A New Devious Chapter

 My parents unfortunately, despite their ignorant claims, still aren't really taking things seriously with the pandemic that it still going on.  While I am keeping tabs on numbers, and trying to be careful as often as I can, it also means having to yell at my mom not to just behave as though life is normal. And I hope that recently, we got a scare that will make at least her be more responsible. Two days after the birthday weekend, we got a call from my brother.  He had found out that his boss's father, who just hangs out in the shop all the time, came in while exhibiting symptoms over the weekend, and discovered that he was covid positive.  My brother had gotten a test, and wouldn't know his own status for a few days.  Which meant we had to stay in, alert the other people who were here to do the same, and prepare for the possibility that we may have gotten covid. Luckily, my brother's test came back negative which meant that either we weren't exposed, or if he test

 January meant all the birthdays, and the end of the holidays here.  Being at the end of that chunk of time takes a good amount of weight off of me, because I no longer have to juggle anywhere near as much.  But while I was making sure every holiday happened as smoothly as possible with my mother forgetting everything constantly, my brother only made it to Channukah and his own birthday. So on Squishy's birthday, he was here and finally got handed his Christmas gifts, and everything from his stocking.  He was going through it, happy with all of it, until he pulled a chapstick out of the bag.  My mom had picked up a big pack of them, all different candy flavors, and so rather than dump a dozen chapsticks into Squishy's stocking, I divvied them out among everyone, making sure each stocking got a flavor that person would like.  As far as I was concerned, a lip balm is something everyone can use, especially through winter when everything dries out. And as he pulled out that Tootsie

 It's feels like everytime I look at Youtube, some other creator is pregnant or trying to get pregnant (while I'm here still hoping to not.) It doesn't really matter what genre they're in, so many of them are in various states of growing a human, and mentioning the things happening.  Among them, was one girl, in her early twenties, who tries to post a lot about body positivity, and everything with it.  And in one video, she mentioned that she has more stretch marks now, and that while she's working on it, she's finding it difficult to love her body while she's seeing them. It reminded me about how I felt during, and for the first few years after my pregnancy.  I hated seeing the stripes forming on my stomach, and then noticing them all over my body.  Where I had been making some progress with my dysmorphia, I had some of the worst body image issues I had ever had then, although I know it wasn't helped by any of the people in my life at that point.  I was

 In general, I've found myself not bothering with true hate.  I've gotten mature enough not to let things bother me that, both out of preservation for my mental health given what I deal with more days than not, and because the energy spent actively hating something could be far better spent elsewhere. After the attack on the capitol at the beginning of the month, I was angry and afraid, to the point where I felt exhausted.  I wanted to hug Lux, and keep him safe.  I wanted to have some sort of space in the middle of nowhere, so that I could keep him and Squishy (and of course Oliver) somewhere away from everything for a few days. I was worried, and still am, but I felt more for the people I care about. Then almost a week later, I was scrolling through the news, and saw a headline that a man from many of the photos had been identified.  A man that was wearing a shirt that said "Camp Auschwitz".  And in that moment, my only thought was that I hope he's caught, and I

 Most mornings, in those few minutes between my eyes opening and braving the world outside my blankets, I will spend that time grabbing my phone.  I tell Lux good morning, and then check Twitter the one time that I will scroll through for the day.  And one morning, I found a post that woke me up better than any coffee. It was talking about how people who are abusive typically don't benefit from therapy.  That if anything, it just gives them tools to try and learn to say the right things to justify their behavior, and behave worse. As soon as I read it, and started poking through the comments, I was reminded of my last visit with Kitty.  How he would try and justify all of his actions as being healthy and trying to help people, when they made no sense, or weren't consented to. Things like my bringing the switch, and both he and Pyre wanting to try the ring fit.  When they finally got to it the last day, he tried to blame me for his not getting to it, because he "never knew

 Often, the start of winter is referred to as "cuffing season".  I talked about it last winter as well.  That time of year when people start to feel the urge to find some manner of partner, whether short or long term, to have through the holiday season, and over the winter, when we have less time to go running about. And topped off with the pandemic, and being less able to meet new people to latch onto, it creates a temptation to go back to exes, old partners, or find infatuation with past crushes again. So even though I am barely on social media, and make it a point to not contact the people who I know won't be good for me in the long run, somehow they've been popping up.  More than one person who I know has had feels for me in the past has sent a random message, wanting to reconnect to whatever capacity. And in most of their cases, they either have a partner, or are very recently out of a relationship (nothing like a test of compatibility to actually have to spend t

 Over the past months, I've managed to stick to the things I've been doing to help take care of myself physically.   I've been working out almost every day, and while I notice the difference in how I feel if I don't, there isn't a feeling of guilt if I take a day to rest.  Likewise, I'm noticing progress in the things I am doing to exercise.  While I was using the ring fit every day, even though I was almost through my first run of new game+, I decided to start in on the new just dance, since we got it for Squishy.  I've since been working on some of the songs that have alternate versions to unlock, but will have the same goal of the last game to get the highest rank on every song, because it's very easy to see progress, and give myself something to figure out with small changing goals. At the same time, I've managed to also keep track of what I'm eating, and it's made at least for me, a noticeable difference.  My clothes are fitting differen