Am Not Coping

@Owlunar If I didn't have private cover it may have been a few months before I could have my stomach and bowel looked at - so just over 2 weeks is pretty soon. I still have to pay the excess but everything else is covered.

I was really touched by your words Dec. I find it so much easier to respond to other people than to 'talk' about myself. Being able to think and speak objectively in response to other's 'issues' also helps me to distract myself from my own head at times. I can't do that all the time - sometimes it is too hard and I find myself 'feeling' for other people and that in turn adds to my own 'sadness' but I do feel like I am getting much better at knowing when I need time to myself.

Your words do mean alot to me - whenever and whatever you post - they always have - and I feel very privileged that you think this about me - so thankyou so much for your lovely words

Hi @Zoe7

I find what you write to so many people wonderful too - and it really touches me at times that you can do this for so many people

Alas - there are many areas I don't understand - I imgaine that when some people are passing through a dark period in their lives - how ever long or short - they may not make themselves clear - but whatever - I do my best and I have learned that there are some situations I need to avoid - this has saddened me a great deal but it the long run we are all different and we need to think of self-care as well

About hospitals - I am glad you have private cover - I think you have IBS or Chrones - I am not sure what they can do about either of these - but whatever - it certainly needs to be investigated when it is causing you so much pain'

The public system is pathetic - yuk - I had full thickness tears in my right shoulder tendons - and my GP refered me to the public system straight away - my left shoulder is very fragile - but it took nearly a year before I saw the surgeon and he wanted me to wait another 3 months and so on etc - and I didn't like this man at all. We may not have our choice of surgeons in the public system but we can choose whether to have the operaton. Regardless - the shoulder healed enough not to require surgery before the three months was up and I can't help feeling disgusted that this took so long and does for so many people.

I have private cover now - the thing is to have the cover - and hope we never need it

I wish you the best with all of thiss - it must be really hard being alone with all of this - I know you prefer to be alone as do I but still - the days must be very long and ah dear me - the way we feel when we wake up and find it's another day with the same old same old

I am reminded a line from M*A*S*H when BJ wakes Hawkeye in the morning and sleepily Hawkeye says: "What Korea - the war still" -

I love that line - it fits some parts of life so well

I wish you the best day possible

Dec

I know you have been through some tough times on here lately @Owlunar and understand completely your need to 'pull back' for your own well-being. It is often a fine line between helping/supporting someone and doing the same for yourself. It is also a fine line between knowing what you are doing is needed for your own self-care and being aware that that action in itself will cause both you and other's feelings of sadness and stress. When it comes to determining the appropriate course of action in these situations it is ultimately about 'what is best for you at the time' and trying to lessen the impact on other's as far as you can. I think you do a fantastic job in doing all this and although 'fallout' is inevitable you handle it with grace and a high degree of dignity - and I applaud you whole-heartedly for that

Hi @Zoe7

Thanks so much for that - I handle the fallout with grace and a high degree of dignity - that is wonderful

Now it is less I am wondering if last weeks headaches and back pain were due to stress - I think so - sometimes caring for ourselves can be really hard but we do indeed have to take care of ourselves - lessons hard for women it seems -

One of my friends told me she has fibromyalgia - I was surprised but I found she struggles with inner demons and told me I have a voice - indeed I do but it took me a long time to find it

Society is so hard on women and it is a really hard glass ceiling - I have hit it hard through my own life insisting on having my own goals and at times needing to be focused on myself esp when it came to studies - and then work - I was told by so many from my mother to people who didn't matter that I needed to put my son first - but so much was unseen - he had my constant attention but I had everything I needed to have done when he was at school or in foster care or wherever life was at the time. It was so obvious that I was attending classes but not that I spent time with a really difficult child and as women we are somehow expected to get every right and to "have it all" and face the "baby trap" and care for our husbands as if they were children too

Enough of that - but I read so much about women feeling as if they are not worth anything and do not have the right to be happy - and I don't know about happy but I think women have the right to be ourselves

I have a mental image of the hunter gatherers and of course the women stayed around the cave to care for their children but - ouch - the man comes up to the fire with a dead animal and drops it on her clean floor - ever noticed that whenever something cleans the floor they own it? Anyway - he wants his dinner straight away and bother the children until he eats and he throws the bones all over the floor and goes to sleep after dinner snoring his head off and in the morning takes off again leaving the woman with his kids and his carcus to butcher and dress the hide and make him a new fur coat and she sweeps the floor and makes more dinner and the same old same old and we are still stuck today with that expectation of how women should be

Enough of this too - but it really does seem that through my reading women have carried society - and yet no one notices until they don't do it but rather do something interesting for themselves. Queen Victoria was a strong minded woman and seemed surprised that her 5 daughters had their own minds too and all of them became leaders in the world of women's rights and so we still continue

I wish for all the women I know that they could find that place in themselves to fulfil themselves and I often do wonder how I have come to find it - but I did. I have paid for it though

Thanks again Zoe - I like living alone - not many women seem happy to find themselves alone but I am

I found I have enough chicken left on my cook chook to have a chicken samidge for lunch - and it is sunny outside so I am going out there to eat it

You are a wonderful person

Dec

@Zoe7 .... something to keep you warm .... 🦋💐💕

You been listening to 'Butterfly' again @Faith-and-Hope It is a beautiful song - makes me think of you everytime I hear it It is very special

Love the rose and butterflies tattoo - actully thinking about getting another tattoo (of a butterfly of course but maybe on a deep pink rose )

Hi @Pepsimax trying to stay warm and feeling really sick again. My stomach pain has been quite severe on and off over the last few days and my 'situation' here has really affected me mentally as well as physically - so haven't been able to be on here much. I am doing what I can manage to just get through each day atm.

I hope you are still doing well