by Valerie Sussman | Apr 10, 2019 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Ladies … Start Your Engines…We’re on a ROAR!, Random Acts of Baggage
By the time my husband moved out for the fourth (and final) time I was already running on empty. I had completely lost myself in the course of an emotionally abusive marriage while raising three sons, working as a doctor, and, oh yeah—striving for perfection. I had...
by Valerie Sussman | Nov 13, 2018 | Narcissists: (Only Bad and Ugly Here)
“Narcissistic abuse” is the term used to describe the emotional abuse aimed at the unsuspecting partner of the narcissist. If you are in a relationship with a narcissist, you are guaranteed to get pricked along the way. Here are just a few of the many “gifts” the...
by Valerie Sussman | Nov 5, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Ladies … Start Your Engines…We’re on a ROAR!, Random Acts of Baggage
“Do it all, Have it all,” Said society’s liars. We women, we bought it (Such gullible buyers.) We climbed up the ladder, Wiped out (fucking tired) To the rope licked by flames, Bravely walking the wire. We fought for our balance (“Stay out of the fire!”) Burned our...
by Valerie Sussman | Nov 2, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Ladies … Start Your Engines…We’re on a ROAR!, Random Acts of Baggage
This is my story. It is a story about stories I tell myself. It’s a piece of… Story. PART ONE: “A rose is a rose is a rose…” But… What if that rose is buried under shitloads of shit? Is it still a rose? Is it a stinking rose? Is it buried treasure? Or… Is it just…...
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 31, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Random Acts of Baggage
Moral of the story: If you over-give, you WILL be over-taken. And taken over. (With apologies— and thanks— to my hero, Shel Silverstein)
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 30, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Random Acts of Baggage
When is it the ripe time for forgiveness? Will it come spontaneously with little foreplay? Or do I have to be in the mood— Wine it, dine it, and undress the part? Will it enter gently—or with a bang? What if I just lie back and wait? Will it come? Oh, fuck it… How...
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 25, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown, Ladies … Start Your Engines…We’re on a ROAR!
Bye, bye, Blandyland, Land of Black and White, Land where all waters run shallow, Where wading is the only way, And in is the only out. Where cotton is the only candy, (White cotton, that is.) Where smiling masks are pasted on, Smiling masks that mask all. Where rigid...
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 25, 2018 | Divorce: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Narcissists: (Only Bad and Ugly Here), Random Acts of Baggage
I married the perfect man. Narcissistic, mysogenistic, Emotionally stunted. Entitled, withholding, passive-aggressive. (But enough about me.) Naturally his outward-facing persona was that of the “good guy.” (It was truly crazy-making.) I, of course, was last on his...
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 23, 2018 | Divorce: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Ladies … Start Your Engines…We’re on a ROAR!, Random Acts of Baggage
I have an ongoing love affair with fleece. I guess you could say I’m sweet on sweats. Unfortunately for me, my (now ex-) husband of twenty years was… not so much. Just the opposite, in fact. To him, “fleece” was the real “f-word,” an abomination, an obscenity....
![Getting [Un]Stuck](https://www.whybebeige.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Getting-unstuck-1.jpg)
by Valerie Sussman | Oct 16, 2018 | Explorations, Excavations, Extractions, and Expressions from My Midlife Moltdown
“Throw five things against the wall and see what sticks,” was the wisdom my always-wise, 70-something-year-old neighbor, Tom, a retired attorney, shared with me as I cried on his shoulder about my impending divorce and my decision to leave the practice of medicine...
