The woman I hath loved...

Its been a while since I've updated my blog, but I feel the need to vent.

So much has happened that is worth mentioning, such as the birth of my baby girl Amelia, but that has not moved me as much as what I want to write now.

I am going to Ireland. I have dreamed of being there for 15 long years and finally, I will go. I'm 29 days away from setting my foot onto an island that has always had me enchanted.

Why do I go? Maybe its my wanderlust, which started when we came back from Paris. Maybe realizing I CAN afford to go to the one place I've set my heart on has pushed me into action.
I was thinking of making this a guy trip, but even with everyone backing out, I realize that this trip is for me, and me alone.

I feel that this trip is a journey inside my own psyche and what I've always wanted out of life.

Gretchen recently mentioned that she was once scared that if I went, I would never come back. I don't blame her for thinking that. There's a lot of discontentment here and I do have the tendency to run.

I have the feeling though that I will NEVER forget the name Jamie Jordan, no matter how long I live.
Jamie seems to be in a similar situation in life. Stuck in a rut and just hoping for something to give.
She's offered to show me around a bit and I've promised to take her out to dinner in exchange, but somewhere deep, I think she wants to feel special to someone.

I always thought that I would marry a girl from Ireland. I really did. I don't know why or how a woman who talks like that can tug so many of my heart strings.
But that never happened. I never left the States and I never met her.

But now I have.

This woman is the symbolic woman of my dreams and I have two days to say goodbye to her. I make it sound so dramatic, but it is what it is.
I'm saying goodbye to a fairy tale woman that never existed. The woman that haunts me.

I talked to her on the phone tonight at work for a few moments and she was amazing to talk to. The dialect is so beautiful and it just rolls off the tongue and tickles my ears.
She's quite stunning too.

Most likely of cases, she would prove to be annoying and repulsive with time; but for two days, she is the personification of everything I had wished for in a mate. For two days, I will treat her as if I have been waiting all my life for her...

Gretchen doesn't know about Jamie and I would never tell her. This is something I must do and I can't let her stop me. I feel like this is all I have right now and it makes me shudder.

I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell...

Awhile back, I found this book laying around the house about "cognitive therapy". The general synopsis of the book is that depression is not a condition, but a frame of mind.

In the early chapters of the book, there is a questionarre that evaluates your depression scale. The point system ranged from 1-66. There were 22 questions that you could answer with a 1, 2 or 3.

"Do you want to slit your wrists?"
1) No.
2) Sometimes
3) I would love to, but dammit, I lost the knife!

Apparently, any normal person would score cumulatively less than 17.
If you are above that, you need help.

I score a 32.

32!

Apparently, 32 is just short of suicidal, even though I've never had thoughts of self destruction. Ever.

I guess that's what triggered the idea that I should get back on some anti depressants.
I initially quit the stuff just to feel like I was in control of my own feelings and not needing pills shoved down my throat to feel like I could make a rational decision.

However, its been 2 years and things are not getting much better on my own.

Which brings up the question of: "Am I depressed or just unhappy? Or both?"

I'll let Cymbalta do its thing and we'll see what happens...

WTS 8 month pregnant wife. Cheap!

It's been a long time since I've been as upset as I was last night...

Gretchen had some friends over and we were watching 'The Office' together.
I had completely forgotten about the whole event until I walked through the door and found that we had company.

The night was going pretty good; good food, a few laughs. But I noticed that Gretchen had left the lviving room and was brooding in the kitchen while putting the dishes away. I called out to her from the livingroom:

"Hey hun, you alright?"

She kinda snapped at me and said: "I'm fine..."

Of course, her abrupt response even caught the attention of our guests. Needless to say, they saw something was up and decided to call it a night. It was late anyways...

So Gretchen comes into the living room and sits down on the couch and begins to look sorry for herself...

It reminded me of something my 4 year old son would do.

So after some questioning, I found out that she was mad at us (I say us, us being me and our two guests) for not offering her the couch while she was lying down on the floor.
Apparently, she was uncomfortable on the floor and she was mad that I wasn't chivalrous enough to offer her the couch spot.

I tried to tell her that I didn't notice and that it wasn't some concious decision to let my 8 month pregnant wife lay on the floor. If she had only asked me for the spot on the couch, I would have gladly given it to her.

But that wasn't enough for her. She was mad at me for not noticing. She felt that she shouldn't have to ask.

I got mad.

"I can't read your mind and you are accusing me of being selfish/inconsiderate based on the fact that I didn't offer you the couch!"

I'm not a chivalrous person by nature. I know that and she knew that long before we got married, but here she was being mad at me for something I am not.

Let me say it again, I was furious.

We fought back and forth because I refused to apologize for something I didn't do. Something deep inside me refused to back down and accept any responsibility for what had happened.

I'm very good at taking blame. Definitely to a fault.
I will take responsibility for actions that are not my own and it has crippled me as a person.

But not this time.

Gretchen was devastated that I couldn't offer the smallest of apologies, but I dug my heels in based on principle.

I don't know who is wrong here.

Me for being stubborn or her for being unfair?

I have no idea what happened to this marriage...

Running to stand still...

I'm not sure what triggered the memory, but I was surfing the web and realized that I had a blogspot out there somewhere that had some deep thoughts written down. I think I just wanted to see what I had written, since my writings never seem like my own after long periods of time.

Its strange. After reading them almost 2 years after they were written, I see that not much has changed.
I'm 30 years old now. I have two children with another along the way. I've been the first of my family to travel internationally (Paris, France), and I've been promoted at work.

Brighton is now 4 years old and is growing to be just like his mother. Elise turned 1 in November of 2009 and she's a darling. She developed this smile that Gretchen says is a "little Nathan" smile. I think she may be right.

The kids are wonderful, though sometimes they can be a handful.

However, I feel that things are only gradually getting worse with Gretchen and I.

She's pregnant with our 3rd child and she only has about 5 weeks before she's carried to term. She's moody, emotional, depressed and tired and its been rough on us both.

Reading my blogs of almost 2 years ago, I see that little has changed in my life regarding my personal feelings.

I'm planning a trip to Ireland for this summer. Sometimes I wish I could leave and never come back. I get so disgusted with my lack of progess in life and I do feel stagnant.
Gretchen knows that I'm not doing well and my whole "I don't love you" stunt of 2 years ago is probably still seared into her brain. But I can't say that for sure.

I've tried to love her the way she needs, but it seems to come out as just being nice.

Its kinda like when you tell someone one thing when you really meant to say something else.

I need a break.

I'm trying to hold out going to Ireland for nicer weather. I need to get away.

Life is good, life is grand...

So it's been about 2 weeks since I've taken anything. Whether it be Adderal, Cilexa or Welbutrin and I have to say that I'm feeling fine.
It's been so long, that I forget why I even got on all that stuff.
I've never once had thought of self-harm or anything, just that nagging feeling of unhappiness.
It's so hard to decipher what it is that's truly bothering me...maybe it is my marriage. I don't know.
I've given this the best shot I can on making the best of my situation. I've tried numerous medications and none change that feeling that I have.
My counselor said to me: "You know Nathan, I would be very interested to see what kind of person you are when you are not on medication..."
I couldn't help but smile, but I think even she knows that I wouldn't change much.
So now it's just Gretchen that holds on to the hope of me changing.
I really want to say that I've tried the drugs.

But I'm feeling pretty good about things. The Welbutrin was crap anyways and was making me dizzy all the time, and I'm still able to focus without the Adderall.
It's probably all the stress in my life.

But life is still good.

My rant for the day...

HAHAHA! To be honest, I logged into Blogger and I wasn't even sure what I was going to write about...
So before I started writing, I decided to head to the bathroom and freshen up a bit.
Well, inspiration comes in many forms. It can even come in the form of a smell. A pungent smell at that.
I walked into the bathroom that 3 different companies share. Most of the time, it's just us guys at Plixer. Which is a good thing, since I don't question the hygene of anyone here in the office.
However, apon walking in...there was a new face.
The guy was a rather plump fellow. Probably close to 300 lbs and not at all charismatic.
He must be one of the trolls from the shipping company down the hall.
But anyways...
I walked over to the urinal to do my business and I was greeted with a horrible stench. It's rather hard to describe is such detail, but if I could speculate, it was body odor mixed with unwash private parts.
It was terrible. I had to cover my nose WHILE I was doing my thing so that I didn't throw up.
Do people like that have any idea of how bad they smell? Are they really that clueless?

I wonder if he even washed his hands...

Blue Ball Busters...huh?

As instructed by an e-mail that I got in my inbox; I drove up to Portland after work and met with all the people that were going to be playing kickball this summer.
There was probably about 30+ people there and we had a room reserved for our rowdiness.
I was a little nervous since it's been a long time since I've put myself in a situation where I knew nobody in a social setting.
But apon signing in, I was instructed to join team 2. Much to my surprise, I was 1 of 2 guys sitting at our teams table. So it's me, and my rather quiet counterpart Josh and a table full of reasonably attractive girls.
I say "reasonably" simply because I'm pretty picky about my tastes in women, and I don't throw around the word "hottie" carelessly.
It was rather pleasant though to walk up to complete strangers and introduce myself. I couldn't help but wonder what the girls were thinking as I made my rounds around the table shaking hands with them, but I never got that awkward vibe from any of them suggesting that I made a bad first impression.
We all sat around drinking beers and waiting for our Coordinator to go over the rules of kickball and blah, blah, blah.
But afterward, we had a nice time talking about what we all did for work and the polite nothings to keep the conversation momentum moving forward. Before long though, we were getting comfortable enough to start cracking jokes and teasing one another and all was good.
It was an interesting experience. I kinda realized what kind of person I was, when I wasn't around familiar settings and away from the life that seems so uncomfortable to me.

I was still a happy guy...

I still loved entertaining people...

and I love Guinness...

But one of the tasks for the evening was to come up with a team name.
Considering that we were the blue team, it didn't take long for the girls to decide on the name "Blue Ball Busters".
Which, in my opinion, can be taken 2 ways...

We either will seriously bust some balls in kickball...

Or we provide sexual services to alleviate the deprived male...

hmmmm...they picked it, not me.