Stories - FD Thornton

I’m a bit of a complicated person. Never one to shy away from my own shortcomings, I tend to expose the parts of myself that most keep hidden. In public I’m a bit loud mouth and a bullshitter. But in the silence of my own space, I seem to relish exercising the demons that plague my mind. I suppose that comes from all the therapy I’ve been given. Because when you lose who you are, you’ll do anything to get it back. I used to obsess and pick apart myself. I was always jealous of my peers that seem to have it all together. Never showing a crack in the veneer they wore. It wasn’t until I went public with my own situation, that I discovered that a lot of people were struggling just like me. We all wear our faces so well. Choosing just the right filter to cover our flaws. For me it never was that easy. It’s a wonder my own self-hatred hasn’t killed me before now. While I can’t say I ever planned to take my own life. The feelings of simply wanting the pain to stop was always at the surf...

It seems that with every movement I take forward, there’s always a few steps I have to fall back. Without trying to sound too mellow dramatic, I have been getting back into my walking habit. But with each walk I can feel the pressure on my worn down hips and knees. And no sooner do I finish my stroll that I’m back home looking for an ice pack or heating pad. I have not been kind to myself, I’m fat, I smoked, and honestly I put my health on the back burner for a really long time. Now all that shit is finally catching up with me. I wish I could say most of this is reversible, but when I ask my doctor’s that question, they just give me that smile. That same smile the veterinarian gives when it’s time to put Old Fluffy down. My kids get really tired of hearing me talk about this, but I am trying to do better. But there are days when I get up and look at those pill bottles and just want to throw them in the trash. It’s not that I’m tired of living, it’s just that I’m tired. But don’t ...

I have turned down the bed for the evening and put my toys away. With nothing now but my phone acting as a typewriter and some ambient music playing over my earbuds. Life is more than just notes on a scale, it’s about connection. Connection with the people around us, connection with nature, and even connection with ourselves. It’s scary to push yourself beyond your comfort zone. So today before I went on my walking meditation, I looked for every excuse not to go. It’s too hot, the sun’s too bright. I don’t like this new walking cane, I’m too out of shape, I might get dizzy. All legitimate excuses with legitimate answers. Still I pushed myself to get going. Awareness of mind can be a scary thing. It can take you down roads you just assume avoid. But if you listen compassionately to the fear and to the emotion, you might free yourself of the chains which can bind you. I used to worry about so many things. I’d plan and I’d scheme all day just to reach that pot of gold. But you kn...

Another 3am wake up call. But this time the pressure isn’t as deep. I often wonder if everyone out there is just tried of my endless banter. My constant self-refection and self-examination. But deep down it has nothing to do with the “likes”, as much as it has to do with my own sanity. My mother had a habit of writing out her troubles and setting the letter on fire. At the time I didn’t really understand, but as I’ve grown older I totally get the reason and the purpose. Life is how you choose to live it. You can be either be aware or you can choose to sleep through it. For some they choose to sleep. For others they drown their awareness in acts of self-deprecation. I think most of us lie somewhere in the middle, either totally unaware or regretting the actions we take. Worry is a bitter pill. It can cause us sleepless nights and indecisiveness. How many nights have you laid there and wondered, worrying about the coming dawn? Sleep the sweet resetter of emotions, is a friend I onl...

Within this shell lays a myriad of outcomes. From the outrageous to the timid. From the light-hearted to the cruel. All rolled into a complex machine called me. Outside influences often dictate our responses. Deep within each of us are the brands of a thousand irons. That pull from us the outcomes we neither want nor desire. But you don’t have to be a slave to your instincts. With the right focus and compassion, you can remake yourself into the person you desire. Still there are outliers that can influence us, drive us away from our desired goals. It is there where we have to focus our compassion and our resolve. In order to seek out the truth from within. Patience is the key to all real change. I know that in my life change never came from shear will. It happens when repeated effort is put into practice to correct a situation. So you say you want to change, but you have no will power. Change is the willingness to put in the work. Now does that mean you’ll never be discouraged or...

I helped raise four children, two girls and two boys. My girls are independent and strong. They have very different personalities, but they’re smart and fiercely loyal. My two son’s, well one has special needs the other doesn’t have that excuse. Still they are both smart young men that do what I ask them to do. I was not the perfect parent. If you know me, you know my backstory and my struggles. But my focus here is not about me, instead what I’m curious about are the expectations we place on our children. For decades I was criticized and scolded for my parenting skills. I either didn’t work hard enough or wasn’t hard enough on my children. I gave them too much free rein over their own lives. But you know what, most learn from their own mistakes. Without digging too deep into my children’s lives, they made mistakes. But they became strong independent people, and I like to think we had a small hand in that. Because life is what you choose, but oftentimes that choice is taking fro...

I suppose we all want to put our best foot forward. Rather it’s in business or in our professional lives. Or in our personal lives with friends and acquaintances; we like to have ourselves seen in a good light. I know in my life that was very true. I hide behind the mask’s of stability, strength, and good fortune. But nothing could be farther from the truth. It’s not that I don’t strive for these things. But for so long they were the focus of my life. So much so that I forgot how to be me. I suppose my near death experience, if you want to call it that, brought me to a place of honesty with myself. That the labels I tried to wear, were really not who I am. I am a complicated ball of erratic emotions, twisted by a life of total contradiction. If you really think about it we are feel this way. But it wasn’t until I stared the fear of death, failure, whatever you want to call it, in the eye. That realized it was okay. Sounds so freaking silly doesn’t it? But it’s best explanation I ...

Sandra Burnsed A thousand times I’ve asked myself, whatever happened to the idyllic young man who sat in these bones. Who dreamed of things to come and loved with the passion of a thousand seas. I never fully lived out any of those adventures. But I have tasted the ocean and kissed the lips of true love. Time is a possession we cannot keep, it shifts through our hands like the sand from the river bottom. We speak in symbols and the poetry of ages, to convey emotions that run deep. In thoughts that we dare not speak, yet speak easily between ourselves. The world is so different now. Changed and twisted from the simplicity of yesterday. Where thoughts and passions were played with and never seemed to end. Now we live under shrouds of darkness with never enough time or freedom. Are we not the same two? Has not the purity of love remained? Or is it stained with blood of a thousand cuts of experience and pain. But I dare not ask these questions of you. All I do is appreciate the mom...

For a really long time my life has been a series of reinventions. In other words if something didn’t work, I would do an about face and try something else. And for a really long time I would bad mouth myself for having to do so. Well a little over ten years ago I started to look seriously at the man I actually was. And what I discovered was that the building blocks for success were there. It’s just that I lacked the compassion for myself to bring it out. I’m not talking about some ego building mumbo jumbo, to make believe I am great. No. It’s that fact that I took an honest assessment of my abilities and worked from there. I attended the University of Phoenix, now before we start bad mouthing them, one of the strengths of UOP is it’s emphasis on team building. The confidence I gained from each small victory in the classroom. The affirmations I received from classmates. And the eventually ability I gained to lead were all part of the team building skills I gained at UOP. The next ...

Why is it that I’m so physically exhausted when I come back from the doctor’s office? I mean isn’t a visit to the doctor for my well being? So why am I so tuckered out by the time I’m done? One of the problems that many of us with physical and mental health issues is the gulf that separates our physical and mental healthcare. I think that most medical doctors have only a baseline understanding of mental healthcare. While most therapist have a limited understanding of physical health. I suppose psychiatrist are the bridge between the two. It wasn’t until a few years back when I began treatment with a psychiatrist, that I truly started getting relief for my mental health issues. He prescribed my current medication regiment and with a little tweaking it has worked very well. Today my cardiologist was concerned with the large amount of different medications that I take. It got me thinking that maybe I should seek treatment from a psychiatrist again. If for nothing else but to see if...

Is it fair to be unhappy? Is it okay to feel pain? Often I ask myself why I can’t just be happy with the status quo. To let things remain as they are and not rock the boat. But when I look over the horizon I can’t help but wonder, what lies on the shore. Commitments anchor us to decisions from our past. But these obligations do not bind me to them, I am still allowed to feel. Time hasn’t diminished the emotions of a different time. The passion I once carried still burn brightly. We are but a part of the same puzzle. Scattered among the fragments of a broken world. You know the emotions I feel. You see the things I see. Tied together by forces beyond our understanding. We live separately, yet together. With a shared past and an unwritten future.

The fragility of life is often it’s greatest strength over us. The helplessness we feel when someone is taken away. There is a silence that fills the void where laughter and conversation once reined. The emptiness can be over powering, so we search for comfort in the words of God. But even there the silence can be deafening. I often face death with my memories and my words. After a period of tears, I find myself digging back fondly into the memory files in my mind. Thinking of a laugh or a tear we exchanged. A word or a story, little things I often bore my children with in conversation. These are the things that help me cope with death. Still our own mortality can be the most frightening after effect of all. Realizing that at any moment we can be gone. Nothing more than an extinguished candle where a light once shined. I am often accused of being a bit morbid about my own mortality. But considering my current state one can’t help but think that way. Still it doesn’t stop me fro...