Tough Love

Right now, life is hard.

For the first few weeks that I was back I was able to bring a lightness and humor to this blog because I suppose I was still in denial. I was so sure that somehow, things would get fixed.

But it's been almost a month now and I've had to start moving forward.

I've been applying for Canadian working holiday visas and scouring the internet for jobs scrubbing people's shit out of toilets on the yachts again. I went on a date and kissed someone else which all blew up in the same old small town Knysna drama I can't stand. I started finally checking things off of my To Do list... picking up my drivers license, getting a South African sim card, sorting out the bank and looking for a new car which I can't afford.

I also decided to finally take a stand against my alcoholic mother. I'm done with her looking at me and spitting out the words, 'Why are you here? Can't you just go and die?! No wonder Mark doesn't want you. Fuck off," amongst other things. I reached out to people I knew would help. She's getting sectioned next week if all goes according to plan... although I've seriously started realising how full of empty promises people (especially family members,) are. I am a blunt and honest person - this is a blog about the gritty realness of the world so if you can't handle that then please stop reading and causing more drama.

I called the police while she was out driving the other day - sadly they didn't catch her but I've reached breaking point. She's a danger to herself and to others. She could kill someone - and that is disgusting. So I have done what I need to do because no one else was doing anything.

I've always been the tough one in my family. I'm the one who has to be strong and tell it as it is. I speak the truth while everyone else is living a lie. No, I'm not perfect... far from it. I'm as fucked up if not more than anyone - but I'm the only person that will actually admit that. And I'm the only person who is willing to change.

I'm also the only person willing to truly HELP. It's called tough love.

Yeah, I hate who my mother has become and I am so full of anger and resentment - but me getting her put into a mental institute and eventually rehab is me showing what little love I do have left for her. She won't see it that way - maybe she never will. But this is literally my last attempt. I've reached breaking point.

Right now I'm at a place where I should be home under my families wings and recovering from a horrible breakup, a miscarriage and trying to find my feet again.... instead, I am more emotionally distraught now than ever before. The stress levels have sky-rocketed. I burst into tears in the middle of town and sometimes I can't bring myself to eat. I've lost 6kg and I'm not OK.

I don't know what the hell to do with my life or where the hell to go. M decided to leave me penniless even though I worked in Aus for 2 years I have nothing to show for it - yet he's kept all the furniture and flat and everything I was helping pay for while my salary - which was FAR smaller than his but I tried my BEST to contribute when I could. I just can't believe how shit life is right now.... that my only option is to have to go back onto the yachts, an industry I hated, just so I can have some financial stability again.

I've decided I'm going to write down everything I've been holding onto on a piece of paper, fold it up and toss it into a fire. Release it.

I need to let go of M. I need to let go of the fact that we are not getting married next year and that the 2 miscarriages I suffered through without him were probably for the best. I need to get over the fact that he's no longer there and no longer cares.

I also know I need to let go of my hatred, anger and resentment I have for my family - my life... I know I look so happy on the outside. I smile, see friends, laugh and joke. But behind closed doors and sometimes in the center of town I am a mess.

I WISH I hadn't given everything I had to my name to my past relationship... because now I'm at a place in my life where I have nothing. That's not even an exaggeration. I AM penniless. I AM homeless... I have to stay in the hell hole that is my parents house and be abused verbally by the woman who carried me for 9 months. I have no where else to go right now, no way to get somewhere if I did have anywhere to go.

I wish I had been smarter and kept a backup plan... I wish I hadn't decided to spend my last bit of life savings on a holiday to Madagascar that now I can't even look at the photographs of without crying.

I wish I had a different life. A different mother. A different everything.

Life is hard. And I am struggling.

I wish I knew what to do.

I just need a hand. I feel like I'm trying my best to help others as much as I can but that doesn't get acknowledged. I feel like I have this huge heart that just gets taken for granted and abused. I feel like I don't deserve where I am in life right now and sometimes it really does seem easier to fade away than carry on struggling through... but that's why I write this... because one day I KNOW I will be okay again and I'll be able to look back and remember what a dark place I was in and I'll be able to help others find a way out to the other side. Until then, I'm just wading through the black abyss.

The Basic Steps to Healing...

I always thought when I finally felt up to investing my time into looking for work on the yachts again it would be the day I knew I would be OK. I'll survive. Oh how wrong I was.

I'm as sick as can be right now having just spent a jaw-dropping amount of money I don't have on medicine and have been in bed all day scouring the internet for jobs. Even trying to take a sip of water feels like knives going down my throat.... (WISHING I had someone to bring me chicken soup, stroke my hair and make me feel better but alas this is a time of loneliness for me.)

I guess for the most part job hunting has been going well... 

I've already been offered a job willing to fly me to Tunisia later this week but I turned it down because my gut feeling (which I'm going to start bloody listening to from now on!!) wasn't a happy camper. 

However, even with a seemingly good response after putting a few hours work into applying for various jobs floating around the med - I have tears in my eyes. 

That saying, 'New Beginnings Are Often Disguised As Painful Endings,' is so true. 

If you aren't interested in the raw, unfiltered rambles from a heartbroken mind then move along now - but some lovely people have actually reached out and commended me for how open and honest I am with what I'm going through. 

I'm not doing it for attention. 

Not at all.

I'm doing it because if someone stumbles across my blog in the future who is going through something similar I hope she or he will be able to realise that they aren't alone. 

If I am able to help just one other person in this world by sharing my experiences then that's enough for me. 

I know what I'm going through is MINUTE compared to what others go through in life and I know I'm lucky in many ways... but this is my story and I know there are people out there somewhere going through something similar.  

I wish I could stop feeling so devastated but how can I when it feels like the last two years of my life was a complete lie?? 

To have the man you thought was your soul-mate tell you that you never made him happy is like running over me with a train. 

I can't get those words out of my head. The last words he ever said to me. I wish he could take it back. I wish he could tell me what he said wasn't true.
Never say something so hurtful to someone who loves you because you never know if they'll be the last words you ever speak to them.

People are telling me that people say hurtful things during breakups and that they don't mean them - that those words are a way to make you move on... but truly I'd be able to move on easier if I had closure that I didn't just make him miserable for two straight years. 

I know I wasn't great. 

But I thought we had some incredible, fun and happy moments. 

I know I was the happiest I had ever been yet also the most depressed at the same time because the truth is that I never could adjust to life in a new country.

I'd done it once before in Mallorca and I could never get over how triggering it was for me to be in such a similar situation again. 

I moved to a country for a guy I met on Tinder again. Had given up my entire life to be there. 

The only difference was that in Mallorca I trusted TOO much. I was SO carefree and happy and bubbly. I was always off bouncing around with new friends and having the time of my life but in Australia I was so Goddamned cautious because of how hurt I was in Mallorca that I never ALLOWED myself to fully let go and embrace it. 

I wish I had now.... I wish S hadn't hurt me so badly all those years ago that even to this day it still affects me.... but things didn't work out that way. 

I can't change that... but I can change the future. 

I am never going to give up my independence ever again or sacrifice what little I do have in life for someone else. I've done it so many times now only to regret it... because in the end I end up with nothing.

I know I stuffed up a lot with M and made things unbearable and took things out on him that I shouldn't have. But I also know I made him laugh and smile and I really didn't think he could ever say something like, 'I never got happiness from you.' 

Those words have destroyed me. 

I never meant to make him unhappy.

I am a good person with a huge heart....  a part of me wishes he had met me before Mallorca when I wasn't broken. Things would have been so different then. I feel back then I would have been exactly the girl for him - and he was able to see small snippets of that girl in me somewhere.. but it just wasn't enough.

Finding a way to heal after what I went through in Spain and now Australia is proving to be the most challenging thing in life...
I'm still trying to navigate through freeing myself from a life tethered by insecurity BUT I've realised the basic steps are as follows:

1. Focus on myself for one.
Do things that make me happy like running (never thought I'd say that but I've truly started loving it!), hiking, cooking, surfing, writing, anything creative...
Be around people that make me a better person.

2. Don't jump into a new relationship.
This is now time for ME. I don't want a man to define my happiness. I want to be happy and love myself first. 

3. Build a life for myself not someone else.
I guess one of my main mistakes I've done OVER and OVER again is give up everything for everyone and focus so much on making someone else happy.
I want to finally create this cottage or a home in general and make it MY safe haven.
I want to get that beautiful border collie I've always dreamt about one day and have her be MINE not OURS.
I want my independence back. Not have to answer to anyone. To be a recluse if I want to be and be outgoing when I feel that need to be around others. I want to cook what I want without having to always ask what someone else wants. I want to put my needs and wants first for once. 

4. Create my own friendships. In a tiny town like Knysna this is hard. Especially as the majority of my friends have left for overseas OR have already settled down with kids and partners... but I just want to focus on my own friendships. In the past I always slotted in with my partners friendship group and when it inevitably ended I had no one there for me. I need to put myself out there and find new friends in Knysna that enjoy the same things as me - and reach out to my old friends who are overseas but will come here on holiday and make time to see me.

5. Meditate. Stretch. Exercise. Drink Less. 
My life has always been so busy bending over backwards for someone else or just being too exhausted or sad to do anything else other than switch on Netflix and pour a glass of wine at night. 

It's been a BEAUTIFUL feeling to take the time out of my day to run 5ks with my dog, meditate while soaking in the bath, allowing myself the time to stretch and love my body the way I always should have but never did. 

In one way I am feeling so good - it's just the actual heartache from losing my best friend that is still crushing me. I know people say the heartbreak will end.... and maybe it will. But I'd never been more sure about someone in my life. I still struggle to accept it's really over forever - but it has to be. The things he has said and done - the way he just kicked me out of the country and made his friends tell me he doesn't love me anymore.. the black and white text reading I never made him happy as the last message he ever sent me... it's the cold hard truth that it's done and some days I get that... but others I don't. 

I went on a 'date' the other night after this guy we'll call A sent me a glass of wine when I was sitting at a pub with my brother. It was nice. And M is no longer the last person I've kissed, which felt incredibly weird. But I am so petrified all guys want me for is sex and regardless I'm just not ready for that yet. I know I need to move on eventually and potentially the best way to get over M is to get under someone else - but I'm so confused. I don't want to be just used for sex yet at the same time I'm not ready to dive back into something serious. 

I want to take things SLOW for once and find someone that ticks all my boxes. 

6. Make a list of the things you need from a partner and don't settle for any less.

Because of what I've been through, there are certain things I need out of a relationship that may sounds completely pathetic to most people but they are things I know will make me happy.

I want someone who opens the car door for me, understand my passions for books, bookstagram, booktube, writing etc.. someone who will support those passions. Take an interest in them. Join me in them. I want someone willing to make a goofball out of himself and laugh at himself and not give a shit about what his mates think of him. I want someone not scared to put me on his social media - who wants to show me off and shout me out for being amazing. I want someone romantic. Someone who will surprise and spoil me... someone who will be walking past a flower store and think of me and get me a flower just because. Not that I actually like flowers... I'm more of a plant person. Don't give me something that's just going to die haha. My new found favorite plant I can't get enough of is Golden Pothos! 

I saw this thing a while back where this girl got home and found a dress laid out on her bed with a pair of earrings and some shoes and a note that told her where to be at a certain time. Those things make me melt. I am a hopeless romantic and I literally can't help it. 

I want someone who won't fart in front of me. Someone who loves cooking and likes cooking with a partner. I want someone who isn't stubborn because I'm stubborn enough for the both of us.

I want someone who likes to read and drink wine, learn new things, travel, laugh, experiment and live life to the fullest... but I also want someone who like me, is happy to not be on the go 24/7. I love cozy days at home! 
I need someone faithful. Trustworthy. 

These are things I've always craved in relationships but never got and I always ended up disappointed. I don't want to settle anymore.

I don't want these things NOW... but when I'm ready, these are some of the things I need. 

There's probably more basic steps to healing but I can't be bothered to write anymore. My fever is high and I fear I'm going to wind up in hospital having my tonsils removed at this rate so I'm off to rest. 

Sorry this wasn't as humorous as most of my recent posts. I've been having a weird, emotional day and just needed to let it out.

Freeing Myself from a Life Tethered by Insecurity

This morning I've woken up and noticed that the heartache has finally started to ease. 

The pangs of pain and realisation that I've lost my best friend and lover have dissipated.

My smile is no longer fake. 

My laughter doesn't seem forced.

I can get out of bed and change out of my pajama's without it seeming to be the hardest thing to do in the world. 

I can concentrate on books and taste the flavors in food again.

I can enjoy the feeling of the sand beneath my toes and my hands on the steering wheel of the car.

I can lace up my running shoes and have a good sweat out... and those endorphins don't disappear the moment I set foot back in doors.

 

It no longer hurts me when I see my ex partners friends remove me from their friends lists...

They never cared about my friendship to begin with.

I've accepted I was only ever tolerated.

So I don't give a crap about not having them there to judge me anymore.

Perhaps they don't realise just how shitty they actually are. 

I owned up to all of my past mistakes and tried to right my wrongs...

but alas I was never enough for them.. 

and I've learned that if people truly don't think you're good enough for them and just in general don't like you then good fucking riddance to them.

I'm at a place in my life where if I'm not the kind of person you want me to be then that's your problem.

I'm growing into the person I was always meant to be. 

It's not been easy and I've been through hell to get here.

My anxiety and depression are things I've always been ashamed of but now I'm learning to love myself properly for the very first time... to pat myself on the back for working harder than ever on my flaws. 

I know I'll never be perfect but I have certain issues that need addressing. 

I have huge trust-issues and can get jealous at the smallest of things... but my sister-in-law and I had a big heart to heart recently and she made me understand that the only person I'm hurting by being jealous is myself. 

If a person if going to cheat on you they are going to cheat on you. There's nothing you can do to stop that. 

I've been living my life so cautiously over the past few years since S cheated on me with so many women... I never had the real time alone to deal with what happened so that I could heal and not let jealousy eat away like a cancer in future relationships. 

I don't want to be the kind of girl I have been... the kind who is so insecure and measures herself up to every other woman in the world. I pick myself apart and steal the joy from my life by comparing myself to others. 

I become so Goddamned paranoid by who my (ex) partners are texting or who they are talking to in a bar if I'm not there.... 

but I've FINALLY realised that if they want to cheat on me nothing I can do will stop them but what will MAKE them be more likely to cheat is me literally having them on such a tight leash that they never have a life of their own. 

I've finally learned that I need to let my insecurities go and it's the most freeing feeling in the world because the only thing I'm doing by being jealous and insecure and comparing myself to everyone else is ruining any chance I actually have of a peaceful, happy life. 

I've been tethered to a life of  self-doubt so far too long. I'm finally breaking free.

I don't know where the hell this road will take me now that my leash is gone.

I don't know where I want it to take me besides to that peaceful, happy life I and EVERYONE (even those aforementioned idiots...) deserve.

My life has become one big, 'I DON'T KNOW...' and I kind of like it.

I'm Going to Write a Book!

I'm going to write a self-help book! 

My immediate family laughed at me this afternoon when I made this announcement. They were all, 'YOU!? Write a self-help book!? Why don't you help yourself first before trying to help other people.' Yes.
It was mean.
I agree.

HOWEVER... 

Having just been through my one hundred and thirteen billionth breakup (but hey, who's counting?) I've had a lot of very sweet messages from friends and followers over the past two weeks and their messages all pretty much boil down to the fact that a) I've been through A LOT of shit and b) I always seem to land on my feet.

Right now I'm clearly feet up in the air feeling pretty bloody sorry myself but facts are facts and at some stage once the grief and self-pity has passed the truth is YES.... I do end up landing on my feet.

I'm like a cat.... but with a fuck more lives than 9 to keep me going after all the shit I've been through!!!

So here it is... 

I predominantly write fiction.

Thrillers to be exact.... 

But I've come to realise that if I can help just ONE other person in the world then that will make my life complete so I'm going to write a self-help book. 

God knows if it's ever going to go anywhere because from what I know you have to be relatively well known for books like that to make it in the industry but who bloody cares at this point? 

This book will be about all the nitty gritty in life that so many people hide and refuse to speak out about. It's not only going to be about living a life with anxiety and depression and having a history of self-harm but it's also going to be about breakups in general, feeling excluded, social anxiety, body dysmorphia, comfort eating, alcoholism, narcotics, abusive relationships, trust-issues, the lies of brave faces, being sexually assaulted, feeling unlovable, the motions of breakups and SLOWLY becoming enough to be WHO YOU REALLY ARE..... (that's the part I'm going through right now.. the others I either already have or am currently battling through too). 

I don't want it to be a depressing book even though it sounds it from all the aforementioned delightful traits people like me possess..... 

I want to help people..... because like I've been told lately, no matter what it is I go through somehow I DO end up landing on my feet and not pulling the proverbial trigger on the gun (only because there isn't a real one to pull... KIDDING..... sometimes...).

I want to help others land on their feet too.... even if it's just one other person. 

I just want to help other people going through a rough time and give them something relate-able... something they can understand and feel and comprehend. I want to show them I know what it's like, maybe not EXACTLY because everyone's shit is different - but the way those things make them feel, the things they do that cocks things up in their lives and the potential things they could do to fix not their actions but THEMSELVES is what I want to focus on.

That's my new project..

I'm thinking of calling it, 'How to (Somehow) Always Land on Your Feet,' by Jade Lee Wright.

What the Fuckery

I went for a run yesterday morning to start the day and was in the middle of doing some stretches afterwards when my dad walked passed me, stopped abruptly and asked me what on earth I was doing...

I must have been doing it wrong because he asked me to please try not to break the cupboard..... which is marble so pretty much impossible for me to damage. 

I do feel rather insulted by his request...

Then Kerry stumbled out for the first time in days clutching a cigarette in her shaking fingers and called my father 'Whiskey-Face....' 

Clearly trying to make herself feel better after being unconscious for the last 72 hours from what I suspect was alcohol poisoning.

I went out and had wine and ultra cheesy nachos with a friend I've always called G-Spot... not that he would know where my g-spot is because I've never found it myself. Oh - and we've never done the... you know... deed.
He very helpfully figured out exactly what's wrong with me (if you believe in horoscopes and all that jazz).
He told me I'm both a Bull (Taurus. May. VERY stubborn.) And a Goat  (Chinese astrology what-the-fuckery).
In layman's terms.... I'm two incredibly stubborn earth signs rolled into one mighty mess. Thanks mum and dad for conceiving me during the WORST possible time. I'm all your fault. Literally.

Google told me that my best Chinese horoscope matches are Rabbits, Horses or Pigs.
So basically I could either be with someone who fucks like a rabbit, is hung like a horse or lives like a pig.
I swear life just keeps getting better for me.
I also strongly believe I've been with all 3 of these types of people before.

Google also told me Goats eat and urinate most frequently.
At least it got something right.

We're also currently in 2019 (just in case you didn't know).
The year of the pig.
This explains EVERYTHING.

Maybe I do believe in this whole horoscope thing...

In other news... I did not get the job heading to the black sea next week which is depressing as I'd really thought the interview had gone well. 

I'm going to google my horoscope and figure out my life... hold on.

Fuck.

On March 7th Uranus entered my sign FOR THE NEXT 7 YEARS.

I don't know what that means but it sounds bad.

I swear you couldn't make this stuff up.

I went on a daily horoscope thingy and it said:

'Today will suit you but don't expect miracles. Now is a time for healing (accurate). In the weeks ahead you will restore harmony to your energies and regain your fitness with improved diet and lifestyle (I am incredibly stiff from running....). Your emotional life gets an overhaul as well, as you find the courage to confront certain unsettling issues. 

Right....

You know how people say you can never believe horoscopes because the people who write them find a way to relate it to absolutely everyone?? Well - I for one think this was FREAKISHLY accurate.

It scared me a little. 

Oh goodie there's a page about what tomorrow has in store for me. Lets have a look-see.

Crap.

You may not know which way to turn, Taurus. You may be emotionally weighed down by sentimental feelings and memories that bind you to the past. You may also feel restricted by authority figures who've been around the block more times than you, and therefore feel they have the right to tell you how to run your life. Try not to let your thoughts get tied up in either of these scenarios.

So FYI people.. tomorrow will be a bad day for me. I'll probably be in a snot-filled breakdown crying into the Carlton footie jumper I got from my ex. 

Yeah.... if you need me tomorrow that's where I'll be. 

HOWEVER... it rates your general moods out of 5 stars and today I only got a 2 star rating for sex and it shoots up to 4 stars tomorrow.... so this is promising. 

It also gives you cards of the day.. kind of like tarot I guess and tomorrows card is The Hanged Man..... brilliant. 

It means: An unsettling mysterious card (no shit...). By letting go and giving up, as painful as it may be, this symbolism suggests that we can overcome restrictions, find what we have been looking for, and ultimately become free, self-determined beings.

Excuse me for a minute while I go and bookmark this horoscope page.......

Oh yes.

I've been running just under 5ks this week while listening to Bridget Jones Diary - The Edge of Reason. 

I think I enjoy these books so much because there's finally a person more marvelously fucked up than I am.

Except Bridget's fictional.

Coming to Terms with Things... and a Potential Happy Death!

Ventured out of the comforts of my bed yesterday to buy ingredients to make pasta as I'd seen some FABULOUS person on instagram who has the name 'Less Upsetti More Spaghetti.' 

I instantly had an intense craving for bolognese.

Dad and I stopped at the bowling club on the way to the store so he could fix some complicated looking electrical whatsitt  so I sat in the corner and continued to read Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson.

There are TWO reasons I burst into floods of tears at the bowling club.  

1. M and I had been there just the other day getting bowling lessons from my dad and the memories came back to me like a punch in the gut.

2. There's an entire chapter in Furiously Happy about Jenny's trip to Australia. NOT the right time, Jenny. Not the right time at all. 

I'd been avoiding picking up another book called Six Minutes by Petronella McGovern as it's set in Canberra and I just can't handle anything to do with Australia right now. I mean, even when looking for a jigsaw puzzle to keep my mind busy the cheapest one I could find was of Sydney.... REALLY!? Thank you life.

Once more during my breakdown cuddled into my fathers shoulder (yes I am aware I am far too old to do that but I'm in a very fragile state...) I had some revelations.

I realised the closest I will ever come to a Koala is fingering ones arse at Steve Irwin's zoo.

I'll never see the Great Barrier Reef, surf in Byron Bay or live happily ever after with M.

I am coming to terms with that now... coming to terms with everything I've lost and everything I'll never have. 

I was up until 4am this morning scouring the internet for jobs on yachts and ski resorts. 

I have the qualifications needed and considering I'm penniless this would be a good way to get back on my feet relatively quickly.

The yachts made me miserable in the past but I was held back by an ex boyfriend who wouldn't let me travel so I was stuck on shitty day cruise boats filled with prostitutes and drugs... so I'd only accept a job offer on a yacht if it is in a healthier environment. 

I've always wanted to work a ski season. Snow and winter are some of my favorite things.. and if I had the chance to base myself in Banff or Jasper I'd be thrilled. 

Right now I am eagerly awaiting a video call interview for a possible job leaving for The Black Sea NEXT WEEK. 

Seriously did NOT think this would be where life was taking me but there you go.

All I know right now is that I cannot and will not continue to live at home watching my mother deteriorate daily. At this current moment in time at 12pm she is face-planted in bed in clothes she hasn't changed out of since Friday last week and has a bottle of vodka swirling around her liver. She's unconscious, again. 

I can't live in an environment like that ever but especially not right now when I am heartbroken and in a dark place of my own. It brings me down immensely. The fabulous thing about this yacht job is that it's 2 months with not one day off so no drinking at all and a crew gym to workout and focus on health and happiness. Yes PUH-LEASE.

If however I don't land this gig on the yacht it would appear I have timed my return to Knysna well considering the Knysna Oyster Festival is coming up. 

I'm thinking I can just drown myself in a mountain of freshly shucked oysters.

That would be a happy death.

Playing the Victim

You never really know what's going to happen after a breakup. 

It's different for everyone... for me, it seems particularly brutal in that all of the aforementioned girls who never accepted me deleted me from Facebook (one of them, the one I'd considered myself closest with actually BLOCKED me and I hadn't said or done anything....). 

They THEN told M that I had deleted them which is bizarre.

I actually can't believe the cheek of it. 

This slap in the face has turned into a full on punch that has seriously baffled me. 

I just can't believe it. 

What the actual fuck?

I'm trying my very best to move forward... after a seriously rough morning with my 'mother' being her usual alcoholic self I took myself out for a run. 

And you know what?? 

I felt better for a while. 

I got home, did some stretches, ran a hot bath, meditated.... 

But then my eyes once again filled with tears and I broke. 

I was supposed to start renovating the cottage with my dad today but I should have known it wouldn't happen. 

My family are the most unmotivated people I know. 

I'm stuck in my own head... 

I keep wondering why I'm not good enough. Why people are so nasty to me. 

I know this sounds like I'm playing the victim.... and I suppose I am but I do feel like the victim here. How can I not??? 

I was dumped, kicked out the country, left with nothing, literally penniless, have returned to the most vile and toxic environment you could possibly imagine... blocked and deleted by my exes friends. What did I ever do to them?? 

If there is one thing I have learned through this it's that I'm glad I'm not part of that shitty friendship circle anymore anyway. I was never good enough for them and was never given the chance to prove to them who I could really be... and now here I am completely devastated, broken, writing my feelings to no one because no one actually reads this shit but it's my only outlet these days. 

I don't want to talk to friends about it because I don't want to bring them down with my shit. 

And all they say is I'll be OK, take it one day at a time, I'm a fighter etc etc etc.... it's a load of bollucks. 

Life is a load of bollucks.

Yeah... can you tell I'm having a bad day???

Productivity and Alcoholism

Yesterday was a relatively productive day.

I got up around 4am - my body clocks usual time these days.. and got to work unpacking my suitcase. I guess I was still in denial and living out of a suitcase seemed easier than to unpack it... because that felt like closing a chapter I'm frankly still not ready to let go of.

But I did it.

I got boxes of my old clothes and random bits and bobs from the storage room and sifted through those... I found old clothes, jewellery, furniture, shoes etc.

It was kind of like going to a second-hand store after all these years.

I was delighted to find my leopard print onesie which is currently keeping me toasty in the 3 degree climate.

I found my Olympia E-PL7 camera which I'm going to start using this week and work on my photography skills.

I threw out a bunch of crap I seemingly hoarded ... except for all the stuff that remind me of M. The Face Your Fears jumper he bought me after he'd bungee jumped... the Carlton footie jumper he got me just 2 weeks ago for my birthday... my beanie from Canada... a Brisbane hoodie...

I folded them into a pile and packed them away in the back of my cupboard where I can't see them but I know they're still there.

I just can't let them go.

This is the most painful breakup I have ever gone through.

The ironic thing is that my promise ring from M broke the other day and I had it repaired but I can't bring myself to collect it because I can't look at it.

Basically... I'm completely lost.

To make matters worse, caught mum (who from here on in will be called Kerry because I no longer associate myself with her as my family) drinking gin at 5am this morning.... this is after she'd been unconscious yesterday afternoon when her grandchildren came over for a family BBQ.

Dad and I took the bottle from her and she called me a cunt and told me it's no wonder M doesn't want me anymore.... which is wonderful really.

Alcoholics are a disgraceful life form. Even though she's completely lost her mind, has let the booze destroy her brain and body - she still manages to a) say the MOST hurtful things humanly possible to those around her and b) somehow find hiding spots for booze you would never think of yourself such as in shampoo bottles and inside her telescope.

I am aware this is a very private topic to be spoken about so publicly but I honestly couldn't care less.

Rehab is voluntary and she doesn't think she has a problem (ha!). Regardless, rehab refuses to take her unless she goes to hospital first to detox. Which she won't do.

The only way forward is a mental institute and considering her brain has rotted away I think it's the best place for her.

The mother I once had who was my best friend and travel buddy is gone. The mum with bold red spiral curled hair and a passion for art and who was the most creative and loving person I knew is dead. She is dead. My mother doesn't exist anymore. She's been replaced with a balding, skin and bone blubbering mess who makes no sense and can't even walk.

I've tried everything. I've tried doing Sober October or various other alcohol free challenges. I've tried talking to her nicely and offering to support her in every way possible. I've tried pushing her out of my life completely. I've tried everything to no avail. There is nothing more I can do. I'm sorry but I give up.

Being back in this environment, in a home that until this morning was sickeningly filthy (I scrubbed the shit (literally) out of the place after the gin situation) and having to live with someone who calls me a bitch, a cunt and tell me it's no wonder the love of my life doesn't want me... it's beyond toxic. Yet I have no where else to go. I am penniless. I gave everything I had to give to M and it still wasn't enough to pay him back for everything he did for us... so even though I had a job until recently the salary I earned is M's because it's his, really.

I literally have nothing.

I hear all these stories about how people just bugger off, leaving everything they ever had behind and starting from scratch again but I don't know how.

How do you afford to go somewhere new? How do you afford to start up again when literally all you have is $18 AUS dollars in your bag that your father gave you so you could buy some lunch.... when I say I having nothing left I mean it. I realise some don't even have that $18 dollars and at least I have a roof over my head... I know I should be grateful but it's so hard to be when this is what I live with.

I'm embarrassed and ashamed of my life.

I don't want to be in South Africa but at the same time this is the first time I've had my dad, brother, sister-in-law and nephews close by for years. Being able to bond with my dad and have brother/sister time and watch my nephews grow up is something I haven't had until now... but how can I stay in an environment so toxic?

Dad and I are supposed to start renovating the cottage today. Smashing walls down seems like a delightful thing to do today given my current mental state.

I just don't know if I should renovate the cottage, move in there at the end of July, write a new book and just take a year to have all the things I haven't had in years.... even if it means living on the same property as the worst mother in the world. It would be lovely to have my cats and dedicate time to doing the things I'm passionate about: writing, reading, cooking, podcasting, youtubing etc.

It doesn't pay the bills but dads said he'd help me out for a year while I try and figure out what I want to do in life.... but then I'll be 29 and still penniless.... hopefully with a bestselling novel under my arm but still.

I've come to terms with the fact that I will never be rich. I'll never have an incredible job and be able to buy my own house. I'll never get married or have children. If I never have sex or a boyfriend again I'd be A-OK with that. I'm not saying that because I'm bitter... it's just a fact. I refuse to start over again with someone new. I don't want that.

I went back through my blog posts from before M and found a post promising myself I would never move country for a man ever again and look what I did.... I moved to Australia to be with M. I gave up a beautiful flat where I could go to sleep every night listening to the roaring waves, I gave up an incredible job at the best art gallery in South Africa, I sold all of the furniture I'd bought myself, spent my life savings and left all of my friends and family behind.

Now I'm back with nothing.

This is a level of pain I have never experienced before. I gave myself completely and even though I know I cocked things up with my insecurities and anxiety I still tried the best I possibly could.

I'm still trying today... but trying for what I have no idea. To keep breathing.... really.

It's now 6am and I'm waiting for the sun to come up so I can put on some workout clothes and go for a C25K run where the chance of being grabbed and murdered in a bush here in South Africa is drastically high. Yay.

I downloaded an app called My Affirmations and recorded myself saying things like, 'I am enough,' and 'I release all negativity and hold joy in my heart.' It plays with some relaxing music... so I listen to that a few times a day...

I also got the Dry Days by AlcoChallenge app which monitors how many days you go without drinking, counts the calories you would have had if you had been drinking and even tallies up how much money you've saved.... not that I have any money to save because I have no money.... but the calorie thing is pretty neat.

I downloaded the Zero app which is a guide to intermittent fasting which I've still been sticking to. I do the 16 hour fast and then eat within an 8 hour bracket.

The keto things is going to be hard to keep up with in South Africa because starchy foods is pretty much everyone's staple diet here. It's the only thing anyone can afford!

I also downloaded a To Do List to try and be productive... so like I mentioned yesterday was good... and today besides being crushingly insulted by KERRY (or should I just call her Demon??) I did clean the heck out of the filthiest kitchen I have ever been into (no exaggeration).

I'm going to buy a plant.... because I want to watch something bloom. It will be kind of like me blooming.... metaphorically.

I'm going to knock down some walls, level up tiles and paint the walls of the cottage... plot my next novel which currently has no premise, no title and no characters... great!

I'm going to shave my legs... because I kind of need to. Not that anyone will be touching them ever again but I'm starting to resemble an ape.

I'm going to get my nails done by a friend of mine who is qualified because I need some TLC...

I'm going to meditate daily, exercise, intermittent fast, stop drinking every day, see friends, cuddle my cat, take my dog for a walk on the beach, surf, stretch, record podcast episodes, film booktube videos and slowly but surely try and figure out what the hell I should do with my 28 year old arse that currently has a twitch in the left butt cheek. Even my arse is begging me to do some squats.

I'm also going to murder the rooster next door.

Ahem...

Embracing Me

36 hours and 4 flights later... I returned to South Africa one week ago today. 

I've really gone through the motions here.

I started out the travels with pig slit eyes that I feared would make me unrecognisable to my passport photo. I'll put it bluntly. I got dumped. 

Dumped. By the man I truly thought was the love of my life. The man I gave up everything more. Moved to Australia for. Spent my life savings on. At first I really believed we would be OK. I thought we'd take a bit of a break and both do some of our own personal healing and then I'd come back home to him... to our beautiful flat and start fresh. How stupid of me. 

A few days in and he'd cancelled my gym membership, packed all my shit into boxes ready to ship across the globe. I received an email basically saying I need to accept the fact that we are over. 

As brutal as it was - I can never be angry with him. I know I messed up. I pushed so hard for things we weren't ready for... marriage, kids, animals etc... I was struggling in Australia because I was finding it so hard to find meaningful friendships of my own and his friends never accepted me. They would never give me the chance to show them the real, happy, fun me... they only ever saw the me that has intense anxiety and insecurity issues. They never knew the true me and that hurts so much because I am such a good person with a huge heart.

I completely freaked out when M told me he wouldn't move forward with me unless we had his friends blessings..... and I knew I wouldn't get that. So the downward spiral began.... I tried reaching out to the girls and putting myself out there... but I was ignored at first then received pretty nasty responses from some of them basically saying I am just not their type of person... that they would be civil with me in a group but that their friendships with the other girls are separate. 

This gutted me... I didn't feel good enough. I didn't understand... I love the same kind of things as them. I love craft markets, coffee shops, creative activities, plants... I truly just felt I was never given the opportunity to show them that side of me. 

Living a life with social anxiety is awful... I get nervous, sweaty palmed, clam up and feel WEIRD around people I don't know.... it's so hard to live that way and it's something I am working on. I just don't get it - those who really know me KNOW how outgoing and fun I am... I am not anxious around them... nor am I anxious around people I meet myself... but it's something about feeling judged when it comes to my (ex) partners friends that gets in my head too much. I don't know why I can't just be myself. It feels so pressurizing and I feel like I'm just not good enough. In South Africa I have the big personality amongst my friends but when other big personalities come in it makes me crawl inside of myself like a turtle into its shell. Those that know me wouldn't recognise who I become when I am intimidated like that. I wish I could fix it... and I'm trying to. It's just hard and now the man I truly believed was my happily ever after has tossed me out.. given up on me.

Being back in South Africa is weird because I'm instantly just me again.... besides the emotional breakdowns at the most random of times. I cried within the first 10 seconds of Mary fekking Poppins. I burst into floods of tears in the middle of the grocery store when I was trying to find a new face wash and my dad wasn't quite sure how to handle it. He asked me what was wrong and I just sobbed, 'It's just not the same!' 

Frankly.... I have been a blubbering mess for 7 days. 

It completely mindfucks me that you can be the happiest you've ever been, thinking of the rest of your life with a person and just a few days later you have nothing and no one and are in the darkest place you've ever been. 

I've lost everything... I'd do anything to turn back the clock and just appreciate the happy moments again just one last time. 

So originally my plan was to come back home, NOT wallow in self-pity, transform my mindset into a positive one and HEAL so I could go back to Australia and make everything right. 

However... when it became apparent that I was not welcome back into the arms of my former lover or past border control in Australia I fell to pieces. 

Then.... I realised it's OK to be heartbroken and cry right now... but that this is now my time for ME. I need to heal and release a lot of pain from my past. I want to start living in the moment and have gratitude for the present moment instead of always focusing on the future. Truthfully, I was obsessed. I have always been a control-freak. A planner. I need to know where I'm going in life... so to be so lost right now has knocked me completely off-kilter but that's exactly what I need. 

I fresh perspective. I need to let go and stop trying to figure out the rest of my life. I need to start appreciating just the current hour I'm living in (6am).

So this is it... this is the start of my journey. 

Before I sign off - I wanted to share a funny story that has absolutely nothing to do with anything but it made me laugh and I want to start finding the humor in every moment now...

So I almost thought I'd won the jackpot for the easiest and most comfortable flights EVER on the way back to South Africa. I usually always get wedged in between obese, snoring, smelly people or hounded by a random American who I wake up to touching my leg beneath the blankets! But this time I had an entire row of seats to myself so I could sprawl out.. and the amazing aircrew doted on me hand and foot (potentially due to the fact that I looked like someone had just died....). 

Alas on the last stretch of the journey I was seated next to a giant African man who JUST as I'd dozed off whacked me on the arm and asked me if tornado's are snakes.

He. Asked. Me. If. Tornado's. Were. SNAKES. 

Yes you read that correctly.

He started telling me how in his village they get these black winds that destroy their homes and he told me those black winds are actually snakes and he wondered if tornado's were the same thing.... I mean... really????

Bleary eyed I tried to explain to him that tornados are a natural disaster formed by 2 different temperatures meeting or some crap because SOMEHOW I managed to retain that information from my sporadic school days... 

Apart from that I have been spending quality time with my brother, making podcast episodes and booktube videos which is something I always loved to do but I lost that passion in Australia because no one there really quite understood it. But I am back. I'm going to start doing what I love again. Even if other people think it's weird. 

It's not. It's me. I'm embracing that now.