Keira-anne.com

These are all things that I love:

Photo: yum9me on Flickr

And as of yesterday, no more. While not so apparent to most, I am well aware that I have indulged in more than my fair share of ice cream over the summer. Refined sugar has always been my nemesis, the one thing that always trips up any balance I try to achieve on the scale.

A co-worker and I pledged to say no to all sweets, treats and everything in between until November 1. If we slip up, the penalty is chugging a litre of water. It’s more difficult than you might think. Though that said, I already have two exceptions to make during that time and I’m fully prepared to get my chug on.

This is where you come in and help. Tell me some of your favourite sugar-free snacks so I can take the edge off from time-to-time without indulging in the devil’s condiment.

In 1946, a single log cabin was constructed by the newlywed Van Normans on a then-11 acre property along the shores of Parksville. Today the Tigh-Na-Mara Resort and Conference Centre is perhaps the best-known and most well-loved accommodation in the Oceanside region.

Now double its original property size, the Tigh-Na-Mara boasts over 192 log buildings nestled into towering trees. Did I mention this is where Rebecca and I stayed during our getaway to the Island?

Settled into a one-bedroom, top-floor condo, we had views of the local beach that were simply untouchable. Everywhere you go in the Parksville and Qualicum region, auburn Arbutus trees are reaching to the sky.

Guests of the Tigh-Na-Mara can choose either waterfront condos or singular cabins. Suites are complete with kitchens, jacuzzi tubs and – in our case – a king sized bed. The on-site Grotto Spa also features bungalow suites.

Locals will appreciate the names given to each of the condo structures. Rebecca and I stayed in the Ballenas lodge, named for Ballenas Island found just a few kilometres off the shores of Parksville. It also happens to be the name of the local secondary school.

Next time I’m choosing a cabin – I couldn’t help but be reminded of the John Candy classic The Great Outdoors. Thankfully there were no raccoons causing a mess of the trash cans.

Six years ago the Tigh-Na-Mara expanded by adding what is now the largest resort spa in British Columbia and, in my opinion, simply stunning.

Featuring a full line of European esthetic products with an array of cosmetics, nail polish and locally-crafted wood burl art, the Grotto Spa offers a full menu of uniquely designed spa treatments.

It should go without saying that The Grotto Spa’s pièce de résistance is undoubtedly the mineral pool for which the spa is named. With a two-storey waterfall and a healing blend of various mineral salts, the spa’s grotto is a place to escape, relax and restore.

While I couldn’t snap any pictures (in an effort to respect the privacy of others), I can tell you that Rebecca and I each blissfully enjoyed the Pacific Body Balancing Treatment. Beginning with a yummy sea salt and green tea blended full-body exfoliation, we rejuvenated our skin with a thermal body wrap, a hydrating facial treatment and finished with an all-over body butter massage.

The irony is that I never normally feel relaxed in spa environments – when you’re alone with your thoughts, all you can do is think. At The Grotto Spa, however, it was the first time I actually fell asleep during a treatment, waking only to wipe drool from my chin.

Okay, so here is where The Grotto Spa gets really unique. On the third floor of the building is a relaxation lounge as well as the Treetop Tapas & Grill. “Robes and sandals only” is the requirement, and spa-goers can dine on detoxifying tapas created with specific health benefits in mind.

Perhaps not the healthiest choice, I started our journey through “endless tapas” with a Tigh-Na-Mara Sour, consisting of lime and amaretto blended with ice. SO. GOOD.

First up: wilted spinach in a buttermilk dressing with seared portobello mushrooms and phyllo.

Olive and artichoke antipasto with the best fresh-baked bread sticks I have ever had in my entire life.

Greens with cherry tomatoes, bocconcini cheese with a light pesto dressing. Apparently I am no longer allergic to pine nuts.

Grilled flat bread with local goat cheese and caramelized onions. Commence drooling.

Flaky pastry tart stuffed with local blue cheese.

Vanilla bean pudding-style tart with fresh-picked raspberries for dessert…

…only to be followed by a red velvet cupcake with cream cheese icing.

Did I mention a delectably delicious walnut tart with vanilla ice cream?

With our stuffed bellies and restful bodies, Rebecca and I floated back to our suite in time to catch what I thought was the most amazing sunset over the region.

That was, of course, until 20 minutes later when I discovered that the sunset became even more stunning.

And after a solid sleep, I awoke blinded to see the sun rising over a low-tide beach. There is absolutely nothing like sea air to awaken your senses in the morning – not even a strong java can compare.

Ready for more food? Ever after the “endless” tapas the night before, Rebecca and I found ourselves in the Tigh-Na-Mara’s Cedar Dining Room for breakfast. I was tempted by and gave in to the apple and cranberry french toast with orange cinnamon butter and maple syrup. No regrets.

Normally when on vacation, the hotel is essentially just a place to sleep and shower when the day’s adventures are over, but the pet-friendly Tigh-Na-Mara is an adventure all in itself. With kids’ programs and babysitting, a swimming pool, gift shop, cappuccino bar, bike rental, multiple beach accesses, numerous dining options and, of course, The Grotto Spa, once hardly needs to leave the property.

UPDATE: Be sure to read Rebecca’s re-cap of our heavenly stay at the Tigh-Na-Mara here.

Tigh-Na-Mara Seaside Spa Resort and Conference Centre and The Grotto Spa are located at 1155 Resort Drive in Parksville, British Columbia. The resort is most easily found by taking exit 46 off Island Highway 19; from there, look for the signs. For more information and to book your next trip (or spa treat!), visit the Tigh-Na-Mara’s website or The Grotto Spa’s website.

Imagine for a moment that you are a nurse or a doctor. Taking care of people that are sick and hurting comes naturally to you because, in your mind, it’s the right thing to do. On a day that seems as normal and given as any other, a new patient is brought into your ward and placed under your care. This patient has been the victim of a malicious hit-and-run car accident. The driver, lacking any kind of remorse, was never caught or punished.

Your new patient is bruised and battered on the outside – almost beyond recognition of who they once were. The internal damage is almost immeasurable. It requires almost no expertise to know that this patient’s road to recovery will be long, slow and incredibly painful. However, caring for this patient is the dutiful thing to do.

Original Photo: la_cola_de_mi_perro on Flickr

As time passes, you find yourself caring more about your patient through your compassion for them rather than just out of obligation. You give more of yourself and of your time than is required or necessary. In intense and time-tested circumstances such as those, an impenetrable bond inevitably forms. Patient and healer instead become “team,” each with different strengths and abilities. You cheer as broken legs take their first steps. As outward wounds begin to heal over, you feel joy at the progress your patient is making. Every triumph your patient makes is a triumph you feel also. While what the hit-and-run driver did cannot be undone, the patient can conquer the consequences.

Over time and through their healing, your patient finally reaches a pivotal point. They aren’t the same post-accident as they were before, as your patient has been forever transformed by the perseverance they’ve been forced to display. It’s time for your patient to go home.

At the end of your shift on that final day of care, you push your tired body out the side doors of the hospital and into the parking lot. Keys in hand, you make your way towards your car. Clumsily, you drop the keys to the ground, and as you crouch to retrieve them, your eyes are puzzled by what you see. Looking up, headlights are looming. Not only looming, but headed directly towards you, accelerating in their approach. Blindsided by what is even happening, there’s nothing you can do to stop it as you feel the front fender slam into your chest.

Photo: Matt Roe on Flickr

Your body, bruised and battered, is laying tangled on the pavement. Every part of you feels incredible pain and everything is bleeding. Through blurred eyes, you see the driver-side door of the vehicle open and are completely dumbstruck to see your former patient get out of the vehicle. Taking timid steps towards you, they stoop to where you lay. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

Those words mean nothing to you because the blood rushing into your ears makes any possibility of understanding them impossible. Words can never negate actions.

How would you then feel if you were that nurse or doctor? What thoughts and feelings would be rushing into your head and into your heart?

I should know by now that the days on which I make my way to my therapist’s with a smile on my face and not a thought in my head end up being the sessions that hit me hardest. I took five minutes to fill her in on my moving news and any other little thing that had come up in the last two weeks. “Okay, but what about that anger issue we discussed last time you were here,” she asked.

Yeah, that issue. Needless to say, I haven’t taken up boxing yet.

The truth is that my emotions have been like a pendulum. One minute I want nothing more than for history to reverse itself and to just be held close again – like nothing bad ever happened. And the next, I’m thinking “what the fuck?” while wishing to do nothing but let my fists fly and knock out every last tooth. Clearly, neither of those are viable options.

I’m a visual learner, so my therapist pulled out her flip chart and black Jiffy markers. At the top, I wrote the word “ANGER” in capital letters. It’s an ugly word. No seriously – look at it. It’s sharp and unforgiving, much like the way it makes you feel.

Photo: pastense on Flickr

Under “ANGER” I wrote down all the words that came up for me that have been directly contributing to my anger. As I scrawled each of them on the large paper, I said them out loud as a release.

“Deceipt, betrayal, unloved, confusion, embarrassed, like a joke, used, cruel, taken advantage of… abandoned“

They were all there in black and white. The words, thoughts and feelings that had been swimming in my head over the last several weeks. No longer in my head but instead directly in front of me. And suddenly for the first time in over a month, I burst into tears. I couldn’t hide what I felt and I could no longer suppress what I was going through.

Sometimes it’s easier to put what we feel in a box and tuck it away on the highest shelf in the back of the closet. What’s always healthier is to hang it on the clothesline in the backyard to dry in the sunlight.

Sometimes I’m a skeptic, sometimes I’m not. What I know that I always am is an open-minded person, and that means I’m usually willing to give anything a shot at least once. A recurring theme in my life lately is “taking care of me” because my needs have spent far too much time on the back burner in recent years.

Photo: topher76 on Flickr

A couple weeks ago, my friend Lindsay suggested I might try some reiki and/or quantum touch healing as one way of taking care of my physical self. Like her mum, Lindsay practices reiki and quantum touch healing, and at that point, I was willing to give anything a try. I happily accepted Lindsay’s offer and set up my first appointment with her.

While I wish I could recall more of my treatment, the truth is that I spent much of the hour lulling in and out of sleep in a deep, deep slow down. That intensity of relaxation is something that I have truly never experienced before. We all know the feeling of rest that occurs after a long day and we finally flop down onto our beds. With the reiki treatment, I was actually able to identify the deep relaxation in my knuckles, my elbow joints, my wrists, my knees and all the other hard-working parts of my body I take for granted.

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Original Photo: That Guy Who’s Going Places on Flickr

Beginning March 1st, Lindsay will be bringing her reiki practice to True Health Studio in Kitsilano on Sundays (for now). Attuned and taught by Reiki Master Jayne Hunter in Truro, Nova Scotia, this is Lindsay’s fifth year of practice. Lindsay’s husband, Mike, was attuned to reiki in October, 2008 and will be teaming-up with Lindsay in her practice at times. It’s important to bear in mind that reiki isn’t intended to replace medical practices, but even registered nurses are learning to administer reiki as it’s shown to be effective in supplementing and speeding up healing times.

Appointments with Lindsay are approximately 45-60 minutes each, with your first treatment costing $70 and subsequent treatments for $60. As a special introductory offer to reiki, if you contact Lindsay either by e-mail or by calling True Health Studio at (604) 221-8783, mention this blog post, and book your initial treatment before March 31st, your second treatment is free of charge.

Click here to learn more about reiki, and here to read more about quantum touch.

Beach bum at Great Slave Lake, N.W.T.

Eastern Europe in the 1920s was less than glamourous, but that’s not to say it wasn’t a time of great beauty. On July 11, 1924, a sunny summer day in Poland, a baby girl was born. Her name was Hildegard “Hilda” Willemina Korber, one of nine children born to a poor farmer and his wife. As she and her brothers and sisters grew up, they all learned the value of hard work and the importance of family while relying on strength and resilience to get them all through the Second World War. Despite her humble beginnings, however, her loveliness was not lost on everyone – and certainly not on one young man from Czechoslovakia.

Fishing at Great Slave Lake, N.W.T.

When Hilda and Karl first met each other in their 20s, it was love at first sight – for Karl. Being that he was four years her junior, Hilda was largely reluctant and refused his advances and declarations of love. Karl moved to Canada and found himself working both in Ontario and the Northwest Territories, saving up every penny he earned.

Finally, after four long years, Hilda agreed to marry Karl and found herself in Canada in the late summer of 1954 at the age of 30. Three months later, they were married and embarked on a lifelong journey of love together on November 3, 1954. The newlyweds set up a home in Yellowknife where Karl worked in local mines while Hilda tended to their small but snug home. It didn’t take long to add to their duo, and almost to the date of their one-year wedding anniversary, Katrina Elizabeth Chalupa was born. Less than a year later, Anne Mary Chalupa came long.

Katrina grew up and became my mom, Anne grew up and became my aunt, so naturally Karl and Hilda were affectionately known by me as Opa and Oma.

Anne Mary Chalupa, Hilda Chalupa, Katrina Chalupa (Yellowknife, circa early-1960s)

Last night I picked up the phone to call my mom and pick at her memory. As I’ve been making my way through changes in my life, self-discovery and attempting to pinpoint the issues that impact who I am today, I’ve realized that reconnecting with my past is an important part of that process. There is perhaps nothing as unique as a daughter’s relationship to her mother, and also to that mother’s mother. I wanted to know more about my Oma, I wanted my mom to remember and I wanted her to share with me what all three of us ladies had in common.

Katrina Chalupa and Hilda Chalupa (Yellowknife, circa mid-1960s)

My Oma was a woman with a great deal of love for her daughters and much devotion and respect for her husband. She was deeply sympathetic and sensitive and had a tendency to cry easily, much like my mother and I. Another characteristic that passes through all three of us is the deep-seated desire to nurture. As I have grown into a young woman, I have become predisposed to overfunctioning.

Overfunctioning is a frequent trait of eldest children and is generally a learned behavior. It tends to be what happens when one is either consciously or subconciously expected to set positive examples, take care of everything and everyone, all the while “keeping it together” without showing any sort of vulnerability. While overfunctioning isn’t necessarily a negative characteristic, the pendulum of this behavior can easily swing too far in the wrong direction, as it has in my life.

Keira-Anne, Hilda Chalupa (Port Hardy, circa early-1980s)

After talking with my mom at great length last night, it started to become more clear how this pattern – my “normal” and natural way of dealing with anxiety – has developed through the generations. As a young girl in Poland, my Oma was expected to work hard, contribute to the household and most likely had to often look out for herself in a home of 11 people.

When my mother was a child, she often took care of many of the younger neighbourhood children, paid attention to them, played with them and even walked many to and from school. As my mom grew older and eventually became a married woman, she would often find herself in the position of being the responsible adult in the marriage – as many women frequently do. Before long, overfunctioning became her survival tactic and this behavior was inevitably passed on to her first born daughter, yours truly.

Photo: tempest_kat on Flickr. Katrina Mellis, Keira-Anne (Vancouver, circa 2008)

While many of the deck’s cards are stacked against me as a chronic overfunctioner, restoring balance to my life is possible. I am willing to do the work. We overfunctioners have a tendency to be resistant to change and have an incredibly difficult time remaining objective and level-headed in times of high anxiety. The bottom line, however, is that if I am overfunctioning all the time for others, I am underfunctioning for myself.

Modifying my behavior – a behavior that simply isn’t working for me – will be a constant, lifelong challenge. There’ll be setbacks coupled with achievements and times when I don’t see the point in changing. The work, however, is anything but disheartening. Though facing up to who I truly am, the good and the bad, may not always be pretty, I’m unearthing a great deal of beauty and freedom in reconnecting with my past and the amazing people that helped impact the woman that I am today.

I’m starting to notice a phenomenon.

On Saturday I went to the gym for my circuit training class, and because I had left my iPod at home, snatched up a tattered copy of Elle Canada to read on the stairclimber. As I flipped through the pages – some stuck together – I came across what is your typical Q&A column where women had written in with their various relationship problems, seeking words of wisdom.

As I scanned over first the questions and second the answers, I was amazed. “Do these women really believe that this is what they’re supposed to do to fix what’s wrong?” Some of the so-called advice astounded me in its absurd logic.

Photo: jamielondonboy on Flickr

Several hours later, I found myself wandering the downtown Chapters with a friend. While her and I both managed to grab a cheap beach read for ourselves, we browsed the store since we had nowhere else to be. By the time we reached the third floor – and often dreaded self-help section – I couldn’t help but notice the large volume of books dedicated solely to women and their “dysfunctional” relationships.

As I scanned over titles such as the classic Men Are From Mars… Women Are From Venus, Why Men Love Bitches and the soon-to-be movie He’s Just Not That Into You, I noticed more than their splashy, brightly coloured covers. Not only were these books aimed to sucker in hurting women everywhere, they all smelled of complete bullshit.

Heartache and heartbreak are great for the economy.

Photo: mollybob on Flickr

I turned to my friend and reiterated to her what I’d thought just hours before at the gym: “Seriously, do women read these and consider them the Holy Grail of relationship advice? I think that’s unfortunate.” Why do I think it’s unfortunate? Any back covers or inside pages I scanned for their purported insight all point to the same issues – that women screw up, pick the wrong men and just need to find “the right kind of guy” instead of the so-called toxic ones.

How about this instead? Women don’t always screw up (but neither do men), sometimes we don’t always consciously “pick” the ones we do and just because a man is broken doesn’t mean he isn’t “the right kind of guy.” Perhaps instead of trying to change how women relate to potential suitors in their lives, they need to re-think how they relate to themselves.

Less of We, More of Me

As women, we have the right to feel empowered, the right to take care of ourselves and the right to make the best choices as we see fit. Playing the blame game gets no one anywhere, so perhaps it’s time to take responsibility for our own actions and choices. Some are so quick to label men as “toxic,” but if that’s true, then we as women are equally capable of being toxic.

Focus on yourself, on your growth and your development. Instead of over-thinking and overanalyzing the differences, I think it’s time to instead appreciate the delicate distinctions between men and women and how we all function – within relationships and, more importantly, as individiuals.

I work at a fast-paced law firm, so handling mass quantities of paper on a daily basis can be expected. Between preparing case citations, legal arguments and client documents, it should come as no surprise that receiving a wicked paper cut happens on at least a weekly basis. While I generally have a high pain tolerance, I won’t deny a momentary whimper and an instant of feeling sad for my poor little finger when it happens.

As I arrived home Friday afternoon and proceeded to think about the tiny slice that had struck me across my left palm earlier that day, I recognized a blatant correlation between paper cuts and my loss of objectivity through anxiety attacks.

Like a paper cut, losing objectivity through anxiety is generally caused by something small and mostly insignificant – not unlike a piece of paper – and yet feels as though it causes a great deal of damage instantly. The second the pain hits, it’s seemingly excruciating when, in reality, it’s just a tiny nick that will likely be mostly healed over and forgotten within hours. In the moment, however, getting our minds off the pain seems next to impossible.

Photo: Angie Torres on Flickr

Friday afternoon and later that evening were times of high anxiety for me. Some of it was likely fueled by the margaritas, but most of it sprung out of the monumental personal work that I’ve been toiling through. After what I felt to be a major breakthrough in counselling two weeks ago, I was sure that I had since acquired a great deal of “infinite wisdom.” In my mind, I presumed that because I’d found the root of my problems, my issues would no longer be issues with me. I could not have been more wrong.

Not long before that work day ended, I found myself with an emotional paper cut and soon after felt so angry at myself for failing the first test. What I instead realized was that I didn’t fail my first test – feeling anxiety is a perfectly normal response. What I did with that anxiety dictated whether I passed or failed.

I can choose to have a freak-out, lash out or overreact. Or, I can choose to shed a few tears because of the intense emotional state, step back and ask myself a few grounding questions:

Normally when I breathe a few breaths and question myself, the answers become rather clear. And while I truly am starting to find the answers that I’m looking for, it’s not as simple as I bargained for. I’m starting to realize that much of how I react or behave is rooted in past emotional issues. The truth is that our emotional issues generally must be processed up through the generations so that they won’t impact our current circumstances or be passed down through the generations.

Now comes the huge task of reconnecting with those issues and finding the teenaged Keira-Anne again.

Ice cream. I started craving it on Sunday evening and was desperate for the taste of a mint chocolate chip dance on my tongue. As it turns out, I wasn’t the only one yearning for it, so yesterday after work I found myself at Marble Slab Creamery with Rebecca.

After polishing off a Skor caramel waffle bowl stuffed with vanilla ice cream, cookie dough and Crispy Crunch bits, I found myself at home around quarter to five. All I could think about was having a bubble bath, but some reason, decided to first check my e-mail.

Panic! Around 4:40 I received an e-mail from my counselor that said nothing more than “I hope you’re okay. I know we re-scheduled to meet today at 4:30, so I hope everything is alright.” I freaked, called in a hurry and was out the door in a flash. Thankfully she had no clients to meet with after our appointment and was in her office doing work anyways. I made it there in exactly half an hour.

Since the last time I met with my counselor, more personal growth and realizations have happened than I bargained for. In truth, I’m still feeling immensely overwhelmed at the work ahead of me, but I also feel an equal part of optimism at the change it will bring in how I function. Not only do I have a clear understanding of what has to change, I also feel ready to do this. I’m not willing to shove it in a drawer and forget about it or procrastinate and do a half-assed job.

One notion that has recently occurred to me is the simple fact that change is possible. I know that I have issues and you have issues and she has issues and he has issues, but for some reason I always just assumed that was a part of life and we all have to “just deal with it.” I never considered the fact that behaviors can change, reactions and outcomes can play out differently and anxiety can be managed. That idea in itself is freeing.

Photo: AYUMi ~ PHOTOGRAPHY on Flickr

I have every intention of making a regular habit of tracking my progress through writing on my blog, sharing some of what I struggle with and being realistic about what it looks like. Much of the grief I feel over my dad has, I believe, been suppressed over the last decade, so revisiting it again could prove to be very interesting. However, the more active I remain in this healing, the more progress I will make – and that is something to be excited about.

Things are rarely ever as they seem. I walked into my counselor’s office last week with only one goal in mind. While I didn’t feel like I had much of anything to talk about, time spent in thought over the Christmas holidays gave me a new focus I wanted to pay special attention to, and I was absolutely resolved to tackle this goal head-on.

As her and I discussed the ideas that bounced around my head, my counselor passed a book on to me that she guessed might aid me in my quest. While the title of the book isn’t something I plan on sharing – that particular issue is far too personal and irrelevant to my point tonight – I am quite sure she knew precisely what she was doing in encouraging me to read it.

What was unbeknownst to me, though apparently not to my counselor, was how limited my point of view was. I had tunnel vision, and the emotional journey I have been on over the past few days since picking through these pages is completely overwhelming to say the least. Not long ago, for the first time I was able to pinpoint the source of anxiety and fear that has plagued me for my entire adult life. What I failed to realize was that identifying a problem does not equate a solution.

Discovering that there’s an issue or that something is amiss doesn’t necessarily come naturally. For as many years as I can remember, men tend to force my stomach into doubled-over knots. I completely and entirely freak out when my mom doesn’t answer the phone when she’s supposed to be home, and I hit re-dial as many times as it takes to get through to her. And worse yet, when I feel as though someone in my life is slipping away, I immediately show them the door to protect myself.

These reactions to panic were something I always viewed as normal reflexes. But why, I have to ask myself, were these reactions constantly conflicting me? It didn’t feel right.

This is where the identification of my abandonment issue comes back into the picture. I called my mom this evening and told her all about the book that I’m reading and the work I have cut out for me. The truthful bottom line, I told her, is that it all goes back to losing the two most significant males in my life during a huge time of growth in my adolescence. My mom was quick to point out that things were much more tumultuous than simply two those instances at that time in my life.

Between the ages of 14 and 17, I lost my Oma, my Opa, my paternal grandfather, my Father, my high school homeroom teacher (one month after I graduated high school), my paternal grandmother and my great Uncle Alfons. This was on top of being in the middle of the dissolution of my parents’ marriage (which was ultimately the best decision for all involved). For a naïve 17-year-old girl, that is a hefty weight to carry.

Ultimately, despite the losses, my relationship with my Father is clearly what still impacts me most at 28, whether I like to admit it or not. It’s been over ten years since he passed away from a drug overdose. It was tragic and nothing that anyone could do anything about. For a time after his death in August of 1998, I felt guilt. Once I learned about his addiction, I was so cold to him. To this day, I can’t recall if I ever again told him that I loved him before he died.

Taking a cue from the book, and in an effort to emotionally reconnect with the loss, I decided to write a letter to my Dad this evening…

As I scrawled out the first page on lined paper, I surprised myself not only at how easily the words flowed, but at how composed I felt. No tears, no sniffles – just words. That was, until, I recollected to my Dad one of the last memories I have of him. On the day of my high school graduation, he showed up at the salon at which I was having my hair and make-up done. I remember that he was gaunt and his skin was the colour of concrete. Instantly I felt anger at him for embarrassing me in front of my friends by appearing in such a state, and so I asked him to leave immediately. I pushed my Dad away, and for that I feel such sorrow. All he wanted to do was tell me how proud he was of me that I was graduating that day, and I couldn’t even allow him that much.

Recalling that is when the deep sobs because to reverberate and the hot tears poured. I felt such shame at the sharp memory.

I was young and inexperienced at life, and understanding how to deal with such a situation was next to impossible at the time.

No one asks to be abandoned. No one asks to feel this way. I know that my Dad never intended to leave his “princess.” I know that he wanted to protect her for her entire life. While I know that he still loves me, he made his choice and that choice and its consequences have ultimately impacted the woman that I am today. It’s hard to understand how much a girl needs a father until she no longer has one. So much of what I experienced in the time since his death was nothing that an hour with Dad couldn’t have uncomplicated.

I feel overwhelmed at how suddenly I am submerged in the work ahead of me. The light at the end of my slowly widening tunnel vision is that I feel a certain peace mingled in with the anxiety. From here, I have no choice but to learn to live as a woman, wholly but with a piece that will forever be missing. It’s no easy battleground to navigate.

I chose to share this because writing is my creative medium, my outlet. I could choose to keep this to myself, to not share it, but I feel as though I would be compromising my authenticity. Judge me if you wish, judge my Dad if you must, but know that it is real and comes from a place of integrity.

When I hear those words – “expect the best” – I immediately think of Debbie Hunt in the film Singles. She was looking for love in all the wrong places and finally signed up for a video dating service called Expect the Best. Her quest for a man crashed and burned and this post isn’t about love, but Debbie had the right idea: expect the best.

With the exception of Ernest Hemingway and the odd Jane Austen novel, rarely do I read fictional books. When I wish to escape and be entertained, movies are my ticket. When I read, I read to learn.

Many of the books in my collection are what you might classify as “self help” or educational books, ranging from how to deal with anxiety to facing up to your fears. Someone even suggested picking up something from Eckhart Tolle, but I put it down after two chapters – it wasn’t for me.

While it has been quite some time since I’ve cracked open a book to expand my mind, what I find interesting is that though I feel I learn much while reading the book, I tend to forget or abandon most of the concepts and ideas I learned. Yes, I do wish to help myself, but it’s always easier said than done.

This past week I visited with my counselor for the first time in over a month. Christmas and related expenses can easily get in the way, so I had to forfeit a couple sessions. As I walked in the direction of her office, I thought to myself “why am I even going? I have nothing to talk to her about.” And in truth, I really felt like I didn’t. Things in my life were calm, cool and collected.

As it turns out, I did have things to talk about – a lot of things – and I ended up surprising myself. Self help books are full of great ideas and concepts (and I won’t stop reading them), but they can’t ever take the place of a counselor. After filling her in on all that had happened in my life over the past month or so, she was able to do what no book can: she reflected back to me.

Sometimes when you’re in the middle of everything, it’s hard to see things from an objective point of view. And sometimes when you’ve set goals for yourself and work at achieving them, it’s next to impossible to realize the progress you’ve made when you’re too focused on the big picture. My counselor was able to point out the little things – things that had become lost on me – that were living, breathing evidence of the growth I’d undergone.

Talking with someone has become so key for me. I feel as normal as the next person, but there are definite changes I want to see in my life. Walking away, I felt as though I had a renewed sense of focus on my ambitions. It’s simple and it’s real but it’s to the point: it’s the power of positive thinking. Cliché? Yes. Realistic? Also yes. I have a tendency to expect the worst possible outcome in any given situation, and there’s something to be said for the vibes we put out there. I have seen real and positive change in my life, in doing what’s best for me, and seen the ripple effect that it’s had.

I will expect the best.