Happy 28th birthday to Bun. I love you, sweetheart.

...to the inimitable capurecitaroja!

Have a wonderful day!

Yesterday was a wonderful day of taking care of myself. Many thanks to all those who sent me good wishes, either in your personal LJs, through comments here, or through private emails. I was touched by the flood of messages, IMs, phone calls, ecards, and other expressions of love and blessings,

This was the first birthday in 5 years I haven't thrown myself a huge party. I just didn't have it in me this year, with everything going on in my personal life. I think there will be something later on in the month when things get settled back down -- I'm determined that they will do so, and in short order -- so watch this space if you're in the DFW area. In the meantime, it was sort of nice to have a quiet birthday when I could reflect and spend some time caring for myself. Things have been hard around here (she says in the understatement of the year) and taking some time for myself was much needed.

In addition to lovely IMs and phone calls, I received some additional paid LJ time from nutmegelf, which I greatly appreciate. I don't need to renew my LJ til May now! Whoo!

eraven presented me with two DVDs -- Melissa Etheridge's The Awakening and a documentary I've been wanting to see, Heavy Metal Parking Lot. They will make for wonderful viewing this weekend, when I know my brain will need a rest.

The Girl found a Rush Presto concert shirt for me -- I soooo cannot wait to wear it! 

It's funny, coming from a large family, birthday presents were never the point of the day. But it felt sweet to be remembered. And the dinner of baked chicken, Rice a Roni, and chocolate cake so thoughtfully cooked for me by eraven was also lovely, as were the phone calls, IMs, LJ comments, and emails.

It was a great day. 

Thanks to nutmegelf for the Paid LJ time and the Extra User Pics! What a great surprise! 

I'm taking a me day for my birthday, to take care of me. I need this. My boss has generously given me the day off since I worked extra last week including Saturday, during the candidate visits.

I will be napping, eating something wonderful for lunch, and generally doing things that make me feel good. 

I have a new (to me) Amy Tan novel to chew on.

I'll post my latest reviews to 50bookchallenge

I'll probably work on my cards and packages for holiday_wishes

I'll be online off and on all day. If anyone wants to chat, I'll be on my standard messaging programs.

Now I'm off to find that lovely lunch. 

As of 2:32 tomorrow morning, December 3, I will be 33 years old. I'm told this is a special birthday for me numerologically -- but since numerology is a bit too much like math for me, I haven't looked into this. Anyone out there on my brilliant Flist know anything about this?

It's no secret to anyone close to me, or anyone who reads this space regularly, that the last five months of my life have been the most difficult period personally and spiritually that I've ever been through. They've been the most wonderful in many ways, and the most enlightening, and the most growth-packed. But they've also been the most traumatic, the darkest, the most confusing period in my life too. I've spent a lot of time keeping my head down to keep it from being shot off, and facing things about myself and my partners that perhaps I was not ready to face. Especially the things about myself that I've had to face. I feel like I'm getting to know myself better than I ever have, and that this is an amazing opportunity for me to grow into the person I want to be and step into the life I want to have. But I also know that I'm not doing it fast enough for anyone around me, and that I can't speed this process up or slow it down, let alone halt it entirely. And it's incredibly difficult for me to know that my process of growth and exploration hurts the people I love, and that the people I love lash out and hurt me in response to their own pain. And the more they hurt me, the more I want to struggle against that pain and grow beyond it, and the more I struggle and grow the more I hurt them. And it starts the cycle of pain and abuse and lashing out all over again. No one deserves that, no matter what they have done. I have seen an ugly side of many of my loved ones over the last few months, and I imagine they feel (and perhaps rightly so) they have seen an ugly side of me. 

I have seen the ugly side of myself. I have also seen the brave, beautiful, vibrant part of myself that I never even knew was being hidden (as  my mother's church would have said) under a bushel basket. In the midst of all the pain and the self-doubt and self-recrimination and guilt (and there has been a lot of all those things, more than I'd like to admit), I have seen a person that I truly am beginning to love. If you would have told me 6 months ago that I didn't love myself, I think I would have brushed you off. But I'm beginning to see that I have only been trying to love the person I am, and now that I am truly falling in love with the woman I am and the woman I'm becoming I realize how much time I have spent hating myself and feeling inadequate. Feeling like I didn't deserve, sometimes still feeling like I don't deserve. I want to love this woman I am becoming. And that means embracing all the dark things about her as well as the things that the world deems acceptable and loveable. I cannot live to please anyone else, which is what I've been trained to do most of my life. I have to live the most authentic life I can. 

And the struggle is to find what makes that authentic life for me. I am figuring it out piece by piece. I wish I could do it faster, to alleviate the waiting and the hurt and the confusion of all those around me. But I can only take this as it unfolds, and it presents itself. 

One thing I have realized in the midst of all this is how much I deny myself self-care. I took a day two weeks ago to stay at The Girl's apartment whilst she was at work, and I realized it was the first time I'd had 6 hours of unlimited time all to myself in almost six months. All I had to do that day was take care of me. No one else. And I didn't recognize until that day how much I let my own self-care slip. I cannot do this anymore. This birthday week I will be focusing on that which nurtures my soul and body. I need to take care of myself, or I cannot be the person I want and need and deserve to be.

All I want for my birthday is me. And I'm the only person who can give me that gift.