I thought a fair bit about whether I should post this or not. There is a part of me that was brought up to never show how much something or someone hurts you. They win if you do. You might say that’s growing up wrong but we are all different. However, this is MY page. As the page name says… An empty space… an empty space to fill with me. 1 rule. Be me. Be the real me that I perfectly hide from the world behind a smile. Here I can be honest in just how broken parts of me truly are. I can write out the cracks and shards of my mind. I can shatter into as many pieces as it takes. I fall apart over and over again and I can bleed words from my fingers all over the screen. This is MY page. My space to ditch the mask and be me.
This isn’t just an empty space… this is the one safe space I have.
So to write the things you have. The messages and comments you have? Its hurt. Does it not occur to you that your words cruelly hurt? I know I’m a mess. I apologise if you feel that I’m a stuck record that someone needs to “throw away” as youso eloquently put it. I dont know you. In fact I make it a point that no one I know IRL reads my blog. To the point that despite the fact I’ve had this blog for 10 years? Only 4 people that actually real life know me have ever seen it. I feel worthless enough as it is, I dont need comments like that. If you don’t like my blog? Dont read it. Simple as.
Everyone else? I’m sorry. I dont want to rant. I just needed to get this out to the “fan” that never learnt the phrase… “If you can’t say nothing nice, dont say nothing at all.”
(This post is going to be a little different than normal. Well maybe it might be. We shall see).
You can take that in more ways than one…
How do you feel? With my fingers usually. But sometimes its far better to feel with the tongue… ICE CREAM!!! You don’t feel ice cream with your fingers do you?! (Perverts).
But for this post I’m on about a different meaning. How do you feel? Honestly? I dont know.
Its still feeling like I’m on autopilot and emotions aren’t hitting hard enough to burst through and make me real again. Last night I sat and cried as I felt so sad. So I know that the feelings are there. They just won’t stay. I need them to stay so that I’m real. Because if I don’t feel like I’m real? Then what am I?
There’s so many thoughts going through my mind and if they’d just slow down from 100mph to maybe 80mph? I maybe just might be able to make sense of just one…
Yeah my brains the traffic and I’m the damn squirrel… why don’t these cars ever run out of fuel? Oh! They are pixie powered?! Fudging pixies… 🤬😡😠
Hows your week been? Yes, I am asking you. And yes… im asking you to. I see you sat in that chair quietly thinking “Who me?” Yes… YOU. Dont try and hide behind your cup. I can still see you. Shy huh? Don’t spill your drink! Ok ok… I’ll let you drink in peace. Wait a sec… is it a nice drink? Whats in your cup? I’m curious now…
Sigh… the week has gone ok in our house. I’ve busted the 11yr old 7 times for YouTube when she was supposed to be on Google classrooms(i swear as soon as my back is turned!!). But I listened to her French lesson. Really good! Oooooo… we had snow ❄ I love snow ❄ like I really really really love that white cold stuff! Me and the 11yr old had a snowball fight(we needed it). It made her late for her French lesson, so she’s about 11 minutes late and I say to her… just be honest. Say sorry and tell him why you are late and that im here if needs be. This French teacher is fab(knows all of my Kiddos), he says “ok ….. catch up please.” So she did. At the end of the lesson he let’s them go 5 minutes early and says go do something that makes you smile. Like have snowball fight! The best bit about that is that the pupils in that lesson had about 20-25 minutes before the next lesson and yes, we went back outside. But listening? We could hear some other kiddos out playing in the snow to. Its good to get outside.
The 15 year old has been doing really well plowing through her work. I mean I cant fault this girl. She’s really putting in the effort. Yep she’s still worrying about the GCSE’s. Every bit of work is proof she deserves her grade. I’m proud of her. She even asks me to reread and discuss word changes just like the 11 year old does. The 15 year old has finalised her college application and after our talk in getting it complete she’s not only sent it off but had her first email from them so she’s happy. She wants to work with children. This girl has the mum gene(If you know? You know). I always laugh and say that if I died? They wouldn’t go to my eldest girl. They’d go to the 15 year old. She’s got this amazing way with kiddos and has all the qualities you’d want from someone to look after them/work with them.
The 17 year old who is 6th form is also doing well. But he’s yet to decide what he wants to do next… he has a love of history and science and food. Erm… but not the science behind the history of food (well he might be into that!), each subject separately. Waiting to see how he feels and what his thoughts are as to what he does next. Interesting food lessons on Google classrooms this week and I’ve been made to laugh.
What I really noticed, especially with lockdown this time is just how much effort these teachers put in. I mean yes, I know they put in a sheer amount of effort into every single class. I know that teaching comes with so much hidden stuff that happens before they even get to the teaching part. I know teachers. I know just how hard it is and that no one goes into teaching for the money. But listening to these teachers keeping our kiddos engaged in working through lessons online and commenting something individual to each of our children making them know that they are being listened to. You rock teachers 👏👏
Currently I’m sat in my favourite place… yep you guessed correctly… kitchen floor. I’ve got the music playing(of course). Current song is Nickelback “Gotta be somebody.” A random list is playing out of 500 songs so I get a surprise every time.
I don’t know if writing all of this has done me any good? Or even why exactly I’ve written it all. I guess you can see that I’m normal I guess… wait… I’m normal?! EWWWWWW!! I dont want to be normal 😱
So I’ve just come back inside from telling my fluff ball to get in the house and hes just sulked past me and walked upstairs. I swear this cat is a sulky teenager sometimes and grumpy old man other times. He’ll be 5 years old this year but officially he’s not 2 years old for another 3 years. (I can see you sitting there trying to work that out you know🤭). Fluffy suits our family and I even admit that he is very much like his owner… completely anti social to everyone and every thing outside his family…
⬆️⬆️ every time I read that? I agree with Dracula. He kinda had it right. However my castle would have glitter inside and black because I like black but also pinks and blues and purples, oranges, lellows… and rainbows and unicorns and dinosaurs and kittens and stuffies!! Yeah… I’m kinda girly and I freak out at spiders… erm… just like that⬇️⬇️
ONLY DON’T KILL IT!!!! PUT HIM OUTSIDE. ITS COLD? PUT HIM IN THE SHED. EEKKKKKKKKK!!!! GET HIM AWAY FROM MEEEEE!!!! *As I scream like a girl and run and lock myself in the bathroom because the maybe the shower curtain and door will save me. Yeah… I know… and I’m supposed to be the adult…*
I know I haven’t really picked a subject to talk about this time for my post. I guess I’m just being real(like always), and just wanted to see where this post would take me. Because sometimes things come out when I write that I dont see until after I’ve published. In just letting my fingers play across the screen tapping away? I’m showing that despite the fact I’m clearly broken, I’m also human and I’m also trying and most importantly I’m real. In my day to day? I hide behind everything. I dont let people see when I’m falling apart. No one would guess that this afternoon I was in floods of tears(yeah bathroom floor). The world around me sees a smile. People that know me, know me as someone who is always ok. Someone who always has her shit together. But everyone on here? You all know that I cry nearly every day. You know that there are times I dont want to breathe any more. You see me. You see the real me. Eccedentesiast. That’s me. I’ve said it for years. I’ve perfected my mask for the world to see… that smile. Ive brought new tea. Remember my post about being caffeine free and my now love of Chamomile tea? Well I brought
And yeah… I drank it last night and got about 4 hours sleep!! (4 hours is an amazing amount of sleep!). So will be drinking more. I need honey in this though…
Anyway… I’ve written loads. Chamomile tea is calling me. Too early for that sleepwell stuff.
Watching you so dainty and sweet, Tiny little nose soft fluffy feet, Nose boops and soft purrs, You jumped up on the counter just to watch what I’m doing, and glare at that yucky white stuff that is all over the floor outside the window. Yes yes… you shouldnt be on the counter. I’m spraying it again huh? I’ve cleaned it 4 times already today. Your tail curled around your feet. That tail that gets people talking, how they know your mine, tail as long as a normal cat and so fluffy! If only everyone that has ever seen you would know that at home the shy timid streak of white and black that runs so fast from everyone, actually likes to be cuddled… on your terms! You look at me and I see it, Those eyes that hold so much knowledge, Those other worldly eyes of greens and yellows that appear to change colour… Chicken? Those eyes say. Always for you. You and your chicken obsession. But not just any way, cut it small or you won’t touch it. Watching you eat with that tiny mouth so dainty. My fluffy friend. That purr… Oh that purr so loud out of someone so small. I get so lost in watching you that I dont hear the pan on the hob boiling. Ooopppssss… So lost in the magic that is you. Once cats were revered as G*Ds. With time we forgot. But cats did not. How I love that saying and believe there’s truth in it. You may be young but you have such an old soul and I see it every time I get lost in watching you…x.
I crashed last month. Like always? I didn’t see the signs until after. Like always I hid how much I cried, hid that I didn’t want to breathe any more. I planned in detail again just how I’d do it. I’ve got a quick fool proof way. No come backs. No doctor will save me. But its just thoughts. Its what happens when I get that low. I know there’s some name for it. Where you plan it but have no intention to actually do it. I seem to purposely break myself and shatter my own defenses every time I try to build them. Honestly I’m tired of this game. So damn tired. I’m tired of building myself back up and pretending that I’m always ok. I’m tired of always showing the world a smile, and im known for it… that stupid smile. Its there hiding me behind it.
Right now I feel numb. No emotion is hitting me hard enough to get through. I’m just sitting here in my mind slowly building these glass shards up one by one. You’d think by now I’d have cut myself so many times that I’d build with something stronger. But no… I’d rather walk on broken glass apparently…
But you see? This is the thing with depression. It hits us all in different ways. Its sets us apart but in being apart we are together(these are my thoughts remember). It torments us with sweet nothings. Promises of things being better if we just give in and let that dark gray soft depressive cloud envelope us in its warm embrace. But they’re not better. They never are. And yet so many of us give in again and again. Are you tired like me? Because I’m so damn tired of all this.
I want to be better. I want to be like everyone else. I don’t want to have to fight the feeling that my skin is trying to crawl off me every time I’m around people. I dont want to keep being afraid of people and places with lots of them. I dont want outs to my anxiety to be to claw my skin on my arms until I make it bleed(I’m working hard on finding ways to not do this including living in t-shirts no matter the weather because I cant hide it). I’ve often said over the years that I want to be normal. But what’s normal? To the outside world I appear to function fine. So therefore? I must be fine. I must be normal… Please remind me of this next time I’m on the bathroom floor crying so hard I can hardly breathe all while trying to make no sound so no one knows what I’m doing. Remind me of it when my own mind turns against me and drags me down shattering every hope I have, leaves me a broken jaggard mess. Remind me then that I’m normal. Because those times I forget…
So here I am. Back to the now. And I’m here. I’m starting to feel words again so I know I’m coming back. I’m building enough and fighting the numb enough and not just floating in it because floating in numb is easy and since when did I ever take the easy road anyway? I can’t quite catch the words yet to make poems. But I will. I have hope. When I have nothing else inside me? I always find a way to have hope. And sometimes things get so dark in my mind. But still always there is hope. Hope plants seeds. Hope can grow a blade of grass or a mountain…
Look at me here littering this page with my thoughts… I feel I’d have made more sense if I’d just grabbed a tin of alphabet spaghetti and played scrabble with it(now there’s an idea!). But I stick to the promise I made for this page… be open. Honest. Who cares if they think your a fruitloop? You’ve never eaten one so does it matter? The point is I’m real.
I’ve just seen something fluffy walk into the room and meow(well he makes a sound that sounds like “no”), in my direction… I’m going to say hello and touch the uber fluffiness because no one can deny a cat…
A view from the inside of going through the minefield of the British benefit system if you are disabled and the ups and downs of coping with mental illness
For when you just need to let it all out. Blogging about mental health, writing poetry and stories. Please do get in touch if you wish. Email and Twitter down below.
"Non è tanto chi sono, quanto quello che faccio, che mi qualifica" ________________________________________________ "It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me." ("Batman Begins")
An empty space.... 