Working On Us – music.

Hi guys! 🙂

It’s week #9 of Beckie’s Working On Us prompts at

Beckie’s Mental Mess

and this week’s topic is music.

Because I already share loads of music with you as part of my song of the day series, and all of it is music I like that has some sort of a beneficial effect on me, this time I decided I’ll only participate in prompt #1.

 

• Have you ever received music therapy as part of your treatment?  If so, what kind of music was introduced to you? – Maybe not exactly as part of my treatment as such, but there was music therapy at the boarding school for the blind where I was going to, and I did take part in it for some years. Back then I had already a lot of emotional/mental health issues but I only sort of knew that “something’s wrong” and nothing more specific, I didn’t want to know even in a way, and some people in my surroundings also knew about it to some extend, at least what was obvious and visible. I liked music therapy a lot. As far as I can remember, we mostly listened to classical music, some soundtracks or electronic music, but we had some other music too. What I – and all the others who participated – loved the most were relaxations. We’d listen to relaxing music and the music therapist read some guided imagery to us. You could follow it, or just let your mind wander, or not think about anything, or fall asleep, just relax. I was struggling with stuff like racing thoughts at that time and didn’t sleep much at all so that could sometimes be very very helpful. And I loved the sort of exercises when we were listening to a piece of music and had to imagine some sort of situation that it would fit to, or what it represents.
• Do you listen to music ( if/when) you meditate?  If so, what kind of music do you listen to? – I don’t meditate a lot actually. We’ve recently started to do some Christian meditation – me and my Mum, usually once a month – but I’m not particularly good at meditation, I have real trouble with shutting up my mind and focusing on just one thing at a time. If we do that, we usually don’t listen to music. But, also quite recently, I’ve noticed that my generalised anxiety has worsened which makes some things more difficult for me, like settling down for sleep, I’ve been overthinking and ruminating more since a few months and I still have yet to discover what’s the exact reason if there is any. Anyways, because of that, I started doing some more visualisations and imageries, especially before sleep, as a way to relax and soothe my brain. I’ve always liked that but now as my anxiety has sort of relapsed, I think I should do it more often. And when I do it, I do listen to music. It’s usually some sort of calming, instrumental music, for relaxation and meditation, though I try to be aware of what I’m listening to as much as I can and not listen to new age-y stuff. Also gentle, calm folk is good, or electronic but not too electrified music. I love harp, especially Celtic harp and especially solo, but almost any type of harp will do to me, and I find this instrument extremely soothing. Also Enya’s music calms me a lot. Sometimes I will just listen to nature sounds or such but usually I need a bit more to create some sort of fuller relaxing image in my mind based on the music I’m listening to.
• If you have never tried music therapy as a treatment, what types of music calm and/or mellow you? – Apart from what I’ve mentioned, it’d be all my music crushes, who always fascinate me, inspire me and are sort of like antidotes for all sorts of negative things, not always necessarily their music calms me down but always gives me positive vibes. Other music I find calming is acoustic pop, some indie, maybe chillout and such but not too jazzy, psychedelic rock/folk, lighter alternative rock…
  • • Do you believe music helps everyone and there is really no use for therapy in this regard? – I do believe that music helps everyone, it can help immensely, but it doesn’t mean that music doesn’t have additional therapeutic values which can be used when they are needed, and I believe that it’s beneficial effects are even more pronounced in people with mental illness or mental health issues, even other sorts of chronic illnesses or disabilities. And music has that quality that it helps to release emotions, or express them, you don’t have to be the one who creates the music to be able to express yourself through it, I believe. I think there aren’t many other ways that would be as universally effective in this, and people with mental illness often struggle with releasing their emotions in healthy ways, and that’s why I think it’s mostly so therapeutic for us.

Question of the day.

Hi hi guys! 🙂

Today I have the following question for you:

Who taught you to go grocery shopping?

My answer:

I don’t think anyone taught me to do that specifically, like “Come on, I’ll teach you how to do grocery shopping”. I often assisted either of my parents when they were doing the grocery shopping when I was a small child, and actually throughout my childhood and adolescence when I was home for longer. I believe we must have had some learning to grocery shop at the boarding school, or maybe I had that at any of the independent living skills classes when I was little, but I can’t remember anything like that at the moment. Then when I got my debit card and all that my Mum taught me how to use it and showed me in more detail how to do shopping at a grocery store. On a daily basis, I hardly ever need any special grocery items just for myself, and it’s usually my Dad or Mum who does groceries for all of us including Olek and me, but if I do need something extra, I either tell them or get it online. When I’m in need of larger shopping, I do it normally online too, or if there is an opportunity or I’d rather get something physically and see in what condition it is or need something from a local shop we do it together with Mum. But while I’m pretty confident with it at the moment when she’s assisting me, I wouldn’t be able to do it by myself.

You? 🙂

Question of the day.

Hey people! 🙂

Here’s today’s question for you from me. 🙂

Who taught you to write a CV/resume?

My answer:

I had classes at my last school, don’t know in which other countries something like this exists and how you call it but we in Poland call it a bit pompously basics of entrepreneurship, I guess I had it for two or perhaps three years, I don’t even remember now, anyway you learn different things to do with economy, business, having your own business, employment, just all sorts of things to do with entrepreneurship. And I remember very vaguely we were learning to write CV during those classes too. But, actually, by the time we had that writing a CV thing in our syllabus, I was already learning largely by myself, that is, many of my teachers seemed awfully scared of contracting blindness from me I guess, some were actually treating me like an air, which wasn’t making things easier for me with the anxiety and communication difficulties, one seemed actually even more sociophobic than me, or rather Emiliophobic, as his social phobia would only come up in contact with me and he was like almost literally tip-toeing around me as if he thought I’ll kill him if he’ll make me angry, 😀 and that attitude was really making me very pissed off whenever I saw him. Oh and he was scared of my Mum like hell too. Besides, the vast majority of them were using slideshows a lot or other things that weren’t really accessible for me. So at some point I just came up with an idea that I will teach myself and they’ll send me what they’re doing, the topics of control assignments and such and I’ll be sending the assignments to them and coming to exams. And they very happily agreed to it, as my Mum said it, with great relief, especially my poor Emiphobic history teacher. But that was relief to me too as you can imagine given the above circumstances, even though I did have some really awesome teachers there too. So, going back to that CV thing, I was supposed to tackle this on my own, which was tricky as I had no idea about CV’s whatsoever, those things still confuse me a lot. So I asked my Dad for help, as he’s had a lot of experience, and, practically, it was him who taught me that. But, actually, even though it’s been maybe three years since then, I doubt I’d be able to write a serious CV applying for job without any guidance. I still find all those things rather confusing. But I do have the basic idea at least of what it should be like, haha.

How was it with you? 🙂

Everyone’s coming and going, but I can’t. :(

Hhrrru? 😻

It’s Misha and I’m sad. I like being alone, but not lonely. And in last couple of weeks I’ve been feeling lonely a lot. I so hope it will end soon, or that I will be able to have some adventures too. The peeps are having them all the time! Everyone’s coming and going somewhere all the time. Last week, I haven’t seen Zofijka almost at all. And then suddenly everyone was gone, I only saw Olek a few times and he gave me some food, but only very little, not as much as Mum or Mila gives me, I guess he doesn’t know how much I eat. I was so terribly bored. Then they came back – that is Mum, Dad and Mila – and were very happy to see me but the next day when I woke up Mum and Dad weren’t there again, so I guess it was just pretended. I hate lying people. I never lie! It’s only people that do it, and that’s why, while I love my peeps, I also think humans are the worst and strangest species in the world. I wish they were felines like me, at least they wouldn’t be so cocky all the time. But I was a brave Misha and I didn’t cry, and at least then Mila was with me so I spent a lot of time with her, and I had a lot of treats. But I felt very sad and a bit rejected anyway, because they could go anywhere they wanted and I can’t even leave the house for a minute because then there’s one big drama. The next day Zofijka came, but this week still they are almost constantly out of the house. I guess that’s what they call holidays. So why can’t I have my holidays too? I really hope those holidays will end soon, or that they will take me at least on the terrace so I can smell the fresh air. I love the smell of fresh air, do you? And I love the smell of flowers. I only dislike the smell of other cats, and sometimes I can feel it when they do let me out for a little while.

Have you been on holidays, pets and peeps? Or if you pets aren’t going anywhere like me, how do you deal with it? Are you sad about it or is it normal for you and you don’t care, or perhaps you even like it this way? What do you do when your peeps leave you?

It’s so very sunny today, I would really like to go out. Maybe if I’ll go for a walk around the house and cry long enough at ever window I’ll piss them off enough to let me out. Mum and Dad have just come back from wherever they were. I’ve heard that even Jocky decided to go on holidays and ran away. (sigh) The world is so unfair! Just wait until the Feline Era comes!

Mishpurrs. 🙂

Misha 💜 💚 💙

Question of the day.

Hi people! 🙂

My question for you today is:

Who taught you to style your hair, or take care of your hair?

My answer:

I am pretty sure it must have been my Mum who taught me the basic things, like brushing and washing my hair, using the conditioners and such. But I can’t really style my hair. Also, my current hairstyle doesn’t really require much styling. Which I am happy about, as I myself am not into that and find a waste of time, and hate when people are playing around with my hair, I don’t understand how some people can even love it! 😀

How about you? 🙂

Question of the day.

Hi guys. 🙂

Here’s my question for you for today, a girly one:

Who taught you to apply makeup?

My answer:

I can’t really apply makeup, and I can’t say I care. I hardly ever wear makeup anyway, and I don’t think it would change a lot if I knew how to do it. Zofijka tried to teach me, she’s only 12 but has been an expert in such things since many years, but that didn’t really work out. When I was younger, maybe 15 or so, figuring out such things, I asked my Mum to teach me how to do it, not as much because I wanted, but more because I considered it sort of necessary, it felt to me like all women do this so I probably should too, that it would be kind of awkward if I wouldn’t. But since my Mum knew I’m not normally into that sort of things she asked me “Do you seriously want it?” and I said no, but I guess I should know, she was like: “No, why?”, and, yeah, I actually realised I don’t need it at all. If I do want/need some makeup, I can ask Zofijka, her style is quite different but she likes to be treated as an expert, or I can ask Mum, or go to a makeup artist. I’m allergic to loads of makeup products anyway and so I look quite spectacularly awful after applying them, and my skin feels even worse than it looks. 😀

How was it with you? 🙂

If We Were Having Coffee… a midweek coffee share.

Anyone up for a cuppa coffee at 9 PM? Or probably it will be even later by the time I finish this post. But perhaps it’s earlier where you are so if you want a coffee, grab a cup of it and join in. Or drink whatever you feel like. I can offer you a coffee, or an iced coffee, green tea, black tea, some herbal teas, or raspberry tea, kefir, Pepsi, or water. Or you can bring something yourself so that it’ll be more diverse.

I have a lot of snacks this time that I can share with you, I’ve made a big big shopping last week, thinking I’ll be alone for a week so will need a lot of yummy stuff to munch on. A lot of sweets, like biscuits, chocolate, some hard candy, gummybears, lots of stuff that it’ll probably take me weeks or months to deal with myself so I’ll need people to help me out! But you can still bring in your own food. We don’t have much serious food here right now, no yummy dishes or anything like that, as Mum is the one who cooks those and she’s just come back from my uncle’s funeral, but I’ve also stocked the house with instant soups, pasta sauces and all sorts of cereal and yoghurts and such.

I won’t be eating anything this time, actually I only ate a little today, a late breakfast and some cookies with Zofijka, I feel kinda weird physically and don’t even have an idea why, I’m tired and a bit nauseous and lousy and I felt like not doing this coffee share today, but I need to catch up with you and tell you about an idea I had, so I don’t want to delay it all the time.

So, grab something you feel like drinking and eating, find yourself a cosy and comfy place to sit, and let’s start our coffee share properly.

If we were having coffee I’d ask all of you how are you doing and how has the last week and this week so far been for you?… 🙂

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that I was on a very unexpected trip to Masuria last week. my Dad just got kind of a suden idea that he’d like to go to Masuria because he’s on holidays for over two weeks now. Masuria is a sort of go-to, traditional place for some longer holidays for us. My Mum has family there, and my Dad is very much into WWII stuff so there’s a lot to explore for him. The food is heavenly there, and so are the views and just the general atmosphere. We didn’t have much time to spend there, as they were supposed to go on another trip with my Mum’s family to the Bieszczady mountains, so we left on… Thursday, I guess, and were meant to go back home on Saturday if not earlier. We didn’t do much there though, because the plans regarding their other trip were changing constantly, and my Dad got cross about it, so in the end we were home on Friday early evening. Still, I mostly liked the trip, despite my Dad’s constant irritability getting on my nerves and my own moods shifting quite a bit which was difficult to contain but I think I succeeded at it very much. It helped me to sort of get away from my anxieties, clear my mind a little, and, while the depression was still echoing somewhere in the background, my anxiety and rumination had significantly lessened while I was away, which was actually surprising, normally I’m one big nervous wreck when travelling for longer than a day and sleeping in a stranger place and all.

We went to one small town called Mikołajki and were just wandering aimlessly around it, I bought myself a cat figurine made of porcelain, it’s blue, as in the Russian blue Misha. 😀 Oh yeah and I mised Misha terribly! I guess I’ll always have that messed up in my brain, when longing for someone, it feels like I’m never going to see them anymore or will have to lose them again very soon, it feels much more of a loss than it is, no matter what I tell myself, no matter that I know I’ll see Misha in 2 days, which is ridiculously short, it’s so stupid and shitty, I hate it. My Dad really wanted to take a ship there, around the lake in Mikołajki, but I flat out refused because it was very windy and I was afraid my vestibular system won’t cooperate, so he was enraged, but couldn’t have any discussion with me. The next day Mum wanted to go somewhere by ship, and it wasn’t that windy so I gritted my teeth and said OK, but to my surprise Dad said we don’t have to and he doesn’t want to force me. Not quite like him, but while I would deal with that, after all we’ve sailed to Sweden and such and I dealt with it, I was happy I didn’t have to go through it again without a sound reason. 😀

After we’ve seen almost the entire Mikołajki, we went to Ełk where we very supposed to sleep, but my Dad – always planning ahead and even a bit stiff – went all wild and spontaneous this time and hadn’t booked us a place anywhere. He doesn’t have a debit/credit card, I left mine at home and Mum was almost skint so couldn’t pay for us, while all the online booking stuff only accepts cards obviously. So he was all raging, until we finally found a hotel that he could plain phone and pay them directly with cash. 😀 I was starting to think that we might end up going back home at night, so fumin he was.

I had really weird, like really weird and rather creepy dreams, some in a cool creepy way and very creative, one was gloomy-creepy and even more odd, and involved me having ECT. Only that if ECT really looked like that… it was even worse than in “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest”. I don’t know what I had that for, was it depression or whatever, I just know I was seeing a very authoritarian doctor there who said something is definitely very wrong with my brain and I need ECT to get it working properly, he was the kind of person who knows everything about you before you even get a chance to say anything. It was a really gloomy and awfully depressing hospital, I felt sick just being there, and I guess it was quite a long distance from my home, because when he announced to me that I’d have to come there I guess every month me and my Mum were very unsatisfied. He first wanted me to sit there and wait for my turn while there were like a dozen of odd, metal beds with people on them, who had all something wrong with their brains, they had some stuff connected to their brains, I don’t know, wires or electrodes or whatever it was, something was beeping all the time like in a trashy medical thriller movie, the doctors were doing something to their brains, like manipulating with them with their hands, they were bound to their beds, and they had awful, like horrible, horrifying seizures, it looked gross, heart-wrenching and creepy and their dignity was taken away from them. I guess they weren’t unconscious but in some altered state of consciousness. And then I had all that stuff too, only that I didn’t have the seizures, instead I felt awful and woke up with no memory. And I know I talked with some of those people who were there, one of them was very much like my friend Jacek from Helsinki, and he told me he’s been having that for 5 years every month and he feels less and less like himself and that I should run away from there. I came back home and my whole extended family came to me to wish me speedy recovery but I didn’t even care about anything and it felt really strenuous to think. And then slowly, life would just go back to normal, and as soon as I’d start regaining my colourful brain, feeling OK, getting back my memories and was less scared of what happened, it was time to go back to that prick. It was weird that I couldn’t even just refuse, everyone was saying I have to, they were very sad about it but were saying it will help me in the end. I often have dreams when people force me to do things and no matter how hard I refuse or fight, or how diplomatically I’d try to persuade them out of it, they have to have it their way. I wonder does that mean something? 😀 So yeah, that was my dream, in a nutshell, I was going back and forth from there and seeing all those people and having it done to myself and recovering, until finally when I came there and he put me on the bed I just woke up. First I was creeped out and wondered why the hell I had such a gross dream, and it haunted me for a while, but then I started laughing at how creative my brain is. Guess I really could write thrillers based on my dreams, only I don’t like thrillers! 😀 Would like to have a talk with my brain and ask it where it got it from, during your average jolly family trip. Maybe something was wrong with that hotel! 😀

Anyway, as I told you, the next day we had to go back home, but before we did that, we visited Augustów and I had the yummiest iced latte there. And both on our way to Masuria and back home we stopped for a dinner in a lovely restaurant where I had absolutely scrumptious pierogi. Apart from my Mum’s and perhaps my grandma’s, I don’t think I’ve eaten better. Not in a restaurant for sure, and most often we eat frozen which are rather dull, so it was a great surprise! But pierogi in Masuria usually tend to be very good. So as I said my parents were supposed to go for another trip on Sunday, and they did, but had to go back, because my uncle died that same day from cancer. They normally probably wouldn’t go back, but grandma was going with them and she wanted to take part in the funeral. Coincidentally, my uncle lived in Masuria, so yesterday in the morning my family were heading back there and have just come back. I was at home with Zofijka and Misha, and Olek, but Olek’s mostly at work. For those of you who read my “Some Random Questions” post, if you’re curious, no, our house didn’t catch fire, Misha didn’t choke and Zofijka didn’t bring a norovirus home from her swimming camp, although I’m feeling really interestingly today so actually who knows… (no, brain, don’t think about that now!), instead, Zofijka came home sobbing hysterically, but didn’t want to talk so I asked Mum as for how I should handle it and Mum said I should ignore it and that means she really enjoyed the camp… Yeah, I see… No, seriously, I get it. There’s a whole long school year until another camp. I hated camps but still, I know the feeling. She’s better now, and has been out with her mates for most of the day. But my parents are going for another trip yet (my Dad’s determination to challenge the  fate is pretty admirable) only not to Bieszczady but somewhere nearer, so hopefully the smaller distance will help in making it a success finally. 😀

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that Misha is being really sweet to me lately, which helps me a lot every day. I suspect it’s my little secret bottle of Mish ice cream (his favourite thick sauce) that I’ve got that made him feel so amicably towards me. Those sauces come in little tubes, so you squeeze them out and if we want to have fun Misha can lick it like ice-cream, but it gets messy and I don’t wfind those tubes very user-friendly. So Mum came up with an idea that for the time when they’ll be away she’ll put a few sauces into a bottle so I’ll have it easier to give it to him and dose properly, it’s like an oil bottle. The thing is you of course have to store those sauces in the fridge, or at least in a dark place, so I had to use up that bottle quick. I used up most of it, but sadly, some of the sauce had turned sour, I was afraid not to overfeed him. I still have his normal snacks, but the sauce effect hasn’t worn out yet and Misha graciously spends most of his very precious time with me and sleeps in his bed next to me at night, as well as has his longest day nap always here. It’s really so lovely! 🙂

If we were having coffee, I’d share my idea with you, which I think is great, but I need your feedback, as it has to do with my blog and with you as my readers! I’ve been thinking about it loads and it’s not a very new idea, but, as is most often the case with me, I needed to thoroughly think it through. The idea is such – I’ve been thinking about doing something like a yearly My Inner MishMash reader award – don’t know what its actual name could be yet but that’s a secondary thing. – There are tons of awards in the blogosphere, some people like them and find them nice, for some they’re annoying, so I wasn’t thinking a blog award, like write a post and nominate people etc. Especially that, as far as I am aware, those awards tend to be connected with badges, or other banners or pics, as a way to emphasise and show that someone’s blog has been awarded and I have no idea about that. My idea is more about expressing my gratitude to my readers, having fun blogging, and just connecting with people in a fun way, and also it’d be like a small giveaway. Every year, I would pick three readers of My Inner MishMash that I think have been most involved, that come here regularly, comment etc. and that I feel particularly grateful for having them around. That would be based on my own judgment and feelings, but also on the comments stats. Then I would send out small packages to those folks, with mini things like some typically Polish yummies, T-Shirts with Misha, Mish-themed Christmas cards (as that would be sometime around Christmas and New Year) and such, I’m open for suggestions here. I’d also make an official post announcing the “winners” (although it’s not about winning and losing, obviously I’m grateful for all my engaged/reglar readers who enjoy being here at My Inner MishMash, whether you comment a lot or just read my posts, but I can’t send gratitude packages to all of you every year 😀 ). Or maybe that post would go before I’d send the packages, and it could have a bit of an award form, that part needs deeper thinking. But what I need most at the moment is for you to say what you think, if you like the idea, are you up for it? Any ideas for a name for this invention? Right now I’m considering My Inner Mishmash Involvement Award (MIMIA) or My Inner MishMash Readership Award (MIMRA), it’s not really an award but it looks better in the acronyms than giveaway, but that feels a little stiff, or maybe it’s just me. My other idea is just simple EMisha’s Christmas Mini Care Package. Yeah, could use some feedback… I love baby names, but titles and such aren’t my ground as much.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I’m getting lots of new equipment soon! I’m happy not happy. I’ve got the maximum funding for my new Braille-Sense and Plextalk, so I really don’t have to pay much myself compared with the original price especially of Braille-Sense, which is good. I also decided to get a new computer, the one I have right now is about 5 and just seems to feel like retiring soon. My current computer is a laptop, but the one I’m going to get is a desktop, simply because it seems more logical for me, I almost only use my laptop in my room anyway. I’m happy because the change is really needed, especially re Braille-Sense, which is a geriatric, but I’m not happy and all anxious and fidgety because I hate hate hate changes and seem to have some internal problem with tech stuff and changing it, arrrghhhh. It’s not because of the sentiment, I just hate change, I’m afraid something will go wrong, or I won’t be able to transition and adjust, I won’t learn to handle the different things, which is quite unlikely. I guess I’d never had that strong anxiety with tech related transitions before, I guess before most of them I was very happy most of all, I don’t like the intensity of it at all. I’m gonna have my new stuff in the end of August.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that, although I’m not sleepy, because I woke up at about 11:30 AM today, I feel very tired for some reason and kind of weird so I’m going to bed soon.

What would you tell me if we were having coffee? 🙂

 

Question of the day.

Who taught you to read?

My answer:

Since despite multiple attempts and good will my parents have never learnt Braille, moreover, doubted I’ll be able to learn it when I was little, I learnt to read at school, as I think the vast majority of blind people would. In spite their doubts, it really didn’t take me that much time to master it. I didn’t like reading at the beginning, but once I’ve become more fluent at it I grew to love it and my teacher was actually saying I read way too quickly and too much (no idea where the boundary between enough and too much lies in this case 😀 ). Nevertheless, when she found out that I feel slightly bored with the stuff we had to read at school, for some time she wrote little stories for me that I could practice reading during longer school breaks when I was at home, they were all – just as I wanted it – about a little boy named Jacek. These weren’t hard to read either, especially that I would tell the whole plot to her earlier so she’d know what to write, and I was actually the one making them up, but at least that was fun and not boring and felt quite special to me. 😀 I guess though that with time it became a bit of a pain in the neck for her, haha, so I had to move on and start writing stories myself which turned out to be even more fun as no one would understand my ideas as well as I do!

How about you? 🙂

Gwilym Bowen Rhys – “Jac-Yr-Oil”.

Hi guys! 🙂

I am still very much in love with Gwilym’s last album, Arenig, so thought I’d share something else from it with you, this time an instrumental, three-part piece. And, since I am a Jac(k)ophile, in line with the song of the day that I shared with you yesterday – by Jac Richards – this one has also to do with Jac, with its title being “Jac-Yr-Oil”. I have no idea where the title comes from or what Jac is doing in it, I tried doing some research but it hasn’t made me any wiser. In any case, the track is beautiful. Just as the previous one I showed you a month ago – “Lloer Dirion Lliw’r Dydd” – was haunting, emotional, intense and rather melancholic, “Jac-Yr-Oil” is positive, energetic, refreshing, uplifting and full of enthusiasm, which just shows in a nutshell a wide range of emotions one can feel listening to this album. I love this about it so so much!

As I said, it is a three-part music piece, consisting of three folk tunes, one is composed by Gwilym, the second comes from Anglesey’s 18th century fiddler, John Thomas, and the last is a re-arranged composition of Stephen Rees’ “2 Cardi 3”. Here it is. 🙂

 

Share Your World.

I am happy to participate in Melanie’s at

Sparks From A combustible Mind

Share Your World this week! Here are Melanie’s questions and my answers:

 

What happens if you-stare at the mirror for too long in the dark?   (credit to Ursula of An Upturned Soul.  If you haven’t read Ursula’s blog, go over and just wade in and enjoy.   To me she’s fascinating and what she writes about is always worth the journey).

Mmm nothing really, haha. I’ve never seen anything particularly interesting happening when I stare at the mirror, and it’s always in the dark as I am blind. 😀 Perhaps I should do that more often, or for longer, and maybe something fascinating will happen. Maybe I’ll end up being the next Alice in the looking glass house.;)

Do you think you’re judgmental?  What tends to bring it out in you?  (Credit to Ashleyleia for this one)

In short, as I wrote in the comment on Ashley’s post, yes, I think I am judgmental. But I also think we all are and we need it, to some extend. What matters is if you’ll let your judgments influence your actions.As for what brings it out in me, I consider myself a good judge of character, but I sometimes end up relying on my instincts too much, and let my judgments shape the picture of a person too early. I’ve noticed that pattern some time ago and now I am able to see it and stop doing it, or not it influence my relation to the person.

Do you work better with actual lists or with mental lists?  (Credit to Sadje of Keep it Alive)

I actually hardly ever make actual to-do lists, only when I have really loads of stuff to do and all is very important and stressful or something. But I think I should make a habit of using them more, because I am quite disorganised and can suck at doing things in order or determining what’s most important at the moment. But so far usually I mostly do mental lists.

Would you go streaking across a football field during a game for a million dollars (insert your own country’s currency), knowing there’s a 50/50 chance you’ll get arrested for indecent exposure? (this one is mine.  Yeah, my mind wanders to some highly strange places sometimes).

No way! First off, it always amazes me a bit how often people happily and proudly declare that they would do something they normally find very unpleasant, disgracing or immoral if they would be paid a lot. In my opinion that doesn’t speak good about them. Even recently I had a conversation with Olek, I don’t know how it evolved this way but we were talking something about bananas, we had bananas in the house and no one was eating them, and they were getting rotten apparently. I said that I hate bananas anyway, let alone rotten. And he was like: “But if someone would offer you to make you a billionaire if you eat a basket of half rotten bananas, wouldn’t you do that?” – and he asked it as if the answer was obvious and the same for everyone. Hell no, what’s the point? How will I know they will really give me the money in the end? And I guess the only use that I will have of that fortune would be for my family as a legacy, I’m not sure one would survive eating a basket of half rotten bananas, no idea how it can affect a person, don’t have the experience. So, same here. What’s the point in me having a million if I’d be disgraced and people would know me as “the one who went streaking across the football field”. I wouldn’t have any pleasure out of it, and I’m pretty sure they’d catch me, my brain would constantly have a go at my extreme silliness, and my conscience would kill me. :DLast, but not least, I’m too self-conscious.

Lastly:

Gratitude/Thankful/Enriching

What has happened in your life that made you feel uplifted and happy, if only temporarily?

Misha, Misha always makes me uplifted and happy, even just a little bit.

Working On Us.

This week, I’m again participating in Beckie’s mental health prompts series Working On Us over at

Beckie’s Mental Mess. 

This week’s topic is suicide, which is a very difficult and often triggering topic for so many of us, so please read this post carefully or do not read it, if you feel like it might affect you in any negative way.

I am going to participate in the prompt #1, which consists of the following questions.

1. Have you ever experienced suicidal thoughts? – Yes. I’ve been experiencing suicidal thoughts and ideations since about the age of 9-10, which is also roughly when I was diagnosed with my first depressive episode by a psychologist. Back then, and throughout my early teenage years, my suicidal thoughts were the strongest.
2. Have you ever attempted suicide? – No, but I was very close to attempting a few times. There were a few things that were holding me back back then. First of all, I am Christian, so I always felt like I needed to be strong for the sake of that, and that if I’d die by suicide, it wouldn’t necessarily mean things would become better for me. Another thing is that I was always scared of overdosing, which would be in practical terms the easiest way to attempt suicide. I’m scared of that because of emetophobia, I mean the consequences I’d have to face if my attempt would fail, being cleared and all that. Also I’ve heard some awful stories as a kid, of people who overdosed on meds and ended up as pretty much vegetables with very damaged brains. If I am to live in this world, I want to have my brain working at least, as it is my shield and weapon. When my suicidal ideations were particularly severe – that is when I was 10 and recovering from an Achilles tendons surgery – looking back on that time I think that if I was given a chance, I could very likely make an attempt, but I had my both legs in huuuge plasters and was very immobile and relied on others for a lot of things, so, although I had plenty of ideas, fortunately they weren’t that easy to undertake. Besides, so many people say suicide is a sign of weakness. I think you actually have to be a strong person to be determined enough to do it. I don’t consider myself particularly strong.
3. Were you ever hospitalized for a suicidal attempt and/or ideation? – No. I rarely even talk to people in my surroundings about such things in a serious way, so back then no one actually knew I was suicidal, just that I was depressed, and now things are better in that respect so I wouldn’t need to be hospitalised at this point.
4. When you were hospitalized, what was your experience like? – N/a.
   1. 1. 1. Do you ever feel suicidal ideation since your release? – As I said, I’ve never been hospitalised for being suicidal, but yes, even though I’m doing better than I did in the past, at least in terms of suicidality, I still do experience suicidal thoughts. They’re usually of a passive kind though, unlike in the past, unless I feel really depressed and overloaded, then sometimes I can still feel really bad active suicidal ideations. But it’s just a mere echo of what it was like for me when I was younger, that was hellish.

 

Question of the day.

Who taught you to cook?

My answer:

Me? Cook?! Well OK, I can cook a little, but only a little, and not without assistance. That little bit of cooking I can do, I learnt mostly at school, or at the boarding school where we’d sometimes cook something for ourselves usually at weekends, and I also know some things from my Mum, and help her out when I can and when she wants it, which is not very often as I usually end up with my fingers bleeding like hell or stuff spilled or messed up, as she puts it, in such a creative way that she’d never even know you can mess up food like this! 😀 So she prefers to avoid that. But sometimes I will help her anyway, regardless of how she feels about it, I like a bit of adrenaline sometimes. Apparently I make the best dough for pierogi, although what I do with it that is so unusual that others don’t I have no idea.

How about you? 🙂

Jac Richards ft. Clary Saddler – “Only Love”.

Hi hi people! 🙂

Today I have something very very unusual for you! In some respects, I think it’s more out of the box than anything I’ve ever shared with you in the song of the day series. It actually appears so niche that I had a little bit of doubt if I actually should. But, while even BBC was writing about him on their website, and he’s been talked about a little bit around the Internet, it feels like the echo wasn’t too big, so I thought it deserves sharing, even just to show what sort of things disabled people can do with the right support, I know for many people that would seem unbelievable.

But what am I talking about. Jac Richards is a 22-year-old boy from Llangennech, Wales (yeah, a Jac from Wales, that’s my territory) who has a severe form of cerebral palsy. In his case, that means he can’t walk, speak, sit or use his hands. He is though well developed intellectually and his senses function properly. Jac has always loved music and going for concerts and his biggest dream was to be able to make music. His dream has become achievable thanks to Forget-Me-Not Productions, who are an UK organisation helping disabled people to express themselves through arts with the use of assistive technologies. They made it possible for Jac to study music and film production and he is able to create music using his eye muscles.

The funny thing is that I read about Jac yesterday… on a Polish website! 😀 Really! I’m always into quirky music undertakings that people make so I just had to look his single up, and read more about him. You can read more about him here

and here.

By the way, I’ve recently noticed some particular tendency that there are quite a few inspirational disabled people in Wales that have been talked about recently in media or such, even in Polish media, although it could be just that I pay more attention to it or something.

Anyway, Jac wrote the lyrics to his song – which is called “Only Love” – he also composed and produced it, and played all the virtual instruments. The director of Forget-Me-Not Productions is a vocalist in this piece.

I must say that it felt rather odd to me when I listened to it for the first time. It feels highly electronified (does such a word exist? Don’t care 😀 ) which shouldn’t be a big discovery since of course all the instruments in there were electronic and it’s bordering on R&B, but, even though I do like some electronic music, even very electronic at times, what exactly bothered me in it the first time I listened to it was that it felt kind of overdone. Like, too much of everything at once, a bit chaotic, I’d say subtly aggressive even! But there was something haunting about it! I sometimes have such songs that I don’t really feel convinced to but still there is something that will make want to listen to them again. And so I had a few listens to it so far, and I must say it’s grown on me. I guess the impression of it being overdone was just temporary. There’s indeed plenty of strong emotions (how couldn’t there be, it’s Jac’s first single and I can imagine that, not being able to speak, music is now a huge emotions releaser). So, while it doesn’t feel exactly my style, and doesn’t strike exactly that special chord in my brain, I do like it! And, since that single was made last year, I’d really like to hear something else from him, I really hope we will be able to enjoy more of his music, and that more people will know about him.

Some random questions.

So as I wrote in my last post, I’m very sorry for my blog absence and that I didn’t tell you guys earlier or schedule some posts, but it all happened quite suddenly and I knew about it last minute myself. I went on holidays with my parents to Masuria for two days. We didn’t end up doing much there, but I hope to make a coffee share – although it won’t be a weekend coffee share any longer of course – and I’ll tell you more about it then, as well as other things. And then I was a bit disorganised for a couple days. I know those of you who read my blog regularly like my question of the day series, but I’m feeling lazy and not like catching up on every single question and making them all up or looking for some separate ones online so I just picked up some from the Interwebs, I guess they’re circling around a lot as I’ve seen them as a tag on a few WordPress blogs, so, I’ll simply answer them for fun, just to write something before I go to sleep and before I write more tomorrow, and you feel free to join in, in the comments, or in your own posts even, however is more convenient. We can call it MIM (as in My Inner Mishmash) Lazy Tag, if it didn’t have any other name already.

1. Do you like blue cheese?

Ugh yuck! It’s smelly! Even I can feel it, and my sense of smell is really rubbish. I immediately get weird and obscene associations feeling that smell, so no, I’d rather normal cheese.
2. Coke or Pepsi?
Pepsi, but if there’s no Pepsi, Coke will do.

3. Do you own a gun?

Well that could cause some world wide disaster, so I’d better not.No, I don’t own a gun.

4. What flavor of Kool-Aid?
I’ve never drank KoolAid. I don’t even think it’s available in Poland, not in normal shops. Perhaps I should get it from Scrummy next time. But from what I know it’s a sort of lemonade-like drink in terms of taste, isn’t it? Not a fan of those, so probably wouldn’t like it.

5. Do you like Hot dogs?
Naah. Hot cats – with their bellies stretched out in the sun, and especially one cat Misha – are much better. 😉 Seriously, i’ll eat if you’ll force me, but actually I hate hot dogs. I’m generally fussy about fast food and like hardly anything other than chips. 😀

6. Favorite TV shows?
None at the moment. I don’t watch much TV.

7. Do you believe in ghosts?
Yes. I am Catholic, so I believe in purgatory and that sometimes a soul can come to you and ask you for prayers, mostly in your dreams, and if you pray for purgatory souls, they are very grateful to you and pray for you too, and you can really count on them. My great grandmother apparently saw purgatory souls and was in contact with them. And I pray a lot for those that are close to me, and those that aren’t, myself, it’s quite an important part of my spirituality I’d say. But I don’t call them ghosts. It sounds evil and Halloweeny. Souls in purgatory don’t scare or harm or haunt people. I guess I believe in stuff like poltergeist or haunted houses or such, but I think it’s not as common as people like to say, loads of people I know have some creepy paranormal experiences. I don’t say it can’t happen, but am kinda sceptical usually. I do believe that people who do spiritual seanses (is it how it’s really called in English? it looks weird!) see ghosts, but not necessarily those that they will like, as purgatory souls don’t come to you on your whim, I believe they’re evil spirits and can do you potential harm, even though I sometimes joke about it myself that I will make a spiritual seans and get someone back to life, I’d never do that, not only because of my beliefs, but it’s rather creepy.

8. What do you drink in the morning?
Green tea – instead of coffee now, or light iced coffee just for the taste, not the effects, and a bit later on a mug of raspberry tea usually.

9. Can you do pushups?
No way!

10. Favorite jewelry?
I only wear a ring made of agate, it’s just a simple ring that looks much like a wedding ring, without any ornaments or anything. I’ve got a present from a gem stones shop owner in Stockholm two years ago, a sapphire ball that I have a pendant with and I used to wear it all the time, but now I don’t, only for some special occasions. I also wear a holy medal, but I don’t consider it jewellery really. I have some brooches and clip on earrings that I wear on some big outings.

11. Favorite hobby?
Hmmm… language learning? Is that still a hobby or a lifestyle? If not that, then blogging.

12. Do you have ADD/ADHD?
No, definitely not, but apparently I do have some executive functions impairment, or so is stated in some of my school paperwork and other stuff, as we’ve recently discovered, and that would actually make some sense, although I didn’t know that it was apparent enough for others to see, and not even tell me, well, I hadn’t thought about all that much at school myself either and it felt kind of rather that it was the way I was than some sort of an “impairment”. And I don’t know which functions they exactly meant back then and what led them to that.

13. Do you wear glasses?
No. As a little child I used to think I will see something if I will wear glasses, but since I didn’t, and found the feeling of wearing them rather annoying, I no longer do.

14. A favorite cartoon character as a kid?
I loved Gumi Bears.

15. What are three things you did or are going to do today?
Did – read emails, fed Misha, helped Mum with cooking lunch – will do – feed Misha and put him to sleep, go to bed, do my Welsh listening. –

16. Drinks you drink all the time?
Water, kefir and green tea (out of necessity).

17. Current worries?
I’m going to get a lot of new tech equipment, I’m scared of changes and that I won’t get used to it or something will go wrong, I don’t even know what, it’s all really stressful! My parents are going to my uncle’s funeral for two days and I’ll be home with Zofijka and Misha, I’m worried how I’ll survive with constantly bored Zofijka and I can’t stop ruminating that something awful will happen – from the house catching fire to Misha choking with food to Zofijka coming back from the camp tomorrow with a norovirus. 😀 These are the main things at the moment.

18. Do you believe in magic?
No. OK, I may believe in some things perhaps that you would call magic, that’s possible. But I don’t believe in magic as such and find the word highly overrated, and hate it especially when people use it in the context of Christmas. So cliche and silly! Christmas is a miracle, that’s for sure, but no magic.

19. Favorite place to be?
My bedroom.

20. Any bad habits?

Nailbiting/picking/cuticle biting/picking, lip biting/picking, self harming, overthinking, self-loathing, if that’s a habit, in a way it could be, being messy, suppressing feelings, and probably some more that I can’t think of right away.

Your turn! I’m off to sleep. 😪 😴

Song of the day (15th July) – Lisa Hannigan ft. Damien Rice – “9 Crimes”.

Hi guys! 🙂

Sorry for my very long absence on here! Lots of catching up ahead! Firstly, I have a song for you. I believe it’s got some popularity some time ago in Poland, I at least have heard it around much earlier than I started to be really interested in Irish music, Celtic or not Celtic, and before I learnt that this song is by Lisa Hannigan, who is one of my most favourite Irish non-folk singers. I always kinda liked this song. I guess what I like the most about it is the melody. It’s also very emotive, as I’m sure you’d agree with me.

Jane isn’t so plain

I definitely agree with the title of this post! How can a name with such an abundance of colourful and varied forms be plain?
I also feel like even if the name Jane itself is very popular and may feel a bit neutral or a filler for some, many women with this name are really original and interesting. I like Jane because it’s so classic, feminine, goes well with many other beautiful names, has something both simple and elegant in itself.
If I had to choose I’d rather say it’s Jean or Joan that are more plain and have less character on their own than Jane. I love Joanna but only the way we pronounce it in Poland (with a Y and double n). Janina is also nice, although I used to think about it as old-fashioned. I think it’s due for a come back, and has lovely nicknames, which I think Joanna doesn’t really, I like Joanna most in its full form.
I love the Celtic forms of Jane, especially Siwan and Sinead. English Janelle is also nice, as are some others.
I could also add that other forms of this name that are used over here are Żaneta, Żanna, and – already mentioned in the post – Jana, which is not a standard form in Poland in opposite to some other Slavic countries but there were 782 women in Poland with that name in 2017 and it can be also used as a nickname for Janina so you get to hear it occasionally.
What is your favourite form of Jane, guys? Do you think it’s plain?

Onomastics Outside the Box

U.S. reformer Jane Addams, 1860–1935

Jane, like its male counterpart John, is a timeless, universal mainstay. It’s the Middle English form of the Old French Jehanne, which in turn derives from the Latin Iohannes and Greek Ioannes, ultimately derived from the Hebrew Yochanan (God is  gracious).

The name was #98 in the U.S. in 1880, and stayed near the bottom of the Top 100 and just outside of it for the remainder of the 19th century. Jane went up and down until 1909, when it rose from #130 to #116. The name proceeded to jump up the charts to the Top 50, attaining its highest rank of #35 in 1946. Its last year in the Top 100 was 1965. In 2019, it was #291.

Jean, a Middle English variation of Jehanne, was common in Medieval Scotland and England, then fell from popularity till the 19th…

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A day of sleep.

Hhrrru? 😻

How are you pets and peeps doing? 🙂 Did you sleep well last night, whenever it was for you? I did, very well. I slept on Mila’s bed. I was very tired before going to sleep, I played a lot with a rubber band, running with it around the house and playing with peeps. I slept for many hours and woke up when already some of the peeps were up and having their breakfast. I had mine too. But I didn’t eat much today. I haven’t been feeling too well recently. That’s of course not a reason for me not to eat, but it is for my peeps. They’ve been very worried because I get sick a lot and throw up almost everything that I eat, even my Mish food and chicken breasts. But what can I do about it? It’s not my fault I guess, is it? SO why do they punish me for this?! They give me very little food and say that there are no treats at all, so I am wondering whether it’s true and they’re too lazy to drag all of their four legs out of the house and get me some or if they just don’t want to give them to me. Really, I should think about learning how to open the cupboards years ago, then I would know what the truth is, but I’m afraid I’m too old to master it now. But I also didn’t eat much today for another reason as well. It’s been a quiet day and all the peeps have been out for a large part of the day, so I just slept it through. It was very pleasant. I had so many beautiful dreams, with lots of chicken breasts, and Mish snacks, cans of tuna, Mish ice cream, kefir and all, everything smelled so heavenly! Just shows how obsessed with food I am, but I’m too obsessed to even care, I love my obsession, especially that, so far, it doesn’t even make me fat. And just dreaming of food will never make you fat, so that’s even better. I love such long, quiet days, when I can just go to sleep somewhere and sleep through long hours, just waking up for a second once in a long while to stretch or turn to the other side. Wonder what I’m gonna do at night, but if it’ll be boring and not much interesting food in sight, I can always go back to sleep.

So, how did you sleep last night? Any cool dreams? Let me know. 🙂

Misha 💜 💚 💙

Question of the day.

Hi! 🙂

Here’s my question for you guys. 🙂

What was the last item you purchased?

My answer:

An Audible book, I guess.

You? 🙂

Question of the day.

Hi guys! 🙂

Have you experienced any minor annoyances today?

My answer:

Well, the last couple of weeks hasn’t been particularly easy for me and I’ve had a lot of particularly low depression, and now a lot of anxiety. Overall I guess things aren’t bad, on the outside, so I can’t think of any external minor annoyances that would be major enough to actually mention them, but my brain is not very cooperative at all and all messed up, and I could say that’s what annoys me the most. Just every single thing stresses me out or I overthink it for what feels like ages and can’t stop it.

How about you? 🙂

Question of the day.

Hi guys! 🙂

This is my question for you today:

When was the first time you remember feeling really angry?

My answer:

I generally wasn’t the type of a child that would easily get angry, not in my very early years anyway, later it started to look a bit different, when I would bottle it all up and then my brain would suddenly throw it all out at once and I’d feel out of control, but when I was very small I remember I was actually wondering why people get so angry so often about everything, and how do they do it, like as if I didn’t even know how to be properly angry. 😀 Yet my very first childhood memory is all about anger. The first thing in my life that I remember is when Olek was born. I was 2 then, and some people tried to persuade me that children don’t remember things at that young age, but, well, turns out that I do, at least this one thing, maybe because of how intense it felt. Mum was in the hospital, and me and Dad came to visit her. I remember clearly when we came in to the hospital and then we were in a very creaky lift and I was a bit scared because I felt dizzy in it. Mum was on her own in the hospital room and we were both very happy to see each other. Olek, like me and Zofijka, was born through C-section, and she showed me her belly, and I saw the wound and all, it looked horrid, and I remember she had a big needle close to her tummy, I don’t even know what it was for, but, at least then, it looked huge to me and it was all just awful, and I was feeling absolutely, seriously mad at that horrible creature who did that to her, I think good for him that he wasn’t there. I was mad at him for hurting my Mummy, and for taking her away from me. I don’t remember anymore of that, but when me and Olek were kids, we weren’t really like typical siblings – yes we played a bit with each other, and yes we argued like all siblings, especially sisters and brothers do, but I didn’t really like him at all, and I didn’t feel anything positive towards him, I was indifferent to him at best. – And, while I don’t remember those things, my parents recall that I would often come over to him and start to beat him with something, or wouldn’t let him play with me or with my things, or wouldn’t talk to him etc. I was real nasty to him. And we still don’t really have much of a relationship at all, which kinda sucks, and is definitely weird, and we both feel pretty awkward around each other and mostly only talk casually. But I no longer beat him, I’d be afraid to do that as he’s at least 30 cm taller than me. 😀 And it’s not that we don’t like each other now, just don’t have a close bond I guess. But while it seems slightly weird, especially given that I have a much more strong bond with Zofijka who is 10 years younger than me, I guess not all siblings have to have a great relationship.

How about you? 🙂