Something I love to do

This week, for SYL12, it was time to Catch my breath. I took it as a chance to sit back and reflect on the first 4 weeks and on me as a person. I thought about what made me smile and what I loved and this is the post that came from it....








One of the things I love to do is write. I really love it. It is something I have always enjoyed doing. I've never been much of a diary writer however and this makes me sad now. If I had written more as a teenager, I think I would have a real understanding of it by now. I assume it would come more naturally to me. This is the piece of writing that has lead to this blog post today. It was a simple Facebook status that has made me laugh every time I have reread it. 



"just had a very cute little old lady at my front door. All I could understand was Italiano and lost :/ this was going to be difficult! She spotted a lady across the road and toddled off to ask her. Now there were 3 of us and only 1 who spoke Italian and she didn't speak English! Luckily the second old lady thought the man in the next flat, who spoke Croatian, might speak Italian so she went to wake him up.


At this point I'm across the road and see a naked Jack letting a bottom half naked Hannah out the front door!!! So I run back home and put them inside!! Run back and find out that Ivan (Croation man) does in fact speak Italian and has figured out where the little old lady lives and is going to take her home.


Phew!!! I knew there was a reason I had a can of Mother for breakfast!!!!!!"




Since starting to write a blog, I've discovered a love for my own writing. Not just the actual process but the end result. I can make myself laugh, I can immerse myself in my own story. Sometimes I am surprised that it was me who wrote the piece, whatever it may be. I'm no author but I love hearing my hubby say that he loves my writing and that he is blown away when he reads my blog or my wandering thoughts because he thinks it's so good.


During the week, I received a copy of "Sophie's Story" in a magazine. It was published in the Metabolic Dietary Disorders Association newsletter. It was quite amazing to read something I had written after it had been printed up and sent to a whole lot of other people. I'm so glad I got the opportunity to share her story and I really hope it helps other families.


Writing has given me strength and power. It has helped me climb out of my depression. Every now and again I slip back, like tonight, but writing helps get the jumbled thoughts and anxious feelings out of my head. It's almost like doing a jigsaw puzzle. Inside my head looks like the inside of the jigsaw box. Lots of different thoughts, many, on first inspection, seem almost identical but as you get closer you realise it's more complex than you thought. This is how I sort my puzzle.


Step one of doing a jigsaw for me has always been to sort the pieces in to 2 piles. One for edge pieces and one for non edge pieces. This is me considering what to write about. Some days this pops out of nowhere and I run with it. Other days, I don't even know what I want to type before my fingers start moving but I always end up with something to run with on those days as well. So the pieces are sorted, next we put the frame of the jigsaw together.


This part is my writing. It just ebbs and flows, my fingers fly over the keys so fast and my mind works even faster than my fingers. I say each word in my head as I type or write. I always have. I don't know if anyone else does this, I've always just assumed they did. In my head, I have a story tellers voice, I am the narrator. I love it, I get lost in it. Some days I don't want it to end.


The writing is done, the frame is constructed. Now we move on to the inner workings of the jigsaw. I read my writing. I do this as I go. Sometimes it's after a sentence, sometimes it flows along and I get half a page written and then go back over the whole thing. Sometimes I stop somewhere and go back to the start and read again, just to make sure that I have stayed on the track I planned to. Sometimes it hasn't stayed on track but I like the new direction better so I let it go on as it is.


Speaking of being on track, I've just realised that I wanted to write how and why my writing has helped me with my depression. My Psychologist (lets call her P, who talks so much more than I do! and I love her for it) asked me to write things down between sessions. Anything at all, notes, dot points, full life stories if I wanted to. At first I was sceptical, I wasn't sure if writing like that was for me, I also couldn't see how it could help very much. At the very next session I was amazed by what I saw. P sat and read through what I had written, I was so nervous. It was about 3 typed pages. I thought it was too much, I wasn't sure if it was the kind of thing she was after, I had told some secrets in there and knew there was no going back. What happened was nothing short of amazing. I realised that I didn't need to talk at all. P talked to me about the things I had written, showed me how to understand what was going on inside my head. Helped me figure out how to set the jigsaw out and start putting it together. I will be forever grateful to her for that.


The writing in the early days of those sessions was mostly negative. I found I wrote very easily when I was angry, upset or anxious. Words poured out all over my screen and they took the feelings in my chest with them. I realised that tapping on a keyboard was giving me the same release as hitting a punching bag. I was letting it all go and then I could read back over it later, often with the help of P, and sort out why these things were happening and what I could do about them.


Now my writing is mostly positive. I know it's because the feelings in my chest are positive more often. I have finally managed to sort the first part of the jigsaw in my head. So now, when I write, I start with the frame already done. It comes out of the box like that. So much easier!! I now enjoy reading what I write as well. I will keep the earlier stuff to remind me of how far I have come and how raw and real that pain was but I hope to never see and feel it again. I hope that this change, in thinking and in writing, is one that is here to stay. A permanent change towards a healthier, happier, simpler me