Hello, dear readers! It’s your friendly neighborhood emotional baggage dumpster, here, ready to have you dump all your shit, no matter how trivial, into my already overwhelmed mind until it reaches the point that I literally go bat shit insane and decide to blow like Krakatoa! Because hey, my life isn’t an emotional roller coaster during the ultimate shit storm right now… I could use someone else’s trivial emotional baggage thrown in there, too! And while we’re at it, make light of my situation because your petty problems are just so much worse than mine. That’s what I’m fucking here for!

I have come to this conclusion that this is how my “friends” see me… I am nothing more than a dumpster where they can toss their emotional baggage without a thought or a care as to how it might affect me or what kinds of trials and tribulations I may be going through myself at the time. I’m sure none of them are this fucking oblivious that they can’t see some of their issues are really small, petty, insignificant or just downright stupid in comparison to the ones I’m facing right now. Yet, they all seem pretty fucking oblivious… They just throw all their baggage into Jackie the human dumpster and never give a second thought to ask the dumpster how she’s holding up…

But before I get into that… How do you like the Halloween wig I bought? Yeah, it reminded me why I started getting my hair cut… Long hair began to annoy me at some point and I began getting it cut shorter (it’s still long). I don’t miss my hair being this long, I learned that much from this wig…

So, the entire thing began over the weekend when I was on the phone with Morticia which, as we all know by now, is enough to send my normally dead person low blood pressure skyrocketing through the stratosphere. I hear a notification and see I have a Facebook message… It’s from one of my ex boyfriends that’s we’ll call Carrot (he’s a ginger). Not that I’m in the habit of staying friends with exes, but Carrot and I were friends way back in high school and started dating when we were about 23. Even after we broke up, we stayed friends for a while then lost touch. It was only a few years ago that we became friends on Facebook. He’s well aware that he and I will never be anything more than that ever again, which isn’t the problem, though he’s made it clear if I ever wanted a relationship with him again, he’d jump at that chance… Why are some men stupid like that? I realize it’s been well over 25 years and yes, people do change… But the things that made me not want to stay with him then are still present now. He knows that because we’ve talked about the shortcomings that made me want to end the relationship. If you still have those shortcomings that a person simply can’t live with, why the fuck would you want to try it again?! Someone please explain this to me because I’m just at a complete loss, here… Is this all men or is he just a special kind of fucking stupid?!

So this is how the relationship with Carrot and I goes… He messages me (sometimes he calls) to discuss the fact that he’s still single, how bad it sucks and I’m biting my tongue so I don’t ask him, “And exactly what kind of cheese would you like with that whine, rat…?” I know that would make me an asshole, but when you’ve heard this as many times as I have… Well, you wouldn’t care if you were an asshole, either… Now at this point I hadn’t heard from him in a long time (thank heavens), so when I saw his name pop up, I groaned. I knew exactly where this was going. And it did… He asked how life was, I said it’s been better. The response: “Okay… lol”, which I found snide and sarcastic. He than asked “What’s wrong with yours?” That also sounded snide and sarcastic and rude to boot. So I told him to go first. “Still miserably single and turning 50 in a few days”… There’s the stupid… I asked, “That’s all?” To which he acted like like it was a huge travesty and I was making light of it. I told him I’d trade him in a heartbeat. He asked when then asked what was up with me, so I told him everything that’s been going on with my health, that I’ve been overwhelmed by everything and crying a lot. He said he cries a lot, too, but for other reasons, not to make light of my situation, but he sometimes gets lost in his thoughts and cries alone… I didn’t respond for a long time because I was going back and forth, should I or shouldn’t I… I was literally stewing about it before I finally decided, fuck it, I should. I told him he was trivializing my situation. You can’t compare being alone with my situation. My lungs are literally rotting and if I can’t quit smoking, this can kill me. I described how it feels to not be able to keep up with people when they walk a normal pace because you’re so winded you feel you’re running a marathon and get sharp pain in your lungs, that you’re only 49 and have osteoporosis and chances are no one will believe you (like they didn’t believe I went through menopause so young) and you’re afraid to bend and lift things or fall because you can break something. I told him he’s so worried about growing old alone, but at least he knows he will grow old. I’m not so sure I will and did he have any idea what that felt like, knowing you may not grow old?! I told him no, he didn’t, because he was too busy whining that he was alone and the reason he couldn’t get women was because the vibe he gave off was that he was desperate and women don’t like desperate men. It took him a while to respond, but when he did, he was like every other guy that has ever known me overly well. He knew he fucked up and that was really bad. He was very apologetic.

But that doesn’t mean it stayed that way… He again turned it around and made it about himself. Shocking, right? I eventually managed to get him to shut the fuck up and leave me alone, so I thought… He messaged me yesterday wanting to let me know he’s available if I want to hang out and “get my mind off of things”… and to whine some more, of course. So… why in the blue fuck would I want to hand out with Carrot for any reason?! Jesus Christ! Seriously, I could need someone to talk me out of offing myself and if Carrot was the only person available to talk to, I think I’d rather die because it would be preferable to listening to his whiny ass bitch about still being single! I wish I could say I was kidding but, sadly, I’m not…

Aside from the fact that I dated him long ago, I’d hooked him up with Morticia during one of her Gomez breaks, hoping it would kill two birds with one stone and get rid of both problems for me. Instead, it created a worse one with Morticia, but that’s neither here nor there… I did, however, gain some interesting insight as to what kind of person Carrot was. I know what he was like at 23 or 24 and it seems not much has changed. I actually think he’s gotten a bit worse. I swear, he’s the poster child for why women should choose lesbianism… Maybe he should try acting like the 50 year old man he is and not a horny adolescent boy and he’d be able to keep a woman his own age. Or any age…

Morticia is no better… Sometimes I wish I would magically go fucking deaf, but inly when she calls. Then I wouldn’t have to listen to the constant bitching about how much she hates her job, how sick she is, how much of an asshole her one friend is, what said friend is doing wrong with her life (I don’t know why she cares), her troubles with Gomez, her money issues… just everything. I wouldn’t have to hear her tell me how I “don’t understand” when I clearly do… At least she’ll ask me how I’m doing, however, that comes with circumstances. Either she’ll ask and, when I start to tell her she’ll cut me off and change the subject because she either a) doesn’t actually care how I’m doing or b) doesn’t want to hear that someone may actually be sick because then they’ll take all the attention away from her crazy Munchausen’s ass. I’m really not sure which, nor do I really care. It’s just the principal of the thing. And if she’s not cutting me off because she clearly doesn’t care to hear what I have to say, she’s putting me down or making up some excuse as to why I’m not well that can be easily fixed. She’s constantly telling me a lot of my issues are because I don’t eat red meat. First of all, I think she didn’t get the memo that red meat is bad for you. Second, she knows I can’t digest it since I lost my gall bladder (I found this happens to a lot of people after said surgery). She also keeps downplaying my osteoporosis, thinking it’s some form of arthritis. I think she wants to believe it’s a mild form of such because she has rheumatoid arthritis and no one can be sicker than her… I’ve tried telling her it’s bone loss, but she thinks that’s what arthritis is…

As for everyone else… Well, I don’t really have a support system. I don’t have many friends and the friends I do have (not counting Morticia who calls every day several times a day and the occasional whining from Carrot) don’t seem to give two hoots and a rat’s happy ass about whether I live or die. I rarely hear from them and, when I do, it’s usually because they want or need something. None of them ever ask how I’m feeling or holding up. Even my own family is no better. They don’t ask how I’m holding up, how my doctor appointments go, what the doctors say…

Lately I’ve had so many doctor’s appointments and tests, that’s pretty much the only time I ever leave the house. I’m so sick and fucking tired of doctors… Honestly, I see doctors more than other people. I’ve gained so many doctors in the past year, it’s fucking insane, and most of those have been in the past month. I miss the days when all I had was just a GP and a GYN… Now I have a GI, a cardiologist, a psychiatrist, a psychologist, a pulmonologist (two, actually, one is for the smoking cessation program), a rheumatologist… I don’t want to know what’s next… So when I actually got out of the house to do something necessary and enjoyable (I needed long sleeved shirts and one of the stores had them on sale), I decided I was going to do a little shopping, just browsing around the store. I happened to see this in the perfume counter… I didn’t know they made Poison anymore! Back when this was super popular, everyone I knew had a bottle except me. I couldn’t splurge on something so luxurious because I had bills to pay and was forced to help my mom support the sponge. So when I saw this, even though I didn’t need it and it was pricey, I decided I deserved a treat, something that would make me smile when I wore it.

I need a pick me up… And if a perfume I can spritz on and make that feeling of being overwhelmed go away for a little while does the trick, it’s worth the money.

I also got my new iPhone (how pretty!) which is good because I was so tired of my texting acting all wonky. I think the screen was starting to go a little. No surprise… I’d had the old one about 2 years and I text and comment a lot, plus I play some games that require me to use the screen a lot. It’s no wonder it shits out so fast. But now I have a pretty new one and I got the full trade in value for my old one, so I got the new one dirt cheap. One thing I can say about Apple: if you want to get a new phone every two years, they make it super affordable to do it. Unlike some companies…

Anyway, back to the subject because my brain was like a train that totally derailed there for a second… Like that doesn’t happen any other time… So Morticia seems to be laboring under the delusion that osteoporosis is a type of arthritis. I told her no, that’s osteoarthritis, which I do have in my back (and I’m sure other places). She said, “Oh… that’s what I have in my back, too (sure you do). Then what the hell is osteoporosis?” Mind you, this is from someone who supposedly went through some sort of schooling for medical training and was just about to get her degree when shit happened and she was tossed out of the program. I told her osteoporosis is bone loss, your bones get really thin and brittle and can break easy because you’re not making as much new bone anymore. The process slows as you age anyway, but with osteoporosis it slows a lot and you lose way more than you create, so your bones are thin and brittle and even bending over can break your spine if that’s where you have it at (and mine is worst in my spine).

No matter how many times I’ve explained this, she still thinks that osteoporosis and arthritis are the same thing… I’m sure there is some bone loss with arthritis from your bones rubbing together after the cartilage is gone (which is what happens with arthritis) but that’s not the same as your bones becoming porous like a sponge and brittle. Morticia is an idiot and you can’t tell her otherwise if she thinks she’s right…

I actually had my appointment with the rheumatologist earlier this week… I liked her, she’s nice and I think she really knows her shit… I just didn’t want to be there, not for what I was there for. I ended up having a mini meltdown in the exam room because of everything. I know there’s nothing I can do about it. It’s here and I just have to deal with it. But there’s a bigger picture no one is looking at. It’s more than the osteoporosis. It’s all about losing my ovaries so young… If I’d had a choice, you better believe I’d have chosen for that to not have happened. That’s the issue I’m having a difficult time dealing with. It was 15 years last month and I still can’t seem to get over that loss of control. And now all these other issues are rearing their ugly heads from it, adding insult to injury… As for the emphysema, that’s my own fucking fault. I was a stupid kid, 15, stuck in a shit show situation at home. Cigarettes, underaged drinking and smoking dope helped me get through a lot of shit for several years. The cigarettes were, sadly, the only thing I couldn’t seem to give up. Now I’m paying for it…

Be that as it may, no matter whether I have no one to blame but myself or no one to blame because I’m an atheist and don’t know who the fuck I could blame, it doesn’t mean I need every asshole I know tossing all their problems into the Jackie dumpster. But they keep doing it… And I’m telling you, pretty soon I’m going to snap the fuck out and completely lose my shit. And then no one’s going to be happy. It’s happened before when I lost my shit…

Ugh, I’m depressing myself… I’m probably depressing you, too, dear readers. I’m sorry for that. Sometimes my venting tirades go a little crazy.

So I’ll leave you with some happy today… I decided to make a new profile picture and use the digital watercolor brushes. I don’t think it’s bad for a first attempt… I wasn’t sure what the fuck I was going for, actually. But it turned out kind of pretty, don’t you think? And yet my profile pictures never look like me, do they…? Hell, they don’t even look like me when I was young! Hahahaa… Wow, that’s pretty sad, isn’t it? What’s really sad is that my hair has never looked this nice, not even on its best day. My hair is like wresting Medusa’s head full of snakes, thanks to the beauty of naturally curly hair and frizz… Ah well. At least I can draw my hair pretty even if it looks like Medusa’s snakes in real life! Anyway, I’m kind of digging the watercolor look… I might do more like this in the future, test the waters, give it some trial runs to see what I can do with it. What do you think, dear readers? Do you like the watercolor look? Should I give it more practice and see what I come up with? Shoot me some comments!