In true Craughing Girl style I have been looking back at memories as the calendar year changed and being quiet blown away by 2019 in particular. And since I don’t want to work on things around my house that desperatley need it, I think I will write about that year instead. What amazes me is, I don’t even consider it my hardest year, but it sure was the craziest.

At the beginning of 2019 I had a barely one year old and his dad was very upset with me that I had ended our relationship (months prior). Moodswing Maverick (little dude’s dad) made my life a living hell every chance he got. He took me to court over everything he could, making me look like some crazy ex girlfriend instead of a loving mother. He moved in diagonal from my home with his ex wife all while trying to move back in with me and being in at least two other relationships I knew of. I can not express enough the mental anguish that man child put me through just for leaving him. Just because I wanted better for me and my kid. I think that is something I will need to fully unpack later, but just know, I am not being dramatic when I say it was hell.

And then my Dad decided he was going to die. He was staying in an apartment in the town over and my brother was checking in on him and it was getting to be too much for the broseph. I had to step in (as an eldest daughter does). My relationship with my dad by that time had been patched up to a dull surface level niceness for the grandkids so it wasn’t too terrible when I busted in barking orders and calling paramedics. (We may have argued a bit in front of them). He ended up being transported to a larger city to the ICU. A day later they called to say he was refusing treatment and they had to release him…. which is so strange because he had JUST quizzed me about my home and the space I had in it. Hmmm. So, he manipulated his way into my house on hospice. Which is fucking ridiculous because if he actually did know me he would have known I would have done it without all the bullshit. And the bullshit did not stop there.

Between my dying father and my one year old I was a wreck. I would sit in my room with both monitors going. One on my dad as he cussed and screamed at death coming for him and one on my son as he laughed and giggled and talked in his sleep. And there I was, midlife, witness to it all. A miracle and a mindfuck. Hospice kept telling me not to expect my dad and I to have any movie moments and reconcile, but we had a lot of them actually. Some where we both screamed at each other. Some where I just yelled that “yes of course I am good at taking care of people, I have been doing it my whole life, you just weren’t there”. There were a lot of moments where he had to accept people were not coming to say good bye to him. You don’t get to be a villain your whole life and expect people to forgive you at the end. But at the end he was at peace, he had good music, and went out listening to his daughter play and feed his grandson. Peacefully.

A few months after my father passed I got a knock on my door from child protective services and the local sheriff. My son’s cousins (Moodswing’s nieces and nephew) needed a place to stay as their mom was not able to take care of them. And that is how my two person family grew to me and four kids in one night. I gained two daughters (a 12 and 13 year old) and a 4 year old son in one crazy evening. And man we made that shit work for as long as we could, and with a LOT of community help. (After a few years and a lot of love and work I am happy to say all of them are now with their father’s and doing fairly well.)

And then 2020 Covid hit and we were all stuck in the house together FOREVER. lol

And that was my 2019. Crazy right? So many blessings in disguise. And I decided I needed to tell this little bit of my life because this memory popped up today.

I added those damn eyes because I needed something to laugh about while Dad was losing his mind, and because I was teaching my kiddo to use the trash can. They remain on the trash can. Still. I must have used the strongest super glue ever.

And that’s the point of all of this. Find joy where you can, and if you can’t? Make some.

All love. All ways. Always.

Craughing Girl