M.I.A

Warning: This might not be the most positive, happy or inspirational post. Prepare yourself for self loathing, self pity and a good old fashioned moan! 

I have been absent from the blogging world for a year now. This was completely accidental and I don't have any real explanation for my absence. I initially started blogging less when I had two weeks off of work and spent some quality time with Gareth, after that I moved house, became lazier and broke my laptop....blogging simply fell off my radar. I forget why I love to blog and I forgot why I wanted to blog. 

There haven't been any drastic changes to my life which have prevented me from blogging however there have been a series of small incidents and events that, over time, have built up and caused me to wander off to place that I like to refer to as Laura Land - a place in my mind that I hide in too frequently. A place that I like to go to when things stress me out or I have to deal with something that I would rather forget about. It's a place that I use to hide from things that upset me and I place that I try to convince myself is nice but in reality it's a dark place and I shouldn't be left there alone too long.

 I imagine that over the last year I have been a nightmare to live with and this is my attempt of getting it out there and facing my current problems. Once I've openly talked about (or in this case blogged about) what I have been trying to avoid, it will become unavoidable. I am hoping that this will be like a fresh start for me and I will be able to approach each day with a more enthusiastic and motivated approach to life. I am the first person to preach about taking your life in to your own hands and ensuring your own happiness and success.....but like most people I completely suck at taking my own advice.

I don't want to dwell on what has been painting me a moody shade of blue in the last few months or go into too much detail so I will simply attempt to list the main things.

• Anybody who has read my blog will know that for some time now I have been struggling with losing and maintaining my weight. I don't think that I am a 'fat girl' however, I am overweight and weigh more than I have ever weighed. This has become incredibly depressing for me and has had a massive impact on my self confidence. I have no clothes that fit me and I feel incredibly unattractive. Eating healthily had absolutely no impact on my weight and now that I've moved house I don't even have the daily walk to work to act as exercise. So, we joined the gym and, like a complete loser, I didn't go. I was a member for 6 weeks and I didn't once step foot in the gym other than for the occasional Pilates class. This whole gym drama only dented my confidence even further. I hated myself for not being brave enough to go the gym and not taking my fitness and my body image seriously enough to do something about it. I know how unhappy I am with the way my body looks and I couldn't even force myself to make the changes that I needed to make. I hate myself for being such a loser and not pushing myself or striving for self improvement. I'm angry with myself that I have got to this stage and I'm even angrier that I haven't helped myself. To top it all off, I have had a massive outbreak of spots and gained some quite severe stretch marks that I doubt I will ever be rid of.  I have started wearing more makeup than I usually do because I feel so unattractive but even that isn't helping, no matter how much I appy or what I do,I just feel ugly. So, as you can tell, I have been unhappy with everything to do with my body image.

• I hate my job. I feel like it is destroying my soul and I have definitely lost at least half my brain cells since I started working there. I have tried to apply for a job that will help me towards my goal of being teacher but received absolutely no response from them.  Most jobs in the area pay less money for more work. I feel like I will never make it as a teacher. This absolutely breaks my heart. I feel like nobody will ever take me seriously as a potential teacher. I feel like universities look at my application and think that i look almost perfect on paper and then when they meet me they instantly change their mind. It is incredibly hurtful to think that I am losing out on any chance of my dream job because people are judging me on first impressions. I have always struggled with first impressions and almost everybody that meets me makes the completely wrong impression of me - this isn't good when the first impression is the only one that interviewers get.  It has been incredibly hard coming to the realisation that I might never be a teacher simply because people don't like me!! What I find even harder is that I have had some absolutely awful teachers in my time and I have also witnessed some terrible teaching but yet these people were clearly considered more suitable for the job than me. I hate that I know so many people who have never wanted to teach but have applied for teacher training because they didn't know what else to do after uni or didn't like their current job. These people have never aspired to teach and haven't worked their whole life to make it a reality; yet they walk into interviews and get offered a place first time. It makes me sick and angry and, to be perfectly honest, makes me feel like a complete waste of space. Like everything I have worked for is just a big joke.

• We have also had money/house/ work issues. Gareth was made redundant and, as selling tools doesn't pay the bills, we made the incredibly hard decision to move in with my parents until he finds another job. Giving up our beautiful house, packing all of our possessions into boxes and putting them into storage was extremely difficult and very upsetting. It was a trying time for us, but we remained strong  and are making the most of a bad siuation. We are fortunate that my parents have a fairly big house so we have the luxury of our own living room , bedroom and bathrroom. As nice as this is, we have been living here since the end of January and we are both starting to struggle with the desire for our own house and our own things. Life is just a little bit harder when you are livng in somebody else's house but it has had its advantages for us and I am proud of how we have coped and how strong a team we have been!

I warned you that this wasn't going to be a particularly happy post but moving on from today my life, and therefore my blog, will be happier and more postive. The last year has been full of highs and lows. I feel like there have been more lows than highs but, as they say, things can only get better!!!!!



Lets see where the next year takes us................