But seriously though, how is it almost July?!

Every once in a while, the urge to write comes over me. It happened about ten minutes ago and now, here I am. Sometimes the itch comes at a moment when I am in no position to scratch it but this time nothing was standing in my way. Doing things I want to do with my time rather than filling it with jobs I feel I should be doing is still a reasonably new thing to me but it's a skill I want to continue to hone. 

It's a sunny Wednesday evening towards the end of June 2021. To say a lot has changed since I last published an update in February would be a wild understatement. The pandemic that we're still living through means things can change drastically in a week and also stay frozen a certain way for months. I realise how utterly nonsensical that sounds but I'm hoping that anyone who reads this will understand exactly what I mean. 

Back in February I wrote about BoJo's 'roadmap to freedom'. Remarkably, we hit all the milestones he outlined back then with the exception of the final stage. Monday just gone was supposed to be the end to all social distancing measures and a return to almost normality. As it stands at the moment, that magical day has been pushed back to July 19 but I won't hold my breath. Best to assume that absolutely everything that spills forth from the mouth of The Lyin' King is bollocks until proven otherwise. 

For me personally, there's not much I want to do that I'm not able to under the current restrictions. I can go for dinner (went last Sunday with little sis and her fella - lovely stuff), go on a proper date that isn't a walk round a friggin country park (did that the Sunday before - even lovelier stuff) and I can go to the cinema. Needless to say, I've done the latter A LOT since May 17 when cinemas reopened their doors to the world. The only frustration about Freedom Day being postponed is the endless rescheduling of mine and Eva's various theatre trips. Our tickets to see Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella will be changed again and I think it'll be the third, if not the fourth, time. We'll get to Belleville eventually! 

The biggest change in my own life since the start of this year is my employer. On May 28, after three years and three months of clocking in (pretty much always late!) to the Primark Distribution Centre in Islip, I clocked out for the final time. Even though it was my decision to go and I was excited about the job I had lined up to go to, it was still a wrench to say goodbye. The woman I was when I started there back in February 2018 bares almost no resemblance to the one who walked out last month. I try not to spend too much time looking back these days as I've wasted so much of my life living through the same things (both good and bad) too many times but it's astounding to me how different I am now to how I was then. 

During my time working there I moved out of the house I shared with Pete and the children, I went through Dialectal Behavioural Therapy and moved home officially four times but that's not counting the three month stint in 2018 when I was 'of no fixed abode'. I had two car crashes mere months apart - both times writing the car off in the process and went through a compensation claim. I've been on ten first dates, been ghosted a few times and twice found myself in a Foster Girlfriend situation. I've been so skint that family members and even old family friends who aren't related to me at all, had to bail me out. I've had my card declined when food shopping and even had parcels from the Food Bank. I've gained and lost weight and gained it again. I've cut short then grown my hair. I've been a runner but I'm not one right now. I could go on but I won't! Best to sum it up in three words: 

So. Much. Change. 

I'm almost three weeks in to my new job and I'm enjoying it immensely. It's another administrative role but this time in the office of a local school. I'm excited to learn and expand my skill set over the coming weeks and months. . Everyone has been so welcoming and I already feel like part of the team. 

So where do I find myself right now? I'm sitting at the table in my kitchen, listening to some easy pop station on my Echo Dot. The back door is open and there's washing on the line. The dishes are done. In a little while, I'll get changed and go to my final beginner's weight lifting class. Oh yes, I am a lady who lifts now! I signed up for a six week course in January... and started it in May when the restrictions allowed us to be in the gym. Tonight is 6/6 but I will absolutely be going back for more. I love the idea of being strong. If I am also toned with a magnificent bottom, well that's a bonus but strength at my core feels more important to me these days. 

My love life is still reliably farcical. Remember the Foster Girlfriend situations I mentioned earlier? I'm embarrassed to admit that I went back to the second offender recently after managing to cut him out of my life completely. It's good to know that even though I have grown and changed so much, I can still be relied upon to make twatty decisions when it comes to men! I was actually already sort of seeing someone when he somehow managed to slither back in to my life. I ended things with the guy I met on Facebook Dating after the snake encouraged me to "recognise my worth". He told me I was worth so much more than FB Dating guy was able and or, willing to give me so I brought it gently to a close. I then proceeded to disregard my worth and dignity entirely by pursuing a man who had previously treated me fairly shoddily. Guess what kids? He did it again! Shocker. But hey, lesson learned for reals this time. He's been deleted and blocked which is the modern equivalent of throwing a drink in his face in a crowded pub. The second option would be more fun but deleting and blocking will have to suffice. 

Off the back of that little soap opera storyline, I re-joined Tinder. I dated someone I met on there for three months last year and even though he ended it, we stayed friends. The app may have a bad reputation but I know plenty of people who found the real deal on there, my big sister and her husband to be included. I got a few matches, started a few chats and then very swiftly moved to Whatsapp (not a euphemism) with one chap. We've seen each other four times in eight days and I'm well on my way to being smitten. Alas, I don't believe it will go anywhere but I'm trying just to enjoy it for what it is. I hope I'm wrong of course and that I look back on this very post ten years from now when we're still together and affectionately mock pessimistic Kati of June 2021 but...

It's taken me until very recently to make my peace with being single. I no longer loathe my own company as I once did. Tonight is a classic example. I got in from work, put a wash on, went for a lie down (I'm working on becoming a semi-professional napper!), got back up, hung the washing out, prepped dinner, washed up... Admittedly that's some fairly boring adulting shiz but I did the tasks without the panicky sensation that used to fill me when I was alone. Back in the day, time to myself was a source of distress, I'd want to relax and do nothing but I was too edgy to unwind so I'd do chores while feeling resentful that I wasn't 'allowed' time off. Such a weirdly unhealthy cycle to be caught in. Now I get shit done and then I chill the fuck out. Sometimes, if I'm feeling tired and a bit overwhelmed, I'll ignore the jobs and just chill out. Eventually I'll feel better and the jobs will get done. I'm the only adult in this house. I don't have to answer to anyone! I want to leave the dishes to pile up? I can. Nap after work when the children are with their dad? Aye, go on then. 

Rolling in to the second half of 2021 and almost 18 months in to bizarre universe of masks and vaccines and twice weekly Lateral Flow Tests, I'm feeling positive about the future. I'm looking forward to a summer off work, dog-sitting for some of my favourites and getting back to running. Okay, I'm not actually looking forward to that last one but I'll do it because it's good for my noggin and it helps to offset my penchant for chocolate. It's all about balance, right? 

Blue Skies

It's been a funny old week. With everything going on in the world right now and over the last twelve months, that simple opening sentence could mean a plethora of things. In truth, I'm not even sure myself exactly how I mean it. The week has definitely been both a mixed bag AND an emotional rollercoaster... A mixed rollercoaster bag if you will but I wouldn't if I were you. 

Monday saw me re-open my kitchen classroom to my one, somewhat unenthusiastic pupil. I braced myself for a difficult day with Hal after the half term break, thinking it would take him a day or so to get back in to the swing of things. It went better than I expected and then came the news that our home schooling adventure/ nightmare was coming to an end! Yes, Boris Johnson, who one Twitter user described as a "barely sentient haystack", took to our screens and set out his "roadmap" to our freedom. Stage 1 sees all children in England returning to school from Monday 8 March. More on BJ's magical plan later...

On Tuesday, buoyed by the news that my time as a teacher was coming to an end and by Hal's lack of whingeing on Monday, I entered the classroom (kitchen) with a spring in my step. My darling second born promptly took the jam right out of my doughnut by being an absolute toad. Thanks, son! On both Tuesday and Wednesday we had tears, shouting and tantrums... and no, it wasn't just from him. I lost my temper, so frustrated was I by the fact that I KNOW he can do the work he just wouldn't bloody do it! 

You'd think that knowing we only have a week or so left of this crazy set up would make it easier on Hal and I but it turns out, it's had the opposite effect! We're both just so fed up of the situation and so desperate for it to be over. I cannot wait to go back to being "just" Hal's mam and not his teacher. In fairness, Hal's actual teacher (big up, Miss Douglas) has been a rock star! It makes such a difference having his teacher 'live' on Teams every day and she's done an amazing job of engaging with the children through a screen. Even just supporting Hal has taken it out of me but Miss Douglas has never let her energy drop. I now have even more respect for teachers having had one in my kitchen virtually since early January. 

I'm happy to report that yesterday Hal was slightly less of a pain in the arse and today, clearly chockful of Friday feeling, he was a delight. Today he did three star challenges in both his English and his Maths when the highest I've ever got out of him previously was the two star! We're done for the day now which means I've got five more days to go and then I can (hopefully) close down the kitchen classroom for good. 

So what else did The Eton Mess have for us on Monday? Well, by the end of March, we can hang out with another household in their garden. Friends will be able to sit on a bench outdoors and have a coffee together without having to pretend that they're exercising. In all honesty, a lot of the early restriction easing feels in a bit pointless as it's officially permitting stuff that so many people are already doing! I've gone for walks with friends (only one at a time, mind you) where we've both carried hot drinks with us as we walked and we maybe sat on a bench (with a gap between us) to enjoy the scenery. The problem is that even though we are in another proper government ordered lockdown, nothing has ever felt as restrictive or as official as the one that ran from March through to summer last year. 

In Stage 2 of Boris' plan, commencing no earlier than April 12, non-essential retail will start to re-open. This means once again that there will be huge queues to get in to Primark and social media posts and tabloid newspaper articles shaming people for queuing to get in to Primark. This could also signal an end to my furlough if I haven't already been summoned back by then. This stage also sees hair salons reopening and people being able to wave goodbye once more to their 'lockdown hair do.' For me, I'm more excited about being able to get my eyebrows threaded again as there is a part of me that genuinely worries my brows could stage a coup and take over my entire face. 

Around mid-May providing we've all been behaving ourselves then cinemas and indoor hospitality can return. Eva and I have tickets for two separate events in London in May, a week apart. Both have been rescheduled previously and alas, I think will be moved again. Even though, in theory, theatres and venues could be operational by May 17, one of our events in May 15 and the other is May 22. If all my planned events from last year roll over in to next, I'm going to be flat out in 2022! 

The big focus is on June 21 when Boris tells us, all social distancing measures could be scrapped and nightclubs can re-open. Social media is awash with folks planning to go absolutely nuts when this happens, raving until dawn even if they haven't put so much as a toe through the door of a club in more than a decade. Being cooped up for so long has done strange things to us all, I guess. 

While I am of course giddy at the prospect of going out for dinner with friends or sitting in a darkened cinema once again, I hope that I don't lose my appreciation for the little things that have sustained me and kept me sane over the past few months. With nothing much to get excited about recently, I found that the arrival and subsequent wearing of some new slippers I'd ordered brought me a disproportionate amount of joy. I really focused on how they felt on my feet and on how much more content I felt generally now that my little trotters were warm and cosy. Yesterday in Tesco, I purchased a new mug - a lovely, big, rounded green mug with a K on it. Today I've sat on my wonderfully comfy bed, felt the warmth from the sun streaming in through my bedroom window and enjoyed the pleasant sensation of the mug in my hands. Lockdown has helped me be more mindful and really tune in to the tiniest details of my day and really delight in them. I hope that's something I manage to retain when the world opens up and our lives become busier and noisier once more. 

The Covid vaccine roll out program seems to be the only thing BoJo and co have got right in this whole pandemic nightmare. The plan is for every adult to have had at least their first dose by July. If the numbers keep falling and if the vaccine keeps rolling and if the general public keep behaving, we might see something that resembles normal life by summertime. A whole lot of 'ifs' and 'buts' and variables to factor in but Spring is around the corner and with her, she brings hope. 

Strange Days

By some miracle, I have found myself able and willing to write something so here I am.

It is almost 7pm on Tuesday 19th January. Ordinarily there would be spellings to practice, homework to complete and baths to be had before bedtime. Presently, my children are lying on their bedroom floor enjoying a game of Roblox with two of Eva's friends also playing with them online. While I will still make sure they get a decent night's sleep, there isn't the same urgency there would usually be. Tomorrow morning they will not go to school and I will not go to work. 

England is currently in the midst of its third national lockdown since March of last year. While nothing since has felt quite as rigid as the original, we are still very much being encouraged to "stay home, control the virus and protect the NHS." Schools were open for one day this year and then BoJo the Clown decided to close them again. School days for my children presently take place in the bedroom (Eva) and at the kitchen table (Hal). Both have live lessons from their teachers over Microsoft Teams. It is odd and alien and stressful but it is also just how things are. Thankfully (?) I am furloughed once again so I am able to oversee and support the home schooling. Eva, God love her, just gets on with it. Her BFF Tallulah is on a WhatsApp video chat that lasts the entire length of their school day and between them, they get their work done. Hal is a different kettle of fish, requiring constant supervision. My second born falls squarely in to the "bright but lazy" category. He understands the work he just doesn't want to actually do it! Ask him to pick up a pencil and write something and you'd think I was asking him to spend a day down the mines. It is challenging and I am not the most patient teacher. 

As with the first lockdown, I find myself enjoying the slower pace. As I said earlier, the pace is not quite as slow as it was first time around with more shops being allowed to remain open for 'click and collect' orders but there is no need for me personally to be rushing around. As the government guidelines state "essential journeys only" I have not ventured far at all this year. No dashing off to Mawsley for a shift behind the bar, no early morning drive to Northampton on a Saturday for Hal's trampolining lessons and no legging it to the clocking in machine inside Primark Islip so I don't get another (alas, deserved) bollocking for my time-keeping. I am operating at a slower speed once again and I'm finding more and more that I'm happier taking my time. 

Watching TV just before I made the decision to put fingers to keyboard and write this, I caught a bit of the news. An older lady had written a poem from her intensive care bed and she attempted to read it aloud for the news crew who were filming on the ward. It wasn't the oxygen mask that hindered her, but her emotions. As she described the "angels with tired eyes" who had worked so hard to save her life, she was overcome. Sat on my sofa, I found myself crying too. It's the first time I can actually remember being brought to tears by the whole situation. I have felt angry, frustrated, sad, trapped, overwhelmed but I can't think of another time when I just put my head in my hands and wept. 

I suppose most of us try not to let the news, the stats and the data drag us too far down. We live in a time of 24 hour news cycles, constant updates and briefings. Even if you take a break from the actual news and scroll through social media, you're still getting a version of events there. Admittedly a lot of what you'll see shared will be opinions and NOT facts but again, it's hard not to let it all bring you down. I keep up to date with the news throughout the day but endeavour not to get sucked too far in for fear that I'll never be able to claw my way back out. 

Just now, that news item punched me right in the feels because I saw a woman in a hospital gown, wearing an oxygen mask telling her story. All those stats and figures, the death tolls we hear... They're people. Real, actual people. This particular lady looked to be on the mend but what about all the other nanas, aunties, uncles, fathers, sons and friends who didn't survive? Jesus. It's just so utterly and incomprehensibly shit. 

For now, I've managed to pull myself together. It would not do to give in to that sadness. I'm no use to my children or to myself if I'm balled up on my bed weeping for every life this bastard virus has taken. My heart goes out to every family grieving and I can't even articulate my respect for the NHS staff - from the surgeons and consultants, right through to the porters and cleaners - who have worked insane hours for almost 12 months. All I can do is play my part by following the rules that are in place to protect us and cling to the hope that one day this will all be over. 

In early March of last year I wrote a blog post as I sat in a trampoline park at Rushden Lakes where I'd taken Hal and his friend, Theo to burn off some energy. I wrote with some incredulity about Italy being in lockdown and the Premier League being suspended. I had no idea about what was about to unfold, no clue that our lives were about to change so drastically and for so long. I also mentioned the continued outrageous behaviour of 'Toddler-in-Chief' Donald Trump. As I write this, Trump's final day in office is coming to an end. Tomorrow Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46th President of the United States with Kamala Harris as his VP. The pair have a mountain to climb and it won't magically make everything better in the US when they take over but by God, it will be a relief to know that a deranged egomaniac no longer has access to nuclear codes. 

I feel better for having cleared my head, transferring the contents on to here. Whether it's of any interest to anyone else or not remains to be seen. I blog because I enjoy it and it helps me. I review films from my car because talking about films brings me joy. I will continue to do both throughout 2021. I'll even try to make the blog updates more regular if only because I find it fascinating to look back and see how far I've come and how much I've changed. 

To anyone reading this, I hope you are well and safe. I hope you are wearing a mask when you're out and about and that you're washing your hands regularly. I hope you're being kind and respectful of others... unless they're anti-maskers or anti-vaxxers or both! In that case, kick them in the shins and run away. I mean, don't do that obviously. You can't kick anyone in the shins while maintaining a distance of two meters anyway and that's definitely more important. Stay safe, stay home. Be excellent to each other. One day, in the not too distant future the world will start to turn again. We'll go to gigs and to the theatre. We'll go for dinner with friends and family. We'll drink in beer gardens, watching the Euros and hug everyone when England get through at least the first few rounds. 

"It'll all be alright in the end and if it's not alright, it's not the end." 

Flitty Brain Days

I sat down in front of my laptop over an hour ago with the intention of tapping out a blog post. The urge to write has been upon me for a few weeks now but I kept allowing things to get in the way. I can ignore the feeling for so long but it lingers, like a faint itch from an old nettle sting until I finally make the time to sit down and scratch it, as it were.

In the past few weeks I've been drafting a post in my head about still living the lockdown life and about how well suited I feel I'll be to retirement when it comes about thirty years from now. On other days, I've pondered my new found acceptance of my curvier shape and I thought about writing a post explaining how this feels. Whatever the specific topic, I knew I had something I needed to say and put out in to the world.

This morning after dropping the children off at school (they're back two days a week now until the end of the school year), I headed home with the intention of sitting down to play at being a blogger. I had my breakfast, my second cuppa of the day and I was all set to go.

Ninety minutes later... I've made two false starts at a post, made notes on the characters for my novel,
Googled 'creative writing courses' and looked up YouTube videos on 'How to write fiction'. The videos I found where all roughly 15 minutes long and I decided I couldn't be arsed to sit through them. I've also opened a new Word document to start writing the aforementioned debut novel and have looked on Amazon for books on writing.

In short, I have procrastinated like an absolute boss and achieved next to nothing. Wandering in to the kitchen just now for a drink of water, I found my washing machine had finished its cycle. In truth, I didn't remember putting it on until I saw it, patiently waiting to be emptied. I'll need to get that on the line but Alexa says there's a 51% chance of rain so now I find myself in a quandary.

Sigh.

Sometimes my brain is just a bit twatty. It's like it's channel hopping or scrolling mindlessly through Facebook, focusing on nothing. The word I want to use to describe it is 'flitty'. Use it in a sentence, Kati... "Today I need to lower my expectations about what I can achieve because my brain is being a bit flitty" and by that I mean it won't settle on one thing and seems to be endlessly flitting from one thing to the next.

It's amazing really to be able to see how far I've come in the two and a half years since my diagnosis. In an ideal world, I wouldn't get 'flitty brain days' but the next best thing if I can't banish them forever is to be able to acknowledge that I'm having one and accept that I may not be particularly productive today. As I'm still furloughed from work this doesn't really present too much of a problem. If my brain (and to a lesser extent, my body) are telling me that they're not up for much today then I shall respect that as to try and go against it would only lead to stress and misery... No thanks!

I really have become more attuned to what it is I need during this time off that I've been given. I want to say that there's a quiet that's come over me but as I write this I can hear what's either a lawnmower or a hedge trimmer going full throttle just outside my flat. I may not have external peace right in this moment but internally I am more centred and peaceful than I have been in a long time.

Of course when we return to real/ normal life (whatever that may look like post-coronavirus) I won't necessarily be able to give myself the day off to just watch films because my stupid brain won't let me do much else. I'm already thinking of strategies on how I can handle flitty brain days when I am at work. The most obvious is to make a list of the essential tasks I must complete that day and allow all else to fall away. In all honesty, that's not a bad idea for work in general. My approach to my working day can be somewhat scattershot and I know I'd benefit from more structure and focus. On the days when I really can't get my brain to play ball, and Lord knows I will definitely have those days in future, then I'll make sure I have simple tasks like filing and general tidying to keep me occupied and calm.

While I endeavour not to let my mental health problems interfere with work and how I do my job, it's no a secret that I don't always feel tip top in the noggin department. If I need to go and do deep breathing for ten minutes or just need a day on menial stuff so I can feel up to tackling the bigger jobs, then I'll approach my bosses and ask for that. Honesty and transparency at all times, I say. I don't want to play the crazy card too often but some  days I genuinely need to.

The other thing I did earlier when I was dancing around writing but not actually getting any done, was fish out a gift I was given for my birthday in 2018. It's a book called '642 things to write about' and it is, as the name suggests, a book filled with prompts to get you thinking and of course, writing. To date, I have not written a single word in it but I intend to change that. Surely I can find the time to complete a few exercises each week? It certainly won't hinder my quest to finally writing my first novel. I do wonder if I'm actually disciplined and indeed talented enough to write a whole book but when I look at the progress I've made personally in the last few years and the highs and lows that I've survived, anything seems possible. Maybe I'll be an author yet!

This is not the blog post that I expected to write this morning but here we are. I've learned that trying to force my writing, my children, my emotions and so on in one particular direction will almost always lead to them going the opposite way. I wanted to write something today and I have. That's an achievement so I'll give myself a cheeky high five once I hit the publish button. For the record, I won't actually high five myself... I mean, I'm weird but I'm not quite that weird.

Finding Peace in Chaos

It's almost half past two on a Tuesday afternoon. Ordinarily I would be sat at my desk in the Hub office in the middle of the million square foot Primark warehouse where I work but instead I'm sat at home in my flat, laptop on the dining table, pretending that blogging is my actual job... that's the dream, after all. Oh to be paid just to write and talk about things I'm interested in and passionate about! I'm not off work because I'm ill or because I booked a day's annual leave; I'm home because I'm currently furloughed. I walked out of the Primark Distribution Centre in Islip on Friday 10th April and I haven't set foot in there since. At the earliest, I'll be back to work on Monday 1st June but even that isn't set in stone. 

In my last post, once I was done explaining my year long absence from the blogosphere, I wrote about the pandemic sweeping the planet. I marvelled at the notion of entire countries like Italy being locked down, schools across the world being closed and the Premier League being on hold. I started that blog on Saturday 14th March while sat in a trampoline park I'd taken my son and his best mate to. I finished it off and hit 'publish' on Wednesday 18th March. The UK went in to lockdown five days later. 

This is my second attempt at blogging during this strange and, to use the current buzz word, 'unprecedented' time but I found myself spewing terrifying facts, figures and death tolls the last time I tried to write. It's not that the reality and severity of the situation evades me... I get it, it's utterly shit and incomprehensibly scary but I wanted to focus more on my own personal experience of this time. Typical Borderline, eh? Always makes it about herself! 

The thing is, I could tell you how many people in the UK have died as a result of Covid-19. I could rant about the incompetence of the Tory government and the shocking lack of leadership shown by the PM. I could regale you with horror stories about how last Friday, morons marked the 75th anniversary of VE Day by doing (allegedly socially distanced) conga lines in the streets but when I look back on this time, I actually want to remember how I felt and the changes I've made as a result of suddenly having time to spare. 

Back in the early part of 2020, my life felt like an unstoppable hamster wheel. I worked two jobs (roughly 40-50 hours a week) while sharing custody of my two children with their dad. I got a Thursday evening to myself which I almost always spent at the cinema and the rest of the week was all go! I saw no realistic way of stopping that hamster wheel from spinning. I wanted to make positive changes like improving my self-care routines... or y'know, actually establishing some self-care processes in the first place but there just never seemed to be time. It felt like I literally never stopped and on the rare occasion when I perhaps did have time to myself, I'd panic about making the most of it and then faff it all away, achieving nothing. 

For as long as I can remember, I have utterly sucked at switching off. It's just not in my programming. Many moons ago when Pete and I were still together, he'd go out every Wednesday for Boy's Night. Once the children were in bed, this was my evening at home to do my own thing. I hated those nights, not because I missed Pete and wanted him home but because I was incapable of allowing myself time to relax. I'd fidget, half doing jobs, maybe doing some Slimming World admin but never fully just chilling out. I never really felt like I was allowed to do nothing, it felt selfish and indulgent. I've come to understand quite recently that this is tied in to the diagnosis I was given in early 2018 after my breakdown at the end of the previous year.

A few months back, I came across a TV presenter and actor on Twitter called Joe Tracini. Joe is the son of the comedian Joe Pasquale and he's very open about the fact that he has a Borderline Personality Disorder. When Joe talks about his illness, he describes it as having an arsehole living in his brain, telling him to kill himself. As a fellow sufferer of BPD I too have an arsehole living in my brain. Thankfully (I guess!) my BPD doesn't tell me to kill myself... never has in fact, and it doesn't tell me to harm myself either but what it does say is that I am unworthy of love. I think one of the reasons I struggled so hard to be by myself was because I found my own company pretty much intolerable. I have great friends and family who love me dearly and they have proved time and time again over the past four and half years or so that they are there for me. I only need to look at the times myself and my children have been fed at friend's houses, or look round my flat at all the furniture that was gifted to me when I first got my own place in late 2018 and the proof is there that I matter. I know I am loved and yet, when a monster whispers in your ear all day long that you are a burden on those around you and that no one will ever truly love you, it is hard to ignore. Only now am I starting to fight back and learn ways of quietening that monster's voice.

The thing is, BPD can't be cured. It can only be managed and understood. Back in April 2018 I was waiting for a place to open up on the therapy course I needed to do and I was struggling to cope. My medication was increased to 150mg of Sertraline a day and it was supposed to be a temporary measure but I never felt ready to face life with less medication in my system. Just before the lockdown happened I saw a GP and we discussed how to get me down to 100mg daily. I did that and now I'm easing myself on to a daily dose of 50mg. Part of me can't imagine ever being free of medication but I can see progress and that's not nothing. 

In the weeks since I stopped working, I have had plenty of time to think and to make those improvements that I talked about earlier. Much has been written in the press and on social media about how we could or should be spending our lockdown. On the one hand, some articles urge us to make the most of the time we've been given to learn a new skill, perhaps a new language or embrace exercise and while there's no harm in suggesting this, it can make those who are struggling just to function in this crazy time feel like they are failing when they absolutely are not! In the opposite camp, we're being encouraged to do absolutely sod all and not feel guilty about it. Everyone is coping (or not) in different ways. 

Over the past week or so I appear to have transformed in to a 'Lockdown Weightloss Wanker' as I described myself in an Instagram post last night. I started the Couch to 5k program on the first Monday morning I didn't have to go to work and yesterday I did my first run in Week 5 of the plan. From last Monday I decided to finally get a grip on my eating habits after weeks (and let's be honest here, months and years) of emotional eating and rampant sugar addiction. Where the focus and determination to do these activities has come from, I'm not entirely sure but I am enjoying it. In truth, I feel calmer and more at peace than I have in years. I can't even remember a time when I last felt this comfortable in my own skin or in my own company. 

The funny thing is... when I look at my naked body in the mirror, I don't hate what I see. My body carried my babies, it's an amazing machine. Even though I'm almost three stone heavier than my old Slimming World target weight, my new diet and exercise regime is about wanting to fuel and strengthen my body and has very little to do with what the scales say or what size my clothes are. Do I want to lose a couple of stone? Absolutely. Do I think I am a more valuable or attractive person when I weigh less? Hell no. I just want to be fitter and healthier because eating like a toddler at a buffet table and not moving my arse isn't good for my head. 

Please let me be clear: some elements of this experience - predominantly but not limited to, the parts where I have attempted to home school my somewhat reluctant children - have been horrendous. One Saturday afternoon a few weeks back, everything went to shit. All three of us were tired, fed up and short tempered. Voices were raised, doors were slammed... I ended up crying in a cupboard, while Eva wept on the hall floor and Hal cried in the big bed. Not a high point. I can't even blame school work for that particular familial meltdown as it happened at a weekend. Sometimes we just get a bit sick of the sight of each other. I am no teacher and quite frankly, my children don't want me to be. I am their mummy (or Mamoo as they call me) and they want me to look after them and make them laugh and find things that they've lost that are almost always IN FRONT OF THEIR EFFING FACE... but they don't want me teaching them. It's a tricky one. Again, you get both arguments presented on the socials: "Children need to be educated! Full lesson timetable or they'll be total thickos who will fail at life!" versus the "Just love them, read with them and protect their mental wellbeing" brigade. I'm bobbing about somewhere in the middle, doing the best I can and that's okay.

I've come to realise in the past few weeks that I am so much stronger than I give myself credit for. I've worked my arse off for the past few years since Pete and I split to keep a roof over my head and to keep my children with me. I am so grateful to all those who have helped me out, propped me up and kept me going. My family and friends think I'm worthy of time and attention so maybe it's okay to be a little bit kinder to myself than I have been in the past. While it's such a scary and tragic reason that I've suddenly found myself in a situation where I can focus on me, I feel proud that in this time like we've never known before, I'm finally learning how to just be. The hamster wheel has finally stopped and for the first time in years, I have caught my breath. I will still have meltdowns, bad days, tears and total parenting fails but I am determined to hang on to this feeling of not actually thinking I'm a total waste of organs. Maybe one day someone might even fall in love with me! Imagine that,eh? 

Apocalypse, anyone?

It’s been a while… and by ‘a while’ I mean an entire frigging year. I’d love to tell you that it’s been a quiet twelve months and I haven’t blogged because I haven’t had anything to say but if you know me at all or you’ve read at least two of my blog posts, you’ll know that there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell, that that’s true. Sadly, I am still a Grade A drama magnet.

One of the reasons why I stopped blogging is because early last year I set up a YouTube channel. My original intention was to post film reviews on there and to begin with, that’s exactly what I did. And then I stopped. It was my film guru buddy, James King, who encouraged me to start again. I’d done a few reviews from my car and JK said he liked those ones best. The channel changed from ‘What Kati Saw’ to ‘Kati in a Car’ and it went from just being film reviews to being anything I wanted to talk about: mental health, parenthood, money, dating. I have a grand total of 88 subscribers so I’m hardly setting the YouTube world alight, but I enjoy it. Having said that, I realised the other day that I missed writing so here I am.

It’s difficult to know where to start after taking such a significant break from blogging. I have personal stuff to talk about as you’d expect after so long but globally there’s quite a lot going on too. We’re only three months in to 2020 but so far, it’s felt rather… how can I put this…? Apocalyptic?! 

Trump continues his terrifying reign as Toddler‐in‐Chief, picking fights with the world and ignoring any and all problems facing his country and its people. The UK was battered by back to back storms in the first two months of the year and the countryside was plagued by gangs of rogue trampolines roaming the land. And now, right now, we’re in the midst of a global pandemic. Even writing that is so surreal but it’s true.

COVID‐19, a type of Coronavirus, started in China and spread with alarming speed through the country in the weeks that followed. To begin with, it was something happening ‘over there’ and I paid it little attention, but it wasn’t long before it was over here too. At the time of writing we have over 1000 known cases in the UK (with the real number estimated somewhere around 5000) and 70+ people have died as a result of the virus.

Italy (as in the entire country) is on lock-down. The Premier League is suspended. Disney is closed. Oh and the good people of the world have decided that the best way to protect themselves from Coronavirus and survive the impending apocalypse is to stockpile pasta and toilet roll. Not only that, but ordinary folks are stealing hand sanitiser dispensers from the walls of hospitals and health care facilities. I. Shit. You. Not.

My hope is that when I read this back in the future, all of this will have blown over and I’ll laugh at how bonkers the world was for a few months in early 2020. Of course, we could be living in some sort of Mad Max style wasteland by then. Good Lord… I do hope not.

My private life is far less dramatic by comparison, but I’ve certainly had some battles of my own to fight. Last November I moved from my shoe box flat in Kettering town centre to… a better designed but smaller shoe box flat on the Ise Lodge. My new gaff is managed by Stonewater and is classed as Social Housing. I first applied for a ‘council house’ in February 2018 and it took until October 2019 for me to get one. It took some hard work (painting, cleaning etc) but it’s actually pretty sweet now. Being a 30 second drive from the children’s father is very handy and it feels nice to be back on an estate that I know well. Of course, it’s far too small for a grown woman and two children of 11 and 7 years old but whaddya gonna do? I must do a year living there and prove myself to be a reliable tenant then hopefully, Stonewater will offer me something bigger. I have moments when the lack of space frustrates me or I feel like I’m failing the children but then I remember that I’m doing the best I can and that we won’t be there forever. It’s warm and cosy. We have pictures on the walls to make it feel more homely and when all three of us are wedged on the sofa watching Saturday Night Takeaway together, there’s nowhere I’d rather be.

My love life is as farcical as ever. After swearing I'd never go down the app route again after 2016's cat fishing disaster, I took the plunge last year and joined Bumble. After a few false starts (and a ghosting incident) I dated someone for a few months in the summer. It came to a natural conclusion and I think the fact that I wasn't devastated told me all I needed to know. I binned the apps again late last year and decided to take a break from looking. Within weeks of making that decision in late November, I found myself on a date with someone I'd known for more than a year. The date went swimmingly, and I felt a glimmer of hope that maybe I'd made a connection. We connected a lot over the following months [insert theatrical wink here] spending (naked, grown up) time together. I'd then try and make plans for a proper date at which point, he'd freak out and friend zone me. We did this dance all the way up to last week and now it's done for good. sigh. I think for me; the hardest part was the realisation that I'd been an almost identical situation in early 2018. I'd allowed a man, battered and bruised from his previous relationship coming to an end, to use me to rebuild his ego. Never again! ... Hopefully! I mean I thought that the last time and then I didn't even notice it happening again but I'm going to try really hard not to be a crutch for anyone. I am worth more and I need to keep reminding myself of that.  

2019 ended with me having not one but two car crashes. In total, since passing my test in May 2014 I have owned five cars including the one I have now. Three have them have been written off and one of them I only owned for a month. I feel compelled to point out that I am not a terrible driver! The death of my first ever car, Dax the Twingo, was entirely my fault and is detailed in an earlier blog post. In late September last year, a woman ran straight in to the back of me, writing off JoJo Clio. Her fault, not mine. Whiplash, ongoing personal injury claim. Insurance paid out and I found a car on Auto Trader. It was my first time buying a car without Pete's input and I could not have got it more wrong. I won't go in to the full saga but in short, I was sold a proper dodgy motor and ended up in a huge battle to get my money back. I eventually did but, in the meantime, my amazing friend Jo set up a crowdfunding thing through PayPal and Facebook and raised enough to buy me a car! Crazy, right?! The car I bought with that money was another black Clio and I named her JoJo 2.0. Fifty days after purchase, I hit black ice on my way to work and hit a tree. Bye bye JoJo 2.0. Fifty fucking days. The gap between car crashes was eighty-one days. A week or so later, I bought a Citroen C1 from a friend. Picked it up on a Sunday... the clutch went on the Wednesday. You couldn’t make this up, could you?! Clutch got fixed and so far, my 2020 has been free of car drama. Long may it remain so! 

It's taken me from Saturday morning until Wednesday to finish this post. In that time, there are been significant increase in cases of COVID-19 worldwide. The death toll in the UK is rising. Most of mainland Europe have closed their schools... as it stands here, right now, our schools remain open. Theatres and cinemas are closed. Euro 2020 will now be held in 2021. The world is weird right now. I may be back soon with another blog post or it may be another twelve months...! Who knows?! I’ll be honest, I’ve really enjoyed writing this so hopefully I’ll be able to keep it up. It declutters my mind and I feel that’s something that I may need to do more often as the year goes on.

Thanks for reading if you have. Stay safe out there. Wash your hands thoroughly. Oh, and stop buying all the fucking toilet paper!! 

All Change

Crumbs Chief, how the actual frig is it March already?

Once again I find myself astonished by something as simple and constant as the passage of time. March though, and mid-March at that.

It's a Tuesday evening and I'm sitting on a beanbag on my kitchen floor, laptop balanced on my knees. In the living space, Hal is in bed, just drifting off to sleep and Eva is plugged in to YouTube on the iPad. I decided against sitting in there to write this as I was worried my tappy-tapping on the keyboard would keep Hal awake. Unlikely, the boy sleeps like the dead.

To be completely honest, it's hard to know where to start as much has changed in the two and a bit months since I last shared my musings. As ever, I'll vibe it and see what happens. I'm sure I've got stuff to say but how interesting or articulate it ends up being remains to be seen.

In no particular order here are some of the headlines from Katisville...

My therapy ended at the beginning of February. Five months and three modules, done. It was a whole lot of thinking, reflecting, laughing and listening. As the end of the course approached I started to panic for two reasons...

1. I was scared to leave and if I'm honest, I didn't want to give up my Monday me-time, and

2. I didn't feel like I'd achieved anything. I didn't feel 'better'.

It was only when I went for my debrief the week after I finished and I talked through my feelings about the course with the wonderful facilitators that I realised just how much I had taken on board.

Just today, an incident at work triggered me. A colleague pulled me up on my tone and while he was entirely justified in doing so, I still found it difficult to take. My heart rate soared, I felt sick and I was on the verge of tears. I've cried in that warehouse more times than I care to remember but not today. I recognised that I'd been triggered and I dealt with it using some of the skills that I learned in therapy. I can catch myself now when I'm about to be overly dramatic, too loud or unnecessarily negative and I adjust my behaviour accordingly. Not every time, but a lot of the time and a year ago, I couldn't have done that.

In other news... my little flat has finally come together. Almost a year ago now, I packed up all the belongings I could fit in my little Clio and moved in to a friend's spare room. Over the next seven months I would live and stay in six different places. For the sake of the children, I made it in to an adventure... "Isn't it fun, house-sitting and staying somewhere different every week?" In truth, it was massively stressful. I am so grateful to the friends who had me to stay or loaned me their empty homes but in truth, I craved a home of my own. Even when I finally secured a place to live, I worried that I'd made a mistake, that the flat was too small. Admittedly, I didn't really have a choice but how could three of us manage to live in just three rooms?! I felt like I was letting the children down.

It took time but now, it works. Not only does it work, it's home. Almost every piece of furniture in this place was gifted to me: a bed from the Patricks and an extra bed from my big sister, a sofa from the Yorks, a TV from Sam, a wardrobe from Nora, a little dining table and chairs from my ex's family and a fridge from the Preedys. A family who come to the bar I work in gave me two IKEA units and a chest of drawers. They'd known me weeks at the time. The few things I did buy came from a British Heart Foundation furniture shop in town. Nothing matches but I don't care and neither do the children. It is our little refuge where we are safe, where we can be silly and loud and dance round in our pyjamas to songs played from our Echo Dot.

Last month I made the decision to treat myself to Odeon Limitless membership for the year. On the one hand I am perpetually skint and am working two jobs just to keep my head above water but on the other hand, I've never smoked and I barely drink so why can't I spend £17.99 a month on something I love? In the first month of my subscription, I saw ten films. That's roughly £120 worth of tickets or put another way, I paid £1.80 per film. I'm alright with that. I haven't spent this much time in a cinema screen in over a decade and it's reconnected me with a version of myself that I thought was gone for good. Over my five years working for the Odeon chain, I saw countless movies and quite often I went by myself. Now I'm doing that again and I love it. I've even set up a YouTube channel to post my reviews on. It's called What Kati Saw and it has 34 subscribers. Not 34, 000... just 34. But hey, it's a start and to be completely honest, I do it for me. I like talking about films and if people enjoy listening to me do that, marvellous.

While I might be a big fan of solo cinema vibing and I am most definitely more at ease in my own company than I used to be, I still get lonely. I've been single for about fifteen months now and I don't see my relationship status changing any time soon. People tell me it'll happen when I least expect it or when I stop looking for it. Maybe it will. I think I miss hugs the most. Proper solid man hugs. I miss the other stuff too of course but on the nights when the children aren't with me and I'm not working, I just miss having someone to be with and share things with. I miss someone having my back. I don't need a man but I'd definitely like one at some point. Form an orderly queue gentleman... I jest, of course. I'll take a disorderly queue!

Over all, I suppose the biggest change is the most difficult to articulate. It's me. Something has shifted ever so slightly. When I think back to the state I was in as 2017 drew to a close or just how mindbogglingly difficult almost all of 2018 was, I am aware that I have changed, that I am a different Kati to the Kati of last year. Am I cured? Absolutely not! I never will be and here's the kicker, I'm not sure I'd want to be. Having BPD is not always a bucket of chuckles but some of those traits are so inherent to my personality, I can't quite picture who I'd be without them. I'd be dull AF that's for sure and I am not willingly to be boring in exchange for a quieter mind. I will take the noise and the nonsense because as time goes on, I'm learning not to allow the more negative elements of my illness control me. As I said earlier on, my therapy has taught me techniques to keep the wilder side of me at bay.


Three months in and 2019 is already a shitload better than last year. May it continue to be so. It's rare I give myself props but I'm still standing and I'm pretty fucking proud of that. I might still be a bit crackers, I might live in a shoe box flat but I have a good job, my small humans think I'm the best and I am definitely far less twatty than I have been for years. Go me!