I wake up exhausted.
At night I lie awake feeling this overwhelming dread and sadness cloak me. It's like tar. Thick, sticky, impossible to wash off and black. So black you could get lost in it. Even with a flashlight.
In the early hours of the morning, I imagine that it's seeping out of my pores. I'm surprised when there is no evidence on my bedsheets.

Getting up is hard. That tar, it's heavy. It wraps around my body and makes it hard to breathe.

I'm just tired
I'm just tired
I'm just tired

I repeat it throughout the day.

I'm so tired I can't sleep.

That black hole I've found myself in is too big.
It's so big and deep and how the hell do I climb out when I can't see anything else?

How do you say to the people that love you that you would like to just...not wake up again. I don't want to die, I'm not suicidal, but it would be nice don't you think, to not feel like I'm sick on the inside.
How do you open yourself up and show all that ugly dark tar inside? it's stuck to my organs and I'll never be free. How can you love me when I'm so ugly inside?

It's always going to be like this. Feeling so good. So high, So amazing and wonderful but anxious all the same. Because it's not going to last. It's fleeting and temporary and oh god, what's the point when you know the crash is around the corner.
I can't run from it. It's IN me. It's ON me. It IS me.
I'm not my mental illness, but I am. It's ME.

Every criticism, every argument, every hard word that has been said, those hands on me, my mistakes and fuck ups and failings, they assault me. Whispering inside my head, like a favourite song on repeat, I'll play it again and again.


--------------

I wrote that over a year ago.
Funny what can happen in a year.

I wish I knew that things would get worse, and then so much better.

Sass of the past,

Babe, you're going to leave your husband.
Don't be scared. Everything is going to be okay.
You'll cry in Ikea over buying a sofa. It's your first independent decision and you'll be almost paralysed with fear. LM will be mortified and then show so much compassion for a ten year old, you'll weep some more.

You'll find yourself being responsible for three children and realise that you've been doing it by yourself for a long time.
You'll be enraged at your ex for this, but also be comforted by the knowledge that you can do this single mum life thing.

You're going to move on.
It's not going to hurt to breathe anymore.
You'll find someone who makes you laugh so much you cry.
He'll love your children as much as you do.

You'll be standing in your kitchen, making pancakes for the kids and there will be music and happiness and you'll realise that this was meant to happen and you're happy.

You'll fall pregnant.
You'll cry in the shower after you've done the test because you're fucking terrified.
You'll have hope.
And then life... will show you that sometimes, some things are not meant to be.

You'll have lifesaving surgery.
You'll lose the baby.
And you'll mourn.

I'm sorry.

But listen.

Life, it goes on. Even when you don't want it to.
You've made it through every single shitty fucking day and you'll continue to do it because the things that terrify you and make you sad, are outnumbered by hearing your daughter call you mummy for the first time, or watching your baby boy take his first steps in front of you, his auntie and his nanny.

It's not easy. But the good things, they aren't meant to be easy.
You're going to be okay.

credit

I'm trying really hard to clean up all of my messes. Physically and mentally and urgh, doing both, at the same time is haaaaarrrrrd internet people. It's really hard.

Part of being a foster carer is opening our home up for social workers and government workers to come through at short notice and at any time.  We have unscheduled unannounced visits sometimes, just to make sure that we aren't locking our children under the stairs (tempting) or living in complete squallor, which can make it really hard to ignore the dirty dishes in the sink, just in case some lady is going to come into the house and judge me.

So, on a superficial level, our home looks clean most of the time. As long as you ignore the cushions on the floor the dog has kicked off the sofa because he doesn't like the way I place them. (he wants me to put them on an angle, but I like them face on with a chop down the middle.)
But go upstairs and into my bedroom and I'm living like a 14-year-old girl.
Be careful opening that cupboard because everything might fall out and kill you where you stand.
Probably best not open under the bathroom cabinets because for some reason, my husband hoards old catalogues and magazines and that's where they end up. Along with half empty shampoo bottles when I decide I don't want to smell like watermelon anymore, it's all about the coconut.

So, I'm trying to do better.
Throwing out things, cleaning out my makeup...I don't think I'm ever going to wear blue eyeshadow circa 2001... sorting through my office and all the empty envelopes my husband has collected...

What it will be like not living on the edge anymore? Gone will be the "if I open the tuppawear cupboard will everything fall out" challenge.

Will I miss the weekly ripping apart of the house to find LM's homework sheet that I was sure I just put in that drawer...

Do people actually live like that, though? Everything in perfect order and organised and clean all the time?

I have a few friends starting our Keto Challenge with me today and I have had a few questions about the Ketogenic diet. Instead of sending the same thing to many people, I thought it would be a good idea to put it all down here and then you've got a resource that you can come back to if you like.