Release and Rise.

Read time: 17-19 minutes. Potential triggers: contains details of depression, anxiety, suicide ideation, trauma and ablism.

“If you don’t think to yourself “fuck yes!” to the person you wake up to in the morning, you should do them a favour and set them free to find someone who will.”

January 2022 was the hardest, happiest and most horrible month of my life.

During the first moments of 2022: while Chris and I were looking out at the hundreds of fireworks going off at midnight all over Cardiff, standing at the top of Penarth together: Chris proposed to me and I said “yeah!” – not the graceful “YES!” that is expected, but it was more “me”.

When I saw the ring I felt like time had stopped, my anxious inner monologue kicked in almost immediately: “do I deserve this? Can I have this? Is this okay? Am I allowed this?” and after another moment of almost forever, a deep speechless voice in my gut echoed back with a resounding “OF COURSE, YES.”

Like a firework in the night, that feeling of “yes” sparked into life. It’s stayed with me ever since.

It was a complete and utter “world flipped upside down” moment. “Of course I was going to say yes”, I said as we walked back home (stopping underneath every streetlight to admire the ring!). If you don’t think to yourself “fuck yes!” to the person you wake up to in the morning, you should do them a favour and set them free to find someone who will.

Back in November, a client asked if I think we’d ever get married: I replied straight away with “Oh, I’d marry him tomorrow!”… Little did I know back then that he had it tucked away in a drawer inside his study. ♥

It’s a custom-made faceted Opal, diamond and white gold engagement ring by Nobel Yates Jewellery in New York – Chris created it based on my love of Opals and my 2 year silver/crystal sobriety ring that I wear on my other ring finger (mentioned in my 2019 blog post, Strong Women Don’t Need Strong Drinks).

“I never thought I’d meet another Auteetotal Tattooer, and I could never have imagined I’d be this happy in a relationship outside of the one I have with myself.”

We started with a sunrise in winter lockdown. He helped me apply for a business loan, helped me build my new studio. We did a guestspot in Edinburgh together then we started working together. The studio is now ours, and my home is now his. The road trips, the hikes, the endless conversations. The game days, long mornings, sunsets, his wonderful cooking. I cherish the wrinkles he’s given me from always smiling, and from allowing me to feel my feelings. He validates everything I’ve survived and overcome, everything I go through and accepts all of me. He suggests better routes for me to take and keeps me grounded. He’s an amazing cat-dad and Sid adores him!

I never thought I’d meet another Auteetotal Tattooer, and I could never have imagined I’d be this happy in a relationship outside of the one I have with myself. My co-pilot, my adventure buddy, my friend, my lover.

January 23rd 2022 marked my 3 year Therapy-versary(!)

I walked into my first session 3 years ago on double crutches and heavy pain meds, 4 weeks after a knee reconstruction: I was just over a year sober but I was depressed, stressed, heartbroken, and suffering from multiple mystery illnesses and symptoms.

It led me to being formally identified as Autistic and diagnosed lifelong chronically ill. I started reading again and have since read lots of self-improvement and psychology books. It gave me the strength to outgrow and understand the toxic relationships, friendships and work environments I’d put myself in. It’s made me a better businesswoman and stronger, more resilient human. Through writing about my life and experiences, I met my fiancé Chris, who also has regular therapy and is now studying a Psychology degree alongside tattooing part-time.

Sometimes you need to stop seeing the good in people and start seeing what they show you (and believe them the first time).

I had an emotional and cathartic session with my therapist this January, who confirmed I’ve overcome and healed the trauma and abuse I’ve endured survived in childhood and adulthood.

It was a surreal and beautiful thing to hear, and I’m so proud of how far I’ve come. Obviously, this doesn’t mean I’ve “completed” therapy, and have carried on with regular sessions as normal to deal with regular life shit, as and when it happens. I’ve had many unsuccessful attempts with different therapists over many years too, which I’ve written about previously.

If you’re on the fence about therapy or whether things are “bad enough”, simply ask yourself – have you been alive during 2020 and 2021?!

Earlier this year, my therapist confirmed and elaborated that I’ve been harbouring an inferiority complex most of my life: this was due to the heaps of unpacked and unresolved trauma I’d survived in my childhood and adulthood. This complex has fed other’s superiority complexes, over the years these have sometimes been people who I’ve called my closest friends or were people I chose to date. Although they weren’t inherently evil, they were all entirely the wrong people for me, for so many reasons.

“The quality of your relationships matter. Whether it be a friend, parent, family member or partner, who you surround yourself with can impact your mental health. Stop feeling obligated to be around people who are familiar but also detrimental to your well-being.”

Minaa B, LMSV @minaa_b

We can deepen our healing when we stop pontificating about and dissecting our partner, friend or family member’s avoidance, narcissism or emotional unavailability and begin asking ourselves “why I keep pursuing and choosing people who cannot love or care for me in the ways that I truly need?”

March 2020: my cat and I moved to Penarth from Newport.

It was a tiny 1-bed flat that had a lot less space and cost more each month than my previous 1-bed flat of 2.5 years. I had turned the offer down the first time, 6 months before; I was unsure about the move and hoped the person I was with at the time would want to make living plans together. I wrote more about this in my 2020 blogpost, Grief and Growth.

I was hardly tattooing at the time due to stress and poor health, and the financial gamble was a huge strain. I was waiting for the results from an investigative CT scan, I was nursing a fresh breakup and had successfully raised the money for a private rheumatologist consultation, specifically for diagnosing mystery chronic illnesses (thank you to everyone who kindly donated, you changed the course of my life forever).

After spending 8 weeks without a fixed address and sleeping on a blow-up bed in an empty house that wasn’t mine, I got the keys to that beautiful little flat on the 3rd of October 2017. Patience and perseverance paid off! That Newport flat was where I got sober and started to heal and recover.
As you can see, the flat in Penarth was a slight “downgrade”, but with a bit of decent decorating and creativity, I made it a beautiful place I could call home, the same way I did with the others. ♥

Despite the move being totally out of my threshold, I’m so glad I found the strength to do it. I turned that tiny space into a tiny paradise!

To help you visualise: it was roughly the same shape and size as a 40ft shipping container. Unfortunately, it’d hadn’t been designed like one of those fancy converted shipping containers you see on Pinterest! Thank fuck for candles, houseplants and orchids.

Through hard work, creativity and daily practice, I managed to live comfortably and peacefully in this little nest while the whole world fell apart. I got the lifelong chronic illness diagnosis I’d been searching for; I stayed sober, I healed my heart, I kept up with self-care and self-development (and sometimes, I kept it clean!)

Despite not being able to tattoo whilst having zero savings in the 2020 lockdowns, there was pressure to keep paying my rent each month. Staying sober during a global pandemic was tough. I’m forever grateful to the owner of the building my 2nd independent tattoo studio was in (the very first incarnation of Ebony Squid Studio!) who didn’t charge me a penny for the months I couldn’t work due to lockdowns. I kept up with normal rent payments as much as I could; and when I couldn’t pay monthly any longer, I made sure I repaid every single penny I owed as soon as I was tattooing again a few months later. During those years I rented properties and rooms with that same company, I’d always paid what any other tenant would have at the time. That company put a roof over my head, and in return I put food on their table. Those homes were never a handout – I’m not a charity case, after all! One of the greatest gifts recovery gave me is that I have so much compassion for the unhealed versions of me that did everything they could with everything they had at the time so they could keep on persevering and surviving. I wouldn’t be here today without them. ♥

I don’t care about other people’s drinking like I used to (unless it’s harming me or others). I’m over convincing people to try Dry January or Sober October. I’ll be (hopefully) celebrating 5 years sober in October this year, fingers crossed. If that doesn’t prove that anyone can do any month of the year happily sober and not die of boredom, I’ll happily fuck off and spend my time doing something else (like rambling on here instead!)

I like to think I was a pretty good tenant, all things considered. However, there was that one time I flooded my bathroom and the room downstairs last year due to a migraine (long story, of which I’m still utterly mortified about!) and although everyone involved laughed it off, I genuinely wanted to head-butt a nail from sheer embarrassment! I bought the landlord a vintage bottle of red wine to apologise though, which thankfully went down extremely well!

Since I got sober and into recovery in 2017, I’ve been really reluctant to buy alcohol (for obvious reasons), but the 4 vintage “posh” bottles of wine I’ve bought in over 4.5 years sobriety have all been for that landlord as Christmas presents (and one for a pretty embarrassed apology!) 

Funny thing about any drink you can buy that contains Ethanol: No matter how much you pay, it all feels the same the next day. Same goes for organic, “clean” or vintage wines, or that Agave one that claims to give you no hangover. I tried that once, and it definitely still does! I’ve been sober for almost 1,800 days – and I’ve never thought the myself “damn, I wish I’d got drunk last night”.

Some people will judge and punish you for changing. Some people will celebrate and support you for growing. Choose your circle carefully. 

One thing I do regret about not drinking and taking other drugs for this long: I’ve lost so many friends and co-workers through getting sober, and I wish it wasn’t so much of a big deal. I didn’t anticipate I’d be ostracised for getting sober and kicked out of studios for staying sober, or kicked out of friendship circles to trying to hold myself to a more mindful set of ethical values and speaking up about harmful and problematic behaviour. It’s hard to stay neutral once you make the decision to make better choices, and it becomes a snowball effect of realising that some friends and co-workers values don’t align with yours anymore, and that awareness creates a void of ambiguity and doubt. I wrote more about this in a 2019 blog post, Rejection and Redirection.

“I’m no longer apologising for: Wanting consistency in my relationships. Having a negative reaction to being mistreated. Leaving relationships that are harmful to my mental health. Having opinions that are different from yours. Taking up space with my words, opinions, and needs.”

“Sometimes what you need might not be what’s best for someone else. Even then, it’s okay to choose what you need.”

Hailey Page Magee. 

Since getting sober, I’ve realised how exhausted I was from trying to fit into a society that was never designed for neurodiverse, chronically ill people. I realised that most of the people I’d surrounded myself with were not my real friends, nor were they meaningful connections that cared very much about integrity, authenticity and self-development. Bids of self-improvement are pretty irritating to people who have no desire to change.

I didn’t realise that by living sober and trying to remain in the same friendship groups, I was enabling the very same problematic behaviour in others that I was so desperately trying to grow away from myself. There was no need to change, because I was telling them I didn’t care through my complacency.

Enabling is a pattern of “helping” someone that actually allows the issue to continue, rather than solving it. This disempowers the other person, because they know that regardless of the behaviours they choose, someone will be there to rescue them and allow them to continue their harmful pattern. Enabling allows a person to not actually face the natural consequences to their actions. Enabling usually comes from a good place. We don’t want to see people hurting, which shows we are compassionate. In the discomfort of seeing other’s pain we try to fix, rescue or save people. Allowing patterns of problem behaviour: Betrayal, lying, emotional abuse. Lying or “bailing out” someone from the consequences of their own actions, repeatedly. Making excuses for someone because you feel sorry for them. Ending patterns of enabling is actually an act of self love and an act of love for the other person. 

Dr Nicole LaPera.

Signs you are emotionally drained by someone:

• You are ruminating about your interactions 
• You feel anxious and uneasy around them
• You are resentful of them
• You doubt yourself after you interact with them
• You dread spending time with them
• You ignore their texts/calls
• You are always worried about them/their issues and put them over yours 
• You need to unwind after talking to them
• You need to vent to others after talking to them
• You experience physical symptoms & anxiety after being around them
• You minimise your issues around them because you don’t feel they can support you
• You make up excuses not to be around them

Divya Robin, MHC @mindmatterswithdiv

Over the years, I’ve repeatedly found myself in friendships with “CHAOTIC BUT MAKE IT CUTE!” as the central theme. We’d drink, cause problems, get into trouble, feel bad, drink to feel better, cause more problems, get into more trouble, feel worse, drink to feel better… See where I’m going with this? It wasn’t constant, but it was consistent. I’d either contribute with an equal dose of my own hopeless messiness or I kept my mouth shut and let them get on with it. When I started to become emotionally sober after a couple years clean, I couldn’t bear the pressure of solving issues that should have been my friend’s responsibility anymore. I could feel that my friends didn’t accept me changing, because they weren’t ready to “let me off the hook” for the times I was a fucking nightmare too. They didn’t owe me forgiveness or acceptance, and I didn’t owe it to them either.

Common reasons friendships end or fade away: 

• You feel consistently judged or not supported (the more you ignore this, the more exhausted and resentful you become)
• The relationship is built around gossiping/complaining (you are looking for deeper, more authentic connections)
• Your priorities have changed (over time you’ve noticed you feel less and less connected because of this)
• The friendship feels forced or awkward to maintain
• You don’t feel drawn to talking or opening up to them and notice yourself only doing it out of obligation 
• You built your relationship at a time when you were a completely different person
• You’re able to acknowledge that you’ve evolved/grown and likely wouldn’t have bonded with them at all today 

I couldn’t clean up their messes anymore or pretend to be a therapist. They deserved better, and I’m not qualified. I had my own grief to deal with, which didn’t have space on the table. I was using my own sessions with my own therapist to navigate their lives and their problems instead of my own. I could feel myself sinking down, the life draining out of me. I wish there could have been more love in the letting go, but their behaviour at the end was the closure I needed to release and rise back up again. I have to put my well-being and my recovery first, otherwise I will lose everything and be no use to anyone ever again.

I’ve lost so many people I’ve considered family, and it never gets easier. I wrote more about this in a recent blog post, When You Know, You Know.

Sometimes you just gotta give people the space to be who they are and how they want to behave and adjust your closeness to them accordingly. 

You are not responsible for the expectations others place on you. You are not responsible for the happiness of others. You are only responsible for making sure you are living authentically and doing the things necessary to be okay. 

Along with lots of friendships, I’ve had to let go of the expectations I placed on myself when I didn’t know myself better. Now I know better I must try to do better, and I need to be able to live life on life’s terms. I’m working hard every day to try to clear the wreckage of my past and build a healthier future full of better choices for what is best for me.

As always: progress not perfection.