You will be joining me in my birthday celebrations. You have no choice about this. Friday night, which should be putting in an appearance later today, who will commence proceedings by allowing D and myself to go out to dinner, whereby I will drink a ridiculous amount of champagne. And possibly eat some ridiculously extravagant food.

And then, after a fraught but usual Saturday daytime, as you like to throw at me EVERY weekend, I will spend my time with you, Saturday Night, drinking an awful lot more and possibly wondering if I'm brave enough to eat haggis.

And then, Sunday, you and I will spend the day making sure I am not hungover, having made it to 31 years and never having had one. We shall indulge in chocolate, possibly some more alcohol, and much more food I suspect.

None of you will crap on me, and this rule has been passed a law.

You guys owe me.

Yours,

jay **kissies**

The bodies in question were Noah, Isaac and the cat.

Bet you can't guess who did what.

PS - Send chocolate.

I know many of them (now my very good friends) through different sources; lately it's mostly through twitter and blogging. I'm not even going to name them all, because with my superior skills, I'm likely to forget them all as soon as I'd start trying to remember.

But I think there are many out there who should understand the qualities in these people that make them fucking awesome. And one of the first things? That strikes a chord with me? Is that those people LISTEN. They HEAR me when I have something to say. They don't come and crap all over me with their own stuff, and completely disregard what the fuck I just said. They realise that the moment isn't about them, it's about ME. Because I happen to be the one talking about MY problems, and if you ask ME how I am, then I'm going to tell you.

Don't get me wrong. Of course I will listen to you if you want to talk to me. I will ALWAYS listen to you if you want to talk to me. But sometimes, it just doesn't hurt to return the favour. Shut the fuck up, and listen to what I'm saying. It's great that you have something to relate to me, that's fab. But it helps if you HEAR me.

Another thing that makes these people lovely? They appreciate who I am, without forcing me to be something/someone else. If I want to act slutty on twitter? Then I will do. If I want to be all soppy mother type in my blog? Then I will do. If I want to be all manic depressive (and I'm not saying I am manic depressive, but someone mentioned that's what I seem like at times, which is fine)? Then it's gonna fucking happen. And if I want to swear? A lot? And say things like cunting motherfucker? Or fucking cock sucker? And I don't care what you think. I'm going to say it.

I'm tired of being the chameleon to fit in with the right people. There are too many people out there who don't know who I actually am, because I spend all my time trying to please everyone. I've been described as a "social chameleon". And when I realised that's exactly what sort of person I am, it was a serious eye-opener as to why I often feel so shit. Why I don't know who the fuck I am.

Sure there are a lot of sides to me. But if you don't like them? Then you don't have to stick around. Go away. If you do stick around? Deal with it. If you don't approve? Fine. Hell, you're welcome to tell me. I'll listen. But what I choose to do with your assvice, is my decision.

I try not to ask a whole lot. But those are some things that are important to me. I recently did a "Friends" Cull and Lockdown on facebook. It was one of the most satisfying things I've done in a while. I got rid of people who just don't belong in my life. Who haven't got a fucking clue who I am. I put people on lockdown who I don't mind having around, but could do without feeling like I have to work that little bit harder and be someone who I don't want to be, to be their friend.

It sounds like I'm asking a lot. I appreciate that a person perhaps shouldn't have to have "criteria" to be a friend. But I'm sick of being shat on, and being nobody in particular. So I'm taking steps to be somebody. And I'll make as many changes as I need to.

Fuck.

Hence the straw.)

I've been pounding my website trying to get it to look like something that might be slightly worthwhile, in aid of YOR. I'm hoping to God that I haven't taken on too much, because now I'm at the point where the title of this post is disturbingly true. See, I should be working on the site now, but instead whenever I open Wordpress, I feel remaining brain matter seeping out of my Facial Orifices.

(Awesome segue)

And speaking of Facial Orifices, we're full on FOF here at Mocha Towers. So much frigging snot and phlegm everywhere it's actually quite disturbing. I wake up wondering if I'm really alive, and have not, in fact, drowned in it in my sleep. And even more lovely is that Noah likes to play with baby wipes, and also wipe his nose on them. So of course, I can't tell which ones he's used and which ones he's, uh, "used".

(Another awesome segue)

Which reminds me, Noah having ventured into the world of two year olds, seems to be fully indulging himself in discovering his rights (and wrongs) as a growing toddler. Unfortunately he appears to have turned into me; having become very strong willed (like, more than before) and taking any opportunity to yell the words "Gaga - OH!!" (Isaac - NO!), regardless of what Isaac is doing.

(Yes another segue. I'm on FIRE)

On the subject of Isaac, he seems to um, have learnt way too much for his own good. He's mastered the art of Crumple Faced Crying (forced tears and everything), and thoroughly enjoys ripping the lounge apart. I'd say it's good fun, but it's old now. Am bored. Isaac - NO!

Anyway, back to the original subject (no amazing segue, I'm spent); I'm enjoying the (few) pictures I'm taking, and still looking for more subjects. It's been so frustrating as I feel like I've got NOTHING. DONE. Like, nothing. I've barely taken anywhere near as many pictures as I'd like, instead deleting maybe a billion duplicates off the macbook (thus clearing up nearly 30gb of space. I suspect that says a lot about my life.) in order to add more, well, crap.

Anyhoo.

I'm still working on YOR, that much is true. I'm refusing to pay anyone to do the website for me (apart from initial startup help, like wtf is Wordpress, and also, wtf is Wordpress again) and I'll keep working at it until I get something I find reasonably presentable.

So maybe around the summer, when I've completely lost interest and am busy working on February, March and April's resolutions.

Many, MANY thanks go to a number of different people who have helped and supported me with my incredibly mundane shit lately.

Right?

Maybe if I could just become completely empty, like, have nothing of me left, then I can stop worrying. I can stop caring, which means I can stop hurting.

I remember this feeling well. It's such an effort to speak. To communicate. It's such an effort to lift my hands to type. To breathe. To listen.

I feel sick a lot. I suppose that's a good thing some would say. I don't know why. It hurts to breathe. I wish it wouldn't. I wish I could just not have to breathe. I remember that feeling. I remember feeling like I could just lie there and stop breathing. It was easy. I'd just stop. But then something in me (reflex? Maybe? I don't know) would force me to take another breath. And another.

I remember hating myself for that. Hating myself for not being able to make my body do what I wanted it to.

It hurts to breathe right now.

I feel sick. So sick. I don't know what to do. In my mind, the voice begs me not to go back on drugs. It tells me the counseling is useless. I agree. I say I want hypnotherapy. It says I'm too far gone for that. Like I'm supposedly in a place where no one can help me now.

Why is this happening again? Why am I slumping back into those periods of being out of it? Where I sit here with the boys around me, and drift off into some sort of weird trance where I have no clue what's going on? Will someone track me down and take away the boys if they read this blog? If they know where I am? Will they have them taken away from me?

I don't want to do this. At the same time, I don't want help. I want everyone to just leave me alone, so I can sleep. So I can sleep for a really long time and then maybe I won't have to talk to people. I can stop the fake smiles and give myself a break. I can just be nothing, nobody will ask any questions, no one will care where I am.

The fake smiles hurt now. I tweet; I text; I google wave; I google chat; it's all fake. With every single stupid smiley emoticon, I feel like some kind of fraud. Like I shouldn't even be allowed to converse with these people because why should they have to take on my crap?

My crap. There has been so much lately, it's been too much. It's now got to the point where the smallest most ridiculous things push me over the edge. There's too much going on and I can't cope. I want, I don't know. I want out. I want escape. I want a break. BUt I know I'll never get the kind of break I want. I don't know what kind of break I want.

I'm struggling with so many people at the moment. I hurt so much because of these people, and none of them get it. I've spent so much time holding my tongue, saying it's ok, that we all live and learn and if they ever bother me again I'll just use my ammunition but I never do. And now, with every day, with every thought, with every breath, I feel more destroyed. It's not like I blame everyone else for the things that are wrong with me; not at all. But I've been hurt. Yeah I said it. People have hurt me. So horribly. And lately I've started to retaliate. There are people who I hate with a seething passion, because of how they've hurt me. How they've helped me get into this incredibly fucked up state, and now I can't seem to get out, and they've fucked off completely, blissfully unaware of what they've done. I wonder whether they care. I don't think they care. How could they care?

That's my problem. I care. I wish I didn't care. Or at least, care so much. I wish I could take a step back and just not give a shit and let everyone deal with their own crap. I wish I could say, "yeah you think you've got it bad? You should hear MY crap! It's far more important."

But I'll never do that. I spend so much time listening to everyone else. That's not a bad thing, I think. But I suppose the problem now is that I'm not so great at seeing when someone else is actually GENUINELY interested in what I have to say. I sit there feeling like shit, with that plastic smiley emoticon on my face, pretending everything is ok, and inside I'm willing them, so desperately willing them to ask me the right questions and get this crap out of me. To ask me things like...like...fuck I don't even know.

I don't want to hear "do you want to talk about it?" because more often than not, I'm too exhausted to talk. I wouldn't know WHERE to start. Do I want to talk about it? Talk about WHAT? Which bit? And do you have all day? People ask if I'm ok. Of course I'm going to say "yes". I'm not going to say, "No mate, I feel like utter fucking shit, I blank out sometimes, have no idea what I'm doing, would like to sleep for a fucking long time. And by fucking long time, I'm talking MONTHS, if not years. So, how are you?"

For as long as I can remember, I've been an agony aunt. I don't mind that so much, but it goes both ways. And I can't deal if it just goes one way. And that's why I want to hide. Everyone is keen to tell me their story. Everyone is keen to talk over my story, which inevitably reverts back to their story.

I don't even know what my point is now. I have no point. There IS no point to this. To any of it. It's all a load of bollocks. My life is a load of bollocks, and there's been no point to any of it. I don't know anything. I don't know how to deal with this, I don't even know what the fuck there is to deal with, I don't even know what the fuck I'm going on about. I don't know what my problem is, I don't know how to ask others to help me, and when I do ask for help, I have no idea what the fuck they are supposed to do.

At the start of the year, everyone was saying what they were doing 10 years ago. I didn't. I purposely didn't. Because 10 years ago, everyone was wondering if I would live to see my 21st birthday. I'd attempted suicide several times already. I didn't want to draw attention, it wasn't a cry for help. I wanted to escape. And now, 10 years on, I find myself sitting here, older, slightly wiser maybe, thinking the same thing; I want to escape. I don't want to die; I couldn't do that to my family. I couldn't burden them with that. That very idea is just so wrong. Who would look after the kids? How could D work if there's no one to look after them?

But I still wonder to myself, it must be easier to cope without having my miserable state around, right? When shit happens, I bury it. People think I just want to deal with it on my own. So many people just assume I just get get on with it. That's what I try to do. That's what I must do, because no one can help me with this crap, for some reason. I want to ask for help. I DO ask for help. I WANT someone to help me, so badly. Sure I can talk about it. That's easy. I can talk it, I can blog it, hell I'll put it out here for all to see. I don't care. If anyone's truly interested, they'll read, or listen, tell me it's going to be ok. But no one can help me fix it. And I'm in too deep. And now I'm stuck behind this fucking fake smile.

And then comes the question that I dread so much; "Well what can I do?" I have no confidence in myself. The classical music industry has been such a blow to my system, with many of the people in it pretty much destroying any last shreds of confidence I had. I spend way too much time kidding myself, pretending to be something I'm not.

It's made even harder when you've spent your life, your soul, every inch and ounce of your fibre making something of yourself, only to have someone turn around and say "actually, you're pretty crap and you'd be much better doing something else". I wonder if it hurt more because I didn't want to do anything else; music was what I wanted to do. I wanted to (and very often, did) work harder than everyone else, to prove myself, to show that I could be as good as them.

At this moment in time, it feels like the most amazing waste of 24 years of my life.

I set standards high. Sky high. Often, so high, it's near impossible for me to reach them myself. This is just because of sheer determination, to show that I could be as good as the next person. But it's been wasted. And still here I am, setting high standards I can never reach.

I want to do so much. I want to show people who I am and what I can do. I want to be as amazing as the next person. I want to have a gift, a talent, and shine like no one else. Or at least, be recognised for what I'm doing. That doesn't happen in music anymore. That's been destroyed.

Maybe it's photography? I don't know. I love a lot of the pictures I take, but there's always someone who wants to come along and crap on the parade. That frustrates me so much. I'm trying so damn hard and trying to learn so much. I've had help from a few select people in terms of photography, and I'm loathe to bother people too much because I know they have their own lives to lead, without having to take my crap on too.

I'm slowly (so slowly) building my website and getting lots of help with it, and to those that have helped me, I can't thank you enough. You've been amazing. But I would hate to think it had all been in vain. I wonder where this photography thing is going to go. If anywhere at all. People keep saying "Come and do my pictures! I'd love you to do some pics for me!" which is really flattering. But that annoying voice...that voice that's plagued me for so many years since I was ill the first time, always destroys me.

I think I'm getting too big for my boots. I'm convinced there are a billion people out there who, in the words of a Fugee's song, "smile in my face then they talk behind my back". I hate this paranoia, it's destroying me, and it's all too reminiscent of being ill before.

I want my identity back. A lot of people have been posting about this lately, and sadly, it feels like everyone can even say what I want to say, better than I can.

So why do I have this horrible need to constantly compare myself with everyone else? Why do I not appreciate any of the things I can do? Why do I not know who I am? Why can I not be who I want to be? Why can't I just get on and do what I want to do?

And my only answer is a really sad one, but the only one that makes sense: it's because I became a mom. Mom's are always comparing themselves. My kid did this, did your kid do that, I do this with mine, I'd never do that with mine...

The things I loved to do don't happen any more. I haven't picked up my cello since last November. I may possibly have another concert this year, if they ask me to play, and if I'm in a position to do so. I haven't picked up any other instruments LONG before that. I love to take pictures, but whilst I think some are great (especially the unedited ones), inside I'm destroying myself about how crap they really are. Same old trite, someone else already did it.

I don't know who I am because I've never been a mom before, and I don't know who I am as a mom; after 2 years I'm still struggling to embrace it, and often make myself sick with sadness with the fact that I can't accept Noah and Isaac belong to me. I can't be who I want to be because even if I did know, I suspect it would be impossible right now. Or maybe ever. Because it's probably another goal that I've set too high.

I'm so lost and I don't know how to find myself. And I'm too scared to find myself because I'm terrified it's all going to crumble like my music did. I can't ever go through that again. I really can't. I can't trust the support of anyone because I'm convinced it's all lies. I don't know how to get help and support; I don't know how to fix any of this.

I'd just like a piece of me back. But I'm not sure if she's all gone forever.

Now, as someone who's taken, like, a cajillion pictures over the last year alone, this felt near impossible. But on reflection, there's one picture that stands out for me an awful lot (at this point it's one picture, I suspect by the time I get to the end there may be more).

A fantastic company by the name of Olli and Lime do some GORGEOUS baby bits 'n' pieces; bedding, bibs, towels - all those accessories that you wish were matching but had a nice bit of "sass" to them, rather than traditional stuff.

I LOVE their stuff.

So when I got a changing mat and towel for Isaac, I couldn't help but snap some pics. And I have to say, this picture ALWAYS makes me smile.

Isaac very rarely laughs out loud, especially hysterically, but on this picture (and all the other ones I took at the same time) he was laughing like a crazy wild child. I also love this picture because it was one of the first to really inspire me to take a change in my direction in life, very much for the better.

It was pic snapped in less than a heartbeat, and somehow has changed an awful lot of my life in the last few months.

And if I could cheat and upload SEVERAL favourite photos, then I'd REALLY cheat and choose a COLLECTION of photos of Noah, leading up to his first birthday, every one of which is a favourite (turn your speakers on)...

I won't talk much about it, because we'd all be here forever, but to the rescue, comes a semi-narrated photo essay of his day.

Enjoy. :o)

Wearing his damn awesome Thomas the Tank Engine pyjamas (and with what I think might be porridge smeared all over his eyebrows) he began opening presents.

See the cute? Yes.

And of course, he had to make random noises down the phone to Nana.

He ripped open cards with joy...

And enjoyed new toys with ridiculous excitement.

The next day the festivities continued, and he enjoyed birthday cake. And crazy faces blowing out the candles.

And he enjoyed eating it. Even though he'd maxed out on fruit and pushed a chunk of cake away (FUCK YEAH!!! That's my fruit and breadstick eating toddler).

I made the cake.

Of course I didn't fucking make the cake. Yes HI. Nana brought it round for us.

And no, Isaac didn't get any. I don't think he minded.

And in case you're wondering, he started here.

I'm working on this.

And then I need to do this, because of this.

Things are looking kinda good now.

You know what I suck at?

New Year Resolutions.

I just can't do them. If I'm lucky, I can last...hmmm...maybe 4 hours. 6 if it's a particularly good resolution. But most often? I've forgotten it (them) within minutes of thinking about it (them).

So I've been trawling through the masses of Revolutionary Resolutionary blogs, when suddenly, one blog I particularly enjoy came up with something that is indeed Revolutionary:

"Year of Resolutions"

That is to say, rather than coming up with a whole ton of crap on 1st Jan that you'll have forgotten by 2nd Jan that same year, you have a new resolution every month, to work through for that month. Make it a habit, for only a month, and after then, it should be automatic.

Right?

Right.

I LOVE this idea. And I'm really hoping Karl doesn't mind me jumping on board too. So I'm going to make a resolution, a new one, at the start of every month. I'll be intrigued to see if any of you do it too, and I'm sure Karl might appreciate your support.

My first resolution? Hmm.

I think it's going to be career related. I've been toying with photography for almost a year now, and my latest "serious" snaps have come out really well I think. And one thing I've become even more aware of is my growing disinterest in music.

So...*gulp*

Let's say this first month, I will make every effort to begin my photography business venture. If it doesn't work, then it doesn't work. But I'd like to be able to say that I made a fucking good start with it, and hope that it continues to go somewhere for the forseeable. I've already done three official shoots, and I'm potentially booked for another four, in the hope that I can continue to build up my portfolio.*

As you all know, I have very little faith in myself, so declaring this as official is quite fucking scary. But I think it's time to take some very fucking big steps. Away from music. And into something I enjoy. I have no idea what will happen, but we'd never know until I tried, right?

...right.

* A very small selection of photos are on my flickr page; if you have a flickr account I would love to hear from you

I thought of you. And you know what? It's our year now. You are so right. Spit-shine your boxing gloves and hoik up those sexy panties.

It's our turn. Bring it.