My dog has fleas. Well, not anymore.<\/p>\n
To be precise, *I* have fleas. Not my dog, not my family, no.<\/p>\n
All me. I am the most delicious person any insect has ever met, and no insect can resist me.<\/p>\n
So when my dog got fleas, and gave them to the cat, and I had bites on my ankles, the cat and the dog got flea treatment and they are fine.<\/p>\n
But the fleas keep biting me.<\/p>\n
I with I could wear a flea collar. This is embarrassing. I have a whole ring around my ankle of swollen itchy bites.<\/p>\n
So I tried some things. I vacuumed, washed all bedding. It seemed to work for a day.<\/p>\n
Then I found some herbal flea treatment, and sprayed the couch and the cat with it.<\/p>\n
That didn’t seem to work at all.<\/p>\n
Ok, it was time for some serious flea poison. Me and the internet spent some time together. I needed what the pros used.<\/p>\n
So I found it. I had to order it through the mail. I was SO HAPPY when it arrived. I sprayed it all over the couch, and washed all the bedding (AGAIN).<\/p>\n
I went to bed that night thinking, “Last night was my last itchy flea bite. Never again.”<\/p>\n
I’ve had “never again” times before.<\/p>\n
I’ve told myself<\/p>\n
I’m never going to be treated that way again.
\nI’m never going to make this or that mistake again.<\/p>\n
I’ve heard other people say
\nI’m never going to drink that much again.
\nI will never smoke another cigarette<\/p>\n
Never again is hard to enforce.<\/p>\n
In concept, if the “never again” is in my control then it should be easy, right? I’ll just never do it again.<\/p>\n
But my weakness is far more reliable than my determination. The best I can hope for is that I will never give up trying for the thing I aspire to.<\/p>\n
Then again if the “never again” thing is in the hands of someone else, I have no control over what someone else does. I can’t control how someone else treats me. The only possibility of a never-again that involves someone else is the nuclear option:<\/p>\n
Total quarantine. Never be in the presence of that person again.<\/p>\n
That’s appropriate in a small number of cases. For the rest of the time, I have to compromise with my never-again vow. I would have to commit to ‘never again will I let that go without comment’ or ‘never again will I react as I have in that circumstance.’<\/p>\n
The ‘never again’ feels very powerful when I first say it.<\/p>\n
But in my case, but it happened again. I woke again with VERY itchy bites.<\/p>\n
Life is not like the movies. There are no jump cuts.<\/p>\n
I had to go back, get educated and try again, with a more comprehensive and realistic plan.<\/p>\n
I had to get real about what this was really going to take. Never again always means a couple more times.<\/p>\n
I’ll get there. But there will be more scratching along the way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My dog has fleas. Well, not anymore. To be precise, *I* have fleas. Not my dog, not my family, no. All me. I am the most delicious person any insect has ever met, and no insect can resist me. So … Continue reading