There's Been A Change In Me, A Kind Of Moving On

It's more sad if it's blue, right?
[Source-Open Clip Art Library]

A year ago on Monday was the worst day of my life thus far. Sounds melodramatic but it's true really-my world as I had known it for 3 years and approx. 27 days ended and I experienced all kinds of hurting that I'd never known before. I've always had a strange affinity for 'dates that things happened on' and I can remember the days significant life events occurred on for a very long time-the "anniversary" (for want of a better word) of the day my last relationship ended being no exception. I'd actually expected to feel a bit down in the dumps with the memory of that horrendous day hanging over me, but actually everything was fine-good in fact. I can't say I wouldn't have been miserable if I were on my own doing nothing, but I wasn't, so it wasn't an issue at all. In fact, I didn't really think too much about it, except when I was mentioning it to my friends, and it didn't make me sad one little bit-which is excellent. One of my mates commented that it feels like its gone by really quickly but for me the 22nd April 2012 seems an age ago-I was someone else then and I can tell there have been changes in me between then and now. And mostly, it's been a pretty good year-I've learned a lot in it and I'm pretty certain I'm over that relationship now. It definitely doesn't have a hold over me any more and that's brilliant.

It's weird to think that the last time I spent a full year totally single was in 2004, and now it's 2013. I'm nowhere near the same person I was then, and boy am I glad I'm not still the angsty teenager desperate to have a boyfriend any more, because really-who wants to deal with that?!? Now I know myself better and love myself more, I know what's in my heart and how my head works and I reckon I'm a better person in a myriad of ways. I'm repeatedly astonishing myself by the things that I'm learning about myself that teenage me would never have believed-that I don't need to be in a relationship to be perfectly happy and content, that I don't need someone else to complete me, that life is perfectly fulfilling on its own without someone to share everything with. That I am no less amazing just because there isn't someone who believes that besides myself, and that I don't need someone to tell me that I'm beautiful to make me feel it.

I feel it's been a necessary year too. I don't think I could have even contemplated starting a new relationship for much of it because I was too hung up on the effects of the old one-that's been a much more recent development. This past year has been enough to allow me to grieve, to heal, to grow and to move on and close the book on that chapter of my life. It happened, it was good, now it's done with and a new one is unfolding in front of me full of unknowns and intrigue. Now I feel I'm ready to be in a relationship again, should the chance cross my path, although there's nothing on the immediate horizon and I'm OK with that too. Sure, there are definitely parts of my brain and heart that keep telling me how much I need a boyfriend NOW, but they're much less insistent than they were when I was a desperate-to-be-loved teenager, and I can happily ignore them most of the time.

So there we go. I survived my first year ever (basically) of singledom, of not having a boyfriend, not being in love, not having sex or someone to share all the minutiae of my life with, no snuggles, no cuddles, no kisses. I'm proud of myself. It might not seem like a big achievement but for me it is-I'm the girl who stayed with my first boyfriend 18 months longer than I really should have done because I was terrified of being single and didn't know how to be just myself again as opposed to half of a couple. I'm a girl who really likes being in love and all the crap that comes with it. I'm the girl who falls for people stupidly quickly and incredibly obviously so all the world will know.
But as I said, I've grown up and learnt a lot in these 365 days. Yes, it really hurt sometimes, and it took me to some dark and lonely places, but I'm glad it happened. Here's a toast to the 22nd April 2012, and the fact it doesn't have a hold over me any more.

It's just another date.

-Jenni-


Title of post taken from 'Change in Me-Beauty and the Beast'

Dream What You Want To Dream...

I feel I should issue a trigger warning here for mentions of human dissection and associated events. If you're squeamish or disapproving of this then you might want to skip this post, or at least the big paragraph in the middle of it.

My Mum gave me this picture for a birthday a long time ago and it's hung on the wall in my bedroom ever since. Right now, I don't think I'm very good at doing what it says, and I kind of feel like my life may be slipping through my fingers somewhat, and I really should make more of an effort to grab a hold and start doing something with it.

Yesterdays NaBloPoMo prompt was "What is getting in the way of you reaching for your dreams?" and I can honestly say that right now the answer is 'not having any dreams' because I have no idea what I want to do with my life at the moment. It's hard to chase your dreams and try and catch them when you have no idea what you actually want them to be.

It's weird because for years I knew what I wanted to do-since 14 I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my life and how I was going to achieve it, right through until my 2nd year of uni when I was 20 when the whole idea got turned on its head. I wanted to be a forensic pathologist-the people who do autopsies on bodies for cases involving suspicious deaths, and I knew I needed to go to med school to do this. I actually got in to med school at my beloved Sheffield but didn't get the required grades in my chemistry A-Level. Had a bit of a cry about this on results day but then shrugged it off-I'd just do a science degree first, then medicine as a post grad. Simple. So that's what I did, I shipped myself off to do my Biomedical Science degree with all my ambitions still intact (Put it this way, about 50% of the people on my course wanted to go on to be Dentists or Medics, so it was a very good plan!). Then my second year of uni rolled around and several things happened to halt my ambitions in its tracks. Firstly, David Cameron and Nick Clegg came along and decided to up the tuition fees for universities to £9Grand a year, meaning I couldn't really afford med school at all. Secondly I realised that I probably wasn't going to get the high 2.1/1st that med school requires. Thirdly, and I feel this is fairly important, I realised that I was absolutely pants at anatomy. Don't get me wrong, I loved it, and I recognise I was really lucky to be able to do human dissection on a Biomed course and it was really interesting. But I'm pants at it. Give me a list of bones or muscles to remember (or a big chunk of text, or a script etc) and I could do it easily, reel them off and sound like a true professional. The trouble is knowing the names is no help to you if you can't work out which one is which when faced with a picture of a partially dissected arm (NB: I have developed a dislike for the forearm because it has an unnecessary amount of muscles in it for such a small area, all of which have very similar names.) or a torso with the skin removed. All the colour-in-anatomy books didn't help me because everything inside your body is all basically beige-with the exception of your gall bladder which is violently green-and so I didn't do very well in any of our anatomy exams. This culmination of events finally taught me once and for all that I wasn't cut out to be a pathologist, as I wouldn't really be very good at it at all. And actually I was fine with it, mostly, although obviously felt more than a little lost-the thing I had been aiming at for 6 years of my life had just been lifted out of my fingertips and placed firmly out of my grasp forever.

But then this kind of apathy set in. I wasn't really connecting with my course, wasn't pushing myself to do better, wasn't really enjoying it any more. I had personal problems which didn't help, but I didn't really do myself any favours when it came to third year because I guess I wasn't really sure what I was doing it for any longer. I had no purpose, no direction, no goal to get to in ten years time. I got my degree but I know I could have done better if I had tried a little harder (and hadn't got dumped at the end of the Easter holidays, but that's another story...) but I just didn't have the inclination to.

I'm still the same way now. I graduated in July last year and since then I've done...nothing. Don't get me wrong, I've had some amazing times in the interim, done some awesome stuff, but I'm still living like a student and not doing anything with my life. I still don't know what I want to do for a career, I'm flirting with various ideas but I've not committed to any of them in any way. I don't have a job or an ambition or drive to do anything and I need to change this.

I'm writing this post to remind myself that I am the only person who can help myself. I am the only one who can dream those dreams and go where I want to go. That it's time to get serious and start trying to live like a proper adult rather than a bum who wears pyjamas more than actual clothes. That I may not know what I want to do yet, but I have to do something because I can't live in my childhood bedroom with no money forever. That I need to take a hold of myself and give myself a good kick up the arse to do something. I'm 22, this is the time of my life, the time I should be making myself and discovering myself and seeing the world through un-blinkered, open eyes, not shutting myself away in my bedroom and not doing a thing with it.

So yeah. Right now I don't have any dreams, or aspirations. But for Gods' sake Jenni, get out there and turn over every stone until you find a new dream to alight its flame in your heart. You're never going to find it staring at your computer screen. Do something, be someone, before you're old and riddled with regrets.

So Long 2012!

Source

Now I honestly can say that 2012 has not been my greatest year ever. The highs have been amazing but fleeting and some of the lows have been so low I almost thought I'd never escape them. I'm already looking forward to next year because as long as all my family members stay as healthy as they are currently *touch wood*, it has got to turn out better than this one overall.
2012 was the year I got my heart well and truly broken when I got dumped in April, which didn't help me with what was left of my studies and generally made life a bit unbearable for a while. To compound matters my ex (who was still a good friend of mine) and another close mate got together and decided that I no longer fitted into their perfect lives any more and just cut me out of them, leaving me with a bit of a hole where I had previously had friends who cared about me. Judging by the endless stream of Facebook updates they are clearly happy together and any feelings I may have on the subject don't matter one jot to either of them.
2012 was the year that I had to move out of my beloved city and away from a lot of my close friends and the support network I had been relying upon to help me get back to myself. I've spent some of my loneliest days this year just sitting in my old childhood bedroom in my pyjamas with no-one to talk to and no money to do anything really missing having friends close by, if only for a hug. I was unemployed for some months and found out just how dull that is and how hopeless you start to feel about everything very quickly. I've left all my social activities behind in Sheffield too, and some times I didn't have anything to get dressed and leave the house for for an entire week, which isn't a fun realisation. In 2012 my birthday was terrible AND I was ill on Christmas day-basically all of the holiday periods have had a downer put on them some way or another.
But. Things seem to be on the  up again. I'm over the break up and actually almost starting to enjoy being a single person with no-one else to answer to, and being free to do anything. I'm employed, albeit only until the 19th of January, but I love my job and it gets me out of the house and socialising with people that aren't my parents which is something that I really needed. I'm not making a fortune but I am so much happier than I was in October, and it gives me the freedom to travel to Sheffield to see friends when I want to. My childhood bedroom is getting a much needed influx of new furniture and I might even slap a lick of paint on the walls too.
In 2013 I hope to get a "proper job", move out of my parent's house and into a space of my own and get my life safely back on the road to adulthood. I want to get back on stage and sing and do all the things I love again. Maybe even find a new boyfriend but for once it's not something I'm giving a high priority to. I'm going to have a kick ass awesome birthday to make up for this year's massive flop. I'm deleting the ex and the ex-best friend from Facebook because I'm drawing a line under the whole thing and moving on, rather than wasting my thoughts on them any longer. I'm pinning my hopes on you, 2013, don't you let me down.

But it definitely hasn't been all doom and gloom this year-I've laughed as much as I've cried probably. I played my favourite character ever in a show and got to stand in the middle of the curtain call for the first time. I travelled around the country and did some awesome things whilst I was working for my Student's Union. I graduated from university, surrounded by the friends who had done it all with me and though I was sad to be leaving, the day itself was awesome. I went to Rome with my besty and didn't melt despite the scorching heat, and laughed myself silly in the process. I went to the Edinburgh festival with some amazing people and performed a sell out show and had a really really good time. I've visited people around the country, seen shows and gigs and comedians and made enough good memories to tell me that this year was definitely not all bad. Not even half bad, really.

So I'll raise a glass to 2012, and cross my fingers to make a wish at midnight, surrounded by people that I love and who make me laugh enough to forget my cares about everything.
Hope your 2012 has been good, but hope your 2013 is even better.

Happy New Year!

-Jenni-