Have decided that I’m gonna have to get back into blogging ... cause life is crushing my soul and I feel like I’m headed full speed off a cliff, so if I don’t find an outlet I’m in big trouble.

I’m gonna start by giving some background. I’m not sure if anyone will even read this blog, and that’s OK, but should someone find me, I’d like to give some clue into who I am and how I got to this chapter of my life. At least the key points.

I’m SJ and I’m a single mum to a 15y son who I will refer to as “Teen”. I have a partner of almost 3 years, “B” who I love with all my heart. I live in the west coast of Scotland and I’m trying to navigate my life living with chronic pain.

In 2020, I started to notice weird pains in my abdomen that escalated to blood in my stool. I’ve been jumping between diagnostic tests since but we’re still trying to figure it out. Late 2021, I started to get pains in my left foot which felt like pins and needles, and it progressed up my leg and down my lower back from my butt. Tests were done to see if this was connected to my bowel issues but after I started to lose feeling in my leg, it was decided that its probably nerve damage that may/may not improve and the bowel issues were separate. The pain in my leg and back is spreading and in spring 2022, I started to lose grip strength in my right hand, which has now landed me a referral to a neurologist as I’m hitting markers for MS, which could account for inflammation showing in my bloods.

I’m currently trying to work out my place the world, as a physically disabled woman and its very hard. I specify “physically” as I have been living with mental illness for the last 15+ years of my life, though that’s just from when I was given an official diagnosis. So what’s wrong with my head?? We’ll I have severe clinical depression (referred to as major depressive disorder) as well as an anxiety disorder. I’ve also been diagnosed with C-PTSD and mild agoraphobia, so there is a lot going up in there. Slowly but surely my body is trying anything and everything it can to kill me, and I’m so scared that soon it might win one way or the other.

So, to try and process/adapt to everything, I've decided to post in my blog. Like an online journal and hopefully I can look back on it one day and see a positive change.

Fingers and toes crossed.