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I have #CPTSD and am fraught with anxiety and shame from October to January. Having estranged parents and a sister I haven’t spoken with in years, I usually recoil and distance myself from everyone this time of year. It gets harder and harder because the more people have an inkling about my situation, I get invitations to spend a holiday with people I don’t know very well. And where I’m grateful to be asked, I’m also supremely self-conscious of my situation during occasions where the world revolves around family. Not having one feels like there is no place to belong for a good quarter of the year—and then some if you factor in the other handful of traditional family celebrations.

I used to be with friends when they were single and friend gatherings were a thing. Now those friends have children and in-laws and the spotlight on my head felt bigger being amidst their family circle. I don’t have a significant other… I don’t expect to find one as I’m inching ever so frighteningly toward my 50s.

This life is a solo ride. But the world doesn’t have a place for those without familial connections. I don’t feel comfortable being around other people’s families. I wish I could find a group of adult, single orphans to hike mountains with on Christmas—or something with equal solitude in company.

I am writing here because I just got a last-minute invitation to Christmas dinner with a casual acquaintance. I cried. It’s thoughtful. But I would really rather just hide in my place with a movie and cobbled together dinner for one. Maybe I’ll clean or do some writing or painting—anything to pass the time away.

I also don’t know what to say: “thanks but I’m looking forward to staying home and letting the world do it’s thing out there while I’m cocooned in my own solo safe space”? I want to lie and say I have other plans — which I do, they’re just solo. But it feels bad to not respond with some celebratory note: “oh thank you but I’m going to x,y,z.” I don’t even have the energy to make up a fake event. I don’t even know what to call a fake family event.

I’m thinking about running out to the grocery store now to buy stuff for a gluttonous meal for one. It’s not great but it is what it is, as “They” say.

Please let me just make it to January 2nd.

#alonefortheholidays #soloxmas #CPTSD #belonging #home #alone

What’s your 2 favourite tea flavours? I love Vanilla Red Rooibos, and cinnamon/ginger/etc spice teas. ☕️⛸❄️⛄️
#home #tea #cozy #inbed #Winter

My last post about being rooted in the past, is still speaking to me. For some reason I feel a drive to move from my current town and home that I’ve known for 36 years! It won’t be easy, moving all our possessions and uprooting to the East Coast of the U.S. I’ve lived in the East though, for 19 years of my life. I’m quite certain I could do it again. My husband says he’s ok with it. He’s someone who grew up in California. Really, he vacillates on moving..I dislike the changes that have happened in our neighborhood..More ADU’s more traffic, people not taking care of property, people infringing on our property..I know there would be a whole set of new things to get use to in a new place, but Hopefully, overall it would be a change for the better. I’d like to be closer to my children (-even though one has written us off!) I’m just antsy for a new start, a new beginning, some where else..I could do this! My husband, not really. He’s too rigid in his ways, even though he’d move for me, he just can’t step outside the box or color outside the lines…#PTSD #change #Comfort married to a non-practicing alcoholic still causes #confrontation #freedom need a #New way, a new place to call #home I just feel I need this before I’m too old…

I have been avoiding contact with nearly all family members for the past couple years in order to better cope with my mental health challenges.

I got an email from my mom a few days ago saying she and dad would be in town today and would like to "repair our relationship". So that email had me feeling suffocated and trapped and even a bit angry. It got me planning out how to pretend no one was home in my apartment so that if they stopped by without notice, they would accept that I wasn't here and just leave.

So, yesterday, I decided that I would try being brave and open my blinds (which I rarely do in general) since my parents wouldn't be in town yet. About an hour after this decision, I had a knock on my door. I thought it was my landlord, so I did open the door. Instead, it was my mom's cousin. She is around 70 years of age and her mother just passed away in the spring (I have previously written about that funeral). She was standing at my door holding a huge bouquet of flowers and a white bag. Note that I have never given her my address (on purpose), so she has to have gotten my address from my mom.

Anyway, so she gives me the bouquet and the bag of veggies from her garden and asks several times if I'm ok. Then she invited me on a walk in a nearby park, but I declined because I was in my pajamas (and because I absolutely did not want to go). So then she offered to wait while I got changed. I declined again, and then she asked me to drop by and visit her any time.

As soon as she left, I viciously shut my blinds and felt like I couldn't breathe. I felt sick to my stomach and my mind started racing with the likely fall-out of this visit, especially how it would likely embolden my parents to force their way into my life. Now it's a day later and I'm dealing with acid reflux due to the anxiety.

Is it so much to ask for my wishes to be respected? Situations like this make my fantasy of running away and changing my name feel more and more like a good option.

#Family #Relationships #Parents #MentalHealth #Depression #Anxiety #Respect #Trauma #home

Nothing beats getting home and putting on a pair of joggers and a comfy top after being all dressed up for the day. Might take a nap too 🙊 #Depression #Anxiety #Pregnancy #home

A few weeks ago, I shared with my therapist that I was feeling a lot of shame about the state of my apartment. If I'm doing well, I clean the bathroom once a month. I am usually somewhat tidy in the kitchen. The rest of the apartment is a mess. My landlords don't provide recycling facilities and I can't bring myself to put my recycling items in the garbage so they just pile up. I have bags of non-perishable groceries sitting in the middle of the entryway from three weeks ago because I just haven't cared to put them away.
So as I cried about how ashamed I was about my apartment in my therapist's office, she asked if having a messy apartment was helping me in any way. Frankly, I thought that was a stupid question and told her that of course it wasn't.
However, I had the realization a few days ago that it is actually something that a part of me is doing to keep me from ending my life. I would feel so terrible for someone to have to clean up my apartment after I was gone. By keeping it dirty and messy, I am also keeping myself alive.
I definitely have a significant battle between the part of me that feels ashamed in the present and the protective part of me that is stopping me from cleaning up, but it is really good to know that it might actually be a good thing to have a dirty apartment.

#tenant #apartment #home #Cleaning #SuicidalIdeation #MentalHealth #Therapy #Depression #Anxiety #CPTSD #Shame