Compliments are insults...

Yesterday I wrote about plans and how they can change. Sometimes we want them to, sometimes they have to and sometimes it just happens. Sometimes we have no plans at all, like me, with this blog. Random thought comes into my head and that’s what I write about. More or less. Today, however, I did make an effort to try and make a plan. Still work in progress, not sure if it will work and right now, to be honest, not really sure I want it to. Right now I feel that the random thoughts in my head is what i should go with. But I don’t know. Needs more thought.

I did manage to, at least try to plan things. I didn’t manage to out for a walk and pictures though. Again. But I am still feeling that cold and my body hurts all over. It cannot mean that I gave up. It must just mean that I need a little break from pushing myself. I need to let myself heal from my cold first. Or at least get serious with that sleeping thing I thought so highly of a while back. Not doing too well on that front.

A front where I am doing good is Instagram. The numbers are climbing. Gained one hundred new followers in three days, and looking back I notice I gained two hundred in one week. That’s nice. I do work for it though. Not only the exhausting myself to get the perfect pictures, in my opinion at least the best I can do. But I also work the media. Like all social media you need to be active. Like pictures, comment, follow back, find new people to follow, make the connections. Look for the people who do what you do, the people who will like what you do, make sure that they find you and like you. If you do a lot of social media, you know what I mean. If you don’t, just know that I spend a lot of time on them connecting with people.

All followers and likes are really fun. I have met some really nice people I talk to a lot on Instagram. It’s not just about posting pictures, it’s about meeting people who share the same interest as you do. But I have to admit that when someone who is a professional photographer, when you see their pictures and know they belong in a gallery or a photo book and they like your pictures… that’s awesome. Or people who have specialized in macro, for instance, they have so many absolutely stunning macro photos and they like one of your macro photos… it’s special. Or when they follow you… It’s recognition from people who know what they are doing. For me who barely has a clue. Still learning to walk while they run free or even fly. Comments like: “You should be a photographer” or “You really have talent” or “You have a good eye”. That’s a little bit extra great. But I love all comments and likes and followers. It’s helping the insecure little girl feel that maybe some things she does may be good enough.

A funny thing that happened today and which is the random thought that controls today's writing is a comment I got on one of the pictures I posted today: “Great picture, good work” and a smiley face. Great compliment. Be grateful, right? One would think, but I can be weird. I don’t know if it is because she lives close to me, about half way between where I live and town. Just a little bit up the river. Maybe it’s because she followed me, then unfollowed, and the began to follow me again. Maybe I feel she’s a little bit too impatient with what I have posted. Sometimes I experiment with filters and edits, maybe she didn’t like that. I don’t know. But that comment of hers, that compliment… Maybe I am the only person who can take a compliment as an insult, but I my first thought was: “What’s wrong with the rest of them?”. Maybe I took it as her being condescending. Do you really never feel like that? Honestly? Someone gives you a compliment and you just wonder was it so bad before? The hair, the outfit, your style, whatever. Maybe it’s just imagination and insecurity or maybe it’s something in their tone of voice. They’re just a little bit too enthusiastic. I don’t know. I lasted a split second and then it was gone. The thought, the feeling, that part of me that turned a compliment to an insult only had control a brief moment, but enough for me to catch it before it disappeared.

I’m not really good with compliments though. I can give them to other people, but not take them. I just get weird. A therapist I saw once at the hospital said I was rude. I should allow people to have their own opinion about me, what I do and things like that. Just because I can’t see what other people might see and because it in some way involves me doesn’t give me the right to dictate what other people should think. He asked me how I would like it if the roles were reversed and I wouldn’t. I’m trying to improve. To at least not call people liars, but to say thank you instead. Even if it feels really wrong because I know they are wrong…

Maybe it’s because I never got any compliments when I was growing up. I never had a cheerleader in my mother, she was my biggest critic until I could play that part myself. No, wait, she still is if I give her the chance. Not talking to her for over a year has made me the biggest though. No compliments, no praising of the things I did. Only telling me what I should have done to make it better. In a way I have been schooled, trained, taught to expect nothing but criticism. When people are nice, say nice things, give me compliments. I have no training for that and it’s easy not to believe them because I am so used to not being good enough. How could I believe it? I don’t want to be rude though, so I fake it. Maybe one day I’ll actually make it.

Thank you! Fake it till you make it. One “Thank you!” at a time!!!

I'm not fine, I'm just pretending to be

Do you recycle? It’s good for the environment to recycle. I do, at least Coke-bottles and my roommate’s beer cans. Because you get money back from that and right now I need all the money I can get. And I know. Buying that Coke-bottle is a serious waste of money, but I’m addicted so what can I do? I used to recycle a lot of other stuff too before my health took a nosedive into a seriously bad state. Paper, glass, plastic stuff, more or less everything. Even organic material, from food and such is recycled. They turn it into bio-gas in the neighbor town to the north of mine. We do kind of get payed for that too, less garbage less payment for the removal. Whatever ends up in the garbage gets burnt in a special facility and used for keeping the houses in town warm.

However that’s not really really the kind of recycling I was going to write about. I am going to recycle an old topic from just a while back. Recycling my thoughts if you wish. Well, technically, since this is all finished, written and published before you read it you don’t really have that much say in the matter. As usual I just write what I write.

I have not been feeling too well this past week. I’m really feeling my cold and it’s probably not getting any better by the fact that I don’t sleep too well. As a result I am very tired, my head hurts and i am not going out for my walks as I should. I am not getting out into the daylight as I should and I am not getting the pictures I need for my Instagram. Having stayed in bed all day today I found I had nothing to post. Nothing to post means that you don’t get any new likes, any new followers, which means that when the followers of a lesser degree of seriousness unfollow your numbers go the wrong way. We like our numbers to grow, don’t we?

Since I didn’t have any new pictures I could have posted some of my old. Not recycling old posted pictures, but I have so many I never used. But instead of doing that I posted some pictures I got from a friend of mine. He gave me his permission so that’s okay, he gave them to me, he took them for me because he knew I’d like them. Okay, so it wasn’t just any friend. It’s my ex boyfriend. And the weren’t old pictures from way back when he wasn’t an ex yet. It’s from a few days ago. Yeah. I still talk to him. He took some photographs for me that he knew I would like…

I guess, theoretically, there’s nothing wrong with that. Except. I’m not really over all that. Everything that happened. Whatever it was that happened. Or why it happened. I can’t ask either because it makes him upset if he thinks I’m upset. So I pretend everything's okay, that I’m fine. A lot of the time I am, or I have been. Not so much when I am tired from not sleeping and feeling bad from my cold. Right now I am not fine at all. But what can I do? Type - delete - type - delete. rinse and repeat! Until I find something that I can say that isn’t showing how I really feel. To spare his feelings? To spare mine? What if he really leaves? But he’s already left, hasn’t he?

Recycling the thought I had a few days back: “When do you give up?” I don’t know. From what he’s done, from what he did, and all the things I have found out. Internet can hide secrets, but they are hidden in public and never as good as you might think. The funniest, or saddest, part is that I don’t even have to look. Just checking in on a friend and there it is, falling into my lap, or eyes or wherever Internet secrets fall. For someone who is active online and uses a lot of the available social media it’s easy to find things you don’t want to find. Things someone else probably wishes you wouldn’t find. The only smart thing is to never keep secrets online. Or maybe not have any to begin with. Secrets are often lies and you just shouldn’t lie.

I’m sure most people would have cursed the day he was born, told him to go the warm place and been done with it. I can’t. I forgive people, I still try to help them when they need help. I still care, no matter what they’ve done to me. Sounds really pathetic, I know. Needy. Weak. Pathetic pretty much sums it up, doesn't it? Someone said to me on Twitter: “Don’t you dare let him think you’d have him back!” He doesn’t want that, he’s happy with the new girl. And I am not even sure I’d want it either. He says he wants to go back to the time before, but that’s not how he’s acting so I don’t know. Maybe I’d want that too. But maybe I’ve just got a fever from my cold right now.

Why can’t I just give up? People aren’t treating me right, I know that. But I still let them, I don’t give up and walk away. I don’t respect myself enough to say I deserve better and walk away. I don’t think it’s because i’m afraid of being alone. I’ve been there before. I mean not just without a boyfriend, I mean pretty much without anyone. I’ve done that. It’s okay. No one can hurt you then. Maybe it’s because I’m questioning if anything he said ever was true. Maybe it was just all lies and I, the  girl with serious trust issues who doesn't let anyone in… Maybe I was too trusting, too gullible... The irony of that one…

But now that I know, why don’t I just give up?

Thank you!!! Fake it till you make it, one smile at a time!!!

When plans change...

Do you also have those moments when you’re just about to do something. have it all planned and then a friends shows up and you forget half of your plans? Of course we always prioritize the friend, right? Except if we have a very important appointment. But when you’re just about to go out and run some errands or whatever you do. You spend time with your friend well aware that your plans can wait. No hurry. Eventually you get to go and when you come home again you realize that you forgot one of the things you had made very clear to yourself that you were going to do while you were out. Maybe it wasn’t the reason for going out, maybe not even top two or three reasons, but it was still something you really wanted to do.

Today I had decided that I would at least begin to plan my blog while I was out and about, but now that I am home again, about to write my daily thousand I remember what I completely forgot. The reason? A friend. He has just had his final day at university, at least as a student. I don’t really know what he’s planning on doing after this. But today was the last day, the finale of many years hard studies and he was so happy about it he couldn’t sleep. He was also still a little bit drunk from the celebrations. It was really nice to be able to share some of his happiness today. We had a very nice talk so I am definitely glad he caught me before I left home. I still don’t have Internet on my phone or tablet. Note to self: “Please fix soon!!!”

It’s an online friend of course. Do I have any other? Well a few, but I rarely meet them offline either at the moment. How things turn out, right? I was just getting ready to go out. I had the plan to plan my blog in the front of my memory log so I wouldn’t forget and then I got the notification I had a message. Change of plans. Don’t misunderstand! I was glad to change my plans for a conversation with him. Not stressed, not eagerly waiting for it to be over, not checking out through the window as daylight were slowly fading. Seriously I wasn’t. I knew he wouldn’t talk for long. He had to sleep. He’s nine hours ahead of me. Right now sleeping in the early morning of Friday the thirtieth while I am writing the blog post for Thursday twenty ninth. Time zones can really drive you crazy if you let them. I am used to US time zones now, but Australia brings on a new level of crazy. Not to mention the fact that it’s spring down there. Really nice people though. Mhmm…

When I finally left the sun was about to go down behind the tree tops and the clouds were beginning to cover the sky. I wish I had money to buy a real camera that would work better in these conditions. And do macro better. Maybe better zoom. More pixels. Definitely more pixels. But I need to pay my bills first. And I don’t know enough about cameras to know what it is I want. Can’t always trust the salespeople. At least you need to know what you want, right?

Anyway. I went to a place I have visited a few times before where I thought there still might be enough light. But when I got there… Never mind the light. The ground was still full of frost even in the afternoon of a sunny day. There was a thin layer of ice on the water. It’s really getting cold now. There were amazing crystals in the grass, but unfortunately I couldn’t take any good pictures of them. Macro needs you to be holding the camera absolutely still. That’s difficult when you’re standing bent over like an idiot in the middle of a field. You don’t even need the cars driving by on the road behind you to realize that’s what you look like. You can feel it in your body. Stop doing this, you idiot, it’s yelling, but your brain wants to try to get that picture anyway. So now my back is really hurt because I wasn’t listening. Joking aside, it does hurt quite bad right now. I need something to sit on and I could use a tripod too actually. Money though, the thing you use to get the things you need are sadly not reaching the necessary levels for me to get any of those things. Maybe I could find something to sit on though. Like a foldable chair that’s not too heavy.

I had intended to think about the blog while I was out. Trying to figure out if I could make some kind of schedule. Figuring out what I am going to do, where I am going to go from here. There’s a new month soon. It’s time to be serious about what I am doing here, again. Or was I ever? I think I had a much better grip on the blogging part than I do now. Now I just write and press publish. More or less. I’m just doing what I’ve always done. Letting it flow, but sometimes maybe there needs to be a little bit of control. And either way doing what I’ve always been doing isn’t exactly trying to improve, is it?

A perfectionist who never thinks anything she does is ever good enough should at least try to improve, wouldn’t you think? Just complaining about it isn’t going to make anything better. I think I’ve proved that I don’t give up that easily, but I have become stuck on this level. It’s like some kind of blogging comfort zone where I defend everything with: “I’m doing this to heal myself”. I guess I could leave it at that and not care about anything else, but that isn’t really me. I want perfection, I want improvement, I want to learn, I need to get better than I was before. Yes, I compete against myself, not anyone else. Improvement is measured internally, right. When you become better than you were. That’s what’s important.

Congrats to my friend who has finished improving his study results and who’s now set free in society to do whatever he wants, at least for awhile. Good job!!!

Thank you for reading and don’t forget to smile!!!!

When do you give up?

I have a friend who live streams. Yesterday I read in one of his posts that he gets complaints from people that he’s a bad streamer. Apparently he’s got haters. When I asked him about it he said happily: “that means I’m doing something right!”. I got kind of sad, because that means I’m not. He tried to cheer me up by reminding me that people have disliked my YouTube videos and one person did actually unsub because of that. That made me feel a little bit better… At least one person hate me enough to unsub…

All joking aside, of course it’s never fun to get haters and of course he’s not happy about it. He works really hard to make people smile and doesn’t deserve this. It’s impossible to make everyone happy, some people will like what you do some won’t. I just don’t understand why the people who don’t just leave and find something they like instead. That would make their lives so much better maybe they’ll even lose their wish to hate, but maybe that’s what They work hard to do. It reminds me of that person who disliked all the people calling themselves writers, but who only write boring, self centered stuff that even makes libraries sigh. You can’t please everyone, but it is difficult not to react when people say these things. You have to be very egoistic to just turn your back to it and keep writing your boring, self centered rubbish instead of quitting as was suggested. Being able to call myself a writer took some time, having my right to the title questioned could have made me give up. But here I am still being self centered. And my friend will keep streaming for all the people who believe in him, pretending haters doesn’t bother him, but of course they do. To feel nothing would mean your not human or maybe that you don’t care about what you do. And we’re not the ones being weak or fragile. We keep moving even when it hurts. One smile at a time…

And of course I’m not happy someone unsubscribes because of a video I made. With my low numbers it’s all friends, which means a friend of mine chose to stop supporting me and my channel because of one video. That’s some pretty personal hating right there. I know that not even friends have to like everything you do, or watch it, or read it, and I have had many friends commenting on some of my videos. But they have come to me and said it to me directly. I can take that. I haven’t always been completely serious with every single video I’ve made. It’s okay to tell me what you think, we’re friends, right? That’s what friends do. Not saying a word but unsubscribing is not exactly what I’d expect a friend to do. It’s not as if I make a constant stream of weird videos that would completely fill your inbox with stupid stuff. I’m easily ignored.

Sometimes socializing with people can feel as if you’re taking a walk in a mine field. A walk can be such a nice and pleasant thing, and so is meeting people, dinners, parties, hanging out with friends, talking, whatever you, it should be nice and pleasant. But with some people you feel as if you constantly have to be on guard, you never know what’s going to happen, but sooner or later a mine will go off. I don’t know if that’s how I make other people feel too, but I wouldn’t be surprised. For some reason, though, I never get the feeling that they are taking this walk with the same caution as I am. Maybe I am very sensitive and appear to be made of glass, but some people I know can be very disrespectful and rude. They never seem to listen or even try to understand whatever it is I am trying to say. Or maybe they just aren’t interested. Maybe the self centered boring writer has met one of those readers who aren’t all that interested in me, despite claiming to be a friend. Or my mother. I keep it all down, bottle it up, say nothing for as long as I can. Fake the smile for as long as I can. When I can’t smile anymore I try not to frown. I still try to at least keep my poker face, and trust me, I can have an extreme poker face. That’s the only thing about poker I’m really good at. Not giving it away. Make believe I am fine, when I’m boiling inside. Anyone with any kind of sensitivity would eventually feel the tension in the air. Notice that I am not responding anymore. It’s difficult to say anything when you’re biting your tongue so hard to prevent all the things you really want to say from slipping out. My mother never has any idea. She can go on and on, from one rude comment to the next. And because she never stops eventually I will snap. And when I do she gets so shocked, how could I?

Some people are difficult to get along with, but when do you give up on family or a friend? In my mother’s case, she doesn’t understand that she’s done something wrong. She always thinks she’s right. No matter how close to bullying her so called help is, she still believe she’s right. Even when everybody around us can see how she’s only hurting me, making me feel worse, making me give up, making me want to die. She can’t see that. She believes she’s right and that she’s helping. Even her best friend called me last year apologizing for believing my mother, My mothers best friend called me to say she finally understood how difficult my life with my mother must have been. She understood why I had to call the police to get my own mother removed from house. My mother can seem like such a nice person at first, but say or do something she doesn’t like and you’ll understand why I am afraid of her.

I knew all this about her and I still let her move in. I should have known it wouldn’t work. I did know it wouldn’t work. But when do you give up? I could see she was lonely, I’m her only child. I know she doesn’t understand me like I understand her. I know she will hurt me, but when do you give up? I keep letting people hurt me because I just don’t know when it’s time to give up.

Giving up on writing for today, well past my magic number so it’s time to stop. Thank you, keep smiling and be careful in mine fields!!!

Routines and blogging

Sometimes when it’s time to start writing I find that I don’t know what to write about, there’s nothing that I feel really motivated to write about. Sometimes there’s too many things I would like to write about and I don’t really know which way to go. I start writing something, but then I get a better idea so I delete everything and start over. Sometimes it feels as if the thing I want to write about is too small to fill the entire thousand words. Sometimes there’s too much to say and a thousand words isn’t enough. And sometimes I do actually stop to think that maybe I shouldn’t be writing about that. Not nearly as often as I probably should, but sometimes I do.

The people who know how to write and how to blog, and who give us wannabes advice on how to do it say that you should plan what you're going to write. One blogger had a schedule on what to discuss on various days of the week. That’s probably a good idea, but I have no idea how I would be able to work that into the chaos I’ve created with this blog.

Before I went on my involuntary hiatus, when I lost my Internet for almost a month, I had begun to plan a little bit. Not as an active plan to plan, it kind of just happened. My thoughts were so often in the blog that non-planned planning began to happen. I had a much better schedule for this back then. Maybe I took it more seriously, or maybe my life was slightly different back then. Definitely better emotionally wise… After I came back I have really needed the writing to deal with the events that were discovered after the return of my Internet. Discoveries that made me wish I never had gotten it back at all. I had a lot of pain and frustration to deal with and to write about as a healing process. And I think I have continued just dealing with the dealing with what happened back then, over a month ago. I’m still not over it. That’s just how it is. Things are better, but things are not good. I’m still trying to deal with it though.

When I started this blog in August i wrote a lot about writing, about the thousand word a day challenge, about blogging and how I saw that as a challenge in itself. I also talked about my confidence not even realizing how that probably was the biggest challenge of them all. Now I’ve been talking a lot about going outside, taking my walks, taking my pictures. Instagram where it used to be Twitter. My sleep problem has always been an issue, but I can feel the effects of not sleeping enough a lot more now than before. And I want to catch the light for my pictures. I’m still writing and I do mention that challenge. I have talked about how it has affected me in the past. The blogging though…

I did have the intention, for a while at least, to think about and maybe plan my blog while I was out chasing pictures. Have not done that yet. Have had hard enough time to get that routine to work in itself let alone add thinking into the picture… Unintended pun, but what can I say? I used to be a taxi driver. We do have a special kind of humor.

Before my hiatus I used to write in the morning, let it all have a rest during the day. Get some distance and then edit in the evening before publishing it. Now I write and publish as fast as I can. I am even running late with writing so I miss the deadline I have given myself. It used to be midnight, my time, which is CET or GMT+1, but I have changed it to 9.30 pm and that just came and went, while I was doing something other that writing. Or… I was writing, just not what I should be writing. Slightly procrastinating again…

I find it easier to edit when I wait for awhile. It’s like seeing the text with new eyes, easier to notice the little things you can so easily miss when you’re writing it. You have the thought still in your head, you know what you mean and what it’s supposed to say. There’s a danger of reading stuff into the test that isn’t really there or in believing that something makes any sense when it really doesn’t. Tried to find the translation for what we call it in Swedish, but I’m not sure if it means the same to you: “blind to flaws at home”. Sometimes the translation helpers don’t give enough information.

Things were easier in the beginning of August. I only had the writing to worry about. I had someone who cared about me, who helped me keep my routines of not sleeping at night. I did sleep EST hours except for my writing, and I slept when he was at work. It was easier then. Just worrying about and trying to organize my writing. With the extra additions I have less time to work with, but on the other hand I have more time because no one is there to spend it with. I have to fill all the hours myself. But I’m also a lot more lonely and sad. Sleeping is difficult not because someone is occupying my time, but because I have too much time to think and then the circle of no sleep helps making it worse. The tired minds finds the things that makes me sad, the sad me cries and then I can’t sleep.

The tired mind can’t be bothered with planning what to blog. The tired mind can come with me outside and take the beautiful pictures, or at least try. The tired mind still don’t want to think about the blog. The tired mind focuses on things that makes it more sad. More crying. And then the mind gets more tired than it was. I should maybe go to sleep now.

Good night. Thank you!!!

Dealing with my panic attacks

Today I had to go through my bills. No one likes this part of life very much, but I have managed to bring the normal dislike to a new level. I have a phobia against bills. I get panic attacks. I feel sick, I feel dizzy, I can’t breathe, my heart starts to beat very hard and very fast. I get very weak, it feels as if I am completely incapable of moving. I cry because I find everything really horrifying and difficult. These are the moments when I miss my ex the most because he knew, he understood and he could always help me. It’s just that, even if we still talk now and then, when I really could use some help he’s nowhere around. I know. I have to learn how to do this on my own and I am trying. I am beginning to cry as i write this, which is stupid because I have already sorted the bills. All I have to do is go to the bank tomorrow and pay them.

Last month I tried to talk to a friend to get some help through this, but he didn’t understand me at all and was almost rude. Then I talked to a stranger on Twitter and he was remarkably understanding. Unfortunately we stopped talking a few weeks back for some reason. Tonight I tried talking to another friend, but that became really weird and awkward. So that didn’t work. I just don’t know where to turn now. I guess there is no one who can save me besides me, myself, alone.

I used to get a lot more panic attacks than I do now, which in a way is a little bit strange. Going to the store was really difficult and I got an assistant to help me with these things. We would meet at the store and she would help me shop for whatever I needed. In the beginning I also had a lot more problems with my back so it helped to have someone with me so I could go outside and sit down if I needed to and she’d stay with the stuff. Then I started trying to do shop on my own. But as with the bills, a panic attack being a panic attack no matter the reason, my ex would be there and help me. Eventually I could do it myself. Even when I’ve had to recycle cans and bottles to get money to buy anything I could do it. That was difficult, but with no Internet I had only myself to rely on and I did it. Now, especially when I do have money it’s not really such a problem anymore.

For a long time I would get a panic attack just thinking about leaving the house. If I had to go somewhere, if there were some authorities I had to meet, she’d be there and that made a huge difference. I’d often get so worked up about everything that I couldn’t answer their questions. My assistant would have to help fill in for me. She’d also meet me when I had to go to the bank. Now I can do that by myself, maybe because I only use their computers, but I couldn’t even do that alone to begin with. There have been times when I hardly left my house at all. This summer I did all my shopping once a week and for the rest of the days I never went out. It wasn’t just the rain.

People have also scared me. I mentioned how I was even scared of joining a server to play Minecraft. I still did, but I avoided people until that Oktoberfest that changed my life. I wrote about it in a previous post. I can still feel troubled if there’s too much people. The waiting room at the medical center is okay because I am so used to be there, but at the hospital it can feel a little bit too much. And if there are too many cars parked outside the store I will leave and come back later, or go somewhere else. The bank is another issue, but I just sneak in to the computers and try to focus on my thing. People too close or behind me worries me though. I try to tell myself it’s a security thing, they can see the screen, but I don’t know if that’s the whole truth. I still go though. And I do leave my house every day. And I do talk to people.

All of this has started after my last accident. Or after the doctor told me to stay at home and work on my health to be absolutely accurate. I was working as a taxi driver when that happened. Meeting people was my job. I loved it. I was at University, working on a project, going to conferences, presenting papers, being on panels, even did some teaching. Being afraid of people was not a thing. Being afraid to go out? I was always out, working or doing something with friends or alone. I went outside, nature, running the forest tracks, going out to clubs or parties, movies, restaurants. Or I was working. Even nights. Weekends, club nights. I was never afraid. Paying bills was a problem, but nothing like this. I had never experienced a panic attack before this happened. In just a short while my whole world changed and I was controlled by them.

I think it’s something that can happen when an active person suddenly gets stuck at home. And why didn’t I keep going out and such? Because I have really bad back problems. In the end all I did was drive my taxi. Walking was difficult, standing up even worse. There was a reason why the doctor wanted me at home, working on my health, but it did ruin other parts of my health. I got depressed and then the panic attacks began. I realize now that staying active can very well be a way of running from your problems. As long as you keep going you don’t have to deal with them. When I got “grounded” they caught up with me.

How did my ex help me? He had faith in me, told me over and over: “you can do this!” “I believe in you!”, he would always stay close, be there. even when he wasn’t physically there, it was enough to know that he was thinking about me. He would hug me, nuzzle me, whatever just to make me see I wasn’t alone. Always calm, understanding, reassuring. So that when I went to do what I had to do I could hear his voice in my head.

Sorry this post ran a little bit long, I needed to talk about this...

Thank you!!! Keep smiling!!!

Doing it my way, I'm the only one who can!

Just finished watching Cooties, a horror movie from last year. Halloween is the season for that category of movie, isn’t it? Elijah Wood is back in horror and in a school, grown up now though and a sub, but still, kind of, a member of the faculty. I still like that movie better though, the Faculty. It has it’s moments though, some attempts at humor. Not really scary, and the only thing that I found too much is the first bite in the beginning. If you’ve seen it you know what I mean, if not, never mind. I’ll never eat chicken nuggets again though, that’s for sure.

Today has been a bad day, the only walking has been out to the balcony to get a picture of the fascinating color of the sky at sunset. Like an orange. Hmm… It was orange. The only pictures I’ve taken was those pictures from the balcony. Another Instagrammer from my part of the world got an amazing picture of a rainbow, or two. One very bright and clear, the other one fuzzier. I missed that because I didn’t sleep at all last night. Again. Three daily challenges that I have failed today.

Talking about failing, or maybe not. Social media can make you very obsessed with the numbers. People follow me, people like my pictures, favorite my tweets, read my blog and to get those numbers you try to figure out what it is that people want. Why did that picture get more likes than that one, which ones get the most likes, which blog posts get the most views? And the you start chasing that result again, you try to take that type of pictures, if that’s what people like. You try to write those blog posts that seem to interest more people. The problem is it doesn’t work. Trying to repeat something that did well before does not necessarily make it equally good. The sequel is mostly not as good as the first movie. Cooties is not as good as Faculty.

When I started working as a taxi driver one of the bosses compared the taxi job to a strategic game. To get the best results you need to know where to find the customers. The town and the surrounding area is divided into districts and whoever is in the right district will get that job. So most new drivers start making lists, trying to remember when and where the steady customers are. I did that too. To a point it worked, but it was very stressful. Part of the reason why you do is because as a taxi driver your pay is a percentage of what you take in, the more customers, the more money you bring in, the more money you get. There is a guaranteed salary, but it’s very low. Eventually I had had enough of the chasing. I gave up, said okay I work for the guarantee pay and have a less stressful job instead. That’s when it all changed. I still had some feel for where to go and when, but I didn’t chase anything specific. I was one of the best drivers my boss had, one of them who brought in the most money. Because I gave up the chase, but still did the job. I did my thing, my way. And that worked.

I came to think about that because I am checking my numbers on Instagram too much. I want one picture to get more than a hundred likes. Some kind of milestone. Silly, but that’s what social media does to you. I looked at the photos that got the most likes, amongst my pictures. And I tried to do get that type of pictures that seemed to do best. Guess what! It didn’t work. It’s impossible to predict what people will like. I gave up on that. I only tried once, got disappointed and then I realized that I have to do my thing. I have to post the pictures I like, not what I think others might like. I haven’t been taking and posting pictures that long and I only have my phone and my tablet. I’m doing what I can with what I have. I’m showing, anyone who wants to view my photos, the world from my eyes, how I see it. I have to take the photos I want, do it the way I want to and choose the ones I want to share. And guess what! That seems to work a lot better. That day or two when I was really obsessing at getting those high numbers were not as much fun as my days had before that. Of course I still check my numbers, but I’m not chasing them. I let them come to me. I show you what I can do and you may like it or you may not. More and more people seem to like them.

Another arena for chasing numbers is this blog. Lately there have been days, or nights, when I’ve been to tired. I’ve written, published and gone to bed. Not checking any numbers until the next day, sometimes being very happily surprised. It’s a lot less stressful than publishing a post and then checking the numbers every ten minutes, being depressed if it doesn’t seem to do as good as previous posts did, but lately it’s been okay. There’s a lot of reasons why there are variations. I try to publish about the same time every day, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the optimal time every day. On the holidays people have a different schedule, some have more time, some have less. Sometimes I find the right headline that interests people, sometimes I don’t and I have no idea in advance which will work and which won’t. There are some rules you can follow that always interests people, but this isn’t that type of blog. I’ve said this a long time and I guess I have to keep to that story, I am doing this for me. I’m going to have to do this my way as well. If there’s one reason why I should write and publish at all is that no one else can tell my story and no one else can see the world the way I do.

Thank you and have a nice day!!! Don’t forget to smile!!!

To fake happy or to be happy...

One guy once said to me that I had to be the happiest person in the world because every time we talked I was laughing a lot. That may very well be so, maybe I do laugh more than other people do, but does that necessarily make me happier? Maybe I’m just very good at hiding my pain. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t in love, so that was not the reason. Not with him anyway. He’s not reading this and anyway I am pretty sure he knows already. The fact that I told him should have taken care of that. Still feel as if I ought to apologize. I don’t know why though. I’m weird.

It is pretty common though with a lot of really unhappy people to hide it well. Maybe that person you know who smiles and laughs a lot is going through a really difficult time and you have no idea. Or maybe they are just happy. Maybe they just had a tough time and things are looking a little bit better. But they could also be hiding their true feelings. Sometimes we do that because we want to escape our problems, pretend everything is fine, get away from pity, sympathy, empathy or whatever we get from everyone who really knows us. Maybe we’re afraid that a kind word from someone would make us break down and cry in the wrong place or situation. No one wants to feel, or make someone else feel, awkward. So it’s easier to say that everything is fine, smile and pretend to be happy. I do that.

My physiotherapist doesn’t like it when I do that. She thinks I take everything too lightly. Making a joke out of everything. I’ve explained to her that it’s my way of coping, if I didn’t I would fall apart even more than I have already. I have to look on the “bright side of life” or I will go under. Okay, maybe I could take some things more seriously, like my diabetes perhaps. I may appear as if I don’t care from how I describe my life, but the truth is still that my tests show my blood sugar levels are getting much better, every time they take new tests they’ve improved. I am talking long term testing not the finger testing I do myself. Or don’t always do to be honest. Still, it’s getting better. When you’re struggling to stay alive day by day you don’t really care too much about the long term dangers of a chronicle disease that actually can be very dangerous. I should really take it more seriously. At least my mother’s not here to feed me a lot of sugar, candy, cake and stuff. I told her to keep it away from me, but she kept buying my favorites.

However, it doesn’t really take that much to make me happy. This past year two guys have said to me that they only wanted to make me happy and both of them thought they failed. I don’t know what gave them that idea other than it’s probably not that easy to notice over the internet. Maybe if we’d met in person they would have known, trusted me whenever I said: “you do!”. None of them were that guy I mentioned in the beginning, the only one who ever said that I seemed to be a very happy person. I don’t know what I did different, or if it was he who was different. Still... Somehow I failed to show them that I was happy…

I have been dealing with a lot of problems and I have been depressed. There has been so many things that have gone so very wrong in my life for a long time. Practically every area of life has been a problem in one way or another. My health, my job, my family, my economy, dealing with a lot of pain and a lot of authorities. The summer was awful just to be followed by an ever worse autumn/fall. I think September was the really low mark. It’s my month. I was born in September. Maybe that’s why things had to get really unbearable that month. And eventually towards the very end I could see a sliver of hope that I might actually have the worst behind me and I could maybe make it. Maybe I came through the crisis without breaking and now I am heading towards the season of many breakthroughs. I’m not out of the woods yet, but it’s not looking quite as dark as it did before. Or maybe that’s just the sun shining for the first time in a while.

Today I am actually really happy. It’s a wonderful day. I only slept six hours and would so have wanted to go back to sleep. I knew it would be a wonderful morning for pictures and I wanted to go, but I was so tired. I did check my Instagram though and was just about to put it down and go back to bed when a friend sent me some pictures. Said I could use them if I wanted to. They were really beautiful. Not at all related to my morning of frosty sunrise and from a different part of the world. But to think he had taken these pictures, made an effort to make them good because he knows how much I like photographs… It made me change my mind. I got dressed, got up, got out. I was taking wonderful pictures before it was even eight am. Sunrise was estimated to about eight am and that seemed pretty accurate, And it had been a cold night so plenty frost.

I went to my favorite place by the ocean, met some people out walking their dogs. Everyone was just so happy about the beautiful morning. And so was I. It was so worth it, so happy I changed my mind and went. So happy I got those pictures that made me change my mind. It was very cold if not in direct sunlight, but I stayed out for over two hours. Probably going to have some health issues because of it and the pain… so much pain… But it was so worth it and I am so happy. It doesn’t really take much more than that.

I hope you’ll feel as happy today as I have. Thank you!!! Don’t forget to smile!!!

See how it changes your life...

The first time I did the thousand words a day challenge was over a year ago. I had my blog and I followed a lot of writers on Twitter. People with advice about blogging and writing and such. That’s how I found this challenge. It said something like this: “try ‘the write a thousand words a day challenge’ and see how it changes your life”. So I did.

At that time I was also very new on the lords of Minecraft server. A place where you role play with other people in a Minecraft world. Minecraft is a video game where you have to shop trees, make tools, find food, mine and fight monsters. Overly simplified, but that’s the basic idea. On the lords of Minecraft server you build your own house, but nothing else works as in the original game. You live in a town with other people, controlled by lords. All my friends from that server will probably have issues with that description, but I wasn’t going to talk about Minecraft or the server as such. So it’ll have to do for now.

My life at that time was pretty much being at home resting or going to the medical center for physiotherapy, meeting the doctor, tests… so many people. At home I had my roommate, I didn’t really meet that many people at all. Before the doctor told me I had to stay at home I was working as a taxi driver. Meeting new people all day long. I know I’ve mentioned that I told the doctor i would be bored and he replied I should find something that was fun. Writing my blog was fun, playing Minecraft was fun. But the time I’ve spent at home and with my mother being the difficult person she is I had become, more or less, afraid of people and I had started to have really difficult panic attacks. During the summer when everything closes I got used to not seeing anyone but the cashiers at the store.

There were a lot of people on the server. Being both new to servers and people I found it a little bit scary at times. I wasn’t on very much and I didn’t really talk to any people. Only when spoken to. Don’t want to be rude. But for the most part I stayed by myself exploring the town, trying to find the places where the lords had been building a new house or done something. When my house was done there wasn’t much else to do. Do your five minutes of work, buy food, go to the gym, read some books, maybe write a letter to a lord. Freaking out when he read it in a video. I forgot to say the lords make YouTube videos and stream on Twitch.

One evening one of the lords tweeted about there being an event on the server. Oktoberfest and how much fun it was. He had taken a screenshot and it looked like real fun. But a lot of people. I kind of wanted to go, but there were so many people. And I hadn’t written my thousand words for that day. I had to do that. Or I wanted to do that. Writing is fun too. I really love to write. And it was really late. I argued with myself in my writing. Reasons why I couldn’t go. They were many. Reasons why I should go. Only one. It looked like fun. Everything was against the server even, the Oktoberfest. So many reasons not to go, except there was really only one reason why I couldn’t go. I was afraid to. It probably sounds weird to everybody else, but I was really scared. And in my writing of the thousand words I realized that this was the real reason, because my wish to go was so much greater than my wish to do any of the other things. No other reason was a real reason, they were just excuses. The only reason was that I was too scared. To go to a party. Online. I wouldn’t even have to dress up. Or leave home. I wouldn’t meet anyone face to face. But I was still really afraid of going. And my writing self realized that my fear was the only reason not to go. And it was the biggest reason why I should go. I went.

That was the end of my writing challenge. I went to the Oktoberfest and it was so much fun. I really loved it and stayed all night. All of my night too. The first time in a long time I was up all night, but it was only the beginning of many, many allnighters. Even when the big event was over they still kept everything on the location as it had been during the weekend. I visited a few times when there was less people there. Still had fun. Sometime later came Halloween with a ghost house and I was there early, waiting in line forever. So much people, but I wasn’t afraid of a crowd anymore. Not like I’m going to get hurt for real, is it?

I didn’t expect the change from writing a thousand words a day would be to join a Minecraft server, but it was. Things changed that night and the reason was my arguing with myself in my writing. As I’ve said before, I use this to solve my problems, to sort through my thoughts, to figure stuff out. And I think it has helped me more than any form of expensive therapy could have,

Sometimes the reasons we tell ourselves, the reasons why we choose to do something or not to do something… sometimes the reasons are excuses and the real reason is something else. When you find that reason it may change everything. Realizing it was my fear that was keeping me from joining the fun at the server, to face and fear and just go… that has changed my life. Not only on the server but my real actual life. And I don’t regret giving up on the challenge back then. I have gained so much more. Most important of all so many really good friends. I guess sometimes what we need the most isn’t what we expect it to be and by being open to opportunities we can get a lot more that we ever could have dreamed of.

Thank you!!!

Procrastinating all over the place

I have had a day off today. Sort of. I had about three hours of sleep, because I had an appointment to keep this morning. I almost called it off, but decided it was better to get it over with. It was raining again, so it would have been so great to just go back to sleep again. My intentions were to sleep after the appointment, but that didn’t happen.

I did manage to go out for a little walk anyway, in the neighborhood, taking pictures of mine and neighbor’s gardens while they were at work and wouldn’t find out. It was nice to be on asphalt instead of the mossy, stony, un-pathed parts of the wilderness where I have been these last few days. No twisting of ankles or fear of falling into water somewhere. Got some nice pictures and spent way too much time on Instagram…

What I really should have been doing is sleeping. Or maybe watching the new episode of Supernatural. I can’t so that when I am too tired though, it’s a sacred moment when I get to watch the new episode. I’ve never been able to follow the current season before. I’ve always had to buy the DVD of the past season when the new was about half way through. Can you tell I’m a big fan? I guess most of you haven’t even heard of it. There are so many TV-shows. I found it by chance and doing something that today would be considered illegal. It’s an old show, it’s the eleventh season now. I have never gotten tired of it and I don’t think I ever will. Maybe it’s the car. The 67 Impala. It might be the car. It’s so beautiful… and the sound of that engine…

Moving on.

I find myself doing many other things right now. I need to find that special song on YouTube to listen to and when I find it, it’s such a good song I have to focus on the song and can’t write. After finding seven special song and playing them a couple of times each I let the playlist continue on it’s own. But maybe something happened on Instagram that need my attention. I just passed three hundred and I am carefully watching so it won’t get below that. As if I could stop it if it did. Well, in a way you can, but not by checking in once in awhile. Instagram just as Twitter and everything else need work, a lot of it. If only it payed more than nothing…

Oh, Twitter… Be right back!!!

I had a message. A business lady asking me what I was passionate about. I never answer these messages, I just followed her back and she’s probably got some app doing it. She followed me first. I never follow first on my main Twitter. Except for a few of the big ones, like PewDiePie for some reason. Earlier I got a question from someone who liked my channel and was wondering if I was interested in the possibility of an auto play function for YouTube videos in Twitter feeds. Yes, sure. Why not? They are going to keep in touch. Do I take these things seriously? No. Like I said, there are apps and if you're making the auto play a thing you can probably program for an auto reply too. So. No, I don’t. But just so you know I have also had a long discussion with the kik bot about how kik isn't working. It was very interesting. And yes, I knew it was a bot, but sometimes you just need to went. It listened and replied very quickly, so that’s good. But in the end it started to repeat itself. Sad how these things happen. I tried to explain that it had already said that, but it didn’t help. We ended the conversation on good terms though. And yes, I still want you to believe me when I say I knew it was a bot. Please!

Still 301…

Came back from Twitter via Instagram, and there’s a great song on right now. Wish it was audion in this blog. Guess what, there is. I can post videos, but it can cause really bad lag. I think I’m testing everyone enough with my excess of words every day. And sometimes, like now, I am basically just going through the motions. My head's all over the place and I am seriously procrastinating, trying to make myself believe I have this under control, but I don’t. Today is an off day. Again. When I’m done I’ll sleep and I’ll do my best to make sure tomorrow will be better.

Looking for the new wisdom I found on Instagram I heard a new song that was awesome. I couldn’t quite hear all the lyrics so naturally I needed to find that video so I could learn it. And listen to it on repeat for a couple of times. It was a really good song.

Anyway…

Instagram wisdom, a perfect reminder for me to have as wallpaper on my tablet so I’ll see it often. “Stop wondering if you’re good enough… Know that you are and start acting like it.” I have mentioned that phenomenon in me a fairly large number of times, so maybe I should start thinking about it in another fashion. Maybe I should start acting like it.

Whoa, this is also a good song, hang on.... it’s really awesome… Sorry! We’re nearly there.

It’s a really funny though though, acting like I’m good enough. I couldn’t be a writer, we need the pain. Seriously though. There are areas where I don’t wonder, areas where I do know that I’m good enough. Or could be with some training maybe. But then there are other areas where I even refrain from trying because I will never be as good as them. Someone said I should watch YouTube videos to get ideas for my own. It’s just that if I do… then I’ll only see how good they are and I am not. And then I will quit.

In one way I am not wondering IF I’m good enough. I KNOW I’m not.

With that final plot twist I have finished procrastinating for today. I’ll sleep now and I’ll be back tomorrow. Hopefully with a better post and hopefully you’ll be here too.

Thank You!!!

Finding something fun to do

Sleeping is a wonderful idea. I fell asleep right after publishing my post yesterday. I was so tired. Woke up quite early, but it was raining so I went back to sleep until about ten thirty. Still being tired I began to check my social media. When you’ve got a job to do... you do. It was still raining, but I went outside for my photo walk at about one pm. Looking for new views to research for pictures I tried the cemetery  on my side of the river, but that isn’t as good as the other one. Or maybe I haven't found the right entrance yet. There’s still a nice forest and foresty vegetation to explore so I park my car at the entrance to the cemetery. Didn’t even bother to move it when I heard cars approaching figuring they’ve got steering wheels. They did. There’s not a lot of traffic and they had full view of the road anyway. I’m not going to cause any accidents, I’m not that selfish.

The sad part though, about taking pictures in the forest is getting where you want to. My feet really hurt from all twisting and turning they have to put up with, or maybe I should say my ankles, but my feet hurt too. And my back. And for the first time today, my wrist. I’m falling apart. I drove a little bit further, past some houses and got onto a gravel road that goes back to the main road. But I found a road I’ve never followed before and I found a path that had markings and such going into the forest. It was an old trail, apparently people have been living here for two thousand years. I didn’t know that. ANd the path was a lot easier to walk on so I am sure I will return when I feel a bit better. It’s a long walk. With a bit of luck and hard work maybe I can walk it the entire length next summer.

I got some really good pictures, and some bad news. How bad the bad news are, I don’t know yet. But the pictures were pretty good. I got a nice picture of my cat too, which normally is impossible. I’ve got over one hundred followers on Vine and I uploaded my first Vine as well. I have beaten that curse, it’s done. At least one. Of my cat. She’s cute, but not funny. I am boring and there’s a rain storm outside my window.

And apparently us boring people shouldn’t be calling us writers. There are libraries all over the world bored by what we write. We are selfish, self absorbed and should stop writing. According to a gut on Instagram. No, he didn’t say it to me, it was more of a general posting, but apparently, because I still remember it I felt a little bit like I was in the firing line. Not that it bothers me so much that I’m going to stop. He’s entitled to his opinion. Maybe he doesn’t understand the more serious stuff libraries have a lot of. Maybe he need a comic book store instead. I’m sorry. That was mean- I didn’t mean it, but I kinda did…

And then there’s the Vine thing… why does it always have to be funny, and people on cam doing dumb stuff or dancing or singing or edits or… Of course funny is always fun, that’s what most of my revines are. Funny. And of course the big cats, but he’s funny, so I don’t know. I’m not funny. I just told you I am boring. Should probably have my keyboard removed because I dare call myself a writer, And now I’m invading Vine with my boring cat too. I don't know. Maybe it was the first and last, but I do kind of have an idea that I would like to try first. That’s why I had to upload my cute kitty. To get more space for the new stuff. Always the deleting and removing of stuff. I don’t like that. I’m a hoarder.

But, they say that to get many followers and likes on Instagram you need to do selfies, party pictures, the pictures with people on them get more likes. That may very well be true, but I am quite happy with how my page/gallery/whatever is doing. My previous account had eight followers, I was happy when this one got ten times that. Even more happy when I realized I had hundred more followers than my ex did. (If you’d ever get the weird idea of reading this, I’m sorry!) And now I have almost two hundred more than him. (So very sorry!). I get even with people by getting more followers on Twitter or on Instagram. Passive Aggressive - The Swedish Way. Subtweeting is also fun. That’s what most of my tweets are at the moment. (Sorry =( so very sorry!)

I guess that what I am doing right now with the writing, the blogging, the photography, trying new hobbies or developing old ones, especially hobbies that take me outside, walking around, is what the doctor meant when he told me to find something funny to do. When my doctor told me, a long time ago, that he wasn’t going to let me work, that I needed to stay home and focus on my health and injuries, that I didn’t realize how bad it was. I told him I would get so bored just staying at home, I need to work. Find something fun to do then… I found my video games, many, many youtubers to subscribe to. I played Minecraft and watched Youtubers play Minecraft. It felt as if I had company. Then I found the servers and really had company. Then I stopped sleeping to play the video games on servers with company, in a different time zone. I don’t think that what was he meant though. But it was definitely fun!!!

That was exactly one thousand words. This is plus…. But I have to thank you and hope you’ll have a nice day!!!

I'm the only one who can save me

The good news today is that I did actually manage to go out really early this morning. The bad news is there weren’t really a sunset, it was cloudy. Today has been the first rainy day in a long time. The good news is I still got some pretty nice pictures. The worst news is I didn’t sleep at all last night. I did sleep after I got home again and after watching the new episode of the Walking Dead. I didn’t sleep for long and now I am not feeling to good again. And it wasn’t really such a good morning to go out anyway. It was very cold out so my cold got worse again. What I sacrifice for my art…

The thing is, though, I feel as if I’m losing the grip of all the good routines I’ve been trying to get into. Sleeping is not improving, it’s getting worse. When I don’t sleep I feel a lot worse, not just tired, but also sad. These last couple of days it’s been very difficult to motivate myself to get up and go out. Walking is becoming more and more difficult again, The pain is coming back except now there’s also the added pain of feet hurting because I haven’t used the right shoes before. I have really nice hiking shoes I bought in Australia, but I’ve been using my taxi shoes, that I bought for taxi driving matters, not walking. To get the good photos now with all the colors and such I walk a lot off the tracks where it’s not always safe to be walking. My back problem makes it difficult with keeping my balance sometimes. I should really not be offroading it so much. Add to that my cold that does make it difficult to breathe at times. I have a lot of excuses not to go out. And most f the pictures I took today were not good at all…

Right now I would prefer to go to sleep and not write this. My head hurts, my nose hurts and I am very tired, but If I give this up too, as I’ve already did a few days ago, then what? Pretty soon I’ll have nothing left. I know there will always be times when we’re tested, can we still keep moving forward even with these obstacles in our way. I read a tweet yesterday about speed bumps reducing our speed but they don’t stop us. I know she meant a different type of speed bump, but if you look at the traffic ones… I told her it depends on what car you’re driving. I’ve seen a lot of fancy sports cars get stuck on them. She found it hilarious and that’s fine. But to be honest, a speed bump can stop you. A speed bump can send you into a deep depression if you’re the fancy sports car type of person. A deep depression will stop you. It can stop you for ever and that has happened to many fancy sports cars on the raod variety of speed bumps. They can break. And we can break too. I know that’s not an uplifting idea, but it’s still true. People still die out of their own free will…

A lot of the time people around a person who has chosen to die are very surprised and can’t accept that they were suicidal or even depressed. But one of the biggest lies we tell people is that we’re fine. It’s easier to smile and say we’re good than to tell someone that we’re actually not doing too well at the moment. It’s difficult to tell other people and it’s difficult for other people to listen to. I’m not in the habit of asking for help. I know I kind of did that by changing my usernames on all accounts I have, by changing my bios to say that I need help. That technique is something I’ve picked up from my ex. He used to do that for every setback he ever had. I haven’t been in the habit of changing my username or bio, but this time I did. I couldn’t go to someone and ask for help. My ex used to be that person, even before we started dating. But how can I expect any understanding for my broken heart and trust from the person who broke it? People noticed the changes though. People showed up and offered help, showed that they cared. I’m not used to that.

I was taught very early that I was the only one who could help me. No one else would come and save me. No knight in shining armor would come for me. No hero. With or without headphones. When I was a small child my father worked as the caretaker of the apartment building where we were living. My mother worked at the hospital so I grew up with my dad taking care of me. There weren’t many children in the house, but three boys live on the top floor. One younger and two older. I remember one incident when someone had done something and I ran to find my dad. I was four or five so that’s kind of what you do. He just said that running, crying to him wasn’t going to solve anything. I should defend myself instead. The idea was probably good in theory, but I was too young for that lesson. The only lesson I’ve taken from that is that no one will ever help you. You’re on your own. My mother wasn’t much better, I could yell for her for hours and she wouldn’t hear me. Though we were in the same apartment and I could hear her as clear as if she was in the same room. I was ill and couldn’t go to her. And she didn’t come to me…

It’s even in a song “learn to expect - nothing”. I’ve learnt that. No one can heal me, except me. And I need my routines to work. I can’t lose them. It took so long to get at least some of them working, I’m not sure I want to start all over again. I just have to make it work…

I hope you’re having a better day than I am. Thank you!!!