Women are not Objects!

Once again I have not written anything in a while on this blog.  I am writing now because of recent events that are boiling in me and bubbling up and over to the point I am having an emotional hangover.

What I am about to write about makes me very emotional, and it can cause a lot of anger and upsetting emotions in others, but I am doing it anyways because I feel the need to let others know they are not alone.

1 in 3 American women will be sexually abused during their lifetime. (George Mason University, Worldwide Sexual Assault Statistics, 2005)

One in four college women report surviving rape (15 percent) or attempted rape (12 percent) since their fourteenth birthday. (Warsaw, R. I Never Called it Rape. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994)

In the year 2000, 246,000 women survived rape and sexual assault. This computes to 28 women every hour. (Rennison, C. M. "National Crime Victimization Survey, Criminal Victimization 2001: Changes from 2000-2001 with Trends 1993-2001," Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, NCJ 187007, 2002.)

 8% of men admit committing acts that meet the legal definition of rape or attempted rape. Of these men who committed rape, 84% said that what they did was definitely not rape. 
(Warsaw, R. I Never Called it Rape. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994)

35% of men report at least some degree of likelihood of raping if they could be assured they wouldn't be caught or punished.
 (Malamuth, N. M. "Rape Proclivity Among Males." Journal of Social Issues 37 (1981): 138-57.)

Now that I have shown you some statistics I am going to go forward with my own stories.

I have recently been trying to work through my own demons, and why I have such trouble with relationships.  I have felt like I will always be alone.  So I started writing down (due to a suggestion from a professional) all the bad experiences I have had with men including rape, domestic violence or the threatening of either.  I am going to share some of that with you now.

When I was a sophomore in high school one of my acquaintances and I were asked by a teacher to reorganize a small room in the school where a lot of supplies belonging to the school were kept.  The Acquaintance was a young man that was pretty well liked by my peers. We went and were a bit overwhelmed by the job at hand. So we started to just talk and kind of do nothing we were supposed to do.  Eventually he told me he liked me. I was a bit surprised and told him I did not feel the same way. He became upset and cornered me against the wall. He put his hand between my legs, and told me I liked it. I was completely frozen.  A math teacher walked in on this, and accused me of being a slut. I tried to explain, but he would not listen, and only sent me to the Vice Principals office.  I was lucky enough that the Vice Principal really liked me, and thought I had potential ans he put it.  He believed me and the boy got into a bit of trouble (not nearly enough in my opinion now), and I was assigned a new math teacher.  sadly most of my friends did not believe he did that to me.  This was my first experience with an assault from a male.  Also my first experience with peers not wanting to believe in a sexual assault which is a whole different subject I will write about at a different time. 

My second experience was with a bad boyfriend who had a cocaine problem, and also was very abusive. There are so many experiences with this one man I could write a whole essay on him.  I however have one experience that stands out more than any other. This is something that I usually do not tell very many people until they are very close to me. I am going to tell it now because I think it is one of the hardest experiences of my life and it still gives me nightmares, and I know there are woman out there with similar experiences and if it helps just one other person than it is a good thing.  MY boyfriend at the time had such a bad coke problem that he ran out of money one day. Which happened rarely, but on occasion. So he said he had worked something out with his dealer, and we had to go to his house.  When we got there they talked for a few minutes, and than my boyfriend said he would be back in a few hours, and I was to stay put.  His dealer insisted I sit on the sofa with him, and than tried to put the moves on me. I resisted him for a bit, but than he pushed me down into the sofa and ripped the shirt i was wearing after that I froze. I cried through the whole thing while he raped me.  A friend found out what was going on and came to get me. They were too late to stop what was happening, but they did get me out of there, and explained that my boyfriend had sold me off for a few hours so he could get some coke.  I was sold for a little bag of white powder, and that man claimed to love me.

The next experience I will tell you about was on my 21st birthday. I was homeless at the time, and these two guys I knew said they were going to buy me some vodka and we would hang out.  We went to an abandoned building that was a popular hang out for the homeless I knew in that area. We all drank the vodka and laughed and talked, and than one of them started to kiss me at first i kissed him back because I kind of liked him.   I than told him to stop, and from there it went from bad to worse. The other man hanging out with us took off when I started saying No.  I was raped on my 21st birthday. 

After this I was with a lot of abusive boyfriends who did not sexually assault me but they beat me.  I even was beaten one night while i was pregnant with my daughter. 

I was married for a time, and there was a lot of mental abuse there although they will never admit or apologize for any of it.  There was the lies and deceit and they also deny all of that as well no matter how I caught them in it. 

Years later while I was separated and dating someone else who was not exactly the best guy either.  I went to go see a movie by myself because I needed some alone time. On the walk home i took a small short cut that I had taken many times.  A man stopped and asked me if I had a dollar, and I sad no. He than grabbed me, ripped my jacket off, and threw me too the ground. He told me to stay there, and he told me if I did not let him fuck me he would stab me with his knife.  When he was finished with me he grabbed my jacket and left with it. I ran home and I think either my roommate or my ex husband (who lived beneath me called the police). The police were so awful to me that i did not tell them about the rape and simply told them about the assault and that my jacket was stolen and it had my wallet in it. When they had me speak to a detective I had pretty much clammed up altogether.  The officers who had come kept asking me if I was sure he was white. They asked me that question at least 4 times. They also took me back to the scene of the crime, and were laughing about my description while i was in the back of the police car. I became afraid to even speak at all. There was no female officer, and no one who treated me like I was important at all.  These police officers treated me like i was trash. 

The last incident i am going to tell you about was with a man I had been with longer than any other.  The first few years were really great. We had our arguments but he showed me love and affection. He bragged about me. He stood up for me. I was completely in love with him. He however had some mental illness, and a serious addiction problem.  Just before we moved to Vermont I started to wonder if our relationship was worth it because he was starting to fall off the wagon. He dropped out of school, and was seriously depressed. I wanted to move and had wanted too for some time. We were living in Albany, NY and i did not like it there or felt safe there.  So we moved to Vermont. I told him I wanted to move and it was his choice to come with me or not. He chose to come with me (surprisingly), and we made the move.  He got a job pretty quickly and it first it seemed he was feeling better and doing better, but eventually he lost the job and started drinking on and off. He became abusive both mentally and physically. I tried to help him. and at one time we even went to counseling together. I still to this day feel like we made a mistake in the counselor we chose as he seemed tocoddle my boyfriend, and I constantly was made ot feel like I was the bad guy in all of it. My boyfriend would lie to him and when i called him out on it the counselor would say things like "Well we all perceive things differently".   Well after a situation where he ended up in the hospital claiming he was going to kill himself (one of his tactics to get me to do what he wanted) I broke it off with him. I told him he could live in the extra bedroom until he could find a place of his own.  A few months later he walked around my house with a knife talking gibberish. The police were called, and when they came in my boyfriend assaulted them, and even hit one of the officers with a metal table.  It took 6 police officers to carry him out of the house. I went and got a restraining order the next day.  I ended up with some PTSD, and my therapist at the time tried EMDR treatment which did not work that well for me. In fact i got really manic for some time, and things only became worse when he got out of jail.  He came to the house I think a week after he got out and begged to come in. I felt bad for him it was winter and it was cold out and he looked awful.  At first he seemed fine and normal and he came back for a few days and we talked about how we could not be together and he said he was getting a place with some people he had met etc...  He started to act weird though and claimed I was his girlfriend again. He did not want me to go anywhere, and I knew things were not good. I however was convinced by another person who knew he was there to just tell him to go away for a few days because we were having a party. Which did work for those few days.  When he came back he was much worse and I could no longer handle the situation. He refused to let me leave the house. he even tied my hands for some time, and he raped me several times.  I finally told someone else besides the first person, and they called the police.  They came and got him. They took a lot of stuff from the house, and I was taken to the hospital. We never went to trial because his lawyers kept putting it off, and eventually someone I was not friends with anymore changed their story, and my lawyers felt that they could no longer trust the jury as it would be my word against hers. So instead we made a deal and the only way to make a deal with a rapist in Vermont is to drop the rape charges.  So he only got assault, and for breaking a restraining order. He was given 3 1/2 years. His time is almost up now.

This is why I am scared to death, and this is why I do not trust men.  The past few days I have read so many incidents of women being sexually assaulted, threatened, or abused by men in one way or another. We have been telling our stories on the Internet. No one seems to be listening to us.  

I saw something yesterday and again today about how if you had a plate of cookies and you were told that some of them were poisoned but you did not know which ones why would you eat any of them?  That is what it is like more and more for women.  We know some of you are good, but we cannot tell usually until it is too late. So now we are afraid of all of you. 

So men when you hear other men say nasty things about women or talk about them as objects instead of as people. Stop them and tell them they are wrong, and not to talk about women that way no matter how we are dressed, or how much we drink, or any other reason they come up with for doing it.

Women please no no matter what you do it is not your fault! These things are never your fault. We have the right to say NO! We have the right to be human beings and to give our bodies when we want to and not when someone else wants us too. 

WOMEN ARE NOT OBJECTS!

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Mother and daughter

I have written nothing since my mother died this past winter. The inspiration left me, and probably when I needed my creative outlet the most. Even now it seems like the words are just not quite right, and the feeling behind them is not coming through the way it should, but I am going to do my best. 

I have been thinking about the relationships between mother and daughter, and how different they can be for each of us. My mother and I rarely saw eye to eye, and did not always even have respect for each other. I do realize my mother did the best she could with what knowledge she had. She sometimes went about things the wrong way, but she also did not have the ability to do things differently.  She did not understand my mental issues, and she certainly did not know how to handle them. For my mother I think it was simply frustrating and scary, and strained our relationship well into my adult years even after I was diagnosed. 

I spent years fighting against being like my mother to the point that I rebelled against being who I really was. Years of making myself believe I was far more independent and interesting than my mother. Now I will say I am a very interesting person, and have been through some things my mother probably never imagined living through.  There are some things though that we do have in common that I have realized and come to terms with. You could say we are the two sides of the same coin.

Now I have my own teenage daughter, and I have never felt more blessed with the child I have. She is amazingly tough far more than most realize. Most people see my tiny sarcastic and sometimes crazy kid. I see something more. 

My daughter was born with cystic fibrosis, and over the years she has been diagnosed with adhd, and a mood disorder which many a psychiatrist has told me off record is bipolar disorder. I kind of already knew, because I have bipolar as well. She is stronger than me though.  Maybe because I understand and I can talk to her about it, maybe because she has meds to help her through, or maybe she has been through so much medical stuff having some mental disorder seems dim compared. She is my heroine.  

My daughter has had three big surgeries since she was born. The first one was immediately after I pushed her out. They rushed her to a hospital in Boston,  and has the scar to show for it. She had a blockage in her intestines,  and so they had to remove it, and sew her intestines back together.  She spent the first month of her life in a hospital, and I never got to breastfeed. I pumped for the first couple weeks and she got it, but I did not have a lot of milk, and my nipples were bleeding. So from the start things were rocky for my bean. She was tiny and looked like an alien. Her head to big for her body it was amazing when she was able to hold it up. I was scared to death. 

The second surgery was years later when a doctor realized her spine was stretched, and they did surgery to snip the cartilage so that her spine could be like the rest of us, and she would have less pressure on her legs. The surgeon explained to me that not all her symptoms would leave, but that this would keep them from getting worse.

The third surgery was for a gtube so my daughter could get a higher calorie intake since she needed to gain more weight. This is a hole in her stomach fixed with a small plastic device that can be hooked up to bags of unflavored nestle drinks that add over a 1,000 calories overnight. She was in the hospital for over a month, and missed out on half of her summer that year. After the surgery it took her some time to get back up to speed. This whole thing was hell! She had to stay in the unit and schedule time in the extra room where she could do art. She had to walk her metal pole with her iv over there and would get so sick of the whole thing she would cry and beg to come home.  I wanted to rip her out of that bed and tell the doctors to "fuck off".  I of course just waited it out with her. 
Although I did kind of tell one of those physicians that they could go where the sun does not shine. Maybe just once. 

After all this her mood disorder really came out in full throttle, and it took some time to work out the right medications, and therapy that was helpful. This one time last year she told me what it felt like to her when she had what I call a bipolar freak out. She said it starts out she is just upset than it turns into a something else and she no longer has any control. She knows what she is doing and saying is wrong, but she loses herself and until its done she can do nothing.  I know that feeling all too well. I hold myself in check quite often for fear of that rage. I try to stay away from confrontation , and even amaze myself sometimes that I hold it together.

My daughter has her moments, but I can say she has far less than I did at her age. She is amazing to me how often she holds it together.  How rare it is that she loses control compared to myself back than. I often tell people that if they knew me when I was younger they would not have liked me.

I sometimes have to explain to my bean that not everyone is going to understand,  and sometimes we have to just face those consequences of these actions even though we lost control. We just have to hope we can do better next time, and hope for future friends who will understand and help us through rather than shut us out. 

My mother did not have the knowledge or understanding that I have been able to pass down to my daughter. She also maybe should have handled things differently a few times, but she did not know any better. I still turned out pretty good.  I think my daughter is turning out even better. I love you my bean, and I will always be here for you.

My daily life and a cleaning tip

My life as a single Mom can sometimes be tedious and somewhat boring, but often I end up wishing I had never got bored when some crazy drama filled thing happens to rock my world. Which of course has recently happened, and I will be discussing those details in my next post. This however is about my basic every day life.

5:30am- Wake up, Start getting Bean up, Get out all her little pills fir Cystic Fibrosis and other things, take my own pills with a tall glass of water, yell in Bean's room get up NOW!

5:45am Bean is in shower, I make her some breakfast usually a micro waved Potato or some leftover soup

6:00am- Bean and I both have breakfast mine is usually hot quinoa or some eggs, she watches some TV and I hang out on Facebook, and start reading blogs out of my google reader.

6:30am - more Internet for me, Bean gets dressed

7:00am- Bianca is getting ready doing her hair, preparing her school stuff. I put together her snack for the day.

7:30am- Bianca leaves to catch the bus. I go back to bed for a couple hours

9:30am- Get up do 30 minutes of cardio on Wii or take a walk for an hour.

10:30am- Make phone calls, Clean Littler boxes, Sweep all the floors, clean bathroom counter, laundry, and other odds and ends.

Noontime- have lunch

1:00pm- Do extra chores I put aside for the day as in Wednesday I dust all the surfaces, clean microwave, and sometimes mop the living room floor (I hate mopping).

3:00pm- maybe gets some writing done, and keeps doing laundry

4:30pm- does dishes

5:00pm Prepare dinner

6:00pm- Bean gets home between 5:30pm and 6:00pm so we eat dinner when she gets home.

7:00pm- Bean does her vest for physical therapy

7:30pm- Maybe watch a movie with Bean or we do some other stuff including homework

9:00pm- Beans bedtime

After that I write or hang out on Facebook and Pinterest and so forth.

I usually go to bed about Midnight.

This is a typical day not including when I have appointments and such.

Now I clean my microwave the natural way. I use one cup white vinegar, one cup of water, and two capfuls of vanilla extract in a microwave bowl. I place it in the microwave and set the time for 5 minutes on high.  Than I let it sit for a couple minutes to let the steam really penetrate the inside if the microwave.  Than carefully take out the bowl. After that I take a damp cloth and swipe down all the walls in the microwave. I clean the glass plate in hot soapy water and after it dries put it in the nice clean microwave that smells pretty neat as well.

This is the life I really prefer its the nice boring one, and I hope someday to share it with a man who will enjoy the dinners I make and we will massage each others feet.

FOX NEWS a bunch of Dumbasses

So the latest thing in the Witchy world is the situation with Fox News about them Wiccan bashing. If you have not watched the video go to Youtube and look up Fox News Wiccans and it will come right up. I have also signed the petition and did my part to let them know what they did was wrong.

That being said I really think that everything that Fox News says is pretty much idiotic and has proven themselves to be the worst News station in human history so forth anyone with half a brain is going to watch this and know they are clueless idiots that have no idea how offensive they are being. They think they are actually making good Television it’s just a little sad. Seriously its pathetic and I pity them.

As a Witch yes I am offended, but I also am not surprised. How many people do I meet that do not know the difference between Wiccans, Witches, Druids, and Pagans? I will tell you a damn lot! We sort of all get squished together into the same category just as Baptists, Lutherans, Pentecostals, and Catholics all get thrown together because they are all Christian (supposedly). I know many witches are pissed off about this, but I am not really all that angry about that part. People are always going to throw us into the same category just as Christians are all part of the same category. I do realize though that it is offensive, and if you want to be angry about it I can understand why you are.

The fact that they think we do not know our own holidays that made me upset. I can name every one of them fine thank you. Do I go about asking Christians if they know all their Holidays? NO cause it’s a stupid question.  Also Halloween is not the most sacred Holiday of Witches or Wiccans although many of us celebrate Samhain, which happens to be on the same day. Is any of this surprising though? No cause its Fox News and I doubt any of them have done any research on anything they talk about at all.  EVER!

Also the bit about Dungeons and Dragons is very odd and just shows how ignorant they are once again.  I would love to play that game but the geeks and nerds who play it tend to not think I am cool enough to play, and as I recently said to someone getting involved in a group that plays is like opening up a coconut made of cement! These guys are a type of gamer not a Religion.

I do like Incense so do a lot of Buddhists, Christians, Atheists, etc..... What has liking things to smell nice have to do with what religion or belief you have? Once again ignorance and stupidity of Fox News!

So here is the bottom line. Go sign the petition.
 Here it is

 Also realize that anyone who listens and watches Fox News for actual news probably has the same IQ as of the people on those shows. I think it is probably the same as of an orange. At least an orange can give you some vitamin C.   I think the only thing Fox news can give you is a good laugh at their stupidity or a possible headache from the same thing.

I am in no way saying we should not find them offensive. I am just saying they are dumbasses.

Thank you! Goodnight! That is all!

Things have changed since Bridget Jones

Do you remember the book Bridget Jones Diary? I loved that book and the movie was pretty good as well. The thing was she showed how hard it was being single when all your coupled friends seemed to look down on you for it. This was a trend for some time, and may still be going on today although I have not felt that kind of pressure from my married or coupled up friends while I have been single.

Instead I have found a different pressure I keep facing that is truly annoying and I think lacking empathy. These days it seems women look down on their single friends for wanting to be coupled. I have done it as well. Well why do you need a man? This question pops up when someone is whining away over a pint of Ice cream that they cannot find a good man.  Who said she needed one? Maybe she just wants one?

What is wrong with wanting to be in a couple? Why is there this stigma against it? As though if you want to have a man in your life your a weak woman or less of a woman for it. How times have changed. Why is it that we cannot accept each other as sisters in this world just as we are?

Do not get me wrong their is nothing wrong with women who choose to be single although most women I have met say it and yet when they find a special mate in their life suddenly they act like they are more complete, and seem to be happier than ever unless of course it goes sour which is a whole different bag of bones I plan to discuss at another date.

A lot of research has shown that people are happier and healthier in relationships and marriage. *According to Professor Dario Maestripier whose findings are published in the journal Stress "What we found is that marriage has a dampening effect on cortisol responses to psychological stress"

That is one of the many health benefits that have been found from coupling up according to many different medical journals. You can certainly go look this stuff up its all over the Internet. I am not going to list them all as this is just a blog and not a research paper.

I myself have found that I am more comfortable within a relationship. I feel more at ease, and I feel less worried about a lot of things such as finances, going out, health, etc..  I can say though it has to be a Healthy relationship and not an abusive one. Of course being in an abusive relationship is bad, but denying yourself a relationship because you’re afraid of it or just on the policy that you think it makes you a stronger person is not healthy either.

Once again I am not saying it is not all right to be single. There are perfectly healthy people being single and seem to be happy about it. What I am saying is take a deep look at your reasons for it. Have you swung all your energy into your career to avoid being in love or found some other place to put those basic human needs?  If not than hurray for you but please do not put down others for wanting to be in a couple. We all have our own way in life so do not put down others for choosing a different one.

As women we should support each other no matter if we are single, dating, in a relationship, or married. The stay at home housewife has just as much value as the working ones. The single woman has just as much value as a married one. Lets stop making judgments about the choices we make or the things we want in life and instead put our energy elsewhere.

References
*http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7952466/Relationships-are-good-for-your-health.html