my book, the holidays, and more!

So with my last update I said that I was in the process of firing my editor, and that has since come and passed the micro gig website found me in favor so that was kind of awesome he's still sent me files that were unusable unrecognizable by any of the platforms that I was going to upload my ebook too and the ebook file that he did send me had glaring errors and also had HTML errors and missing files so needless to say I am not too upset with the fact that I had to let him go. 

Now Sunday December 8th is going to be the launch of my book party and according to Amazon I mean not have my author copies in until December 11th which really makes me unhappy because if I were to have ordered it directly through Amazon I could have had them within a day or two but because I'm ordering them through KDP I can't have them until the 11th or the 17th. 

So this has taught me a very valuable lesson should the time come that I decide to publish anything else! And in the process of ordering my author copies I have now placed myself in some significant debt right before the holidays, which is just freaking amazing and fantastic! 

But I'm going to do the best I can with what I have available to me and just hope for the best between now and then. Everything seems to work out every year regardless of how stressed out I get. But I never expected to be as far in debt as I am right now but oh well it is what it is right? 

As for Thanksgiving Thanksgiving when pretty well I didn't think that we were going to have it because 3 days of my sister telling me that we weren't going to do anything only to find out day of that we were. And it kind of seemed like she was upset that I showed up but oh well I still ate food and just sat there and played on my phone most of the night. 

So yeah just been trying to figure everything out get last minute details worked out and living the dream try not to wake up LOL

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The election, depression, hope and more

First, I must start this post to let you know that it is going to be a bit of a rant, as well as something that I like to try and stay away from, politics. With the latest election, the country is divided even further. And with the change of the regime, we have the Sword of Damocles hanging over a majority of the nation. Along with the changes coming to the White House, we also have the looming Project 2025 that could in my opinion which is shared by many, revert the country back to how it was prior to the 1960's where segregation, women's rights, and many other civil liberties could be stripped away from those within certain demographics. 

It is a very scary idea that someone's religious views can cause all of these things to come to light, when the very country itself was founded on the idea of religious freedoms. Yet since the founding of the United States we have had anything but that. Time and time again it has been a wave of Christianity washing over the entire country from Plymouth Rock in 1620 to the golden coasts of California. The destruction of Indigenous people and their cultures, and so much more. 

With the revocation of Roe v Wade more than just women's reproductive rights have been affected. The LGBTQIA+ Community may lose the very rights that have been fought for with countless lives being lost, either by diseases, violence, or self-harm. Gay marriages can be dissolved. Gender affirming treatments are on the chopping block as well. I fear that this is a very very slippery slope for everyone, including those who blindly voted for this to take place. I fear the narrow sightedness of said votes may be what spearheads the next Civil War within this country. 

That aside, my depression has been coming and going in waves. Some days are better than others, and during those really horrible days, all I can do is cry and listen to the voices that say I should unalive myself. In a lot of my videos and podcast's I refer to it as "The Self-Checkout line." Because you can't use certain words without getting your post banned or flagged. 
And I know there are things that are outside of my control, however, that is not how mental health works. You can have a full understanding of all the right and wrong and everything in between and still your brain tells you that you should hurt yourself or get into the self-checkout line.

If you have been following along with the Podcast, or the YouTube channel you will see that I have taken steps to "fix" certain aspects of my mental health and the wanting to cause myself self-harm. I've never delt with the idea of self-harm but just recently that became something "new" for me. I began doing Cold Plunges and strangely I found that by doing so it has "scratched" that itch. So, for now, it's a good thing. I'm able to "hurt" myself but in a very healthy and productive way. I have talked with my doctor and told him what I was doing, the reason behind it, and how it was helping and he "signed off" on me continuing to do so.

Moving away from the "heavy" stuff and getting into lighter things. I have been focusing a lot of my energy into playing my Nintendo Switch, I finally was able to get a game that I have been wanting that takes place in the Harry Potter Universe called Hogwarts Legacy. As of right now I have about 60hrs into the game. It has been a really nice distraction. 

As for the book....well the book has caused me more stress and anguish then I had ever thought was possible. I've finally gotten a copy of the book from the editor that I was able to get uploaded to Amazon, and have ordered my Author/Proof copy which should be here Tuesday November19 2024. After which time I'll have the ability to look at and hold a physical copy of my book and give the go ahead to publish it and make it go live. 

I had to send my editor an email today letting him know that the eBook isn't coming out properly when i look at it on the previewer that Amazon offers and that I still have yet to try to upload it to Barns and Noble, Kobo, Apple Books, and Google Books. I'm hoping to be able to cast a wide enough net to make it available to a wide range of people across the world. However, I know that it is going to be nice just to get it sold locally, and a dream come true to go to a thrift store in Brooklyn and see it sitting there.

With the holidays quickly approaching, I am really worried about what is to come with those as well. All my finances are wrapped up in trying to get this book out, with my vision being very narrow and only looking at most 30-60 days ahead.  But I always seem to manage at one point or another when it comes to the holidays. After the first of the year, Im going to try to do some traveling. With what finances that has yet to be determined. But I need to get out to California, and I want to go spend a week or so with my aunt in Indiana and try to get out to Las Vegas to see my friend and meet her beautiful daughter and see her family too. 

So this is everything up to this point in my life at the moment.

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Depression, and the hiatus from posting

Well as you know from looking at the dates of the last post to this post it's been quite some time in between. And a lot of that has been the result of just unsurmountable depression that really kind of hit me full force in August and hasn't really let up since then. I've had a lot of anxiety and stress due to my book not being completed in the time frame that I had set aside for it. The editor has had it now for over a month and still has yet to produce any kind of file or workable edit that will translate properly to print and to ebook. So been dealing with a lot of just back and forth with him and I'm at the point where I'm about ready to fire him and see if I can find a new editor. I sent him a message letting him know that he's out of time because as far as he knows he had to have the manuscript back to me before the 16th of November because that was when my original book launch party was going to be and he's had this like I said well over a month now and I still have nothing. So there's that stress. I've also suffered from losing a couple of friends due to misunderstandings and just general bullfuckery. One of these friends I've been friends with for 14 or 15 years the other one just short of 13 years and when I was setting up personal boundaries and just needing to make some changes in my life I didn't realize that the changes were going to come at the expense of losing these two people who were really close to me. But I guess that's what happens when you start to grow and you outgrow those people who are around you. There's been a lot of times within the last couple of months that I have really contemplated not being here anymore by getting into the self checkout line. And it's hard to verbalize and even think of those actions that would make me no longer be here. But I don't want to be dead, and I don't want to be alive, and each time that my depression hits me it gets harder and harder to walk away and to have that strength to fight and carry on. And I know that I'm supposed to be this Pillar of Strength for everyone else but it's hard enough being there for everyone else and yet feeling like no one else is there for me when I know that that's absolutely not true I have a community of people that I could turn to but anyone who deals with any sort of mental health illness understands the isolation that comes with being in the thralls of your downward spiral at the time. So pretty much the only thing that's holding me here is guilt because I don't want to hurt the people who are in my life even though I want to stop the hurt that's in mine! But I just keep moving forward and doing the best I can with what I have available to me even though nine times out of 10 it's absolutely nothing but I try to make the best of that nothing. I've been spending a lot of time playing video games just trying to stay out of my own head and not think about all of the other insurmountable bullshit that's like piling up on top of me. And also knowing that the holidays are right around the corner and have absolutely nothing planned no ideas of gifts nothing and I know that that's not fair to those people in my life that I need to get gifts for and want to get gifts for so I got to pull my head out of my ass or something and start focusing on the holidays and just trying to get together the funds to not only be able to finish publishing my book and getting the book launch party up and going but also getting the money together so that I can buy a little something for everyone on my Christmas list. About the only saving grace that I have right now is the fact that I've started doing cold blooding and that has really helped to reset my mood a lot of times. I was having thoughts of self harm there for a while and that's something I've never had to deal with before. And so when that self-harm kind of showed up it was almost serendipitous that I was asked to do cold plunging with a friend. And so getting into the Super frigid water has had significant benefits. One it's causing me to force myself into a situation that I normally wouldn't be getting myself into IE walking into cold water and forcing myself to be in the cold water. Too as my body starts to acclimate to the ice cold water it hurts and it burns and as I start to swim around it feels like razor blades and Nails scraping across my whole entire body which is satiating that need for self-harm all the time being extremely good for your health and having tremendous health benefits. So as long as I continues to be something good for me I'm going to continue to do it and I actually find myself looking forward to doing it which is really strange. The hardest part for me though is if it is raining or if it is windy trying to get out into the water I know that you know oh yeah you're going to be wet anyway so why does it matter if it's raining but it really does make a huge difference especially when you're coming out of the water trying to warm up and being caught in a deluge of rain. And when it's windy you have the bitter cold waves slapping you in the face and making it that much harder to swim and to just like focus on what needs to be done at that time. So I don't know there's a lot of things kind of culminating all together right now that are making me think feel do and try different things and things that I've never done before. So yeah that's pretty much been it in a nutshell since the last time that I posted. And I really urge you to check out the YouTube channel youtube.com/hellocupcakeitsme check out my videos that are updated every Wednesday and Thursday and then to check out the podcast at podcast.hellocupcakeitsme.com and if you're interested in the book is www.cdsthebook.com 

But for now I guess that is it. Got any questions comments concerns you know how to get a hold of me!

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My book and it's progress - a review of the last 30 days

 So, as of right now, it's been almost 30 days since my last update here on the blog. There has been a lot of stuff that has happened. Mainly a lot of depression. But tonight, which at the time of writing this it is Friday October 11th, 2024, at 11:08pm PST I have submitted my book to the final editor. It should be back to me within 5 days. It is currently Saturday 12th 2024 at 7:08am in Nigeria. I'm working with a guy that I selected out of about 30 people on Fiverr to bring my book to life. From the get-go he has been very communicative, professional, and has amazing reviews. 

I am super excited and nervous to have pulled the trigger and made this huge investment in myself, and my dream. All of this foreshadows the previous 29 days where I have dealt with stress, depression, self-doubt, thoughts of self-harm and more. I had a huge emotional outburst to the point of doing the ugly cry in the middle of the grocery store the other day, which was hell of embarrassing, but I could not stand by and listen to the prelude to a conversation that not only triggered my own childhood trauma but was the bases of something that by law would have forced me into filing a Child Protection case.
The self-harm is something new that I have never delt with before. So that is kind of concerning. I've delt with suicidal thoughts, depression, and all types of mania, but never active thoughts of causing myself pain like cutting or some other type of pain that would dull the mental with the physical. Thankfully the analytical side of my brain kicked in and was like "what the actual fuck is this and where the hell did it come from?" I am one of those people who have internal monologues aka "verbal thinking" or "inner speech" where only 30-50% of people the world over think to themselves or have internal monologues, others do not have this ability. So, because of this there literally are "voices" inside my head. And each one has its own "sound". I know it's rather difficult to properly explain it if you don't have an internal monolog. But when the thought of self-harm came up, it was a "new voice" and the "others" were like "no bitch you are not invited." So, I did a shallow dive into self-harm reduction and other such topics on YouTube and got a shit ton of pop-ups for the 988 Suicide Hotline and things like that. But it has given me something new to study in the terms of mental health and the classes that I have taken over the years.

I have found a healthy way to "self-harm" however. That came in the form of doing Cold Plunges. It was a temporary pain that I could cause myself and have healthy benefits from. I have only gone twice, since writing this post. But I find myself looking forward to it more and more, and it's like a drug. Each time I've gone, I've submerged myself a little deeper and deeper with my final goal of just jumping headfirst into the freezing water and actually swimming like I would in a pool for the 15 to 20 minutes that is allotted to me by the medical nurse whom I've befriended and go with. I even was able to get a portable showering unit that is basically a rechargeable sump pump with a shower attachment. So now when we get out of the water, we can pour our collective hot water into a bucket and shower off more thoroughly, rather than just dumping a bucket of hot water on ourselves.

But the emotional rollercoaster that I have been on since July has really thrown me for a loop. Dealing with my biological mother's failing health and her intolerable drug addictions and toxicity and overall general negativity has been one kick to the balls after another. First getting a call that she was rushed to the hospital with a broken pelvic bone or a fracture to the femoral neck, and then her going through detox and withdrawals and hearing how she is going to "beat the shit out of any motherfucker who tries to put her into a goddamn home.." and being so violent that the doctor and several other members of the hospital contacted my sister and I via Zoom to discuss how she is being discharged against medical suggestion and that she was basically going home to fail aka "die." 

Only for her to call me not even 3 days later to complain about how much pain she is in, and to be actively doing drugs on the phone with me as I can hear the sounds of her being in a car with other people. She thinks that I am stupid and not aware of her drug use, and doesn't remember all the times that she has given me meth pipes trying to pass them off as marijuana pipes, when I use to hand blow them for the tweaker "friends" I had as a teen, as a source of income for myself, and watched all of my friends from the age of 13 to 25 use meth and know what it looks like, what it smells like, how to make it, and what the residue looks like.

Like I was about those streets, when she would take off to the casino with the alimony, child support and welfare checks and leave me at home for hours with no food or anyone else in the house. So needless to say, I was never home much as a teenager because well I didn't really have a "home" to be home for. How I never got mixed up with doing drugs outside of smoking marijuana, trying shrooms and doing something called Sherm in my twenties (which is marijuana or tobacco laced with formaldehyde (embalming fluid you know that stuff that they put into corpses before burying a person) or PCP, is beyond me. The closest thing to a drug addiction (other than Valium that was given to me at a very young age without any supervision) was when I was actively smoking Sherm (I felt myself slipping and stopped before it got much worse) and later when I was smoking marijuana daily and had to stop myself because I noticed that it was becoming a huge problem. 

So all of that to say that it has been a bunch of compounding issues that have come to a boil and has beaten me into the ground. Plus, my father's birthday hit me really hard this year. And thinking the thought of how he cleaned up for about 27yrs and found an amazing woman who I consider my mom, because she's done more for me in the 20-some-odd years that she's been in my life than my own biological egg carton ever had. And he passed away and she is still roaming the earth. Like why is that fair? He worked hard, always put me ahead of his addictions, and really tried, and she's calling me up doing lines, and just actively fucking up all the time. Then I get mad at myself for getting mad at her and allowing her stupidity to hurt me, and for me to get into my feelings because of it, and it just snowballs into a bigger and bigger mental health ball of anger, shame, and depression. 

I really do think that my next book is going to be about growing up at the child of addicts and how through some miracle not ending up a statistic, but still ending up with mental health issues, but trying to heal themselves, even though they come from toxic backgrounds. But for now Carpe Diem Scroto is one step closer to becoming a reality and that is something to celebrate. 

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Stress, Depression, and more

 So if you've watched any of the YouTube videos that I have uploaded in the past 2 weeks, or listened to the Podcast at all you will know that I am not doing that good right now. There is aton of things that I haven't said on camera or on the podcast that have really be weighing on me.

Lately the new thoughts of self-harm have arisen and I have no idea where the hell that has come from. Not like suicide or anything like that, but the physical act of harming myself. I have never been a cutter or anything like that. The closet thing to that I ever did was carve the initials of me and this person who I was really into at the time on my leg, like you would carve it onto a tree. I took a bunch of pills and used probably a pound of ice and a compass to dig into my leg. But that wasn't to "hurt" myself it was to show "love" for the other person...you know the crazy shit teens do.
But this has been something new for me and as someone who studies mental health, and lives with it as well, this is all new territory for me. I don't plan on actually following through with it, and I do have access to lethal means, but have no actual plan to do it. It's falling into the category of my ideation more so than anything. But all of this is also compounded feelings of hopelessness and being overwhelmed with the bullshit my biological mother is going through, as well as my own stresses about getting the book published, and dealing with new health issues, and everything between.

I don't really know when this is all going to stop. But I do hope that it is soon. Im thankful that I'm not still trying to write the book because I wouldn't want this energy going anywhere near it. Today has been a good day so far. I went grocery shopping with my sister, and a friend worked on my car some. But it was almost instantly when I walked in the door, all the racing thoughts, and the bipolar mood swings hitting me all at once. So maybe it's just the house right now. But I am going to be reaching out to my psychiatrist and seeing if I can get a zoom meeting if nothing else just to talk things over. Or I may reach out to 988 to see if I can talk things over with someone there.

But for right now I'm doing like I said "ok" but it's still rather taxing to deal with my brain wanting to hold itself hostage. 

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Reflections of 2024 seven months in

 What can i say about 2024 so far? Well, there has been a lot of changes for me, and some milestones met, and new passions ignited and some moments of depression, and others of pure joy, happiness, and gratitude. I started off 24 with an outlook of middle of the road enthusiasm. However, January found me completing my manuscript and from that getting interviewed on several pod casts, becoming an accidental Beta Tester, and starting the steps i needed to start getting the book published. February and most of March found me in a depressive slump. April found me in a straight up panic about my housing and trying to get that figured out. May had me holding my first public fundraising event, and June and July have found me just being anxious yet grateful for my life as it is thus far. I have ups and downs like everyone else, but it is also highly favored right now too. I've been blessed with cleaning my house and getting rid of old items and making my home a home again. 

The other day I just sat in quite awe of my home, my life, and the steps that I've taken to get to this point. However, I am no longer built for heat of any type, anything above 65 and I'm dying. but an amazing opportunity appeared in a free portable air conditioner from a low-income program that I am part of. Mind you I have a large window unit that has sat unused still in the box it came in, on a chair in my living room because I cannot install it by myself, and though I've asked many people to help, none have. So, like many items in my life, I will have a backup if anything happens.

Im not a religious person, but I am a spiritual one and i just had to take some time to put a thank you out into the universe and be mindful of where Ive been and how far I've come. 

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Playing with my MacBook Air

A few years ago I was given a MacBook Air a few years ago and never really did anything with it as it was somewhat outdated and I couldn't upgrade to the latest OS which at the time was Catalina. Well I figured out how to go about installing new OS's onto "outdated" computers with a video I came across on YouTube and went from there. So all day yesterday I upgraded my computer to Sonoma which at the time of writing this, is the latest OS. Im a PC person through and through, and only really used Mac in college and back in the early days of computing before I got my very first PC. So getting use to the layout and the commands and keyboard shortcuts is a very novel experience.

 But with it now up and going and with the latest OS and being able to download the apps I've wanted and needed to use, I believe I'm going to be using this laptop more often. Especially when doing my YouTube Videos and my Podcasting, though it may be rather hard to make the switch since everything is pretty much automated on my phone. But the intentions are there lol.

 

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Cleaning up the last 9 years

 Depression and mental health will cause one to do things that are not typical of who you were before they became part of your life. I look back over the years and see where things have changed, and the slight gradual build up to where I am at this very moment.

Over the last few days, I with the help of some good friends, have begun excavating the layers of pain, hurt, and mental illness. Each ticking second of the living room clock, ticks the next layer to be thrown into the overflowing trashcan. The music blaring in the background hits my ear but doesn't fully register the rhythm and lyrical stylings. 

My body is present, and automatically going through the motions. Randomly throwing things into the 55-gallon bag, while some small part keeps tally of all the money, all of the emotion, and all of the false need that each item holds. Each moment finds me swimming through floods of images, emotions, and money spent collecting each item. Things crammed into every nook and cranny like some dragon hoard, with nearly enough space for the air in the room to slip through. Looking at towering piles of forgotten items, wondering if I should even begin disturbing its resting place, in the futile attempts to regain some semblance of the home I once had, before the intrusive thoughts of a mentally ill mind moved in.

A filing cabinet with boxes stacked to the ceiling, with layers of who knows what cascading below it. A filing cabinet that has not been opened in probably 9 years or more. The arcane documents therein, more than likely no longer relevant after such a long period of time. My body screaming for the comforting embrace of my bed, like a vampire fleeing from the burning rays of the morning sun, so to does my want and desire to lay in bed call to me. My body longing for the caress of the comforter, and the softness of the pillows, and the cool breeze from the fans positioned throughout the room. A room in need of cleaning like most the other parts of the house. But in its disastrous state, a peace and a comfort that would make others uncomfortable.

A momentary reprieve in writing this just to take a few moments to rest before returning to the task at hand. Always propelling my tired and broken spirit and body towards an unforeseeable conclusion. A conclusion with no clear time or date of completion, just the daunting mechanisms of pseudo mechanical marching with slow forward progression. 

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It was a day

 Today was both a good day and a hard day all in one. The good aspects of it were that I got to spend time with friends, and they helped me with some things that needed to be done around the house. We got to laugh, listen to music, and get some things done that have needed to be done for a long time.

The bad aspect of it was that I felt like I was holding them hostage and that it was something they were doing out of some sort of obligation, and like they had to "rescue" me. I know the later was probably not the case, however, the old lump of flesh between my ears, is listening to the wrong voices, and the Depression is talking really loudly right now. 

I was doing really good until the time came for me to try and throw a stupid stuffed cactus away, and I started crying. It was something that belonged to my grandma, and when I saw it go into the trash bag I started crying. I tried to excuse myself and my friend pulled it back out and said "its ok to keep it" I couldn't part with it. I know it's only a material item, that is dusty and dirty and for someone else would mean nothing, and it really shouldn't mean anything to me, but it is a physical connection that I have to my grandma. The act of seeing it taken from my hands and thrown into a garbage bag caused me a pain I wasn't ready for or could have ever expected. Even now as I type this, tears are strolling down my face.

We still have a lot to do. But I am excited because once things get in order, I want to have a few friends over to celebrate and maybe do a friends BBQ/Dinner type thing. I've never had people over, so its scary and exciting to think about. There are very few people who have ever been allowed to come into my house, so opening it up to them would be a huge step for me. 

And as I begin downsizing and getting things cleaned, it will make it easier when the time comes that I have to move, and it will be something that I look forward to having people over at various times. This chapter of my life has a very strange middle, so Im not sure if its close to closing and a new one starting, all I do know is that if this is what is to come, than I guess I'll welcome it and not fight against it.

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What IfThe "What

 The "What If" game is one of the worse games that one can play with oneself. As I have typed and said many times, I have no clue as to what my future holds. No one really does when it comes to it. However, some at least have an idea as to what they would like for their lives and how they would like things to turn out.

I know what I want, and the problem being, is that to obtain those things, there is a great deal of change that has to happen that absolutely scares the shit out of me. The dangling sword over my head, the anxiety of unsure footing, and the fear of jumping out of the frying pan into the fire are all very real. All of this coupled with what is feeling like a futile embattlement with my creative side, wanting to go into full on creation mode, and run with every project I see fly across my timeline, and the depressed and scared side of me wanting to do nothing but lay in bed all day and cry and just pretend that everything is going to be ok. 

I blare the music as loud as I can, yet my every waking thought is WHAT IF....I've been taking 1 1/2 Xanax daily when im only supposed to take one 10mg pill for generalized anxiety, but everything feel like it is balls to the wall 100% anxiety. It was so bad a few nights ago that my pupils were dilated and my heart felt like it was going to beat out of my chest. I know you're not supposed to drink alcohol when taking certain medications, I had yet to take the Xanax that evening, but I drank a rather generous glass of wine, and that seem to calm things down for a bit, and switched me from Fight or Flight mode to relax mode.

I do not know what is going on with me, and the energy around me right now, but all I do know is that im done feeling like im at the edge and all the pebbles are sliding around me.

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