I frequently debate with myself about whether or not I want to keep this blog, it’s been 10 years since I’ve posted something, and honestly, it’s mostly because my musings about my mental health struggles nearly cost me a friendship at the time and I was too people-pleasey to realize the friendship was toxic. It feels ridiculous to say this now, because what kind of person abandons their friend when they’re struggling rather than try to help them? But I was dealing with self-esteem stuff, I was in my early 30s, and I have always had a hard time letting go of people. So, I didn’t see it for what it was and shrank myself to try to fit who they thought I should be. I think the situation hurt more because I was getting such positive reception from a few friends who were reading and commenting, and I felt like I was helping people feel more open about discussing mental health. I’ve only gotten fiercer about discussing mental health in person because I think it’s important. I guess it felt like a slap in the face and it was very painful at the time. To be honest, it would have been a blessing for me if I’d have just let the friendship fizzle and continued writing what I want because I spent too much time chasing that friendship and ultimately ended up resenting it for multiple reasons and letting it go anyway. I guess these are the lessons you learn through your 30s. I got tired of feeling like I had to twist myself to be the right kind of person for them to want to be friends with. It feels gross to say this, but I think a lot of it was that they reminded me of an estranged parent and I think I latched onto them a bit too hard because of that. I will say that I did end up gaining positive things from the situation, so it wasn’t all bad. I’m at a point in my life where I’m done letting toxic friendships hang on for too long. There are very few people I’d reach out to and ask why they’re not really talking to me anymore, because most people that I put energy into wouldn’t just stop speaking to me over some perceived shortcoming of mine. Just know if you’ve stopped reaching out to me or disconnected yourself from me, and you chose not to talk to me about it and just fade away, that’s on you and I’m done being the one to reach out to make things “right” or whatever.

Anyway, if you’re reading this, you probably already know me, but a whole lot has happened since I last wrote here. Of course, a lot happens in one year, let alone ten. I now have a teenager (yikes) and a very precocious 6 year old who somehow looks even more like my clone than my older kiddo did. I’ve gained and lost friends. I’ve gone on life-changing vacations. We adopted an elder corgi who only lasted a year and a half in our care, but we gave him a good life. I lost my soul dog at 13 1/2 years, and after almost 2 years of missing him, we got a new corgi babe. While she can be very challenging, she’s a wonderful addition to our little family. We had many ups and downs during elementary school for Lukas, Kindergarten was absolute hell. I will say our pandemic school experience was actually really good compared to a lot of people and his teacher that year became our friend. Our older kiddo did wonderfully with online school, but he also had a very tech literate teacher which helped. Most of middle school was rough on him, but he found his footing in 8th grade and it seems that high school (he’s a freshman, eek!) has been great for him, he loves marching band and is bonding with a friend over classic literature. The job I worked at during the pandemic changed their policy only a year after the worst of it when things were still bad, so I left there for a fully remote job based in NYC and that has been an amazing move. I am working on the exact tech stack that I enjoy, doing really cool new things, and everyone on my team is incredibly smart. Meeting up together once a year in NYC is also a lot of fun. I started playing my flute again in a community band, and had the amazing opportunity last year to play a concert at the DSO Orchestra Hall in Detroit. The feeling of playing on that stage is just honestly indescribable. I started playing piano again and bought myself a new, much nicer, electric piano. I still knit and I’ve picked up crochet. I’ve picked up and put down art, mostly drawing. I started learning ukulele, but there are only so many hours in a day. We went back to Bellaire again a couple years ago and would love to go back again. I’ve hiked mountains in Colorado, driven to upstate NY twice for family reunions, visited NYC enough times for work now that I feel comfortable there, reconnected with part of my family that I thought I’d never see again, lost both parents and an uncle to cancers, gained some new besties, did aerial silks for a few years, and done a whole lot of growing emotionally. I’m probably missing stuff, but you get it. A lot.

I’m not really sure where I’m going with this, I might not even publish it. I am pretty confident that no one reads blogs anymore, at least not blogs that aren’t for recipes or some niche hobby. Social media basically accomplishes sort of what I’m doing here, I suppose, but also not really, and there are a multitude of things grabbing everyone’s attention now, much more than a decade ago. If I’m being honest, I’m not doing this for anyone but me, although it’s cool if anyone else is reading. I’m really beginning to feel like even though that’s where everyone still is who I want to keep up with, social media has been twisted and a lot of people are leaving it. Maybe this is my way of still being able to share on my own terms. Maybe no one will see this, and maybe I need to be ok with that. A lot of people don’t share a ton about their lives with anyone, but I guess I’ve become accustomed to keeping up with people. When I originally had the thought of backing off on social media, I got contact info for quite a few people, and there are only so many hours in a day. I think everyone realized this and either didn’t care what connections they held onto or just kept using social media to try to keep up with people, which is what I did. I do use it a lot less, though, and that’s helped. I could stand to do better, but, baby steps. I started writing this post a year ago and while a ton has happened in that year, most things still held true. I might be back again soon, maybe not. I’m not counting on anyone noticing either way, and that’s ok.