Thank you for your support. It warms my heart that people care. I am 55 years old and I would like to be able to do things for 10 - 15 years more even if I have to sit in a wheelchair. I am quite capable of doing and solving things so I think I will find a way forward. But I struggle a lot with my self-worth as I was raised to take care of my siblings and when I needed help from them they was not able to help me. I know that I have to take better care of myself, eat better and a lot of other things but I feel so guilty when I do things for myself.

I have two small parrots, Lovebirds, and they mean everything to me as they are my children right now. They are very important to my mental health and I take them with me when I move but some people think I am crazy for loving them so much and it is quite costly to get them with me. But the same people wouldn’t question if it was a dog. It makes me feel guilty but at the same time I know that I wouldn’t go without them.

I just came back from a hospital where I have spent the night for a sleep study. I have no idea of the result, all I know is that I was awake until 4 am and still need more sleep.

I struggle a lot with my diseases, some weeks are so bad so everything is pain and the only thing to do is to rest. I have to go and shop myself and for every day out I need at least 2 – 3 days rest. The problem is that the big pain does not come right away; it comes after 20 – 30 minutes and then is too late to do something about it. Worst is when the hip is aching because then it get so hard to walk. The hips are x-rayed and the joints seem to be ok, it is the fibromyalgia in the big leg muscle that is giving me the pain.

Even when I have all this pain I think it is important to focus on something else than my pain. I don’t want to sit and feel sorry about myself all the time. I am educated about child abuse and have worked with it in the past. Then I also voluntarily worked with abuse against men and from men. It is my goal to be able to go around and talk about abuse against men as I have knowledge and experience about it that can be important to share. In Sweden I was doing research about bullying about 20 years ago and when I left there has not been any more research done. And it is much needed. But first I have to find ways to take care of and improve myself.