple times. But my life has taken an odd turn and as I entered my 40s (I’m currently 41 at the time of writing this). I found myself single, in a job that was sucking the life out of me, a family that literally kept trying to die for various reasons and child who was now an adult.

As I got through 40 and entered 41 I changed jobs and found out that gasp there is more to life than work, cleaning and taking care of everyone but myself. I also learned that though I normally turn to cupcakes or Target to sooth my stress, it leaves you with extra pounds of both weight and stuff. So I decided to to work on that. And I tried but I was now working from home without constant fires and people going in and out of hospitals every month and I didn’t know how to refocus. I felt so freaking lost. I wasn’t running on caffeine, sugar and adrenaline. And like any true woman feeling lost, I got a pet.

So Pepper joining the family. A kitten found in a garbage can, she came and decided she was in charge here. She is picky, demanding and really enjoys video games (my tv is covered in paw prints as she tries to catch whatever is used for the loading page).

And as I started playing Sims due to watching various Twitch and Buzzfeed videos of game play while cleaning out my house, I realized I really really liked the game. I am normally a FPS person but there was something calming about it. And then it occurred to me, I could organize their lives in a way I didn’t feel like my life was.

So while Pepper tried to catch the moving arrow I played thinking about what specifically was motivating me to make the clicks. The first was I could pre-load activities and rarely did my Sim deviate. I, on the other hand, procrastinate, like checking instagram, twitter or playing Sims for just a few examples. I used to have a calendar that I kept up to date and had alarms on my phone. Now, I’m technically winging it in comparison to what I used to be. I need to find a happy medium.

Second - my character was leveling up her skills in things I used to love: writing, cooking and fitness. She also was working on other traits but those were the first ones I focused on leveling up. When that moment hit (which I know, my Sim is named Diana and is a brunette with curly hair like her creator so duh), I realized I missed these things. Over the past 6ish years they all fell away. I used to do movie and comic reviews for other sites (no, I’m not good at it) but I enjoyed it. I used to love coming up with new recipes. And I used to run 5ks and was so super proud of that line in my triceps and calves. And they all fell away as I let life impact me.

Third - there was direction. And was sad was I was literally the one driving the direction. So I could build a great life for my Sim but not for me? Now how ridiculous is that statement.

But I felt so all over the place. Maybe it was a midlife crisis or the fact that for the first time in a while I haven’t been on the go from 5am to 9pm daily non-stop, but now there is time. And I am not taking advantage of it in the right way.

So after talking it over with a heavy bag (I will talk about how amazing Title Boxing has been for me) and Pepper and decided to start this blog.

So, that is the rambling story of how an idea inspired by Sims is now this website. Now whether a single person reads this, I have no clue.

But I think having a way to keep myself accountable while writing again is probably not going to be a bad thing.

So yep.