Jared says I have been less afraid of him this year; that I am making progress.
He says for years in the 2010s to the early 2020s I flinched, as in actually jumped, whenever Jared reached out to touch me.
Jared says it hurt, but he knew it was not him I was reacting to: it was ghosts of the past.
The body keeps score.
And even now, my nervous system is highly wired and worn out.
But I do love my husband, and I am learning to trust the love that he has shown me consistently for 22 years now.
Trust is hard.
Trusting men is harder.
The body keeps score and even with 22 years of careful and tender care, there are confusing outbursts occasionally. It’s hard to remember that my husband is not the enemy sometimes.
And when my nervous system feels short-circuited due to high alert, the best thing I can do is bury my head in Jared’s chest and let him tell me, without me saying a word, “You are safe.”
In fact, when I am at my most distressed, Jared takes off his shirt to hold me, telling me I need the contact of his warm skin.
Jared says, “You are safe,” at the most unexpected times.
The situation is delicate enough that Jared’s incredible employer lets me hang out with him at work whenever it’s practical.
Right now, I am drafting this post from the hallway of the press box while Jared is working with the broadcast kids for the Halloween football game tonight.
Lots of afternoons, when I have been unable to drag myself out of the bed due to despondency, Jared will say, “Come see me,” and when I manage to get cleaned up and out of the house, I just go hang out at his office.
Jared is truly my safe place.
How I got so lucky when that man with the online profile “Maxtheape” sent me a message in early July 2003, I will never know.
I remain convinced that Jared Price saved my life.
Not in the whole chronological sense….I mean, of course I am aware that in general, a year has passed in my life.
But I mean…. it’s been quite the year, in an emotional journey sense.
2025 has been hard.
This has been the year of the financial reckoning. I was burned out and floundering and not doing well mental-health-wise which led me to close down the photography business. But also: the photography business was an unsustainable financial venture, and keeping it open greatly added to our debt every month.
I’ve been through our budget time and again over the months. We’ve used YNAB for years– since 2012– and all this time, I’ve kept track of where our money goes. It’s just that most of the time, I overlooked credit card spending. I was focusing more on the emotional wants and feeling like I needed to spend both to quell the overwhelming terror and urge to figure something out professionally, but also to stuff the overwhelming sense of boredom in my life.
And all that messiness came out in gross overspending.
And so here I am, and it’s the last days of October, and it’s month five of actually attempting to be responsible.
I spent a grand total of $22.39 this month on nonessential fun stuff for myself. That’s major progress. I bought a couple of skeins of yarn and some more antique resin cameos for necklaces and rings.
It’s not enough. Not spending is not enough to clean up this mess.
At this point, if rent were not so astronomical everywhere, if we hadn’t bought our house with a 2.875% interest rate and if the real estate landscape were not pretty atrocious right now, I’d probably be trying to figure out how to get our house on the market, to pay off our debt, because that’s probably going to be the only way out.
Not an option at the moment. We couldn’t afford to live anywhere else.
We need more income. I need a job.
And I’ve sent out tons of applications. I had an interesting offer last week, but the whole operation reeked of shady, and I’ve learned that I have a pretty stellar intuition about people so I said no. It was interesting not in the “this would be a fun job” sense but in the “I’m not sure this is a legal operation” sense.
At the same time as the financial reckoning, I’ve been seriously working on my mental and emotional health.
I’ve been facing some long demons head-on.
It’s not been easy. Progress is not linear.
I went to bed afraid of someone last night and didn’t sleep well, waking up unable to go back to sleep at 3:45 AM this morning which is why I am drafting this post at 5:30 AM.
That’s just my life.
Jared and I have been talking about the what-ifs of life lately.
Like, what if I ever had to live in this house on my own, without him.
And Jared is not sure I could do it, because I am so fearful.
And he’s right– I like to think I wouldn’t have to leave the house to go live with family or someone else, but I don’t even like to turn out the lights in the house for the night by myself.
My fear is that intense, and it’s always worse at night than during the daytime.
In the daytime, it’s manageable.
But at least this morning, I can cry, which is progress.
Because there are times that I’m so emotionally numb– most of the time, actually– that the tears don’t come.
And while trying to clean up the financial front of life, I’ve also been attempting to dissect, at the most very basics of levels, the trauma bonds that have kept me in bondage for most of my adult life, since last December.
It’s been messy, and honestly it’s been a miracle at times that I haven’t landed in a psych ward. That’s all I really care to say about it.
Except and this morning, I am angry, and I feel hurt, and slightly stupid, and I want retribution that will never come.
But, I do know this: Karma is a bitch.
So, I bide my time. And heal what I can, as I can.
Time for some shallowness and navel-gazing (not that all my posts aren’t mostly navel-gazing)….
The photo above is me in June of 2021. I’d shaved my head in July of 2020 after I bleached my hair beyond repair the month before. I was probably also 50 pounds heavier at the time.
Just so people know…..if you decide to ever shave your hair you might love it. But also know: working through the first little 3 inches or so of grow-out phase is really, really, really hard. Which is why I was mostly bald and had super short hair through June of 2022. Just saying.
It’s been a process, honestly probably, shaving my hair was an awesome thing to do because in the process, I learned how to cut my hair myself.
I’ve had probably 4 professional haircuts in the last 3 years total…..I had one in June of 2025 and the one before that was in July of 2024.
Just so y’all know….Justin Hickox on YouTube is great for videos on how to cut and give basic small layers in fine hair like mine.
I picked up some regular cutting shears, and some texturizing shears. And while my hair was super short I was still using Jared’s trimmers on my neck.
Secret fact that’s not so secret: I still mostly use the trimmers sometimes to cut my hair, especially now that I mostly want a blunt cut. It’s a lot easier to get a straight line in the back holding the mirror.
Layers can be cute for short hair but the last time I had nearly shoulder length hair my hair looked so thin and I know now it was because it had entirely too many long layers in it. That might change if my hair gets beyond shoulder length, but not holding my breath on that. I’m aging and my hair is thinner and graying in odd places, which also makes it look thinner.
As far as products, it has been an evolving system.
Now, I use plain V05 shampoo from Walmart (I think it’s $1.99), and Trader Joe’s 3-in-1 shampoo, conditioner, and body wash. I wash once with the V05 and once with the 3-in-1.
My hair tends to look greasy fast with heavy conditioners. I do use the L’Oreal Pro Longer conditioner every once in a while since I still have some….but probably not more than once every two weeks.
I’ve never been one to really use leave-in conditioners, but I picked up some Mixed Chicks leave-in conditioner at Publix and I do actually kind of love it. My hair is mostly straight but as it gets longer it has a sort of wave in the underside of it. But regardless, the Mixed Chicks conditioner is by far the lightest conditioner I’ve found.
Now, I use the Mixed Chicks conditioner most days, and I mostly focus on the hair below my ears.
Very occasionally I also do still use L’Oreal Elvive 8 Second Wonder Water in place of a conditioner, but I do this even less often than I do the L’Oreal Pro Longer conditioner at this point. I like it and it takes only a very tiny little bit with with my hair still being just below chin length, but I just don’t feel like I need it very often.
I’ve stopped using most of the L’Oreal Pro Longer line, but the one product I will continue to use daily is the L’Oreal Pro Longer Heat Protectant Cream. It is pricy but it is a 10-in-1 and I love the way it makes my hair feel. I mostly focus on the hair below my ears with this too, but I am less worried about it with this product.
I will say, with both the Mixed Chicks and the L’Oreal Heat Protectant…a very little bit goes a very long way, which is why I don’t mind the higher price.
Now that my hair is longer I am also back to using Kenra Sugar Beach Spray 7 as a texturizing spray instead of a salt spray. I like the way this make my hair feel too, and it adds a little body.
Best of all: I was a militant curling iron user from my teen years clear through adulthood.
I wish I’d stopped long enough to pay attention to my hair’s natural behavior to see that all I have to do is point the hair dryer at my ends and my hair curls under naturally. I don’t really even have to use a brush to get it to look that way. I guess it’s the natural wave, but it’s way easier on my hair than the curling iron is, for sure.
My goal for this season is to resist trims until after Christmas. That’s the issue with having the hair cutting tools and knowhow at home: It’s really easy to just pick up the shears and go at it, but that means less length over time. It’s why despite letting my hair grow since 2023, it’s still just under chin length.
So anyway, that’s the hair story these days.
If you’re new around here, you can read about me here. Have a great day!
Once upon a time, there was a girl who was out looking for herself.
She looked everywhere. She looked back in time.
She looked in her hometown.
She looked in far off places.
And there was a boy who held her hand the whole time.
And he reminded her that she was enough, that she mattered.
And he reminded her, daily, that he loved her.
And, one evening, holding the boy’s hand at the Marina in the picture above, she briefly snapped out of her fragile venture for meaning to see that it was right there, with her, holding her hand, the whole time.
