The Sitcom That Is My Life

For years, I've been living in a sitcom. Two single mothers and their kids live together in the suburbs, with episodes of blended family friendly fun and shenanigans, and sometimes drunken adult shenanigans when the kids visit their dads. Good show. 

Then suddenly,

my ex husband tells me, oops he sold his house and doesn't have anything lined up, guess he'll have to move in with us while he looks for a new place... and the market is bad... so he's gonna take his time finding the right place... New show! 

We've officially gone from Valerie to The Hogan Family. Yeah I'm a little sad, but. These shows can't last forever.

I shouldn't complain. He's the bumbling sitcom Dad that fixes things around the house and makes omelettes at the crack of dawn. Always making jokes, always trying to help. Likes grocery shopping. Will watch soccer with my Mom. In many ways life will improve. My house will improve, at the very least.

Now the sitcom is sitcom-ing, and the shenanigans are shenanigan-ing even more as my kids are here full time and my ex husband is suddenly a roommate, with pets, that I have to consider, work around and compromise with. And introduce to all my friends. And wait for and clean up after and pay attention to... it's fine. What's one more person, a dog, and a cat and kids full time? 

Stay tuned for more blended family fun and adventure. I'll surely be venting about it!

Lil McGill Esta Aprendiendo Espanol (Y No Puede Encontrar Un Enye)

 Como cambio mi keyboard de ingles a espanol? Bueno, econtre un keyboard universal pero como lo uso? Uso mi portatil ahorrita... seria mas facil en mi celular (sigh... como se dice sigh en espanol?)

Anyway, mi espanol es horrible pero quiero aprender. Necesito practicar. Por favor, digame en espanol y dame una prueba, un examenito jaja me gustaria mucho...

Es que, mi cerebro sabe muchas palabras, pero yo no. No puedo hablar con mi boca. En vida real, necesito tanto tiempo para encontrar las palabras, jaja. Y por supuesto, hay muchas frases que todavia no aprendi. Tambien, no entiendo nada cuando me hablas! Tienes que hablar lentamente, lo siento. 

Hago Duolingo cada manana -dammit where's the enye- cada dia, y tambien miro el How To Spanish podcast cada dia y escucho musica en espanol... y otros, hay muchos videos para aprender espanol- ugh basta! no puedo sin enye es equivocado y grosero

el punto es, estoy ensenando yo mismo y quiero practicar espanol con hablanativos cuando posible, quiero ser fluida algun dia.  Muchas gracias, amigos <3

ok hasta luego

The Internet's Big Sister

 I should be a therapist or social worker for real. With ~12 years of therapy under my belt, I learned so much I feel like I should get an honorary degree! 

And for those people who won't go to therapy or who can't afford to make it happen, well... who can they turn to? They need a big sister to steer them right. Maybe me?

Idk I'm just a natural helper. How do I go about putting that out there? Like, hey if anyone needs a big sister, make an appointment. 

I could call myself a mediator. If you need to settle an argument, call me.

I could call myself a life coach. If you just don't know what to do in any given situation, call me.

Like whenever I go on the dating apps, I end up being every guy's therapist. And they are desperate for someone to listen to them and help them. 

I have grandiose daydreams about having my own talk show- well nowadays it would be a podcast- for those guys, I guess, where I could help people deal with their personal shit while also somehow affecting some sort of shift in social culture, especially the toxic male colonizer culture that so many of my friends have internalized and need to be "big sistered" out of. Maybe people could call/text/email me questions anonymously and I could read them out loud and we, the studio audience/guests/the chat and I, could discuss solutions and come to some sort of cultural conclusions. 

The point is, I am somebody's therapist in real life every day. Why can't this be my job?

How do you want to be helped? If you want anonymous advice or whatever, HOW? Just tell me how. 

Some people prefer to get therapy under the guise of a tarot reading or astrology, which is fine, some people need that to be the catalyst for their therapy. Others hate that and need a different approach. 

Like an advice column/advice podcast/advice channel, we could call it Not All Men? or The Internet's Big Sister, or something that wouldn't scare guys away or make them think its just for women. IDK I'm just spitballin now.

Would the guys from the dating apps even be open to calling an advice podcast?

covers

 I took a course called "How To Make $ With Your Music". At the time, I didn't even have a product to sell. So I organized all my singles into albums. Then I called a bunch of studios to discuss recording time and all that... which is way too expensive so instead, I bought a macbook pro, and Logic pro, and took a bunch of courses on how to use it and released three albums. 

Then I took a course called "How To Market Your Music" and it told me to build an email list.

So I took a course called "How To Build Your Email List" and it told me to record some cover songs to give away as a free download in exchange for people's emails, and THEN buy facebook ads to drive traffic to my website to collect emails, and then market my music and merch to the people on my email list.

So I guess I need to focus on putting together an album of cover songs to give away for free on my website, in exchange for emails.

Dead and Dying

 My third album is called Dead and Dying. This is a collection of songs that I wrote about another tumultuous relationship. Again, I am looking at this whole situation with disgust, through adult eyes, with years of therapy under my belt... 

If I knew then what I know now, this relationship would never have happened! I ignored every red flag right from the start! Let me explain:

1. Live Like This

I wrote this because he didn't want anything serious and I was trying to be the cool girl about it.

2. Writer's Block

I wrote this about how I should stop seeing him since I found out he has a girlfriend... and I did. But started again after a couple months. Eventually he moved in.

3. Dead and Dying

I wrote this about living with a liar, who thinks you are also a liar.

4. Broke

I wrote this after we broke up but were still sleeping together ??? I was a mess. And then I got pregnant. And he moved back in.

5. Don't Let The Rain Out

I wrote this when I found out he was cheating on me, while I was pregnant, of course he was. He moved in with her when I was 8 months along.

6. Come Back

Sigh. I have to forgive myself for being like that. But I cringe.

7. Bitch Tax

I wrote this many years later. We should have been in a much better place but for some reason, he kept us in the past, and had so much hate and distrust for me, and acted outright disrespectful to me. As if he misremembered our entire history.

If you can relate to any of my songs, you are probably in an abusive relationship. Instead of writing songs about these jerks, I should have just left them! I had no self respect. I was co dependent.  Please don't stay with people who are hurting you. Love shouldn't be a struggle.

The Long Night

 My second album is called The Long Night. I wrote these songs between the ages of 21 and 31, to express what I was going through. It tells the story of a stupid 21 year old falling for an older man, who manages to convince her that she can have it all... marriage, kids and a career in music... and then turns out to be a raging alcoholic with anger issues. But it takes ten long years for her to figure out that it's not going to get better. It takes ten years of abuse before she realizes she would rather be dead than live one more second with a drunken man baby who thinks he's king.

Of course, I'm looking back on this time with adult eyes, with years of therapy under my belt. That whole time I didn't know I could call it abuse. I didn't know that I was being gaslit into insanity. I didn't see that I was allowing myself to be exploited, that I was enabling alcoholism. I never had any self respect in my romantic relationships, I assume because I was sexually assaulted so much as a kid. Of course now I can see all the red flags in retrospect. 

If I knew then what I know now, I never would have put up with him! I would have broken up with him after the first temper tantrum. I was so dumb! 

If you relate to any of the songs on this album, you are probably in an abusive relationship. Consider talking to a therapist, just in case. 

Track list and song descriptions:

1. Happy

Basically, a song about a stupid 21 year old who thinks she's found a keeper. The fact that he was 28 was the first of many bright, red flags. I was so easy to fool!

2. Almost Tomorrow

"let's work hard to build a life better than this one." Which I did.

3. Life And Love

This is a "Keep calm and carry on" song. A "cycle of life" song. My husband's father got cancer and was dying while I was pregnant. He died, and then we had our first baby shortly after.

4. Loud And Clear

This drunken asshole is starting to get on her nerves. But she thinks she can handle it. And she believes he wants to do better, he just needs to be told. I clearly didn't understand what I was dealing with.

5. Never Good

This song is basically saying, "every time you open your mouth, you put your foot in it" and to answer your question, No, he didn't get the hint. He didn't listen to my songs. He just kept on talking shit and yelling and embarrassing me in public.

6. Truth Is Rising

This song is a bid for peace in a never ending war with an alcoholic. It didn't work.

7. Strange Soliloquy

This song is about wishing he would change. But from the lyrics I can tell that I still didn't understand that he was planning on exploiting me as long as we lived. I was very naive, wish he could read thoughts in my head- as if he cared! Even if he could have read my mind, he would've just used that information to exploit me and control me even more! It was never a fair fight and I actually thought it was. I was so clueless!

8. Bent

I have had it! But I still keep truckin' on for some reason! But someday, Buster, someday!

9. Kick

This is my "alter ego" song, where I explore really wanting to hurt him back... but of course I cave in at the end, I'm all like "just kidding! I didnt mean to hurt you even though you hurt me every day" I was completely brainwashed!

10. Little Lies

Can't lie to myself any more. Ok maybe a little.

11. Craving A Connection

It's lonely living with someone who hates you.

12. Waiting For Sunrise

Get busy living, or get busy dying.

And then I got a therapist. 

Click Bait-y Titles For My Memoir

 I Was A Six Year Old Sex Slave

Sex At Six: And Boy, Was I Screwed

How Fucking Kids Fucks Them For Life