Bring on Spring!

 Spring is here, and thank god for that - I need some sunshine!

I like winter better than summer... physically.  I do not enjoy being hot at all and prefer to sit inside on a rainy day and craft than be out in the hot sun in summer. 

Mentally though, is a much different story.  Winter has never been good for my mental health.  I have got through most of winter unscathed by not seeing much sunshine and getting enough Vitamin D, but the last couple of weeks the doldrums have set in.

There's a lot going on and I just feel physically not great and mentally drained.  I tried to go shopping with my boy yesterday and didn't even pull into a parking spot before turning around and going back home.  The thought of going into the shopping centre and having to deal with people was just too overwhelming.

My partner has a few issues going on with his ex-wife that are tough to deal with and one of my best friend's is having some issues in her relationship.  I'm trying not to take these issues on as my own and trying to just be there for both of them when they need to talk, but of course some of it will creep in.

I think I'm also stressing about going to my home town for my Mum's 80th.  

I realised recently that it's not that I don't want to see my Mum, it's that my Dad is not there that I find hard to cope with.  

He passed the year before Covid hit and so I didn't have much opportunity to get back there to see Mum over the next few years because of restrictions.  I have increasingly found it hard to go back and I always put it down to the relationship my Mum and I have - she knows how to push my buttons.  I would prefer to stay with my sister than my Mum. It has recently hit me that the main reason I don't want to go is because I hate walking into my Mum's house and not seeing my Dad sitting in his chair.  I miss him so very much.

So, we are staying in one of the B and B cottages instead.  Mum seems quite happy with this, I was worried she would be upset we weren't staying with her.

Wow! I didn't actually know I was going to write that (from Mum's 80th part).  I knew something was bothering me, other than what is happening around me in other's lives, but I didn't know what it was until I started typing that. I have tears streaming down my face but I'm actually feeling much better.  

This has happened to me a lot over my life. I will be feeling off and out of sorts but don't really know why, and the obvious things are not it.  Then something will happen and the pin will drop and I work it out and can work through it then and start to talk about it and work through it.  

Of course, it's harder when there really is no reason, it's just part of having depression and anxiety.  I'm glad I jumped on here to type and get it all out.  I never really know what is going to come out when I start to type, it really is great therapy.

Thanks for listening!

HUGS xxx