Keep Pushing On

It’s been ages , again, since I wrote on this blog.

That doesn’t mean that I have forgotten all about it, quite the contrary. I think about it all the time but still am a bit hesitant when it comes to actually writing on it… I never know which one of the bullies from a few years back is still following this blog to make fun of it…

What I can say however is that I’ve never been more glad that a year has ended… 2017 probably was the worst year of my life, for so many heartbreaking reasons…

I lost people I loved dearly, I lost something I’ve wanted for years now, I lost my job, twice even. My husband lost his, twice. So now we’re home together, both unemployed… We lost a lot of money, 2017 literally was the year we lost the most in… “Loss” seemed to be the central theme….

I’m not ready yet to talk about some things and in a way I don’t even want to. I’ve put it behind me and I feel that there’s no reason to look back when all I need to do now is move forward.

Of course I will mourn the ones I’ve lost because that is the right thing to do and because I do miss them. I need to place the fact that they’re gone in my life. I’m grieving them. I miss them…

Normally, every time around new years eve, I say to my love “next year will be our year” but this time, I didn’t.

Instead we are both working to make it that way, to make it our year.
We had quite a rough start but we’re working to make it better soon. We’re working hard to provide our own happiness…

Although it’s all but easy…

Although it gets tested a lot, I still have faith that things will be right, eventually.

Keep faith and work hard has become one of our many motto’s the past year and we will keep pushing through.

We will make it, we’ll make sure of it

– Britt

Feelings & Fears

There are times that I wonder, that I worry.

In exactly 3 weeks from now, I will be a married young woman. On August the 3rd, I say “I do”. It’s official. I will be married.
Although I look forward to it, with all my heart, counting down the days…
I worry as well.

There are times that I feel useless. Maybe even unloved. Misunderstood. Unimportant. Invisible.

I’m used to being invisible, in a way.
I never was popular at school, even though people often told me how beautiful I was. I never did exceptional things. I’m good in a few things and I do a lot, but I don’t excel in anything. I remember every face from people that went to the same school as me, did the same sports, shared my hobbies, … but no one remembers me. And honestly, I don’t mind. I am not someone who needs or even wants to be in the spotlight and although I look forward to our wedding party next year, I kind of get panic attacks when I realise that my love and I will be -or at least are supposed to be- in the spotlights all day… that is also a reason why I want to keep it small, intimate.

I’m used to feeling useless.
I never felt needed, or at least not much. People often used me but they never needed me, not truly.

I’m used to being excluded, I always felt excluded in my family, my friend groups, school, hobbies, … and things like Facebook don’t help that feeling, at all…
It’s all fake and I know it, but still… It would be fun to have someone post awesome statuses about me as well, tagging me in pictures…

I often feel alone…
Misunderstood.
As if I come from another world and no one quite thinks or reacts like me… I feel like an outsider. An intruder.

My love was the first one to truly accept me as I am, for who I am.
All my weird unusual characteristics as well.

But lately, ever since we started living together and even before that I feel excluded from this relationship as well, from time to time.
I don’t feel needed, except for cleaning, cooking, washing, ironing, …
When I express my needs, my hopes, … nothing happens.
At the best we often fight about it.

We are a good couple, a great couple in fact, but we had a very, very rough year.
We went through some things that weren’t caused by us at all, but we went through anyway… we had them thrown in our face and had to deal with them… which I now feel like we never did.
We pushed ourselves through it all, but never really dealt with it. Experience it. Give it a place…

We lost someone we both dearly loved…
Had our future changed multiple times, in a bad way…

The past months were so rough…
That’s why I , we decided to take a break from something we could: having a baby.

The past 2,5 years we’ve been trying to get pregnant… in multiple ways, with help, because the doctor very early assured me that there was no way I could get pregnant on my own…
It’s been a long, painful, rollercoaster of a road…
In June, we had our first IVF-treatment, finally.
It was hell.. all the injections, the egg pick-up, the placement, … the pain was incredible.
Good news, bad news, good news…. a true rollercoaster…
We were pregnant, then we weren’t , then we were, … and then the news: we were pregnant, but we wouldn’t stay pregnant… I would miscarriage… guaranteed.
The only question was when and how. Would I need surgery? would it come ‘naturally’?

And what the doctor predicted happened: I miscarried.
I was pregnant, and then I wasn’t…

So now my body is exhausted, my mind broken… I need some rest… Some time with my love…
I need to feel like me again, no hormones, no injections…
I need rest… to be able to go places, do things without worrying about the injections I need to place, the doctor visits, …

So I decided to take a break, for at least 2 months.
To be a girlfriend, a fiancée, a future wife again…
To be a couple again.

But it feels like we both work through things in our own way, in two separate worlds…
I feel like my Love is getting out of my sight… like he is moving away and I can’t see him anymore, can’t keep up with him.

I’m scared that it will get worse when we are married… and that we would both become unhappy. Become a burden to each other… Loose sight of each other completely.

Sometimes I can feel him slip through my fingers and desperate as I am, I don’t know what to do.
It’s like sand slipping through your fingers…

I hope the break will do us good, that the good things we have planned together will make us stronger, will make us notice each other again…

Because right now… I don’t know. I know I can get pretty emotional over this, but honestly, the feeling I sometimes have of loosing him… it scares the crap out of me… It’s terrifying… because right now, he is the last thing keeping me up… his love, our relationship… He’s the only strong thing left and if that would be taken away… I don’t know what I would do…

I don’t talk to anyone about it anymore as well, because people say stupid things like “leave him”, “don’t get married if you have doubts”, …
But I’m not going to leave him, because he’s the best thing that ever happened to me. He truly is the love of my life, my soulmate.
And I AM going to marry him, because I have no doubts about what I feel for him and what he feels for me.
I KNOW he loves me, as he knows I do.

We are just a couple that have had a shitload of shit to deal with in a few short months… things we didn’t see coming at all…

And just because we kept going on, we didn’t process it properly. Which I now feel like we NEED to do… even though it hurts like hell…
We NEED to grieve
We NEED to cry, be angry, smash things…
We NEED to scream…

we MUST move THROUGH IT, instead of past it.
We need to experience it… We need to let it in.

So that finally, hopefully, after all that
we can give it a place
and move forward without boundaries, without strings keeping us to the past, to the pain, …

together.

– Britt

 

Romance

I like to think of myself as a romantic person.
Always have.

I can enjoy a good chick-flick, but often end up irritated.
True love isn’t about letting the right person go, getting into a relationship with someone and end up cheating on your current partner with “the one”.

I know that true love isn’t easy, and not always clear to see in the moment. But it doesn’t give you an excuse to cheat on your current partner, even if when it is with “your one true love”.

For that reason, I don’t like The Notebook for example. She can’t seem to make up her mind, dumps him, becomes engaged to someone else and end up cheating on him with her first love… I do , however, totally adore the fact that years later, when they are both old, he still stands by her and tells her their story -without her knowing at first it’s their story-. I love how he still loves her and looks after her. I love that you can really tell how much they love each other. And the ending, when they die together is simply beautiful.

But that’s pretty much the only part of the movie that I like.
You have a few other movies like that as well, and I know, the girl/guy usually has reasons why they did what they did, and people can relate to that but still…
I usually feel bad for the other guys/girls that get used in the meanwhile, that get cheated on and have their heart broken.

No, I’m a romantic.
That’s why , for example, I love vampires so much.
They pick someone and stay with them, for eternity. That kind of old school romance, true, unconditional love…
It warms my heart just thinking about it.

So when you ask me what my favourite romantic movie is then, I can say , without hesitation: “Ps. I love you”.
They were a couple that wasn’t perfect, but they loved each other nonetheless and were faithful. And so adorable, even though they hadn’t got the easiest life.

Even after he died, he kept taking care of her.

I could go on endlessly, but I’ll leave it a this.

I’m a romantic.
I believe in true love.
In fighting for what you love.
In unconditional love.
My favourite flowers are red roses, I know, how typical can you be.
I love kisses and walks during sunset.
I love long conversations that go deep into the night.
I love all the mushy romantic things.
I’m a real sucker for romance.

The love from old movies, books.
Where men were gentlemen.
Where women knew what they wanted.

I am romantic myself as well, in my actions.
I often prepare breakfast for my love, and give him breakfast on bed.
I love to surprise him.
I love to make him feel loved.

And as I am writing this, I am thinking about how I would love to watch a good movie again.

Life’s too short, so that’s what I’ll do now.

Talk soon ,my lovelies.

– Britt

It’s Been A While

It’s been months since my last post, I’m aware.
Believe me when I say I would have loved to write down my feelings, and whats going on…
But the truth is, ever since people from my neighbourhood found this blog that was and still is so precious to me and made fun of everything on it… my blog hasn’t truly felt safe anymore…
It feels violated.
I don’t know who else is reading along, is it just my faithful followers, my wordpress friends? People I love and care about?

Or are those from my “real life” still around? lurking to see if they can find some juicy story that they can exploit?
How safe is it for me, to post things on here?
Will people read it behind my back? make fun of it? talk to my family or friends about it?

I have so many things I want to talk about… that I NEED to talk about.
Get them off my chest.

Even if no one reads them
comments on them or even cares about them…
I just need to write them down.

A few times I was here, writing those things down but ended up deleting them in the end… because I got scared.

I hate it.
My blog was my own space, my escape. With all these lovelies following me, the sweet comments, the good friends…

I hope that soon, I’ll feel safe enough to start writing here again…

Because I really miss this..
I miss this place.

I put so much time, effort and tears in creating this safe space.
This virtual world.

I’m not planning on getting it taken away so easily from me…

I’m a lover, not a fighter, but I’ll fight for what I love…

– Britt

When Life Gets You Down

Last Thursday life got to me once more, in a bad way. 

One of my clients where I go and clean and such apparently complained to my boss. She said it seems that I don’t like my work, even hate it. She said my work isn’t properly done and not very neat. I won’t be going to that client much longer, just until my boss can find someone else to go there. 

It sucks when people go behind your back and complain, but I kind of saw it coming. Her and me never really clicked.

So I don’t mind that she will be dropped out of my client list, it’s just the way she did it that bothered me. She is always very nice and asking about my studies, the wedding. She seems very supportive. And then she goes and does that behind my back… oh well.
It was just the worst possible timing. My grandmother has been in the hospital for over 3 weeks now, we fear that she is losing her mind as well. My grandmother being in the hospital is very hard on my grandfather as well, the poor man. 

I felt a lot of pressure from my studies as well, too much deadlines, classmates being much further than I,… and even though some people don’t believe it, I  quite a perfectionist, I want to be a good student. Make the deadlines.

My love and I have been trying to get a baby for over 2 years now as well, put a lot of money in it. A lot of  heart, a lot of soul. But without result… and now we are on a break from getting pregnant because of our  wedding party in 9 months. 

My best friend is also kind of trying, and has the same medical problem as me and yet… she is pregnant. I am super happy for her -obviously- but to be honest it kind of stung as well. I am over it now though. 

And all of a sudden, everything came crushing down on me… 

it was just too much. 

I started crying and didn’t stop.. picked a fight with my love when he tried to comfort me. 

Life can be a real bitch,with perfect timing. 

I am fine now, focusing on everything good in my life.

Not pregnant : ok, more time to spend with my love and enjoy being alone (with our cat and bunny) 

School: we made up a schedule on when to study what, when to complete an assignment,… and so far it works.

We will see what the future brings. For now I am happy.

All I know is that I want to face the future with a positive mind.

– Britt 

Preconceptions

Something I see on a daily basis in my work as a household maid/cleaning lady is that my clients often have a lot of preconceptions. 

I tend to work in trainers and a sporty top, which I notice my clients often see as me being some kind of lowlife …. 

When I tell that I study, it’s as if I’m doing some kind of hobby course, or as if I’m still trying to get a high school diploma. Which I’m not. I’m doing legitimate higher education studies.

They also seem tho think that I’m quite retarded and that I do this beceause my life is crappy and I am incapable of doing anything else. Which is not the case.

So when I tell them a few actual things about myself, they often don’t even believe me.

I do this work beceause it has good hours, no weekends, no holidays… and because I was looking for a job I could combine with studies and family (relation, kids,…). I can work more or less hours if I want to, always have the same clients… but I don’t love doing this job nonetheless. I can feel myself getting more and more stupid everyday. 

It will change one day.

Sometimes in life, you have to do something you don’t really like in order to be on the way to what you like. 

I too keep my goal in mind, and that helps.

I too try not to have preconceptions about other people, because you never know why they do what they do or say what they say. 

Although sometimes it hurts me how my clients see me. 

But I’ll get through it. I’m on my way. The right way.

I’m just bit eager to get there.

– Britt

Tea and Time

After my latest post about time, I wanted to end on a more comic note about time as well.
So please enjoy this clip from “Alice Through The Looking Glass” where the Mad Hatter and his friends are having a bit of fun with Time. Enjoy!

 

Time

Time.

A concept that dates back to the beginning of everything.
To the beginning of time itself, as one would say.

Ever since I was a little girl, the concept of time kept me wondering.
When someone I dearly loved would die, people would often tell me that “it has been their time to go”.  Which I never quite understood.
I would visualise it for myself. We would all have some sort of… timer. It could be floating above us, or imprinted on our foreheads or such. No one would be able to see it, not even the person itself.

As I got older, I stuck with this… image that I had. That we all had a timer, and that some choices could effect that timer. If you were doing risky things and you weren’t being safe for example, you would have less time. If you would cross the street without looking, you would only have a few more minutes left on your timer, while if you would have looked and stopped, you might have had 30more years for example.

When I was a teen I fell in love with the music of the band Nickelback, especially with “savin’ me”. I loved the clip very much, because it does show how I’ve been looking at time almost my whole life. I’m sure that most people have seen the clip, but it shows my examples. In the clip, a young man gets saved from being hit by a bus by another man. From then on, he is able to see the time a person has left above their head. At one point -and this one really stuck with me- he sees an old woman being pushed into an ambulance, he sees her timer counting down until it reaches zero, meaning that she died…

 

I had a lot of people whom I loved dearly die… and had a very hard time coping with it. I couldn’t understand why they had to go. Why that young?  Why like that?

I got more and more mad about it, upset. Bitter. I thought of time as a thief, something evil. Just like we often say ‘we have too little time’ ‘time is short’ ‘the hands of time stop for no one’ and so forth…

But a few months, around May 2016, my vision completely changed.
As a few of you might remember, I am a huge Alice in Wonderland addict. I collect tons of stuff about it and love love love the book(s) and the movies, especially the Tim Burton ones. So in May/June I went to see the latest movie ‘Alice Through The Looking Glass’, for those of you who haven’t seen it yet -shame on you by the way! 😉 – the story is that the Mad Hatter (played by Johnny Depp) is dying and all of his Underland friends are desperate, so they use the caterpillar to go and get Alice (played by Mia Wasikowska) and bring her back. She is the only one that can save him, but to do so she must go back in time, using the chromosphere. A device owned by Time (played by Sacha Baron Cohen) that allows you to travel through the ‘sea of time’, and thus go back in time.

I won’t tell any more about the movie since I don’t want to spoil it and encourage everyone to go see it yourselves (it’s on dvd!).
In the movie, at some point Time says to Alice: “You might not change the past, but you might learn something from it.” which is very true , if you ask me.
I see it in my personal life everyday. People saying they don’t want to end up like their parents, dreading it, fearing it most of all, and then doing exactly that.
People dwelling on the past , a mistake I often made too, instead of looking forward and seeing the brand new chances that you get every day. Make the most of the time you have left, however little that may be.

But what truly changed my view about time is something that Alice says when she says goodbye to Time. In the beginning and throughout the movie, Alice often shows how much she dislikes time. That time is a thief, and a villain.
But after she meets Time in Underland, as a half man, half clock, she changes her mind.
So when she says goodbye to Time she says:
“I used to think Time was a thief, stealing everything I loved. But I see now that you give before you take. And every day is a gift. Every hour, every minute, every second.”
This part actually left me in tears… because throughout the whole movie I knew exactly what she felt, since she already lost her dad when she was younger and now facing the possibility of losing her dearest friend Hatter… I think that many people can relate.

A more recent movie about -among other things- time is “Collateral Beauty”, with Will Smith, Kate Winslet, Keira Knightley, Helen Mirren, … a truly heartbreaking beautiful movie with a great cast. In this movie , Will Smith’s character is coping with the loss of his little girl, and his business partners and close friends are worrying about his wellbeing. They find out that Will Smith writes letters, to Time, Death and Love. The rest of the movie I won’t spoil.

 

It’s the principe. Imagine that just like Alice and Will Smith’s character you would be able to talk to Time, that it would be some sort of person. What would you say?
Would you assault him/her? Would you cry? Would you plead? Would you hug? Would you forgive?

I ask myself that question from time to time.
Would I be able to forgive Time for all the hurt he has caused by taking my loved ones so soon from me? Or would I thank him for all the beautiful moments I’ve had? The long friends, the lovers?

I think I will never really know, not until I would be face to face with Time itself.

Like I’ve said, Time has caused me quite a lot of pain, but I also had a lot of beautiful moments.

All I’ve learnt from those stories, those movies, … is that none of us know how much or how little time we have left in this life, so I try to make the most out of it. By doing what I always try to do: move forward.

Although sometimes I stop and take some time to reflect. Am I happy doing what I do?  Do I still see my closest friends enough? Then after reflecting, I go back on moving forward.  And if I am going through a though time I always remember the words “this too shall pass”.

Time is fluid, and vivid. It’s always moving.

So to all my lovelies:
Cherish your special moments.
Take them in.
And make the most of the time you have left, because none of us know how much time we have.

– Britt

 

Happiness Is Expensive

Happiness is expensive.

It’s a thought I often had and still have from time to time.
When I am sad and thinking about what I can do to make things better.
Most of the time I’m stressed, exhausted, …
The best solution I can come up with then is : “I need some time off. Take a break from work, from school and just get my love and go on a little vacation, even if just for a weekend.”
Then I eagerly start to look up trips that are fitting to what I need, sadly, trips cost money.
And when you don’t work -at least at my current job-, you don’t get paid.
It often makes me sad and then I say to my love “That we are to poor to be truly happy, because we can’t go anywhere or buy things that make us happy”.

I let it sink and then I realise: happiness doesn’t cost a thing.
It’s not taking a trip that can only make you happy, or buying expensive things.

Happiness, at least for me, is spending the evening with friends and their little children -as we are going to do tonight-.
Happiness is having a movie night with either one of our younger brothers, or both.
Happiness is going out with friends, having drinks or something to eat.
Happiness is lying on the couch with your lover behind you, his arms wrapped around you, his breath in your neck, watching a show and softly falling asleep, together.
Happiness is coming home to a cat meowing frantically , happy that you are home.
Happiness is a little bunny jumping up and down his bench when he sees or hears you coming home, or coming downstairs in the morning.

Happiness can be whatever you want it to be.
When you let it, the small things become big ones.

Happiness is everywhere, if you just let it.

I am tired of looking at what I don’t have, instead I learn myself to focus on what I do have.
I appreciate what I have, and who I have.
The lover by my side
The friends.

Happiness is a choice.
And I choose to be happy.

– Britt

Bright Future Ahead

Today I had an oral exam early in the morning.
I got up on time, with my love, and we drove to my school – a drive of about half an hour , give or take-.
I was very nervous getting in, but was able to calm myself.
At the end of the exam I had a “really? that was it?”-feeling.
I went to the reception to collect my exam results from my second and third exam. They were less than I imagined, and one of them I flunked.
I was kind of disappointed at first but then remembered:
I haven’t had much time to study for those exams, no time to make summaries, didn’t even get to read the whole book for one of the two, so in fact, I didn’t do that bad.
It alsof felt quite nice that I didn’t have to tell my results to parents at home now, knowing that I would get a lot of bad, negative, mean comments about it. That I would get punished. That I would feel even worse. Like a failure.

No, this time, it was different. Because this time I’m not studying for anyone else, or because someone else wants me to. This time, I’m doing this for me.
Because I want to graduate and have a bachelor degree. Because I want to be able to give myself a better future, and my family.
Because I want myself and my future husband to have a better future, to give my future children more chances.
I want to be able to improve my life, and in the meantime those of others as well.

I am doing this for me.
And even though I’m keeping up high standards for myself, I sometimes need to pat myself on the shoulder. Because I know that I work hard, doing my utter best to balance work, my relationship, my household, friends, family, planning a wedding and a few others things at the same time.
It’s crazy at times, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way.
So if I look at all that, it’s no disgrace really to have to do some exams again this summer.
I only failed 1 out of 3 this far, so that’s not bad at all.
Also because the one I failed, is one that almost everybody failed, there have been a lot of complaints to the principal about the unfairness of the exam, and my grades aren’t final until the end of June, so a lot can happen in the meantime.

It feels good to realise that finally, I have my life in my own hands.
That I can make my own choices.
That there’s no one yelling and calling me names behind my back, forcing me to do things I don’t want to.
I feel so free whenever I realise that.
And my love is by my side, supporting me. Not pushing me.

I feel so free, so mature.
Making my own choices, paving my own path.
For the first time in my life, I see good things ahead, and I couldn’t be happier.

– Britt