Introducing: Project Happy UK

As a follow up from my previous post, I want to share with you the first video we produced as part of Project Happy.

We currently have a blog set up, with tips on getting through uni, and dealing with stress, among many future topics we will cover in relation to mental wellbeing. You can find it at www.projecthappyuk.wordpress.com  where Sarah and Katharine post weekly on Sundays. (I used real names for once).
We also have a twitter and instagram set up, both with the usernames @projecthappyuk.
Please follow and support us, if you have any suggestions, we will be sure to look into them and see what we can do. You can email us at: projecthappyuk@gmail.com

Thank you as always.
Unconditional love,
Cazzie x

This Is Strange..

I am finding less and less people attractive. Ok, that came out wrong.

What I mean is, I still find people attractive, but I don't find myself attracted to them. Make sense?
Take, Dan Howell for example. He has the cutest dimples, he is attractive and is usually the type of guy I would like.

G Dragon. From the beginning I have felt something. It's not necessarily physical but I love the way he looks. I'm contradicting myself too much... But with both of these guys, I want to hug them. In the past, I would fantasize about what it would be like to be in a relationship with them. Now I only think of friendship. Nothing more.

Now there's this girl I like. We text all the time and she's so adorably cute. Yes I want to be with her, but I can't tell if it's physical or not. I think about her all the time, but I want to leave it a while before we go any further because I don't want to find that we're better as friends, or I don't actually have these feelings... Every relationship requires some physical attraction (a mistake I made several times in the past), but underneath that, there has to be a connection.

I think I might just be a lesbian. I've always liked girls, but I have had crushes on guys too. But recently 'guy friends' have been putting me off them, by getting too close to me. By trying to be close, it's pushing me away. Oh, and I never came out to my parents... So this could be interesting if we date.

I don't even know what this post is anymore. Just a little bit of venting I guess.

Unconditional love,
Cazzie x

Paranoia

So I get paranoid sometimes, but in my mind, it's not unrealistic.

My mother and myself have realised (together) that when we think something is happening to us or that we are being targeted we are actually right. People look at us and think we are mad or something, but we test our theories and come out right.

When I was young, my mum thought we were being racially targeted. She told her brothers and other family that she felt unsafe where she was living, an later found evidence of people breaking into a mid-terrace back garden which had no access from the back. She found other peoples' footprints in the sand pit. So we moved house the first time.

Whilst at uni, I thought that someone was using my stuff. So I started to deliberately leave my stuff in certain places and positions, and then I would notice if it had moved. I was right. I also noticed my mug 'missing' one day and could not find it at all. Later that day, a flatmate came into to kitchen with it. The one person that seemed to hate me in that flat was taking my stuff.

Now I am noticing (after moving buildings) that my milk is going missing. Before I was just confused, but after my (almost) whole box of cereal had been eaten (I rarely eat breakfast), and half of my remaining ice-cream being eaten, I knew something was up. So now I take a sharpie into the kitchen if I know I will be using milk for anything. I make a mark where it finishes and if the milk line is lower, I mark it with a line and '?'. The '?' is for when I don't use it myself. The marks are on the back of the bottle, so they can't be seen easily, but I wrote on the front for someone to stop using it. Unless I put cameras up in the kitchen, I will not catch the culprit. :(

My next thought is to get a mini fridge in my room (against my contract terms) so that I am not being stolen from as much. This is so frustrating. >.<

Unconditional love,
Cazzie x

I hate this

The stress is just too much now. I know I haven't explained anything really on here, but I am seriously considering dropping out of uni, retaking the year or ending my life.

I swore, after Aaron's death just over 2 years ago, that I would never let myself get that depressed again. This past month and a bit has thrown me into a downward spiral of despair, I don't know what to do. I have cried more times each week since September, than I have in the past few years. I almost self-harmed again, I panic when I see 'resemblances' of her, walk the long way home just so I can't be seen from my flat and dread going home. I barely even eat in my flat anymore. I don't go in my kitchen if I know or think someone else is in there too.

My housing office will not let me move out, I have no time to catch up and get my work in on time, and I'm just panicking now. My deadline for this essay is four days, and I've barely started it... Obviously will be handed in either unfinished, at a rubbish standard or not at all.

It has gotten to the point where BOTH my parents are working TOGETHER the help me sort this. And if you have divorced parents, you know how rare this actually is.

So, I just collapsed on my bed and cried for the past 20 minutes, and I must say, despite having so many people backing me up, all I want is a hug and I feel like I have no one to contact at midnight... My family all live over an hour away by car, and longer by public transport, any friends that I may visit or come here will not be able to get back home and the two people I am close to (distance), I have been there too much and feel like I'm bugging them as they have the same deadlines as me and have gone through something similar but worse recently.

I will now leave this depressing post to be forever lost in cyber space.

Life Lessons #6

CONFRONTATION

Ok, so during a party on Friday night, my flatmate came up to me to say 'Stop writing notes, just talk to me if I annoy you.' I just agreed and said that I would try. Little does she know why I don't confront people face to face, but always text or write a note to talk later.

As a child, I never had much emotional support. My father was abusive, even though my parents were divorced. My mother never listened or understood. I couldn't talk about how things made me feel. I was constantly told not to bother speaking up. Over summer after a fight with my foster sister, it was the first time my dad had been there for me. He actually picked me up and hugged me. It's only taken him my whole 19 years to start attempting to be a dad.

The one time I spoke up to my mum, I left home. I was 16.
The one time I spoke up to my dad, I got kicked out my home. At 17.

The only way I have ever been able to talk to my mum about how I feel, was to write it down so she could read it in her own time.

I'm actually very strong minded, but I don't always speak up.

I can't even remember what I'm trying to say... Basically, if you don't feel comfortable speaking, find another way to communicate. Even if its to me. Like I said somewhere, I will always listen and reply when I can. Write notes, draw, shout it out. Do anything, just don't keep things bottled up because that's not good for you or your health.

Small World

I have a lot of random thoughts pop into my head at various times, and this hot and sticky night is one of those times.

I remember back in primary school, year 3 or 4 I think, and I used to get bullied. I never told my family, or my friends as it would happen when I was alone, and it was a couple of 'groups' that did it. One couple were girls in year six, about 2 or 3 years above me, and they would taunt me often. Eventually I confessed this to my mum's friend's daughter, (lets call her L) and it turned out that she used to be best friends with one of them. I still remember their names now, S and C shall be all I will reveal. S was a friend of L, who went to my school but later transferred because it was 'not good enough for her family' (they're snobs now). I begged L to do something, but it did not cease until S and C went to secondary school... luckily that was only about a year or two.

Unfortunately for me, the year after they left, I got bullied by another two girls, two years below me. They would sing songs about me being too skinny, calling me a twig or sticks. I took matters into my own hands and started eating a lot more. Again I never told anyone, and this is my first confession. They stopped the teasing for a while, and then it started up again by calling me a fat whale. I looked like on of those starving African children with stick arms, and a massive belly. I just ate and ate, but didn't care what.

When I finally finished that school, I found that I no longer had the same friends and my self esteem went all the way down. I became reserved and extremely shy. Almost like a different person. I was always a bit on the quiet side, but I now realise that I had changed. I was told by some 'friends' that I should stop complaining about my life because it was too depressing. I grew a tougher skin and never showed my emotions. I didn't know how to fit in and I was often alone in class.

I never really manage to keep friends for very long, but I have a few that I can stay close to... well, make that two. No matter how long we go without speaking because of uni, we can still talk about anything and be who we are. I'm glad I have these two to keep me strong through all the emotional heartbreak (more stories to come), the depression and self harm, through exams, stress, domestic violence and being homeless (for about an hour xD).

My story isn't normal, no one's is. This isn't to share with the world, but a personal reminder of what I have gone through and to know that I am stronger than people realise. I am who I am because of what has happened to me.

Stay strong everyone, and if you're being bullied, tell someone. I know I didn't and was always afraid that it would get worse if I did, but I wish I had more help back then. :)