'home'

Without even thinking about it, most people make a distinction between 'house' and 'home' or 'place I live' and 'home'. You can live somewhere for a long long time but it'll never be your home. And vice versa.

I guess I'm questioning what makes something 'homely'. The people who live there with you? The objects you fill the place with? The memories and experiences you've had there? A combination of these things?

'Home' tends to be a feeling, people call things 'homely' or say they feel 'at home' somewhere. But what happens when there's nowhere left that you feel at home?

For me, home is somewhere where I'm 100% comfortable and I have my own space to do with as I please.

byebye

I have decided to start a new blog called Michelleaa which is a lifestyle blog and I will be writing about a variety of different things. This will include anything from makeup and beauty to food to sports to DIY decorating products, just anything happening in my life that I think others might be interested in. The link is http://michelleaaalboe.blogspot.co.uk :)

I will keep this blog up, or if I manage to find a way to take it offline but keep all the content I'll do that because I used this as an online diary/journal and I think it helped me to articulate all my feelings during those rough patches I went through. My new blog will be more interactive and aimed for people to read and give me feedback etc. I may even start a Youtube channel at some point, who knows?

I may still continue to post but they won't be frequent and will be in the style of the most recent posts so this is a goodbye for now and thanks for reading :)

drifting

I've noticed that I've been a little hypocritical lately. Well, to be fair, I'm always hypocritical but especially so, this time. We were talking in philosophy about how the news only ever reports bad things: accidents, economic crisis, crimes etc. and if you think about it, it's quite true, which is also what I thought in the lesson. Although, now that I think about it, it's not entirely true, but no, I'm going to pretend it is so this makes sense. So the part about being hypocritical is that I really disagreed with that and I've always lived my life trying to be happy and focus only on good things etc. However, I've realised that the only times I 'document' things in my life, they're not particularly good things. Like my last post or diary entry, or this post I'm about to write. Just thought I'd throw it out there...

I was showering and thinking about stuff and I got this feeling (not from my shower) that I've just been drifting along lately, metaphorically. I go to school, go through the motions of my lessons, eat, sleep, repeat - not in that order. Like I feel like I don't really have my place and I don't belong anywhere, most of the time I prefer being on my own which I find a bit weird.

I don't think that I really completely looked at every angle when I declared that I would move school this time last year. Now that I'm here, I've realised how many things I didn't think through properly, I only focused on the advantages and refused to see the reasons why so many people choose to stay at their schools for the last two years of schooling. I didn't see how completely my life would change, I didn't see that I would not know anyone and would be around no one I knew and not have any kind of safety blanket or group of friends to go to, I would have to speak to people and make friends. I also didn't realise that I wouldn't be able to make friends as easily as I did with my two besets friends that I met a few years ago at my old school. I didn't take into account the extra pressure from just the harder level of work and being at an even more academic school. Or that I'd be in unfamiliar surroundings with different teachers.

I don't think it helps that I've been dealing with a lot of stuff outside of school which makes it a bit difficult. Since I don't really know anyone that well I don't feel comfortable telling people really personal things and I don't even know who I would choose to talk to even if I did. The worst thing would be if I told someone and they just thought that I told them for pity or sympathy or attention. Saying that though, I didn't give some of these sixteen year old boys enough credit. I did open up to a couple of friends (they caught me at a weak moment) and if anything, they listened and tried to offer constructive advice or just cheer me up and distract me. Obviously they probably couldn't really understand or empathise unless they were in a similar situation. They do seem to care about me, sometimes at least. It's like that thing where people say you know who your friends are when you're going through bad things. That's the thing though, I never know what to do with myself when I'm 'fine'.

reflecting

I was just about to start my homework and so in the spirit of procrastination I opened up everything I would possibly need for my homework - textbooks, moodle (this online thing where they post homework and lesson stuff), my school email and planner. I then started to make a list of all the homework that I have a very small amount of time to complete for school tomorrow that I ignored for all of half term when I started reflecting on some stuff. I know, groundbreaking stuff right here.

I realised that I have no idea what's going on in all of my classes right now and I've fallen very behind because I pretty much missed the last three days before half term. This then led me to think of why I'd missed all those classes and led to this reflective stream of consciousness. It's strange when I think of how upset I got at different times over the last week and bit since I was told that I need a biopsy and I've come to a few realisations. 

First, sometimes I take advantage of the special treatment I get (from my school) because of all the stuff that's happened and I slack and get lazy and don't do my homework. I think, they meant that it's understandable that I might not get work done because I'll be having to go to a few medical appointments which could upset me if its bad news or something major that I'll get worried about or if I get really down about any of this 'stuff' (I don't feel the need to give details since a) that would be a post and a half in itself and b) I don't want pity or anything and c) it's not necessary in the context of this post, I feel) clearly, those are good reasons for why I won't have done work since I'll be busy or distracted and not able to do homework. However, I'm feeling a bit guilty because I could have not done so much stuff with my friends or so much lazing around eating dark chocolate chips and done some of this homework that I am still not doing. 

Secondly, my emotions seems to operate by an 'all or nothing' principle. Let me explain, when I get upset, I get really really really upset - think hysterical crying to the point of being sick and migraine, or I'll be quite bubbly and happy to the annoying degree, but that's kind of my usual personality so... OR I'll just be neutral or nothing or numb and not feel much, this one has two halves, the good halve where I'm just neutral and nothing so I'm not upset or sad really but not uber happy either, a bit like how I'm feeling now. The bad halve is either before or after I feel really down when I'm feeling numb and nothing and I really don't like it because I just get this really dull, heavy feeling and I'll either get really upset following this or have been really upset and who really likes to get upset?

Thirdly, for the most part I only get really upset by triggers. This would be a good thing, except that these triggers cover a wide range of things because of all my issues so someone could say something and a normal person would see the proper meaning behind and not feel much but I'll interpret in a really bad way and I start thinking bad things and feeling really horrible and get really upset but it's really hard for me to see that it's just my brain making these things up and that's not what the person intended. Even though I notice this when I'm feeling 'fine' - with fine being 'in the happy side of the spectrum of emotions', when I'm feeling 'bad' I forget all this and 99% of the time I'll end up twisting things in my head and making myself feel horrible. People might read this and think 'she's being attention seeking' or 'it's an act' or 'get over it' or similar. But when I'm feeling that horrible it's like I'm being sucked in by these emotions and it's really hard to see past it all, especially if I'm on my own or I don't think whoever I'm talking to really understands.

Fourthly, I'm a creature of habit and I'm really lazy (I didn't just realise this after 16 years). I mean, I'll make a playlist of music and listen to it on repeat for a very long time, even after I get sick of it because I think it's too much effort to find new music I like. This means that I listen to the same music when I'm feeling both happy and sad so it's hard to distinguish between the two and they get smushed together. It's probably not great considering how upset I can get by simple triggers but luckily, thus far, music has not triggered any extreme emotion, so yay.

It didn't seem right to end the post there so now I'm improvising more than usual since I never have an outro, well I don't have intros either but at least I'm consistent with them in that they are almost always of no relevance to the title and are about random things only I really understand. Although I think that if I read back I'd cringe and think 'why have I put this on the internet for all eternity?'.

numbness

I think that I want to change this blog. I want it to just be a place where I occasionally write to figure things out and be almost like a diary. I do have a diary but I like having this here and it also means that if I lose my diary (fire etc.) I will still be able to look back at how I was when I was 15 and 16, ten or twenty years from now. Not sure why I'd want my diary to be in the public domain and never fully erasable but not many people that I know, know about this so I guess it's fine.

I just wrote a few pages in my diary in a bid to feel better but it didn't work. If anything, it made me feel worse because before I wrote I was feeling a bit sad with a heavy feeling in my chest but as I was writing I started to cry. Actually, that could be a good thing because it means I'm 'letting some of the feelings out' which is supposedly good. I'm not sure I agree since I usually cry so hard that I get all snotty, give myself a headache and my eyes start looking puffy and red and not like me.

I don't know. Lately I've been feeling so horrible and I can't pinpoint a solid reason for this and I HATE IT. I HATE feeling so 'heavy' and numb or sad and upset and I especially hate that I don't know how to feel better. It's been a long time since I've felt truly happy and 'lighter' for a period of time longer than a few hours. I mean, I'll chat with my best friends or cousin or the teachers at school and feel better for a short-ish while. But after a few hours or a day the heavyness or numbess comes back.

Not to make light of it, but maybe I have proper depression - isn't it called clinical depression? I don't know. I just want something, anything to make me feel any of the spectrum of happy and good emotions. (Although after a few weeks of A level Ethics I don't even know what good is anymore). I guess what I'm trying to say is that lately, I've been crying and getting upset, a lot. I mean, I do go days without crying, but that's not really an achievement, is it? It should be the other way around - where crying is an abnormal event, not as I am right now when the best days are those that I feel nothing and don't get upset. Those are far too rare and far between for me.

I feel like I have this massive barrage of negative, upsetting emotions, just waiting for when I start to feel just a tiny bit bad to come out and make whatever negative emotion I'm feeling ten or twenty times worse. I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know how I'm going to keep 'coping' if that's even what I'm doing. I'm a bit worried about what I'll resort to, to even feel a shred of happiness soon. I don't want to end up being one of those cases where a teenager cuts, or drinks, or takes drugs or becomes slutty to make themselves think that they feel a bit better. But I'm afraid that soon that's the only option I'll have.

feeling blue

I've found that sometimes, writing stuff out on here makes me feel better or helps me to better understand something so that is what I'm doing. Therefore, forgive me if I do not make any sense since I don't really understand it myself so I'll hardly be able to explain this whatever it is coherently and clearly.

I can't really pin point the exact time but I've started to feel a bit blue this evening. I have 'made' a scale to 'track' my 'mood swings'. So there's depressed which is the saddest, upset, sad and feeling blue/down. I think it started around 8pm this evening when I was showering. I'm not sure what I was thinking about but those thoughts obviously weren't in the happy region. I don't know, it stared with a fun bout of insecurity -do my new 'friends' actually like me? What about the girls I've not really spoken to? Do they hate me because I've made friends with guys and they haven't really? What about my best friends? Have they found a better friend to replace me now? Thoughts like these kept swirling about in my head and bringing down my mood. I stayed at the 'feeling down/blue' level for the rest of the evening but it slowly got 'downer'. I'd texted a friend I'd been neglecting a bit lately and sometimes the rubbish he spouts amuses me at the least or the cheesy stuff he says that I don't really think he means makes me smile but I didn't feel anything and just wished I could end the conversation or not reply. However I don't really work like that and had to reply. The conversation just added to my bad mood. Then whilst I was chatting with one of my best friends she said that she couldn't meet this weekend (we'd decided that all of us would meet at least once a month so we don't drift apart and not be friends anymore) and I felt really disappointed. I'd wanted to see her this weekend but homework and possible plans with my new potential friends kept me occupied and she was also busy. I spent the rest of the evening this way and 4 hours later I'm still not feeling happier. It's strange because I'm never usually like this, I'm usually in the 'very happy' parts, 'normal' or 'upset'. I don't visit 'feeling down' a lot and I don't like it, plus it's usually quite easier for me to break these moods and feel happy again but it's just not happening tonight.

I guess there could be a lot to attribute to this mood. Firstly, I stayed up reading and only got 3 hours sleep last night so I had a Starbucks early in the morning (caffeine early in the morning, on a near empty stomach and after zero sleep makes me feel weird), plus, I'm on antibiotics for an infection and these antibiotics made me feel bad last time I had them (its only a seven day course and I was desperate so that's why I haven't been to my doctor). Plus, I skipped lunch because I went to debate society during lunchtime, then I got home and went straight to badminton without eating. Plus, it's been rainy all day, I've been a bit cold and the sixth form common room was packed and loud and I inhaled cigarette smoke at the bus stop and got a headache. And, since I'm now at a mixed school spots and my hair and clothes are becoming important and stressing me out, especially since I just got a bunch of spots from this time of the month right when school started. Everything just seems to be well timed to mess with me today I guess...

Unfortunately writing hasn't really helped me tonight but I might as well post this since its written. Maybe I'll be better tomorrow after some sleep and food. Hopefully I will be, I'm not particularly enjoying feeling like this.

excited

Don't judge me, but I'm excited for the first day of school tomorrow. It's still pretty warm at quarter to 11 at night and I can't sleep, well the heat and because I'm jittery and nervous and excited about school tomorrow, therefore, what better way to dispel these feelings and welcome sleep than to share it with the Internet and my few readers?

I had a 2 hour induction at my new school today and I was really nervous the night before that because I thought that I would meet all of my new classmates and have to make friends but end up making everyone hate me with my sarcastic comments. I tend to come off rude and big headed if people don't realise I'm being sarcastic so I probably don't give the best first impressions. So I got there and saw way too many girls for an all boys secondary school with a mixed sixth form and turns out that it was only e external students for the induction and I'd see the rest of the boys tomorrow. This reassured me a little. The teacher who gave me my information pack told me that everyone had to try to talk to three new people so that we would all try to socialise instead of stand about eyeing each other awkwardly. I'd arrived a few minutes late so most people were there and I walked around, away from the teachers to find people to talk to. I went to two boys talking and they pretty much ignored me which wasn't great but luckily another boy who'd just finished his conversation came over and introduced himself, completing his three. We talked and he was a nice friendly guy who I can see myself becoming good friends with. I said about my miserable failure to compete the challenge and he pointed out two girls who just happened to be walking past, one who is in my form coincidentally. We chatted then got called into a welcome talk from the head, head of sixth form etc.

Then we were split off into our tutor groups and taken on a tour of the school. To my disappointment there were only two boys in the group and eight girls including me. Luckily there will be the other half of the form tomorrow all of which will be boys which is brilliant. I know how I am coming off especially moving from an all girls school after 5 years to an all boys mixed sixth form but I'm not that desperate, I swear. So I was the second person out the door in our group and the first was the better looking of the two boys, I tried to strike up conversation but he replied then walked over to the other boy. Rude. Our group ended up split into pairs and I was with the girl I'd spoken to earlier. She strikes me as the quiet type and I'm not sure she really understood my sarcasm when I made a joke about our awkward year 13 tour guide so I talked a lot less than I usually would if I were around someone I was comfortable with. We went to form and met our tutor, he talked about a few things then answered questions we have before taking us back to the sixth form common area. We went to the wrong bit but the headmaster found us and took us outside to the picnic benches laid out with nice snack food. I went to a table with cookies and 3 other girls from my form joined us. It turned out that I'd somehow gotten into the 'Asian' group. We talked and ate and a few other girls joined us. One girl was really confident and talked a lot, a bit like me when I'm comfortable around people and know them a bit. I saw my year 6 friend and the guy who'd spoken to me earlier walk past and said hi. After a little while I got bored and went to talk to the boys before we were taken to a talk at the library. When it finished I walked out en realised I had to go back in to find the head of year 12 so she could take me to change my options, walking out was a big mistake as there was a very large flow of people trying to leave to go home. I got in to find a small group of boys standing around and the teacher I was looking for was busy talking so I lingered outside. One of the boys started talking to me and I'd met him at the social evening back in April since he was my year 6 friend's friend from the same school. Pretty soon the rest of the group introduced themselves and instead of saying 'nice to meet you' or some other peasantry I kept respecting my name. I'm not sure why since I wasn't even nervous. This was the group of boarders at the school, which is why they weren't trying to leave. I'd met another at the social evening since he was also from my old school and I can see myself becoming good friend with them since they are all nice and friendly and male, obviously. 

Nobody really wanted that much detail but I'm tired and accidentally went into storybook mode. I never even explained that I'm excited to meet all the new people and see if I can make friends with anyone or reconnect with my other year 6 friend who moved to this school when I moved to my all girls. The other friend stayed at the school we were at which had a primary school, secondary and sixth form. Plus, maybe I'll spot a few hot guys since they were few and far between today (this is one of my hobbies).

I promise I am not boy crazy after 5 years of being at an all girls, I just like to make not funny jokes and mean about 30% of this.