This year has not been unremittingly dreadful.

I say this because there were certain stand-out events which make it seem very truthful to just say "2009 was a steaming pile of crap from start to end and I'm so fucking glad it's over". But I feel like a nuanced review of the year would include, celebrate, focus on some of the things that were good or positive or helpful about this year. A look at such things will follow in due course. Overall, however... 2009 was a steaming pile of crap from start to end and I'm so fucking glad it's over.

2010, therefore, should not have its work cut out for it, right? Because it would be a breeze to top 2009 in my estimation. But since I've had a generally shitty year, I'd really like 2010 to give me a break (preferably several) and really kick it up a notch and give me an awesome year as recompense. So my expectations are probably unreasonably high, but luckily I'm a realist-verging-on-pessimist and a cynic so I fully expect to be disappointed.

Good things about 2009
I'm only going to aim to come up with five. Five should be doable. That's not even one every two months.

1. New job (the old one was really starting to piss me off. New job achieved while off sick, was the first one I applied for, they matched my old full-time pay despite the fact that I now work fewer hours, it's smack bang in the centre of town, my team are lovely and have been incredibly supportive during all the chaos this year, and it's really, despite all the niggles and office politics that come with any job, ridiculously easy to handle, allowing my primary focus to be...)

2. Continued success at university (having been full time since January, which picked up the previously-glacial pace somewhat, am now in FINAL YEAR! Unbelievable. Every coursework mark this term has been over 70%, with the top one being a lovely and unexpected 93%. Probably fucked up my exams a little bit - due to That Upon Which I Am Not Focusing Right Now - but good coursework marks will help to lift whatever unbrilliant/mediocre/dismal grades I come out with.)

3. Went on holiday (Proper beach holiday. Proper warm weather and beautiful Greek island sand and seas. Proper pampering with all food provided, leaving my only responsibilities as a. sleeping, b. reading and c. having lots of sex. Could do with another one right about now, actually...)

...I am now struggling to come up with positives. *thinks harder*

4. Weathered storms of year without losing emotional balance and winding up in mental health crisis myself? Learned a lot about my regained ability to cope in the meantime?

5. Did not lose touch with family, friends, reality?

...and I'm out.

I'm incredibly unhappy right now (break ups will do that to a person), but I have to believe that whatever the new year does and doesn't bring, that will change.

If nothing else, I'm going to graduate, which is huge, given that I've been studying on and off, full time and part time, for the past seven years.

I'm having one of those days where the future, so uncertain and split into many paths, ever-forking, is absolutely paralysing me with terror.

I am not unduly worried about this, however, as I have had many such days in my life and I now deal with them by putting the thoughts aside (or decanting them into such a space as this) and then addressing other things. Paralysis helps no-one.

Mostly I believe this to be my normal reaction to the choices and options that lie ahead of me, and so I will deliberately skew this into a positive, a reason to take heart: there is still so much before me to be achieved and accomplished that, regarding everything as a whole, it is occasionally overwhelming. But things only need to be done one at a time*.

* or as is more usual in my life at the moment, three at a time. (Uni, work, house. Though too often: Work, uni, house.)

I am halfway through my first semester of final year (a point I have at many times had good reason to believe I would never arrive at). In the next seven weeks: four pieces of coursework are due, one class test must be sat and then two exams. And then Christmas. And then Dissertation Term.

I am living with my girlfriend of almost two years' (albeit occasionally off-and-on) standing, though I planning on moving out and closer to work/uni for the next couple of months just for the headspace, peace and room.

I am accomplishing my goals and plans for what comes next can wait.

I am accomplishing my goals and plans for what comes next can wait.

Like a mantra.

I am focused on accomplishing my goals and my plans for what will come after can wait.



Breathe.

Okay, so... I didn't eat any more of the porridge yesterday (or today, for that matter). I can be a stick-in-the-mud when I want to be. Instead I didn't eat anything at all until around three pm, at which point I attempted to make a vanilla shake with ice and water, rather than just water, thinking along the lines of a frappuccino. I am not exaggerating when I describe the taste and consistency of what I eventually created as "pancake batter". Yeesh.

I then didn't eat anything at all for the rest of the day, and wasn't planning to, except what with having just got back from holiday this week, there was no food in the house for Lizi to eat (she's not joining me on the diet until two weeks hence). So off we went to Asda. I managed quite well, despite being in a giant room full of FOOD, until I got demoralised when we were waiting for our ride home (thinking about going back to yet more batter-drinks, I suspect) and so I ate a mini pork pie. Then, when we got home, Lizi made me steamed tuna with spinach and broccoli. There is an "approved foods" list (also known as green + white, because what you eat is generally greens + a portion of white meat), which is for people not on 'Sole Source', but a step up. Or, for people who are very tall (which Lizi is, so eating 3 packs plus one of these 200kcal meals is a legitimate option for her).

I don't know what to do. I think this is the best structure for weight loss that I've come across, but I can't stomach half of the stuff I've tried so far. It's unlikely to last if I'm forcing myself to eat the products (or avoiding them altogether).

Today I took porridge to work with me, but it's still sat in my desk drawer, unopened. I did drink one chocolate tetra-brik (which is a pre-made-up version of the shakes in a juice carton, for when you are "on the run" - or don't have access to a blender). It was not bad. So I've had one portion today. I had two litres of water at work, too, but I've still come home with a cracking headache. Carb withdrawal? When I got home I made myself the same thing Lizi made me yesterday - tuna and greens. I'm confused. I don't want to eat, I want to make lasting changes, and I want to lose weight, but I know if I suggest one or two diet packs a day plus a little meal to the counsellor, she's going to tell me that's not an approved programme yadda yadda. Maybe I'll call her. I'm demoralised. But I'm also not eating very much outwith the programme so I don't consider myself as having fallen off the wagon just yet. I just need to make this programme work for me.

So... I'm back. Which is to say... I was gone for a bit, there, and now I have returneth. Mainly I was gone because I had exams at the end of May, having just changed jobs at the beginning of May, meaning I had to wrap up my previous job for handover in April, and then as soon as I was done with exams I had a two week holiday to prepare, pack and depart for, including a week on a Greek island. All of which has now taken place, and I'm back ready to enjoy the summer and actually take a look here at this thing called the internet which I have now oodles of time for again.

Especially as I found out yesterday that I actually passed all of my exams (I even got a merit in one of them), so the summer is free and clear for the first time in many a moon. All this despite the afore-mentioned job change, the university discontinuing the part-time course while we were still on it, necessitating that we do the same number of modules as the full-time students, a second bout of glandular fever in the middle of term, and a seriously depressed partner with whom I live in what amounts to not much more than a two-room flat. NOT BAD. A+ for Siobhán.

I even got myself a second job this past week so that I can earn as much as possible over the summer, hopefully easing up the financial pressures for the next year.

The only downside to all of this is... I decided to Diet Properly and Seriously this summer, because it was/is About Time and The Perfect Opportunity and Lizi's going to do it too so we can support each other etc. And I was all up for it and I understand the theory and I am on board with drastic action to achieve one's aims (it's one of those total food-replacement diets - for more info see Cambridge-Diet.com). But I started this morning with the porridge foodpack, which was... okay. Watery, and not much of it, but I guess that's to be expected. For my second foodpack of the day I had a banana shake, which smelled quite strange but was actually fairly palatable. And then I tried to have tea (or dinner, to the Southerners around here) with an Oriental Chilli-flavoured soup mix. BLECH. I actually couldn't finish it. Luckily I had planned for this and so got more packs than I needed for the week before I saw my Diet Counsellor again, so I gave up on that and got a Chocolate Mint shake to try and fulfil my three-pack quota. I blended it up like the banana and again, although the smell was not great, it tasted more or less okay. I was feeling a little nauseated by then, however.

My mother (who has done the programme before) assures me that it's just because I'm new to the diet and my calorie intake has dropped so suddenly that I'm feeling a little green. I'm just worried because in order to get right down to a healthy weight for my height, I am going to have to be on this programme for upwards of six months. And I knew that I would miss food, because I love food and I comfort-eat, so there's a big emotional component to my eating. But I didn't think that I'd miss food just because the food-replacement stuff was virtually inedible!

I hope my mother is right and it becomes something you get used to. Otherwise I will not be able to go the distance. Porridge again tomorrow. Stick to what works.

This is more or less a placeholder message. I've imported all my old LJ posts to DW (which I pronounce in my head as dee-dub, am I the only one that does that?) and I'm slowing going through and making them all private so I can have an archive of my past journalling fun on here and yet still start with a fairly blank slate. (I might go back through again at some point and unlock stuff once I've decided whether or not it's relevant.)

To that end, I am friending anyone who sounds interesting in dreamchasers, even though there's really no content to read so far. Feel free to subscribe, grant access to, both or neither.

I am excited about Dreamwidth. Yay, internet.