The little things

Each time I accomplish something, no matter how small I am learning to celebrate it.  Because no matter how small that thing is, I did it and it is a part of a progression of that small thing turning into something bigger.

It has been said in my blog before that I am a huge fan of a motivational speaker called Mel Robbins and currently I am reading her book “The high five habit” and though I am not seeing massive results three days into forming this habit.  I did notice today a small, very faint in fact, smile on my face when I went to the mirror this morning.

I’m not presuming you know what “The high five habit” is all about, so I shall tell you.

Mel Robbins suggests that each morning you high five yourself in the mirror in order to acknowledge yourself, try not to criticise yourself the first thing in the morning – self-love is key to making solid foundations in other relationships, if you don’t love yourself or take care of yourself enough, you can’t do that for other people, can you? 

Why? 

Because you will feel depleted in yourself and you won’t give it your best shot. 

Many people feel that high fiving themselves in the mirror daily boosted their esteem and performance throughout the day.

Why? 

Because a high five is a positive reinforcement and it makes you feel you have value.

Three days, that’s all I’ve done so far, though when this post goes out it will really be five days, because I am posting this to schedule.

I have barely done any writing since September 2023 but I am celebrating any writing I do even if it’s only a small sentence now. 

Why?

Because I am feeling depleted and I don’t like it and it was with Mel Robbins that I learned I felt depleted in so many different areas in my life through a free course I finished last week ran by her.

https://www.melrobbins.com/takecontrolthanks

I learned all these tiny little areas of my life built up and gradually I became overwhelmed and because my social circle died around four years ago – I never found a way through other people to pick myself up again.  It’s all self-reliance only, 100% pure self-reliance and most people can’t pick themselves up when they are being 100% self-reliant, but I have no choice right now so any little thing is going to be great progress for me right now!

Today I have written two poems, this blog post and approximately 1600 words towards my vampire project, not a lot really – not for me and how I used to write several years ago!  But I am learning to be kind to myself, not to whip myself so much because I have learned recently I am an incredibly mean slave driver to myself and a tyrannical bully – as I always felt I was so darn lazy, yet I wasn’t.

In the scheme of thing, in the law of averages I wasn’t.

I’ve been working under overwhelming conditions for a decade and didn’t realise it and the more I was putting onto myself the harder and harder I would beat myself up about it.

No wonder I struggled with suicidal thoughts for so long, no wonder I had no drive and energy to get out of bed and try harder.

I was beaten, purely by myself – no one else did that to me!

I escaped abusive relationships and I became free from all of that and I became my own abuser, pushing myself constantly, being hard on myself for the smallest thing and mistake, because that’s how I was trained by people from my past and I was carrying over in my head, their idealism of what I should be doing and putting it on myself. 

Effectively I escaped abuse from other people but replaced it with me abusing myself in the same way they did to me.

It takes something like doing a course by someone like Mel Robbins or reading their books to really get deep inside of yourself to realise these things are happening to you, because of you.

What’s more, these things can change because of you too – only you can save yourself from yourself!

It’s a weird world, but it’s true for all of us!

You don’t need someone else to get things to happen in your life, you do it for yourself.  Letting someone else hand things to you;

A; is very unusual to find someone who will do that to you anyway and…

B; handing your power over to them, thus disempowering your own potential!

If you feel you need to rely on someone for ANYTHING then you have chosen to be at another person’s mercy.

Now for me, to a certain extent this is fine for me, because I am happy to have some direction from others. 

But most people want to master themselves fully and that’s fine too.

However, even the most ambitious people can often fall into the trap of disempowerment because of their reliance on another person and they will become frustrated and even vicious with that person if that person doesn’t live up to their expectations to receive what they want from them.

Some people do this in romantic relationships, in fact a lot of people do.  They mistake their need for love with a need for resource and often confuse the two.

If you love someone, you don’t use them – you love them, you care about them, their happiness if your happiness and you will protect that the best you can… if that’s not true in your relationship, then there is something seriously wrong with the relationships foundation and it will fail.

Do you know how rare it is to find someone who will love you selflessly?  It’s actually very special and many relationships fail because one or even the both of them fail to look at the relationship from a selfless perspective.

Now this wasn’t something Mel Robbins said, this is me talking now.  This is what I have experienced – I am not perfect, I’ve done the same in my past too and it’s not right and it’s not fair!

Where am I going with this?

To be honest, I don’t know.

But then again, nobody really knows what’s going on in their lives do they, let’s be honest?  We’re all just learning as we plod along, doing our thing. 

So, today I’ve done 1600 words towards my vampires – I celebrate that!

I did three lessons on DuoLingo for Italian – I celebrate that!

I wrote two poems – I celebrate that!

I read several pages of a book and magazine – I celebrate that!

I managed to eat a breakfast which is rare for me!  – I celebrated that too!

All these micro things are a progression to something bigger – foundations of something that will be big for my future.

The little things count, because doing nothing doesn’t.

Sitting back and thinking doesn’t count as productive time, because you’re not doing anything in action, you’re just thinking!

Anyone can think!

Anyone can waste oodles of time just sitting back doing nothing but plan everything to the letter!

But action brings things into motion, action is progress, no matter how small – it counts, it’s a manifestation, it is beyond thought, action is tangible, thought is not.

So when you write 50 words towards your novel and other writers laugh at your dreams of being a writer, remember this… you wrote 50 words, you didn’t just think them and that counts towards creating a book.  Sitting back and thinking about 50 words and not writing them, doesn’t make you a writer, it makes you a thinker!

Honestly how many writers out there think away hundreds of words per day but fail to write them down because they weren’t confident about it, didn’t trust the process and felt they needed those words to be absolutely perfect before they wrote them?

Also, how many days go by, weeks, months, years even because of the same thing?  Because of writers block?  That doesn’t exist actually; writer’s perfection does and guess what?  It doesn’t have to be perfect until you send it off to be published and even then it won’t be!

Just get the thing written, because you’re going to have to rewrite it anyway, so why waste time trying to be the impossible?

Nobody is perfect!

Not even the bestsellers, it doesn’t exist because perfection can’t be defined as everyone has a different idea of what that means to them!

So what you find as perfect is somebody else’s trash, basically.

Cold hard truth and I am not sorry for saying it.

The only successful people in the world are the people doing the things they want to do – doing, not thinking, not waiting on a hand out, not sitting back a dreaming – doing!

So celebrate the little things you actually do, not the great ideas you thought about and didn’t do anything with!

Thanks for reading!

Stinky dog deposit

I remember the cacophonous laughter of all the nags in my life

Picking and tweaking, jibbering and jabbering with their speaking

Tearing fingers and knives into my heart making wounds

Sometimes in spoons they take my faith of man away

Take my dreams to laugh and play

And threw them into a dark room

Locked up and lost the key

Wondering who will come and save me?

Make me remember the time before

They closed me in and shut the door

Called me an evil dark whore

And fed me lies and nail like words

Saying I am strange and absurd

A forgotten thing left in a closet

Like some stinky dog deposit

To this day I don’t know what caused it

But to this day my life’s been shit

Flux to Fluck?

I am in a flux today.

I am experiencing deep depression and high motivation and there is no real in-between.

On one hand I feel extremely down and tearful and struggling to even think that I’d get to April and on the other I feel pumped to exercise and morph my body over a time into how I really want it to be.

I’ve been staring in a mirror for months trying to see myself through other people’s eyes and occasionally I see something, but then I move my head a certain way and the ugly comes back to haunt me.

So, exercise raises endorphin levels when you do it after a time, but it’s getting the will to get up and just move today that’s eating at me.  Because I just want to hide under my fleece blanket and cry about things, cry deeply – I’m wearing hoodies a lot lately to hide the fact I’m crying so much to other members of the household.

They really haven’t noticed, perhaps my friend is right – I’d be a good actress?  Who knows!

When I have got used to never dreaming because things never happen for me, someone comes along and tells me that life is soon to be great and it’s like another tease.  More disappointment for the future and more broken dreams and an even more shattered heart – that’s the forecast for me I think.

I used to be a positive person, a Pollyanna and I used to tick people off with my ray of sunshine and words of encouragement – it’s like someone was bothered by it so much they’ve cursed me!

I’m told regularly, I will have great things because I have a great talent and this person and that person likes you – it’s all bullshit really, because I haven’t seen these people tell me things.

There are lots of talented people in the world who don’t have those great things – I’m not the only one and it’s not things that I want.  It’s love.

A few rich men haven’t got that into their thick heads yet – they think they can seduce me with things, but they can’t.

Why are the simplest things in life so hard to obtain?  A persons time, snuggles; words of love, support and encouragement, a good time and a laugh without judgement?

A tactile relationship that feels real and not based on lies and broken promises, a relationship where we encourage each other, instead of one of us being a sponge and draining the life out of the other in order to make the other one feel better?

I know I have had a life of abuse, but it sounds strange to roll this off the tongue, but I was always a happy kind of person, known for being bubbly and friendly and since I’ve moved here slowly and steadily I am being drained of life.

I remember before I moved here that I could never imagine the day I’d die, I was scared of death and wanted to be immortal – but now I crave death.  It’s so contrast!

My willpower for survival is weakening.

Paul told me the other day that when a problem used to occur when I first moved in and I wasn’t moved by it and stayed relaxed and the same, that it bothered him, frustrated him even.  Now, whenever there is a problem I am at the complete opposite end of the spectrum, where a problem can become a huge drama quite quickly and it’s a big contrast and he thought that I’d be more supportive and take it more seriously, but instead it’s made me fall apart.

I know why.

When I lived with my parents, emotions were not tolerated if it made a person loud or unmanageable and unproductive. 

When I came here, it’s ok to be loud, shouting, ranting and raving at the slightest problem and to not let go.

I’m a huge empathic sponge, I soak up the energies of people around me and become like them – I’m a spiritual chameleon of sorts.  This is why it’s essential I remove myself from this environment somehow, but it’s difficult when the energies around me are apathetic, depressed, defensive and aggressive.

On the rare occasion a visitor comes who is of lighter energy, it rubs off me quickly and I feel like the old me again – their energy can boost me for a couple of days in fact, but it never lasts.

I remember having such high energy when I first moved in that I drained Paul instead.  Paul looked awful and exhausted all the time.  Because I was always on my feet, being bubbly, finding joy in the smallest thing like a child in a candy store, no matter what happened in life – everything was like a novelty to me and it was.

Because I rarely got to choose anything and go out when I lived with my parents.

I had comments from Paul that I looked at the world in childlike wonder and innocence and that I was so excitable, he kept telling me to slow down, calm down, sit down, lie down, everything had to come down.

Till I emotionally fell down and can barely get up with the weight of it all.

Words can’t describe how I truly feel – all of this feels like intense whining of a bitter heart who hates the world for the joy it has because she hasn’t got it.  Jealous slurs, that’s probably what you’re thinking about this post right now.

If you aren’t thinking that, then I apologise.

Art would show the world more of what I feel inside, but then again I can’t use my art table right now can I?

I really miss doing art.

I think the reason why I look younger than forty is because as tragic as it sounds I cry so much my tears sometimes dry on my face and make it feel taut after a while.  Like now, my face feels tight because the tears have dried.

I try to keep my sense of humour and find something to laugh about, which is part of the manic depression I have.  One minute extremely low and playing with sharp objects near my wrists and then the next moment cracking jokes about my darkness.

I might be depressed but with the tear treatment at least it keeps me young.  It’s a little light, but still gloomy and incredibly pitiful.

But that’s where I am today.

No in between – motivated to exercise and cry my heart out at the same time whilst being at my most deeply creative. 

Lack of sleep, slept four and a half hours again last night, my average for the past few weeks actually.

Motivated to exercise because I saw a glimmer of hope in the mirror the other day that I could look exactly like Diana Dors (Diana Mary Fluck) my main idol after all!  Just dye the hair, tone up and lose around forty pound and yes, I can see its possible I could be like her…

Maybe someday I will get myself out of this dump and sell my work and get myself a red dress covered in rubies and diamonds and wear a pretty wine coloured faux fur shrug with a silk ribbon?  Maybe someday I can walk in high heels without looking like a rookie tranny and actually be elegant and swan like?

Or maybe someday I will be found in a pile of my own poems covered in blood and white as snow, cold and still like ice and maybe my finders will publish my work for me and I will become posthumously famous?

Sods law that.

Thanks for reading…

Raven warrior day

Today I feel like a warrior, the raven warrior I used to be.

I feel like dressing up in my old black clothes and wearing my raven feathered necklace and rethinking about designing that raven feather cloak I have always wanted to make.

I miss my gothic make-up today; I used to be a Goth as a teenager and into my mid-twenties – a big contrast to the semi-kawaii style I like these days.

I was the Gothic Jock type at school, but also sort of nerdy – because I was an A & B grade student mostly and I was teased for it some of the time, though I never flaunted it and tried to conceal my grades wherever possible – because in my family, nobody got grades like that it is a sort of anomaly, a weird thing which I held close to my heart in shame.

My dad and his side of the family was the only people I felt comfortable knowing my grades, because on dad’s side of the family there are teachers and government workers, so education is important to them and it’s not a cause for shame there.

But today, I am the raven warrior again – or at least it’s the first time in years I feel like she’s been awakened again.

At least I do have some black clothes, though no make-up – at least I can sort of feel like my old self again, in part. 

A black lace cami, a long black skirt, a back flowing shrug, black socks though ruined by pink diamonds, but you can’t have everything in this place.  It’s a cheerful day, despite the kind of poetry I am producing and despite looking mournful – to me it’s a brighter day in my heart.

I wonder why the raven spirit in me is so strong today?

I used to be called Raven Mother by some people in the past – sometimes The Raven Warrior – sometimes The Vampire – sometimes the warrior goddess  and I tried to get people to call me Raven but they didn’t do it, because I guess they didn’t like my sense of humour in being known as The Raven Lunatic, haha.

Some people have no sense of fun – in fact most, don’t.

I had lots of interesting nicknames before I moved in with Paul and every ounce of my identity in all of them has gone, you wouldn’t recognise me now from what I used to be.

I may have been abused badly in my past and mostly isolated – but to be honest I did still socialise on my mother’s terms and I did so more often than I do now I live with Paul.  I may have been living day to day scared for my life with violence and unpredictable people and living day to day with loss after loss – but strangely enough, I was happier then than I am now.  I still don’t understand it.

Maybe I was happy because of how many people used to visit?  Maybe I was happier because I was a lot richer back then and never had to wait months between necessary non-food purchases?  Maybe I was happier because I had more personal freedom around the home, even though I had copious amounts of duties and chores to do between them?

I don’t know.

As I said, I am still puzzled by it.

How can someone be so happy in a situation where day to day they are not sure if they would be alive by the end of the day?

Food for thought I guess?

Yet when I was in that situation I was desperate to get away because I was under so much stress, I often had black outs because things got too much for me and I had to constantly make excuses to non-family people about why I can’t be normal, why I can’t just take their invitation on the spur of a moment etc – because there was often a violent backlash if I did.  Not from them or from me, but if my mother found out she’d go nuts and literally hunt the person down.

So the raven took her flight and said “Nevermore” to that situation and came to live with Paul.

Thanks for reading…

My quiet dad

Today I am going to talk more about my dad.

My dad has hardly had much of a look in regarding my past, but I thought I should share some things about him, because he wasn’t part of the problem when I was growing up – he was like a cushion to the blow I could have had – if that makes sense at all?

My dad was always fighting to get me better things, to get me better socialised, to get me better educated and he was almost always ignored – but my dad did have some small victories now and again in regards to having choices about what happened to his child.

My mum made no secret about why she married my father; she let it be known to both him and I that she married him purely to keep her boys safe in case she died, because she had a health scare about a year before I was born.

Her arrangement was, I shall marry you Tom if you ensure that you will raise my boys as your own if anything happens to me!  He agreed and he would have done so too, however my dad said he was sad he would never have children of his own and he sulked about it for a time – my mum was terrified in having another child because the child she had before me was a breach of which she was more or less forcing herself to have naturally and she suffered for three days in labour until she relented to have a caesarean.

However, she told me she felt sorry for my dad and said that she would give him only one child to seal the deal and he was happy with that!

So I was born before they got married, they married in the January after my birth. 

My dad was a sheet metal worker shortly after this and remained in that job until I was seven years old. Then stuck to his next job until retirement, pun intended a glue factory foreman – where I got my first job as a labeller at the age of 15.

Before he married my mum he was a chicken farmer and a train driver before he went into the army to get a HGV license, but he stayed in the army longer than he had planned.  There is a family rumour that my mum broke my dad’s leg deliberately to prevent him attending his duties in the Falklands, but it was never proven.

My dad was a quiet man, who hardly spoke about himself and so I don’t know much about him in his own words, only the rumours from other relatives who knew him.  He kept himself to himself and often shut himself away to play on consoles in other rooms away from family.

Sometimes dad would cook, but mostly I cooked for the family when mum was on nightshifts from the age of 7yrs onwards, dad was a less fussy eater than mum and would be more adventurous in the food he ate – he would have been a healthier person if mum wasn’t so dominant about the kinds of food she bought.  He had very little say on what happened to the money he bought into the family and he only ever had £25 a week to himself for betting on horses only.  She didn’t like him buy what she called junk to fill the house up with, because my dad was a bit of a retro head.

My dad always wanted to be an entertainer like his sisters, always wanted to do stand-up comedy and play the harmonica in public and create his own funny songs.  He liked making people laugh, but mum told he she wouldn’t let him do that as a side hobby, because he embarrasses her and it’s not fair to her that he should do that!

Mum was always telling him she was embarrassed by him and he just took it on the chin and obeyed, he tolerated it because he loved her.

My dad was a Tommy Cooper lookalike and he had his style of humour and my dad often imitated him a lot at family parties and weddings – in fact he looked so much like him and could remember all his jokes that his sisters tried heavens hard for years to make him be a lookalike act at special events where they honoured Tommy Cooper after he died – but mum simply wouldn’t allow it!

My dad would have been very successful doing that!  Especially as my dad could also do the special magic tricks that Tommy Cooper could too!  My dad was a bit of a magician!

My dad taught me how to act too; he would often play and relive our favourite movies together.  As a child I knew the lines to almost every Laurel and Hardy movie there was, because we played it together the most and also Blackbeard the pirate!  We also liked Norman Wisdom movies, Carry on movies and George Formby!

I don’t remember too much nowadays as it’s been almost twenty years since I saw a Laurel and Hardy movie last, but I do have recollections now and again.

But my dad and I were definitely entertainers for the family at family events, which is why mum started to refuse a lot of the invitations from the age of ten onwards – because we were both embarrassing her, my dad for simply being who he is and me being a fat funny girl who was too highly influenced in naughty humour bought about by my love for the Carry on team and comedians such as Frankie Howard and Julian Clary.

I like saucy and naughty humour, naughty is nice!

My dad paid for a while for me to have singing lessons (opera to be specific) but mum put a stop to it when they decided I had talent and needed to go to talent contests etc. around the country.  Plus she hated the idea of the amount of money she had to lose in order to hone my skills.  When I lost the singing lessons dad fought heavens hard to get me tutored in playing the piano, because of my addiction to my grandmother’s piano whenever we visited!

My dad would not compromise on one thing in his life and that was visiting his side of the family, something my mother really loathed bout him.  She hated every Sunday, because that would be the chosen day each week my dad would take me visiting his side of the family!

She rarely went with us because most of the family were outside of her 3 mile limit and the anxiety of travelling was just too much for her!  My gran lived 25 miles away in Bedfordshire.

Other relatives lived in Berkshire, Luton, Cheshire, Wales, Southend and Canvey Island or West London, far too far for my mum – so she stayed at home most of the time.

My dad and I would often go rowing in the lake at Alexander Palace in the summer with my cousins and have a large picnic, mum hated us doing that because she didn’t like my cousins being called cousins – as despite my mum having a mixed religious and mixed race background herself (third generation), she hated the concept of me calling my mixed race cousins, cousin and was quite racist about it, to the extent my aunt who is very passive was pinned up against the wall by my mother and threatened simply because she felt that she was putting ideas into my head that were against her own!

My dad never tried to control my mum behaviour, never tried to apologise for it or make any comment or even seemed to notice it – sometimes he would sigh and look downwards and wait for her to finish so we can all quietly leave again and hear the rants in the car about how victimised my mother felt for her own actions!

My dad was bullied by my mum and sometimes that did include physically being bullied too, though he’ll deny it, because he loves her.  But I remember lots of times where my mum has slapped him, kicked him, pushed him out of the way, called him names and dragged him physically off somewhere!

I do believe that domestic violence can affect both genders; I have witnessed it growing up!

Whenever my dad was pushed to the limits and he would rarely stand up for himself and say something, mum always won because she would say she is going to leave him right then and there and would often storm out of the house and stay with her friends for the night to try and scare him back into submission.  I remember those times, she would come back in the house with a smile on her face and carry on like nothing happened and dad would be thankful she is back, but she would pretend she wouldn’t know what he was on about!

Even when someone proved to dad my mum was having an affair with a bouncer at a nightclub my dad’s reaction was a shrug and well she comes home to me doesn’t she?  He wouldn’t challenge her on it.

My dad was submissive and unassuming and incredibly patient.

I often questioned his reactions and said you are not often happy dad, why stay?  He would make all kinds of excuses, but the one that stood out the most was hearing at the age of nine your dad confessing that if your mother did die of her heart troubles, you’d lose two parents at once, because he told me at the tender age of nine he’d commit suicide if she died.  Which shocked me, because he promised my mum he’d look after her sons if she did!  His reply is, they are adults now Tina, done my bit.  I said to him, well what about me?  I was shocked and hurt to hear him reply, the deal didn’t say anything about me!

I told him, I am your daughter, and surely you’d think about me wouldn’t you? What would happen to me then dad? 

He said I would be alright with my gran!

It was a scary time for me, because this was the time mum left for two weeks to go on  holiday in Great Yarmouth with her sister and friends because of another argument, one of which my dad tried to prepare me to pack to go and live with gran with him.  So suicide was lurking around the house for too long, mum came back, no smiles this time and she was asking if he had packed yet and he said no, but Tina has – then that’s when mum sent me off again to another aunt for a while and the whole time I was scared dad would be dead!

Other than gardening and playing darts with me from time to time, there isn’t really much else to say about my dad, other than his addiction to horse racing and online casinos.

He is a teetotaller, a good honest man who works hard and got obese living with my mum on the diet she provided him and he has very little self-esteem.

He is funny, a good entertainer, but she knocked him off his pedestal as much as she did me.

That’s all there is really to my dad.

He tried hard to get me into clubs and learn things – singing lessons, music lessons, pushing me in my sports, but mum always stopped us.

Dad always wanted to take me on holidays, but mum didn’t like it, didn’t like travelling unless she was with her sister and so we never had a family holiday together ever!  Not once.

I had no birthday parties after the age of 7yrs, nothing special for my landmark birthdays and that hurts when you see your mother go all out on landmark birthdays for your brothers, 16, 18 and 21.  It was always made clear to me, I was not important, I was not really supposed to be part of her family and so I don’t get those things!

That was my life, she lives for her boys, I got the scraps.

My dad never hit me unless he was bullied by her, she would literally lay into him to force him – but outside of her, he never laid a finger on me, even when he was at his most angry! 

Thanks for reading!

Maybe she couldn’t help it?

As hard as it might be to believe it, but I am starting to understand things a bit better about how I was treated as a child.

I am starting to realise as I am getting older that both of my parents were not really normal at all, I had my suspicions about my dad, but he was lovely, I kind of felt my mother was also a bit odd but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it… I presumed she was a bit off because she too, had a hard life – but no, there was more.

I may be entirely wrong with my suspicions, but it is making me wonder…

I’ll get to the gist shall I? 

I have been reading a book called “An adult with an autism diagnosis” by Gillan Drew, because I wanted to better understand my son Henry’s autism diagnosis better.  But as I was reading the book I realise more and more that the book was describing my parents!

Both had their obsessions, extreme OCD, both self-neglected when things went into turmoil in their lives, both were excessively awkward with strangers and would never leave the house if it meant leaving a specific three mile radius and would abandon trips altogether if they needed an alternate route because of roadworks or accidents.

Both had irrational ideas and were easily triggered into aggressive mood swings that held grudges sometimes for months and in some cases forever!

They also took everything literally, they never questioned what they were told and they were both excessively stubborn about any knowledge that they had.

Multi-tasking was also a trait none of them had; they were easily flustered whenever they had to do more than one thing at a time and were easily irritated by sudden changes of plan.  Everything in their lives were run by a tight schedule and outside of that schedule they were easily lost and confused.

The main trait of autistic parents according to the book is emotional distance from people, especially their children, though they focus on them a lot and they will do everything for the child in usually a suffocating manner, they often neglect their emotional needs.  They often fail to comfort their child, or cuddle them or support them verbally, but are quick to criticisms if it is outside of their idea of perfection.

I remember my parents thinking that cuddles was silly, get off, what do you think you are doing?  Do you think that is appropriate?  I remember my parents cancelling things if it meant that their dinner had to wait even by fifteen minutes, because the idea of not eating dinner by 4:30pm every day except Sunday was alien to them!

I know a lot of the time my mother would refer on the telephone to relatives she respected about the behaviour of all of her children and based on their advice she would change her parenting method quickly and react to whatever was suggested to her.

Throughout most of my childhood the parenting was delegated as much as possible, I was passed onto relative to relative a lot of the time and in between that she arranged for live in help in the form of au pairs and home helps.

Sometimes my mum would let me get away with things because in her opinion she didn’t see that something was wrong, if someone mentioned that it was wrong to her she’d instantly panic and respond in a very aggressive and often violent manner in the embarrassment that someone else had judged her.

All of these things are very much like a high on the spectrum autistic parent.

This would totally explain to me the constant inconsistencies in her parenting style and her ways and how extreme she was.

I know she hasn’t been diagnosed with autism because she has lived in a time where those things were not widely known, but I do know that my mother went to a prove school and was expelled for her behaviour a lot of the time and she had psychiatric tests a lot throughout her childhood because of her strangeness.

My dad isn’t so high up in the spectrum I think; I think he is just socially awkward and easily manipulated by my mother.

My mother had what I called “flaps” she often had to try and control herself, it is making total sense to me now and it is a confusing emotion to consider forgiving her because she may have had this condition and didn’t know any better!

Seriously, that is what is going through my head right now.

Her behaviour on many occasions was inexcusable, but I never once considered that she isolated me because she was suffering from social anxieties herself – because throughout my childhood she kept saying it was I who was not normal and that she simply didn’t socialise because she didn’t have the time or energy because of running a family and a home along with ridiculous work schedules. 

I didn’t realise when I grew up that most of the people she socialised with were in actual fact distant relatives and not friends at all!

This fact only came about near the end of my nans life as she revealed several family friends to be 3^rd to fifth cousins and then it was confirmed on GenesReunited on more than one occasion that it was true!

Yet growing up I was led to believe my mum was cool and extroverted and wild, because of her stories and ways.

How she berated me for being a strange creature who was the complete opposite to her.  She said she feared that I was too trusting of strangers and that I didn’t know how to properly behave in public as I am too forward and innocent all at once, that strangers would get mixed signals from me!

Every therapist I have ever gone to has felt that socially there doesn’t seem to be anything amiss – that perhaps some of my problems are based around my mother putting scary thoughts into my head – but to them they thought I was rather mature and worldly and acting very appropriately in fact splendidly.

It’s very strange to consider I got this book to understand my son, but instead it made me understand my mother!

I remember growing up and hearing my mother ask me why I would do such and such and to have me explain things to her almost constantly and she would always ask me why I reacted that way!

I often used to cry about not being cuddled or having attention as much as other children with their parents – she honestly looked awkward and frustrated and often said “why is that important?  I don’t like to do this, so you should respect that – why can’t you just understand I am not the cuddly sort of mother”?

It was bad enough her rejecting me, but when I was around ten years old my dad started to say he won’t cuddle me anymore because my mother finds it inappropriate now!

Henry doesn’t like cuddles either he doesnt understand how they are important in families.

She was always asking me why about everything –why is this important to you, I don’t think that should be, you should think this way instead (her way).

She’d also never understood how people had their own hobbies, likes and dislikes and would easily get offended if you said you didn’t like something that she liked.

She always tried to tell me that as we have a mother and daughter relationship, it is the daughters duty to be as much like her mother as possible, therefore I should endeavour to dress like her, think like her, choose the same hobbies as her and want to be with her as much as possible doing things as a team!

She couldn’t fathom for the life of her that things don’t work out that way!

She was so self-absorbed that for years I didn’t realise that brushing teeth and washing outside of the once a week on a Sunday bath was important, until other relatives I lived with raised concerns about my hygiene standards when I was thirteen!

When I told my mother about this conversation, she said that she presumed I would know to have done it, because she did it to me right up until I was 5yrs old and she presumed that I would carry it on now I knew the basics… no children don’t work like that… children don’t understand those sorts of things unless you tell them specifically and remind them regularly!

When I moved in with Paul in 2009 my mother couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t have the usual meal time schedules, why I had breakfast now whereas in London I never had one – why I don’t do lunch at 12:15pm sharp instead it floats around 1pm to 3pm and why on Earth is dinner anywhere between 6:30pm and 8pm when it should be 4:30pm? 

Why do I now have an 11:15pm bedtime and a 5:45am wake up time? 

Why do I insist in going out at 8am every morning for a long walk?

Why do I want to have yellow and purple walls instead of ivory white?

Why am I wearing pink instead of black and white all the time suddenly?

Why… why… why…

Why can’t I be like her?

She couldn’t cope with all the changes, the idea of travelling up to visit me made her ill because it was an hour and twenty minute car journey, a whole 87 miles too far!

The panic of me leaving home caused her to phone me approximately twenty five times a day!

When she temporarily moved in with me because I wasn’t coping a the last month of pregnancy as I needed bed rest due to chronic oedema and blood pressure – she went around the house changing furniture to her taste, painting my walls her colours and throwing out anything she found ugly whether I wanted to keep it or not, whether they were special things of                 Paul’s or not too!

She couldn’t understand when I had my baby, that my baby was priority over everything, including her!  She was hurt and often whimpered and cried if I ignored her to attend to my baby, because I never used to just ignore and abandon her when she spoke to me.  She really didn’t understand the transition!

All of this makes me wonder if my mother was a high functioning autistic person.

It makes me wonder if she deserved my sympathy because she really didn’t understand anything at all and still probably doesn’t understand why I decided I had enough of her controlling, aggressive and oftentimes childish ways.

I remember before I decided to wash my hands of her, I told Paul; my mother is harder work than our two year old over there!  He is a doddle; she is driving me around the twist and endangering him with her stupid antics!

Thanks for reading!

Loneliness

Disappointment, I’m used to that

I don’t ask for much, but it seems like I ask for the world

A hot dinner eaten cold, sitting alone at a table because you no longer form part of this little unit anymore

They are making it blatantly obvious you aren’t wanted

Being consulted about nothing, only little shots here and there for an update, if I’m lucky

Conversation is too difficult for them, they don’t even try anymore

Yawn, looking forlorn, worn and tired of hearing you, even if you are friendly and chipper!

Good to know they find you so boring, good to know they are there to comfort you and it is good to know they aren’t spreading their toxicity to the child you share

Sarcasm comes easy these days

Teamwork is dead and gone

But I am told I am wrong, it’s not like that, I am just tired and I think I have a chill

But it’s been like that for weeks

Merry Christmas is just an ordinary day

Nothing changes, most things forgotten like candy canes, pigs in blankets, meat in the stuffing and old family rituals

Nobody cares anymore

Nothing is important

Everyone has given up

But I still try to keep things normal until I leave

But nobody else wants to

Yet I am not leaving because I want to, I am leaving because I am unwanted

Though he learned his mistake when my replacement turned out to be a fake

Hastiness is punishing him still

I have months of a life like this before I can go

Lots of the old shit I have to clean up before I can be free from this toxic environment

I can’t just up and leave, I have things to do first – pay the debts I suffered due to broken promises

Trying to keep this family together, warm, cool, clothed all on credit

I have to work on my health too, get myself fit for the only work I can do which will guarantee payment for me – trolley dolly; I am too deaf for telephone work now and too stupid for other things

This is why I am trying to let my creativity and daydreams pay my way through life soon

I never wanted to be alone

Never

But life is making me walk the lonely path

Doing everything alone

Like Rambo a lone soldier, battling the world against the odds and never getting love or comfort

That is too much to ask for it seems

Though don’t pity me, I suppose my lack of tolerance for the past is punishing me somehow

They were tests I failed and this is the booby prize for not living up to lower standards

I should have tolerated the abuse, at least I wouldn’t be alone

At least I could feign some kind of happy families now and again

Instead of living in a cesspit of toxicity and loneliness, with bitter people who don’t even try

Should have tolerated being their money pig and Tina the tea maker

Do this and that and cry yourself to sleep at night because you can’t get away and you can’t choose to be yourself, be an individual, that’s not allowed

But hey, go and cry with the people we let you talk to from time to time, they might cuddle you if you are lucky and they are sucker enough

Those times were better than now and it is a horrifying revelation

Things were fine before I got sick

I did it all

Living with an overprotective father figure who wouldn’t let me try and fight my ailments by allowing me to continue running the family

Go back to bed – slow down – go to sleep – just stop…

Stop…

So I stopped… for years I got worse

I tried every now and again to do things but it was always the same pattern

Slow down…. Go to bed… go to sleep… just stop…

Is there any wonder I wanted to stop completely?

I snuck exercises in when he wasn’t looking and was out of the house

Convinced I could turn things around and guess what?

I could

Just a little, but that little was a lot!

The resentment for my successes were in his eyes but not on his tongue

Feigning pride for me, but he looked hurt I was trying

Looked hurt that he might not be needed anymore

And in less than three months of my change, he was looking for someone new

But still he says… I don’t want to get rid of you

Ah but he did when he thought Emmie was real

That’s the deal

And it hurts still…

God has forbidden them!

Am I healing my wounds?

Not yet I need TLC

A little love and some kind words and someone to snuggle me!

I am tired of doing everything alone

All by myself, till I’ve turned to stone

Or at least my heart has turned to bone

It’s cold here in the dead zone

I can’t heal when there’s a hole

A big chunk is missing I am not whole

I can’t mend when I still bleed

And the eels eat more of me through greed

I can’t heal when my heart is dead

Gone and hopeless I lie in bed

Turning to rock and dust and history

How can you heal me now, it’s a mystery!

Though I try to love everyone who hates me

Even those who forsake me

I fight to stay alive some how

But each day the people drive in more nails

I can’t heal until they stop or someone loves me

Like a clot

Because I can’t do this all alone

All alone till I’m a crone

I can’t find my happy place

When I am shut away in disgrace

I can’t mend my stone cold heart

When others intend to always tear me apart

I can’t live till I have love

But I am easily disposed of like an old glove

I give my heart for them to burn it

As far as they are concerned, I am just a piece of shit

So I can’t heal though I’d like to try

Why do I bother?  Why oh why?

Would I be better off if I die?

And fly off to heaven in the sky?

I’ve heard there’s love there in the clouds

They wrap you up in it like a shroud

Nobody can harm you ever again

Because God had forbidden them

Amen

Pollyanna is dying

Pollyanna is dying, a slow and awkward death

She wants to stay positive

But should she hold her breath?

Things will work against her

Like they always do

There is only so much light here

Here within the blue

She is drowning in the misery

Of broken promises and lies

The blue are the tears that came from her

From all her heartfelt cries

She tried to keep them happy

With a little charm and wit

But they flogged her daily

With words so full of shit

Slowly they made her like them

Slowly her heart turned to stone

Because slowly the eels gnawed at her

Through her flesh and bone

Her happiness frustrated them

They couldn’t stand her words

It made them feel insubstantial

She is stupid and absurd

Of course life is not like that

They said day to day

How can you sit and tell us

Those things are bright and gay?

I tell you now, we will make you

See what life is like

That the whole world is a hard place

It will hit you like a spike!

You won’t be happy much longer

Not when we’re done and through with you

You say you should find the positives

We say, you have no clue!

You are stupid and naive

And we’re here to tell the truth

There is nothing so nice about life

Nothing is sweet and smooth!

You stupid little girl

With your stupid sweet ways

We are tired of you seeing things sideways!

We’ll knock you down and you’ll be like us

Off a pedestal

You will hurt like the rest of us

We are taking you to school!

The joy and laughter will leave you

When you come and see the truth

Do your lesson well and we will show you proof!

You can’t have these or this or that

You can’t be happy in mounds of scat

You will eat the shit of life we give you

Down here in the deep blue

You can’t tell me there’s something grateful here

Yes that’s right go and shed your tears

You are learning good, now shut your mouth

Or else we’ll go worse on you and take you to the South!

So Pollyanna is dying, she is leaving me

Pollyanna was once alive, deep inside of me

But they made me see that things aren’t bright

And maybe things one day won’t be alright?

Maybe they’ll stay the same and they won’t change at all

We are in this for the long haul

Can I ever see the light again or am I in too deep?

Will I have the courage, to close my eyes and sleep?

I can’t tell right now at all

Because today I am at a wall

It is blocking my sight to see

I wished I could be free

But I am stuck here in the blue

My only hope is to be fished out by you

It’s not vanity week, honest!

Why did I confess about my supressed vanity and why do I seem so proud of it?

Because, it is a major part of my natural personality that got the hardest beatings and chastisements over the years, to me it feels like it was 50% of my personality and that since my suppressors took a hold on me – to get me out of the mind-set of it, it was like I have lived my whole life a lie.

I lived as my shadow self for too long, though many people feel that vanity is the shadow aspect in itself, maybe my mind is all muddled up – but to me, this is what came naturally to me and it is this what got moulded out of me.

I know a lot of people, my mother included will tell me that vanity is the shadow self, because vanity is a sin.

I don’t see how it’s a sin to make the most of what you have, why shouldn’t you adorn the precious body God gave you however you like?  Why should you not worship God through your temple, which is your body and give thanks and honour him for a job well done?

Why is it more holy to hate yourself and live modestly about your looks or abilities, surely revelling in it all is the biggest form of gratitude to the creator?

I remember slaps across my face as a child when I actually used to have the guts to ask these questions to my mother!

“How dare you” she used to say as she’d drag me to the bathroom to wash my mouth with soap, literally!

To wash those dirty words out of my mouth, because I say something that can’t be redeemed, her long nails scratching the back of my throat as she washed my tongue deeply!

I hate Imperial Leather soap to this day!

All the women I admired growing up were the vain glamorous types, I always kind of screwed my nose up at the ordinary woman and lived in amazement at how much some women put the time into their looks above everything else.

I always wanted to be like that too, but I was only like that for two short years in my adult life before I moved in with Paul and about a year when I moved in with Paul – funnily enough the year before I became sick.

Its sods law that I want to get to grips with my true self now and I have long Covid alopecia which is ruining my idea of what great hair is!  I have learned these things over the years, your hair is your crowning glory, and the thing that gets you judged the most; second to that are your shoulders, people look at your shoulders and your neck and judge your posture a lot!  Thirdly to this is the clothing or accessories you choose to wear and it’s generally make up as the last thing people will notice about you. 

Though going back to the clothing, people don’t look up and then down, they look down and go up, they judge you from your footwear.  This is my experience in any case.

Your smile is another factor that probably comes before the cosmetic application judgement!  Which is why I have a closed mouth smile, I am ashamed of my mouth.

My mouth is the most abused part of my body, my voice suppressed a lot, my mouth has had a lot of abuse – forced feedings, mouth wash outs, slapped across the face a lot, squeezed to keep silent, hand over my mouth, is it any wonder my throat chakra is hard to unblock?

So what is going on here, why is it vanity week?

Well it’s not intentionally vanity week – it’s just I am really working on my inner child in the past two or three weeks and it just so happens to coincide with a few of the self-therapies I am doing.

Waking up the true me, the unblocked me, the real me.

I want to take you all on a journey with me – weight loss and changing my image and I hope it will be fun for all of us!

I am not going to be happy until I can rock a pair of suspenders better than Dr Frank n Furter!

Just don’t think of me in them now huh, don’t want to have nightmares now do we?

For me one of the big things I hate about living here is the inability to get access to someone who can do household maintenance when it needs to be done, instead of having to wait years between projects!  Our shower broke down in 2016 and I bought its replacement in 2018 and it still hasn’t been installed!  I need my twice daily showers and twice weekly exfoliations!

I miss lathering myself in shea butter for an hour and then showering it off, the stretch marks were reduced a lot and it does a lot to help with cellulite, but you can’t get into a bath to wash it all off, ew!

I think my biggest goal since childhood was to have the confidence as well as the body to rock a velveteen cat suit too!  One I’ve dreamt of designing since I was a nine!  When I had the figure to wear something like that I didn’t have the guts!

Its really weird how since doing all this inner child stuff, I am seeing a lot of butterflies, dragonflies, caterpillars, flamingos, ibises and peacocks – all representatives of transformation, flamboyance, vibrancy, vanity and confidence.

I have been taking care of my body with a high protein diet, a little exercise per day and face yoga and I am seeing a major difference to my face and figure personally.  I am starting to like myself a bit but I am thinking that’s a lot to do with the change in my mentality, thanks to that Mel Robbins technique I shared with you a couple of weeks back!

I am now able to plank for about one minute, which is impressive when you think that I struggled to hold a squat for fifteen seconds at Easter!

Six weeks ago I could only do ten reps of bicep curls without weights before needing a two minute break to continue to the full thirty reps – now I can do fifty reps off the bat without resting, though I am slightly out of breath by then.

My main focuses in toning up are my triceps area, as that is not a very nice part of my body, as well as my abs, because I look five months pregnant if I am being honest right now.  The rest of the body seems to be doing itself naturally and appropriately, I don’t know why these two areas in particular are being stubborn!

The aim isn’t to become too muscular, but to tone it up and not be horribly flabby.

At the moment my arms look alien to the rest of my body, which is why I pose with them tightly behind my back, because I look like an ape… well I am an ape, all humans are… but you know what I mean!

So, I just want to be beautiful and feel good for it, I want to be in a position of belief when someone tells me I am beautiful.  But I don’t want to be a mean cocky bitch about it like some women are. 

I just want to wear what I want, feel great in it and be who I want to be, when I want to be it, instead of cringing and thinking I am making a fool of myself, or that people are going to think that two little boys are fighting up my skirt as I walk down the road!

Thanks for reading!