A place for Vase and Berry

Yes, my youngest son is in 12th grade and the exams do have some impact. He starts with maths tomorrow and then continues to test for the next three weeks. Luckily, his play is now done so he has more time to study. He will test in maths, history, chemistry, drama, literature, and French. Some of his test scores will show what level he is when he starts at uni. My oldest son currently works in politics. He was the legislative aide assistant for a representative in our state government. Now he is running her reelection campaign. Sometimes he gets to meet famous people. Last week he was in the room when President Biden gave a speech. But he will return to school in another year for more advanced study. 

You are right that your friend will probably not change. But I always hope that a change that I am not expecting happens. Sometimes it occurs with my students as well. The ones who struggle at the beginning suddenly become great students and do good things. You are absolutely right in not trying to plan out careers so far in advance. Those who try to do so (I know some on here) end up getting themselves seriously stressed and burned out when things don't go as they have planned. It is MUCH better to be flexible. There is no need to listen to her about future careers. She is already on the wrong path. 

I would continue to be a little friendly with your lunch seat mate. It is better than sitting by yourself and being lonely. I don't think that I would judge her too harshly for liking a teacher that you hate. People can see things very differently and that is okay. She may not be able to see your view right now, but you weren't bringing it up directly at that moment either. She was just talking in general. Your canteen friend may be figuring out how to deal with people in general. There are often people who talk extra and try to dominate things a little when they get especially nervous. They don't quite understand how to be friendly. Maybe it will turn out to not be a good friendship for you, but no need to give up on it completely quite yet. 

You are right about your mom being stressed if she also must travel soon especially just after moving. I am glad that you are able to be patient with her. You are learning to get along better and that is awesome. 

Hopefully you will figure out how to cool down a bit over the break. You can continue to try to experiment with what makes the space even a little cooler. Every little bit helps. I can imagine that it is harder to concentrate, etc. when it is hot. 

My good moment for the weekend was definitely my son's play (though the songs will continue to run through my head for at least a week after watching it three times). I also had a good moment yesterday in watching one of my students who I have known for 4 years (and who was massively mentally ill when he started) present an excellent final senior project. 

@bestVase7265 hmm yeah, moving is feeling a bit better now. i agree, things do feel better to me when things are more organised. today has been an extremely busy day with my father doing all the stuff he needs to do in my room, like fixing the noisy fan, fixing a part of the broken window grill (yeah, he had to do welding in there). he also put in a curtain rod at the entrance of my room, so if my parents need the door to be open, i can keep it open and just have the curtain drawn instead. now he had to do some drilling for this which made my whole room very dusty and dirty, so i had to clean everything all over again, but i do think my room looks a bit more organised now. i am really very tired from doing all that cleaning work in addition to helping my father with the stuff he was doing for me (so i was running around the house getting whatever he told me to get) and i also had to help my mother with a lot of stuff. i am really exhausted, and my legs are hurting a lot from standing for most of the day. but yes, at least my room feels more organised and feels better. i have lots of more cleaning to do, but i was too tired and my legs are too tired to stand any more, so i decided to do the rest another day. i am going to bed now because i am very sleepy, and i know i haven't been able to really reply to your messages today, hopefully i will manage to do it tomorrow. lol, i kinda wonder why i enev started typing right now because i knew i needed to go to bed soon, but anyway, since i typed this, i'll just send it across for now and will respond to the rest tomorrow (hopefully).

It is good that the new place feels better than the old one. You will adjust slowly but surely.

Data science also isn't the end of the world. It is another way for your brain to be thinking. Using your brain in lots of different ways overall makes lessons less boring. It also helps you confirm which subjects that you like and which ones you dislike.

That second paragraph about your benchmate is really insightful. For some reason, he thinks pushing people away will protect him from getting hurt and then he actually gets more hurt that way. You do a much better job of understanding kindness.

I hope that the time off for you will continue to not be too stressful. Just keep working on the homework pile. Sorry that your mom was a bit rougher this morning. Sometimes when you get a maid, especially at first, people feel like their house should be at least partially clean so they don't appear like they are disorganized or slobs. 

My grading, etc. is going okay so far and I am finishing the papers that I need to do. It really is a day at a time.

My son who is at home continues to study for the upcoming week of history, chemistry and literature. He is working on the history homework now which will prepare him for that exam, but it is the chemistry one that concerns him.

It is good to mingle with people when you can even if it is a little cycling in the heat. Can you take a cool shower when you return? I know doing such things for any length of time is quite hard for you and I am not suggesting that. Just do stuff for short intervals. Both the exercise and the meeting people help keep your brain healthier and the mental health stuff more manageable. 

What you are doing when you pull your eyelashes or eyebrows is self-harming. It is something that many people do who have harder forms of depression to manage. When I was especially ill, I scratched my arms slightly. It made me feel horrible, especially if I left any kind of mark. Training yourself not to do it is hard, but you can do it. One thing that therapists suggest is doing something else instead - as soon as you start doing it catch yourself and give yourself a hug instead. I know it sounds pretty stupid, but it is known to help. You can also try something like putting a rubber band on your wrist and holding it when you feel the urge to self-harm. For me, I gradually began to stop by praising myself for each day that I didn't do it and saying "tomorrow is a new day and I won't do it then" if I gave into the urge. You are pulling out more right now because you are stressed due to the move. Try focusing on doing things that care for yourself instead.

My special moment today was probably being able to purchase some small birthday gifts for my sister (some jewelry) and my niece (a small journal and pencils) and finding a box that was the right size to send them in. I have so much on my list this month that it was good to check something off.

Chores are really a very necessary part of life unluckily. Think about how bad your mom must feel when that is really all that she gets a chance to do. It explains in part why she gets upset at you all the time. So your job is to figure out how to do them with as much calmness as you can. Letting yourself get upset because you have to do them doesn't make them go any faster. Trust me. I am saying this as I look at tomorrow's laundry pile and try to figure out when I will find time to dust and clean the bathrooms this week with visitors coming this weekend.

By excitement with the move, I didn't mean joy. I meant stress and the rearranging of everything. It is something different and that is hard on the brain, especially one which has depression. So I hope that you can find more time to cry a bit when your mom gets home. But sometimes there isn't a way to make yourself cry. You have to wait for your brain to decide to do it.

You are feeling in part weak because you aren't getting enough water. I know that it breaks the cleaning routine but it is important that you care for yourself. Otherwise the chores will seem more overwhelming and you won't be able to get them done as quickly and easily. 

Do listen to the rain as often as you can. Unluckily rain in summer usually means that it will be hot and steamy afterwards, but enjoying the rain itself can make that heat more bearable. We are still waiting on the rain to start. So far all we have is the heat. They say maybe rain in another few days, but probably just to the north of us. Once our rainy season starts though, we should get intense downpours about once a day for 15-30 minutes. 

You got the history done - that is great. Focus on the homework before me. I can easily wait a week or even longer between messages. I have lots of other people that I answer too. You are right about homework being more of something that you can check off a list than chores. But that doesn't mean that chores aren't still praiseworthy. What would things look like if you hadn't done them? In many cases you would have double the work the next day.

As far as the hair pulling, if you are doing it every day then start to figure out how to limit it to a certain part of your body. Work on "no more eyebrows" for instance. You can pick a different body part each day to like. That isn't a problem. Just force yourself to pick one rather than just always focusing on what you don't like. You are retraining your brain.

Ok, on to as much of your second message as I can get to before I need to stop for the night.

I can see why your dad wants to make your house a home. That can be really important in terms of giving someone a sense of accomplishment. But your version of home is different than his. Having bare walls works well for you so that it is good for your room. Yes, I can imagine that he doesn't cook when your mom is home. To be honest, men get away with not doing as much in terms of helping around the house because women let them. They get to choose the chores that they want to do. You won't necessarily change your dad, but you can look for a partner later who is more willing to help with household things and recognizes how hard women work. My husband still doesn't do half the chores or anything but he does do the dishes and his own laundry. That is a massive blessing. 

Your mom is someone who you see all the time. Cups people and other friends are people you make a decision to see. Your mom you don't. So sometimes you will miss her and sometimes you won't.  That's okay no matter how you are feeling about it. I am sure part of you is relieved that she can now do more of the chores while you are simultaneously worried about getting yelled at. That is how it is with parents. 

You actually did a great job handling the wifi/electricity issue. You showed tons of ingenuity in keeping working at the problem until you had a temporary solution. I am impressed and I can imagine why your father was as well. Not giving up is critical. His happiness is what you should focus on rather than how long that happiness lasted. Remember how his brain works with his illness - happiness cannot last long. Actually it doesn't last long for most of us. But we are in charge of making those little moments of happiness as precious as we can. So be grateful for the kindness that you did get.

That is a good happiness moment. It can be very relaxing to be by yourself.

My son's car ended up not being seriously broken so it was all okay. I am doing okay with the other stuff as well. I got to see all three of my sons at the same time today with my husband. We shared a meal together and that was very special because it happens so rarely now. It was a day that made me smile.

So sorry that you have been sick. That is no fun. Glad to hear that you are feeling better today. Rest and drinking water helps even when your throat hurts.  My guess is that you are just too physically ill to cry at the moment.

I cleaned my house well for a few hours today in between grading and will do the same tomorrow. My youngest son graduates on Saturday so we have a bunch of relatives coming into town. If I am less active on Cups the next few days that is why. Today I did bathtubs, toilets, etc. It always feels nice when things are cleaner. Tomorrow I need to do my bedroom where my mother will be sleeping and iron a bunch of clothes for my son. That is in addition to grading several papers from my pile, attending someone's thesis defense, helping prepare for a big ceremony of honors graduates at my college, going to that ceremony, and going to a dinner at my son's school in honor of his graduation.

We did start to get our rains yesterday. Today there was a steady rain in the morning. It was steamy in the afternoon but pleasant this evening. Today the high was 29 but it will be up into the low 30s for the next few days. We will probably get some rain most days for the next few months until early September or so.

We seem to be on a good schedule in terms of communicating. We will both do our best. 

You are going to get the homework done slowly but surely if you keep at it. Go for variety - english, then some chemistry or math or physics. The more you mix things up the less overwhelmed or bored that you might feel. Avoid leaving one subject to the end. I hope that the book is a nice read. 

I am glad that you are back to your normal chores which feel more manageable. 

It is great that you aren't pulling from your eyebrows right now. Every little bit that you limit yourself is a step in a good direction.

Have a good rest. 

@bestVase7265 hey hey i couldnt get on here yesterday, i got a little carried away with some other things yesterday. but i'm here to reply today.

(responding to the second part of your message from monday)

haha yes, my father wants everything in the house to look perfect in his standards so as to have this feel like home to him. and he had pretty high standards obviously. plus as an engineer, he has the knowledge and tools to get everything exactly how he wants them to be, so yeah. umm he's not working on putting photo frames and stuff yet, those things are for decorative purposes only so he's kepy them for later, right now he's working on properly placing the tv speakers and stuff. it matters to him because he's considering using the tv now, but it doesn't really matter much to me or my mother. but yes, bare walls do work for me, so i wont let him do much in my room.

i think the fact that many men don't help with chores much could be because of what they are stereotypically expected to do. you know in olden times it was normal for females to sit at home and do all the household chores, and males go out and earn. now that's changing these days with women too going out to work but i guess men enjoyed it the way it used to be so they don't like chores. i mean my mother is a housewife, but she is one only because my father is unwilling to do any chores. he wont even make his own bed.

if fact my mother thinks and tells me that my father got married only to not have to do chores. you see, before my father got married he used to depend completely on his business partner's family for cooking and he did everything with that family, so they started to completely control my father's life and get him to do a lot for them and my father tolerated it for some time because the business was going well but when it started to not go very well, he had a lot of arguments with that family and he got rid of them from his life. now he hated to cook and manage stuff, and even though he lived alone he needed to do chores, right? and apparently from what i hear he tried to keep many maids but none of them stayed because of my father's rude behaviour. so yeah, he decided to find himself a wife who he could keep trapped. and my mother is exactly the kind of person he needed, someone with parents who were desperate to get her married and out of the house and parents who weren't nice to her and from him home state where he grew up, which if far away from where we live. that way my mother has nowhere to go and nothing to do once she's here with him. especially now since he's trapped her with me, a child. my mother cant possibly mange all chores herself (even if i help her) take care of me, and work to earn enough to free herself.

i know that's a pretty bad thing for my mother too, and i hate the fact that my maternal grandparents (especially grandmother) had so stereotypical beliefs and wanted to get her married and out of the house. because traditionally, a woman gets married and goes to the husband's house, and men stay with their parents even after getting married (doesn't happen much these days). i mean, my mother was earning and doing something, and they had such a problem with her just living there. because they wanted to get my uncle married and needed space in the house in my uncle got married for his wife to come live. they wouldn't let my uncle go anywhere else because they would need him to take care of them as they grew old, because according only men can take care of their old parents and women cant.

and of what use was all this is still don't know. because my uncle, who is 48, is still single and had always been. my grandparents tried desperately for their whole lives to find him a wife, but he didn't like any of them because he has too many specifications (and some of them make no sense, like the "she has to be fair skinned" one). also, my grandparents actually allowed him to choose and gave him some freedom. they gave none to my mother, she never got to say no even though her first impression on seeing my father wasn't good, she was forced to get married because my grandparents seemed to like my father. also, i really doubt that he actually took good care of my grandparents, i really don't think he did. and my mother thinks so too, and she thinks that if my grandfather would have been taken better care of, he might have lived longer. also, my uncle hated the responsibly to taking care of my grandparents, he constantly complained about it over the phone and asked my mother to come help him. that makes no sense, my mother has me and my father to deal with, she cant go somewhere a 30 hour train journey away to him take care of his parents. if he seriously didn't want to take that responsibility, be could have stood up for my mother when she was getting married.

anyway yeah, now that my grandparents have passed away, my uncle is all by himself in a 2 bhk, lol. he's got nothing much to do, just work, do his gardening hobby and spend time with one friend that he has, and annoy my mother over the phone. yet he still doesn't do chores. he has a maid for the dishes and brooming and mopping the floors. he does the laundry and cooking, and that's it. nothing else at all, from what my mother saw when she visited. he's also very lazy about the cooking. so for tomorrow's lunch and dinner, he will chop up all the vegetables from today night and keep them in the fridge. then get up and be done with cooking lunch and dinner (he has the same thing for lunch and dinner every day) and then make breakfast, then brush his teeth, have breakfast and then work. he works from home by the way and his schedule is quite flexible, so all that with the cooking is quite unnecessary. i wonder how he eats that kinda food every day. because from what i know, if you cop vegetables hours before cooking them, they do not tase good after cooked. oh, and some news by the way, he will be coming to visit us in july. and i am not looking forward to it. and he'll stay here for a week. i don't know how i'll manage. also, when my mother goes there, he makes her do chores there, so i wonder if he'll do chores when he comes here, lol!

umm i think i have really gone off topic very much here, so coming back, i agree that i cant change my father, nor man my mother change him. i can only hope that my mother's kind of story does not repeat with me, i know my mother wont want it to, but my father, i don't know. my father can be a very old fashioned person so i don't even know if when i grow up, if he's let me look for a partner or if he'll insist on an arranged marriage or worse, look for a partner himself and not let me say no. and who knows if i ever even will grow up, maybe i wont live long enough, and let's just hope i don't.

hmm anyway, yes, i get why i didn't miss my mother but i miss cups friends. it makes sense. lol, i am definitely relieved that i don't have to do so many chores anymore. i still do have to help her, but not do everything. but yes, i am getting yelled at, and a lot. it really hurts so much. yesterday and today were the most my mother has yelled at me after we moved. my mother was mostly keeping her voice down here because she doesn't want everyone to hear and she doesn't want to look like a horrible person. she tells me to keep my voice down too. i try to, but sometimes i fail. and she is definitely failing very badly.

well, that day with the wifi/electricity issue, i had given up. but something happened again and the ups was beeping so i had to get on the ladder to check. i also realised that it was impossible to reach my father and let him know that he needed to come home soon. and i figued i just couldn't survive for hours like that with no fans. so i just had to do something. so this is not something to be very impressed with. i agree that happiness doesn't last long for most of us though. but i don't think that most of us actually completely change our behaviour and attude towards a person just because they did something that impressed us. he does, and that is very short lived, that's what i'm talking about. i'm grateful for the kindness he did give me, but i wonder, do i always need to be able to to something to impress him to get some basic kindness? i don't think it works like that for most of us, we do treat people with some politeness even if they didn't do something to impress us.

it is surely nice to be alone at home though and i honestly kinda miss it now.

i am glad your son's car was not seriously broken, also glad that you're maganging okay with the other stuff. it's good to hear that you were able to share a meal with all your sons and your husband the other day, it sounds good. i think my good moment today was after mopping my room. i was so incredibly tired, but it was nice.

i'll stop here for today, it's really late, but i'm on here because i slept for 1 and a half hour in the afternoon and knew that i wouldn't fall asleep if i went to bed on time today, so i decided to stay up and type here. now that i'm feeling a little sleepier, i'll get going. i'll respond to your newer message tomorrow.

@bestVase7265 hi there, i'll try to reply to everything today, so let's start with your message from 2 days ago first.

i guess i am not really that sick now but i am not exactly doing physically well either. i was really sick on tuesday, wednesday was a lot better, thursday was mostly the same as wednesday i guess. but i have not been good since yesterday again. i think i was fine in the morning yesterday but in the afternoon/evening i was feeling awful. i was so exhausted and felt so weak and my head hurt. i had done a lot of work like dusting my room and mopping it, so i guess i was just really tired. i was also feeling kinda dizzy so i decided to lie down. and i thought my bed looked nice and i had taken a lot of efforts to make it look that way so i didn't want to lie on it just yet and thought i'd lay on the freshly mopped floor instead. so i lay down for a bit and then tried to get up but was too tired to. and i fell asleep like that.

i woke up about 30 mins later at 5:30 pm and was feeling awfully tired to do anything so i just moved to the bed. slept on for another hour and woke up to my mother's yelling. i guess i managed to get up and get some things done. i knew i had to sleep at night again and knew that there was no way i'd be able to do it just like that. so i exercised a bit in the evening to maybe be able to sleep again at night. but i realised that i still didn't feel like i'd fall asleep if i went to bed at 12:30 am. so i decided to stay up cupsing. and ended up going to bed at almost 2 am. still struggled to fall asleep, but somehow managed a little while later. and i am quite tired and not feeling good today. i hope i can get through the day without sleeping though, so maybe i can go to bed early tonight and get some rest and maybe feel better tomorrow.

i'm glad you've been able to get some cleaning done in between the grading. cleaning bathrooms isn't exactly fun, but glad you managed to get it done. i hope cleaning you bedroom and ironing the clothes went fine. what is it like for yo to have your mother sleep in your bedroom? are you both sleeping there fine or have you by some chance have had to go sleep somewhere else? how many relatives will you really have staying in your house? woah, cleaning in addition to grading, preparing a ceremony and attending a bunch of stuff, that sounds like a whole lot of work for you. how're you managing? and are you getting any time at all for yourself?

i'm glad you got some rain the other day, also that the evening was pleasant after a steamy afternoon which was surely not very fun. wow, a high of 29°C sounds very nice to me, low 30s sound good too. but i understand that what temperature is nice for me might not be for you. it really all depends on what our bodies are used to and what kinda climate we live in. for me, a high of 29 would be the best thing in the world, because that only happens on the few very cold days in winter. but in your area that might be more summerish temperature, so i understand if it's not the most pleasant for you. oog how do you feel about getting rain on most days for the next few months? do you like rain?

yes, i'm trying to get the homework done. i'm trying to do it by aiming for something specific for each day. today it's 10 question answers for chemistry and the first chapter of the book for the english project. i haven't really started the book yet, but hopefully i will start today. starting is the hard part, because usually when i start reading a book i am quick to finish it. it's actually the first sherlock holmes novel that i've decided to read because my mother had them with her and she thinks i'll like the story. the book as been with her from when she was in school, so the pages are all yellow hehe. and we don't really have a lot of books at home, i have harry potter but i didn't want to take that for this activity because half the class might do harry potter and i don't want to be part of that. i think doing something that not all your classmates are doing makes your project different and less boring and you don't need to put in too much effort to get marks. plus the teacher already suggested harry potter so many people might take it up. i wonder if many people read sherlock holmes these days though, a few people might but certainly not half the class.

yeah, being back to my normal chores feels so much more manageable hehe. it might still be tiring but it is better than having to handle the whole house.

i think i am managing to not pull from my eyebrows. i did give in with my eyelashes yesterday though and they arent looking good at all. hopefully they'll grow a bit soon.  i want them to look better by when we're in school again...

ooh, seeing some pretty clouds sounds like a nice good moment you had the other day. i don't know if i've had one yet today, it's just about 1 pm so not a lot of good has happened yet. i'll send this post across right now and get back to your newer message later today, so i'll try and include a good moment there. i'll be showering soon and then having lunch (and my father is home for lunch today which is not nice, but yeah) and then trying to study and read a bit. then i'll be back on cups in the evening today.

Sorry that I missed a day.

Sleeping and schedules can be really tough during school breaks. Hopefully you will find a way to feel better soon.

I managed to survive my son's graduation just fine and did okay at today's school graduation as well. For my son, it was just my mom staying at the house and I was able to sleep where my husband usually does while he slept on the couch. No one slept well but we survived. For both graduations I had to get up before 6 am, so I am tired tonight. For my son, we had 15 people in attendance and then at the house for a party afterwards. It was intense, but people get along well so it was good. Today's ceremony was outside under a tent in velvet robes with temperatures in the upper 20s. But I managed to score a spot by one of the giant fans. That was very much my victory for the day though my hair was a disaster afterwards.

I love Sherlock Holmes. It is a great series of adventures. That will be a good one to read for you. You are right that it will be a little less popular than Harry Potter but still lots of fun. The key is that it will start a little slow and then build up. You will always be surprised somewhat in the end because Sherlock is seeing things that you just miss as you read it the first time. There are also some great Sherlock Holmes things that you can watch. A more modern one is Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch. He is really awesome.

It is great that you have managed to stop pulling your eyebrows! Great job. Keep that up and work towards the eyelashes. I am sure that you can do it. Keep trying and praising yourself. 

In terms of chores, what I meant was is as you get older standing up for yourself. I don't mean telling your dad that you won't do a certain task. What I mean is telling other men in your life that you believe in better division of chores. I know when I was younger, people insisted that I would end up doing all of the laundry and ironing. When I met my husband, we agreed he would do all of his own laundry and ironing. We have kept to that. I did my kid's stuff when they were younger but now they do all of their own clothing. So think in terms of as many little things that you can do like that. 

You can blame lots of relatives for your mom's situation, but you can't blame you. All you did was be born. You don't cause her any more stress than any other child would. The marriage had already happened. There was tons wrong there before you were even around. She may see you as the culmination of all that went wrong, but she knows deep inside that she is wrong. You are a beautiful person who enriches her life. She knows this but doesn't know how to say it. She also wants to protect you from what happened to her. That is why she gets so upset. She is trying to break the cycle of toxic men who don't do anything by raising you to be strong. 

You aren't being lazy in not dying. You are being stronger. Lazy is to not fight the battle for life and to give into the depression and the bad thoughts that your brain sends you. You are a warrior. 

I doubt that your uncle likes the way he is living. He is uncomfortable in terms of his living space and know that people don't want to be around him. No one really wants to be in that spot. You are never content if you cannot care for others. You are right to worry that he might enter your space. I would tell your mom your concerns beforehand. She might not be able to prevent it, but she can be on the lookout for it. She won't want that to happen either. Maybe she can help you to come up with a plan. 

Okay, I need to stop for tonight because I have gone well over my time limit. I will try to catch up tomorrow.

@bestVase7265 hey, dont worrry about missing a day, it's okay. you've had so much going on, so it's totally okay. can i ask you if you've been getting any time for yourself lately?

yep, sleep is quite hard to be honest. every single day i'm trying to go to bed before 12:30 am and i'm failing every day. sometimes by an hour and a half, sometimes by 25 mins. but i have never been able to go to bed on time. plus to be honest i have also not been getting much homework done. i'm writing this in the morning right now. i'll try doing something a bit different to try to get some homework and reading done. let's see how it goes. because there is seriously a lot for me to get done.

you got through the graduations fine and that sounds good. ah, i get that no one was able to sleep well while your mom stayed. and also, if you had to be getting up before 6, you probably didn't get much sleep either. that must be really very tiring. i'm glad you were able to sit under a giant fan during the ceremony at your uni. but yeah, the fan made your hair fly around and get all messy and tangled. that's quite annoying honestly, but getting drenched in sweat isn't fun either.

that sounds great. i think i started reading a few pages but i forgot something important. the teacher needs us to list down all the new words we've come across, and i forgot to underline those as i read. so i need to start again with a pencil ready to underline. and honestly speaking, that is not fun. when you're reading a story it's much better to just read on even if you don't know the meaning of some word, for me at least. i usually figure out the meaning when i read the whole paragraph. and even if i don't, i move on and figure it out somehow by the end of the story, and even if i don't, i don't care. as long as i understand the basic story. i only look things up if not knowing the meaning of a certain word is seriously messing up my understanding. but now i need to underline every word i don't know the meaning of so i can find out and write it for the teacher. i feel like this is going to suck out all the fun of the story. it feels like a very boring task now. plus we have to summarise the full story.

well, i haven't completely stopped pulling my eyebrows. i still pull a bit sometimes, though not so much. and on sunday i think, i pulled out a lot of my eyelashes. for some reason when i try to pull lashes from my left eye, they get pulled out so easily. but they don't get pulled out easily on my right eye. i have no idea why. but yeah, now i have more eyelashes on one eye and a lot less on the other. i'm kinda just really hoping i can stop and let them grow out. i managed to pull out none yesterday and haven't pulled today so far so i guess that's good. maybe i pulled none on monday too, i don't really remember.

hmm got it about the chores. it's really nice knowing that even though people thought you'd end up doing everything yourself, you and your husband were able to agree to him doing his laundry himself. i'm glad you've been able to keep to it.

ah okay so i think you see it as, if i wouldn't have been born, some other child would have. but not sure if i can say that i haven't caused her more stress than any other child. my mother often tells me that no other child in the world causes their mother as much pain as i cause her. not sure how true that is, because obviously, she hasn't gone to see the pain every child on earth causes their mother. but surely i cause her more pain than some other children. because it's not like i always listen to her and am very nice to her. surely there are more obedient and nicer children. maybe if i wasn't born, some other more obedient child would have. and that kid would have caused my mother a lot less pain.

can i ask you why you think that i am "a beautiful person who enriches her life"? and she wants to protect me from what happened to her? a lot of stuff happened to her, so what of that does she want to protect me from? also why does her wanting to protect me make her upset? i also didn't understand what you meant by " She is trying to break the cycle of toxic men who don't do anything by raising you to be strong." exactly what cycle is she trying to break, and how is she raising me to be strong?

well, i guess you might be right that i'm not lazy by not dying. but i think i am living because i cant figure out what to write, how to write and how to actually say goodbye, and i'm too lazy to figure it out. whatever, my brain isn't working well right now so i don't think any of what i'm saying is making sense. i dunno, actually giving in to the bad thoughts also needs effort. maybe not generally speaking, but if you've promised yourself that you'll write a ten page long goodbye letter before to go, then it take a ton of effort. and that's too much for me when i am actually struggling a lot. it's easier when you're not struggling, but why'd you write a goodbye letter if you're not really struggling at that point? so i feel like that promise to myself is keeping me going. in a way i am glad i made that promise. in another way i regret it. i dunno how to feel about it. just so you know, since march, i've been thinking that 24/05/2024 would be the day i'd go. but now that there's just two days for it, i know it's not gonna happen because i'll never be able to finish writing so much. plus i wont be home tomorrow all day so no way could i manage to write all that. i think the fact that we're going for a trip tomorrow is very good, it'll keep me distracted. and if it happens to be fun, it might also make my life feel more worth living.

i think yeah, my uncle might not really like the way he's living. not sure what you mean by him being uncomfortable in terms of living space, but i agree about people not linking to be around him much. only very few people are actually okay with him, the rest just talk to him for the sake of it. to be honest he's mostly cut off most relatives out of his life by being rude to them. and that also affects my mother because those relatives get back at my mother for her brother's behaviour. doesn't make sense because my uncle isn't in my mother's control or whatever, but that's what people do.

umm i will tell my mother about my concerns of him coming in my room and exploring everything. i actually already kinda told her and she just jokingly said that we could put a not entry sign on my door. like how's that gonna stop him, but whatever. i hope we can do something.

i think i'm gonna go now, i'll reply to your other two messages later today. by the way, if you're wondering why lately i am getting back to some in the morning or around noon and doing the rest later, it's because coming on here early in the day makes me feel better. but normally when i come early and don't finish, i keep it saved in my notes and come back in the evening. but with that i've noticed that i tend to re-read my message again to make it more like i've written it in one go and like it includes the incidents of the day. and i spend a lot of time on that. so it's just better for me to type it and send it immediately after. that way i don't feel like i need to change what i originally type in order to make it sound more continuous. i can just make another new post at the end of the day which covers any incidents of the day and good moments and stuff.

Ok, I am going to try to get to at least some of this, but I don't think I am going to be able to finish again. My semester will be over completely in another day or so and then I will have more time. But the 9-5 workshop yesterday, today and tomorrow is very draining. 

I am glad that you are attempting to rearrange your schedule to find more time for homework. That will be pretty critical as your holidays begin to wind down and you have to go back to school. Sherlock Holmes is going to have more unknown words. But I would probably do just a quick underline right now of unknown words so you can keep reading. Go back at the end to do the vocabulary part. That way the story itself will remain exciting. Which one are you reading?

Every day that you succeed in pulling nothing allows the hairs to grow back. So keep up the good work on that front! You can do it. I believe in you.

I would disagree with your mom's assessment of you causing her more stress. What is interesting is that you can logically see that - she hasn't had any other kid to test that on so how could she possibly know? But I disagree that there are necessarily children that listen more or more obedient. The age that you are right now is when you are figuring yourself out and so kids naturally listen a bit less. All children are disobedient in different ways. That is very true of my own sons. There are no perfect ones. All kids cause their parents some stress and anguish. The problem isn't you. It is your mom having expectations that aren't attainable. 

You enrich the world by being here so you enrich your mom too. Think about that moment you told me about her showing you the peacock. If you hadn't been there, she would have had no one to share her momentary wonder with. So even in very little ways, you bring her joy.  I still do think that she doesn't want what happened to her to happen to you. It is what you naturally want for your children. Her stress over seeing that path as one you could go down causes her to yell. She has tons of conflicting emotions that she doesn't process particularly well. She thinks she is raising you to be stronger by getting you to do your homework, know how to keep a clean house, etc. 

Your life is very much worth living and you are figuring out a path forward. Yes, it is really tough but that shows your strength and bravery. It is a battle you are fighting. Writing goodbye letters puts you in a much worse spot and makes you more ill mentally. I would avoid it at all costs. It will bring you NO peace, only pain. Focus on the small moments of joy. You are finding them. The possibility of fun is always there.

Ok, I need to stop for tonight, but I hope to finish answering tomorrow.