Tag: jeanne marie

Magic

Magic

Set it free…

Set it free…

Letting Go

Not even a whisper of hope
Not even a tiny  glimmer
Not even a maybe
Yet somehow,
Letting go hurts less than holding on…

When Codependency Therapy Fails

When Codependency Therapy Fails

 

 

where do you run to woman 

where do you run to woman
when there’s no where left to go?
your feet are slowing down
your body is broken and old.
you still wanna run
you still wanna go
you wanna keep moving
from sunshine to tornadoes to snow.
where do you run to woman
when there’s no where left to go?
fifteen houses and seven states
moving trucks and new couches
starting over again, it’s a temporary relief
such an insane, disastrous distraction
cause you always pack the same problems
between your books and your shoes.
where do you run to woman
when there’s no where left to go?

Such a perfect couple…

Such a perfect couple, people always say…
They don’t know that for so many years we have said the same sentences.
“Don’t talk to me that way.”
“I talk to you that way because you made me so mad.”
“Well, that doesn’t give you the right to talk to me that way.”
“Yeah, I know.”
I believe we have said just that paragraph over five thousand times.
Exactly like that, except now and then a f’n works its way through.
So, now it’s decision time.
Because I keep repeating the same sentences too.
How do I change the script?
Our responses are so automatic.
Can you actually change within a destructive relationship or do you have to leave it?
I learned a long time ago, that you alone are responsible for what you accept from other people. I have accepted verbal abuse.
I am also responsible for how I respond to other people. I’ve become angry enough to start screaming right back at you. I don’t want to be that woman.
I don’t know how to be near you without being angry anymore and that scares me.
Can I change? Can you change?
I guess we would have if we could have.
Such a perfect couple people always say…

That feeling…

that feeling
you know
that one
that turns your blood to ice
fear that overwhelms you
when you get a phone call
in the middle of the night.
that feeling
you know
that one
that sucks the air
from your lungs
because you know
when you answer
that phone
because you know
that one call
will change
your life forever.
i had that feeling today
when i remembered
that you’re not coming back
and it really is over.
that feeling.

That shoulder is quicksand…

That shoulder is quicksand…

 

A Woman Who Thinks Too Much’s Family

My son and daughter-in-law received copies of my book, Women Who Think Too Much, yesterday and my grandson, Cole, called me last night.
He told me he was reading it and I asked him, “Are you old enough to read that?” and he said,  “Come on Grammy, do you know me? I’m very mature and I’ve been through a lot of stuff.”
I laughed. And cried.
He was so impressed with how professional the book looked and he loved the art. Thank you to my publisher, Michelle Marie, Creative Publishing for that accomplishment!
He went on and on about what an amazing, talented and creative writer I am.
Made me cry.
How incredible is that to hear that from your twelve-year-old grandson?
Then, he was reading me different parts of the book that he loved.
I am so blessed to have my family. Four kids, fifteen grand-kids and five great-grand-kids.

Women Who Think Too
A No Help At All Handbook
By Jeanne Marie

Buy Ebook Buy Women Who Think Too Much Ebook

Read Reviews for Women Who Think Too Much

Our Love Is Only

Our love is only valuable when we’re apart.
It becomes so intensely sad, wild and mystical that
I can almost forget where we were when you left.
When we’re together it’s no, I didn’t, yes, you did.
Crying and fighting and tears and yelling.
Boundaries that should never have been crossed.
Now it’s  two-thirty a.m.
and sleeping is what I should be doing
but your nice words from tonight
are swirling in my head, lingering
as I ache for your warmth in my bed.
Talking to you is so hard and so painful
as your voice awakens my anger
that we are doing this once more
and I have to live without you
when that wasn’t what I wanted.
Your current kindness stirs my grief
into a big old mess of confusion and regret.
The train is blowing through town
the whistle long, drawn out and melancholy
just like when you were here.
Now it’s three-thirty and sleep is just a thought.
I want what we didn’t have
I want what I thought we had
even as there’s no way back
to what I thought we had
for the first few years because
it was something that didn’t exist.
It’s five a.m. and as soon
as I shut my eyes the tears fall.
That’s why I don’t shut them.
Sitting alone in the house
that you pay for, the house
that is everything that I didn’t want,
but it didn’t matter what I wanted.
Watching the sun come up
behind the trees
as the tears go down.
Our love is only valuable when we’re apart.

I Cry Because

I cry, not because you’re gone, no
it’s that you left me so many years ago.
I’ve realized it was a lie, I’ve been sleeping with
and snuggling against the enemy’s back
dancing with demons in my bed
holding my breath to give you air
for thirty years too long.
I cry because
I refuse to love you anymore and
love’s removal leaves a gaping wound.
You pulled me close, then
you pushed me away so hard
you bruised my tender soul.
Over and over and said it was my fault
while I bloodied myself in battles
you had already won.
I cry because your love
was just an illusion, a reward
that I could never earn.
I cry because
I lost a love I never had at all.

More

More…

Every Mile Mattered

I have decided to live every day like it is my first and my last and to not worry about all the years I spent spinning my wheels.
Because when you come down to it, it was all about life trying to teach me what really mattered, and every step I took mattered, right or wrong.
I just wish I wasn’t such a slow learner and that I had trusted myself more and feared less.

You Said

brave (2)
You said that you’re proud of me
you said that I am strong
you said that I am beautiful
you said that I am kind
you said that you were wrong.
It would have been awesome
if you had said those words to me
before it was too late.

Spirit Whispers 3

 

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I want what you want God.
That’s all I want in my life. Nothing else.
I want to write what you want me to write.
I want to breathe the air you want me to breathe.
I want to see you in my life everyday, in every way.
That’s all I want.
Lead me where I need to go, teach me to be who I need to be.
God, heal my broken heart and let me learn the lessons I am meant to learn.
I want what you want God.

What’s Left

If we could have
we would have
but we couldn’t
and this is what’s left…
Empty arms, your clothes
folded on the bureau
two extra pillows
that I tuck around me
so I can fall asleep
left over love
your favorite glass
wedding photos
your old tee-shirt
guitars in the cellar
pictures of us kissing
between each fight and
two lonely Chihuahuas
confused, waiting
to hear your truck
pull in the drive.

New House

20180607_125253
June, 2018
Everything is still a little crazy, but that’s to be expected after a move of this magnitude .
My son, Ricky, drove two hours to see us last night, with his wife and the baby. We went out to dinner and it was so good to see them.
We went for Mexican food at a place called Lopez’s and it was delicious. It was also the first real meal I’ve eaten in a week!
Cable guy is coming today, so then I’ll have internet, thank goodness. I’ve been using fifteen extra dollars worth of data every two days. WOW.
We are dealing with the normal stuff of settling in, trying to find things and then trying to decide where to put them after we find them.
We just saw a man from the water company out front shutting off our water because we hadn’t been down to the water company yet to give them a deposit. He left it on with a threat to get to the office today.
LOL We moved in Wednesday and we already called and gave them our information.
The movers put boxes wherever they wanted, despite them all being labeled, so there are going to be a lot of boxes getting moved around.
They also tried to overcharge us by $400 but my honey said no, thank you.
My back has had more than enough and I’m having a hard time walking in the mornings, so some of those dang boxes are just going to stay where they are for a little bit!
Jerry’s brother is still here until tomorrow…he’s been a huge help.
Hoping to unpack the kitchen today, but I will see where God takes my day…
All the flowers I brought with me are doing fantastic and I’m ready to bring in some more. My honey is going to go buy bleeding hearts and lilacs at Lowe’s.
Backyard is big and shady and beautiful and my porch upstairs is more like a tree house because it’s all windows, and you look out into the tree tops.
My kids keep begging me to make it the guest room, but, I said NO; it is going to be mama’s writing room. Buy your own tree-house. I waited sixty-four years for this tree-house!
Went to buy furniture the other day and the gentleman who waited on my husband decided to make fun of Yankees and to make disparaging comments, so we won’t be buying furniture there.
People are so worried about everyone else being racist, but that doesn’t stop them, does it?
The fine gentleman lost a $2,000 sale.
To end on a positive note, I love my new house, I absolutely love having two of my children and lots of grandchildren close by and I love that my daughter Jodie is ten minutes away from me. She is my Sunshine.
Love that my friend Michelle Marie is less than an hour away because she is my Pinkshine!
💖💖💖💖💖💖💖

Ambition

Have you seen my ambition? I’ve looked everywhere and I can’t find it.
Nope. I did notice that you didn’t have much of it lately, but I thought you had put it away. Did you look in the upstairs closet?
Yes. I searched every inch of this house. Why would I put it away? That doesn’t even make sense!
I don’t know why you do the things you do. You do weird little things and I just pretend they’re normal.
Do you want me to try to help you find it?
No, that’s okay. Thank you. Wait. You have that funny little smirk on your face. Seriously, did you hide it?
Why would I hide your ambition?
Maybe so I would sit down and watch TV with you instead of running around the house, cleaning and cooking and gardening and writing.
Nope.
Well, I have to go look for it. This is sooooo not acceptable. I need my ambition and I’m not going to stop until I find it.

Bleeding Heart

Down to my last bleeding heart…

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As I Go

I must leave pieces of myself behind
as I go and that used to frustrate me.
I wanted to gather up all the pieces
and take them with me
wherever I was going.
But I can’t gather up all the pieces
I already laid down…
I know because I have tried.
The flowers I planted
roses and lilacs and
daisies and sunflowers,
gathered with you by my side.
They must stay.
Even you cannot come with me this time.
I am giving you back your heart.
The raspberry bushes I have grown
the bed we sleep in…
I have to leave it all behind.
There is no other way.
As I prepare to leave the life
that I’ve poured my worth into
I realize I will be leaving
pieces of my spirit
as I move on to another place
another garden, another season.
I think I like the idea of leaving behind
pieces of my spirit because maybe, just maybe,
those little pieces of me were blessed
and they will comfort you.
Maybe one of my sunflowers will burst
from the earth I turned and help
your hurting heart smile again.
And maybe, just maybe, we’re supposed to
leave precious pieces of ourselves behind
to nurture others as we move on.
It is not easy but I must,
I must leave pieces of myself
behind as I go.
2018 Jeanne Marie

I Am Sixty-Five, Thank you Jesus

August 11, 2018
Thank you Jesus, for allowing me to live to the age of sixty-five, a blessing that many never receive and for helping me to learn to live with the wrinkles.
Thank you for forty-two years of sobriety with only one night of insane drinking.
Thank you for the man in my life who has loved me with his entire heart. He loves me on my best days and even harder on my worst days.
Thank you for my daughter’s life, her sobriety, her sweet, forgiving, beautiful heart and the love that she showers on me. Thank you for the beauty that she sees in me.
Thank you for my four children, fifteen grandchildren and five great-grandchildren, my sisters, my family and my few, true friends.
Thank you for one beautiful house after another all the way up to fifteen, for the many moves you’ve allowed us to make safely and for all the wonderful places we’ve been able to explore.
Thank you that I can still walk when all my x-rays declare that I shouldn’t be able to get out of bed.
Thank you for the awesome gifts you tucked into my heart when you formed me, the ability to play with words and the creative ideas that flow through me.
Thank you for all the pretty clothes in my closet and all the books on my shelves.
Thank you for the successful surgery that allows me wear normal shoes for the first time in almost twenty years, and for my pink boots that I picked out as a birthday present.
Thank you for the music that blesses my life.
Thank you for the church that you led my body to because as you know, it blesses my spirit, even though it was 1800 miles away from my house at the time.
Thank you for every breath that I take and for every day I wake to find another chance. Amen.

The Table & Chairs

 

My old table and chairs have been freshly painted and they’re adorable, but that’s not all there is to it.

They have traveled a long, rough road to land pretty on my front porch.

I’ll start with when I first remember seeing them in my mom’s living room. They were brand-new, white.

I was thirty-something with three young kids and my sister, seven years younger, had four young kids.

My mom had a small basement apartment underneath my aunt’s house, but she had one closet full of blankets and pillows that we would use when we slept over. We would just spread them all over the tiny living room and it would be wall-to-wall kids.

Mom never cared how small her place was, she always had room for all of us.

We would cook huge Sunday dinners in her little kitchen, and then we would all stand there together doing the dishes.

In the evening, after the kids would settle down, my sister would put a table-cloth on the little table and a candle. She would say we were in a French bistro.

Then she would ask me to read some of my poems, which I always just happened to have with me.

For an hour so, we would all be transported to a little café in France and I was the entertainer.

My mom was my first reader and fan, but they were all my very first audience and their love for my writing carried me on waves of encouragement.

I didn’t find out until many years later that my sister also wrote poetry, and I was stunned when I read it because it was so much better than mine. She always gave me the spotlight.

My mom passed away in 2009, and I don’t know when my older sister acquired the table, but she graciously gave it to me when I asked her for it last spring. She also gave me the round cushions.

The little set traveled eighteen hundred miles with me to my new home.

My husband spent days painting it and repairing the metal binding around the table. Butterflies surrounded him as he worked, even landing on his hands.

I scrubbed it down before it was painted and butterflies were landing all over it then too.

My mom is a butterfly, so I believe the restoration made her happy.

Now that it’s finished, just looking at it makes me smile, overcome by the flood of memories it invokes.

I had my coffee at it this morning and as butterflies flitted by, I could feel my family, young and unscathed by the heartaches yet to come, unburned by the tragedies and the pain we would all go on to experience.

Those were innocent days. I just didn’t know. I am thrilled to have the table to remind me.

 

Waves

 

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Enjoy the waves of peace and happiness while you are riding high.
Soak up the sun and the sweetness so you will be strong when the waves crash down, because they will crash down.
Always have faith and believe that although the waves cannot last, they will rise again…
Waves will lift you up above your brokenness over and over.
That is what waves do.

It’s The Memories

We start out with nothing and we pick up a lot of things along the way. Some of the things are important and some of them are not.
Some of those things bring us joy and some of them bring us down. Some of them actually hinder us and so many hurt us.
Today, I sit here wondering, where are the letters I wrote to you when you were a baby?
In our crazy lives, we have moved so many times and lost so many material things, and I wonder, are baby letters material things or are they heart things?
I always tell you that you are my sunshine and the first time I told you that you were two years old.
I sat down that night and I wrote you a letter so that you would always know, no matter where you went, if we were together or apart, that you were a ray of sunshine in my life.
Since then, we’ve put a lot of miles on our boxes and our possessions.
We have traveled to different states, to different apartments and lived in dozens of houses.
A lot of memory boxes have been lost along the way.
I spent a moment regretting those losses, wishing I still had your baby book and your brother’s Hot Wheels and Lego’s and your hippie christening dress, but then I remember that most importantly, I still have you and your brother, and all the moments I spent with your sister.
I own my memories and I don’t need to carry around all the boxes.
Even knowing that, I still have way too many boxes because every time I lose a memory box, I hold on tighter to stuff.
I think today I need to clean out some of the boxes and lighten my load because in the end we come with nothing and we leave with nothing.
It’s all the people we love in between our beginnings and our endings that matter and the things we carry around are not important.
The best things can’t be packed up in a box…the memories, the love and the moments.
The boxes are just stuff that can be lost.
We own our precious memories, the moments and the love already received, because those things are safe, packed in our hearts and in our minds.

Spirit Whispers 2

Spirit Whispers

Do not look at the things that you can see and touch. Do not look at your problems, do not look at the things that are blocking your way from what you call happiness.

Look at me, just look at me and you will walk toward the plans I have for you.

Just look at me and you will feel a calming peace flow through your veins.

Just trust me, my child and my plans will unfold before you.

Walk in faith for I am with you. I am always with you. Nothing that happens in your life can overcome the plans I have for you. Just take the next right step in faith.

Trust me.