Take a journal to therapy

     I love therapy.  I feel as though it should be a law that all people attend a certain amount of sessions per year. Annually.  Everyone has something that messes them up...big or small.  We take vitamins, exercise, diet, etc but we leave the most complex part of our body, the brain a tad bit neglected. 
     I was able to talk to my Mom about some stuff but unfortunately a great deal of it turned into "it's all my fault isn't it?" and that was not usually even the case.  My Dad doesn't understand anything at all upsetting people so it only goes so deep with him.  I've lost my husband and friend of almost 18 years and it was hard enough to get him to stand in one place long enough to hear the whines before, so we know it ain't happening now.  My friends are all in tricky places in their lives as well.  It's hard to process the changes and losses without some support... so back to my beloved Patty I went after years of being on my own.
    I run through my week.  I figure and fix as I sit there rambling endlessly without judgments being thrown at me.  I look to find the positive, I accept the real for what it is (or at least try) and I set goals for what I need to do next.  I treat it as a To Do list for the spirit.    What I have truly discovered in the past several months is that I need some sort of permission from people to do things.  My Patty signs all of my mental permission slips.  Yes, that is one of things I need to fix, I know.
     This week I started to journal.   I've never been good with them.  I start them and they fizzle.  If I bore myself enough to not want to read it over again in five years why bog someone else down?  But it's different now.  I have so many directions that I need to set the road map for the routes that I will be taking.  I start off on Sarah Street and end up in Tahiti and that's no way to "fix" a brain.  So now when a new feeling hits me or I pin down an old one I run to my green flowered journal and write.  My arm will actually hurt because writing is so infrequent at this point in my life.
     So today at my appointment I will carry my little book with me.  I will read some entries and have a new tactic for deciphering this crazy series of synapses and wires.  Maybe I'll be able to stick to one topic eventually or figure out what makes them all merge so mercilessly.  Sometimes I might just read about the crazy dream I had the night before complete with rotting food on counters, poker games and tidal waves.  In any event the journal is cute and if I bail yet again on the big blank book of pages at least I can rip out the few in the front and give it to my daughter for doodles.  The important thing is that I never stop trying.  I'm a mess, I'm real and I'm proud!!!