9th day of Moura: Why is everybody on Tumblr cursing right now?

Dear Reader,

Prayer square 1

My brain is still having some difficult with executive function due to stuff like emotional flashbacks. It didn't help that I had the joy of an ovarian cyst bursting this morning and I had to lay down for a while because it hurt to sit upright let alone stand. (Poly-cystic ovarian syndrome can go die in a fire.) I was finally up and doing stuff about three hours behind my rather lax schedule. I fixed my look for the day (because my hair was sticking out like I put my finger in a light socket) and brewed some coffee. As I did so, I put the finishing touches on a prayer square that I made last night. I made two of them. They're both white for Dea in all her aspects. They both have a charm for the Daughter aspect of Dea. And one of them has an eye bead on it to repel ill luck. Yesterday I also finished the shawl I started the day after Yule ended. Well, shawlette because I didn't have enough yarn in the whole ball to make a full sized shawl out of it.

Prayer square 2, w/ eye bead

 So, this morning/early afternoon, I sat down with my cup of coffee and reviewed what was up on Tumblr. Cue my being very confused (and mildly concerned) that there is a laundry list of curses that have been posted and trending. I posted my bit about curses can turn back on you, if you think you have been cursed you should break it, and that blood used in a curse need not be your own (and I gave ethical alternate sources). But, seriously, Tumblr, are you ok? Did somebody hurt the collective somehow last night when I wasn't looking?

Right now, I'm torn between writing and going and scrubbing the bathroom. The trick is, if I do one I am not going to have time to get the other done. Because the kids are going to be home from school in about an hour. I'm trying to apportion my spoons wisely but I am just ... Well, I'm not in a great place mentally right now and that makes executive function get wonky. When executive function gets a little haywire, deciding what is the priority project gets hard. I don't know if I'd say this is full on brain fog, but it is an intermediate stage between full clarity and brain fog.

Shawlette

I'm drinking coffee like it is going out of style. Not the best thing for my blood sugar but not the worst I can do either. I'm drinking plenty of water as well, but the coffee it to help be be upright and functional. Otherwise, I'd be just a slug on the couch watching Vikings (because I finally have gotten into the tv show, I'm up to the beginning of season 2). I feel guilty for the fact that it is so hard for me to just knuckle down and get things done. I feel anxious that horrible things are going to happen.

I am striving not to let myself be swallowed up by these feelings and to find the energy to do things. It would help if I was actually sleeping through the night. My anxiety has been so bad over the last few weeks that I keep waking up at 4 am with the urge to walk through the apartment and make sure that everyone is ok and that my life is real. That initial thought upon waking that my life is a hallucination and I'm still 14 and living in my parents house is pure terror.

It lurks at the back of my mind on days like today. I find myself waiting for them to show up on my door step and forcibly take me away from my life as they would have when I was a kid. It's ironic. My parents isolated my siblings and I.They subjected me to a great deal of emotional abuse and encouraged my brothers to harass me. But when I took refuge in my room, they took the door off of the room because they were offended that I wasn't being more 'social' with the family. Things were not good in my parents house when I was a kid. The memories of these kinds of things are what's been going through my nightmares and running through the back of my mind during my waking hours. It's painful.

I know, however, that the gods will carry me through this just like they carried me through the events that I am having flashbacks to.

Eight day of Moura: So behind on my household stuff!

Dear Reader,

Because of my chronic health conditions, I have to juggle a lot of book keeping. I have my blood sugar to monitor daily. I have my mental health symptoms to log daily. And then there's just keeping up a record of what's going on for the kids with school. All of this, before you factor in the actual book keeping that most people think of - the budget and what not. I've been unwell for a little while now.

I thought that I was more or less on top of things, because brain fog duped me into thinking that. Well, here I am a bit more clear headed and good gracious are things a mess in the book keeping arena. My food journal hasn't been updated over the last week. My daily planner is ... well, let's just say that the last time I updated anything in it it was during the first week of February / the mid-Brighe. So, I'm sitting here trying to make all of this organized and tidy again. And I have to plan for next week.

Did I mention that I'm still behind on filing papers? Some how January went by with out my putting a single scrap of paper away in the correct place. By some small miracle, I didn't misplace any of the bills or important letters. And those things got dealt with promptly. I spent most of my morning dealing with sorting out the mass of papers sitting on the desk. I'm now down to school related paperwork for the kids and the planning paperwork for Beloved's parents' anniversary party in August. (And that is so complicated, it's like planning a wedding. Thank goodness his siblings are helping us plan. It's a team effort and I'm thankful for it.)

As for my cleaning in the bathroom, I swept the room with a glance when I was last in there and took a moment to water plants. I know that doesn't count as cleaning in any fashion, but I'm planning on spending a half hour in there working as the kids are doing their chores. I figure that'll make life a little easier and maybe I can make some headway on getting that tub sorted out. I've tried a bunch of different cleaners on it, but it is still grimy. I have broken down and bought the old powdered cleaner that my parents used on their tub when I was a kid. That stuff can take paint off of a wall, so I think I might actually get the tub clean this time. If not, then it is hopelessly stained and I can't do a thing about it.

6th? No, 7th day of Moura: Brain Fog Hates Me.

Dear Reader,

I looked at my calendar and realized that I was a day off in my posts. I've been having a lot of brain fog over the last week due to my not feeling well. The week right before the start of Moura, I had a medication change to my diabetes medicines. Since then, my blood sugar hasn't been right and I haven't felt very well physically. This has had a negative impact upon my mood, which was already not too great because of seasonal affective disorder and complex post-traumatic stress disorder making me miserable. There's been a lot of brain fog where I've been completely forgetting to do important things. It makes me feel bad and guilty for being sick like this.

A vicious part of me, that is an echo of one of the people who is the reason why I have c-ptsd, keeps telling me that I am lazy and good for nothing. Regardless of the fact that when my blood sugar runs high, I get sleepy and I've had at least one migraine over the last two weeks. I'm working with my doctor to get this medication stuff sorted out. It doesn't help that this problem was created by the health insurance company randomly deciding that they weren't going to cover the combo medication that they had been covering for the last year. Now I'm taking the combo medication in its component parts and when that started, things got off kilter. It's kinda scary and I'm trying very hard not to listen to the harpy in my head shrieking that I'm worthless and such.

The project of cleaning the kitchen is complete except for vacuuming the floor. I can't figure out how to put this brand new contraption together. I've run the little sweeper over it, but it hasn't made much of a difference. Aside from that, there's the usual tasks of dishes and cleaning out the fridge (which I do every Wednesday so that there are no science experiments to find in there).

I haven't been keeping up very well on my prayer journal writing. I pray, but I forget to write. I have not been working on my transcription project. By the time I remember to work on these things, the kids are getting home from school and we're off to the races. My sense of time has been skewed because of the brain fog. I'm trying to compensate for it, but it's not working so great.

Fifth day of Moura: Emotional house cleaning.

Dear Reader,

Today found me restless and unsettled. I did my best to ground and center myself. Then I realized that there were some things bothering me on a deeply profound level. So I wrote about it and took action. It was as if a great weight had been lifted off of my chest. I anticipate that some of the fall out from the action I have taken is going to be a bit messy, but Moura is the time for cleaning up messes, I suppose.

I was going to work on finishing up the kitchen today but I had to service my sweeper. I pulled out enough hair to make a small dog out of it. I do not have a small dog or a furry pet of any kind. It was a rather disgusting experience, to be honest, but necessary so that I can get more cleaning done. I have my daily chores that are going on a haphazard way right now. It's been hard for me to focus (as I mentioned earlier) so I have been bouncing from task to task.

I am struggling with my Seasonal Affective Disorder still. Great waves of grief roll over me along with powerful surges of anxiety. My chronic nightmares have gotten worse over the last week which makes me suspect that I have some form of trauma memory attempting to break through. Yay c-ptsd, am I right? As the grief and anxiety hit me, I do my best to roll with it. I try to allow myself some time to sit with these emotions and then give them to the Gods to handle.

Today's been harder than the other days. I am not get as much done in the sense of physical house cleaning as I wanted. (The pile of laundry to sort and fold is almost as tall as I am, despite my sorting and folding it.) I am just doing my best to trust that the Gods have my best interest in mind and keep plugging away at my day. I trust Them, myself not quite so much. I'd post more, but I have a few more chores to do before the kids get home from school.

Godspousery Notes: They're doing what??

Dear Reader,

I was feeling very frustrated the other day with things like having piles of housework to be done and being behind on my writing. I felt like I was setting myself up for failure with my plans for Moura. Then I was blown out of the water and left amazed by what Frey and Loki said to me. "We're going to do this with you."

I said to them that it was entirely unnecessary, after all they're gods and they've got all kinds of other things to do. Practicing a month/season of discipline and work on self-improvment wasn't something I figured they'd have to do. Well, that was the wrong response to have.

Loki openly laughed at me when I said that. Laughed to the point that I thought he was going to sprain something. Frey was actually irritated with me. That doesn't happen too frequently. (Well, it sort of does, but usually its because I'm forgetting to take care of myself.)

Frey then said something that blew my mind again. "How can gods improve at what they do if they do not work on improving themselves? They become static figures and shadows of what they are if they do not continually push themselves to keep up with humanity and the world. There is always something new to challenge even gods."

That got me to thinking about Déa and the entire mythos of the Daughter. It really is a story about deity changing and improving to help the world. So, while the Daughter is on her journey into the Netherworld, I have Loki and Frey with me practicing self discipline and meditating on things like transformation. This leaves me even more curious about what the relationship between these gods are. Especially considering the mythos around Frey. Maybe they'll explain that to me some day.

Fourth day of Moura and things got weird.

Dear Reader,

I'm attempting to get back into my usual schedule after last week's tumult with the kids being on vacation from school. And strange things seem to abound today. Things like a paycheck that was supposed to be in the bank has gone MIA and the tarot deck that went poof and vanished has reappeared. Let us not forget I have been having pre-migraine symptoms despite the fact that there isn't a major shift in the weather due for a few days yet. Also my shoulder has been in pain since I woke up. I'm sure it's because I slept on it funny, but who knows. It's been an odd morning.

Beloved helped me out a lot over the weekend with getting the kitchen sorted out. I can't figure out how to put together the brand new vacuum cleaner. I'll be asking him to handle that. In the meantime, I have the non-electric sweeper that I have to take apart and get all of the hair out of it. You'd think we had hairy pets with the amount of hair in that thing, but all we have is a fish and two snails. (Not that we don't want to have a cat at some point in time.)

I have managed to run out of white novena candles. I use them on the altar for Déa's candle. Now I have a deep red one there. It has no design on it or anything. I suspect it might be a leftover from the Advent candles that were being sold that I grabbed by mistake at the Dollar Tree a few weeks ago. Every time I look at it, I find myself thinking about Our Lady's courage to make her descent into the Netherworld for our sake. Incarnation is a difficult and arduous thing more often than not. As she passes through the worlds and goes down in to the Netherworld, she endures the suffering of incarnation with us.

The road to the place where the dead lie is one of mostly suffering. Perhaps it is appropriate that I have a red candle for Her courage and unwavering will on my altar right now. Interestingly, my miniature rosebush put out a blossom on the first day of Moura. It is on the altar right now. The bush was supposed to be pink but the blossoms have gradually turned a deep red. And the plant seems to be promising future blossoms. It is a blessing to have a fresh flower to lay on the altar in offering to Déa. May it please Her and be an ornament to give Our Lady some joy in her journey along the road of suffering.

The second day of Moura and I'm already behind.

Dear Reader,

My children are on break from school which has thrown off my schedule terribly. As such, I had plans to start on my serious cleaning yesterday and that didn't happen. I had plans to work on my transcription project and that didn't happen either. Most of the day was spent playing referee as my children fought most of the day. They're as ready to go back to school as I am for them to go.

Through the four weeks of Moura, I am going to be focusing on four major sections of my home in deep cleaning mode. Week one is the kitchen and the entryway. Week two is the bathroom (which desperately needs some TLC). Week three will be the bedrooms. And week four is the living room and the project room.

I'm somewhat frustrated that I can't get the mud up off the floor of the entryway. Every time I mop it, more gets dragged in. I'm the only person who mops the entryway and this is a building with four apartments. It didn't help that the paint wasn't fully dry when people began coming in and out of the building when it was put down. So, there is some mud that is stuck to the floor via the paint. I don't quite know what the solution to that problem is.

The kitchen is in need of some work, but I am making slow progress. Since I have a week to focus on it, I am confident that I can get most of the work done with out the kids casting legos all over the place. After all, I have most of next week, when they're at school, to manage things like running the new vacuum over the floor and such.