Loss Sucks

Current mood:Unsettled
Category: Life Six months after my last blog entry and the theme of loss continues. And, I must tell you... it sucks. Here's a recap:

September 2006: David breaks up with me

December 2006: I lose my thyroid via surgery due to CA

January 2007: Uncle Bob, an important father figure to me, loses his battle with ALS

July 2007: My own father loses his battle with lung cancer. (This is the big one.)

August 2007: My job is eliminated

October 2007: My cousin Brian loses his battle with alcoholism

January 2008: A dear lady who adopted me into her family out here in IL, Joan Twarowski dies of cancer after a long fight.

March 2008: Aunt Ethel dies at age 94. (I was planning a trip to see her this spring.)

That is a hell of a lot of loss and I have to tell you, it's too much for one person to deal with alone. I realize that the other people in the family have experienced most of these losses as well. What makes it different for me however, is that I am alone. Everyone else has spouses and/or children depending on them. No one depends on me. And so.... I also find myself grieving the loss of my chance at motherhood.

Alone and grieving is not a good place to be. It is horribly depressing and I'm not a generally depressed person, so feeling down was alien to me. In fact it is dibilitating. I have been paralized. I have been nonfunctional If I hadn't had my little dog, Ozzy, I don't know that I would have survived at all. He is what I know I have to take care of every day. Everything else, I didn't care about.

Now I am finally wanting to choose life and fight my way out of this abyss. I need help, but I know not who to ask. Hell, I don't even know what kind of help I need, for that matter. I have made a mess of my finances. I seem to be afraid of everything. The only thing that keeps me going is work. And even that is not the best. I need to find a regular job, with benefits, but I am so mired in grief that I don't know what I want to look for or where to begin.

I think about moving back to New Jersey so that I can be close to family again, but I really don't want to go back there. I would much rather have everyone move out here to Chicagoland!

Floundering in limbo is what life is right now.

The only thing I have really worked on and enjoyed in the past year or so is the novel that I am writing. I have made some good progress and hope to finish it in the next few months or so. Then I will have to figure out how to go about getting it published. The problem is that it is a very well written and very erotic novel. So what kind of publisher would touch it? I'm thinking I'll have to send it to Larry Flynt or Bob Guccione, but I would prefer it be picked up by a decent publishing house and marketed towards couples. I have let few people read experpts and have received some fabuous feedback. The recurring theme of the feedback is that it is well written and VERY HOT. There is enough plot to hook women into caring about the characters and yet has the kind of language that men find.... um.... shall we say, "stimulating." I think it could be a great erotic bedtime story for couples. It could be the catalyst for mutual fantasy exploration.

I was originally concerned about embarrassing the family and considered using a pseudonym when I sought publication. After much thought, it became clear that I have to put my name on it, because I'm always the one saying that Americans need to stop sweeping sex under the rug and start talking about it. I mean, by the age of 15, a teenager could probably tell you more than a hundred ways to kill another person but not be able to tell you how to please another person. The paranoia over nudity and sexual content is ridiculous to me. Shouldn't we show how to treat each other well in our media and not how to kill each other? I would like to see more loving relationships on TV that admit to sexual relations. The only show that I watch that continually goes there is a cartoon! Family Guy actually explores in a very clever and funny way the sex life of a married couple. It's genius! Seth MacFarlane even showed bdsm fetish play between Peter and Lois.

OK... I'm done rambling for the moment. This blog took on a direction all its own, but I am going to take the risk and post it anyway.