Its been snowing constantly all day and last night. I think I’m going to have to shovel. At least it improved the roads a bit… well, if you ignore the white out conditions. Our roads have been ice rinks. Literally. You could strap a pair of skates on and skate your way to where ever you needed to go. Talk about stiff nerves. My hands are a little sore from gripping the steering wheel so tightly.
I’m recharging my digital camera battery (Piece of crap. It won’t hold its charge properly and its brand new), so that I can get the Yukon Quest pictures off it. I took some neat pictures of dogs running and such. More on that later.
Beyond that, my family (well Sister and Mom) think I should be more shook up, frustrated, and angry about having my things stolen. As I told them both, what’s that going to do for me? Getting mad? Upset? Frustrated? Sure, I’m annoyed, but I don’t have anyone nearby or I don’t know the culprit to go beat the living shit out of them.
My mother, I love her alot, but sometimes I wish she would accept I was an adult. She’s flying up to drive down through Canada with me when I graduate. She doesn’t like the idea of a lone female traveling by herself through “foreign” country. I’ll be honest, I am looking forward to seeing her. It’s been four years and she is alot better or… she’s well or more well than she has been for a very long time.
My mother is bipolar. Bipolor disorder II to be more specific. My grandmother (on my mother’s side) is a Bipolar Disorder I (the extreme of the two orders as I understand it). The reasons for my parents situation when I was younger I actually account to my mother’s sudden break down. Needless to say, she isn’t the mother I grew up with. Yes, she was a bit quirky when I was young. There was this one time when she made me brush my teeth again and again and again times infinity because she swore I had bad breath.
We had just moved to Alaska and had moved into a new house when my father went TDY to Korea for four months. He shouldn’t have gone. That’s when everything literally fell apart. My mother started acting really strange, trying to recapture her lost 20s I think. On a regular basis, she was going out with new friends to bars leaving my sister and I alone. Sometimes she wouldn’t even come home until 7 - 8 in the morning. My mother hardly ever drank when I was growing up. Sometimes her and my father would throw small parties. But alcohol in the house was unusual.
Something else happened that I can only piece quietly together in my mind with what little facts I had. As it is, I would never dare to ask either of them what truly had happened. Shortly after my father came back and my mother moved out of the house, she was diagosed with Bipolar after being diagnosed with Maniac Depression for so many years.
It took alot to get use too. To be honest, I found my mother an embarressment. I didn’t like being seen in public with her. Her medication caused her to gain weight and she just acted irrational when it came to being around people. It bothered me, but at the time I didn’t understand the reasons or why these things had happened. As things progressed, my mother fell into a rut. It was like she lost the will to live.
My mother became more like the daughter and I became the mother.
In many ways, despite my excitement, I’m afraid of her coming up here. I’m afraid of treating her like she is a burden rather than a helpful person to me. I’m afraid that she’ll find the adult I’ve grown into is not what she would of thought I’d become.
I have to apologize. When I started writing this entry, I was just doing one of those general what’s going on in my life. This is a topic I’ve been wanting to put into words on the screen rather than composed in my head for such a long time. My fears, as it is, are probably pointless and silly.
But then…
I am my mother’s daughter afterall.
