Tuesday Journal: 26/05/20

This one covers the last two weeks, as I never got round to doing my Tuesday journal last week. How I’ll remember everything from the last two weeks I have no idea!!

 

Things I am grateful for:

• Water (as usual!) – essential and refreshing. Can solve most ailments.
• Crochet (as usual!) – keeps me sane.
•  Animal Crossing game – absolutely love it!! So much better than the Wii game I used to play. Addicted to it. But before anyone says anything, I’m not into the social element of it – playing with others – yet. Happy enough on my own.
•  Cooler days. Can’t stand this hot weather.
• People who talk to me, but also people who understand when I can’t talk to others.
• The friendly cat I met yesterday on my walk – beautiful and cheered me up entirely. I’m someone who feels so rejected if cats run off when I talk to them. This one wanted me there! So I was happy. 🙂
• Our neighbours who randomly gave us some flowers and chocolates, just because they recognised how much we do for others (shopping for our elderly next door neighbour & my nan). They thought we deserved a treat. Was so lovely and unexpected, and warmed my heart. ❤

 

What I struggled with:

• Anger…. some to do with politics the last couple of days. Could do without that crap. But also anger at the Wellbeing Centre (frustration), and mainly anger at my former friend for abandoning me like she did, and her response or lack thereof, to my last communication with her. Will write about it sometime, to let it out, but it’s played on my mind a lot recently, as my God-daughter’s birthday was the other day. I’m angry at my former friend for destroying the bond I had with her daughter. That’s the thing I’ll never recover from… losing the kids. I just can’t understand the mentality that causes someone to ditch someone at their lowest, and to respond to feelings of hurt, or someone standing up and saying something wasn’t fair or right, with silence, rather than a ‘You’re right, it wasn’t fair and I’m sorry’. I just don’t get it. I don’t understand her, and I don’t understand what I ever did to deserve being treated the way I was. It’s not fair or right, and I hope one day she’ll understand what she did wrong and feel bad about it, rather than blaming me for what happened.

What I learnt from it:

• In terms of the political anger – step away. Come off Twitter for now. I’m fragile and on edge at the moment for certain reasons. My anger can be easily triggered. Must avoid those triggers.
•  In terms of the Wellbeing Centre – at the moment I’ve learnt to close down from them. I can’t pretend I’m okay with them. I’m not. But just like with my former friend, they won’t listen to or understand what I’m saying. There’s no point saying anything more to them. It’ll only lead to more frustration and anger.
• And in terms of the stuff with my former friend – that’s a work in progress. I can’t say I’ve learnt anything from it as it’s still happening. I just need to process some stuff. I don’t talk about or write about it anymore. So it’s built-up inside me. This lockdown is making me face stuff I’d buried. So I need to work through it.
• It’s okay to be angry. When people treat you wrong, I think anger is a healthy sign – it shows that you know you deserve better – which means you value yourself enough to say that something wasn’t right and you’re worth more than what they did to you.
• It wasn’t my fault what happened. I may never understand why it happened. I may never forgive her for how she cut me out of her life. But to be honest if she can cut me out so cruelly, then I’m better off without her. I clearly never knew her. I didn’t know the potential for such cold abandonment was lurking in my life all those years. I trusted her. I thought I was safe with her. It’s better to know the truth than to forever live a lie. But it was not my fault and I did not deserve it. Yes I can accept she had her own issues to deal with. I fully acknowledged that and sympathised. I even said she should focus on herself and her own mental health. That was caring. But I still had a right to stand up for myself and say I didn’t deserve to pay the price for her issues with other people. If she can’t acknowledge the hurt she caused me, then I’m better off out of that situation anyway. I need people who take responsibility for themselves and aren’t afraid of accountability and admitting mistakes and apologising for them.
• So in a way I guess the anger is teaching me about myself. It’s teaching me my values, morals, the good qualities I have inside (somewhere – they’ve got a bit lost lately!), and it’s helping me find my boundaries, my expectations of others, and in a sense although the ‘Why?’ aspect does affect my self-worth, it’s also a battle between feeling I must’ve done something to deserve it, and knowing I did NOTHING to deserve it (good self-worth). So people who try to break you can sometimes be the people to strengthen you and your belief in yourself. God that sounds profound. I don’t truly believe all this yet, but I’m working on it. I can’t let this destroy me. Got enough trying to do that already…

 

What I’ve achieved:

•  Learning lots of new crochet ideas.
•  Joined an online MH community recommended by the Wellbeing Centre… felt like a good step, but having looked at it more now, I’m not sure it’s a healthy environment, as there’s so much triggering stuff on it and seems to be no moderating going on. Just lots of people saying they don’t want to live anymore, and nobody doing anything about it. So probably won’t continue on there.
• Spoke to my nan on the phone for quite a while. I know that sounds daft, but I don’t tend to talk to anyone on the phone usually, even her. But wanted to cheer her up as I’ve not seen her in weeks.
• Grew sunflowers – we’re having a family competition. Mine actually grew!! I’m currently third place out of four though, but at least it’s growing!
• Walked four miles yesterday. Longest walk since lockdown I think….
• Managed four weeks without any self-harm. Please don’t celebrate this too much though, as it never usually lasts… normally get triggered and slip up soon after celebrating a milestone. It will happen. But even though it will, I guess it’s still an achievement to have gone pretty much a month without it. Compared to earlier in the year, it’s good.  I remember writing these journals at the Centre and an achievement being going a week without self-harm… so four of them is an improvement.