Josie

I don't need a lot of luxury--just stability. I'm willing to do whatever I have to do in order to give my family a life that doesn't consist of constant worry and nothing else. I can work hard. I can self-sacrifice. I just need it to actually mean something in the end.

I'm tired of phone calls asking for money that I don't have. I'm tired of being told that my only options are to either abandon my partner or force her to do more than she's able. I'm tired of feeling like a burden to anyone who treats me with kindness because I always need something these days.

I'm tired. I've been running on fumes for months, and I don't know how much longer I can keep doing it. Every time I think that I might be able to catch up and start to get things stabilized, life finds a new and creative way to fuck me over, and I get knocked back down to that drowning state again.

But the fact that we're always in such a precarious position means that there's almost no improvement in her condition. All she can see at this point is a world that can't let us have anything good or nice--never mind stable--and honestly, I can't really blame her. It's becoming all I can see too.

I'm doing everything that I can. She's in therapy. She's finally starting meds. I'm doing everything in my power to meet her very specific mental health needs, and that's really only been possible in the first place because I've had an extraordinary amount of help from a friend.

I've worked incredibly hard to keep us afloat, but we've had to let bills go, live off nothing but pasta, rice, and beans since that's all we can afford, and we've still had to rely on friends entirely too much to keep us housed. We've been "almost homeless" nearly every month for the past year now.

On its own, that all means that I'm managing her schedule as well as mine, but it also means that she can't work. Since mid-January, I've been trying to make ends meet on my income alone, and it's not gone well.

Firstly, her mental health issues have been far more extensive than just depression, and that's really complicated things. Since she's gone so long without any kind of treatment, it's done some real damage, and she's reached a point where she's having gaps in her memory and losing chunks of time.

Without sharing too much of her stuff, she's been suicidal since last year. She's been depressed as long as I've known her, and SI has always been a part of that, but it's gotten terrifyingly worse. We've been doing everything we can to help manage her mental health, but it's been... challenging.

Things have been really rough for the last year. I know they've been difficult for everyone, but this has probably been the hardest, scariest year of my life. Since this time last year, my partner's mental health has been in the gutter, and that's gutter has just gotten deeper and deeper.

I know that very few people are going to see this, and even fewer are going to care. That's not meant to be a self-deprecating statement or anything--I just know that I don't really have much reach, and the people who will see this don't really know me. This is mostly a vent--an update for the void.

That obsession feels overwhelming too. Even if you can recognize it for what it is, it's still so hard to shake. There's never a "thin enough." There's never a realistic goal. It's just a constant announcement of "you're too much" or "you're too big" in the back of your mind. It's like brainwashing.

Even with everything being bad and scary in the world right now, I'm feeling kind of sappy today, and I just feel like saying that it is one of my absolute joys lately to give my partner the opportunity at some point in her life to just be a housewife. She's my favorite, and she deserves that. 🥰

If you have to go around a mountain to arrive everywhere you go, then your route planning must be as unfathomable as the motivations of an eldritch being

Thaaaank you ☺️

Oh thank you! ☺️

Josie is taking a mirror selfie. She's wearing a white blouse, black pants, black shoes, and glasses. She's just looking at the camera, but goddamn if she doesn't just pout like a bottom as a baseline. 🤦🏻‍♀️

Josie is wearing a white blouse and glasses. A necklace hangs just inside her top. Her brown hair is hanging down, loose, over her shoulders, and her lips are slightly parted.

Josie is still in that same white blouse with glasses and a necklace, but this time, there's clearly a filter on the picture because she has a splash of freckles on her cheeks and yellow butterflies at the corner of her glasses. She is smiling a little bit this time.

Once again, Josie is wearing that white blouse, but this time, she's not wearing glasses. Her head is tilted to one side, and she's still smiling a little.

Entering my consummate professional arc

I'll never read anything she says normally again 🐸

Oh these are cool as hell!

For the fellow boy enjoyers out there, all of this same stuff still applies, and in my experience, they melt just as hard. 🫡

Baby👏🏻your👏🏻tops/dommes👏🏻sometimes!!!👏🏻

There is nothing more precious than watching a girl get babied a little for the first time, and it takes VIRTUALLY NO EFFORT FROM YOU! How hard is it to be the big spoon every now and again? How hard is it to hold a cute girl? I promise they appreciate you for it

Super true and also absolutely mind-blowing because I've never thought of it that way before 😦

Holy fuck I forgot about the cd thing 😦

My ex had this really grumpy looking Manx cat, and she'd walk around all the time looking so mad but then her little nub tail would be wiggling around, and it made for an incredibly goofy picture every time

It's happened so fast for me 😵‍💫

I don't know if this was meant to be an Obama impression, but that's how it sounds in my head

Yes, and it is so hard to recover from in the moment. 🥲

Thaaaaank you! 😊

Josie is wearing a pink sweater, a black, lace choker, a set of black headphones with a microphone, and her glasses. She's smiling at the camera, leaning her chin on her fist.

This is how she showed up to her exam today 😊

He's phenomenal! I assumed everyone knew that 😧