Ouch!

There are so many things I want to write about, but my mind and body are exhausted. I’ve been setting the scene for my photo shoot that should have taken place weeks ago. Thank you, TEWSNBN! Fuck it. Thank you GLENN!! I spent so much time scanning pages from journals I haven’t read in ten years and re-living the horror of that period because he swore up and down that he had no idea what I was talking about. Then, when I tell him several days and about $50 later that he needs to choose whether he wants me to put the scans on a cloud server or risk the package arriving on the weekend when it was likely to be seen by nosey eyes, the little shit basically declares war. God, he has become the man I dreaded!

I think I may have mentioned this before, but a former mutual friend said that he is often overwhelmed and confused. Yep! And despite growing up in the NYC area and traveling all over the world, he is rather plebeian in his acceptance of people and his view of the world as it is. In fact, very plebeian. I honestly never thought I’d say this, but my worldview and acceptance of different peoples and lifestyles is FAR more broad-minded than his. If readers had known Glenn when we were attending the same college, I think there would be a lot of surprise. Then, he came off as worldly and sophisticated. At 16 years old, of course I ate it up. Then, after spending 17 years more together than not, he married and my life had to go on. I found the leather/kink community online and immersed myself in it both in the virtual world and the real world. I also began trying my hand at writing fiction. It seems I have a gift for writing little scenes that say a great deal. I also wrote my first full-fledged short story with something like six chapters about a bi-lesbian couple that became very well-known around the net because it has a killer BDSM scene in it that took me two days to write, all while listening to Pink Floyd over and over again. I really would love to continue writing stories about their relationship. I need a muse. Then, I had one in the form of this gorgeous blonde chica with lovely pierced nipples I could nestle in and suckle all day long. I have tried to find her, but no luck.

I know that the whole BDSM thing scared him because he had no clue. I used to think that he’d be good at it, but I don’t now. A Master must be empathetic, giving and willing to communicate. That’s not him, I’m sorry to say. I think that most men are very intimidated when I tell them that I still consider myself a leatherwoman even though I haven’t practiced in a long time. They are afraid that whatever they may bring to the bedroom won’t be able to compete with my BDSM experiences. Frankly, they may be right. Eventually, I’m going to get bored. Right now, any man who gets hold of me had better be ready for the fuck of his life. Yes, fuck first, then make love. I’d really like to get to know the guy I met at the gym last week, but my idea of “late” and his idea of “late” are two different things. I’ll pop in earlier tomorrow to see if he’s around.

What I wanted to write about in this post is a happy thing. My excursions to the gym are paying off. My body feels better once it stops hurting; my fat is firmer, if you know what I mean; I sleep better, and; I am physically stronger. Oh, I should also mention that I’ve lost four pounds. Granted, that’s not a lot, but I’ve only been at this about six weeks. Nearly two weeks out of six were spent at home, as I said, scanning my ass off and re-living unimaginable pain for someone who didn’t deserve it. You’d think I’d know better by now. Any act of kindness I’ve ever shown him has been met with a kick in the teeth. He is his own worst enemy and his account will come due. No more GLENN! (I hope you see your name in caps, m’dear.)

As I said, the gym is paying off. However, at this moment I hurt like a son-of-a-gun. I have placed lidocaine patches any place on my body they’ll stick. I need a script filled, but money is extremely tight until the first of the month. I haven’t been this broke since I was in undergrad. Still, overall, I’m quite pleased with myself. I realized that there was no iPhone app that met all of my needs, so I decided to just keep records using Notes. I’m trying to remember whether or not I have a spreadsheet app somewhere around. If so, I’d like to use it to track my progress. Right now, though, I’d like to share.

April 23, 2013

Cycling
Distance: 2.09 miles
Calories burned: 41
HR: 144
Time: 17 min.
Resistance: 6

Rowing machine
Strokes/min: 25
Calories burned: 107
Cal/hr: 308
Time: 17:00 min.
Resistance: 5

Pull down
36 reps @ 40 lbs.

Chest press
50 reps @ 40 lbs.

Shoulder press
40 reps @ 40 lbs.

Leg press
50 reps @ 40 lbs.
40 reps @ 55 lbs.

April 25, 2013

Cycling
Distance: 3.74 miles
Calories burned: 78.3
HR: 140-144
Time: 31:33 min
Resistance: 6

Rowing machine
Strokes/min.: 28
Calories burned: 94 (This is an inaccurate measure due to problems with the computer on-board.)
Cal/hr: N/A
Time: 21 min.
Resistance: 5

Pull down
40 reps @ 40 lbs.

Chest press
40 reps @ 40 lbs.

Shoulder press
40 reps @ 40 lbs.

Leg press
100 reps @ 55 lbs.

I haven’t measured the body metrics yet. It seems that I never have time when I’m close to the tape measure and I do have time when I’m not close to the tape measure. I’ll do it eventually.

The reason I’m so proud of myself is that I’ve heard a litany of “Don’t do that!” and “No, you need to not risk your quality of life.” Basically, if I do hurt myself on the leg with the birth defect, no one has any idea how to put me back together. I can think of ONE surgeon in the entire country who would have more than a clue. The hospital that stole him from Johns Hopkins built an entire new wing just for him. The bad part is that he’s a pediatric ortho and they do NOT like to work on adults.

That’s not to say that my current ortho would be totally clueless because that’s not the case at all. In fact, his primary interest is in bioengineering. That gives him a solid background in the mechanics of my body. In addition, this hospital’s doctors actually listen to me when I tell them I am not just another amputee. That wasn’t happening at the hospital where the first spinal surgery and knee replacement were done. In fact, I kept telling the ortho that I was sick after my first knee replacement surgery. He blew me off by saying that people often feel that way after joint replacements. He didn’t listen until I spiked a fever and my pulse-ox was in the high 80s. Lo and behold, I had pneumonia and a partially collapsed lung. He was frustrated because medicine wouldn’t release me to rehab, thereby screwing up his schedule and stats. Fucking narcissists. If the nurses hadn’t called in medicine, my lung would have completely collapsed. Ever since, there have been times when I feel as though I couldn’t breathe and had pain in my back right over my lungs. That’s when I say a little prayer for myself because I really cannot deal with being in the hospital right now. I’m hoping that my breathing is better now that I’ve spent six hours cleaning off my dresser. Yes, you’ve read that correctly. SIX hours. I didn’t even dawdle in the process! I found all sorts of things I’ve been looking for for years. I have to clean off the dust, (this house collects it like a magnet collects iron shavings), but a little Pledge goes a long way.

It’s time for me to turn out the lights, continue listening to some music and close my eyes again. I came in from an appointment with my pain doctor and immediately went to bed after feeding the girls. The pain doctor was concerned that I was unhappy because my body is not cooperating. He asked me if the medication was working. That’s a loaded question when asked by a pain specialist because if you say no, they may think you’re drug seeking. If you say yes, even though the meds aren’t working, you’ve conceivably missed an opportunity to get the medication adjusted so that the whole cocktail works better. He told me not to be depressed because there are so many things going on with my body and my life that I have to be realistic about my goals. Thank you, God! He understands! I didn’t even have to prod him. Even if I weren’t at the gym at least twice a week where I theoretically risk injury, I have a specialist for just about every system in my body. That’s a lot of doctors, but there is a lot to be examined. I’m getting a cortisone shot next week if I can get my cousin to take me to the appointment. I have to be sedated because that damn needle HURTS.

At any rate, Bruce is singing Badlands and it’s time for me to magically envision the place about which he’s singing. Every time I hear his music now, I think of The Big Man, Clarence Clemons. I miss him a lot. His nephew is good, but he doesn’t have the experience his uncle had and won’t until he’s been through the trials and tribulations his uncle had. Oh well, Better Days came up next. I think some spirit knew that I needed to hear that song. I wish you all better days ahead. Remember, “Strength above all!”

The eternal quandary

I qualify everything I’m about to type with the fact that I am sick. Therefore, if a sentence doesn’t make sense or there’s an obviously misspelled word, please forgive me. I’ll probably catch it later, but it has flown through the holes in my brain for the moment.

What to do? What to do? I am so confused. I think I’m in a phase where I actually have an attraction to men. I don’t mean a specific man, but men in general. That scares the daylights out of me! I have no idea what to do. I am not straight. I haven’t been straight since I was about four years old. I admit that most of my intimate emotional and physical relationships have been with males, but that general attraction pretty much stopped in my late 20s. It was then that I came out as bisexual, but I wasn’t a “true” bisexual. I didn’t like men and women equally. I definitely preferred women even though I was involved with a man at the time who was the lover of the woman who became my first female lover. If there was a box I could check that said “It’s complicated,” that would be the one I’d mark.

I think there are two factors at work. The first is that Prof. B brought up the issue of me sleeping with men and having to become monogamous AND completely lesbian. I can understand both desires. If there were a woman who connected with me intellectually, emotionally, socially and sexually, and I with her, and; who didn’t think that developmentally disabled children were things, not people and certainly not “its,” I would be happily monogamous in a lesbian relationship for as long as we both shall live, as it were. I so want that! It physically hurts at times that I don’t have a mate. The yearning is so strong that it threatens to tear me in two. I’ve been alone most of my life. Yet, I am not someone who is emotionally equipped to be alone. I need that person I can trust to have my back. I need that person I can turn to when there is no one else who will listen, even if that person doesn’t have answers for me. I need someone who values me as a person and as a bright, loving person who has a great deal to give to someone else and to the world. I need to know that I really do matter to another person. If I could build that person, she would be a woman with a penis. Really! Thank the good Lord that penises can be ordered online!

The second factor is that I’ve been spending time at the gym, although I haven’t been in over a week because my body feels like crap due to a fibro flare I thought I could exercise through, but couldn’t. While I haven’t really spoken to a lot of men, I do have an opportunity to see more of them up close and personal. They don’t stink the way they used to. Did my sense of smell change? I also saw a couple who fit my two, very different, physical profiles of attractive men. The first profile is what gay boyz call a “bear.” That means big, probably bearded, strong, very masculine. The second is one I didn’t realize I had until men kept physically reminding me of the-ex-who-shall-not-be-named (TEWSNBN, maybe I’ll pronounce that “twos’ nibin”). That type would be a bit on the short side, no taller than about 5’9″; canine teeth that are noticeably sharper, and; arms that are slightly long for his height. As TEWSNBN once said, he looks a bit simian. At the time, I tried to deny it, but he was right. Like it or not, black men with that look immediately grab my attention.

There are a couple of each kind at the gym. I’ve said a few words to one of each type. Nothing I actually thought about, but things that came out of my mouth organically. For instance, there was this machine where I couldn’t lock in the weight and I asked this big, handsome bear of a man if he could help. He was a doll, as “bears” frequently are. He not only showed me how to do it, but explained a couple of the other machines too. The more “simian” guy just happened to catch my eye in the mirror as I saw him leg press an incredible amount of weight and I said, “Wow!” as my eyes grew big. He smiled back and I asked him how long it took him to be able to do that. He said that he’d been at it for years. I couldn’t help but notice how cute he was. Eh, I’m human.

I know that sexuality can go back and forth like a pendulum with some people, me included (I suppose). It’s as though there’s this smorgasbord out there and I want to taste it all. In many respects, I’ve had the sexual adventures of two or three people’s lifetimes. I just haven’t found the right person for me and s/he has yet to find me either. I’m not the kind of person who likes sitting around and waiting for things to happen to her. I like going out there and making things happen for myself. However, I think this is the most difficult task I’ve ever faced. I don’t know how to find the right person or how to be found by the right person. I feel as though I’m alone in a fatally opaque bubble where I shall remain until my dying day. I, like the rest of humanity, do not want to die alone. I have too much love to give and I know that I’ve got one hell of a hot-danged love affair in me full of intense passion, great sex, opening of windows to allow fresh air in and peace. I need to share it with someone who will appreciate it. I think my problem now is accepting that it is possible that person could be male. I’d have to do a huge mental make-over, but if that’s what it takes, then that’s what it takes.

It has occurred to me that maybe my mate could be a male amputee. We could understand each other on a level no one else can. The idea only came to me a few hours ago as I was watching Thursday’s network evening news about vets coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan missing limbs. That led me to think about the photos I should have already taken and have been stressing about because I have zero energy, but they must be done because I’m utterly broke. I don’t do “poor” well because, frankly, I’ve only been poor once in my life and I could have hauled my butt back home, which is what I subsequently did. At any rate, it is my hope that my very tastefully suggestive photos reach a good man among some of the . . . shall we say . . . less than desirables. I know that I have to treat each with respect and I will. However, that doesn’t mean some won’t earn a greater respect than others. There are days and nights when it sucks to be me. I am, however, trying to make the best of it.

Lonely on the Great Lakes

This is all Glenn’s fault!!

The scars of your love remind me of us
They keep me thinking that we almost had it all
The scars of your love, they leave me breathless
I can’t help feeling
We could have had it all

That’s me speaking to Glenn. OK, forget about the rest of Rolling In The Deep for the moment and just focus on those words taken somewhat out of context–but just a little. That was definitely Glenn and me. If nothing else I ever write or have written thus far is worth believing, believe me when I write this: The memories of him do leave me absolutely breathless. For the longest time, I thought that he would be the only person I’d ever feel that way about. I was with someone else for three years during the first years of his marriage. After all, he’d chosen and there was nothing I could do about it as much as it damn near killed me to continue to draw each breath afterwards. That man, I’ll call him “Gregory,” was my first Master and I loved him in ways Glenn didn’t need and kept closed to me. The difference is that I knew that I’d never spend the rest of my life with Gregory. So, although I had feelings that were nearly equal to those I had for Glenn, they fell short. Still, Gregory was probably the person in the number two spot on my list of “Loves of My Life.”

Now, there’s someone else I’ll call “Professor B.” I am head over heels in love with her mind and her heart. I don’t give a damn about her body, but her body is a real factor. It’s a miracle that we found each other to begin with. It’s an even greater miracle that she, a woman who takes love and all forms of sex far more seriously than I do, is willing to wait for me to figure out: 1) If I can promise to never sleep with another person, especially another man, and; 2) Out and out told me to go to a woman with whom I was very much in love once, and talk to her about why and how lesbians of their age tend to turn off their sexuality or take sex very seriously. That takes guts! I should say that she, feels about me the way I feel about her. There is so much to say that I should start from the beginning.

First, know that I’m typing this through curtains of intermittent tears. I’ve been confused about relationships before. This is not new. What is new is that I’ve been caught in this fucking lesbian disdain for women who sleep with men! It’s not like I sleep with men in general. I don’t. There is only one that I know of at this moment I would even consider sleeping with and he’d have to work like a motherfucker to get me to let him back into my pants and actively into my heart. We all know who that man is so I won’t bother with naming him . . . again. I can wrap my mind around making that commitment if it weren’t for Prof. B’s disabilities. Neither of us is sure she can have sex now. I am going to GUESS that if her doctors say that she can, they will also say that she will have to take it easy. That is going to be a problem.

You see, for me at least, there are different kinds of sex. Each kind has its own rewards. I have made love so achingly slow and carefully that, for me, orgasm was not going to happen and I was perfectly fine with that. The only thing I cared about was that my partner reach a pinnacle he’d never forget–or, that she would never forget. I have had sex to satisfy a craving and that meant absolutely nothing afterwards. I have been fucked royally to the point I can’t forget it if for no other reason than its raw physicality and I don’t want to. Furthermore, I want to have that experience several dozen more times in my life. Fucking can happen with a stranger or it can happen with someone you’d die for. I’m coming to realize in this moment that I would probably die for Glenn, even now. Then, there is this great woman I’m falling for and who is falling for me that I’m going to have to promise to give away part of who I am if I expect to keep her. I am so absolutely torn I’m almost incapable of forming a coherent sentence.

There are some people who’d say that I was very lucky to have loved two very different men and one woman, going on two. This is true. However, it should be noted that I am not with them now, except for the one that is current. Of the three people, only two were viable in the sense that a very long-term relationship was possible. Gregory was, I do believe, a love/sex addict. In the end, we wore each other out emotionally. Anytime ALL of a Master’s slaves get together and say that he’s in trouble, he’s in trouble. He wasn’t happy with any of us afterwards, but that’s neither here nor there. I know that I stayed with him and tried to help him, terrified half the time that I would lose him. He kept the woman I loved dearly (I’ll call her “Khat”) and, although he consistently failed to acknowledge it, was really his primary partner. There is so much pain there still that I’m going to move off of him as a subject. Suffice it to say that Glenn and Khat were the only viable relationships. Although memories of Glenn turn up in odd places, he is effectively gone from my life and has been for many years. The same is true of Khat.

The title of this post was half in jest. The other, non-humorous part, is true. I don’t think I’d use the word “fault,” but he showed me how all forms of sex, but especially the combination of fucking and making love, can have a power that is absolutely indescribably, utterly, wonderful. I want that again and Prof. B cannot give it to me. I’m not sure it’s even in her to give it to me regardless of her disability. She’s more of the slow, aching kind of sex. That is going to leave me very frustrated and ultimately unhappy. I know that I absolutely must have the raw, physical kind of sex from time to time to keep me happy. She’s said that if I or anyone she’s with has an itch that just has to be scratched, she didn’t want to know about it. I can deal with that. However, when I pushed the issue tonight, she told me that she wants total monogamy even if I end up moving out of the state. I don’t think I can promise that to anyone. That’s not to say that I’d fall in love with someone else because I am damn hard to satisfy intellectually and keen intellect is a deal breaker. Therefore, I’d say that falling in love with someone else is remote. That notwithstanding, wanting to jump someone else’s bones, or vice versa, is inevitable in that circumstance. For that matter, it’s inevitable in the circumstance I’m trying so hard to get my mind around.

It has occurred to me that maybe I’m just not ready to give Glenn up. That is to say, to put him in the proper perspective of someone I loved more than I loved life itself and would have laid my life down for if need be. Notice how that’s all in the past tense. I think there’s some small part of me that knows he did what he did to me for a real reason and has a damn good idea of what that reason is. Yes, what he did was unforgivable. However, I just know/knew him too well to accept that he’d be vindictively cruel to someone who’d been his lover for 17 years. Add to that the knowledge that he knew I’d tried quite hard to kill myself due to his words and actions and I still can’t see it. I know that he’s a coward in some respects and to be pitied in others. He’s both in this one, for sure. I deserved better and I deserve better. I deserve, if anything from him, that he be a grown ass MAN and not some cowering manchild afraid of wifey and me! I don’t know if or when he will do it. I do know that I can’t put my life on hold waiting. Nevertheless, can I promise someone else that I will forsake all others, blah, blah, blah when I’m pretty sure that she cannot give me what I need sexually? We won’t even talk about our different needs where people are concerned! And, she says there’s a large class difference that I don’t see. I just see two people with different, though not incompatible, life experiences. I don’t care that she’s the first in her family to go to college or be ABD. Why should I? Yeah, there would be some things that she couldn’t relate to in my long-ago past, but I don’t even relate to them now!

Prof. B and I talked off and on all day today from the time I woke up this afternoon until I went to bed very early. I was busy going about my errands and so forth, but she was on the other end of the line. It’s a good thing she’s on leave or I can imagine a whole lot of things wouldn’t have gotten done on her end. It took a very long time for me to know through experience that I belonged with women. Glenn had gone and Gregory and I were temporarily off for the zillionth time. I was actually with someone else who I inadvertently pissed off that weekend, but he should have said something. *sigh* My point is that I’d known since I was four years old that I liked females be they girls, young women or women. That didn’t necessarily mean that I didn’t like men. Glenn was my first whole-hearted love and that’s something he can’t take from me, nor can anyone else. He married his first whole-hearted love. I should be happy for him and, on some level I am. That doesn’t mean that I don’t know I had a right to expect more from him, especially since we both knew that he wasn’t wild about the idea of giving me up completely. Had he been honest with himself, with me, with his wife, we’d have had different lives. Mine, for sure, would have been better. Then again, he would have done what Prof. B is doing: He could not deal with me being with another woman and loving it.

Whatever I do, I can’t win unless I choose. I can’t choose. Not now.

What now?

I don’t need to see Glenn again. I don’t want him in my life. I don’t want anyone who can do what he did and won’t accept any responsibility for his own actions. I am the one who swallowed a handful or two of benzos to end my life. What he did to drive me to do so is on him. No, I do not need to see him again. On the other hand, *evil grin* I want him to see me.

The thing about Glenn and I was that neither of us were sitting around waiting for the other to call. Well, I should qualify that. I did sit around waiting for him to call when I was in undergrad. I was young. However, after I crossed the threshold of 30 years old–actually before that–I was off doing my own thing. I had other relationships and, as he learned, I chose to actually do something about my attraction to women. That was our Waterloo. That’s what he couldn’t handle. He really couldn’t deal with me now. I am no longer willing to put up with a manchild. Heck, I don’t even know that I’ll ever want a man as a lover again. Part of that is thanks to him, but it’s mostly because I have a very hard time trusting men. OK, so more of that is due to Glenn than I’m admitting. *shrug* It is what it is. The only one who can make it go away is me. I have some idea of how, but I’m just not willing. It would mean becoming involved with a man for a while and gradually learning to trust again. It’s not an easy or quick road. I do think that I might be willing to get royally fucked off the edge of my bed by some hot young thing with an appropriately-sized penis, but that would be a quicky and meaningless. A little meaningless sex has it’s place, though.

In the last couple of weeks, almost as if I knew Valentine’s Day would come and I’d finally be more or less free of Glenn, I’ve done a couple of things to move my life along. The first was to re-join a dating site I’d left sometime last year. It was annoying to me that their clientele wasn’t as educated as I’d like. So, I took my money elsewhere. The “elsewhere” was Match.com. Oy! That place is infested with con artists! I encountered two in the first week. I would definitely suggest staying away from them. I won’t divulge which one I’ve joined, but I will say that it’s gotten better. There still aren’t the number of educated women I’d like to see, but there are those who can manage to put together a profile that’s worth a second look. There’s one woman in particular that’s piqued my interest. She’s pretty, tall, into the arts and, as I wrote tonight, gutsy. She’s been through things to which I can relate even though I haven’t been through the same things. We share some interests as well. We’ll chat and see if there’s anything that is worth a third look and, perhaps, a fourth. It’s fun discovering new people even if I don’t find The One.

The second thing I did was join a gym. I’ve never done so before, but I am so very ready to get in there and make my body into the weapon of mass destruction I want it to be. NO ONE will ever laugh at me or play cruel games because of my body–any portion of it–again. Glenn was the first time and he will be the very LAST. In addition, as much as I don’t feel my age intellectually, my body does. Things are going south when they used to be perkier. It’s time to do something about it. I was supposed to meet with a trainer today, but she had to cancel and I’d overslept anyway. I can’t be upset about oversleeping because stress has kept me awake for two nights. Actually, so has chatting with a fellow fibro patient feeling very depressed, poor dear. I know what that’s like and I wasn’t going to leave her alone in her depression. Therefore, I believe that I lost sleep for good reasons. However, I can’t lose any more. It’s too easy for me to get back into a habit of insomnia cured only through medication. The exercise will help, so I’m told. Personally, I just want to: 1) tone, firm, reduce; 2) repeat an infinite number of times until complete. Since I have a tendency toward anorexia, I have to be very, very careful about eating at all, eating properly and not over-exercising. Nevertheless, my body will become a W.M.D. Boom!!

How Do I Write This?

I sat in my living room, unmoving, for hours after feeding and watering the girls and taking some garbage out for pick-up Friday. I sat in what was my mother’s chair and didn’t even turn the television on. You see, I’d done something earlier in the day I didn’t plan, didn’t even think about, but ended up doing anyway.

I met a very nice, very intelligent man in his 70s or 80s some weeks ago. We talked for a while and enjoyed each other’s company. Thursday, I went back to the fast food restaurant looking for him. I only wanted someone to take my mind off of my own pain and try to help someone else with theirs. You see, he’d lost both is wife and then, late last year, his girlfriend. He and I understood each other’s pain and sorrow. He let me know the first time we met that he wanted me. I was flattered, but I wasn’t interested. Today, to my surprise, I did get interested. I needed to touch someone else’s soul and I most assuredly needed someone to touch mine. It was “shrink day,” and I didn’t feel all that much better after the session. In fact, I felt worse. It wasn’t the therapist’s fault. How can she understand in 50 minutes what has taken me someone else’s lifetime to understand about myself? That, and NO ONE will let me tell the whole story without interruption which leads to some tangent that’s important, but can wait until I finish my story. It’s involved, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense when heard in pieces and I ask myself so many “whys” all the time. In fact, that’s one of my biggest problems: “Why?” It’s always been that way with me and I honestly don’t know how to change that or even if I want to do so.

I feel shame. I feel so fucking alone (no pun intended). I’m worse than I was before. I just needed someone so very much and he was there and offering, so to speak. He’s also the kind of man Mom wanted me to have before she knew I was mostly lesbian. (Don’t try to figure my sexuality. You’ll get a headache. Really.) She wanted me to settle down with a very nice older man who adored me and would let me be all of who I am. That “all of who I am” became more meaningful after my unashamed and unabashed love of women was confirmed. Mom wasn’t as old fashioned as I’d believed in that regard. She wasn’t at all happy when I told her. In fact, she bordered on, I thought, being a little bit peeved that liked women more than men. Her words were, “Hmph. I’m going to have to get used to this,” in a very grumpy voice. By that time, Daddy had died and I was spared the tiny possibility that he’d be upset. If anything, he wouldn’t have cared at all as long as I was happy. Actually, Mom and I were just about on the same page. However, while she read right to left, I read left to right. My mother would have me with a husband as a primary partner while I’d have a woman. I have loved more than one person at the same time and been loved by more than one person at the same time. If I’m really lucky, I’ll have the opportunity to do so again. To be honest, it would be much easier for me to give up men than for me to give up women. I think the latter would require severing a major part of who I am as a person. I don’t think that giving men up would do that, but it also wouldn’t be painless.

I thought my days of one night stands were over. I haven’t had one in so long that I can’t remember back that far. The reason this will be a one night stand is two-fold: I didn’t know I was going to take my clothes off in front of another person today and forgot that I’d left the house without putting any lotion on and without shaving those areas women tend to shave, and; I think we’re hopelessly sexually incompatible. He’s very old school Italian and I’m not. Men of a certain age think that women should orgasm with the wiggle of their fingers in certain places. It’s our own fault because we’ve faked orgasm so many times horrible lovers think their wonderful lovers. While I wouldn’t put him in the “horrible” category, it’s pretty damn close. Any time I can’t even make myself orgasm while with someone, then something is wrong. Then again, it could be my meds. Naah, while the meds don’t make orgasms easy at all, they haven’t stopped me from getting myself off either.

It really doesn’t matter how good or bad a lover this man was. What matters is that I feel shame, regret and dirty (in a negative way) about what I did. I do want that one, last, epic love affair and I don’t particularly care about what sex my lover is, although I honestly believe it will be a woman and not a man. I don’t want to be treated like a $10 whore getting it on in the back of my van. Those days should have been over when I left my teens, but we each had obstacles at home, although all mine were either paper, dust or had four legs. He’s a neat freak and this house is anything but right now. I never, ever should have allowed my need for some kind of solace to overshadow everything else. I think I just want to forget. I think that’s the only way I won’t feel like a $10 whore. Just forget.

I forgot to mention that I’m really having trouble eating. I’ll order something and not want it when it gets here or I’ll make a sandwich and only eat half of it. Then, I get dizzy during the day and have to stop and eat just to go on, all the while hating that I’m eating. The question popped into my head while writing, “Do I cut or do I stop eating? That is the question.” Even I have to admit that things are not getting better, at least they weren’t today. Maybe something will make tomorrow bearable. A cousin I’ve never met but have spoken with dozens of times is in town for a convention. We’re going to compare family history notes and make a plan for ferreting out more information. I wish she were coming here in a month or two. I don’t know how I’m going to get through the day tomorrow and I have to drive 20+ miles each way to get scripts for my pain meds.Damn.

Yes, I Am Here

Lips clothed in red lipstick always impress.

My mother is the kind of woman who can wear brightly colored clothing in either prints or solids accessorized by large pieces of jewelry and not look like a $20 hooker. In fact, she looks great even at 84 years old. The fact that she is blessed with lustrous skin and the wrinkles one normally sees on someone who is in her 60s helps. Despite the fact that she’s quite shy, Mom would definitely not fade into a beige wall.

Anyone who has ever seen my mother and me together says that we look alike. With some very minor differences, this is true. Her skin is yellower and fairer than my mocha-based skin tinted with red and yellow. She also has a conspicuous fingertip-shaped birthmark that I think is adorable and a gap in her front teeth that gives her face character. With the exception of the additional shades of melanin added by my father, I almost look like my mother’s clone. However, that’s about as far as the cosmetic similarities go. Where she wears vibrant colors and prints, I wear earth tones. Where she wears larger, colorful jewelry, I tend toward simplistic gold, silver, white and some blue smaller pieces. Neither of us has ever worn much makeup–until recently.

It is not unusual to hear disabled people complain that they are invisible to the able-bodied world. In many instances, I think that’s true, especially if you’re a woman in a wheelchair. Those of us in wheelchairs are looking at everyone else’s navels (or something lower on the male body) as we try to make it through a crowd. Able-bodied people walk, talk, eat, daydream or generally don’t pay attention as they go from Place A to Place B and expect everyone else to inhabit the same general vertical space. However, if a person is in a wheelchair or on a scooter, they’re not in that space. They are somewhere else that can be blocked out of the conscious brain of the able-bodied person. Usually, a loud, “Excuse me!” will get their attention. But absent a polite (or impolite) exclamation, the wheelchair- or scooter-bound person doesn’t exist. And sex?! Most able-bodied people (read “men”) don’t think of the disabled as sexual. Again, we are invisible unless it’s for all the wrong reasons.

Some weeks ago, I realized I was tired of not existing. I think it was probably around my birthday this past March when I began to think of how long ago I was born versus how old I feel. I don’t feel older than my mid-30s. My body worked a whole lot better then than it does now. Nevertheless, in my mind–indeed, in my very being–I am that 35-year-old woman. Better yet, I am beginning to think of myself as a 35-year-old woman who is very sexual and very sexually attractive. I made a conscious decision to feel this way because, truth be told, getting laid was never a real problem for me. The problem was getting laid by the right person. I didn’t have the confidence and so I didn’t get the attention I wanted from the right people. It was as though my pheromones told people to “Stay away!” In truth, I think it was my desperation.

I have been ill for nearly seven years straight. My life has changed dramatically. People I thought were friends, really weren’t, and; people I thought were family were only related to me by chance DNA. Part of this time has been deeply painful. It has been so painful that at times I’ve wanted to leave this world forever. The only thing that stopped me was three days in ICU. But from there, I began to heal. I’d already begun some parts of my healing years before, but the last suicide attempt resulted in me finding the very best therapist I’ve ever had. If it weren’t for her helping me make sense out of something tragic, I doubt I’d be around today to write these words.

I have a birth defect called proximal focal femoral deficiency, (aka PFFD), that is the result of exposure to the drug thalidomide in utero. My right leg is significantly shorter than my left and I have to wear an above-knee prosthesis to walk. I am different. I have always been different. That difference didn’t physically effect me until I was in my mid-20s. From there, things began to slowly go to hell in a hand basket. But today, at this moment, there is a tremendous sense of hope. I think it is the hope that has unleashed my desire–my sexuality–and my yearning to be noticed. You see, part of the desire to blend into a beige wall stems from being a rape and incest survivor. We never want to be noticed. But part of it stems from being disabled–different and vulnerable to predators. So, there are two very strong instincts fighting me and telling me to go back into my cave where it’s safe. I won’t do it. I want to look and feel pretty again. I want to be noticed again, even if I’m using my wheelchair at the time.

In that vein, I’m buying accessories to brighten up and enhance the clothing I already have and I have my eye on some really cute, sexy underwear. I’ve also gone through all of my jewelry and realized that I’ve got some exquisite pieces that only need the right clothing and makeup. Yes, I have begun to wear makeup far more often. I’ve purchased two types of mascara that I’ll wear depending on the occasion and I am searching for diverse, colorful eye shadows that make my eyes POP and lipsticks. I think the eyeshadows I want are only to be found at a department store, but I’ve discovered a lipstick vendor with many varied shades at my neighborhood drug store. To be blunt, I want to be so fucking attractive that I don’t have to sit and wait for ANYone to call. It can and will happen. In fact, I think it might be happening now. But, for the moment, I think we’re playing a game. I am amused, no doubt, but this person won’t be the only suitor if they play too long. Yes, I am here!