mostly roving, partly stars

So my beloved fluffball Fiyero has spent the last few weeks dealing with health issues, to the point where he underwent PU surgery on Monday. He's back home now, and recovering as well as if not better than can be expected, but he is kind of a handful to manage & this whole thing has been insanely stressful, so I thought I'd cheer myself up with a game: How Fast Will the Belly Floof Return?

For reference of his previous majesty, a post I made in 2017—

I didn't get any photos yesterday, the first day he was home, but today there's already a hopeful bit of fuzz returning!

(The belly photos won't ever show the surgical site or bruising. He has marks, but my guess is these are melanin patches on his skin, as the bruising looks much nastier.)

Spoiler: Belly day 3

 

Best wishes to the floofy friend

 

Re: the dark spots, it's definitely melanin, it's a perfect mirror of the patterns in his belly fur

 

More belly fluff update, Day Ten of growth: actual wispy length instead of just velvet buzzed ends

 

HE IS FREE

aka my boy is finally removed from the cone! I'll try to get another belly fluff pic today.

In other news, Imbolc is coming and I am vibrating with excitement. I attended a really good online class for it yesterday, and I'm fired up for the most (personally) significant holiday of the year. Gotta start a planning page for it!

 

Spoiler: BELLY

Some real Floof coming back! Nowhere near its old glory yet, but finally crossing the line from "fuzzy" into "fluffy," I think.

 

Confession time:

I've had a knitting design submission form open in another tab for a couple of days, but I keep scrolling past it almost like I'm scared of it :/

Things I'm worried about:

• It calls for a modeled sketch of the garment and I have no idea how to do fashion sketches
• I'm not sure I'd actually be able to stick to the deadlines given how unreliable my work output is for disability reasons
• They mention wanting "unique" designs in the call multiple times, and I'm not usually a fan of or great at modern looking design, I'm genuinely more about classic aesthetics, even if I feel like they're pretty unique they still are built on a p traditional look in some ways
• What if I just come off as horribly presumptuous and an unprofessional goblin bc I work from home and have never studied basically anything related to this field properly
• Aaaaaa

...but I kind of still want to try it?

Aaaaaa.

 

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=4919581305232

We had a good Imbolc!

 

eughhhhhh having to renew my IDR for student loans is bringing up all kinds of financial planning stress :/ I am super fucking lucky that my sis has bookkeeping experience & is willing to help me with setting up this childcare stuff, but I am still just feeling like I am failing morally somewhere due to my financial choices???? probably capitalism baggage. do not know.

also this is vaugue bc my brain is a pudding due to (anxiety/stress + ear problems + arm pain + not eating), where all four of those factors are making each other worse. today is a no bueno day for kit.

 

Okay, I have managed some basic self care (fresh comfy clothes, good perfume, pain meds, water, protein heavy snack). Brain is trying to find other stuff to freak out about and I'm definitely still full of cogfog, but this is probably the best I can hope for now.

I wish being a person wasn't so hard.

 

I will be watching my nephew regularly starting on the 24th!

Holy heck I have a lot of setup to do!

 

it's so funny how discombobulated I am about setting up the legal/financial side of childcare, since I've been running a business for literal years, but sole proprietorship is very very different from partnership!!! also I've been a cogfog pudding for days now, which probably isn't helping.

 

I rearranged furniture in my bedroom! By MYSELF!

We'd still had the Cat Confinement Kennel up from when Fiyero was recovering from surgery, and I really really needed to take it down. I realized I'd been delaying bc I didn't want to go back to having a stack of shitty milk crates as a nightstand again. Soooooo I moved my desk, so it's up against the same wall as our headboard & I can use part of the desk as a nightstand, and now there's more space along the exterior wall of our room, and more room on my side of the bedroom to spin in here rather than out in the living room. It's really nice! Now I just gotta figure out what to do with the milk crates and their contents.

 

Picture taken while sitting in my spot on the bed

 

Bonuses to the new desk location:

• More room for spinning
• Solid! Stable! Space! for my nightstand things like water cup & smoking mug & so on
• Moving my things encouraged me to put all the Stuff For Treating Myself (chocolate, hand cream, etc) in one bowl and it's delighting me
• My monitor is now angled 90° from the door & most places people might hang out in the room, which helps the "people are watching what I'm doing" discomfort
• Now that the power strip is over here, it's muuuuuch easier to be on my phone in bed & still have it charging
• Wall space! I'm considering installing some hooks to hang my bathrobe & cardigans rather than having them get thrown over my desk chair or stuffed into the "rewear bin" & get wrinkled

Downsides:

• Kind of dreading figuring out what to do with three milk crates full of stuff I haven't been using but have weird emotional attachments to
• Now K wants to make adjustments to her side of the room, but they would have been easier to do when I still had everything out of my desk so we could place the desk slightly further to the left (and thus scoot the bed).

 

I have so much time when I get up early in the morning!

And I get to enjoy being a morning person! I haven't done that since college.

I usually get really frustrated at people who tell me my life needs more structure to help with depression, but I have been feeling kind of ashamed at how much this structure I'm imposing to prepare for the childcare schedule is helping. I shouldn't be ashamed though! I was suffering from severe insomnia for years! And my habit for a year+ of getting up noonish with my second-shift sibling was based on the fact that I really do struggle to wake up without 1) help getting coffee & a starter food, and 2) social interaction. And it felt like too much to ask of K when she struggles with her own mornings too much. But I tentatively asked, since I HAVE to get up this early starting Monday, if she could make me coffee in the mornings. And it turns out that if I'm getting up early, it's easier for her to get up! And she's been wanting to give herself more ready time before work!

I won't have this expansive I have so much time!!!! feeling once the childcare starts, probably, but I hope the joy of the mornings sticks around some.

 

I genuinely am doing so much better, mental-health and trauma-wise than I was even a year ago. But still, every time I set a healthy boundary about my availability & disappoint someone, I have a (smaller, but still there) sinking insecurity in my chest. Am I being unfair? I'm trying so hard to vet my people, I shouldn't have anyone making unreasonable asks of me. If I feel like they're asking too much, is it actually too much or am I being unusually aloof/self-centered/defensive? All this over wishy-washy plan-making.

 

My nephew!!! Is so good!!!

 

A VERY QUALITY BABEY!! <3

 

The first day with my nephew went pretty well! I have not, as my anxiety/trauma tried to tell me, forgotten everything I knew about newborn care, or picked up horrifying bad habits from peers who were a bit Frightening at parenting. I can do this just fine :)