so during my freak out I took advantage of the fact that I have the email address of my dermatologist. The one that called another dr to get me to have the "black whatever" removed today.

She is having a sleep over for her son and many of his friends so she was awake. She wrote me back, reassured me, told me to stay off the internet and away from lifetime tv. She did everything but give me a hug. I promised to watch hgtv, food network or reruns of burn notice or 24. Things that blow up in space or home stuff. That will be weekend therapy for me.

the boggy man is gone for the evening. Thank God.

It started out to be a good day. Tickets to Norah Jones went on sale today and by some sort of miracle, I was able to purchase them before they sold out. They are crappy seats but I don't care.

It is Friday and I am feeling better from the second round of antibiotics for my sinus infection.

The groundwork for a very good day.

Until I went to see my doctor. I love my dermatologist. She is the nicest lady. Instead of going to her full blown office, I went to see her at a cosmetic clinic since I was going to pay out of pocket for a small skin tag removal procedure and didn't want to wait an hour for an appointment were they triple booked her. I wanted some devoted time since I had several of these small tags and wanted to be sure we got them all.

As we were finishing up, she was looking at my back and decided to look beneath my bra strap. That is when she said, "how long have you had this?" Had what? what are you talking about? I mean I am a yogi and everything but I had no idea what she was talking about. I can't crank my head around that far to see my back. I had a 3 mm, black as coal something or other on my back. Immediately she began to look around her office. She was adamant about removing this IMMEDIATELY.

Jesus, how often does your doctor desperately search for the tools they need to cut something out of you? Now I was worried.

She couldn't find what she needed but called another doctor and set up an appointment this afternoon for me to go and have it removed.

I went to that dr and they agreed with my doctor and removed it and sent it to pathology. It was about the size of a freckle. They are checking it for melanoma.

And this is where I lost all ability to have any rational thought whatsoever.

I went online and googled it. That is like asking for trouble, no actually running into a freight train. The dumbest, worst thing you can do. I did it.

Astonishing how quickly all rational thought can run away from you. Really, just "poof" no ability to think clearly at all. Now I can't sleep. I am scared and I am alone as my honey is out of town. Just me and the two dogs. And to make it worse, one has gas. Yea, now I am tired, scare and the only thing I can smell from the lingering sinus infection is dog farts.

My thoughts I am sure are irrational. I am not a sun bather. I don't go out in the sun. I am the whitest white girl you have ever seen. What the hell?

I am afraid.

That is it, I am pissed.

I bought a used Harley Sportser last fall. It needed some work so I put about $1,200 into it. Sure enough the dealer that worked on it did a terrible job and I wound up having to put another $1100 into it. Along comes winter, now almost spring and it won't start. Dealership #3 and it will be at least another $700. I have driven it 2 miles. I have only gotten the bike into 2nd gear! I haven't even taken it out on the open road.

One thing that I am struggling to learn from my marriage is how much is too much. I wonder if I stayed in the entire relationship too long. Yes the marriage itself was only 14 months but maybe I should have gotten out at 6. CERTAINLY at least what should have happened is I should have brought up issues sooner and addressed them. Is lying over money the first time too much. Is treating me poorly for two months too much. Is draining my savings too much? When to do let your head decide issues of how you feel. How do you lift the fog and look at things rationally and say, "holy crap, this ISN'T what you want" and work toward change?

The Harley is a lesson for me. I don't sped $3k a year on Bikram yoga and I am at class ALL THE TIME and I LOVE IT. It brings me peace. I think this is a way for me to learn to step back and say "too much".

In a few days, my beautiful, shiny stunning, custom work galore Harley will be home again. A day later, it will be for sale. Too much. No guarantee that it won't drain me more. I don't expect a guarantee in relationships but perhaps this is a lesson to help me learn to draw a line.

This is Esak Garcia doing the full expression of camel. He is a wonderful example of how beautiful the postures can be. When I am sick with sinus infections and away from Bikram yoga for a few days, I spend time looking at photos and videos of people doing the postures. They get me excited to be back in class but also remind me of the peace that I get when I practice yoga.

Somehow I am backsliding a bit on my sinus infection. This means I am bone tired at night and not reading and sleeping like a log and not having strange dreams. In Bikram class I have some trouble fully and deeply breathing so my postures look like they did about three years ago. That is OK, I am healing. I am thrilled to go to class and to feel how great it is to stretch deeply and my muscles are happy. Sore but happy.

Needless to say, my physical body is operating on more of a "I am too tired to think about much" mode and thus I don't have much to report today. More soon but until then, another beautiful advanced posture done by Esak Garcia. I am fascinated at how his hands are in prayer and not holding his foot at all yet he is perfectly balanced. Beautiful. Wonderful.

Namaste

I had a spectacular weekend. After suffering horribly from a sinus infection, I finally got back to Bikram yoga on both Friday and Saturday, it was 60 degrees both weekend days and I spent 5+ hours each day doing yard work, went to two parties with my honey and generally had a wonderful time.

I am so sore that even my little toes hurt. By the time Sunday evening rolled around I was looking forward to a wonderful night of peace and great sleep.

I did get a good night's rest until it was almost time for the alarm to go off when I suddenly woke up with another odd dream. I was getting married to my ex and I called it off seconds before I walked down the aisle. Then somehow weeks/months later the wedding was back on, and sure enough I did it AGAIN. So I dreamt that I was the runaway bride to my ex husband TWICE.

?

Maybe I was thinking that I should have run? No one was hurt emotionally in the dream so maybe it was just a big fashion show? Maybe I just was looking forward to cake? WHO KNOWS???

But here is where it is interesting. I had no negative emotions. I woke up still in a good mood, no anger, no fear, no animosity, etc.. I feel great. Is this a breakthrough? Maybe this dream was about me finally letting go of the situation. It was like just seeing a picture and not having any emotional attachment to it. As if I was watching spiderman scaling a building and just saying "ok, its spidey, no biggie".

Healing? It feels like a breakthrough. Like a weight has been lifted. I don't have any tension at all, again the situation was loaded in my dream but there was no focus on anyone (including my ex) experiencing any emotions at all. There were no tears, no pressure, no sadness. It was as commonplace as brushing your teeth.

I don't know if I fully understand it but it feels good! Like a release. If nothing else at least I am getting a good workout in life from the bikram and in my dreams I am a heck of a good runner!!

I feel really bad about blogging. It is uncomfortable for me. I am getting great value from it. I see that I was living in a different universe than I am now and can understand that I can let some of it just stay in the past.

What is bothering me now is that I have represented my ex to have no redeeming qualities and to be quite a self centered asshole. I think I need to explore this.

There were great qualities about my ex. He was a lot of fun to be around. He was always laughing, easy going, an extraordinary cook, had a fantastic sense of adventure, was very focused on doing well at his job, loved his family, loved my dogs, was a great balance of silly and dorky in a charming way, and was very generous to others. He worked in the travel industry and I was looking forward to a lifetime of travel adventures. He was very easy to travel with. He was brilliant with a map (I am the entire reason for the personal gps I am so bad) and could navigate his way through any city in the world to find is most precious jewels.

For several years that we dated I enjoyed these qualities about him.

When we got engaged, some of these qualities began to evaporate. I believe this was directly related to the beginnings of the gambling addiction. There was an eminent change in both his career as he took a pay cut for a new job and the change from living in his condo to our house. This does not mean that we didn't still have a good time, but it was different. My engagement period was no party. I had a lot of heavy lifting to do. He gave me the signals I needed then to get out but I didn't pay attention.

Sometimes the truth is just ugly. I honestly do not remember one moment of my marriage that I enjoyed or that demonstrated any of his good qualities. I have spoken with many people that are divorced and they can all recall times in their marriage where they had fun, did things together, etc. The gentleman that I am dating has two fantastic children from his marriage and can recall many positive experiences with his ex wife. I can't offer anything of substance, whatsoever. I am not saying this because I think my ex was some asshole, I am saying this because to the day we divorced, he denied having a gambling addiction.

Addiction is something that will consume every ounce of light in an abundantly bright personality. When I had plenty of physical evidence of his full blown addiction, I called my ex's sister to ask for help as you need the entire family to help an addict. She could hardly believe the things I was saying. I remember listening to her sniffles and sobs over the phone during the conversation. His father adamantly rejected the notion that anything was wrong with is precious son. Long term, I know this will always hurt my X. My X will always be an addict, and unless he seeks help and does the hard work to keep his addictive tendencies in check, it will consume him.

Sometimes the truth is just ugly. Lets go through the signs of a gambling addict:
"Persistent and recurrent maladaptive gambling behavior as indicated by five (or more) of the following:

Preoccupation: The person is preoccupied with gambling and has frequent thoughts about gambling experiences, handicapping or planning the next venture, or thinking of ways to get money with which to gamble, etc.

Tolerance: Similar to drug tolerance, the person needs to gamble with increasing amounts of money in order to achieve the desired excitement or "rush"

Loss of Control: The person has made repeated unsuccessful efforts to control, cut back, or stop gambling

Withdrawal: The person is restless or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop gambling

Escape: The person gambles as a way of escaping from problems or of relieving a dysphoric mood (e.g., feelings of helplessness, guilt, anxiety, depression)

Chasing: After losing money gambling, the person often returns another day to get even ("chasing" one's losses)

Lying: Lies to family members, therapist, or others to conceal the extent of involvement with gambling

Illegal Activity: The person has committed illegal acts such as forgery, fraud, theft, or embezzlement to finance gambling

Risked Relationships: The person has jeopardized or lost a significant relationship, job, or educational or career opportunity because of gambling

Bailout: Relies on others, such as friends or family, to provide money to relieve a desperate financial situation caused by gambling"

The only symptom that I can not vouch for in my ex was Illegal Activity.

The ugly truth is that I wasn't married to the man I dated for years. He had no ability to let the best of his personality shine due to the full consumption of addiction. This doesn't mean he didn't have all the positive qualities that I mention and many more. The ugly truth is also that I don't think our marriage would have survived even if he had gotten help for the addiction. I am responsible for my choices just as he is responsible for his and I choose poorly. He may have as well. The point of my blog is for me to explore issues that cause me to hold misperceptions of dating, marriage and relationships and many of these were driven by my brief marriage. In order to do this, it means that I have to spend most time focusing on the ugly.

Baggage and Money.

Great topic for today.

Thanks for the continued questions and insights!!! It helps me to go back, reflect and learn. I appreciate it greatly!

If you were to ask my honey, he would be able to address some of the items he has noticed in our 2+ years of dating now that are baggage from my marriage. One of the top ones that I am sure he would mention is my treatment of money in our relationship.

I requested that my ex husband sign a prenuptial agreement before we got married. I am a part of a small family owned business and that is standard. We never spoke of our finances before we were engaged however, after the engagement and as a part of the prenup, finances became an issue. X did not have poor credit, nor did I. My good credit is not only important for my well being but also because I sign for our small business loan and as a part of that, our business bank pulls my credit score.

I knew that my x was carrying some credit card debt not a big amount. This was AT THE TIME OF THE ENGAGEMENT.

X did not have any savings or any savings for retirement. This didn't thrill me but he indicated that he wanted to save so we could manage the budget such that both of us were maximizing our retirement savings.

This was my financial health perception when we FIRST GOT ENGAGED. It is amazing how fast this changed.

X is a pilot for a major airlines. X wanted to change to another airline for job security reasons. I was absolutely supportive of this. This is his career and was critically important. This meant that he would take a 35% pay cut. That was OK until we factored in other items. X owned a condo and put it on the market. When I did the math, prior to the pay cut, he was well about the 30% of income for housing as he also got an assessment for $7,000 on his condo complex for construction cost. The fees, etc for his condo were over $800/month alone! So after all of his expenses, his paycheck was gone. Factor into this equation a pay cut and he was operating in the red. So we put the condo on the market, I came up with a budget and I could afford to float the difference.

So I thought.

X never cut his lifestyle expenses. In fact after we got married I discovered he was behind on his mortgage payment. !?!?!?! I paid down his credit cards and he ran them back up. Some of this was for gas, food, etc but most of it was to do cash advances for gambling in Vegas. X wanted to take additional routes to make extra pay to "cover" some of this deficit. He did take many routes. BUT I never saw the paychecks so he was pocketing the money and I was still paying all the deficit. He claimed this wasn't true. Funny how the facts and his story seem to have a HUGE gap. During the time of the divorce we had to file our taxes. He flew enough extra routes that he MADE THE SAME PAY AS HE HAD THE PRIOR YEAR! Thus he could have afforded all of his expenses and actually contributed to the household budget.

Here is a question that I can not answer. Did the pressure to make more money add to his gambling addiction or perhaps it was the flash point that turned a hobby into a full blown addiction? I understand that addicts of any kind display the addictive tendencies in many ways. When X wasn't gambling, he spent countless hours online playing blackjack games thus that time he wasn't actually gambling he was addicted to playing games. I would joke and call him a hobbit because he ate no less than six large meals a day. I mean LARGE meals. Perhaps he was just unhappy. Perhaps he was unhappy with his choice to marry me. I know that I was unhappy. Whatever the catalyst, he became a full blown gambling addict while we were married even if he wasn't before we were married.

If that wasn't enough there was great resentment in our relationship about money. I made more, I managed it and he resented it. Every month he could afford less of his expenses and it was my job to make up the difference. I knew that if I didn't do everything I could and his credit score slipped, it could cost me my ability to borrow money in my business. This didn't seem to phase him. All he knew was that he wanted more money. He was irate all the time, he was hard to be around and I was absolutely miserable. He drained me of every dime of our wedding money, then most of my savings until finally, I gave him a lump sum and told him that he had to make that last for six months. It was gone within two weeks. I knew this by the fact that at this time, I had gone online and accessed and began to watch his bank account.

Realize this, I prenuped my house and my retirement. He had no ability to access the equity I had worked for ten years for on my home and he had no ability to touch my retirement. He never took out credit in my name. He never took out a marker at a casino. These were all things that I knew were coming and weighed on my decision to get out fast. OH and another sign that I should NOT have married him, he refused to sign the prenup for a long time because he didn't have any money in retirement and I did and he thought he should be entitled to my retirement money PRIOR to the marriage??? Lets just say that the lawyer I hired to represent him was very frustrated by the fact that he didn't understand that a prenup was there to protect your assets prior to your marriage.

I never wanted any money from X. I wanted him to contribute to the marriage. I wanted him to help me keep the house clean (holy crap was he a slob from the depths of hell), I wanted him to appreciate all that I did to work hard and keep everything afloat. I wanted to be respected for the fact that I was up at 5 am and in bed at 11 pm and was either at work, working out, or working on cleaning the house. I never minded carrying the financial load. I was doing it to more his career along and to establish a home for us. I never minded until I realized that I wasn't carrying the financial load, I was pouring my money, my work, my time, my emotions and my effort into a black hole.

It took me awhile into my current relationship to relax about money. I had been taken advantage of so I would never put someone in the position of feeling like this because of me. I was freakish with our dating and our travels such that he never spent a dime more than I did for our activities. I always go overboard with gifts to my honey. He wouldn't care if I spent $1 on an item and wrapped it in newspaper. He is just happy that I have thought of him. It has been a learning process. I am getting better. I trust in my honey and that makes a huge difference to letting go of this big ugly bag.

OK it is fair and time to address the issue that I have been questioned on and that is the status of my relationship before I was married.

I dated X for almost three years before we were married. We never lived together and I visited Vegas with him four times before we were married. A few clarifications:
1. I never saw any signs of gambling addiction. He pushed back from the tables when he was losing or out of money and didn't try to get any more to gamble with.
2. I thought we got along and were friends. We talked and laughed and had a great time together. We spent a few years together dating and I thought that was adequate time.
3. We spent a lot of time with both of our families and everyone got along well.
4. We did break up about a year into our relationship and I didn't want to see him again until six months later when we got back together. The reasons that we broke up had changed completely and he demonstrated legitimate change.
5. We only went through one "trial" to the relationship where he needed me, no instances where I was under great duress and needed him.
6. We traveled together a lot and had a great time.
7. We talked about many things. We enjoyed very different things but respected the other persons interests.
8. I thought we both valued the same things. We spoke about what we valued and wanted in life.
9. We never shared financial information prior to being engaged. We shared many expenses when we traveled and were generous with each other but not in a way that would hurt either person financially. Our relationship was not about money and we kept that out of the equation as much as we could. We would seek good deals, sales, ate at home a lot, etc..

I am not saying that there were not signs before we were married. I clearly did not explore these signs. For the period of our engagement when I had to clean out and remodel my house to accommodate us instead of me, he refused to participate. Any time I needed help or support he was completely MIA. There was always some excuse and finally it came down to "it is your house, you do whatever you want". ? Yes this was THE red flag. When I needed him to help with things that he wanted he expected me to do all the work and to pay for everything. Exactly the format of our brief marriage. WHY didn't I pay attention??? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY?????

There was one other big red flag. I am hypothyroid. I don't mean a little. I am one of those rare cases where I will have problems with this constantly whereas most people can take a synthetic hormone replacement and they are fine. He knew this and I wanted him to understand what I experiences (aside from the extreme fatigue) when things were off and to understand that I would be fine again just it takes a few weeks. So I got him a small booklet that described all the symptoms, etc. I thought he would want to understand. He said "I am not reading that, I don't believe you have a problem any way". ? Huh, like he didn't see me take my meds every morning? This isn't a life threatening condition however it can affect the quality of your life at times. I assumed he cared about my wellbeing.

WHY DIDN'T I STOP AND SAY "hmmmmmmmm"? 99% of the time we were smiling and having a great time. It was fun. I took fun and what I thought was a friendship for something real.

We went to marriage counseling 1x. It was after I had served him with divorce papers. The consoler and I spoke again after that. He told me that in his experience gambling addicts were the most deceptive of all the addicts he works with in couples. One minute they can be your best friend but when they are denied what they need to continue the addiction, they are your worst enemy. This never made me feel better. I had the signs that I should have seen. It simply further justified my decision making to leave as I had built nothing and would never build anything.

I thought we were friends. I made assumptions about our friendship that were incorrect. I had two major signs during our engagement and should have stopped at that point and realized these were previews of what was to come and called the whole thing off.

Wow, can you believe it? Still ill. Got absolutely slammed with a sinus infection that laid me out completely.

Thus, no Bikram yet and now it is SNOWING again in Atlanta. While I was stuck at home it was sunny and in the mid 50's, the first day I am back at work, snow, sleet and just cold and miserable.

As I am shedding the baggage from my marriage to the gambling addict I also physically do shedding. In December, I ordered a custom couch. On Thursday it was delivered. The couch was the last item that I was still in possession of that belonged to my ex. Since I moved almost two years ago, I have been methodically renovating my 1930's bungalow. It is a delightful and charming home but hasn't really been touched since say 1990 so it needs a lot of love. However the neighborhood I selected has a VERY pricey cost to buy into so I purchased one of the best opportunities I could find. So a new couch hasn't been high on the priority list. But it finally happened, my new couch arrived and the last stitch of his things are gone.

It feels really good. The new couch isn't soft or frumpy as the old one was. It is more crisp and stylish. It is perfectly comfortable to sit on but it isn't a couch that says "get sucked into the oblivion of tv and let your a** grow large on me". It says, welcome to my home, enjoy a good book, have a glass of wine with friends and socialize and be happy. I love it.

Part of the book Committed that I have completed discusses infatuation. That obesession that assists you in making horribly poor choices. I was infatuated but not with my ex husband, with the idea of marriage and travel and companionship. Truth be told, I didn't love my ex husband. I was infatuated with an idea, a notion of what I wanted and it drove a series of poor decision making. I am embarrassed by my decision making. I was in my mid thirties and should have known better. How do you get over the humiliation of your decisions? I justified my feelings because I loved his family. I loved his parents and his sister. I didn't love his brother but I respected his feelings for his brother and encouraged him to help him as needed. I loved the security that I thought I was choosing. I loved everything except my ex husband. We were not even friends. So when we hit the wall moments after our marriage, there was absolutely nothing to build on.

I love my new couch. It fits me perfectly. It is surprising that it took three years to let the old one go.

Crap. I actually feel worse today than I did yesterday. I now have the aches. I was supposed to start my 30 day Bikram challenge today and I just don't see it happening. Very sad about this.

Let me get back briefly to Elizabeth Gilbert's book Committed.

While I was traveling I read just a little bit more. I didn't want to really get too deep into my feelings while traveling with my honey.

I was struck by her perspective of love. As if it is something that happens TO you. As if a butterfly landed on your nose. It just happened. Now I am not saying that circumstances aren't correct for things to happen but what she had neglected (and I haven't finished so I may reverse this later) is that you have to choose to participate. That doesn't mean you do or do not have feelings but you have to choose to act on them.

On my wedding day I remember sitting in the chair getting my hair styled and the stylist saying to me "are you sure you are about to get married? Most brides are so keyed up and tense!?!" I was comatose. I was self preserving. I knew exactly what I was doing, rising to a level or emotional mediocrity. I had settled in the worst way possible but I CHOOSE to do it. It took a big kick in the teeth for me to get out but at that time no one forced me to get married. I was in my mid 30s!

My best friend found me as I was having someone do my make up. Normally are incredibly chatty. Not that day. I didn't have anything to say that day and I knew she understood perfectly. All she had to say to me was "well at least you will travel, that is what you have always wanted".

She was focused on my consolation prize before I had even participated in my vows as she knew that I was choosing poorly.

Elizabeth Gilbert's beautiful recap of the young monk and a love letter was compelling reading but I think part of the emphasis should have included the fact that the monk choose to read and choose to reflect on the letter. You have to choose love.