April 2024

Hmm... I thought I would have written in this diary more. I thought I would have done a lot of things. As it stands, I'm just really tired...

I've been trying to write in this diary for three days now. Each time, I realise how much I'm whining, then give up and go back to bed. I guess the solution would be to stop whining, right? The problem is there's not much to say if I'm not complaining.

The nightmares finally stopped, but I don't feel any more rested than before. I don't want to do anything. It's a struggle just to stay out of bed. I flipped through the last month of my pen-and-paper diary and it broke my heart, watching my handwriting deterioriate. At my worst, the entries seem to be written by someone else entirely. As usual, I sit around all day feeling anxious, accomplishing very little. I took a shower today, and made rice the day before yesterday. That's good. I guess.

Here's a list of things that have distracted me from how exhausted I am:

1. Last night, I started reading fanfiction again. The "Flowey & Sans" tag on AO3 is a gold mine for weird, fucked up stories, and currently I'm about 100,000 words into Sugarless Milk Chocolate by starrylitme. The prose leaves much to be desired, but the author's Sans Voice is on point and, as always, I enjoy watching him deteriorate and go insane... I love the way she writes Flowey, too.

   I'll probably finish reading it tonight, then move on to another weird, fucked up story. Honestly, I think real books are just too hard for me right now, so the lowered writing quality is actually a plus. I'm grateful to all the amateur authors putting their stuff out for free.



2. I somehow got myself back into Pokemon and now I'm thinking a lot about Steven Stone. It's only taken me my entire life, but I finally have a pokesona to ship with him. Her name is Ecce and, like all my self-inserts, she's a freak!!! But a very cute one. I stayed up late one night recolouring and dressing up the Pokemon on her team. Take a look:

   

   Arachne also listened to me rant about Ecce's courtship with Steven, and even drew her with Creamy Mami's hairstyle... Thank you Arachne ♥

   I just watched some of the Pokeani for the first time in years, too— Ash vs. Steven in the Masters Eight Tournament. My hot take is that Steven only lost because of Ash's protagonist powers... I want to watch the other episodes he appears in, too. He's so cute... I love it when he kisses his Mega Brooch. Both him and Ecce are serving pure magigirl realness.

   Someday, I'd love to make a Pokemon section for this website where I talk about my favourite games and 'mons, write out Ecce's lore, and gush over Steven, but... it will be a long time coming. It's so hard to do anything at all these days.



3. SANSDOLL. I'm not playing with him nearly as much as I'd like, but I have him sitting on top of my computer tower and he looks so cute staring down at me. I like to kiss his little face and go like coochie-coochie-coo on his chest. LINE Camera keeps offloading my stickers which is... irritating... but I'll survive.

   

   It could just be my imagination, but his limbs are floppier than when he first arrived. I think I should restring him? That will also be a task for my sort-of-distant future. I just don't have the energy for much of anything these days. Sigh.

The weather is getting warmer! I'm seeing lots of birds around— just yesterday, I marvelled at two little blue jays in the big tree— and the forsythia is blooming. I love springtime. Here's hoping I can muster the strength to go out and meet it.

Things happened exactly as I predicted they would. I spent the first two-maybe-three days of April totally fired up and determined to make a better life for myself, then over the course of the week have seen a slow decline back into depression. I never managed to talk to my friends again or take more than two steps outside. I've spent the past three or four days in bed. Obviously, I don't regret that burst or energy or the good times that came of it, but that's exactly why I feel so disappointed and sad to be right back where I was before.

How much longer can I go on like this? Making so little progress— experiencing life in stops and starts— never aknowledging or internalising the achievements that I do make? All I want is for someone to tell me that they see how hard I'm working, but I still can't tell if I'm actually trying at all. When I congratulate myself, it makes me cry. Dunno if that means I'm on the right track.

Still, some good things have come from this month's adrenaline rush. Part of my 77LOVE program was to write just 100 words a day, which has so beautifully turned into writing at least 1,000 words a day, 100 words at a time. Almost immediately, I've gotten myself addicted to the creative process and it's basically all I do and think about doing all day. It's not quite as smooth as web design— a hobby about which I have absolutely no baggage or anxieties, and therefore enjoy fairly seamlessly— but it's twice as satisfying because... well... it's my life's passion, LOL.

So far, my total wordcount is still rather small, but it's larger than zero and that's an obvious, measurable improvement. I felt a bit concerned when I read some of my work from two years ago and thought, "what the fuck, this is still amazing!" because that leads me to believe I haven't improved much at all since then, but... that's to be expected, isn't it? I've barely written anything at all for a long, long, long time... Or... I've been writing, but haven't acknowledged that I was...? It's hard to tell when my days all blur together and I consider myself a failure no matter what I do.

Anyways... I'm just rambling at this point. I'll keep rambling cuz who cares? It's my blog. I wanna talk. I need to talk to "someone" even if it's not really anyone because there isn't any response. That's not to say I don't appreciate you, whoever you are, but... I dunno. I have social problems, haha. Just ignore me. Just stop reading now, okay?

I'm not sleeping well or eating enough. I have nightmares every night and wake up feeling gross. Today, I've felt dehydrated no matter how much I drink. That's probably because of the anxiety— it makes me sweat— which is so bad that I can't stop doing my little nervous habits for more than a minute at a time. When it's time for me to go out into the world, I'll have to keep my hair in braids small enough for me to play with, because twirling random locks of my afro until they stick straight out makes me look unkempt and insane. I'm so glad there are so few people around to see.

Speaking of my hair, it's all matted up again... I think I'll have to wash and comb it out tonight. I don't want to!!!! I feel so sad and scared, like a dog going to the groomer's, hahaha. It will be okay. It's just momentary pain. That's all anything is. All of life is ephemeral.... It comes and it goes.

Okay, happy April for real this time! All that activity from yesterday left me kind of exhausted, so I spent most of my day in bed. In the afternoon it started to drizzle, which was the perfect ambient noise for my day of relaxtion. And I'm calling it relaxtion instead of "rotting," as I usually do, because I was very deliberate in the restful actions I chose.

I exchanged several long voice messages with , which was awesome but took up way more time than I intended. I'm realising that if I truly want to fit everything that matters to me into 14-16 wakeful hours, I'll have to be more mindful of that. That said... I wouldn't trade the people that I love for anything— not even time! And I doubt that I would have gotten out of bed anyways, LOL.

I also spent about an hour reading the first chapter of Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. It's been so long since I've read a novel... this one is really reminding me what makes a good story. Ishiguro strikes a healthy balance between piquing my curiousity and offering insight into his world and characters, among which the titular protagonist is my favourite. I'm excited to see where Klara's story goes.

Maybe I'll read chapter two tomorrow, or maybe I'll continue Baccano! volume 9. Between now and then, I might even stumble onto a brand new book or story that I can't bear to put down. Who knows! It's kind of exciting to know that I will read something of quality but not exactly what.

Besides that, I spent the day just... chilling out. Breathing deeply. Over the weekend, I noticed that my breathing was so shallow, I might as well have been holding it completely. I felt like a prey animal playing dead. At the time, I was too anxious to do much besides make a mental note, but now that I've got some more energy, I've introduced two 20 minute sessions of coherent breathing into my (still-forming) routine.

I laugh at myself for being so immature about it.... I never want to start because I always think I have something better to do, but once I actually lay down and get to it, I relax and really enjoy myself. My favourite part is that it's not a meditation. I make a point of thinking about whatever I want, with absolutely zero attemps to "clear my mind" or "let things go," or even focus on the truth. All I have to do is breathe. My poor oxygen-starved cells thank me kindly.

The article I linked suggests 5 breaths per minute, but I think that's still too fast for me. Next time, I'll try four. The point is to relax as much as possible without falling asleep, right? Slower is probably better.

What else can I write about...? Right, yes. She's since deleted her website, but I was inspired by Honeybread's 75HARD parody called 77LOVE. She started it in January and I've been thinking about it ever since. Sadly, now that she's disappeared, we won't be able to cheer each other on, but I still wanted to make up my own version— not just to find more happiness in my daily life, but also to honour her creativity and drive.

At time of writing, I've yet to finish designing the page... but part of my program is spending at least one hour on creative work! That means drawing, writing, doing crafts... and, of course, everything to do with Vivarism. I don't think I'll count writing diary entries as "creative work," though, even though it technically is. That feels like a loophole that'd be too easy to take advantage of. Plus, the brain muscles that I exercise while journaling are totally different from the ones that have gotten so buff from building the cutest pages on the internet.

I'll publish this entry, then crack my knuckles and get started! I can do it! And I'm gonna enjoy myself while I do!!!

Happy Halloween, everyone!!! It's hard to believe it's been 7 months since my last update... but I just love web design so much, I simply couldn't stay away. By now, I'm sure you've all heard about the controversies that sparked my disappearance... the accusations made.... Surely, for you it was just passing gossip, where you made up your mind after five minutes and forgot just as quickly, but for the sake of my own character— my sense of integrity and my personal pride— I want to address the allegations directly.

First of all, the literal defintion of lolicon is, "I'm just fucking with you." Happy April Fools.

... was that funny? Was that a funny joke??? If you didn't laugh, just forget I said anything. I thought it'd be a good prank if I pretended that my diary from October had somehow travelled backwards in time for your viewing pleasure on this lovely April 1st. I thought about commenting on some made-up world events, but I don't keep up with anything well enough to make predictions (accurate or otherwise) or care much about release dates. Would it have been funnier if I said something silly about Deltarune Chapter 3??? Hm. I'll try that next year.

And in case you were wondering, "why October?" It's because purple is a Halloween colour! I think blue or yellow are much better for April, but Roki!Sans by あひん was too cute to pass up, (while the UTAU cover itself... leaves much to be desired). It could have been even more Halloweeny, since I kept picking out pink and purple candy stickers, but I restrained myself. It's still gotta be convincingly springlike! In this case, it embodies the strength and energy of the season— the push to be reborn. So... yeah! This is my real, actual design for April! Tomorrow, I'll change the dates and use this page as normal.

Anyways, today has been a lovely day for me. It's kinda crazy how quickly I go from, "who cares! I give up on everything!!!" to "actually? I need to do better right now ASAP." Yesterday's diary entry touches on a bit of that, but it ends on a sort of defeatist note. Of course, I'll become depressed again. That's just how this goes. I have no control over feeling painful emotions, but I don't have to wallow in them— and even if I go back to wallowing again later, at least I'll have had some good days in between.

Really, really good days! I love keeping myself busy!!! I love sitting upright at my desk and cooking rice and tidying up and I especially love taking cute pictures because— guess what! It's not just April Fool's Day... it's also Sans's birthday!!!! Er, at least it's the birthday that I made up for him. I made my doll a little crown to celebrate. Seems this is also the SANSDOLL reveal... oops? I've been meaning to write about him for a while now— and honestly all of this belongs in my UNDERTALE diary instead— but I only have time to publish this one page tonight, so... tough. You and me both will have to deal.

If any of my doll friends are reading... I'll see you again soon!!! Part of my push towards better health and a better life is to stay in contact with people. I know for a fact that bad days are saved by good company. It's just a matter of creating a sustainable lifestyle for myself. Being an introvert autist with 1,000 mental problems is hard! But this is the only life that I have, so I need to live it to its fullest.

I've got lots to say about that— how I plan to make it happen, the things I've been enjoying, the people who inspire and support me— but it's already so late at night... yawn! What a pleasant fatigue I'm feeling after my day full of fun.