I'm tired. I'm tired of cleaning up. I'm tired of disciplining. I'm so tired of having my life drained from me.
I've made big changes; changed my job, changed my home. And still, I'm being drained by a life-sucking sloth. These things exist, people! They are the people who are too lazy to give a shit about anything. They don't care how they look. They don't care how they act. They don't care how they feel. They don't care what effects their being has on anyone else, even though, most of those effects are negative. Life-sucking sloths.
Somehow, I spent nearly ten years with one of these beings. Got pregnant twice, but I'll save that for another type of blog post. I went from happy to sad. Fun to dull. Pretty to tired. I became a zombie, because I had the life sucked out of me. I couldn't have friends because, then I was doing something wrong. I couldn't hold my head up because I was looking for sexual attention. I couldn't go to school because I was going out cheating instead. Couldn't have my own job because, again, I was cheating. Couldn't go see my family because I was cheating. My life was being sucked.
Pretty soon, I forgot who I was. I forgot I liked things. I forgot I was good at things. I forgot I wanted things. I didn't exist. I was a skeleton of a person; all bones, no mass. And at that point, I didn't care enough. I didn't, because I was told not to. It's not that hard to boss around a zombie. So, I stopped.
But, eventually, I got extremely lonely. Even the psychotic, drug induced, paranoid rants didn't make me feel scared anymore. I didn't feel angry anymore. I didn't feel anything anymore. And I remembered that feeling. The dark, shallow tunnel without a single glimpse of light. And I remembered there was a reason I fought myself from going into the tunnel before, and there was damn sure a reason not to go down it now.
I started slowly, taking a college course here or there. I met up with a friend every once in a very long while. Took it slow. Until I realized his temper tantrums didn't actually stop me from attending my classes. I know it sounds crazy, but for some reason, I thought he'd get so mad, that the classes would stop. And his accusations of me cheating constantly didn't have any actual effect on the person I really was: good and honest.
The passing away of my sister really gave me the push I needed to start the ball rolling. I knew, then, at least if I didn't deserve a personal and private final conversation with her, she did. And we didn't get that. Because he couldn't be man enough to comfort a baby. He couldn't be man enough to respect a dying woman. He definitely couldn't be man enough to respect me. That was the moment that sealed it for me. I was going to fight for my life back.
Years following, I got in shape, got a job, regained my friends, graduated college and moved out - twice. I can tell you, the ride was long and bumpy, and I lost faith more times than I have fingers. Fortunately, I had amazing support from literally everybody around me, so I just gritted my teeth and held on. I tore myself away from anything that might possibly allow me an excuse not to make a decision towards change. Like an addict who locks themselves away from their circle so that there would be no excuse for relapse. I wanted away, so far away, from that sloth and my zombie shadow.
Fast forward to now. Everything that has happened to me has made me a deeper person. I have understanding of things I remember thinking I'd never understand as a child. I've experienced things that people shouldn't have to experience, though many do. I'm 10 years older with negative experience. Literally, experience that brought me backwards instead of forward. Instead of buying a house, like my peers, I'm renting from low income. Instead of getting married, like my peers, I've basically sworn off anything that even smells of relationship. Instead of planning and executing a family, like my peers, I won't have anymore children, and I have to explain all kinds of hard questions from my two stork surprises.
Which brings me back to being tired. Did I mention how life-sucking sloths don't care how their behavior effects anybody? That includes their family, their friends, even their own children. Now, I think I'm a pretty liberal parent. I let my kids get away with far more than a lot of other people, but that's usually because it's funny. Not the immature kind of funny you feel when someone says "duty," but true, gut-wrenching comedy. My kids are hilarious. I'm going to thank myself for that, but that's only because I haven't heard all the shtick their peers at school have yet.
Anyways, sloths generally don't know how to parent. That's just a true fact. They lay around, slothing away, while life happens. And what happens in kids' lives is pure craziness. And sugar. Craziness and sugar. If you don't add discipline, or even a basic set of adult eyes, to that mix, you have a very tired, cranky, little brat on your hands, when all is said and done. You have that annoying kid who screams all through lunch in the nice restaurant. Or the kid who constantly kicks the seat in front of him on a six hour flight and laughs and acts like it wasn't him. Those are not my children.
I vowed, when I was just a girl myself, that I would never have children like that. I would be a parent. I would be respected. Apparently, not everyone thinks like me. So every time I regain my children from their father, it's like a little civil war to bring them back to reality and how to act in real society. And this reoccurring war makes them pissed at me and me pissed right back. They get used to having rule over the jungle and doing whatever they want,so much so that they despise having to go to bed, or having to sit at the dinner table and not watch t.v. And that propels into how comfortable dad's bed is when they don't have to go to bed there, and how much they miss dad, and how they are staying with dad tomorrow. And this, my friends, turns me into a raging lunatic.
Not only does it exhaust me to hear his name or even have to think about how much supervising he doesn't do, it hurts my feelings, and it pisses me off that my entire life is going to be spent combating his cancerous "parenting." While he sits there and fills them full of crap about how mean I am as he feeds them ice cream and cookies in front of the t.v., I'm planning their school careers, trying to figure out how we are going to sell so many damn girl scout cookies, and working my ass off to be able to have them safe and away from him part time. And that just makes it worse.
Part of me wants to say, "Fine! Go live with him. Let's see how you like it when no one likes you because you will become him!" But then I realize, I'm dealing with children. Children who like to run amok. Who like to have free reign. Who like to not get in trouble when they throw a ball at the face of another annoying kid. What child wouldn't like that? Then I realize what is making me think like this: a life-sucking sloth. He doesn't care if they turn out like him, because, he doesn't really care about himself. But it does make him feel powerful, sitting on his couch, in front of the t.v. with his computer on his lap, watching some brainless video on his iPhone. He is able to suck some of my life from a different city, without doing anything out of the ordinary.
The point of this long, depressing, somewhat funny story? The ante has been upped. I will not have any more life sucked away. I will, instead, fill my life with far more positives. And I will breathe when my children act like barbaric heathens. I may even throw a ball at their face. Okay, maybe no ball. But they will respect me, and in the same breath, they will understand why. They will enjoy being active with me and they will be rewarded for good behavior. Slothing will stand no chance against me and my positivity. And to that, I say, On Guard!
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