WISHES FOR 2021

In 2021 I wish…

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… to read 12 books. In 2020 I only read 8, which is partly because I suddenly decided to knit some Christmas presents and they took a lot of time and energy to get done because I haven’t knitted for such a long time. This year I have definite plans not to knit anything, so I will have plenty of time to read, haha.

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… to get control of my self harming. It’s been a lot lately and at the moment it feels quite hopeless. I’m drowning in shame and guilt and I just want it to stop. I know I can do better. It’s hard when you don’t actually care what happens and couldn’t actually be bothered to stop, because you know “it’s fine as it is”, but I’m determined to take action and don’t let it control my life.

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… for the first time to write out and finish my first ever notebook. I’ve been journaling my entire life, I remember I must have gotten my first notebook when was about 4 or 5. It was this tiny book with an orange plastic cover. I called it something that translates to “little writing book of mine”. (I find that pretty cute, to be honest). I didn’t finish it and I haven’t finished a single book since either.

I think one of the issues is that I love collecting notebooks and when I find a new one I just have to start writing in it. Another is also my constant need for for fresh starts, a way of deleting the person I was, press the reset button. But this is the year!

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… to save up for a tortoises! Since last Spring I’ve really wanted tortoises, I find them fascinating and think they’re awesome creatures. I’ve talked to a breeder, and now I just need the money to pay for it. I have never been good at saving money, never thinking I would need it as “I wasn’t going to stay around for too long”. Bad impulse control has had a say in it as well. I’m hoping these tortoises will help me look forward and stay on track. After all, if I don’t save I don’t get those tiny dinosaurs.

Yes, I realize it says 2020, I made an error. I fixed it.

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… to lose XX kgs. This is not a healthy one, but it’s on my list so I’m sharing it. I haven’t talked about it here before, but my eating habits and body image aren’t exactly healthy and I was diagnosed with an eating disorder around the time when I was first inpatient. It has stuck around in different forms. I have to do this, if I don’t I will most definitely not manage to get control over my SH.

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… to eat more fruit. Over to a more healthy one! I have been very bad at eating fruit the past years, it just never had a place in my mind. I know fruits are very beneficial for both our physical and mental health, so this year I’m going to focus to have fruits as a big part of my diet.

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… to photograph more, and bring my camera with me everywhere I go. I’ve been in a rut with my photography since Autumn, and it’s been painful, at one point I felt so much like a failure and loser in photography that I put my camera up for sale. But I’ve had a serious talk with myself, telling myself I am good enough and that I need this, so I took the ad down again. And so far this year I’m doing good! I feel content with what I do.

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Do you have any wishes or wants for this year?

– E.J

THOUGHTS ON A WEDNESDAY

💭 Will I ever get better from my personality disorders or do I just have to accept that things will be like this? How can I maximise my quality of life and get the most out of it while living reduced with these symptoms?

💭 It feels like Spring. It’s a fresher air outside, it feels newer – like air revived. Maybe it’ll revive me in a sense.

💭 I’ve decided to stop using snus! No more nicotine for me. (Well, after the 10 boxes I just got in the mail yesterday, if I don’t manage to sell them to someone..) I’m way too addicted to it, and I’m tired of it. Good bye.

💭 I am beyond grateful for my four-legged babies. They always manage to brighten up my day no matter what. I’m so glad that Kalypso has settled in so nicely.

💭 “I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil” – J. R. R Tolkien.

Do you see Khaleesi mid-attack next to Koda, haha?

💭 I read this critique of a documentary that just came out here in Norway about a photographer named Lene Marie Fossen, who suffered from anorexia. It said “we are critical to the fact that the illness is portrayed as artistic and beautiful. We who work with this know that art and eating disorders don’t belong together”.

The first thing I reacted to was that it wasn’t her eating disorder that was portrayed as artistic and beautiful, it was the woman herself. Her courage and strength to create meaningful and outstanding photos despite her deadly illness.

The second thing: aren’t people with eating disorders allowed to be artists? Should they hide away in a dark corner where we don’t see them, stripped down to “eating disordered” being their whole identity? Lene Marie kept repeating in the film “first and foremost I am a photographer”. She was adamant she wasn’t an anorexic photographer, but a photographer who had anorexia. And that takes strength in a life consuming illness.

x Almond