kaytey

I just measured myself. The scales mean nothing to me, but when the jeans start to pinch and the measuring tape reads a number higher than before, I know its time to do something.
Right now I'm aware of every single pound. I can feel it hanging from my chest, gathering at my waist, bulging, excessive. I hate putting on any weight. Ive maintained the same weight since I was 15 with only a few hiccups and every time I've got it back on track. But each time I've felt in control. Now I do not.
As I've got older I've found it harder and harder. The battle between the need to eat and the fear of putting on weight is constant.
Its no surprise when the world is so confusing. We are constantly told people are too skinny or too fat. We are told to be normal and end up going too far with the treats. Or told to lose weight and end up too dangerously skinny. And the only company telling us its ok to be normal is still telling us that in order to be normal we need to slather ourself in moisturiser and all kinds of special products.
There are a million and one products in my cupboard that I never use but feel safer merely by their presence! Throw away untouched anti wrinkle eye cream? No way! I might get wrinkles if I do!
Sometimes I just want to be me. Just plain old me dressed to suit myself, free of make up. But I do that and go out feeling proud only to end up feeling invisible. Or even worse, like everyone is staring at me at for being too ugly. So I go the other way and get dressed up only to feel cheap.
Where is the middle ground? As women, are we ever allowed to just relax?!
A friend made a comment the other day about how strange it is that mens magazines promise men beautiful women at their demand, whereas womens magazines tell us how to be beautiful for men and how to get them.
This is a battle us women are constantly going to be fighting. Yet it seems we are fighting against ourselves as we keep on buying the products and fuelling the companies that told us we needed them in the first place. Unless we stop buying they wont stop selling. But we wont do that just incase their stories do come true and we become grotesquely ugly and unloveable by not using anti wrinkle, toning, brightening miracle cream!
I think I need cake right now!

I've not been on here in a while. For somebody who likes to call myself a writer I have an amazing ability to avoid writing!
I'm on here because I've just given up Facebook and I felt a need to write about where I am right now, mostly just to help myself to understand my mind.
You may wonder what Facebook has to do with my mind?! I think I was becoming addicted! Everytime I was bored I'd check Facebook and waste time doing stupid pointless things on there instead of doing all the things I used to love to do such as reading or walking. However things got really bad when I actually found myself thinking about what I was gonna put in that addictive little status box...thinking about yourself in third person randomly in the day is surely not a good sign!
As for where I am...I have no idea. I am lost!
I am just about to begin the final year of my degree and I feel so much pressure to know what I want to do with my future. I feel like I cant even decide on little things in the here and now without making that huge decision, i.e I dont want to waste time doing a dissertation project on something that I'm not going to do in the future! Its just so scary.
I've started to take these fears out on food again. I feel like I am in a constant battle with myself that just ends with me thinking 'well you need to eat' after spending the day avoiding food and eating way too much. I know its bad yet I feel like its not really happening. I feel the strangest detachment from myself, like Im hiding from all of the responsibilities I have at the moment.
I feel like I need to go home and let somebody else be responsible for worrying about the bills and the rent and cleaning the house, keeping fit, studying, socialising, sleeping, living all squeezed into the hours between the two jobs I have to maintain to be able to afford to do those things. I need to work to pay for my life but doing so means I just dont have the time and energy to do that. Only I cant go home and let somebody be responsible for me. Sometimes I feel so proud that I have achieved so much by myself, but right now I just envy everybody who has their parents pushing them; those who go home for summer and live like spoilt teenagers again.
My uncle was a half hour drive from me last week and didnt even pop by. Right now with an uncertain future and no family behind me I dont know who I'm doing this for and so it seems pointless to do it.
It might not seem like it right now but Im an optimistic person. I'm looking for something to keep me moving forward. I'm considering charity PR and so need to find a placement and also some other charity work. Everybody needs to find a reason to get out of bed each morning and I will.
And until then Facebook is no longer gonna be my hiding place. I reckon coming on here and writing nonsense about my progress is a bigger step in the right direction than comparing my taste in music with somebody I've not seen in 5 years and probably never will in the real world again.
Goodbye Facecrack!

Im just so bloody bored right now so I thought I'd write a random pointless blog. Does anyone even bother reading these things? I hope not cos they're pretty pointless!

Anyway, what am I going to write about?

Having a big old stress at the moment cos I've screwed up my photos. Just not as good as I hoped they'd be cos I'm a shit photographer. The strangest thing is I'm more annoyed because the shop lady kindly lent me the clothes and I dont have many good photos to give her back. Got enough to use in my article but thats not the point. Well maybe it is but not to me.

Still havent posted on the money to the Jamaican guy. What if it ends up in some other random Falmouth in the world. Although once it leaves England it will probably be safe. Highly doubt that any other country could have a postal system stupid enough to deliver a letter clearly marked Falmouth, Jamaica to Cornwall!

Got an email back yesterday about contacting my mother! Super eeeeeeeeeeek! They estimate 3-4 weeks. Oh my god am I really ready? Not really too happy about the ball being in her court either but apparently thats the way it has to work. She needs to give permission and will therefore have the opportunity to make initial contact. I want to ask her the questions first rather than give her the chance to just throw things at me.

God this is scary!

At least I will finally get to ask if Stan is my dad, or of not who the hell is. If it is though I will never forgive myself for not speaking to him at Les's party. I might never see him again. That was such a random encounter. Was it fate? Why should he suddenly turn up out of the blue at this time? eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek! I've a feeling there are going to be a lot of eeks in this blog, and a whole lot more in general in the next few months. I thought I was so ready for this, and I guess I am, I just hoped it wouldnt be so scary this time. God knows how many letters I've written and not posted. This time it could be real. Thats a whole lot bigger than eeek. Its almost a f**k! But I dont swear right!

Why is that everytime I do one of these bloggy things I end up just writing loads of personal stuff without intending to and then cant stop. I guess its my personal counsellor. How bloody sad! LOL!

Yesterday was to be another boring day. I had nothing to do thanks to oversleeping and missing my days lectures. But then the post man came,and what did he deliver? A little mystery for me to solve. I dont get out much Ok, I like little things!
Anyway, the letter was not addressed to me but to somebody who lived on a street with the same name as mine, in a town with the same name in JAMAICA! I live in Cornwall, thats Cornwall, England just in case you are wondering!
I left the letter to sit on my desk for a few hours, giving it furtive glances, desperate to know who its for and what the hell its doing sitting on my desk.
Supposed to be doing work but as usual always glad for a distraction, I decided to google the address. I came up with one in America and two possibles in Jamaica itself. Thats three other doorsteps it could have graced this morning and God knows how many others there were! That put paid to the idea of just putting it in back in the post and hoping for the best. How many hands had it passed through in the British postal system, none of them noticing the problem with sending a letter destined to Jamaica to Cornwall?
Its cold, windy and grey here for a start. Sure we have palm trees but they are not swaying gently in a warm sea breeze, they are being thrashed around! And besides that would rob me of my mystery!
Anyway, I got an email address for one of the Jamaican addresses as its a business. I asked if it belonged to anybody there but as yet have no reply...!
By this point I decided to just open it up and see if theres a return address. Probably would have been the easiest solution in the first place but it could have been personal! When I did so there was no address, just a hand written note wishing the person "best wishes for 2007" and $110!
I'd been keeping friends updated on this exciting little tale and when they heard this development they all said keep it, except my overly suspicious Grandad who reckons I should take it to the police just in case they track it down. I think he belives its from the mafia or something!
Whoever its from or for there's no way I could keep it. Research on the area in Jamaica its meant to be going to shows its quite a poor area. I may be a broke student but this guy may need it a whole lot more than me. And Im not selling my mystery for the equivalent of £57! The research on the area didnt show a street of the right name, but I did come across the local newspaper. I searched for the guys name and it turns out hes a kid and rather a good athlete. He won a scholarship to a top Jamaican school for his medal winning athletics.
So now I know which school he goes to! Yay! However the only contact details I have for the school is phone and I am reluctant to call. I would rather email, its free and not one million pounds a minute!
I could just send the money to the school, but I found an online version of a residential phone book while trying to find the correct address and it seems not only is his a very common surname, but every other boy there also seems to share his first name so it may not be the right one. The school is in a completely different area to where the letter is addressed! Maybe I should just call afterall?
Now Im following a different line of enquiry. The post mark on the letter says its from the Tyneside area. Ive posted a message on a local message board trying to find them. Its a bit of a long shot as I only have their first names!
Today Im thinking that maybe I should get out more instead of doing this! But am I going to give up? No way! I want to make sure the money ends up in the right hands and not another random person on a street with the same name in another part of the world!

As well as trying to deal with the issues with wanting to find my mum, I've been trying to find other ways of trying to deal with this constant feeling of lethargy and sadness that has shrouded me for too long. I've always eaten quite healthily meal wise, but I tend to snack on unhealthy things, and althoughy as I say I eat healthy meals, sometimes I skip them, or eat at strange times and throw my eating pattern out of sync. I thought I would try to make an extra effort to be healthy and so have limited myself to one cup of tea a day and trying to avoid unhealthy snacks and Im doing so well. Although I used to sit and drink about 6 cups of tea a day (bad student habit-its all we seem to do!), yet its not even hard to cut down, its all in the habit. Now I'll just have my morning cup with breakfast, which Im eating properly now. It used to a case of shoving a bowl of cereal down my throat and running out the door, and thats a good day. Now I force myself out of bed when the alarm goes off. It feels hard but its so nice to have a leisurely breakfast. Although now without all that caffeine and sugar from the day before its easy to wake up. Even today I was up. And Im sleeping so well its amazing. But the best part is my new found zest for life. Ive been active all day today instead of spending all day finding the energy. And Ive been getting things done that Ive been putting off for ages. Most of all Im getting the passion back for my work. I used to love it and then I just couldnt be bothered but I really want a first and now Im back on track!
And now theres the wedding plans. The one who has been there all through everything, since I was 17 minus a day, and I are planning to get married as soon as we graduate, the summer after next! Yay! It will be an eco wedding hopefully!
I cant believe how great I feel, and mostly because of cutting down on tea and therefore a lot of sugar too, taking some vitamins, and just getting out of bed. I never thought it could be done. I just hope it lasts. I hope I can keep my mind on track.
I have been thinking about writing that letter, I have a contact address, and I have managed so far to keep my positive out look, so fingers crossed.
Now I just have the hurdle of telling my nan, the woman who raised me and who really hates the idea of me being close to anyone else other than her, including my own sister, that I want to contact my mother. Oh god thats scary. Just keep on smiling girl.

So why the hell am I here considering posting my life on a public forum?
I guess I just need somewhere to vent. Im 21 now and never before did I think I'd want to find my mum, well maybe there have been times I've thought about it, but now I really feel lik eits something I have to do. Everything else is going well so I need to deal with past, the big stinking obstacle that keeps tripping me up.
I keep trying to write that first letter: Dear G. I know you never expected to hear from me, and to be honest I never thought I would write to you, but here I am. Things have changed I guess. I'm more grwon up and feel that I need to ask you some questions, to hear your side of things. I would appreciate it if you could be honest, it may not be nice right now but it'll be for the best in the long run.
Why did you leave us? What made you need to go? Why couldnt you keep in touch?
And I know everyone's always said you dont know, but do you know who my father is? I dont want to find him, I just would like to know.

And thats where it ends. When I write it on paper I cry, yet doing it then felt so cold. Maybe its because I know this one is never going to get to her, affords me the emotional security I need. What if she tells me things I dont want to hear? She accused my uncle of abusing her. The family swept it under the carpet, said it was lies. What if its true? What if they are right and she does lie about everything. How will I know what to believe. I do know that I need to know for myself. I've had my head filled of propaganda against her for nearly 11 years now, thats how long its been. I know she was depressed. I remember her crying. Just crying and crying all the time. Most of my memories of her are of her crying. Or in bed. I remember the room, dark and cold and being scared. I went to the bed and woke her but it wasnt her that grunted back, it was a man. I think it was my brothers father, but maybe thats just my memory being kind. He was a nice man. There were others that werent. I dont really remember them. My mind draws a blank. One thing I do know is that she is gay, and my family are seriously homophobic. They didnt know when she left, but what if it was because she felt that she couldnt be who she was there. What if we reminded her of the lengths she went to to be normal? The dirty, degrading lengths. So many questions and I dont think anyone will ever be able to give me the answer, but at least if I get it from every side I can create my own truth from the tangle.