#NSFW: What's better than texts from last night? Video from this morning!

Um yeah. This is happening ...

It's time for a #change. Like now.

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

I’m normally a super happy person.  Positivity is something I always try to maintain, but lately I’ve been feeling really...shit-head-y.  I’m not sure what it is......actually, I know exactly what it is.  2010 sorta sucked.  Not just a little ween, either, like a fat stinky ingrown hair-riddle scrote.  Okay, that’s a little harsh, we did get a gorgeous baby this year.  Mostly everything else blew fat ones.  Up until this last week I have felt like my face is getting pounded in the dirt around every corner.  

See, to start, my hubby was “on call” all year, which basically means he got to work about 40% of the time.  We live very simply, but mortgage companies gots to get their dough.  Kids apparently get hungry and need food.  All silly things, I know, but we’re pretty insistent on having a place for our kids to sleep and yummies for their tummies.  The stress of not knowing if we would be getting a paycheck from week to week is not only hard on us as individuals, but because it is hard on the individuals it is hard on the couple.  

I also had an incredibly difficult pregnancy.  I had gestational diabetes, which means a whole bunch of things - the baby could be huge or tiny (my son-pregnancy #2-was 10 1/2 pounds at birth), could be stillborn, could die shortly after birth...all sorts of crazy complications.  Which means that I was on a crazy strict low carb high protein diet.  Two things that should never go together: pregnancy + diet.  Or pregnancy + low carb.  Or pregnancy + high protein.  So hard, it made me feel like total shit all the time, on top of the stresses of being pregnant.  I constantly felt guilty for needing to be on medicine, and the fear of harming my daughter if I ate too many crackers was hardcore.  Recovery from the c-section was awful, like super awful, and to top it all off, one of my hubby’s parents treated me poorly in the hospital, and even got upset that I asked my husband to help me take a shower one day when he was supposed to be home working on our remodel.  Apparently that’s a nurse’s job and it’s 1950.  

All of these things have hardened me a bit.  I find myself getting angry easily, staying annoyed with people over little things, and not giving new people much of a chance.  That is sooooooooo not me.  What the hark?  I no likey.  I no likey one bit.  I’ve been judgemental and intolerant.  And it’s time for a change.
No more of that bullshit.  I want to be positive again.  I want to be funloving again.  I want my fuse to be loooooooooooooooooooooong.  And I’m starting today.  It’s all starting from within, and it’s time to re-evaluate EVERYTHING.  So buckle up kids, it’s going to get bumpy. 

The transformation begins today.

See for yourself on Twitter or Facebook.

#ThingsThatMakeMe ... FEEL REJECTED

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

My dad is a nut.  Total nut.  Like borderline sociopath, I think.  He thinks the rules don't apply to him, he's an angry person, and he honestly honestly thinks that he has control over everrrrrything.  Literally, he told me once that if I pissed him off he would go down to the DMV and tell them to revoke my license.  Right, that's how it works, brainiac.  He was incredible emotionally and verbally abusive while I was growing up, and I finally left his house when I was sixteen.  I didn't talk to him again until I was 24, when his mother died.  I went to her funeral to be supportive to my grandpa, and he mostly acted like nothing ever happened. 

We talked, he was nice to me, and everything seemed fine.  He got to meet my daughter (she was 1), and I felt like a pretty generous person by giving him another chance.  I decided at the time that if he wanted some sort of a relationship, I would be open to it. 

I talked to him again a couple weeks after the funeral.  He called to tell me to call my grandpa.  Not for any particular reason, just to remind me to call him.  Cause I'm not a grown up, and need to be reminded to be a good person, apparently.  I told him that I was pregnant, again, and he said congratulations.  And then I never heard from him again. 

Well, not really.  He sent a present for my son on my daughters birthday.  4 months after he was born.  And last Christmas he sent a savings bond for both of my kids.  He has yet to acknowledge that I have three kids now.

You know what?  Whatever.  I haven't had a good dad ever, so it's not like this is new stuff.  But I have kids now, why would anyone not want to know their AWESOME grandkids?  Here's what gets to me - he has a relationship with my sister.  He bought her son a high chair not too long ago.  He calls her up to let her know that my grandpa is going to be in town, and takes her out to lunch.  And the kicker - he frickin called and invited her to Thanksgiving.  Let's not forget that my sister got tired of the abuse and left his house when she was 17. 

So what the fuck?  What did I do to deserve that bullshit?  It's easy to say that I don't care, but guess what?  I do.  He's my dad.  The only one I've ever had.  And for him to live in the same town as me and just not want to be around me ever?  Eff off, doucher.  I honestly think it's because he can't handle the fact that I am a successful, accomplished adult.  Really, if he can't be telling me what to do, he just doesn't know how to have a relationship with me.  It's so frustrating, and sooooo hard to stay confident when your own father choses not to love you. 

I know all I can do is be a good mom to my kids.  I can cherish the relationships I do have.  But damn, Daddy issues fuck with the brain, and they last forevvvveeeerrrr.  Forever.  I'm not sure I will ever be fully healed.  I forget and move on a bit, but then I hear that he invites one of his daughters to Thanksgiving.  Busted wide open.  Damn it. 

Tweet me.  Friend me.  Love me.

Total #buzzkill

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

I'm bummed.  I hung out with the family today, and this whole lifecasting business came up.  I had talked to my mom about it before I started, and she was totally on board.  She has read my stuff in the past, and was all about it.  Today when we talked about it she said, "Yeah, some of your posts are......interesting."

I knew right away she was talking about the shoplifting post.  She told me she knew at the time that I was lying, but there's just not much you can do when it's your kid.  I don't know....the whole thing just upsets me.  I believe that she knew I was lying at the time and didn't know what to do about it.  I guess my issue is with the tone.  She was and is the person that I worry about reading these lifecasts.  There are so many ugly things that I would like to talk about, but so much of it I don't want my mom to have to see, and I don't want her to judge me for it.  What do I do about that?  Tell her I don't think she should read this new part of my life?  How can she support me in this new adventure if I don't let her experience it.  Should I pick and choose the posts that I invite her to read?  Or just get over it, and let her see things that I am okay with everyone else but her seeing?

I just don't know what to do, and I'm sad that my previous post wasn't well-received, which out of everything I have to say, is one of the mildest.  Uuuuuggggh.  I knew this was something I would have to face eventually.  I just didn't think it would be so soon. Maybe my feelings get hurt too easily, and maybe I am being too sensitive, but this is a big part of my life right now, and I don't want to half-ass it one way or the other.

Twitter and Facebook + you = awesome.

My #life as a #wife...

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard

Hi friends!  So it looks like some bunskies got a little puckered over a posting by @JenFriel (I’m talking about this one).  So here I come to show a different side of things.  I’m a young (26) nerdette, I am married, and I have three (yeah, 3) kids.  Here is my story:

I was wild as a youngen.  And when I say wild I don’t mean I was the girl that would get rowdy at parties and maybe flash someone.  I mean WILD – yeah, I was that girl.  Drinking.  Nakedness.  Sexing.  Partying.  Smoking.  I’m sure there is more, but the memories are foggy.  I was smart, active in school, had loads of friends from loads of different social circles, and a rockin bod.  A D cup in high school = trouble.  I also had an abusive turd for a father, a mom that had to work three jobs to keep us in a house, and all of the issues that came with all of these things.  So I NEEEEVVVVVEEEEERRRRRRR wanted to get married.  I sure as shit didn’t want kids.  I had plans, I had goals, and I had a future.  And a husband and kids would just hold me back.  My dad told me more than once that I would marry young, never make anything of myself, and end up barefoot and pregnant.  That was NOT going to be me.  

My last year of high school I was in a serious relationship with a total tool (again, daddy issues), and we moved in together for convenience while I went to college.   It wasn’t anything special, we were mostly friends that just “loved” each other.  Not someone I was going to marry, just someone I was having fun with.  I had plans, and he wasn’t down for them (like moving to another country to work with animals), and that didn’t bother me at all.  My sophomore year of college I got the opportunity to go to Ecuador for a summer to study caterpillars  - I geeked out, worked 50 hours a week, and made it happen.  The first week there I met Brian, he was also a student there for a two week tour with our group.  He had been in a class with me but I was in a relationship (and so was he), so I hadn’t really noticed.  Our connection was immediate.  Just like in the movies.  I made a lame Austin Powers reference and he totally finished the quote – something the tool had never done.  We both secretly did whatever we could to work together on projects, we learned tons about each other and fell so super deep in love that it freaked our freaked.  It took 10 days.  We broke off the relationships at home, he ended up spending the summer there, and it’s been beyond amazing ever since.  We married the following year, and got pregnant on our honeymoon.  Anika came in 2007, Tucker in 2009 and Cadence in 2010 (and they were all planned, believe it or not).  

My life now is so different than high school Jen expected.  Instead of working as a zoologist I work as a professional photographer.  Instead of caring for wild animals I care for….well…wild animals.  I have a degree that I’m not using for anything other than annoying people with trivia.  So the addition of my four favorite people did change things.  I gave up a lot to have this family.  I would love to work in my field.  I would love to be in school.  But it has also enriched my life beyond belief.  The light in my daughters eyes when she tells me the things she knows (she knows that caymans are crocodiles) makes me so proud that I could just die.  Having a husband that supports all of my crazy ideas and is willing to do anything for me is more than anyone deserves. 

I do still have dreams.  I have goals.  I have a plan.  And they are all the same as ten years ago.  The timeline has just shifted.  We decided to get married and have kids early, then do grad school and travelling later.  I get to run around like a crazy person now while I have the energy.  I get to build a new profession that will benefit me my entire life.  And I get to love every minute of every day.  In five years I will head to grad school, get my PhD, and relocate the family to Ecuador.  Or something along those lines.  

So while things have changed, it certainly wasn’t a change for the worse.  Randomly finding my perfect match isn’t settling for something that society deems appropriate, it seems a lot more like fate.  Or good luck.  Or whatever.  When the world presents something like that, you snatch it up.  Not one of my choices has been because that’s what I’m supposed to do.  Actually, everyone wanted us to wait until after college to get married, and spend our twenties travelling.  By today’s standards we were supposed to wait until our thirties to have kids.  And we were only supposed to have a boy and a girl.  Nothing more.  And two dogs.  And a little fence.  Maybe we seem weird to our friends that have chosen a different path, but we are also weird to people living a similar life.  Honestly, how many 26-year-olds with 3 kids do you see lifecasting?  We are rebels, doing whatever the hell makes us happy.  

Our situation isn’t perfect, or easy.  But it’s the life we want, and we are on the track to fulfilling all of the dreams we have built for ourselves as a family and as individuals. 

So if you are in the same situation – LIVE IT UP.  Don’t sit in your cubicle just paying the bills.  Follow your passion.  Find what you love.  Ruts aren’t ravines, you can get out of them. 

I don’t care if you are married with 2.5 kids, if you are the CEO of a major corporation, or if you are a slutty slutty whore.  Do it because it makes you happy, not because your friends, family or society like it.  Settling is for d-bags, and you are not a d-bag.   

You likey?  Tell me about it on Twitter or Facebook.  I'll love you long time.