Beauty and beyond...

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" "Beauty is only skin deep" Yada yada yada... Today we live in a world where you are very much judged by what you wear, what you look like and if you do something about your appearance. We'd rather have beautiful friends than ugly ones, none of the girls wants to be the 'friend' to the gorgeous girl, we all want to be the gorgeous one but why? is the position as 'friend' less than the attention receiving gorgeous one? I personally do not like being the one getting attention, I feel it's a pressure to live up to and you cannot really be who you are. The "Shut up and look pretty" is too strong and you end up spending time with people who do not care about who you are but rather what you look like. To me that it's the ultimate downfall, one should never forget what happened to Narcissus, the Grecian who fell in love with his own reflection and fell in the river and drowned. I'd rather be average than dead :P And I'd rather be me than pretending to be perfect because, as we all know, perfection is an illusion. So yeah, make-up is not something I put on every day and since the baby was born, clothes are considered clean if there is no puke or poop on it. I do work out, not for my appearance but for my health not to mention, the little one loves lying on my legs while I do sit-ups - it's a win-win.
All in all I believe that you should look the way you want, not care about what people might think and generally be who you are because no one else can :P

Money - pro or con?

Then after the first-hand impression you're asked what you do for a living, where you live, have a house? and so on... it's something that often puzzles me, I simply do not get it. Some of the most genuine and kind people in the world have/had nothing, here should be mentioned that I am referring to Ghandi, Mother Theresa, The Dalai Lama and so on. The children who can play with hand-me-down toys from older siblings or cousins are considered well-mannered and well-raised and the ones who get anything they point their grubby little fingers are at the spoiled brats. It's funny how we teach our children that less is more though we ourselves live by the rule that the more you have the better you are. I often have the conversation with Steve that I don't care about money, yes, it's nice to have but it doesn't make you happy, we live on a very tight budget and often it's the cause of concern but I'd rather be happy and generally I am. Like the Beatles said: "Can't buy me love". My cousin hasn't got a penny to his name but is still overly focused on wearing designer brands because it makes him who he is. I couldn't care less to be honest, I think it's a waste spending 500 Euro on a pair of jeans when you can get some of an equal quality for 50 Euro, of course I do have a pair of Lewis jeans and some T-shirts who have cost more than I want to admit but they are not my favourite, they are not the ones I wear on a daily basis and actually 'make their worth' In my world, the clothes you wear the most, are the ones that is worth the most, no matter what you spend on them/it.
Borrowed feathers cannot make a raven into a peacock but the raven can fly and the peacock can't
So why are we so focused on it? True: money makes the world go around but if it's not the main thing that makes your life richer then why strut yourself?

Women...

We're are lovable, chatty, snide and manipulative, we never really say what we want and we get hurt and insulted if our men doesn't know what we want/is thinking about/is referring to and so on but we also have many good qualities. We can multi-task, apply make-up with one hand, cook dinner while arguing with our mothers on the phone, we often do not need a shopping list but can still buy the things that are needed for the household, we can keep house! We often give men a headache and blame them for everything (PMS) and cause them to throw their hands in the air and mutter something starting with "Women!..." (IMS) But we take on every roll that is offered to us: friend, sister, mother, daughter and so on. And, not to be too modest, we excel in everything! I knew only a few women who give up and say they cannot do it, we're generally not afraid to ask for help with the things that we know we cannot do, we know our limits and that, in my opinion, makes us strong - knowing your weakness and admitting defeat are true traits of strength. But are we the weaker sex then? Because men who are dominated are miserable creatures :P They need us to need them and of course we do, I need Steve for reaching things on the upper shelves when I'm too lazy to get the ladder and to open jars when my hands are wet (and the lid on the jar is too tight) We might be proud, strong and independent but we need our men as much as they need us.

Nagging!

An action I hate and that I know I do, Steve doesn't mind, he doesn't consider my constant reminding him to do certain things, nagging; my ex certainly did.
I think I have what every woman has, when I ask my better half to do something I'm referring to the fact that I would like it done - NOW! Not tomorrow, not tonight and not in 3 hours but within the next 5 minutes but you cannot tell your man if he would please do this or that now? Men feel bossed around by that little word at the end of the sentence and often go in defence mode. I'm avoiding that word, simply to keep the peace at home. Normally, if it's something that can wait, I'll phrase my question: "At some point/Either today or tomorrow/when you have the time..." When it's something I really would like done now the sentence starts: "Honey, can you please..." Steve hasn't figured out the difference yet but all in due time.... I hope! The thing is, mostly I don't mind doing it myself and if I can't do it, I'll find a way, it's just sometimes needed for me to make my man feel needed. He gets a certain gleam in his eye when I need him to open a jar of whatever and often the sentence comes "Yay! I'm good for something!" I smile and shake my head at him with a "You're good for more than that dear!" It's a ritual we have, it happens almost every time I ask that of him.
Now when I need something of the top shelf I go collect the ladder to be able to get up there, I've gotten too old and clumsy for crawling on kitchen counters, and his remark is always: "Why don't you ask me to do it?" And I have to bite my tongue not to say "Because I need it NOW!" Both would be said in an annoyed tone, I know he's not annoyed with me, he just likes to feel needed and I'm not annoyed either, I'm just too proud to ask for everything. I'm glad we have a good relationship with room for each of our quirks, we agree to disagree and often agree on the cultural and language-barrier being the source of the problem. Good thing we're not the problem :P

OCD

Over compulsive disorder
There is a thin line between being perfectionist and having OCD and the difference between the two is small, it's all down to how you handle it. Like washing your hands after you get home from shopping, taking the bus/tram/etc, a lot of people do it and it's considered normal but if you wash your hands in scalding water 3 times, it's considered not to be normal. Arranging the pictureframes in your window sill is also normal but not if you enter a slight state of panic if any of them should be moved just an inch, the annoyance of having to make it 'look pretty' again is normal, the panic is not.
No matter how you put it, the thin line is there and it's about how far you take it, your actions and rituals before it becomes unnatural and unhealthy. Watching 'As good as it gets' makes me laugh, turning on and off the lights 5 times before you can leave the apartment and locking and unlocking the door equal amount of times before you feel it's safe to leave seems like overkill to most of us but I remember what it was like living with OCD, I never had rituals like that, I find them silly and very abnormal but I understand the state of panic if things aren't 'right' - the through that clutches itself to your brain, fogging everything up and making you believe that if things are not 'right' then something will go wrong. "Which things?" A question my therapist often asked me but I was never able to answer it, it was just 'things' - everything, anything.
Rituals and a routine are two similar but very different things, rituals are bad and routine is healthy. Funny how that is and who sets the rules of what's normal and not, dominant and perfectionist people who are in control of their lives have routines to make their busy life run more smoothly and consider it a waste of time to stride to do everything in a certain way, they might do it themselves subconsciously but as soon as it's an action you're painfully aware of it's considered an obsession, a compulsive act and a ritual.
To me the difference between normal and abnormal is very small, it's all about to what degree you take your actions, consciously or subconsciously.

Moving to Belgium

In October 2010 I packed up all my things, sub-lented my apartment to my former room-mate and ex-brother in law and Steve came and picked me, my things, my two cats and my two ferrets up and drove 1000 km and 15 hours back to Belgium. We were going to stay at his parents place until our apartment had gotten new floors, which we had to choose, buy and put down. His father and mother were extremely kind and very welcoming  and that made the moved and culture-change a bit easier.
Now the paper work was a whole different story, I was treated like an alien from time to time even though we live within the EU and we're supposed to have open boarders, Steve had to sign a contract saying that he would take care of me, financially and legally, because I couldn't take a job when I arrived, they had no understanding for the fact that I'm not going to lie at a job interview, I would always be honest and who would want to hire a pregnant woman? Not to mention, the only job I could get from day one was one in an Irish pub and heavy lifting and odd hours are not the best job, neither when you are in a relationship nor when you're expecting.
I'm still on that contract, I have my ID now and my health-insurance compliment of Steve and I am grateful for that, I cannot wait for the day I can repay him.

How we met

Steve and I met playing WoW also known as World of Warcraft, an online RP-game for those who don't know it. I was with another guy, Martin, at that time and our wedding was planned for the following summer. I was so in love that I didn't see the problems and it took a long time before I was how much I was giving into the relationship and how little I was getting out of it. I have nothing bad to say about my ex-boyfriend/fiancée, he was my soulmate and I still love him but love isn't always enough. A month and a half before the wedding I freaked out, called it off and threw Martin out. It was the toughest thing I have ever done because I loved the guy but we had both changed, I was loosing myself and had lost himself long time ago and if it hadn't been for Steve I never would have had the courage to do it, I am, still to this day, terrified of being alone/single.
It didn't take long before Steve and I decided that it was going to be us and with my biological clock ticking so loudly I could barely hear the conversation we agreed on having children right away, so the baby-project started in August 2010, only a month after Martin and I were over. I had my spiral removed on Thursday, had my period Saturday and went to Belgium Tuesday, when I came home after 2 weeks I was pregnant, something my two cats noticed right away, they honestly wouldn't leave me alone.
We've only been together a little over a year and have a 5 month old son, things went extremely quick but I don't regret it one bit

Being a stepchild

I've been a stepchild and still is, my mother and father got divorced when I was around 2 so I've never experienced them together. Now my father got married twice during his life and my mother lives together with my stepfather going on 21 years now, my two stepmothers were very different, the first one, Karin, had two children of her own and was certainly not fond of me and especially not of my mother, she was a weird woman and I still, to this day, do not understand nor know what my father saw in her. They had a child together, Elisabeth, whom I haven't seen since she was around 8 months old, she is today probably around 20 or so and even though Karin contacted me a few years ago after my father passed away and asked, on the behalf of my halfsister, to create a contact I declined, like said, I haven't seen the girl for a lifetime and the only connection we have is half of our genes in common. The second wife of my father, Sus, was unable to have children even though she wanted one of her own badly, she always treated me right and never saw me as a problem to her relationship with my father, I liked her though at times I felt she was trying too hard, which is not really a bad thing.
My mother and my stepfather had a child together when I was 14, Marianne came into our lives when my mother was 38 and 14 days after my stepfather had turned 40, quite late to have a second one if you ask me, but my stepfather wanted one of his own which is perfectly understandable. Now the relationship between him and me have been turbulent, I lived with my mother and stepfather and only visited my father about 2 weeks a year and we barely spoke apart from that. My stepfather and I didn't speak to each other for 5 years, I can't even remember what went wrong but I'm sure he can. I was a troublesome teenager, being an only child for 14 years, first having my mother to myself and then at the age of 8 having to share her with another person and then at the age of 14 not being the only child anymore - oh yes, here it should be mentioned that I had serious problems and actually needed professional help, it was the beginning of my Borderline. When I was 15 I was 'shipped' of to boardingschool, a year I think back of with mixed feelings - let me put it this way: I haven't got contact with any one I met there.
When I finished boardingschool, the summer I turned 16 my mother found a room for rent further down the road from them and I lived there for a year before I got my first apartment, my mother pair for it all and I, still to this day, have no clue how she found the money for it but I guess it was important for her to get me out of the house so it wasn't a constant warzone. There was no screaming dialogue, I was the one acting out, I hated my stepfather and often slammed doors, I even broke a doorhandle once so I understand why I had to leave.
Today my father has passed away, I have no contact with any of my stepmothers and I refer to my stepfather as my father, I have come to realize that he was been there the entire way, been completely overthrown by the tornado called Bente and all the complications that comes with a modern family but he stayed and held on and he's been the only father I've known in my everyday life. In other words, he was there for me, maybe not when I needed it, but after the storm settled and he provided both me and my mother with a home and security, financially and physically and for that I am eternal grateful and I love him for it.

The evil stepmom

Yup, that's me. Steve has a lovely daughter form a previous relationship (yes, we are a modern family) Kate turns 3 this November and lives aprox 150 km from where we live which makes the trip to go get her every second weekend a very long one but so worth it. What she visits the house gets turned upside down, we have to go visit grandma and grandpa and maybe the uncle and aunt unless they come to the grandparents house as well. Steve loves his daughter and that was one of the things that made me fall in love with him, he's a great father and spoils his daughter rotten, which is both good and bad. To be honest, I am the strict one, I'm the one that sets the bounderies and tell her off most of the time and it's annoying and hard, I love the girl as if she was my own but as strict as her 'real' mum is as soft and allowing is her father which causes problems from time to time. Understandable really if you ask me. The girl only speaks Dutch, a language I am only learning so often when she says something, I do not understand plus when I have to tell her something, I often have to as Steve to translate and with the attention-span of a teaspoon the moment is gone and she's thinking about something completely different. Steve and I agreed from the very beginning that we would set the rules for Kate as we would for our own children, Bianca (Kate's mom) told Steve off again and again for allowing her too much, for not calming her down and instead letting her run amok on a sugar rush. My opinion is that kids will be kids but that they develop best with guidelines and solid rules - a point of view Steve and I do not always share but we come to terms with our disagreements and try and make the short time we have the little rascal as pleasant as possibly.

BPD

Borderline Personal Disorder
Yup, the whole 9 yard, a combination of OCD, EDNOS, nervous disorder, multiple suicide attempts, selfmutilation and loads of other goodies.... I've been diagnosed for about 9 years now, not that it helps the healing process, the only thing that helps is therapy and time and I've invested in both which is why I have been able to come to this point of my life, I needed to understand my disorder before I could live with it and handle it on a daily basis. Cured? Never, it's one of those things you have to live with for the rest of your life but it gets easier, when you have the tools you learn to read yourself and prevent panic attacks, the anger, the confusion, the compulsive actions but it's not fool proof, I still have days when getting out of bed seems as easy as learning to fly or study Nano-technology and times when I go to the supermarket and the amount of people might as well be a pack of mad dogs: equally scary!
Some days are good and some days are bad, I have times when nothing can get me down and times when just dropping my toothbrush ruins everything. I seriously pity Steve but I know I was honest with him from the very beginning, he knew what he was getting himself into or rather, he thought he did. You can never prepare a person to what goes on in the human mind, especially not in the mind of something who is 'slightly off'. A good saying is: "For those who know, no explanation is necessary, for those who don't, none will do"
But I do my bit of it as well, I take my medicine and my vitamins and fish-oils (they are good for the brain) I listen to myself so if I am edgy I do not go to the supermarket, if I am restless I do not stay home all day, if I'm feeling down I avoid alcohol and unhealthy foods. As said, I do my bit and I do it because I can no longer allow myself to be selfish, I have people depending on me, relying on me and I would never do anything to disappoint them.

Funny comments from Steve

Some of the funniest things happened when I was pregnant with Quinten:Late at night we are in bed, I'm around 7-8 months pregnant and Steve rolls to his side, I cuddle up behind him and put my bell against his back and my arm around him. The little one then starts kicking, kicking him in the back to what he grumpily replies that the baby is kicking him and he cannot sleep like that. I try not to laugh as I roll over on the other side. If it's tough on him then what about me?
Another night I was trying to roll my huge corpus over to the other side and since he was taking up most of the bed I had to bounce on the spot to get to my other side and Steve rolls over and, still in his sleep, tells me to lie still or I'll wake up the baby. To be honest, I would be the only one noticing but kind of him to take that into consideration.... I think
One thing should be said, we snore, I snore, Steve snores and Quinten snores.... and we can all keep one or the other awake with our snoring. One night Steve fell asleep before me and started sounding like croquet balls in a wood-chipping machine, I lie in silence until I give up and decide to go into the living room to either get some sleep or watch a movie, now reaching over I fumble in the process of getting my glasses and they slip through my fingers and bounced of the table a few times to what Steve rolls over and schysses me... right at the point I could have killed him but a split second later I was about to burst with laughter. You have to see the funny part of even the most annoying thing.

Nesting

I called my mum in a slight state of panic the other day and asked, very seriously, if there was something wrong with me, I mean, apart from the usual.I have cleaned and cleared out clutter, I repolstered the dining room chairs, polished all the wooden furniture we have, sewn pillows for the couch, ordered covers for the couch and chairs and cleaned my kitchen several times a day, here it should be noted that I also dirtied the kitchen in between by baking, making baby-food and trying out new recipes. My mum's always clever answer was: "No honey, that is perfectly normal, when the seasons change you prepare yourself for a new period, in the autumn you prepare yourself to spend more time indoor and make the home cosy" It makes sense, in the spring you spring-clean and air out to get the last of the winter's dust out of nooks and crannies and to enjoy the freshness, in and out.