Always Aunt Katie

What do you do when you feel like a cause isn’t worth fighting for anymore? What do you do when that cause is supposed to be your stepdaughter? Two years ago my answer would have been to cut and run. Cut my losses and salvage what I could in the hopes of something better. This time around, I feel like my back is against a wall. Cheese and I got engaged on Christmas Day, and I got about two weeks of relative bliss before the shit completely hit the fan and the teenager lost her fucking mind and took off out of state. The police brought her home two days later. I have never been through hell like that before, and rather than soften my heart and fuel my desire to see her improve, it has hardened my heart to her. Her behavior since her return has done nothing to change the way I feel –  quite the contrary. I’ve stopped counting down the days until we start to see positive changes, and started counting down the days until she moves out. Between the random and unpredictable hair colors and the four…count ‘em FOUR… holes she’s put in her face in the past two months, she’s managed to make herself completely unemployable.  She’s made no efforts to get a driver’s license –  not that I’d give her the keys to my car; and chances are pretty good she’s going to flunk out of school, despite the weeks of work her father put into making home bound arrangements to bail her ass out of the bad situation she put herself with school already. She begs and pleads and cries about needing help, but multiple efforts to provide her with appropriate counseling and medication management are met with disregard at best and hostility at worst.  It breaks my heart to feel this way, but I don’t have anything left for her. She’s treated me like a doormat. She only comes to me when she wants something she can’t get out of her father, and I am tired of giving her even the time of day. She’s selfish, narcissistic and completely inwardly focused. To top it all off, she’s a practicing “Spiritual Satanist”.  As intolerant as I know it will make me sound, not only is this complete bullshit, it’s simply an excuse for her to do whatever she wants without having to answer for it.

I don’t know what to do. I’m supposed to be excited about my future with Cheese – planning our wedding and thinking about the future, and all I can feel is dread at the idea of dealing with M for much longer.

Imagine my horror when I realized (about 10 minutes ago) that I haven’t blogged in almost a year.  A WHOLE FRICKING YEAR.  Without going into a lot of drawn out explanation, I’ll just say that shit got busy, a little less busy, and now it’s back to consisting mostly of insanity sparsely interrupted by fully-clothed naps (usually with the light on and a cat on my face).

I’ll go back and update my info page, because it’s sorely behind the times. The writing gig was a bust – mostly my own fault for being lazy and trying to work in the same room as my bed.  Mr. Cheese’s teenage daughter (The Incredible Miss M) has moved out and moved back in.  Turns out I’m kind of a mom after all, whether I was ready for it or not. But that’s a blog post all on its own, and I don’t have enough wine for that tonight.  Our household now hosts two dogs, two cats, six guinea pigs and a rat.

Among the notable events of the past year, getting my maiden name back and acquiring permanent full-time employment probably top the list of most awesome things ever. Mr. Cheese and I are still going strong, and we still make googly eyes at each other across the table at restaurants. You know, when we can actually afford to eat out. That shit is expensive, y’all.

My fabulously ghetto 1997 Nissan Altima GLE with the chipped and faded purple paint job and bubbly tint (aka The Professor)  has reached legendary status among Miss M and her friends.  I think that part might be due to the fact that a car that ghetto still has ALL FOUR ORIGINAL HUBCAPS.  You just can’t fade that.

Given the fact that I tend to talk a lot and tell stories that ramble on forever and forever, I’m sure the events of the past year will spill out eventually.  But for now, I’ll leave it be.  Besides,  I have to go bathe a cat. This is probably going to suck.