A 'State of the Union' Re: The Boyfriend Moving In

This is the state of the union in regards to what we thought about James’ (The Boyfriend) visit, about him leaving, and now what we think about him coming back to live with us…tomorrow. TOMORROW. As of tomorrow we lose our alone time…:-/

It’s been a stressful week, for everyone involved, we’ve been having issues, some of us and James, and he’s been hoping for awhile that we would finish writing this, and post it, to ease his concerns about how we all feel, because he is feeling less than positive/apprehensive about how we feel. It also helps us to sort it out. Much like our  

'State of the Union' Re: The Visit of Our Twittercrush James back in July right before he came to meet us in person for the first time.

This has been entirely difficult to complete, mainly because it takes team work in its entirety to write, and the added stress of our life lately has made it difficult to focus and work as a team. So much this last week, from saying goodbye to Special Someone, and unexpectedly to Fuck Face…to putting in our three week notice at work so we can prepare to move, because we have to. But James will be here soon, and maybe we won’t be as stressed…maybe.

We are putting everybody in alphabetical order for the ‘state of the union’, as to not indicate anyone has more or less feelings, one way or another, regarding James.

Bethany – It was confusing for us to decipher how Bethany feels, about James, at first. Bethany really doesn’t talk much, or rather she goes through “quiet but there” periods.  James and she spent some time together on and off, a short period at the museum when she was unintentionally triggered* at the hands-on science museum in our city, (James wrote about that day) an evening watching ‘X-Men: First Class’, a then another night where James read her a story, though it could have been the same night as the movie (Sorry, I don`t have all the details, but we do know a switch happened in the middle of the night that night, during a bad dream/flashback she had)

There has been some uncomfortable conversation with Bethany about James, and this will sound strange…and it’s rather embarrassing for us – and straight off we will tell you this is not a perversion, or sexual in the very least. At some point she started referring to him as “dad”…now we know what some might be thinking, but like we said, this is not a perversion, or a sexual thing. (When he is unfortunate enough to have to share the bed with her he wears shorts, and she wears her favourite nightgown that is white, knee length and has little pink flowers on it).

We’ve explained to her that James is not her dad…that she knows who dad (daddy, a.k.a. The Father) is…our father. It made our stomach churn until we realized that it all comes down to love feelings.

Bethany is 6 years old. The only equation to love she knows, has ever really known, in male form, is the love she feels for our father. Once we figured this out we relaxed a bit…but not completely.

It seriously makes my head hurt thinking of her calling him that accidentally…for now we’ll just let her call him “teddy bear”, or pick a different nickname, because for some reason she also thinks he is that, her teddy bear.

Bethany is happy and excited for James to come home.

Brooke – Honestly, she’ll be angry about it, but we don’t give a fuck one way or another about what she thinks, or how she feels. The only way it matters is when she’s persuading us to be angry, or mean, to James…and then we have to apologize, and then she wins - except for the apology part, and it only matters insofar as she feels like she wins.

We know from messages she’s left both to, and entries regarding James, on this blog and on Tumblr, that she hates him; probably as much or more than she hates us, for whatever reasons she does (she thinks us stupid, and worthless, and untalented, amoung other things). We won’t get too much into things about her, or her personality – we don’t know much about her yet (though we have been mapping her on our therapy mapping project) other than she is mean, and she tortures us…and we have to learn more about why she is part of us, and what her purpose is.

She never directly spent time with James, until briefly, recently, on video chats, but she’s been in co-consciousness many times. James has written about her in his blog; I am not sure if she has been mentioned in our entries much, though she has written one or two recently.

Catherine – Catherine had a really good time with James, she loves him very much, but she is also fairly young. She spent more time, in the last week or so of his visit, with James then he had anticipated. Towards the end it was a fight for who got to spend time with him. She’s excited for our boyfriend to be living with us, especially since he knows about her (and can tell when she is here more and more each time they talk, and this makes her pretty happy).

All that matters is James knows Catherine loves him, and she feels safe going out into public with him when she has “an episode” (she has paranoia & social anxiety issues).

She is happy, James…to have you coming home tomorrow.

Cassandra – Cassandra and James had a rough start, James wrote about spending time with Cassandra, as he did write about a few of us, however I think he wrote more than one entry about her.

While not a fan at first, because of her love for Someone Special, Cassandra now is okay with the fact James will be our boyfriend, and thinks James is going to be a neat friend to hang out with and watch movies with, plus he likes to eat, just like her. Thankfully James knows about her penchant for eating and hopefully will be a good influence on her, or they are liable to dine on pizza, pudding (more than she is supposed to), donuts and other assorted things that she is technically not allowed.

She doesn’t love James…and he knows that and is okay with it. They can be good friends and maybe someday that will change.

The only concern I have is that her depressive moods and his depressive moods will feed off of each other and send us all into a downward spiral. James is aware of this concern, however, because we have really good communication with him, and we hope we can all be strong for each other.

Emmie – What can we say, Emmie? She doesn’t fall in love easy, and she is still has residual “feelings”/thoughts for Fuck Face, so …we’ll wait and see about the “L” word.

She says she is pretty happy with the conversations she’s had with James about sex, and the things he is willing to do, and let her do (read: everything and anything her dirty little heart desires). She’s exceedingly happy with…the equipment…that is being provided to her.

It is interesting though, the last day she spent some time with James and he wanted to know what other things she liked, besides sex, because he wants to spend additional time with her, apparently. She didn’t have too many answers for him that weren’t in the realm of sex, but after he left she put some thought into is, and realized no man has ever wanted to know more about her, or know the things she likes to do that aren’t in relation to being naked. She’s curious to find out if James likes some of the things that interest her, outside of the bedroom.

As a note, for Bethany’s sake, and further clarrification: The one “sick” games Emmie doesn’t play, is the daddy-child role-playing, our stomach collectively churns at the thought of it, though everything else is open for experimentation with Emmie.

Frank – What can I say? James is my love. I had a wonderful time with him while he was here, despite everyone else fighting for a chance to spend time with him (meaning become Executive*, or be “out”, which means massive headaches for me, and for some of the others) but, just as he doesn’t ever seem to have the right words to say in e-mail, when it comes time to say something to me, (he writes us letters, and addresses us separately, on occasion) it’s hard for me to put into words my feelings for him.

He is so supportive of us all, and honestly I never thought we’d find someone we could all be ourselves with, all of us (Bethany being the biggest concern, always). He is patient (but not always and that’s good because I don’t want him to be a doormat), he is not afraid to address us each in the way he feels we should each be addressed; he is handsome, intelligent, sensitive, stabby, witty, honest. He knows that I love him, and would do anything for him, as he would us.

My concerns fall into the areas about his ability to withstand…everything/everyone that is us, but it’s nice to know we can have a relationship with someone and not be afraid about being entirely honest, and though sometimes he hurts because of our frank honesty, we know he would have it no other way, because he has told us so.

I would be stupid not to be honest about still having some sort of feelings for Fuck Face, but he was a very important person, and without him what we had to do this past year, to become separate, but whole, would likely not have transpired as quickly as it did. He will always hold a special place in my heart, in our hearts…we know James can understand this.

I love you, James…with my whole stabby insane heart. I can’t wait to see you tomorrow.

Ivy – Ivy didn’t get to spend a massive amount of time one-on-one with James…a bit in the art museum, a bit here and there, but she was present enough to fall in love with him. Of course, she is our lover of many things, and happy and giggly and a smart ass (James like to call her a “sarcastic moo”). She is very excited for James to come back, even though she appears to disappears for some lengths at times (we hope this changes), lately, however, she’s been more here. She likes to poke fun at James. She never had a chance to be intimate with James while he was here, so she’s pretty excited for that day to come. (no pun intended).

Melody – Melody spent some time with James, not a lot, but she enjoyed it as much as she could. She likes that he knows to let her be and work on the computer, write or do whatever. She likes to be alone a lot. She is a little fearful of having someone around 27/7 again, but luckily for her, and the rest of us…for most of us it’s never 24/7…

She doesn’t love James, and James knows why (to not love is part of her function in our system*)…and that’s all that matters.

Sam – didn’t spend ANY time with James one on one…but is very excited at the prospect of having a guy to hang out with, and play video games with (word is the boys are going to buy a game counsel, probably a Wii…and will probably be looking for people to race Mario Kart with online…if you know some people); most of us are terrible TERRIBLE, at video games, and find them a waste of time. Sam is also excited to have a guy to check out girls with (though he and Emmie enjoy doing that together, as well as some of the rest of us who like girls…which we all do not) we’re sure it’ll be different with an “outside” person, the checking out “the ladies”, he used to have fun doing it with Fuck Face.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

That’s us, the 9 we can account for. We’ll be working on mapping through the winter (that’s a form of therapy for DID)…we hope there are no more than 9, but sometimes none of us know who we are…and that scares us…so we’re going to look into that, once we get some peace and quiet…and now that we have someone who can support us, emotionally, when we freak out a bit, like we did when we first started the therapy process  back in (roughly) March of this year (2011).

DID mapping is not something generally done quickly, is something usually assisted by a therapist (there are none in our current city who “treat” DID patience), and is discovering, and refining personalities is an evolving process…you can read more about it on our mapping therapy blog: (http://wearejcmf.blogspot.com/

One thing we want James to know, collectively, is that we can take care of ourselves, we have for 32 years. Some of us want to say that we don’t need you. We don’t in fact need you, or anyone, except us…but we want you.

I hope, James, that this somehow eases your mind. You know you are important to us, we would not be giving up so much for you, if you were not.

~Frank (et al)

_______________________

*Some helpful terminology imported from our public blog where we do our mapping therapy (http://wearejcmf.blogspot.com/) which is currently not being worked on due to massive life stress.

DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER A.K.A MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER: TERMINOLOGY

Personality Specifics:

Alter: alter states, selves, parts (a subjective term); distinct personalities; fragments alternate personality, personality state, ego state or identity with its own unique perspectives, abilities, memories or other traits that differ from the Host or Executive personality.

The Core: The original birth personality.

Host: is the alter personality who dominates the control of the body most of the time and is often unaware of the other personalities. The host is usually the alter personality who will initiate after experiencing symptoms of mental distress, such as, anxiety, triggers or recovered memories.

Executive: When a personality (alter ego) has control of the body.

Switch: To switch from one personality to another. The process of an alter coming out from the subconscious mind into the consciousness mind while the other alter (who was already in the consciousness mind) slips back into the subconscious mind.

Who's out? A common question used to determine which personality is executive or host.

Co-conscious(ness): (The Core) A state of being aware of what the other personalities are doing and saying.

Other Terms:

Acquired: Anything that is not present at birth but develops some time later. In medicine, the word "acquired" implies "new" or "added." An acquired condition is "new" in the sense that it is not genetic (inherited) and "added" in the sense that was not present at birth.

Triggers: Hysterical conversion symptoms or body memories. Physical phenomenon such as pain, smells, tastes, etc.; re-experienced again.

Dissociation: In psychology and psychiatry, a perceived detachment of the mind from the emotional state or even from the body. Dissociation is characterized by a sense of the world as a dreamlike or unreal place and may be accompanied by poor memory of the specific events, which in severe form is known as dissociative amnesia.

Re-live: A total memory recall (includes visual, emotional, physical and all other senses).

Losing time: Also known as a Dissociative Fugue, is the period of which an alter personality is in the subconscious mind and has no recollection of the time that is being utilized by the alter personality who is occupying the conscious mind. Therefore when the alter switches into the conscious mind they realize that minutes, hours, days, or even months and years have passed since they were last aware of time.

System: is the structure of relationships between the alter personalities who live within the internal world of a survivor with D.I.D.! Every system is created and operates in it's own unique way, just like every family living in their own homes run their households different from the next door neighbour.

Inner (Self) Helper: is usually the alter personality who has a good understanding of the system and how it works. The I.S.H. is also among the typical group of helpers or protector personalities.

Grounding: is the process of disrupting a dissociative episode and is accomplished by tugging on an earlobe, rubbing the hands together, or shuffling the feet back and forth. This type of physical stimuli can bring the survivors mind back to awareness of their surroundings, and helps to make them feel less animated.

(these terms are pulled from a wide array of sources throughout the internet and are ones we choose to use in writing, on occasion, to talk about the things that happen in our lives)

Our Final Goodbye To Fuck Face... Unexpectedly.

We said goodbye, unexpectedly, to Fuck Face tonight…

We had plans to write about our day at work, which was unusually stressful (more to come about that tomorrow), but it looks like we are going to save it due to some unforeseen...something.

In an unusual turn of events…well…what can we say.

First, we had drinks with Fuck Face tonight, turns out it was our last drinks with him. We didn’t expect that. (Don't know who he is? The many stories of him are over there on the left hand side...if you care to know)

Over a glass of wine (several, at this point, for us, of course) and a Guinness (several, for him) he began telling us about his plans for the weekend, yard work, and such...things to do regarding his wife’s horses..and the infamous barn.

“You know, despite the fact all that we are going to do is dance at the grocery later, paint, write, drink wine, and spend the weekend on Twitter…we still live a more interesting life than you. When you’re on your deathbed ,working won’t be what you are thinking about” we snidely we say, we’ve had a couple wines at this point, “Hopefully you’ll be thinking about us”, mostly joking of course.

We were his first, and probably only, affair. We know that to be true, we also know, from previous conversation, it’s us, not just the fact that we were an attractive  female, that had led him astray. Once he had said, last week “There will never be another [The Other Girl].”, when we were discussing things about him seeking some education outside the city, away from his wife, for a couple of months…chiding him about infidelity. So we give him a hard time, about thinking about us on his death bed.

A shadow passes over his face. He is silent. He leans back in his chair. We can tell he has had a bit more to drink than he should. We’ve never seen him this candid looking. He reaches for our hand with a serious look on his face.

He pulls his hand back.

“I’m not going to spill the beans” he says, and starts to divert the conversation.

“The Beans” being something he referenced the first and second drinking “dates” ago (last week)…regarding our getting fired. We had tried to get him to tell us then, but to no avail.

“Take another drink of your beer” we say, nodding our head towards his beer. We know that with another drink he might tell us what he’s been referencing for the last couple drinking sessions. We want to know, we have no idea what his secret is.

He begins talking again, about something random…we don’t know what, and then all of a sudden he stops, leans in, looking seriously and blurts “I love you”. This look on his face, we’ve never seen it before. We know he’s telling the truth.

We…stare at him…our eyes well up…there are many things going on in our head. With tears spilling onto our cheeks we give him "the finger". 

“Fuck you, I hate you, you suck”, we say.

He spilled the beans. We are angry, confused, and sad...those are not the beans most of us are expecting.

“Fuck you and your timing” we say. 

More tears.

The next 20 minutes are him admitting how he’s felt about us from the very begging, even before our affair, and that the week we got fired how he felt, us not being there, going to our office for something and…just…being sad we were no longer there, (because we had gotten fired) which makes us understand how happy he was when he got fired.

Him saying how his marriage has improved since telling his wife about the affair, but he says he still wakes up in the morning and watches out tweets while we ride the bus to work. He reads our blog, he reads James blog. While he plays video games…our Twitter feed is there. He thinks about us always. Thinks about us and tries to erase the feelings, kill us, metaphorically, while he digs fence posts for his wife’s horses.

He loves us. Just as we always thought. Thank god we were not off base. But he agrees, as do we…there are four people involved now. He says he wouldn’t try anything, he doesn’t want to do that to his wife again.

He read our blog entry from last night, and he had hoped tonight’s drinks would be us “breaking up with him”…our final drinks,  as last night was our “goodbye” to Special Someone, now that James is coming into town to live with us.

We sit and talk…he says he wanted to come tonight and ask us to run off to Cuba, only half jokingly. We are stunned, laughing, and then crying, confused, but relieved that we had been right.

He tells us how James is good for us, and that he doesn’t want to hurt James (they actually met once). 

He tells us “In another life…” then he pauses…and talks about how it never would have really worked because of one of us (Bethany) and that he only wanted to deal with us as one, as Frank. We tell him that he’s dealt with all of us. He says he realizes that, and has noticed the differences in each of us, but still…

We cry, and cry…covering our mouth, alternating between laughing because he is trying to make us laugh, and crying because he tells us we are gorgeous, and amazing, and funny, and interesting…and that had he been single, almost the first day we had started working where he worked, he would have asked us out that day.

“Wow. I really hate our life”…just one of the things that come from our mouth, because sometimes the irony is far too painful, as we listen to him talk about the first time he laid eyes on us and called us “Wonder Woman” to our face…and how he says he had loved us from the beginning, and how the last week or so, after we got fired…was the worst days of employment he has ever had; how he hoped each time he had asked us for drinks since we had gotten fired he wished we had said no…and other things too much to write about, involving throwing rocks at our window…and…

We know he is telling the truth. Several of the men on Twitter, our followers, married ones who had had affairs before, who were reading the story as it unfolded, back in the day, told us “He loves you, he is confused”. 

They were right. Men know men, we guess; and clearly we do not. (but we do, they just have to be honest...and then we know we are right.)

We stood in the parking lot this evening, outside of our apartment, in front of his new motorcycle…he wouldn’t let us hug him goodbye…but we did anyway. 

We're talking, and crying a bit, and he is staring at us, with pain in his eyes, and finally he asked us, almost pleaded, that we just walk away…He was sad, we were sad. He was our friend, more than anyone can understand, if only because we have not written about the rest of the impact he had on us, and how he helped us, this year…with us. We will write about it someday...it's disturbing, and dark...and everything that Fantastic was to us in those days.

It’s bittersweet…it all is. This year has been…fucked up…we still haven’t written everything about our relationship with him…we will. We’re two years away in the writing of our life. When we get to that part, those days with Fantastic New Addition/The Jean/Fuck Face…the things we didn’t and couldn’t write about at the time, why he was so important…you’ll all understand more.

For now, we sob…because…well…life is never what you expect…people are…confusing. We had a shitty couple days at work…we’ve had a shitty couple of days in general, now, saying goodbye to friends is hard…and we haven’t even gotten to say the goodbyes to Girl Crush and Fabulous People (our female friends); they will be just as difficult, but in a different way.

For now, the rest of what we know about tonight, we are keeping within us. Rest assured, there was no betrayal of any kind. James is important, many of us love him…and as someone we truly love, we could never betray him, and his love…that’s not how we roll.

[Dear Fuck Face...as you knew we had to tell James...you also knew we had to write your final chapter...you know we will miss you...you know.]

Doing Freedom Right, Our 9/11 Post

We’re not gonna get too deep into this, or maybe we will. Who are we kidding, we will.

*Gets on soapbox*

It’s 9/11…and we have views on that…just like everyone else.

Before we get too far, understand, this is our opinion. If you get upset, angry, about the words we wrote…that’s your right and freedom, just as it is ours to write and share our thoughts and feelings on this, and so much more. People died for freedom; a long time ago and people are no longer dying for freedoms, and haven’t been for a very long time. Freedoms are getting stripped away every day, from all over the world, and it’s been happening all through history…from book burnings, banning, censorship, violent acts by police in non-violent protest, wiretaps, government watch lists…on and on…all in the name of freedom while the rug is slipped from beneath us.

Recently we had a follower share an article written recently for CBC Canada, about Homeland Security and mental health…it’s just one example of freedom being taken away not only by citizens of the country so proud of their freedom (of which we are a citizen), but also, that countries attempt to take the freedoms of others away; as if they are the only ones with the right to such a privilege.

If you are interested, this is the article in question…http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2011/09/08/f-border-mental-health-privacy.html?cmp=rss…we were shocked and saddened by what we learned…and are open to debate if you feel that it’s justified; because the truth is, mentally ill people are no more a “threat” than any other person who has not had the misfortune of coming face-to-face with their illness/problem/mental health, and given it a name (or in our case, names…)

That event, on September 11, 2001, 10 years ago, brought a nation together…at least it brought the white people of a nation together. Ten years later, they are divided again, if ever they were truly together for anything more than false altruism. Many people have died because of that day, people from almost every nationality in the world, not just white Americans, and while the man who was responsible (in theory) for the attacks is dead…we still fight a war in a country that somehow got the blame…and the public is okay with it because of what the government has them believe. If you don’t think it’s about money and oil, if you really think it’s about freedom…you don’t pay any attention - if you put specific names on the blame, like George Bush, Barack Obama...then you don't know how government works, and how media works with them.

Our September 11^th, 2001 was spent in Chicago. Back in those days we were married and we were headed back home from downtown that morning, listening to Mancows Morning Madhouse, a favourite morning program of ours in Chicago. When he started relaying the news we didn’t believe it, we thought it part of a skit or prank. When we made it into the house we turned on the TV and there we sat glued for days, but for trying to get our husband out of downtown Chicago because the entire city was on lockdown, we were transfixed. We were 22 years old, and since then we’ve watched news programs with the take from every angle, watched documentaries from both sides, we’ve read books on facts surrounding 9/11. We formed our opinion based on facts and observation, not what some lunatic who got his own show on FOX, or some other network, made us feel like we had to believe.

We’ve watched a world get even more divided with hate and intolerance, all while pretending an event brought them together. In neighbourhoods in Chicago, in days surrounding that event, as well as all over the United States, those that were heavily ethnic (read: Muslim/Middle Eastern) we’re under attack, as if they had been responsible, personally, for what had happened.

We have so many things to say that we won’t, things about the people who die all over the world by terrorist attacks on their homelands, that go unnoticed, uncared for by an entire nation that fixates on themselves - unless there is a natural disaster, then they come to the rescue…after all…natural disasters are an act of “God” and are in no way the fault of man, and the raping and pillaging of the natural resources that the earth requires to maintain balance in its ecosystem; but that’s a whole other thorn.

If you couldn’t taste the sarcasm in the end of that last paragraph then let us insert that hashtag for you now…#sarcasm

The political world, the world, is a catastrophe…and it is people who stand by and believe everything the news and government has to say, without thinking, logically, about the words they are being fed, that propagate ignorance around the world; people who don’t want to analyze what’s going on around them. Anyone who can think and act logically, who really pays attention to the facts, questions them, turns them on their head, and analyses them can see…the government lies, people lie…and lies breed hate, ignorance, intolerance and distrust.

The world is divided. It always has been. From before words were ever written, societies have been fighting each other over differences in philosophy and religion, and land, since the evolution/creation of man. Now it’s just called terrorism, unless you’re a government doing the terrorizing, then it is justification.

It would be great if the world gave peace a chance…but the world has never been in peace… ever, and until people learn to respect the rights and ideals of others, there will never be peace.

Some might be saying “Well, it sounds like you want people who kill others to have that right. You must think it is okay the to kill someone, that it’s their right!?!” If you think we mean that, then you aren’t listening/reading. If people respected differences in each other then nobody would have just cause to kill each other, they wouldn’t want to. Break down the hate, break down the intolerance, build up the knowledge and understanding, and there will be peace.

Now, that looks optimistic, and not all of us are optimistic, but that doesn’t mean we can’t see what is ideal, and be a realist about the likelihood of something like peace and understanding being magically created…but it makes us feel comfort to know what we think the answer is, even if the answer will never be find the solution.

*steps off soapbox*

Later tonight we are posting an opinion piece by a fellow follower (@VagabondRoyalty), "friend" and host/co-host) of The Nothing But Show. He talks about hyper vigilance, which is a theme running through this blog post…it’s a very interesting take from him and we can relate to a lot of what he says in his piece, so if you remember, come back tonight, or click over to it now (if it's tomorrow already)

You don’t have to agree with him or us…you just have to know we, and him, have the right to write and express our thoughts and feelings in a non-violent manor. That’s doing freedom right.

Freedom. How sweet it is.

Stress And Food...And Weight Obsession

Just a quick post today, soon we're going to work on an entry about nutrition and weight loss. We studied it for about a year and a half at University before we headed to culinary school (only part of that we've written about so far), and after we'd lost 100 pounds on a diet and one of us became very interested in food, nutrition and balanced diet.

We've written in the past 9 months about issues we have with food, we got really thin for awhile, and it was a problem...but now we're getting back to a healthy weight...and it's a problem again.

Part of the stress of last night; which Cassandra wrote about on Tumblr...but only a bit, and not about all the issues she was having, more about the ones we were having; is that we're struggling over food with each other again. It's been going on since James was here visiting (we put a few pound onto our 6' stature), and now a lot since we have a new job where we work around massive, massive, amounts of food.

"I just want to eat" she whimpered and cried to James last night, who usually spends all of our home time with us logged into Gmail Video Chat. "I want a pizza. They won't let me." She put her hands over our face, sobbing.

While Cass and Catherine we're prominent last night, and Catherine's favorite food is pizza, she's a finicky eater, preferring not to eat when she is stressed out, which is the opposite of Cassandra, who is a little cow when it comes to food when she is sad/depressed/stressed...and even when she's not those things, she loves to eat. Catherine wouldn't let her eat...Sam wouldn't let her eat. There were many at work last night, as Catherine wrote, we were switching too much and our head was in agony. James saw us to bed via video chat and read us a story till we fell asleep. He really is the most wonderful boyfriend, no matter how much Brooke protests and hates him.

It's always more difficult when there are too many of us around. Back in the day (only a couple of months ago) when we would go to the grocery store, in between Tweeting and dancing, you would have see a tall young woman (looking much younger than her actual age) walking down aisles, staring wishfully, wide-eyed, at all the food. Sometimes in the grocery line she would want a candy bar, and Others wouldn't let her have it, and she would struggle with keeping her tears in until we left the store, begging to us silently, and sometimes she didn't make it out of the store before tears would stream down our face; and that's another reasons we wear sunglasses as much as we can.

Sounds childish, but she's only 14...and an emotional and sad one at times...

So, we're having struggles...we don't know what to do.

If you think seeking professional help is the answer then we won't agree unless you can tell us exactly how they might help; we're not giving each other us, we just want to learn to work together better. Like we told The Father last weekend on Skype, we need more than a year, preferable a year uninterrupted by stupid sexual affairs, getting fired and scrambling to find a new job, problems with the property we own, and all the other stuff that has been going on this past year with people in our past life, from The Others Girls life. It's only been a year since we had to deal with an ex, Significant Other...who we are still in need of writing about...who harassed us when we ended the relationship with him last September.

How far we've come, is far...how far we have to go is further...and with all the new stress, maybe having to move, but then, maybe not (still waiting to know), meaning selling the house and moving back in with the mother...we're just looking down the road, to some time to relax and not be looking for a job for awhile, and spending time with the man who is much too kind for us...we need a vacation...from our life...we need to get to our adventure.

~Frank et al (almost all of the et al these days, again...it so much easier with only 3 of 9)

Where We Live and Why We Might Have to Move...Again.

Here’s the thing.

We live in a country not our own, but it feels more our own than our country of birth. If you are a reader of our blog, and have actually read some of our life stories (which we need to complete yet) then you probably have figured out where we live. We're still not saying though...just because it's risky.

We have lived here, in this country, for seven years (come December of 2011). We went to school here on a study permit for three and half years, we stayed here on a work permit and opened a catering company which we’ll write about sometime in the future, then we worked at our last job, which we’ve written quite a bit about, and now this new job…a job we love, despite the physical pain it puts us through…we do enjoy it.

The work permit is the problem we are facing now, it is a type they started offering graduates of this countries Universities and Colleges the same year we graduated. This permit is not extendable on its own, which means we need a new work permit…and as far as we have been told by the Immigration Department a few weeks back.

This is also the reason we were very anxious to get a new job, because you can’t get a work permit without a job offer, and since we already live here what is better than a job offer for being eligible for a work permit than already having a job?

So we’ve been working on the paperwork, and talking with our boss about the paperwork they are requesting from his end, because the employer has to justify your hiring over that of a citizen of this country.

We’ve talked to Immigration in person and they said there needs to be a certain form filled out (something like a job market survey); our employer talked on the phone with them this afternoon too, and was told it’s not just a form; it’s an application for permission from the government to hire a non-citizen.

He seemed pretty put out that he was going to have to spend his time filling out the paperwork, and didn’t understand why they didn’t have to do this with the last foreign employee they hired, who hailed from China (this is a big place, our place of work…there are people working from all over the world). The paperwork is six pages long.

“This thing is longer than my mortgage application was”, our employer said, after he printed it off.

And we laughed it off because we had already heard the bad news we are about to share, and we were forced into a switch so we didn’t cry in front of our new boss; a couple of us DO NOT take bad news gracefully…

So what’s the big deal?

The permit expires in one month, which means in ONE MONTH we are here as a visitor, no longer able to work…so we’re going to be unemployed…AGAIN. Of course we can stay here, in this, the first place we’ve ever felt was our home…but we won’t be living in a building, we’ll be living in a box. And winter is coming, so that’s not so cool. And we are so tired of moving, we just moved into this apartment last October, and we love this apartment (we have had nearly 30 physical addresses in at least 6 states and 1 non-state).

The woman on the phone from Immigration basically told our boss this afternoon that if he had not posted the job listing in at least two places, which they require proof of, then the application WILL be denied. So, because he decided to use the government job board website to post the job listing, and didn’t post it in the local paper (which nobody reads) or on Kijiji, or some shit, we’re going to be denied our permit. (75% chance of denial, as far as we can tell)

For the first time we have a good paying job, and despite the pain we were willing to stick with it and work on some alternative pain reliever methods…and we had budgeted so that by the end of January 2012 we would have all of our debt paid off, as long as our only excess expense were a few bottles of wine a week (a bottle of what we drink regularly costs less than $12 after taxes). We gave up smoking in January, and we gave up marijuana a couple of month later (between the two we were spending over $600 a month on things we smoked) for a plethora of reasons, and we really don’t eat out, or much. Debt makes us nervous. Very, very, nervous. If you have read the stories of Us (THE CHAPTERS OF FRANK/HOW WE CAME TO BE US/ADDRESSING WE) then you probably know why from at least one of the stories.

More importantly, if this permit is denied we’re moving back to the United States by the end of the year, something we really don’t want to do…so we are probably going to be looking for a job in the United States…and we are willing to move just about anywhere. (New York and California are preferred though...maybe Chicago).

The economic state and employment outlook of the United States is really…making us feel we’re jumping from the fire into the flame…and all we want is to be in the pan. And we don’t know if we can even apply for unemployment there until we find a job, having been living “abroad” for seven years.

How much bullshit do we have to put up with? Really. It’s not as bad as it could be we suppose…we just have a “severe” mental illness, some of us suffer from depression and eating disorders, we have soon to be debilitating back pain* from that fucking car accident and we are basically unemployable.

We write though, and we paint. And if it wasn’t for those two things we’d be dead today.

At least we have our wonderful boyfriend, who is much too far away… (he iss selling all of his belongings to try to raise money to come to us as fast as possible)…

…And our family, who we called on tonight. We don’t ask for help. We never really have, but tonight I decided to tell them what we need. And we might need help. That’s what family is for, right? *sigh*

The Facebook message we sent to The Father, The Mother and The Brothers...a first.

~ Frank et al

…mostly Frank…everyone is freaking the fuck out right now. Emmie really wanted to spend some time out tonight…she, Ivy and Cassandra had what they thought was a very successful day at work. Emmie is pretty good at staying on task, and great in the kitchen because burns don’t bother her as much as the rest of us, and we burn ourselves a lot.

*was also told by the boss this afternoon that we move too slowly in our job position, he is thinking of moving us to a different department…one we don’t want to move to. Of course we didn’t tell him about out back pain or anything. We’re still on probation, must’nt give them a reason to find fault in us…we have two and a half more months left of that, if we make it past the work permit bullshit.

- Is that all coherent? Does that make sense? We've had a fucking week from hell...we're going to drink a whole shit load of wine -