We are all so different . . .

I am gonna ramble. I know most of you are thinking, "Isn't that what you do every day Sheri?" But you are gonna get stream of consciousness today . . .

I was thinking the other day about blogging. I have often wondered if I should've blogged anonymously and made up cute names for all my kids. At the time I started blogging I didn't even know people did that sort of thing. I was bluntly honest. I suppose that is my personality in real life. People who I talk to on a daily basis get an earful of my life, probably more than they want.

Then I started thinking, "Do they really?". They get what I want them to hear. They get snippets. They get a small sampling of what I am dealing with at the moment. As do you, my dear readers. You don't get the back story all the time, or the ideas that brought me to the decisions I make at any particular time. Even though I am a storyteller in every aspect of my life, I wouldn't have the time or the effort to explain to everyone how I can to those conclusions or how each and every thing that happened today affected me and added to the frustration I let out here on my blog. No one would want to read all that.

Blogging is important for me for two reasons. One being . . . it fulfills my love of being nosey! I love to get involved in people's lives. Who among us hasn't talked about someone, whose blog they read, in normal conversation and referred to them as a friend. For example, the other day someone at work was talking about their child's asthma flaring up and I said, "Oh my friend Yondalla has had a rough time with her asthma lately as well." How many times have I started a sentence with, "This one lady whose blog I read. . . " Or I will say, "Wow, Cali is going in for a doctor's appointment today. She should be having her baby soon. I can't wait." Then someone asks who Cali is and I have to say, "Well I haven't really met her. I read her blog everyday." People think I'm nuts. Please don't tell me I'm the only one who does this.

The second reason is that it allows me to vent. I can rant and rave about what I am dealing with and you all get it. You encourage me. You make me feel not so alone. I read your stuff and think "Wow, you clean up pee just as much as I do!" It is cathartic.

And then there are those times that we are attacked by trolls. Torina recently was a victim or a troll attack. I began thinking, how can someone attest to what is going on in any one of our homes? You can't. I may think Kari is a "mother of the year" but she has her times when she questions her ability to parent her kids. She feels as though she has failed at times and worries about the future. Claudia is up front and honest about her flaws in parenting her hard kids. She honestly proclaims that some of the things she deal with are her own issues. Cindy honestly blogs about the mental illness that runs rampant in her kids and her inability to help the situation. We all have our issues, our ways of dealing with them, and our ways of blogging about them.

I will be honest and put myself out there. . . there are times I read a post written by the mom of a special needs kid and think, "Wow. You think that was difficult? Come spend the day with Dustin!" Or I may think, "Hmmm. You get PCA hours and I get none." I am certain there are those that may think, "Sheri, get over yourself, that is nothing compared to what I deal with." We all have our own set of experiences. We come from different places and I may not know what lead to your exasperation. I wasn't there. It is easy for me to think you have it easier that particular day. There were times when I started finding you all blogging that I thought "How can they write that about their child?" I didn't skewer you, I read farther. I read the daily frustration with medications that aren't working, therapists who don't get it, doctor's who wash their hands of the situation, and insurance companies who make you fight for basic care. I see the hurt coming from friends and family members who shun your family and your kids. I read about the feeling of isolation in your communities and your fights with the law. I feel your disdain for the people who caused this trauma to be happening to your child. I see your heart! I read about your love for you child DESPITE the trauma. I live it. I get it.

I may say things that outsiders don't understand. I may use words that in the heat of the moment sound harsh or cruel. You don't live in my world. You don't understand that by saying those things here, on my blog, that I can then walk back into the playroom, hug my child and deal with whatever they throw at me because I got it out! Out of my mouth, out of my head. I had people say, "I've been there."

You (collectively) can assume all you want about me, about us (my bloggy friends), but you have no idea. As much as I love all my regular reads I don't profess to know what happens in their family just as you have no clue what happens in mine.

The written word is a sharp tool. I am super sarcastic in real life and I am certain that sometimes I come across as rough in the written arena. I have written many a comment on other's posts that someone has mistaken my intention. I can them reread it and see where that could've been construed that way. It is a difficult medium, especially when you come as I do, to simply "vomit" out your frustrations so that you can adjust yourself and better tend to your family.

I am frustrated. I am frustrated with people being "attacked". I may bring some of that heat on myself. But "you" do not know me. "You" do not live my life just as I do not live yours. I may be Sheri Rouse from Indiana and then again I may be Terri Spouse from Los Angeles. You just don't know do you? You may catch people doing horrible things to children and then again you may destroy healthy families that work hard and have a thankless job.