Where to start. I feel lost so much of the time. I feel like for so long, most of my life I've been lost. I don't feel like I have anything that is worth something. What I mean is that I look at people I grew up with and they have families and these really solid relationships, they travel and have fitness competitions, or businesses, or jobs that are really successful and these beautiful lives. And then I wonder what I have in comparison, and it feels like nothing. Everyone says that comparing is unhealthy and bad for you and blah blah blah, but really, how can you not look at other people and realize how far behind you are from everyone else. I have a post-grad degree and still feel like it was for nothing. My job is at about the max potential I can reach, it's not stable, it's barely paying the bills. And the pressure from everyone to change to something else is overwhelming, because no one really understands that feeling of suffocation I get when they try to force me to keep a schedule. I mean for 4 years I've worked at not panicking when I'm supposed to be somewhere consistently at a certain time. But overall, I'm not much better than I was a few years ago when I think about some other position where I can't come and go as I please. Because holding a schedule is suffocating, it feels like walls closing in and I can't breathe. God there's so much on my mind lately, I wish I could even find an end to start at with untangling this mess and knowing where exactly to get my thoughts straight. So. I guess we start with money and try and figure that out. Money is....well it's bad. I can't even say tight. It's somewhere beyond that and J doesn't feel the same money struggles that I do, because he doesn't have this insane need to plan. I need to know what will happen because yay control freak. So by not knowing what bills will be paid when, I panic and then I can't breathe and commence anxiety. So now I'm somewhere in the process of bankruptcy and dealing with the stress from that. And losing my car, which has always symbolized freedom for me. I can take off when I want with a car. Something that is mine, and my space. Which J also doesn't seem to understand why certain things like feeling like my things in the car are moved gets me. It's just always been something that feels like a safe place to get out of my head, and by getting into the car and feeling like things are moved or hidden or that I may find something belonging to someone else it's like that safe place has become a point of stress. I don't actually think I have a safe place to not feel anxious anymore. Not somewhere I can get to. So I just walk around freaking out all day and white knuckle it. So then there is the job, and the job doesn't make enough money but as mentioned it also is the only position I've held that doesn't suffocate me. I schedule my own shit, I go where I want and cancel and hide when I can't be there. I have a place that I've made into my own and the people aren't dicks. So going elsewhere feels like setting myself up for misery and like I will quit. Because that's what I do when I feel uncomfortable. Which goes to I guess the issues surrounding personal stuff. Losing my only real friends here for the most part. One of them goes between cycles of normalcy and then being overbearing and jealous. She's fine as long as I play by her rules and color in the lines and I don't do that well. I never really have. And the other took my godson with her and the kids I watched grow from birth to toddlerhood. I miss G, because there were a lot of times where we just hung out and did dumb shit. That was my best friend, and I try to acknowledge maybe J has that same exact thing. Like when G and I used to just go to the downtown area at 3am and find Pokemon when that was a thing, and people still did that. Or when we got drunk and sang DMX, because we were way funnier then obvs. But really for years there was nothing sexual between us after he realize I just wasn't his person outside of being a best friend who was the one who could logic and calm him out of the stupid shit he got himself into. And maybe that's what J has with his friends. That's such a sensitive subject, because I don't know where it's going or what is going to happen. And like G always said, I control the river and don't just let it flow how it wants. I don't know if we will be together or not, or if he will even be trustworthy at that point or not. Because trust has always been hard for me and he hasn't been terribly trustworthy honestly. So. I guess there's that. I go between hope and sheer despair. I've been here before so many times, because I feel like this is always my luck with people. That I'm always good enough for so many things but not good enough for someone to keep. And then I feel like at my age I should be past this nonsense and I am too tired to keep with the circles. I don't know anymore. There are so many things I wish I could convey, like my thought patterns don't make sense and that's frustrating. Because I'm seen as selfish when I really am not, it just feels different for me than it does most people. Like some things that seem like selfishness are actually my fear of the end, or not knowing what will happen. Because so many things feel like abandoned or like losing hope and I just wish I had the words to convey that yanno.

Friends wonder why I hate my grandmother, I mean people don't generally hate granny. But she really is this awful person, it's not just a "oh she thinks ridiculous things and has no boundaries". But she's manipulative like there is no tomorrow.

There's a cheesy line in a song, that stupid one about "hate is a strong word, but I really really really don't like you". That's sort of how I feel right now.

I'm angry at you for never following through. In all of the times you said you'd do something you never did. You never managed to follow through with a single goddamn thing. I made excuse after excuse for you. In 6 years you've never done anything you've said you were going to do, while I gave up 

A little over a week ago one of my oldest and closest friends died. Part of me feels guilty for never posting anything publicly but I was waiting to find this picture, which of course I couldn't find. No one really wants to hear every memory I have, and I get that. I mean his fiance might but right now she needs to lean and to vent. My memories aren't even about anything particularly emotional. I'm not upset from a place of love but because in the end he truly became one of the very few people I could count on. I met Pat after one of the most abusive periods in my life with someone who really fucked me up. I got into this really special program that only 2 kids from our school got into and the other was my best friend at the time since we'd applied together. I saw Pat at orientation and back then I had a thing for goth boys. I damn near ripped her arm out of the socket trying to follow him around the school. At that point in time I had just gotten out of a summer stay in a place where I had no phone reception and I was states away from everyone I knew to keep me from partying. When I went into my family's idea of drying out/rehab with extended family I was a 15 year old who drank 6 out of 7 days a week and was putting away a bottle a night. I followed that shit up with whatever pills I could get my hands on and started washing it down with letting dudes feel me up or trying to get into my pants. Granted, I wasn't a huge hussy at this point I deff had 2 one night stands under my belt because I just. didn't. care. I wanted to die. My goal was to party until my heart stopped. The tipping point for all of this was when I thought I was pregnant. Dude was 23 and I was 15, so super illegal and his fiance was pissed off. He was some popular guy from a local band that had just started getting noticed and didn't want it getting out that he had been with someone under the age of consent. He told me if I was he'd pay for me to get rid of it, so that it didn't ruin his life like I had. And that I was a worthless whore who should go kill herself. Cue more drinking and branding myself with big words as to how I felt about myself. Anyway. What did this have to do with Pat? He had to deal with this when we met. He was the first guy I'd interacted with since I'd been back in any sort of friend sense. How did we become friends? I knew the words to Absinthe with Faust better than him, which he was impressed by since it was his fav band until his death. When we became more than friends he dealt with this incredibly broken human being who was probably really difficult to get close to and love. And then after we split and I was able to look at him without too much heartache we became awesome friends. I was able to count on him for anything for over a decade. It didn't matter what was going on, he was willing to drop everything and help. He was my relationship confidant. He was willing to bail me out of sticky financial situations. He was willing to listen to me vent and cry and bitch even 10 years later. He dealt with more panic attacks than anyone should have to. He even had his friends take me in post break-up so that I wasn't so alone because he was more okay with being by himself and wanted me to feel supported and cared about while at school. 12 years ago I met my first love. He was just as jaded with the world as I was. This abused kid from a sunny beach town who hated the beach because his dad ruined everything good about it. He fell in love for a very short period with a girl 2 hours away who was in love with the beach but who couldn't trust anyone. And somehow they became this awesome friendship duo as adults who didn't judge each other for any of the poor life decisions the other made. I'm mad at you Pat. I'm fucking angry because you knew better, and you knew to reach out to me instead of hiding it. Damn you dude. Legit damn you. Because you shouldn't be gone.

It's been a while, hasn't it? I haven't quite known how to write about things in my life, so I've put it off. I've put it on paper, but the words never come out quite right. Some time last winter I began my Master's degree, and it's something that I've been really proud of having began. I have a few months left in the program and couldn't be more excited to graduate and be promoted at work. I work with my female best friend, I couldn't ask for another human to hold the supervisor position until I graduate and am promoted. She's so similar to me, and I'm very thankful for her as she came to be a friend during a really dark period of my life. I think without her my depression would be a lot worse. Annnnd for the less positive elements. So, the night of the Super Bowl, Shags and I met up with my friend Lyd. He had two huge beers and was pissed off that he had to watch football with a female and that he didn't like my friend. That meant we left at the half-time show and we went to his friend's. The affection between us had been little to none prior to this, after his stay at the hospital there were nights spent mostly distant from each other and more comfortable but with no affection. At his friend's he proceeded to down another six pack or two, I really don't remember at this point but he was clearly drunk. We drove back to the apartment and he started using my data to play Pandora off my phone without asking, which pissed me off and I voiced the opinion. I also voiced that he was going to blow my speaker's and I had a really bad headache so he needed to turn the music in my car down. This turned into him being really mad, and my not knowing it. He put on a MMA interview, I remember hearing Joe Rogan's voice and I still hate it. I hate his fucking voice and it's not his fault. I used to love Coldplay-Adventure of a Lifetime and now I don't enjoy it nearly as much without thinking of how excited I was about the halftime show and it playing. Shag's had me put my head on his lap, which was customary. Except he told me if I moved he'd smack me, since I'd laid on him without asking in the first place. I itched my face, smack. Shifted position to get more comfortable, smack. It was on the rag, I had a headache, I didn't' feel good. My skin hurt, I was exhausted and in pain and had no interest in anything remotely sexual. At some point he started smacking more, the details get a little fuzzy. Then he started choking, but he wanted to choke me until I blacked out. He kept telling me that I wasn't good enough more or less because I wouldn't let him. So he started choking and didn't stop when I did the sign for it. He covered my mouth and nose while choking instead. He knew this set off flashbacks from PTSD, he knew it was a hard limit, and he laughed and did it anyway. I clawed at his hands and he just laughed. I don't remember when he grabbed a metal serving spoon, the kind with holes in them from the kitchen. I don't remember at which point he dumped water over my head and I ran in the bathroom to pee. I know he told me it was okay, but next time I had to ask, and I just agreed. I didn't actually have to pee, I wanted away from him but didn't know how to stop him or how to leave. Because this is what he'd been working toward for 8 months. Someone who didn't know how to voice up that things weren't okay. When I came back I think is when he got the spoon, because I remember my pants being taken off and the spoon against my thighs and ass. I was trying to cover as much as I could with my hands and that made him angrier. He spit in my face and spit in my eye, which just made everything worse. Mentally it was as low as I could hit, I had spit in my face and I was told not to touch it....and I didn't. I went and got him a beer like I was told to do, and as he drank yet another one he wrapped my head in a blanket. I tried not to make it obvious I was moving, because then he'd have hit more with the metal. I created a little tunnel so that I could get air, and hide that I was crying. I was angry, I hated him. I hated everything about him. I saw my ex's face, and I hate him too. I told my brain to turn off, and I was mad that it wouldn't. I couldn't dissociate and I couldn't deal with what was going on, but I didn't know how to leave. I said I liked it, it was obvious I didn't, but I was too afraid to say I didn't like it. I wanted to tell him I hated him, I wanted to tell him to eat shit and die. I wanted to ask him why. But. I didn't. At some point the blanket came off, I don't remember. And he was drunk and his aim was bad. He'd tried to hit my face and missed hitting my throat, my nose, and finally my ear. I heard a loud pop, and felt this searing pain. He started yelling that I was overreacting, that he boxed my ear and it would stop hurting eventually. 5 months later the doctor said my ear drum was damaged from trauma and still healing. Certain temperatures still hurt, hitting it still hurts. Thankfully it's not nearly as bad as it was, esp at the beginning of summer. After that he told me if I wasn't into it then to get the fuck out, so I did. And he berated me the entire way home via text. But was that enough for me? Nope! I stayed because I'm a fucking dumbass. But I didn't feel anything for him after that. I hated him, but still I stayed. About a week later I confronted him on how I felt, and he told me the story of The Scorpion and The Frog. It's not a story I was unfamiliar with, I just had never considered it to apply to my life personally. However he considered me his frog, and that it was just in his nature to beat the shit out of me. Two weeks later we went to the bar, and he drank an entire bottle of tequila rose with me. I was fine, minus the fact I should not have been operating a vehicle. He then had half a bottle of whiskey, and he was hanging out my car windows screaming. He screamed so long and so loud that I was embarrassed to be seen with him. He was screaming in the streets, and all I could think was "I'm wasting my Valentine's Day here. With you? And I hate you, you're stupid" so I left. And he texted me demanding I come back so much that I turned off my phone...for once I didn't listen. For some reason days later I took him to a doctor's appointment. I was annoyed and he was still stupid, but the good in me was still helping him. Until he called my phone at 3am until I woke up, calling me a bitch and demanding I come pick him up from a friend's house. That somehow did it for me, and I stopped speaking to him. I blocked his number, and I was done. I haven't spoken to him since. But in that time the fear that should have been there all along has set in. I dread seeing him, it gives me the worst anxiety. My stomach knots up and I panic. I have nightmares about him, or that he's found me and called me. Which leaves to me texting G in the middle of the night to calm me down. But that's another post for another day.

For some, unknown to me reason, I have always loathed New Years Eve. It's not even a depressing holiday, but every time it rolls around I have some horrid effing anxiety. Aside from my birthday, it's probably the one time of year that I get the most destructive. I have a tendency to start pushing people away, or starting shit so that they push me away first. I've pretty much been in my little mini apartment deal all day, drowning the day away. Doing absolutely nothing productive. I could have been working out, getting to where I want to be. But when I go to do it I just feel...idk. Prematurely defeated. Like I'm just tired of trying, and tired of fighting. And that's not even with working out only, I'll get the same way with other shit as well. I mean I'll still do it. But with working out there's that hang up. It's this "You already hate the way I look, shit I hate the way I look" and insert defeat. Even when I'm pushed I just get angry at people. Angry that it hurts, angry that I can't do what they want. Angry at how I look. Angry. Just angry. So fucking angry. Angry that I'm not thin, angry that I hate myself. Angry that my body doesn't want to easily do the things I think it should be able to do. Angry that I'm not the same way I was when I liked myself. And did I even really like myself then or did I only like myself because people gave me attention?

I've been working, and pretty much not around. And you know, the one that I missed is back so there's that. Girls make me want to hit them when they talk about how amazing and romantic FSOG is. Not for the most common reasons. I've heard all of them and don't really care about those, because that's totally not the point of this. What gets me is how "romantic" it is to love a broken Dom. It's not. It's hard, easily harder than anything you want to willingly engage in. But, for some odd reason you do it. Not that I'm incredibly sure why, but you do. Kiddos, I love the broken sadistic Dom. I love the foster kid who does shit that you don't know about because of a childhood trauma. I love the one who will try to focus his demons on your body, and not in an abusive way. By all means if someone is abusive fucking run. But in a way that, yes stops if you call Red, but before you do he lays all the pain he feels into your body without sometimes realizing it. You don't get to be the one to "fix" him. Because he has to be the one who wants to repair the cracks that the world has left on him. But trust me when I say, it's not a romantic cake walk. Until you've been on the receiving end of loving someone who "Doesn't do girlfriends" or worse, doesn't do monogamous, don't romanticize it. Until you've been on the end of a bad night where you let them use your body to release their own pain, don't tell me how cute it is. If someone hasn't withheld how they feel completely, and not been 100% up front about it because they don't even know, don't tell me how much fun it would be. And for the love of all that is, don't tell me you want to "fix" someone. You can't fix someone. And if you're the reason someone wants to try, then hope like hell you're strong enough for the ride because it's exhausting physically and emotionally. It's so fucking exhausting.