The Sofie Saga Part II Coping

There are good ways and bad ways to cope with emotional pain and some times it is hard to tell them apart.  What on the surface can look like a piss poor idea can actually turn out to be a blessing.   On the other hand, some of my brilliant ideas to feel better failed pretty miserably.  Still, I always say failure is a catalyst to learn and grow.  Speaking of learning and growing:
I learned that if you sit on the couch with a cat and watch TV you will grow.  You will grow exactly seven pounds.
I learned for the millionth time that alcohol will not make me feel better.  A week after Sofie left I drank for the first time in seven and a half years.  I learned you should go to more AA meetings not zero AA meetings when you are in crisis. If I had taken care of myself and gone to meetings I might not have found myself at the grocery store getting “stuff” for “dinner” and thinking wine is an entree.  One is supposed to call another member of AA when one feels like drinking but this one thought that was a really stupid idea because one will tell this one not to do it.  So I kept my phone in my purse and put a bottle of moderately priced wine in the grocery cart.  When I got home I put the groceries away and fixed Addie a non alcoholic dinner really fast so I wouldn’t smarten up and change my mind.  Next I had to find the corkscrew and I was panicking because I didn’t know where Don kept it.  I was worried I would not be able to open it, but it was just like riding a bike and I have spent way more time opening wine bottles than I have riding bikes.  As I poured the glass this little voice in my head kept saying, “Just drink it, just drink it.  Remember how cool and fabulous you used to be and how alcohol is the answer to all problems?”  So, I drank it.   Hmmmm.  Nothing.  I did not feel better. I did not feel the glamour I feel I am so sorely lacking because I no longer hold a wine glass.  They (the AA old timers) say that no matter how long it has been since you had a drink if you pick up again you will be right back drinking as much as you were when you stopped.  This seems to be true in my case because after two glasses I wasn’t even tipsy.  In my lost weekend days two glasses of wine were what I drank while I was shaking my martini.  Afterward, I was surprised to find I wasn’t feeling guilty, but I did need to tell on myself so I texted Don (conveniently out of town) and Peggy.  The next morning bright and early Peggy called:
Peg:  Are you going to a meeting today?
Me:  I don’t know Peg.  I haven’t decided how I feel about it.
Peg:  Well, can you do me a favor and if you won’t go for yourself can you go for me and for Sofie?  We just cannot handle another crisis right now.
Me:  God Damn it Peg!
Peg:  I promise when my cancer treatment is over and Sofie is home it can be all about you but not now.
Great.
So, I went to a meeting and a very dangerous bad idea gave me a lot of information to keep me sober in the future.  Any AA’s reading this please do not try this at home!  I was very lucky stop right away.  Most people who go out do not get back.  So pick up the phone not the glass and call someone who loves you.  They won’t tell you not to drink they will just listen to why you want to do it.  Actually, you should probably call Peggy.
Finally, what I thought was a really bad idea turned out to be the thing that saved me.  I learned that kittens don’t care if you are sad.  Life is great to a kitten- all life all the time.  It’s a party. Two weeks before Sofie left I thought if we got her a kitten it would fix everything and we got her a cute little kitten that naturally didn’t fix anything.  In fact, it made it worse because now I was yelling at her for not changing the litter box.  One week before she left, fate (named Addie Todd) brought home an abandoned 2 ½ week old baby cat.  I told Addie we could not keep her because we already had a kitten, but we could foster her.  I went to Pet Co bought  around $7,000 worth of cat formula, bottles and crates and then found myself sleeping on the couch with the kitten waking up every two hours to feed her and make her go to the bathroom.  I did not know about the bathroom part when I agreed to take care of her. The next thing I know I am carrying the “baby” around in a baby sling and putting her down for naps.  El gato es mio ahora.  That little tiny fuzz ball saved my life.  As things were sliding out of control with Sofie, I could fix the kitten and the kitten not only lived but thrived.  I grew a cat!
To Be Continued:
Part III Hoping
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The Sofie Saga, Part 1- Moping

I have been an Aunt for twenty five years and during that time I have been referred to as a Fabulous Aunt, Sainted Aunt, Tattle Tale Aunt and even Bitch of an Aunt when my nieces got in trouble because I tattled.  But yesterday, when my niece Mallory gave birth to baby Jack,  I became the best adjective of all, a Great Aunt.  Malllory lived with us for a while when she was fifteen and at the time I didn’t think she would make it to sixteen.   Now she has become a 24- year- old nursing student married to a man defending our country and has a beautiful newborn.  Good job Mal.
You may have noticed this blog has been rather quiet as of late.  That is because I was too busy with my depression to write and I had to sit on the couch everyday eating junk food and watching Bravo reality television with my new kitten.
Last October, after a whirlwind two months having a delinquent teenage girl, we sent said teenage girl to “boarding school in Utah”.  “Boarding school in Utah, Arizona, Idaho or Montana” is almost always and in this case is code for “residential treatment program”.  These schools are located exclusively in Red States because the law in those states says you can admit a minor over fourteen into a facility against their will.  Sometimes those Republicans know what they are doing.  We sent Sofie to a school with thirty- six girls dealing with such issues as self harm, suicidal ideation, adoption attachment, anxiety, depression, addiction, substance abuse and trauma.  It’s a fun place.  Pick a couple of those issues at random and you will have Sofie’s diagnosis.  The school is great and the staff is incredible.  I am so happy we found a place for her to get better, but it feels like I cut off my arm and sent it to Utah for a while.  Even as I write this the grief and sadness of the past few months covers me like a wet blanket and I can only cry. I have cried more in the last few months than in my entire life.  The computer screen looks blurry right now and it was already blurry because I am getting really old and my eyes are bad.  Things can really suck.  Sofie has never been an easy kid, but if she can learn to use her power for good and not evil she will be amazing.  My job was supposed to be to teach her how to do that and I failed.  It may not have been my fault, but I couldn’t do it.  She is only fourteen and she is not supposed to be away from me.  I am relieved she is in a safe place where she can’t hurt herself, but I hurt everyday she’s gone.  I know it’s the right thing, but as I so eloquently just said, things can really suck.
Not surprisingly my depression wasn’t going over very well with the rest of the family and I finally had to get off the couch because Don pointed out that I did have another child and she needed a bath and to go to school.  Oh yeah.  I thought it might be time when my couch buddy kitten decided there was a world beyond the blankets and left to go see it.  However, the main reason I rose like Lazarus from the couch is that the season of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills ended. That show is not even a guilty pleasure.  It’s horrible and any one who watches it should feel genuinely guilty.  I watched it because those housewives were the only people in the world acting worse than I felt.  Finally, I was able to decided I must stop all this nonsense and get up because if I was still on the couch when the Real Housewives of Orange County started I would have to shoot myself in the head.
That is not such a funny joke if you know that my Grandfather and my Great Grandfather both shot themselves in the head. It appears that depression and alcoholism run in the family.  Sorry Sofie, that’s why we sent you to live with the Mormons so quickly into your rebellion. 
Speaking of Mormons, and who isn’t these days, one silver lining has been the school is fifteen minutes away from my Mormon Aunt and Uncle.  They have been quite literally a Godsend and have been amazingly supportive. My Uncle Jack (named after Mallory’s baby) decided to join the Marine Corps and the Mormon Church when he was sixteen.  This is a man who likes structure. It has been so wonderful to connect with my Aunt and Uncle and their many children and their even many more grandchildren.  Mormon’s have some wacky ideas and some Mormon’s even have some pretty hateful ideas (prop 8), but I have never met better people than My Mormon’s and there is not a better man alive than my Uncle Jack.  I wish he was running for president instead of Mitt Romney.
To be continued : Part II Coping
Told with Sofie’s permission.

A Triumphant Return


This is a post from my friend Peggy’s Caring Bridge website. However, many of you know Conchita and those of you who don’t should so I thought I would repost here.

It looks like both Peggy and her friend Scary Conchita will be finished with their cancer treatments this week. It is so ironic that these two old showgirls would end up in treatment together. It’s been a long haul and they are both sick of having cancer and ready to get back to work. While Peg has a few things lined up, Conchita has not been as successful at procuring employment. Since many of you do not know her she asked me if I wouldn’t mind saying a few words about her resume here in case any of you hear of anything for her. Since she and Peg go way back I don’t think Peg will mind us using her webpage.

Scary Conchita made her debut when she was simply known as Conchita. She appeared in Evita at the Grand Dinner Theater as Peron’s Mistress’ Doll. The Mistress was played by the talented , lovely and then young Beverly Ward. Even though Bev was fantastic in the roll the scene belonged to Conchita and from out of nowhere a star was born. When Evita closed she was thoughtlessly put into storage by Propmaster Graham Poole until she emerged one Halloween night during the run of Sugar Babies. Among the “Sugar Babies” were Peggy Hickey, Beverly Ward, Tracy Lore and myself, DeAnne Spicer. That Halloween night 1986 Bev rescued Conchita and one of her mistress slippers from a box and the two of us ran in to each dressing room yelling, “OOH Scary Conchita” and “AHH Scary Slipper.” I remember people basically ignored us, but what happened later is dinner theater history. As if by magic Conchita, now known as Scary, would start appearing on stage. We never knew when she might jump in and join us in a dance or sketch. On night when the curtain went up we found her sitting at a front table in the audience swilling martini after martini and once while we were sitting on stage during the Minstrel number we saw her swinging from the lights overhead. Sometimes her lack of professionalism was astonishing and it was always very very Scary.

Sugar Babies closed but Conchita was now hooked. Hi Ho the glamorous life! She continued to appear in other Grand Dinner Theater productions such as La Cage Aux Folles, and GiGi. Eventually she left dinner theater and found work in numerous productions around the country. Sometimes if she didn’t feel like performing she would just turn up sitting in your tap shoes during a quick change. This usually meant there was a particularly hard nosed director or producer lurking nearby who did not appreciate her talent.

After a while she felt she wasn’t being recognized as a true artist in Musical Theater and that her talents were being wasted so she decided she would upgrade to opera. She appeared in The Merry Widow, Don Giovanni and a few others. You might think it would have been difficult for Conchita to get past the opera stage managers at the Dorothy Chandler, but you don’t know our girl. In The Merry Widow she managed to get a table at Maxim’s and in Don Giovanni she performed her most dramatic roll to date, “aborted fetus #1”, carried by a harpie sent to drag the Don to hell.

She spent a few years in retirement but the bout with cancer has reminded her of what’s important… a triumphant return to the stage! She is in pretty good shape for her age, but unlike Peggy she has lost her hair. However, she comes with her own trunk of costumes and several wigs by Rick Geyer. That’s more than most of us can say.

For more information about Conchita please contact Peg. She’d love it.

Art in the Wasteland

Time to go home. Just how many book stores, gardens, art galleries, massages, yoga, and pilates does one person need? I guess I need a lot. The trick will be to find a way to keep doing these things when I get home. Now that I am a Stay Around Mom I have e few extra hours a day and I hope I don’t fill them playing games on my IPad.

The truth is it is very difficult for me to be creative and feel good about myself in Los Angeles. When I am away from the City of Cranky Angels I don’t spend hours of every day thinking about how old and fat I am. Sometimes I even feel good about myself. LA is tough man. It is a young woman’s game and those who aren’t so young anymore are desperately trying to hold on to their size 2 jeans- myself included. It is so fricking exhausting and it takes up all the space that any creative energy or even dare I say, happiness, might creep in. Not to mention that with very few exceptions Los Angeles is a cultural wasteland. It is hard to create in a fear based atmosphere and people in LA are very afraid. This is why most television and films suck. Fear from the top of the industry down. No trust in the artist whose idea it was in the first place. I have watched it happen a million times (not really a million but a few times a year) a really good idea gets thrown like a stuffed animal to a pack of dogs and if it survives at all it is handed back to the writer barely resembling the cute little bunny it started out as with the declaration, “Now that’s a show!” When it becomes apparent that America does not want to watch a torn up stuffed animal the pack of dogs slink off to their master and say, “Must be the writer’s fault.”
I just got really distracted there. This isn’t about me at all! This is what my husband goes through every year. He’s even learned a few tricks to handling the pack of dogs. Some of them aren’t very smart so if you throw them a cookie first they might leave your stuffed animal alone. I don’t know how he does it. He has extreme discipline, does’t drink or do drugs and he still creates scripts that are wonderfully funny and deep. Art in the wasteland.
Now back to me. This is not the Don Todd blog. Can’t think of a thing. See you in LA. I’ll be the woman with the newly auburn hair, henna tattoo, wearing her glasses. I will still be wearing makeup- let’s not go overboard. Thanks Portland, I needed that.
Later: I want to add that while I consider Los Angeles to be a cultural wasteland I know many talented artist that work and thrive here. They are way cool,too.

In Fellowship

I am in Portland. I arrived yesterday, ate from a food truck, went to Powell’s book store, a three story block long stuffed with books haven (where I would like to have my ashes spread) and saw a foreign film in a theater that uses real dishes. Fabulous. I was planning on taking a vacation at the end of September, but I got a job that starts September 9, so I took it now.

I was offered a Fall Fellowship from Obama For America. Basically, I will be organizing my hometown, La Canada, land of the Republicans. I think I was offered the position because I was the only one in the San Gabriel Valley who applied. There is just one teensy problem. Besides the obvious issue of not having even one viable alternative candidate, I am not real sure why we should reelect Obama. Now, I realize this attitude is not going to send people running to the poles voting Obama, but I don’t think I am alone in my feelings. If I, DeAnne Todd, the person who stood screaming from the roof top of the Mirage in Las Vegas,” Hope! Change!”, is reluctant imagine how the less enthusiastic people in the middle who voted for him must feel. So, I am hoping to learn the reasons why I should be excited again at the training next week. I had two phone interviews for the job with people I am pretty sure were around Andrew’s age, 23. I get why they are excited, they are not as tired. But, tell me why I, a fabulously young looking married 50 year old with children and more pets than animal shelter should get excited about Obama. Can you believe they hired me? Don’t get me wrong, he is still my guy. I have faith, but even the faithful need to see the water turned into wine once in a while. At least now I won’t drink it all.
I am off now to explore Portland, but first I am going to do some yoga with the the yoga kit they gave me when I checked in and then I am going to get some coffee. I hope I can find a coffee shop in this town.

The Unclean

One of the not so nice things about being fifty is that doctors start to stick things in places where things have never been stuck before. I am prepping for my colonoscopy tomorrow and I figured everyone loves laxatives so here is my day so far:

Breakfast- 2 cups of coffee

Lunch- Diet Coke and 5 laxative pills

Not too bad yet as this was pretty much my diet from 1980-1995. The only difference is back then for dinner I would have a martini (with olive if I needed roughage) while tonight I shall be swilling a cocktail of gatorade and Mirolax. Yum.

5:15pm- 10 ounces of magnesium citrate

Yuck!! So sweet. It reminds me of what I had to drink when I was pregnant with Andrew for a glucose tolerance test. I found the test completely barbaric. After making me, a pregnant woman, fast, I had to drink this yucky stuff and have blood drawn every half hour or so to see how I processed the glucose. Well, after the first blood test I threw up and was told I would have to come back and do it again. I politely said, “No way. I threw up. Write down in my chart: does not tolerate glucose test.” I thought my body handled it perfectly, it got rid of it. O.K. Just finished the mag citrate and I am starting to get scared.

8:15pm- It is now time to start drinking an entire bottle of powdered laxative mixed with 64 oz. of gatorade. This does not taste nearly as bad as the liquid laxative. I mixed it in a a blue glass pitcher and it looks a lot like a pitcher of margaritas. What a fun party that would be! Ole!

Blogus Interuptus

I was planning on reporting on the rest of the evening, but I was in dispose. It was a loooong night and I think I only slept about two hours. The actual procedure wasn’t bad at all. In fact it was a great nap. They gave me warm blankets, pillows, drugs, and then after they asked me if I wanted apple juice. It was the most I have been taken care of since I was twelve. Don’t misunderstand, I do not want to be in the hospital, but it would be nice to be taken care of once in awhile instead of being the one taking care of everybody else. It did feel a little weird being wheeled out in a wheel chair as my friend with breast cancer jumped out of her car to open the door for me and drive me home, but oh well. The only problem is that I have to do it again because I wasn’t “clean” enough. Don’t ask. Also I am told I have to have an anesthesiologist next time because even though I was unconscious on the drugs they gave me apparently I was uncooperative and I fought them. That’s right even passed out I am difficult. I’m sure this will not surprise you. So in two weeks I have to do an even longer fast and cleanse and go back for colonoscopy number two. That’s o.k., at least I’ll get warm blankets and apple juice.

Summer Light

We are on vacation in Carpinteria. I should say the kids are on vacation and I am on a trip. It’s not really a vacation when you still have to clean, cook, and do laundry and I don’t even have to do that at home. Still, it’s really beautiful here and the view from the laundromat is nice. Yesterday I even had an entire hour to myself to lay prostrate in the sand and listen to the waves. Bliss.

So, as the sun sets slowly over Carpinteria we say a fond farewell to Summer 2011. Summer 2011 has been really difficult. Kid issues and my best friends cancer diagnosis have not been conducive to enjoying these “lazy, hazy, crazy days”. (If you are not old enough to get the song reference I do not care.) I have had to do some growing and changing this summer and I didn’t like it. I am generally of the mind that I am pretty perfect and it’s all of you who need to grow and change so it is not easy. What has been confirmed however is that even in the darkest moments there is beauty, humor and a faint glimmer of hope and light if you look for it. I have watched a marriage grow stronger and a family come together to face a really scary disease with so much courage and love. They were close before, but now they are a formidable team. I have witnessed a teenage girl bravely begin to face her immeasurable teenage angst. And, I have been fortunate enough to sit on the beach looking at the darkness within for that faint glimmer of hope and light only to look up to find myself bathing in the awesome, magic, golden light of sunset reflecting off the faces of my children and realize what is really important……… me. Joking. Kind of. Happy Summer.

Is is Hot In Here?

Please excuse the following stream of unconsciousness. Yesterday I was at the mall and I had my first hotflash and I lost my IPhone. I was passing The Brighton Store and I saw my old musical theater friend Ann Winkowski was working so I decided to stop in and say hi. Instead I said, “Is it hot in here?” At that point I started taking off any extra layers of clothes I had on and my boots. Ann took pitty on the half naked barefoot woman in her store and to get me out of view got me a chair and some water in a pretty bottle while I kept saying, “What does a hot flash feel like? What does a hot flash feel like?”. Since my heart was racing and sweat was pouring down my chest and neck I was pretty sure I was either having a hotflash or a flashback. but since I wasn’t hallucinating I deicied on hotflash. I was actually kind of excited. Hooray! The beginning of the end! Luckily I was sitting next to a basket full of flip flops so I put some on and handed Ann my credit card. I couldn’t find my phone so I went to take all my bags to the car and see if it was there. It was not and Ann came running after me to tell me I had left my card in the store and forgotten to sign the slip…..ok.

Then began the search for my phone. I staggered from cosmetic counter to cosmetic counter to see if I had left my phone with any of the heavily made up women who had so kindly shown me the latest products for aging skin. (Yes I bought them.) But, no luck. Gone. When I called the phone someone had turned it off and the locate my IPhone button was off as well. I hope you are happy whoever you are that has my phone. Enjoy the photos of the Chinese kid!
I really wanted to cry, but I couldn’t. It seemed funny in a sad pathetic, oh shit I’m old now kind of way. Don was at a business lunch meeting with a writer he is working with so I went by to see if we could locate my phone with his. From Don’s point of you I lurched to the table and said “I lost my phone and had a hot flash!” I apparantly looked like a crazy woman as confirmed by Don’s lunch partner who thought I was an insane out of work writer come over to hit Don up for a job and a new phone. Sometime during the hysterical retelling of my time at the mall he realized I was Don’s wife and I could see the look of pity in his eyes. Poor Don. I used his phone to call my number and someone picked up! Ah Ha!
Me: You have my phone!
Man: Excuse me?
Me: You have my phone!
Man: Who is this?
Me: Who is THIS?
Man: What? What number are you calling?
Me: Mine.
Man: What?
Me: You have my phone!
Man: What is your phone number?
Me: (I tell him accusingly)
Man: That is not the number you called.
I check
Me: Sorry.
At this point I put my hand in my head and laid down on the table. Don had his hand over his mouth and the poor younger writer sitting across from him decided at that moment to either never marry or become gay. I can’t blame him. You think I would be embarrassed by this kind of behavior, but much to my family’s dismay I am not.
Last week I also mailed a thank you note to my friend Donna and I had stopped writing in the middle of a sentance and mailed it to her. I also mailed a note to my friend Karen with just her name on it and no address. Today I slept 5 1/2 hours fully dressed on my bed and everytime I tried to wake up it was like I had taken to many xanax on a cross country flight. I also forgot to pick the kids up from school today and I want to drink my weight in diet coke.
Sorry I am not going back over this to edit it. It won’t help and I already forgot I wrote it.