Welcome to my diary. Be warned that nothing here is accompanied by a trigger warning. It is the unfiltered talking space of someone who, in a word, "is fucked up". This isn't a happy or relaxing page! Proceed only if your curiosity outweighs any discomfort with dark topics.

⊳ Home
⊳ Archive

12.14.2022

Lyric of the Day: You have so much to do / And I have nothing ahead of me

...

So. First entry in my first-ever digital diary. Where to start?

Well, I'm not just starting this because basically everyone on Neocities has one of these diary or journal or blog-type pages. That's as good a place to start as any. Around 2 or 3 days ago, I played the free video game, Adventures with Anxiety by Nicky Case. It was a good game. Short. The way it personifies mental illness and strife, and encourages the player to work with it rather than against it, reminded me a lot of how Celeste treated the issue. And Celeste is super important to me because of how it treated that stuff. I decided to check out the resources linked at the end of the game, and I found out that apparently, journaling about your emotions has been shown to improve mental and physical (weird, right?) health. So... I decided I could give it a shot. It couldn't hurt. Although, I have to write about my emotions and try to understand them. Expressing emotions without cognitive sense-making doesn't seem to help much.

So, kinda like this:

"Today when (event), I felt (feeling) because it seemed to fulfill/challenge my need for (need). Next time, I'll try (experiments around that need)."

This isn't my first time attempting to keep a diary, mind... When I was really little, I used to keep diaries all the time. But I don't think I ever kept up with one for more than a month, before starting over in a new diary. Before, around the time I was 13, I eventually just decided I wasn't 'suited' to keep a diary and gave up altogether on it. I've always liked the idea of keeping a diary, but I've never been able to quite do it.

So... What makes me think I can do it now? Well, for one, my ADHD is medicated now. And that's only sort of a joke. For another... I don't have much to do nowadays, anyway. I'm in college, sure, but, for the most part, I'm just online. Like, all of the time. I also just like writing a lot more than I did back then. On top of all that, the diaries back then were physical. Which matters a lot more than you might think. See, I hold pencils in a really fucked up way, and it makes my hand and fingers hurt real bad if I write a lot at once. Sometimes to the point of making myself bleed. So, a digital diary is sort of ideal.

So, why make it public? Well, to be honest, I'm not completely married to the idea of making it public yet. Might fuck around and add a password to this page eventually. I don't want everyone to know that I'm not actually that good of a person, after all... But, hey, I figured that if I could customize and personalize how my diary looks, then I'd be more motivated to write.

Also, nobody cares (but it's MY diary page and I get to talk about the shit nobody but I care about!), but these pages were stylized to be reminiscent of the diary I kept as Travis Phelps. (Or "journal", as I called it back then.) It had this sort of velvety-purple outside, and I would tape pictures and stuff to the inside of it. I commissioned my tumblr mutual to draw me writing in it for this page; you can see that up in the corner, there. I really like that art. (Who knew that if I wanted art of me that looked similar to how I looked in my canon, I could just commission it? Crazy.)

Something that hasn't changed since I first tried to keep a diary, though, is that I still, uh, don't do shit. I mean, I'm going to college right now. (Well, not 'right now'. I'm on winter break.) (Well, not technically on winter break, either. I was just lucky that all of my classes had their final class last week, so I'm essentially getting an extra week now, before it officially starts.) But that doesn't take up nearly as much time as elementary through high school did, thank God. And, for the rest of my time, I'm just sort of... Online. Drawing. Coding, sometimes... Writing. So... Don't expect any cool life story stuff about going interesting places or meeting interesting people. Prepare to see more stuff along the lines of... I dunno, bitching about people who annoy me on Twitter or whatever.

I'm probably not selling this page very well. Good. Go look at the rest of my site; I promise, the rest of it is much more interesting, and, like I said, I'm gonna expose how shitty of a person I am in here, so.

Hmm, what else...?

That 'lyric of the day' thing is just for me. (Well, all of this is just for me, but still.) I dunno, I figured that, if I'm gonna have music stuck in my head 24/7, I might-as-well do something with it.

I think that's about all for introductions.

So! What did I do today?

Not much. (You'll be hearing that a lot.) My latest samefood lately has been pasta and butter, but I had a conversation about how many carbs I eat with my mom recently. So, instead of eating that, I had some rice and veggies for lunch and then one of my little brother's 'lean meal' microwavable things for dinner. But then again, my snacking on dark chocolate Hershey's kisses throughout the day has probably undone any good that those better food choices might have done... Not to mention my daily bottle of Dr. Pepper. But it's better than having done all of that with the buttered pasta, I guess...

I stayed up late last night, and I woke up late today. It's almost time for my usual bedtime, but I'm not tired, so I'm probably gonna stay up late again... Whenever I get a break from school for over 5 days, I always manage to become functionally nocturnal. You can imagine how awful it got over that first year of quarantine and pandemic.

Next entry (maybe tomorrow?), I'm gonna talk about my little brother, since he got mentioned here today. Maybe the rest of the family I live with, too, while I'm at it. And also, more stuff that I'm trying to implement into my life, like the healthy eating, to help with my mental and physical health. (You know. Assuming that there isn't going to be anything super time-consuming or interesting to talk about. Which I can do with pretty decent confidence.)

Maybe I should stop shit-talking myself for never doing anything.

Oh, well. Here's to hoping I can write semi-regularly for at least a couple of weeks, if I'm gonna fall off of this like I did with all the diaries I tried to start when I was little. Ciao.

12.15.2022

Lyric of the Day: Well, well! Look who's inside again / Went out to look for a reason to hide again

...

You know, my early decision that I would try my damndest to not go back and edit diary entries once they're completed is harder to abide by than I thought it would be. I ended up going back and editing the first entry a couple of times despite this rule... I'll try to abide by it better in the future.

Like I predicted yesterday, I woke up late. I had my usual cereal for breakfast, the rice with veggies and Whataburger. I also took a nap pretty late in the evening, which may have been a bad decision, but, oh well.

I'm currently working on a zine! It's called From Fictionkind, and it's about the experiences of 'serious' fictionkin. So far, I had two people drop out (one of them pretty late in the game), and another one only just today messaged me with their final prompt, after ghosting me for over a full week after the final submission deadline passed!! No messages, no nothing, just completely ignoring me, despite me making it clear what day the deadline for the final submission was! They didn't just respond a week late; they responded two days BEFORE the zine is supposed to be COMPLETED and UPLOADED!! I'd only have two days to put everything together now, if I had everything already perfectly set up for its completion, jerk.

And now, I'm contacting everyone about what names they want used on the 'contributors' page (finalizing the zine before putting it together), and everyone has responded BUT THAT SAME PERSON!! And now I'm afraid he's gonna take forever to respond to me AGAIN!! At this rate, the zine isn't gonna be uploaded by the projected upload date!! And I'm worried that it will make ME look bad if I push back the publishing date, even though it's not my fault. I'm handling it professionally, I think, but still... It's really anxiety-inducing.

Whatever. I had a good talk with my boyfriend, Verdant, today, about some behaviors of his. He said he'll work on it. We both do this pretty frequently; talking about our issues so we can work on them. Hopefully, this sticks.

I had a conversation with my mom today about my brother's high school over dinner. Apparently, all of the teachers there are quitting all at once, because they're tired of being treated like shit. (Good for them!) But the school's solution to this was to call the parents of every child that they knew had some sort of degree? Which is why they called my mom? To ask her to be a substitute... Because they don't even have enough substitutes. My dude, my man, if you want to make it so you have enough teachers and substitutes for the school, maybe... Stop treating the teachers like dirt so that they stop quitting? Just a thought... I dunno...

That's basically all for today. So, I'll go onto the journaling prompts that I set up for myself yesterday.

I live with my brother, my mom, and my dad. Up until recently, I lived with my grandmother, too, but she passed away a few months ago. It was really hard on the whole family, as she was basically like a third parent to my brother and I. But I feel like we've been getting along smoothly without her, even if it is still hard, living with reminders of her around the house.

My brother is younger than me by two years, but he's grown taller than me recently, which is beyond fucked up. He has a deeper voice now, facial hair, he's gone through a few girlfriends?? (Which I know because he brings them over all the time.) It's so weird.

My brother and I are essentially opposites; it's like a sitcom. He's super sporty. He lifts weights in the garage, he watches what he eats like a hawk with protein shakes that he measures out and stuff, and he doesn't really talk a whole lot. Despite being younger than me, he's gotten his driving liscence and his first job before me. Honestly, I feel kind of bad about it. I think that I worry that he and my family judge me, for letting my little brother get ahead of me like that... They haven't actually done anything to indicate that they think that, though. I think it may just be my anxiety...

Like I said, he's very quiet, but he's incredibly sweet. You'd never know it, though; he keeps most of his good deeds secret. For example, I attempted suicide when I was around 15, and I know this is a dark and unexpected segway, but bear with me. A few months ago, my mom noticed that my brother had gotten a bill in the mail, and asked what it was about. He said that he had seen a suicide prevention fund-raiser, and topped off the donation goal in my name. He's also apparently talked about getting a tattoo about suicide prevention, as well, and he asks my mom how I'm doing. I would have never known any of this, had my mom not told me any of it. Back then, my little brother was the main thing that made me hesitant to kill myself; he was 13 at the time, and he clearly still remembers it. I think he worries about me, more than looks down on me, like I fear that he does. The idea that he worries about me isn't a super pleasant one, either, but it's better than the latter.

My mom is my favorite parent. She's neurodivergent, like I am (she found out she was when I found out I was), so she understands me more. She's more emotion-oriented, as well. She stays at home more, though, so I get into more fights with her, just because she's around the most. She used to run a church, but she's a stay-at-home mom now, after she got fired from that because of interpersonal co-worker drama. She's the only person in my family who knows that I'm bigender (aside from my aunt who outed me accidentally, by checking my art Twitter account, then asking my mom what an 'enby' was after seeing it in my bio; thanks for that, aunt). My mom isn't perfect, obviously. She has a habit of telling me that I "hold grudges" whenever I bring up anything bad she's done to me in the past, and I need to just let it go (ie, pretend the way that my parents treat me doesn't affect me somewhat and never talk to her about it again). She was the main person who I received the most backlash from when I originally came out as bisexual; she's gotten more accepting, but that'll never take back the trauma that I initially went through. But, still, she's better than my dad.

My dad is... Well... He's a father. You know what fathers are like.

His sense of humor is literally just "annoying people is funny". He uses this voice whenever he's trying to annoy someone on purpose, and, whenever he does it, I get irritated immediately. It's like a Pavlovian response. But, when he's not trying to be "funny" by irritating those around him, he's fucking terrifying when he's angry. He yelled at me and scolded me while I was actively dying that time that I attempted suicide, and he's done that fun shitty-dad thing where he gets so angry that he punches a hole through a wall. He's tried to kick me out of the house while I was still a child, he's tried to re-send me to psych wards that traumatized me... He is fucking terrifying when he's angry!

So, basically, he's either an elementary school boy who thinks that pulling on girls' pigtails is Peak Comedy, or a terrifying adult NOT afraid to go to extremes, yell, use violence and insult people to get what he wants. Talk about whiplash.

I also live with four dogs! Who you also get to learn about now! With pictures! Because who doesn't love a good doggy picture?

My dog is named Sammy, or Sam! He's a rescue and mutt, as well as my certified service dog. He's a big sweetie-pie and full of energy.

My brother's dog is Darcie, who is a purebred pug. She was a birthday present for him. She's a clown and spoiled princess who thinks she's bigger than she is.

My mom's dog is Ellie. She was one of the dogs who we found while looking into a service dog for me, but she ended up going to a disabled veteran. But, once the veteran couldn't afford to care for her anymore, my mom took her in for herself. She's a gentle giant and very, very sweet. She's a Great Dane with a little bit of Greyhound in her.

My grandma's dog is Jackson, who is a purebred Papillon who is so, so nervous, all the time. Ever since my grandma passed, I think I've become his honorary chosen one, because he does things with and for me that he used to only do with and for my grandma. Unfortunately, this means that he's often at my feet, and I get really worried that I'm going to step on him eventually.

That's all of the misc creatures who I live with! So... What I'm doing to improve my life. Aside from writing in this diary, obviously.

Right now, I'm trying to eat a little bit better. It's not an official diet or anything, but just... Better? Less pasta. You know.

Once school starts up again, I'm gonna try to go to the gym for at least 30 minutes a week on Fridays, to emulate my health class that just ended. I know that 30 minutes a week isn't very much, but it's better than nothing, I think.

I'm actually trying meditation, too. Mostly at night while trying to sleep, albeit... But if I ever get stressed, I could try it to calm down, too. It'll probably be useful once I'm back in school.

For all of this talk about trying to improve my mental state, though, I'm not seeing a therapist. When I turned 18, I was unable to continue using the service I was using at the time, as it was for minors only. It was up to me to figure out how to continue seeing my therapist, so I just... Didn't. I didn't want to. I don't like therapy. I'm not good at talking about my problems to people in real life. (Can you tell by the fact that my latest plan to improve my wellness is to write about my problems where any stranger can see?) When I have to talk about my issues to someone in real life, I clam up. But I think it was also just the therapist that I've been seeing that I don't want to see anymore. I don't even know why. I've been with him for years, but... I don't know. I think I may have internalized him as some sort of parental figure, because he has been an authority figure in my life since my early teens. And I wouldn't want to tell any family member any sort of thing that I'd want to tell a therapist.

Therapy felt like a chore, when I still went. I don't really want to go back. Even if every mental health resource says that it's what I need the most... I just... I don't want to. It has never felt like it's... Helped. Besides, I would have to go through the process of finding a new therapist by myself, as an adult. I'm worried that, if I asked my mom for help with it, she'd refuse it and say I need to do it for myself. But I don't know how. I still feel like... Just... A tall child. And I'm even more worried that, if she does help me, she'll judge me silently. I still don't even make my own appointments or stuff. I don't pay for my own medicine, I'm on my parent's insurance, I don't pay taxes... I've never even had a job aside from freelance art work. I'm a pathetic excuse for an adult, and I'm going to be turning 20 in a month. If my parents both suddenly passed away, I'd be completely helpless on my own.

I never thought I'd be alive this long. I never thought I'd have to be an adult. I feel paralyzed by fear at the thought of even trying to be an adult, even with my parents' help, because I grew up with the notion that this would never happen for me. I thought I would have killed myself by this point. That's one of the scariest parts of overcoming suicidal urges; having to live the rest of the life you never thought you'd have to deal with.

Maybe I'm being too harsh on myself. I feel the need to remind myself that I'm disabled sometimes, but... I can't help but feel like I'm using my disability as an excuse. It's not like I'm physically disabled, aside from my eyesight. I don't know what to do about these feelings. I feel completely unable to take any steps forward. The thought of even shifting in that direction makes me freak out.

What I should do about these feelings is something to think on, I suppose.

12.17.2022

Lyric of the Day: And this is why I have decided / To pull these old white sheets from my head / I'll leave them folded neat and tidy / So that you'll know I'm out of hiding

...

The past two days, I haven't done much. (Shocker.) It's been a lot of napping through the day, and staying up late, honestly. As per all school vacations. I finally gave in and ate some pasta today (and my mom even got me some cookies, too), but this is the longest I've gone without that samefood in quite a few months, so I'm pleased with myself.

The zine I mentioned is up on time, though! The person who I was complaining about yesterday gave me the information I needed the exact same day that it was supposed to go up (thanks, jerk), so I had to do a mad scramble to get it up, but I did it! He did apologize for the 'late replies', but I didn't want to tell him that it was 'okay' (because, for a zine with a schedule, it kind of wasn't), but I didn't want to say 'I forgive you', either, because that would make it sound like I'm annoyed with him. Which I am. But I didn't want them to know that. So I just didn't respond; acted like I didn't see it, you know.

My boyfriend was also let onto the team as a Discord mod, but he didn't help moderate the zine, so I plan to refer to this zine with myself as the "sole moderator" in the future. Verdant was just a Discord moderator, and he was a contributor for the zine, anyhow. I'm sure he would agree that this was effectively a solo moderating venture for me.

Also... Ash is being replaced in the Pokemon anime! What the heck! I never thought the AniPoke writers would actually do it. Especially after this long. I was in shambles when I first found out! I'm actually very interested to see the final episodes with Ash in them, though. I hope they wrap up his character's conclusion in a satisfying way; Ash is an icon and has defined multiple generations of children's childhoods. It's what he deserves!

... Yeah, no soul-searching self-examination stuff today. I'm exhausted from throwing that zine together last minute.

12.19.2022

Lyric of the Day: Ana's safety / Ana, hear me / Ana, baby / I'm not crazy / Oh, Ana! Oh, Ana.

...

Not much going on in the past few days, per usual. Napping a lot, etc... Haven't had any pasta in the past couple days! That's good.

The only thing of note that has happened is that I have gotten some more suicide bait in my site's guestbook. Every time that happens, I get really, really curious as to what specifically triggered that reaction. What was the straw that broke the camel's back? I wish the people who left my website hate would at least specify. I'm curious.

I also don't really know what this commenter specifically was trying to accomplish. They called me "cringe" as their main insult. But I call myself 'cringe' on my about page. Cringe but free, baby, that's me! I've already reclaimed that insult. I dunno why they thought that would be effective.

When I posted about this comment to my Neocities page, Nephro said something pretty neat in response. It said (adding the capitalization and punctuation myself because I'm a stick in the mud like that), "This is why I don't keep a guestbook. (My eccentric fun enrages the general population and I will not let them win and make me hide myself.)" Gore's pretty cool like that.

I think that freeing myself of the shackles of what is considered "cringe" has helped a lot with how I view myself. Cringe culture has a tendency to specifically target autistic people and autistic joy. Allowing myself to be genuine and passionate again, even about things that are "overrated" or "weird" has made me a lot happier. A lot of my idea of "cringe" had to just do with my internalized shame, after all. So... Why would I embrace that? Why would I hide away my joy and passion? For the sake of onlookers who are so used to money-driven and gray ventures without any passion behind it that they mock anything outside of that? Outside of that drab, boring "norm"?

"What a wicked and ironic comment, bro! Now, try saying something true and beautiful."

12.21.2022

Lyric of the Day: His solution is a lie / No one here deserves to die / Except for me and the monster I created

...

Had pasta again today, but none the day before.

But I do have an update on my feeling like I'm a bad adult, though. I've done a lot of introspection, and I think that my fears originate from my low self-esteem and anxiety, along with my tendency to compare where I'm at with my brother, more than anything. I'm an adult, but I'm still a teenager. And, sure, I won't be a teen any more soon, but even then, my brain won't be done developing. I won't even be able to drink! I find that the people who I compare myself to are people who are much older than I am, or who come from a privileged background. My little brother, on paper, is doing better than I am, but all he has over me is a driver's license and a minimum-wage job working the cash register at a burger place. And it's not like I'm not making any money at all...

I don't really know where I'm supposed to go from here... But for now, this is alright. I have a whole lifetime to figure out how I'm going to survive in this world. And I'm never going to be able to figure it out if I'm making myself so anxious that I can't move forward.

I've also joined a small indie dev team for a game jam on itch! It's for the 2023 Boy's Love Visual Novel Game Jam, and I'm going to be the main artist! I'll also help with UI design and writing. Someone else is gonna do all the programming, which is good 'cause I dunno shit about that, hah! Same for music. The cool part is that I'm the one who gets to pitch concepts for the game! I have a few plot bunnies that could work for this, so I'm quite excited. I hope it goes smoothly and nothing falls through! (I get really anxious about things falling through when working with a team on a project.)

12.24.2022

Lyric of the Day: If the sun ain't shining, let's light it up together / Don't care what kind of shape you in / Spin around, show it off, I'm okay with it

...

It's Christmas Eve! And... The person assigned to me for the Sally Face-themed secret Santa I joined dropped out on, like, the last few days of the event! Jeez! What is with people and doing that! If you're gonna drop out, do it near the start of the event or project! If it's near the end of the event, just suck it up and do it, because people are counting on you!! Doesn't everybody know that? The backup artist I got assigned said that it 'should be complete within January'. And I don't blame the backup artist, but jeez, man, that really sucks. It likely won't even be done within this year, much less within the few days around Christmas, like secret Santas are supposed to be. Especially when I got my own secret Santa done literally a month in advance to make sure that it would be done in time, this bites. I really can't stand people who drop out of events and projects they committed to like that.

As for my no-pasta-endeavors... I had a chat with the boyfriend the other day, and realized that the way I was going about my 'healthy eating' was making me slip back into the mindset I had while I had an eating disorder. Which isn't... Great. So... That's on hold for now. At least until after the holidays.

As for the holidays... Today, I went to my grandparent's house for Christmas Eve! Among my misc stocking stuffers, I was basically exclusively given cash, which, hey, I'm down for. It always fits and it's always exactly what the recipient wanted! The dinner there was divine... Agh, just thinking about the mac and cheese again is making me wish I had eaten more!! I also ate only one brownie, and instead mostly snacked on the Christmas cookies, which was an unexpected turn for my usually chocolate-obsessed self. Maybe that downgrade of the desire for sugar that occurs in adulthood everyone has told me about is finally hitting me.

Papa and Nana always give us one stocking-stuffer that we can play with in the moment, and this time, they were little mini Nerf guns and darts. It was a lot of fun to play with them with my dad and my two younger cousins. It reminded me a lot of the Nerf fights I used to have with my dad and my little brother when I was a lot smaller; with all the lights turned off for better snooping! When the memory resurfaced upon reminiscing, I asked my brother which one of us got hit in the eye with a Nerf dart during one of those old battles. He suggested that it had probably happened to both of us, which, yeah, I buy. Either way, the nostalgia of it all totally got me in a Christmas mood. Which I'm glad for! It's been a while since I've been in a good mood for Christmas on Christmas Eve.

12.28.2022

Lyric of the Day: Freaked out, dropped my phone in the pool again / Checked out of my room, hit the ATM / Let's hang out if you're down to get down tonight / 'Cause it's always a good time

...

AHH!!

I haven't written in the past few days but that is because a bitch! Is! STRESSED! My boyfriend's tumblr account got wrongly terminated a few days ago. He's had that account for years, and a LOT of our history together is on it. He's never violated the TOS; pup makes a point to be nice to other users. Come to find out... It's because he's using a VPN!

There's been a huge uptick in activity in r/TumblrAcctTerminated because of this. One of the people who got their account reinstated said that staff described it as a "glitch" in their response, which means the staff are at least aware of it, but... GAH!! I don't know what I'm gonna do if Verdant's account is lost forever! I'm beyond anxious; maybe even more so than zir. It may seem silly but, again, it's an account with a lot of our history on it...

Aside from that... Christmas happened! Among my favorite presents are Pokemon Violet, a sakura-themed cardigan, and new headphones (after I tore my old ones up). This was the first year I felt like I could afford to buy presents for all of my friends with my own money, and it felt really good to be able to do. My boyfriend also got me Slime Rancher on Steam, and I got myself Super Lesbian Animal RPG as my Christmas present to myself.

I'm still sleeping a lot most days. Still nocturnal, too. My sleep schedule will be a pain to fix, but, hey, that's a problem for future me.