Forgiven

By my daughter, at least.  Yesterday she came home from school and crawled right into my lap, where she spent the remainder of the next 6 hours (when I wasn't at the pool with my son...more on that later).
I just want to clear something up; I don't say "shut up" to my kids.  I will lock myself in the bathroom and say it quietly, but mostly I say it inside my head.
Just wanted to clarify.
(There was an incident, when they were REALLY small and Hubby was out of town, when one started to cry, which set the other one off, which set the dog howling, which set ME off; I started to SOB. I was exhausted and overwhelmed.  Both kids stopped crying, the dog stopped howling, and all 3 of them looked at me as if to say "What's YOUR problem?!?!  Why the heck are YOU crying, weirdo?!?!)
This morning we turned on "Baby Einstein" as soon as WG woke up, and I think that helped keep her calm.  She even ate breakfast!
Learning curves.
So, anyway, yesterday afternoon I promised LG I would take him swimming, but that we'd have to go after dinner, because I had my tele-class at 6:00.  OK, I didn't say ALL of that, I told him we'd go after dinner.  At which point he proceeded to go into the cupboard to try and wrangle up something to eat.  Hubby put a stop to THAT.  Then LG saw I had a glass of iced tea, which I guess he thought was part of my dinner, because he kept trying to force it down my gullet.  When THAT didn't work, he went upstairs and put on his swim trunks, came back down and wrote "Let's go swimming!" on his doodle pad, and spent the next couple of hours alternating between trying to get us out the front door and exclaiming "Let's go swimming" about, oh, every 4.2 seconds.
Eventually I took him to the pool, and he had a great time.

And, yes, last night was the second part of the online retreat with Geneen Roth.  She talked about The Voice.  I think we're ALL familiar with The Voice.  We discussed how it is a necessary developmental milestone in our lives, that we all have it by age 4, and that it is part of our survival mechanism.  We internalize external cues; don't touch the hot stove, don't run into the street, pay attention in school, play nice, etc.  What The Voice does is try to protect us.  As we get older, The Voice wants to keep the status quo going, because that is what is familiar and safe.  Any type of change is, of course, a threat to the status quo, so The Voice tries to prevent it.  (BTW, she calls it The Voice, but it's also known as the Super Ego [Freud] as well as many other names.)  Part of the process is learning to recognize The Voice, and then to quiet it.  The main problem, for most of us, is that The Voice has become quite mean and critical.  Most of the time we don't even consciously hear it, it has become so ingrained in us.
Boy howdy, am I familiar with this!!!!!
A couple of other things that have stuck with me since last night:
If this is going to work, I have to want to get my life back.  My SELF back.  Even more than I want to lose weight, I have to want this.
The concept of living AS IF: as if I am worthy of my own time, attention, respect, and love.
Pretty tall order.  But definitely something to work on.