Tag: self-love

It really wouldn’t kill you to be nice…

Before I go into what I suppose is a little rant, I just want to say, I hope everyone is doing okay and I hope that this does make a few people think and make others laugh…which is completely allowed at this time! In fact, its needed!

This is all very difficult on lots of people and it has been so lovely to see everyone coming together to help one another and showing a lot of appreciation to our key workers. To be honest, I give a genuine applause to anyone who hasn’t killed their partner, sibling or any other family member, from being stuck inside the house. Seriously. Humans were never meant to live on top of one another in this way. But, we do what we need to do right now to survive.

However, I was reminded yesterday that there are still people in this world who really do not care about anyone but themselves and it was in the stupedist scenario ever! Now, I completely invite you to laugh at this situation, because, looking back I can now laugh at it. At the time, I genuinely cried and wanted to punch somebody.

Let me set the scene: I had had a bit of a bad morning, having had an argument with my family and decided to go for my daily walk with my dog. Its sunny, clear skies and I have just had a chat with my boyfriend who has cheered me up completely. Hes a key worker, so we couldn’t chat long, before he was off his break and had to get back. I’m walking down this road, when I get to a bit of off road track bust is a cut through. Please bare in mind that this is a wide road. Two people are walking towards me with their dog. Now, my dog is fine with other dogs as long as they aren’t bigger than him. Clearly, with the current situation, we dont want to be going anywhere near them. So, I’m holding my dog back. The owner puts his dog back on the lead (which looked like an extremely long piece of rope) and let is hang very loose, hardly holding his dog back. My dog is watching him when this dog starts to bark and go for mine. I pull mine back (Archie) and he listens. The other dog goes again and as my dog pulls forward too, I lose my footing and fall over my foot, twist my ankle, whilst dragging my knee across the ground and falling flat on my face.

Did they ask if I was okay? Did they apologise for not keeping their dog back and letting it get so close to mine?

No.

They literally looked at me and walked away! My dog immediately stopped the second I fell over and came by my side. He licked my cheek as I started to cry and sat on the ground holding myself up and completely letting myself just have a moment.

You have no idea what other people are going through. None at all. I was angry with them, yes, but later I was able to laugh at how funny I probably looked in a sitcom kind of way. There are genuinely some people who will never understand how to just be kind to someone. I called my friend, who calmed me down, reminded me to breathe and checked I was okay. A small gesture that was gratefully received.

Later that day I had an influx of people who I am lucky to have in my life, tell me that I am loved and that they were there for me. It completely turned my day around. By the end of the day, I didn’t even really remember what had happened that morning. Come two weeks time, it would even cross my mind once and those people would of been gone from my life. It’s easy sometimes to let people’s actions take over in your head and have an impact and worse of all it can happen with people that you dont even know and who won’t have even given you a second thought. Don’t waste time of people like that. It’s so easy to do and I am the worst for it. I hold onto things and struggle to let go and have done for a long time. I need to take a leaf out of my own book. Don’t let those that aren’t important, affect you and put a downer on your day. Now, more than ever, you need to keep hold of the things that are important to you. That make you smile, laugh and even cry. There is always a balance needed. Negativity in order to see the positive things in life. But dont let it take over and have power over the rest of your day or what you want to do with it. Time is precious. Sometimes it really bloody hurts when you fall, but you just have to get back up again and keep going.

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I’m tired.

It seems to be a common phrase I am using at the moment. I’m physically tired. Emotionally tired. Mentally tired. My body is craving more sleep every single day. My mind wants to just shut off and go quiet. My emotions feel constantly all over the place.

This post has no particular purpose other than for my own need to just spill and get things off my chest. And if by some chance it helps someone else feel less alone and see that someone feels similar to them, then great! In other words, I just want to have a little rant.

I’m working a lot at the moment, which is one reason why I am so tired. However, if I didn’t have a million and one things to do in the day time, my evening shifts could be my one and only focus and I would probably feel a lot calmer and as though I was a little more in control of my life.

Right now… I don’t feel in control. I have felt very lost over the previous months since finishing university and have struggled to get through one day to the next. My routine and system had disappeared and I had no idea what I was doing. I now have a system (not so structural) but a system all the same and I feel a lot smoother in my movements with where I am going to next. I have an idea of what I want to do with my career and my life, more so than I did a few months ago. I haven’t got it all sorted but slowly I feel like I’m ticking all the right boxes. This should be making my day to day life a lot easier. But… I have so many things going on in my head at the moment, that I’m struggling to just stop, take a step back and watch what I have accomplished so far. Constant rejections of jobs I apply for, is something I am getting better at dealing with. However, it’s still draining. You see people achieve and conquer all over social media everyday that it’s easy to forget that they had to work hard to get there! They had to have low and awful days to get to the highs. But these are not often seen. Pride gets in the way. So I’m going to put it out there. I have been rejected for more jobs than I can count. I have got to interviews and failed. But my achievement is getting back up and starting again. Wiping those tears away and trying to move forward.

One thing I have had to admit to myself, is that I really need those I care about the most to be there for me right now. That’s a massive step with anything is admitting when you need help. Drop the pride. Put your hands up and just say, “I need help.” I’m definitely no expert in it. In fact, I am so stubborn that sometimes I make matters worse because I can’t just say that I need help. I hope that my friends and family know I am always here for them, even if I don’t message everyday (I know they do know this). I am just a phone call away and I will always be there for any of my friends. They are so important to me. But I am tired of fighting for friendships where I feel like it is one sided, or that I am fighting for my worth to be seen. My patience with time, my energy to be understanding has decreased massively. I have become quiet. I have become secluded. I see myself doing it and yet I can’t seem to stop right now. I know I need this time to focus on me. To focus on those most important to me. I have the most amazing rock in my life who is keeping me on my feet. Who is giving me enough strength to push forward. If you have someone like that for You, hold onto it. Let them support you and help you.

This is no sympathy post. I find writing to be therapeutic. I enjoy to just sit and chat with you. And if you are feeling the same then you can be comforted by the fact that others go through the same. It isn’t easy. I understand that. I am applying for things over and over. My time will come. This is just the path I am taking to get there. One that isn’t easy right now, but will become easier. I can already see the jigsaw pieces are falling into place. It’s easy to forget that sometimes, but I know deep down, through all of my tiredness, that ultimately everything will work out and everything is going to be okay. If you need to hear that too then just know now. Everything is going to be okay. I promise.

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#6 – May, Myself and I – Weight

Yes, I know, I missed days 4 and 5, but I never promised to get everyday done. I knew it wouldn’t be possible to do it all and so I wasn’t going to set a goal that I already knew I would fail. This is something I have learned to do over the past few years – not setting myself up to fail. It does nothing for my self-confidence and only ends up making me feel grumpy and annoyed at myself for not accomplishing it, even though I knew from the very beginning I would never reach it in the first place.

When I was in first year of Uni, I put on a lot of weight. This was due to the amount of alcohol I was drinking, (freshers week really did completely kill me) food I was eating and the fact that I was on the pill. Yes, I’m about to start talking about a little subject that some people feel all squeamish about and really makes me want to slap them. I was on the pill due to having very heavy, very unpredictable periods. With a whole new chapter starting of living on my own, doing a degree, remembering to wash my clothes, the last thing I wanted was the extra stress of not knowing when my stupid period would start. This would give me a structure that I could stick to and not have to worry of randomly waking up in the middle of the night and have horrible sheets due to not knowing when I was about to start. It was a stress that I could completely avoid. It all started off great, although I did change my pill a couple of times due to it not suiting my body, but it turned out that I am allergic to the oestrogen that are in many pills. I was offered other pills by the doctors but in all honesty I wanted to give my body a break. What had started as an easy option to avoid unexpected periods, slowly turned into a nightmare. I put on a heck of a lot of weight, my hormones were everywhere and I began to get acne all over my face, something I had never been prone to before. I came off the pill and decided to just let mother nature be. I think if I was to go back to the pill, some deeper research would need to happen on my part to find the right one.

By the time I came off the pill and it was out of my system (which can take up to 3 months), I was in my second year of Uni. I had tried the gym in first year and probably showed up 3 or 4 times during the whole year. I just didn’t enjoy it. Now, don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t huge or unhealthy, but I just didn’t feel good in my own skin. I constantly felt bloated or dirty or completely sluggish, and I struggled to do anything about it. To me, your size does not matter as long as you are healthy and happy. I didn’t feel happy and I definitely didn’t feel healthy. I would walk to and from work and everywhere around Lincoln when I was at uni. It’s not like I didn’t do any exercise, but between all of that I just didn’t feel like it was enough.

I began to go to the gym and gave it another go with my roommate. We joined classes and often did the spin class and to toning class for legs, bums and tums (the three areas I was most conscious of.) But slowly, I stopped going. I didn’t go for about 4 months and continued to pay for a membership that I never used. I made excuses.

There was a period at Uni where a lot of things had happened and I completely hated my body. I couldn’t stand to look at my own reflection in the bathroom. There mirror was right where I would stand when I would get out of the shower. I wouldn’t even look up and would cover myself with the towel. I drank more, ate rubbish food and began to feel numb towards my own body. Not looking after it. Not caring at all. I wasn’t eating great and so the weight did drop off and I was pretty skinny. But not healthy. Again, size to me doesn’t matter. My health does.

After an amount of time, lots of late night walks and thinking, I gave myself the kick up the butt that I needed. I wasn’t looking after myself. I wasn’t sleeping well. I felt stressed and so unhappy. I would drift in and out of conversation, never really being in the same room as everyone else. Just being. Not living.

I decided to set myself realistic goals. I would get up and put my gym clothes on straight away. I would have my bag ready. I stopped going to gym classes because they restricted my freedom to pick and choose when I could go. I started with just half an hour workouts, once a week. I cut out drinking for a short while and slowly went back to it when it was a social outing, but wouldn’t allow myself to get completely obliterated. I still need to drink more water, but my intake definitely improved. In my day to day life I made mini goals. Getting up and making the bed. Cooking myself dinner from scratch. Going for a walk if I didn’t go to the gym. I kept going until I no longer thought about it. It became second nature. I actually became the person who would go to the gym 2 or 3 times a week. My sessions would last an hour and a half. I felt mentally better. I began to tone up and saw curves on myself that I never knew existed. I began to feel happier.

The point of this, is not about losing weight and being extremely toned and muscular. It’s actually about your own mental health and feeling happy in your own skin. Everyday I still take those steps. Everyday I hope to get slightly better. It’s definitely easier said than done and takes a lot of time to get there. Recently, I haven’t been able to get down to the gym as much as I would like. But I walk my dog, I walk to work and I’m on my feet all day when I am on shift. I have to take that into account and try not to beat myself up about not going to the gym and working out. When I’m at the gym, I stick to what I know and what I enjoy. I don’t force myself to do anything that makes me uncomfortable or atleast not until I’m ready to. It all has to be at your own pace. The gym isn’t for everyone. It never used to be for me. But there are so many different routes.

In today’s society we are constantly bombarded with mixed messages, from crazy workouts to lose weight and be skinny, to being told to love your size and that’s it’s great to be big and a different shape. It’s so hard to decide what to tune into when everything feels incredibly judged and like it’s the wrong answer.

All I knew for myself was that I wanted to feel happier in my own skin. I felt like I couldn’t speak up because I was a size 10 or 12. I felt like speaking about it made people think I was craving attention. But I simply didn’t feel healthy. I didn’t feel like I was looking after myself well enough. The first steps I took, was to stand in front of the mirror naked and find something I liked about myself. About 50 flaws came to mind first and I had to really look to find something I liked. Slowly but surely I began to find atleast one thing a day that I liked. Whether it was how I had done my make up or how my butt looked in a pair of jeans. It’s something I still try to do now. The more I worked out, the better I felt. I could shut everything out at the gym and only listen to my own breathing. I set myself smaller goals that I could see ahead of me in my mind and ones that were difficult but reachable.

Size does not matter. Every body shape, every curve, every mark is beautiful and it’s really difficult to see that sometimes. Rather than looking at weight, look at your own health. Physically and mentally. Once that mindset changes, it’s a lot easier to do something about it. It’s fine to have had days and it’s fine to not always get there. Talk to people. Write down your goals. Find a routine that suits you. There is not right or wrong way. But actually starting to love yourself,even if it is just one thing, the first step to feeling happier and healthier. Screw looking at weight. Happiness comes first. Everything become a easier and a lot more positive when you aren’t constantly clouded by judgement and self-hatred. Try and try again. Weight can be gained. Weight can be dropped. It doenst matter. All you need to ask yourself is, am I happy? What do I love about myself? Just find that one thing first and the ball will start rolling all on its own.

I think I will make a further blog on weight and how I changed with what I was wearing and what I felt good in. Let’s call this part 1 to maybe a mini series of my own journey if you are interested.

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