does 'everything happen for a reason'?

I have always believed that everything happens for a reason. What is the reason that my body must suffer for so long? A year and a half and it seems like it's just getting worse. Everything hurts my stomach.. Sometimes I'm fine after eating, but mostly, I am just bloated all day, and if I'm lucky, that's all that will happen. But my stomach cramps are just getting worse and worse (among other things I won't describe), and I am just effected and feel sick pretty much always. It sucks because I am FINALLY getting better with my muscles, after a couple months at this special training gym that I LOVE, but now that my insides are getting worse, it's making me weaker and I'm fighting to stay doing what I was but it's getting harder. I just want to find a job but now I'm worried I won't physically be able to until this problem is resolved. I went to a specialist this morning and they want to rule out lactose intolerance and celiac disease first, (but I'm pretty sure it's not the food that's the main problem, I'm pretty sure it's my insides) but my appointment to take the lactose test (drink milk sugar and blow into a thing) isn't until the end of June. WHY?!

 It's getting worse by the day and no medicine really helps, to be honest Marijuana has helped better than any medicine they have given me, but still I can't really ease my suffering that much. I just broke down outside the doctors office because I am so sick of suffering. I just want to live a normal life and prove that I can live here in Germany without relying on someone else. But I'm in so much pain all the time it's making it so hard for me to get where I need to be. And I know it's only a small bit but summer is coming up quickly and I am actually feeling good about my body, but because of whatever is going on I am so bloated all the time and it makes me so much bigger than I am and I can't control it at all. I want to feel good this summer like I know I could but it seems like this problem is just going to drag out. I feel so defeated. What is the reason for all of this?! The only thing I can actually think of is that I am avoiding money situations where I come from. Is this my karma for not dealing with that situation? Or is this just some random suffering to teach me that life is just hard and you have to learn to deal with it in a peaceful way?

I also mistreated the hell out of my body in the past so it doesn't surprise me that I am having problems, I'm just surprised it's taking so long for the doctors to figure it out. I feel such a disconnect between the doctors and myself here. The newest one I have been going to has actually helped me quite a bit. She sent me to the specialist today and also gave me a list of many psychotherapists in the area, and I finally found one that doesn't have a waiting list and more importantly, she speaks English! SO this is a huge plus for me, my first appointment is in 3 weeks.

I left out a detail earlier that I would like to now add haha. During my breakdown on the street (crumpled in a ball crying) a lady came up to me and asked me what was wrong and I explained everything to her (In German, which for me is a big deal) and she was so helpful and sympathetic. She said I should try to call the hospital and talk to them about it and make an appointment there. It was a really good idea that I probably wouldn't have thought to do. But they do everything there it's a hospital!! If I am suffering this much I need to do whatever it takes, and I don't want to continue suffering! My doctor gave me the last medicine she can give me and yah it doesn't work. Hospital it is. Thanks for reading my rant about my dwindling physical condition, I feel better now.

no one leaps mountains.

I've been hiding how I'm feeling from myself. I'm not really okay. I push away all the sadness and confusion. It's mostly too hard to face. I've suffered so much I feel like I won't make it having a good life, like it's just not going to happen. When it comes time to write down how I feel it won't come out. I can't get out of my head and I also can't stop repressing what keeps coming up. How am I supposed to deal with what I do not understand or know? When I think about where I should live or what I want to do, I feel nothing. Like I don't really want to exist, because life just seems like too much to handle. Wtf do I do if things don't work out with my boyfriend Timo? Would I live in Germany still? That's the big question I cannot answer. It's what brings me to the place of feeling like blank existence. I'm so fucking confused about life, love, everything. I have no idea what to do. But I've decided life here deserves a chance. There are many things I love here in Germany, especially Timo. I need to focus on that instead of all these what ifs. Save those for the if time. Also, One small step at a time. No one leaps mountains.

all you need is love

One of my favourite sayings is “all you need is love”. The problem, I am realizing with that phrase, is that most of the love that you will want or need in your life comes from yourself. It has to! Even the people that do really and truly love you get sick of you from time to time or need their love for other purposes. Love needs to come from within. Why is that such a hard thing for me to remember/practice? Why do I get so easily out of balance and feel the opposite; like all the love needs to come from outside of me, to make me feel good again. That clearly isn’t the answer but it’s really hard to build yourself back up from that.

I feel like I’m at such a low right now, sick of almost everything in my life and unsure of where to really go from here. Of course I have moments of happiness but underneath everything I just feel like I’m failing at life, letting down the people who had high reverence for me, changing their opinion of who I am, coming to decisions I cannot control and I hope that this low doesn’t cause too much damage. I don’t want to be thought of as being this way, unable to take care of myself, unable to work a steady job, unable to live life properly. It’s sad isn’t it? That because my nervous system works differently than the other 80% of people, I am judged without understanding, every day of my life. Lately I can just feel the judgement coming off of my super wonderful, smart and caring boyfriend. He is certainly not sensitive, and really can’t get into my head. I can see it in his face sometimes that he doubts I really feel the way I do. My easily overwhelmed sensitive self comes off as lazy and I really don’t know how to explain myself any different so that it is understood why I am unable to do what I am unable to do these days.

I guess it also sounds like I’m a little bit depressed, which I read tends to be a problem with HSP’s. We get ourselves into these holes, be it by our minds or the overwhelming circumstances around us, and it seems like we aren’t trying when really we are just trying too hard. I hate it. I want to be positive about being an HSP but at the moment it isn’t really working. I am seeing how much I am going to struggle though life, and realizing that there might not be someone willing to love me unconditionally ‘forever’. I seem like such a perfect catch at first, but after time the complications unravel and at this moment I am hoping that I can roll this ball of yarn up and turn it into some new kind of respect. Respect for myself and for the differences of my partner, I hope that he can gain the same respect.

I just need to keep going, finding the love from within as much as possible.

just care more about yourself

There’s so much inside of me I can’t even think of where to begin. I feel sad and defeated, like a lost puppy. I feel like when I need love the most, a friendship, a relationship, someone to count on… I’m coming up empty. It’s like my sense of need has actually scared away/annoyed the only people in my life that cared about me. Now they don’t even want to hear what comes out of my mouth.  Everything to do with me is old news, they've heard it all before, like they just want me to get a grip. Take control of your own life like everyone else. I AM NOT AND NEVER WILL BE LIKE EVERYONE ELSE. 

Fuck you for thinking that “getting better”, means I will be “a normal person”. NOPE. NEVER. Either get used to it or maybe you can’t be in my life. For such a wonderful like-able person, I sure feel unlovable. Or, unloved. Even my less close friends don’t message me back. My dad always told me to let go, fuck ‘em. Do your own thing and they will come around. But what if they don’t? What if pulling back makes them realize I’m not important in their lives. Also I now have this feeling like I don’t give a fuck anymore or even want to try, at all. I feel rejected and that makes me want to pull all the way back. But now I have an underlying sadness, like ok I’m on my own now time to make myself happy, I don’t want to inconvenience you at all by being around, I don’t want to take up any more of your life with what’s going on inside of me. Well then how the hell am I supposed to let it all out?! WHAT THE FUCK DO I DO NOW?

 I can't hold in all of this sadness, all of this doubt. But I can't talk to anyone about it because it is just annoying now. I feel super stuck and as much as I can try and do my own thing and make myself happy that won't take away my need for love, especially from my own boyfriend. I know that feeling un-cared about or that I'm annoying  or uninteresting means I need to care about myself and focus on my own interests, but it doesn't hurt any less knowing how alone I actually am. I’m scared I’m going to ruin every relationship because I care too much, put too much effort into my partner and lose myself, making my partner start to resent me. I expect so much because that’s what I want to give, but it seems like I’m just too much to handle. I don’t really know where to go from here. I miss having a therapist. 

horrible boss/ self discovery

I haven't written anything for so long for two reasons; one good, and one bad. I would rather end on a more positive note so I will tell of the bad reason first.


I have been having some terrible issues with work that made me feel so much worse about my boss and working there than I ever did before. Health insurance is necessary for me to live as a foreigner in Germany, and to have health insurance I am required to have a job contract which shows I earn over a certain amount of money each month. When I started working at this company I received a job contract that was accurate with everything I needed and the government has a copy of this, and so does my health insurance company. Later, without my knowledge, my boss called the insurance company and told them that I was employed as part time and therefore he does not have to pay for my health insurance. But guess what? No one told me that and also the government did not know about this either. So here I am working away since September and suddenly a get a letter from the health insurance company telling me to call and clear something up. Of course my boyfriend had to call and talk with them because my German isn't fluent enough to deal with over the phone business. After I heard the news that no one had paid for my health insurance for the whole year, I was shocked. Next came the news that my insurance was now cancelled. This is terrible because I can't get sick and I need to apply to extend my visa by September 1st and without health insurance it might not fly. And I instantly need to find a new job somehow by this same time that will cover health insurance. So that leaves me broken down, how could someone do that? what did I do to deserve such horrible trickery?


So I went straight to the landratsamt (translates as the District Office.. the place where I have to get all the legals sorted out) to see what could be done. I was allowed to quit my job without worry until September! YES! So, I waited until I got paid to finally quit, and I receive one final blow, I somehow only got paid half of what I should have gotten paid. WHY?! But I had had enough, it wasn't worth staying anymore to try and fight about this money, it wasn't that much anyway. Over the past few days my boyfriend and his family have helped me figure everything out and I now have no worries about my future here in Germany. So to my horrible boss: thank you for kicking me when I was down. you truly were by far the worst boss I have ever had. karma is for real and we will both get what we deserve soon enough.


Now on to the happier reason I have been absent from my new craft (writing this blog), I have been venturing more into learning about my trait of being a Highly Sensitive Person. Originally my eyes were opened by reading Dr. Barrie Jaeger's book Making Work Work for the Highly Sensitive Person, learning and realizing so many things about myself and my life as I went along. More recently, I have been reading the original book wrote about HSP's written by Dr. Elaine N. Aron simply titled, The Highly Sensitive Person. This book which I am about 2/3 of the way through has been making me see my life in a new way. I am able to evaluate my life and realize the reason things went the way they did. I can take what I am learning about myself and use it in two ways, one to stop feeling guilty when I "can't handle things the way everyone else can", and two I can start accepting what my personal limits and strengths are and work on figuring out more realistic standards and goals for myself.


One of my favourite things about life is learning about myself and personality and why I am the way I am so I can move forward and make a better happier life for myself. I have spent the last six or so years working on different aspects of my inner self and life and it has paid off tremendously. I am excited that this time I have figured out the reason for everything, it makes me really happy to know that this battle just keeps getting easier. The inner self always needs work, I am just happy I am at a place of peace with who I am, it makes it much easier to develop.


Now I am going back to reading and I am sure within the week I will be writing about the insight I have gained on being a Highly Sensitive Person!

can a season be a trigger?

Summer is my favourite season, I love the colours and the warm weather and sweet smells. I also love summer activities, swimming, biking, running, bbqing etc.  Summer makes me happy, but for about the last 10 years of my life, summer has also brought a lot of mental pain.  The first time I remember trying to lose weight it was at the end of the school year in Grade 11 when I had just turned 17. That was my anorexic summer. The next summer was the summer I remember arguing a lot with my family, admitting to my mom that I had an eating problem, and certainly not being ready to move away to University. Every summer after that for about 4 years this season meant diet pills and exercise so I could wear all my favourite clothes and bikini’s. One summer it got to be too much for me, the mental effects of my lack of food brought me to a place where weight and food were all I thought about, that was the summer I decided I needed out of this mental hell, and started on the recovery path.

Every summer since then it seems to be the same for me, feelings of anxiety. Wishing it would be easy to turn to my old habits so I could feel good in summer clothes. Feeling sadness that I feel so uncomfortable in my own skin that I have to x out many options of attire I might wear including bikinis and anything strapless or form fitting. Every summer the acceptable length of shorts gets longer for me to the point where this year I hate wearing shorts, I don’t want to, I just want to buy dresses, but again my body type is hard to fit dresses correctly without it being too small on top or too big on the bottom.

I spend so much time lying around hating my body and the fact that I don’t feel like I look nice in summer clothes right now. This has consumed me for so many years. I was going to buy a summer pass for the pool in my village but I am now realizing the terror I feel this summer of being in a bathing suit (not even a bikini) in front of other people. It sucks. I know there are so many others out there that feel the same as I do, and even worse. I have come so far from that first summer, and I would never go back to my old eating disordered habits, but I just wish I knew how to stay positive! I know it helps to focus on what you like about yourself, but lately my problem is I am starting not to like those parts anymore since my recent weight gain due to physical illness and the halting of physical activity for a few months.

I want so bad to inspire others that have disordered eating that there is a better way, but it is still so hard for me most days to like my body and that was always the question “is it better to be skinny and miserable or normal size (feeling constantly fat) and miserable?”

The answer is definitely normal size, because at least I can focus on other things in life besides my body image, and that is worth the most, being able to live life!

The goal: not to care so much about how I feel in summer clothes, and just enjoy the summer!

will I always struggle?

I have been neglecting writing lately because I have been pretty mentally and physically exhausted from my job and losing sleep over it. While I was at work the other day and had some spare time I wrote a little bit on what I have been going through.


Lately I've been feeling more anxiety than usual. I recently started working again, only to find that switching from evenings to days means losing sleep because I am so worried that I need it. My job isn't even hard, the only hard part is that it's in a language I am just becoming familiar with. I don't think I'm worried about it but somehow I'm getting more and more worn down. My thinking is (like I've talked about before) it's time to move on, find a new job, something better. This brings even more anxiety because thinking about what kind of job I would like, that is possible for me to get, is really hard. Near impossible. So what does this mean? Will I always have anxiety with everything in my life? Is everything always going to be so draining for me? The frightening answer is probably, yes. Because I am an HSP, I am effected more by everything. The sooner I can accept this the better. Despite my anxiety about not having an income, I am going to quit my job (unless my working visa doesn't allow a gap for job change, in which case I will continue to be worn down until I can attain a new work contract). My heart is heavy and I know life and finding a new job would be much easier if I can just give this up. It doesn't make me weak, it shows my ability to listen to my needs, which I am finding more and more are different than others, and that's totally ok!


I have been uninterested in food, unable to sleep properly, crying almost every day, just down in general. Finally I started to feel a little more calm and was able to eat and sleep, and today my life was way easier and happier. It really shows how much anxiety can affect my life.

amy winehouse: a diamond in the rough

Something has been plaguing me for over a week and I think it's about time I wrote about it.

Amy Winehouse

To be completely honest I am not one to listen to the radio or follow the lives of the rich and famous. I didn't know much about Amy Winehouse, I had heard a couple songs and knew I liked her voice, raw and with a different edge than a lot of other famous lady singers. When sometimes hearing about her tales of destruction, I wrote her off as another girl starving for attention. When I found out she died watching youtube videos of herself, I think I may have laughed a little, seeing it as an act of vanity. These were all my first impressions because my only information came through hearsay of the media. This must have been most peoples impression of her. 

Last weekend an interest sparked when I heard someone on "Deutschland sucht den Superstar" (Germany's American Idol) singing  Rehab, the only song I was familiar with. I am very passionate about singing and find it really lifts my mood to really let loose and sing as loud and wonderfully as I can, and when being reminded of Amy Winehouse I thought, I would like to learn to sing a few of her songs. Remembering that she died a couple of years ago I looked her up on Wikipedia. There is a lot of information about her musical career (rightfully so), but there seems to be even more information about her personal life, having drug and alcohol problems, relationship problems. It tells a lot about how much the media attacked her. There is slight mention of an eating disorder, but not much information is given as to why these problems were in her life. All that is written is that her parents divorced when she was nine, and she took it hard when her grandmother died because she was a big musical influence for Amy. 

I thought, 'that's it?' really? So I researched further. Trying to figure out what lead her down the path of destruction. I only could find the information that she had been battling bulimia since the age of 17, that she struggled with self harm, that her abusive on again off again relationship with Blake Fielder-Civil was the cause of her drug problem. 

I started to feel more and more sad for her. No one, not even Amy herself, seemed to care about what was really troubling her. I watched a few videos on YouTube, including some from her final live performance , (says Amy is 'drugged out of her mind' but I am 95% sure she is just drunk) and I couldn't help but start to cry. As someone who has battled an eating disorder and drug addiction, I could see so clearly that she was destroyed inside and out. I got angry, why didn't anyone help her? Why did the media attack her constantly instead of trying to get to the root of the problem. Why are the problems of celebrities blown so out of proportion but not looked into further than the destruction's caused? Why was her eating disorder pushed aside to the public when it is just as crucial a medical problem, especially when drugs and alcohol are part of everyday life? Her brother Alex seemed to be the only one that truly understood the seriousness of her bulimia, to the point he expressed it was the cause of her accidental death. I know ultimately Amy was responsible for her own actions and refused professional recovery multiple times but I feel like more could have been done to help. Everyone was too busy gossiping about her bad behavior, but no one took the time to try and understand that bad behavior can also be due to extreme mental problems.

In my opinion, the media didn't pay as much attention to Amy's eating disorder because drug and alcohol problems are more dramatic and also more visible. It is way easier to write a 'successful' story about the antics caused by intoxication rather than the self-harm caused by an eating disorder. It is much easier for the public to handle a situation that seems as though someone is acting out of control rather than mentally out of control. The media had a horrible approach to Amy's weight fluctuation that was clearly due to eating problems. There are many pictures of a skeletal like Amy holding giant bags of McDonalds food. After she quit drugs for good, she appears to "gain weight and have a muffin top" but looking at the rest of her body she is extremely underweight, and it is very clear to me that she actually has the belly bump of someone that is malnourished and addicted to alcohol.

                                          

I wish that the media didn't hold such authority over the lives of the public, as well as the lives of celebrities. Looking into Amy's life was the first time it really registered what kind of impact the media can have for those being reported about. Any celebrity must be in total mental control to not let the masses bring them down. Reporters and paparazzi are like sharks, one drop of blood and from far and wide they come to feed. I truly feel sorry for the continually growing number of celebrities that succumb to the pressures they feel and end up with drug/alcohol problems and eating disorders or intense weight fluctuation. All are seriously harmful to the body and mind. 

It seems unfair to me that just because someone is famous they must remain perfect and in total control. Fame or not, people are people and almost everyone struggles with some kind of mental or physical issue in their life. Everyone deserves a chance, everyone makes mistakes in their life.

Maybe if the media wouldn't have been so consistently harsh to Amy Winehouse, she would still be here.  it is a shame her personal life became more important to the media and to the masses, which in my opinion is what ultimately destroyed her. 

At least we can forever enjoy her musical talent and distinctly soulful voice, and as sad as it is, at least she is now at peace.

stop feeling guilty about setting personal boundaries

I need a boss who understands when I need to take the day off because I can't stop crying. I need a job that lets me set my own boundaries, because I am different. Unfortunately not many business owners are the type of people who would understand that being a Highly Sensitive Person means if I am not on my game, my work will seriously suffer. I do not respond to pressure and criticism but to positive guidance and encouragement. Sometimes life is overwhelming and unfortunately I can't just "leave my personal life at the door" when coming to work. Everything takes longer for me to process and fully understand, I need time to come to peace when something shakes me.

This is discouraged in the work place. I think it is very unfair. I know that some jobs give you personal days, but I have never worked somewhere where I was able to do that. I have never had this opportunity, and actually this is something I really need in my life as an HSP. The ability to say no to life when it gets overwhelming and take time to rejuvenate so I can continue on in peace and with motivation instead of drudging along with resistance. Life is hard and I think everyone should have the ability to take a day off when they are feeling a mental drainage/explosion. Why is it less manageable to get that across in the workplace than having a physical ailment?

I shouldn't have to feel guilty when something is preventing me from working, whether it be mental, physical, personal or not. Normally in Germany, where I live, it is no problem to take a day when you need it, but I don't work at a company that runs with the regular ways so I am out of luck. It is definitely time for a change in my work, which of course brings on more anxiety. I enjoy a lot of things about being an HSP, but sometimes I wish I could just let things go and move on easily, I wish it didn't feel so heavy to jump into something new, especially when it comes to my work. I want to feel purpose in what I am doing, even with the anxiety produced by looking for a new job in a foreign country. I deserve more and I need to learn to not be afraid to go for what I want and need in life. Of course when I say I deserve more, I also mean everyone. Everyone deserves to go for their own version of gold!

the worst is over

Recently I started working out again after an excruciating and mandatory halt in physical activity that was forced upon me after two months of battling a UTI while continuing to work at my job. Apparently the physical stress of my job plus the internal stress from anti-biotics, ibuprofen and the infection itself caused pretty intense damage to my core, mainly my stomach and back muscles. As extraordinarily wonderful as it is to be able to exercise and to move without pain, I am now aware of all that I have gained. I don’t weigh myself because I know I personally don’t need to go down that road, and I have a hard time really looking at my body in the mirror for more than a second or two, so it is kind of easy to ignore what has slowly built up over time. It was about 4 months of not being able to get proper physical activity. 

So now when I am moving about and stretching, I feel what I have been avoiding looking at. It is a terrible horrible feeling. Less of my clothes are working for me these days and it is just becoming harder and harder to feel good or even ok about my body. I know that the worst is over now and I am on the path to becoming fit again but this takes time and as hard as I try I just can’t get passed the terrible thoughts and feelings about my body right now. I know it ultimately doesn’t matter but I just can’t get this out of me. I can’t stop wishing that I could be skinny again. I can’t stop hating the fact that I have a normal body now. I can’t stand that I feel uncomfortable when my boyfriend (who I live with) puts his hands on my stomach or legs, and now even my butt which usually I love. 

It really frustrates me that I can’t just accept my healthy body and be happy with myself. I love myself and my personality but when it comes to my body I can’t seem to find a way to work through the hate. I thought keeping positive and the passing time would be the answer but I didn’t realize time meant years. I don’t want to feel negative because I have a great life, and being able to be physical again does really help. It’s just that I spend so much time trying to stay positive and push the bad thoughts out, but they build up inside me and then attack. I have spent some time crying over it and being bummed out that this is still a part of my life but my life was so much worse and I am way better off now than when I was skinny. What I need is to find new ways of combating these negative thoughts and images, I am just not sure of how to do that yet.

size doesn't matter

I do not like the power clothing has over me, still. I try so hard not to care what size I am because sizes are different in every store. I am getting much better at not letting the size I have to buy bother me because I know ultimately it doesn’t matter. What still gets to me is when the season changes and I have to figure out if my clothes fit or not, and it fills me up with so much anxiety and sadness every time. I hate it. I know I am way healthier now and I love that but not being able to fit into clothes that I used to fit into makes me feel horrible. A lot of times I avoid trying some of my stuff on altogether because I don’t want the sadness and disappointment that comes along with it. 

Due to months of health/physical issues I know I weigh more than I did last year at this time, and I am terrified of trying on all of my shorts. I know most will “fit” but I don’t like fitted clothes and will feel super uncomfortable wearing them. I was having this conversation with my best friend who is in the same boat as me, and she did a really positive thing that I think I might have to do. She took one look at her shorts, knew they wouldn’t fit how she wanted, and got rid of them! Just like that! Luckily she can afford to buy a couple new pairs! I was so proud and inspired by what she did. I don’t have money at the moment to buy myself some new shorts but I think I will get rid of them anyway, I have plenty of dresses to last me until I have some money in a month or so. It just makes sense to not even go there if I know beforehand it isn’t going to go well. I am also curious if other people that have not battled an eating disorder have the same struggle I am having. It’s way more important for me to feel comfortable in my clothes than to worry about trying to fit into something that makes me uncomfortable and sad. 

job hunting at it's worst

It’s that dreaded time, looking for a new job. A stressful and draining task for most people, but for me this task can bring on extreme anxiety very quickly. To add to the fire, I live in Germany and though I have made great improvements in learning the language I can only carry on a simple conversation, and I cannot speak as well as I can understand. I feel even more anxiety because I am not sure if my language skills are high enough for the jobs I might want to do. Being an HSP also heightens my anxiety about work because I am easily overstimulated and feel I can’t handle “normal” working hours. I tend to choose easier jobs like serving or retail but then I am under stimulated and bored and quickly fall into what the book “Making Work Work for the Highly Sensitive Person” calls drudgery. It seems it will be hard for me to find work in my life that makes me happy or keeps me satisfied for more than a short period of time. Many HSP’s find they are happiest being self-employed. I don’t know where I want to go. I have a University degree in Theater Studies, and since graduating I have wanted to stay far away from that world. I hated most of school, it was really hard for me to stay focused on my studies while battling an eating disorder and depression, and I was forced into taking a bunch of Theater courses that I really didn’t like. I did it though! Forcing myself to finish something I didn’t really care about sucked but I did it! Since a couple years have passed I have had time to reflect on the parts of Theater and studying it that I liked. I am seriously considering applying to a couple of Theaters around the area and hope to get in doing some kind of background or set work. Maybe the Theater would be a nice place to work. But there are only 2 or 3 Theaters around here and I am really scared I won’t get a job.  I have no idea of another job I might be able to handle right now, with my personality and also my lacking of language skills. I don’t want another pointless job. I would love to get paid to write on my own time. That would be an ideal job for me. If anyone has any words of encouragement or suggestions I would love to hear them.

stoner queen

thanks to positive feedback left by my question earlier today on Google+ I have decided to share about how drug addiction has entered/left/effected my life. Today I will just share a bit about my addiction and love of Marijuana.

Marijuana (or weed as I like to call it) is by far my favourite drug, inside and out. Now I will also have to tell you that I struggle with needing it at times, I do not want to call myself “addicted”, but there was definitely I time when I was but I didn't know, I didn't realize until I moved to Germany, and because I moved in with a host family, I couldn't sit on the couch with my bong and smoke from when I woke up until when I went to bed. Yes, if I was not working, I would be stoned all day. I didn't see a reason why not. I was getting everything done that I needed to, maybe it took a little longer, but it didn't halt any progress in my life. But I know that I needed it because every time, I would seek it out while I still had some left, I didn't want to be without it, just in case. In case of what? Would I die if I didn't have it? Would one day be slightly more boring? This was a problem for sure. I am not like this now, but I have worked my way back up to several times a day when it is available. Now it is just something to look forward to everyday, before it was my day. Another thing I found when I went from all the time to sometimes was that I wasn't really motivated to do anything unless I got stoned. Even if I didn't feel like doing it in the moment, it would get me excited and make me want to work on something specific later on in the day. This just doesn't seem right to me. Weed gives me more motivation? It also helps me eat. I have so much more desire to eat, and make myself good food, when I get stoned. Recently I realized that I have also been using weed as a crutch in getting over my eating disorder. Food is so much more appealing to me in general when I am getting stoned, like with all people, but for me it is positive and negative. It is good that it makes me want to eat, but it is bad because I still need it in some way. I can go without it now, but I function so much better when weed is a regular part of my life. Recently I have been thinking that this is because I am an HSP and smoking pot really helps calm me down and look at things from a more logical instead of emotional point of view. It dulls my senses a little so I can live a bit easier. Or is this just my normal because I have spent almost 8 years of my life this way? I am not sure, but I am sure that it makes me happy, helps as a sort of therapy, and it keeps me going so why fight it? This is still my reasoning, and I know I am not going to do anything about it. I know that I will continue this lifestyle because it is one addiction I can keep that doesn't take over my life completely, like it and others have in the past.

This is just a little thought process of mine. I have many stories and also have had other drug addictions as well but I thought this was a good place to start. Feel free to ask me any questions!

there really is a method behind my madness

I recently discovered that there is a reason I have always thought that I was a little bit different than most people. Though not diagnosed (I live in Germany and at this time I would rather wait until I can engage in a proper examination) I am 90% sure I am a Highly Sensitive Person (or HSP). At first this may just make it seem like I am super emotional (which I am). But when I looked into HSP’s, (I read a book called Making Work Work for the Highly Sensitive Person by Barrie Jaeger, ph.D.)I found that they are 20% of people! I also found out that being an HSP means a little bit of difference in genetic code that allows the senses to absorb more. This means that everything I see, hear, feel, smell, or taste, is more in depth and intense than most people. It also means it takes me longer to fully encounter things because I am taking in more and analyzing everything about it. This also means I am easily overstimulated and need more recharging than others.  

As soon as I read these things my entire life made sense; from having an eating disorder, to falling in and out of depression, drug addiction, having constant anxiety and worry, and continuous extreme highs and lows in my moods. I am different. But now that I know why, I like it. It gives me encouragement to understand why I feel the way I do, and why I feel so much all the time. Now that I know all of this I can take the positive sides of being an HSP (creativity, empathy, passion etc.) and use them to my advantage. I also understand what the negatives can be from this (being overtaken by emotions, afraid of failing or not being loved, being easily overstimulated and rundown) and work on harnessing these into even more positives over time.

I wanted to share an entry I wrote in one of my journals a few months ago just before I realized all of this HSP business because I think it is an honest piece about how hard it can be to feel so much. (It is also the best at times but I don’t usually need to write when I feel happy)

What direction do you want in life? Why don’t you care about doing anything? Why don’t you follow one of your passions? Because I was always told I wouldn’t make it [and to have a back-up plan. I was told] that you can’t make a living that way. So how the fuck do I make a living then? I am not ready to study something in another language. As far as a career goes, I am also not ready to have one in another language, nor do I know what a career even means these days. I don’t have any ambition I’m just learning German because I have to to live here. I wasn’t happy living in Canada and I’m only kind of happy here. When will I stop using my boyfriend as a source for most of my happiness? When will I start to create my own? When will I learn to be positive in most situations? How can I learn to be zen? How can I not let my emotions take me over? Is that what is preventing me from getting to my life? Having no control over how I feel, living my life based on pleasure. It’s not working. The pleasure runs dry and I am left with self-doubt, uncertainty and dissatisfaction. I have no path. I am standing in a field staring at many paths. That’s my problem… I’m just standing there watching these paths get overgrown because I can’t fucking pick one to wonder down. Why am I so scared of living my life? Not doing things is still failing. I need meaning and purpose in my life. My heart doesn’t know what she wants. Or maybe I am just ignoring what she says because I don’t want to know. I need to learn to trust myself and do what I feel is right or needed instead of just continuing on or ignoring things.

A few months later I can say that I feel a lot better about life than I did when I wrote this. Starting a blog where I can share my stories and struggles gives me the ability to do many things I love at once. Maybe this will help me wonder down a path or two, I know living in sunny southern Germany certainly helps motivate me these days!

I'm wondering when my stomach muscles will ever heal.

This is a short poem I wrote last week as a way to let out how frustrated I am with the recent troubles I have had with my stomach muscles. After reading it I realize much of it could also be applied to my body image issues as well.

I'm sick of this mess,
from constant stomach stress
it's making me depressed,
like I can't get enough rest.
I can't remember when I've last been my best,
taken a physical test,
or blessed my soul with sex;
and it's taken it's toll, I feel hexed,
cursed, did I break a mirror?
did I look and see fears or,
was I trying to hide the tears?
I'm trying to switch gears,
but I'm stuck,
so I'm riding up this hill,
without any luck.