40D ?!

I have gone from 38C to 40D. In 2 or 3 weeks.

I tried more than a dozen 38D bras at The Bay and they all fit. However, 38 was just okay. I wasn’t sure whatsize  Ireally  needed with the thoracic cage expanding.

I finally went at Thyme’s store where I got help (finally). I bought breastfeeding bras because they are in cotton and they are way more comofrtable than the other 3 models available. One model is for smaller breasts, the other is a Transformers bra and it scratches and the last one offers more support, it covered the whole breast. It made me look matrony, there was too much space in there and it’s so big you could see it when I had my shirt on, at the neck.

3 t-shirts for 9$, a bathing suit at 60$, 2 bras : 170$. Bras were the 2nd at half price. I had doubts. It won’t take long before they don’t fit anymore. Is it worth the investment ? The seller recommended that I keep one of the bras with the tags on so if my other bra doesn’t fit in a couple of weeks (we have 4 weeks to exchange it), I can exchange the one with the tags for a bigger one !

Now I understand why I received puzzled looks lately at work. They see something weird but they don’t know what it is. My plan is to not tell anyone until I return from vacation near the end of August. I hope my body can calm down until the start of the vacation…

Changement de style ?

Je commence à penser à changer de style de blog pour avoir des colonnes plus larges. Ce qui m’en empêche c’est qu’à chaque fois, je dois retrouver tous mes widgets…

I can do it by myself

My mom once told me that I was already saying it when I was 2 years-old : chus capable toute seule. Je suis capable de le faire toute seule. I can do it on my own. It could be by myself or alone.

I didn’t ask for help when it was time to go to the doctor’s, the psychiatrist or the psychologist. I didn’t ask for help when it was time to shop for home insurance, for clothes, for a gym membership. I didn’t ask for help when it was time to go job hunting, to prepare for interviews, to go to the library, to go to work or school at -40 celsius, to apply for a loan. I didn’t ask for help when it was time to go to the police, to court, to the hospital for operations. And if I had had my say in it, I would have gone alone to the abortion clinic.

I didn’t ask for help. The one time I tried, I was 19 and couldn’t stop crying. My boyfriend had dumped me and I was hysterical. Don’t think shy wallflower shedding a few tears silently. Think massive hysteria, sobbing, dropping to the floor, screaming, head pounding on the wall. I’m not exaggerating. I called a suicidal helpline. I wa sin distress, I wanted to kill myself (seriously). The woman clearly thought I was exaggerating and asked me how much time we had been together. When I told her two years, she said « oh ». As in « ah, I thought it might be two weeks ». Anyway, I learned my lesson. If you couldn’t get help from people on the phone, who were there for it, might as well do it on my own. As usual.

I can do it on my own. That’s all there is to it. And if it’s something I hate doing like taxes, I pay someone to do it and I don’t need to befriend the person, I don,t need a relationship. I just make a request, fill forms, pay and voilà. It is as lonely as it seems but I didn’t see it this way until…never. I see it now but I don’t feel lonely.

However, I have learned that people around me want me to ask for their help. They want to feel useful, needed. They want to be there. And I’m so damn independent. I push them away.

I’m not a feeble woman and I’m an adult. Why would I ask for help ? I’m intelligent, resourceful, strong.

I don’t want help carrying my bags, to open the door, to get that plate on a high shelf. But I say yes when my boyfriend wants to do it for me. It makes him feel needed and he feels good.

The best example of what I learned about all of this is when it’s time to look at my bobo, to change the dressing or to get my socks on. My bobo is on my backside. I can use the mirror, I can stretch to change my dressing myself and I can put my socks on myself even if it takes 5 minutes. But my boyfriend can help me and everything takes less time, it’s less painful. To change my dressing, I just have to lie there while he does it. And he’s so gentle, I don’t feel a thing.

I feel relieved to have someone there for me even if I have to ask for help. I feel a bit disconcerted too. I still don’t feel like I need help. But my boyfriend smiles and is proud to be the one I ask pancakes from, to be the one that helps me with my bobo, my socks, my bags.

And the reason why I started asking for help is that I have friends who never requested my help or didn’t call with worries. I want to be there for them and I felt I wasn’t allowed to be the best friend I could be. I relaized it’s what I had been doing so I decided to change things.

Thought Question 390 : Do you think your parents brought you up right ?

I put that blog in my RSS and lately I have been neglecting my RSS reader. I have been tired (I almost slept 12 hours friday night and staurday night) and I have been preoccupied with…The Good Wife. So this morning, I decided to use one of the questions to prompt a bit of writing.

No. I don’t think my parents brought me up right. But yes they did.

It depends on what I look at. Of course, this is going to look like I blame them for everything. I do. But then I didn’t stop there, I changed things. Isn’t what growing up is all about ? Moving on, forging ahead, creating the life one wants ?

Nobody’s life is perfect, right? Mine certainly wasn’t and my parents gave me what they had which isn’t that much if I look at it carefully. Slaps behind the head, control issues, alcoholism, muteness about what’s important. It all affected me and it all gave me the message that it’s better to slap someone when that person doesn’t live up to your expectations or if that person defies you…or shut up and drink if you are so mad and you can’t talk. Violence is a lack of words. My family is really super good at talking about nothing. It’s boring. I think that the only real talk we had, my mom and I, was about sex.

I had to wait to go in therapy to talk about what really bothered me, about all that was stuck inside me and I couldn’t get out. When reality is too difficult for me, and all I have learned is to act like everything is fine…it is really stretching the fabric of reality and stretching the mind and memory…I have to make everything fit so I forget things. Exactly like my mom.

So my life up to a few years back was about forgetting, shutting up and being mad. As a child it was also about being so mad and having no control and getting into fights.

However, my mom loved me. Badly but she still did. I can’t say the same about my biodad. Loving me brought me up better. Kind of.

My mom is curious and I am the same way. She loves to read and so do I. Everything I lacked I took from my books. Books brought me up better and friends also helped.

My mom showed me that people do change sometimes. Not always in the way I would like but they do change. For example, my mom is never going to stop drinking. But she became a bit more honest about herself. And I put clear boundaries that she tries not to cross.She showed me it is good to celebrate, she loves to party. I prefer celebrating every birthday as the conquest of another year. She loves food and every meal was a battle because I didn’t like food but now that I’m grown up, I love food. Superficial stuff.

My parents didn’t bring me up quite right but they sure showed me how not to be.

Hello to ICLWers !

Hello!!

My fake name is Terry Elisabeth Wynd. When I think of it, it’s weird that I preach honesty and that I am honest, forward and myself in real life but I use a fake name here and I don’t show pictures of myself or my family. I guess it has to do with the fact that like many other people in real life and bloggers I don’t have many people to talk to.

Of course, we talk about the weather (the most important subject of conversation in the province of Québec), TV series, books, food, flowers, etc. I don’t mind talking about « real » things but I think people don’t really want to deal with real. Some yes. Most not. So I keep to myself a lot. My blog is a way to put out there what I have inside. My pictures are a way of sharing what I see, all those details that make life so beautiful. My words are a way for me to not become sick again. I just have to get it out.

I have to say that life has become sweeter and my past troubles are not invading my thoughts as much as they used to. I do have flash backs once in a while. I do have temper flareups where I swear and feel like I want to scream. I do have periods where I would like to cry. I try and succeed most of the time to be positive. I charge forward and make do with what I have.

This year I found that :

• We take our bodies for granted and don’t think how wonderful it is that we have working legs and arms, that our brains allow us to live and work…eyes, ears, skin. Sometimes I feel lucky just being alive.
• When I change my workout I’m passionate about it.
• When I’m stressed at work I tend to make fewer hours packed with work instead of long stretches of work.
• Mondays give me a headache.
• I find it crazy that going to the dentist took care of a problem I felt was always there. Turns out it was not.
• Even if I subscribe to magazines in the attempt of spending less money, I manage to buy even more.
• With this change of workout and eating clean a bit more, I have more energy, haven’t been depressed except for a very small dose of brain fog at the start of Fall, and I sleep better.
• I realized I don’t have as many nightmares as last year or even the year before that.
• I realized I am not the person I was. In a good way. I love who I have become and I hope I continue to better myself.

My blog is written in French and in English. If you would like to read posts in French and you want to translate them in English, use my Google Translate widget. It’s not perfect but it’s good enough. I also have a Québécois language page for certain untranslatable words.