Re-reading past posts and pages!

Good morning my dear readers.

I’ve just spent the last hour having a long re-read of this blog!!  I’ve read all the pages I created along the way.  I’ve gone over some of the old posts.

How extraordinarily therapeutic this has been.  Yes I’ve had a weep as I reminded myself of the dark catastrophic place I was in when I started out on this blogging marathon.  The Eureka Moments I’ve had along the way (and why do I think there still might be more to come?) have been wonderful to read.  Even though the 2nd has been so incredibly tough to acknowledge and will need – one day – to be faced and dealt with.

It is true – I have come a long way!

But I still want more.  And the great thing is that having reminded myself of how far I have come I now realise that I can get the rest!!!  After all – all I need to do is double the ‘distance’!

I hope the sun is shining on your day today.  It looks as though, finally, the sun is about to shine here in the UK.

Have a lovely day everyone.  Now I must get going and not waste this day by sitting about doing very little!!

Revisit to 6′ and 30″

Last night I bottled out of Camera Club.  The prospect of photographing vegetables using different lighting techniques just wasn’t enough for me to venture out into the rain!  I wonder why!!!  I don’t really do a lot of ‘still life’  I’m more of a moving type of person!

Anyway having given myself an evening in I did then feel at a bit of a loss.  As you know – dear reader – I’ve been a bit down for a few days.  So I replayed my 6 feet and 30 seconds moment – I have it on DVD and also several audio recordings I made when I was practising my speech for my party last November -  (see Eureka moments) .  That really worked and was, and still is, a defining moment.

My outlook has changed from where I was last summer.  I no longer get the horror moments, those moments when I screamed at the walls and sobbed for days on end.  My lows are more sad rather than miserable.  I haven’t read my Post It Notes list for months, and they were so important to me for weeks and weeks last summer.

So my outlook has changed!  Which is good.  But I do still feel it’s all so surreal.  That the man I thought loved me and cared for me could have done what he has.

No doubt this will also eventually go and I shall be able to remember the past with fondness and nothing more.  And not mind anymore.  Not mind that we lost so much. That we threw away so much.  Well that He throw away so much.  It will be good when that day comes.

Damn it …… I bolted

Sometimes I could shoot myself!!!  I think I need a brain transplant!!  And quick!

I cause my own angst with such brilliance it’s stunning!   Talk about stupid!  That’s me!!

I got invited to friends for Christmas lunch and evening – I could have even spent the night if I wanted to.  So what do I do?  Yes I go.  I have a lovely lunch with them and their family.  11 of us in all – and a great time.  And they had more family coming for the evening.  Perfect. Lots of people. Just what I need.  But muggins here decides to bolt.

So I bolted.  Got home at 5.30 and so – Hallelujah – I’m then on my own for the rest of the evening.  Talk about stupid decision. So I then feel lonely, unloved, miserable, sorry for myself…….  Yup!  I created my miserable future for myself all over again. And shot off down to the bottom of my personal Chilean Mine.

I then had to use a  great deal of will power and running my “6ft and 30 seconds”  exercise in my head to get myself out of the hole!  Which has worked partially!

I am saying this with a wry smile on my face – Dear Reader If I wasn’t me I’d wring my neck!!!

You know when you break something – like a leg or arm – or you have something that needs mending physically.  Some kind anesthetist puts you to sleep, a surgeon rolls up and fixes what ever it is, and you wake up a bit sore but mended and on the road to recovery.  I just wish someone could do the same to my mind! It would be great to be put to sleep and wake up fixed!!!

So I did have a lovely Christmas day.  I’ve had some lovely presents from friends.  I could have had a lovely Christmas evening.  Apparently I chose not to!!!

I hope the rest of you were more sensible!!

And no feeling sorry for me anyone!!!   I think part of my mind is looking for sympathy and attention – and it’s a bad habit I need to break!!  And break it I am going to do.

I really do want a happy future, surrounded by lots of people, doing things I like doing…..  And yes I don’t want to be on my own.

And I can’t stand those forlorn, droopy women who go round looking pathetic because they’ve been dumped by their Mid-Life-Crisis husbands.  Those women who no man in their right mind would look at twice!  Or those brittle ones who are just plain terrifying!!

I AM going to buzz and make people laugh and want to be with me.  I just haven’t quite got there yet.

And I do wish I hadn’t bolted!

I’m beginning to see…

I’m beginning to see why I have been so stuck emotionally these last 22 months.

Why I have clung to my failed marriage and the hope of Alex returning – like a drowning man to a life raft.

I couldn’t see any other option.  Because my marriage and Alex represented – for me – security. That safe haven where I was protected.

In fact I now believe (with the help of several emails from Stephen, my life coach, today) that security was more important to me than love. So although I do love Alex –  more importantly he represented security, so I felt safe.

He is totally opposite from the man I “encountered” when I was 15.

Alex was supposed to be my rock, my oak tree, the man who would protect me and ensure no harm came to me.  So when he cheated and lied and did what he did and removed that security blanket I couldn’t cope.  I was prepared to do – or to be – anything to get that ‘blanket’ back.

So letting go (words that I hate as they represent lack of security) has been totally impossible.

But now.  Now I have faced what happened to me and what effect it has had on me I can at least learn and deal with it and create a new future for myself where I can be secure in myself .

This is an interesting time.  Very scary.  But I am assured I will come through this.  And I am placing all my faith in those who assure me I will.

I have no other option.  I don’t want second best for the rest of my life!!

So to give this a positive spin.  It’s actually quite exciting!!

As I know from my “6 feet and 30 second” moment – I can pick all the fun things in life I want. I can be who I want to be.  I can do  what I want to do.

Maybe  – at last – I am close to actually being able to do these things!

xxx

The winning funny answer to my riddle!

I hope you find this as funny as I did!

Six foot and thirty seconds

Well, the start of Caroline’s troubles began when she took up growing Durians. To the uninitiated this is a fruit tree and considered a delicacy in the Far East. But unknown to Caroline it is only the female tree that produces a sweet smelling fruit, whereas Caroline had unfortunately planted the male species and that produces one of the foulest smelling fruits in the world.  Her close neighbours were horrified having to don gas masks during the day and night!  All her friends, colleagues and neighbours rallied round to try and advise Caroline that she should really stop growing this fruit.  However, rather than stop growing Durians, she planted more and more.

Durian fruit smell so bad it is banned from taxis in Singapore

 

Soon the matter was brought to the attention of the Parish Council. They decreed that Caroline should plant fragrant pine trees around the perimeter of her property.  But, before she got around to do this one of her close neighbours (who will remain nameless-to protect the innocent), with expertise in civil engineering and an enviable reputation for neighbourly diplomacy, decided to take his own action to protect the neighbourhood. His solution was to place cones around the perimeter of her property. These were not ordinary traffic cones though, these were cones used by seafarers and the like. Known as sea-cones they are manufactured in male and female versions for easier stowing whilst at sea.

Unperturbed by this act Caroline thought that these sea-cones would make excellent planters for the pine trees as directed by the Parish Council. A few days later she noticed that the pine trees growing in the female sea-cones were dying, whilst those growing in the male sea-cones, grew strong and healthy.

The months drift by and Caroline finds herself increasingly isolated as the hedge of pine trees grew shabby and the drifting odour from the Durian fruit caused her friends and neighbours to seek refuge in their own homes.

One day, whilst Caroline was taking a stroll, a wizened wise old man on a white horse rode by. “You look sad” he said. Caroline replied “well that’s because no one wants to speak to me anymore”.  “Well” replied the wizened man “that’s cos you’re growing male Durians which is a really pongy fruit and wots more them damn trees in them sea-cones ‘ave grown all shabby making your garden a mess.” “Have you got a solution?” Caroline asked. “Yes I ‘ave” said the wizened man and continued “if you really want a cure you need to replace them female sea-cones with male ones and only grow female Durian fruit”.  “But to do that” Caroline said, “I need to establish the gender of both the Durians and sea-cones”. “Yep that’s right” said the wizened old man and he turned and rode away.

Caroline was aghast by this but now knew that to make an amazing difference to her life she needed to follow the advice of the wizened old man. With that she turned and hopped and skipped back to her house and shouted:

 

Sex fruit and fir-tree sea-cones

What did it for me?

Actually 6 feet and 30 seconds Is what did it for me!  And I can tell you now.

I couldn’t before as I had set all my party goers a challenge to answer it as a riddle.  So I had to keep quiet in case they googled it!.  If they find it now it won’t matter.

That’s what changed my outlook on life and has allowed me to sleep.

Amazing that something so simple worked so well.

It might work for you.  I know it wouldn’t have worked for me without going through the other coaching sessions before it.

So what was it:  It was the distance between the miserable future I had created for myself in my mind and the fun, happy future Stephen helped me create in my mind.  And – yes – the time it took for me to decide to walk from one to the other.

And mostly – all I need to do is re-run it in my mind to remind myself that I will be OK.