#WeekendCoffeeShare (November 1, 2025)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone on this first day of November. I’m not struggling as badly with memories of my admission to the psych ward (November 2, 2007) as I was in previous years. However, I’m struggling nonetheless.

Today, I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare. It’s been a while. I just had my last cup of coffee for the day and will probably take a break from writing this post for my 8PM soft drink and meds. Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, first I’d talk about the weather. It’s been a mixed bag but mostly rainy with daytime highs around 13°C. I didn’t do a lot of walking, but still managed to meet my movement goal each day this week. Unfortunately, it seems that my Apple Watch doesn’t care that I paused my activity rings while sick with probable COVID during the second half of September, as my streak is now down to 33 days.

If we were having coffee, then I’d moan about the fact that the care home is chronically short-staffed. There is, fortunately, a new staff here who started orienting a few weeks ago. She started her orientation on my side of the home on Tuesday. That day, I tried to make smalltalk with her, knowing that she’d be oriented to my activity the next day, but she hardly said a word. The next day, indeed, she was oriented to my activity. This went okay’ish, in the sense that I accepted her for the whole two-hour time slot and together with the staff doing the orienting, explained several activities. However, once again my attempt at getting acquainted with her didn’t get a response. The staff complimented me on how well I’d done. I told her she’d probably use that against me. I was right.

In the evening, the staff said she’d be orienting the new one to my morning routine the next day. Having hardly spoken with the new staff, I wasn’t comfortable with being naked around her yet, but the staff didn’t accept this. She claimed I hadn’t accepted the new staff in the afternoon either and just don’t want to meet new people and screamed that soon there’d be no-one left. I tried to explain my point of view, with the help of another staff, but to no avail.

On Thursday indeed the staff tried to force me to accept the new one for her orientation. She yelled that I had one chance and if I refused the new one now, she’d be considered as having had her orientation to me. This, I consider horribly unfair, as with the other clients, new staff get multiple orientations. But it’s in my rules, the same rules about no completely unfamiliar staff. I was originally told that the reason for the rules is simply money, ie. the fact that regular temp workers are not given an orientation period so I’m lucky to get one chance with them. I understand this, but I don’t think it should apply to staff who do get an orientation period. And for what it’s worth, I never said I needed temp workers to be oriented to me, but staff need to know these workers are still strangers to me and aren’t as familiar as the staff who’ve been working here for years. No rules can explain this, it’s about empathy. And I’m pretty sure the staff telling me off about refusing the new one, doesn’t have much of that for us clients.

If we were having coffee, I’d also moan about the fact that I now have no assigned staff at all. Like I said a while ago, the student one left for the intensive support home a month ago. The next one doesn’t want to work with me for now due to me having hurt her feelings. And yesterday I found out that the third one is off sick. I E-mailed the support coordinator asking her that, if I need to have another assigned staff, it won’t be the staff who I mentioned above. Don’t get me wrong, she’s fun-loving and great with activities, but she doesn’t know me behind the rules.

If we were having coffee, I’d try to end on a positive note. Yesterday, like six weeks ago, I joined the dance party at the institution townhouse. This time, I decided that I could deal with there not being a staff member for me and to just ask a volunteer if I needed help. One of the reasons was the fact that there were only two staff who are authorized to give meds at the home during the dance and I didn’t feel like I could ask one of them to accompany me, yet the other staff haven’t been oriented to me yet. I considered asking that one of the temp workers accompany me, but, for reasons that you’ll understand if you’ve read this far, felt this would be used against me. The dance was fun.

Finally, one more slightly positive note: we had general elections here in the Netherlands on Wednesday and, thankfully, Democrats 66 (D66) won. This isn’t the party I voted for, but it’s much better than the far-right Party for Freedom, which came out second. D66 is the most progressive, queer-supportive party out there. The reason I didn’t vote for them is the fact that healthcare and social security matter even more to me and the fact that D66 would likely need an economically right-wing party on the government too. However, unless Rob Jetten (D66’s leader) is a total hypocrite and cooperating with the far-right JA21 in favor of the left-wing GroenLinks-PvdA, things will be okay’ish in this respect. In any case, I’m looking forward to the first openly gay prime minister.

Of Elements, Songs and World War III

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Esther’s writing prompt this week is “Element(s)”. I was immediately reminded of the song The Elements by Tom Lehrer.

Tom Lehrer, who passed away this summer at the age of 97, was a comedian and singer, though to be honest like most male comedians, he couldn’t actually sing. Then again, neither can I, but I don’t try. I don’t care whether he could sing or not though, as his song lyrics were brilliant. The Elements isn’t nearly his best song.

I love his songs about current events. Though they were written in the 1960s, some still ring true, in a scary kind of way.

I honestly have been feeling more and more unsafe over the past year or so. I mean, Millennials like me were in our teens when the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened and the world (or rather I should say the West) hasn’t been at peace ever since. I mean, the world’s never been at peace, but in 1989, the West at least thought it had won. Not so. Now with Trump in office in the United States, I wonder who “the West” even are anymore. I, being in Europe, feel more and more like it’s not just Russia and China who might cause the next world war, but Alabama might as well.

I feel more and more scared when I use my mantra that everything will be okay in 2034. I know, I started this thing as a satirical take on the book 2034, which is about the next world war. I realize now that the authors of the book were actually quite serious, but a few years ago, I thought I could turn things around by saying everything will be okay. I don’t mean this to be blasphemous, but I honestly got the idea from the Bible. I mean, I remember when I was (pretending to be) a Christian, I at one point wrote that everything will be okay in 2021 and sort of hoped that Christ would return that year. He didn’t, and as a non-believer I doubt He will in 2034.

Of course, I try to hope that there won’t be a World War III in 2034 or ever. But if there will be, I hope whoever presses the button, will remember Tom Lehrer’s survival hymn.

Historical Events

Posted on by Astrid

Today, in the journaling app Day One, the daily prompt was to write about the historical events you remember. I used to be a big news and politics junkie as an older child and teen, so I remember quite a few events.

I was born in 1986, so technically might’ve remembered the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, but I didn’t. In fact, the first important historical event I remember was the Gulf War of 1991. At the time, I listened to the radio and heard about it, but erroneously thought that Iran, Iraq and Kuwait made up Ukraine. I don’t know what news event there was about Ukraine at the time, possibly the fifth anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

When I was nearly eight, I remember my parents taking me to the polling station for the national election in 1994. I remember both of the names of the candidates my parents voted for. I also clearly remember learning about the “purple” government, which meant that the Labor Party and the conservative party VVD were for the first time forming a coalition. Another party, D66, was joining them too and I asked what color they were and why that party’s color wasn’t represented in the mix. My parents explained that mixing too many party colors would make brown and that’d be a Nazi color.

When I became a teen, I got involved even more into politics. I obviously remember 9/11 when I was fifteen and the murder of Pim Fortuyn eight months later. That year’s election, nine days after Fortuyn was killed, was the most memorable election of my life. I remember kind of aggressively persuading my father to vote for the Socialist Party rather than GroenLinks, the leftist party he normally votes for.

During the fall of 2002, I myself joined the Socialist Party. I was a semi-active member in my local affiliate for a while. Still, I gradually lost my interest in politics and important news events. I left the political party in September of 2007, half because I didn’t like its rather undemocratic treatment of its members and half because I was tired of politics.

Since then, I haven’t really been following the news or politics much at all. I do find it intriguing to be a witness to the coronavirus crisis even though I’d rather have gone on like old normal.

As a teen, I wasn’t affected by the impact of important historical events. Like, I always wanted the stock prices on the AEX to be low for some reason I still don’t comprehend. Now, I understand the impact of economic crises more than I did before and it scares me. That’s why I’d rather put my head in the sand and not watch the news.

What historical events do you remember most?

#WeekendCoffeeShare (March 27, 2021)

Posted on by Astrid

Welcome to another #WeekendCoffeeShare post. I just had my afternoon coffee about an hour ago and am going to have a soft drink in a bit. Of course, I can still make you a Senseo if you want. Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, I’d say that I’m just about as well as it gets with respect to my cold. I am still a tiny bit sniffy, but I don’t think it gets any better anytime soon. I didn’t go to Lobith this weekend, even though my husband had promised me pizza at our house if I did. After all, yesterday I still wasn’t convinced I was well enough. Instead, my husband is coming over tomorrow.

If we were having coffee, I would say that this past week has been great in the walking department. Like I said yesterday, I’ve been quite active. Today was an exception, as it was raining on and off all day so far. I hope to still get some steps in this evening.

If we were having coffee, I would talk some about the political saga that unfolded after last week’s general election. The current prime minister, Mark Rutte, won the election again, probably because people are used to him doing the corona-related press conferences. Before the election, he’d hinted at some restrictions being lifted for Easter. Of course, that was just a political game to win voters, as in the last press conference, only the curfew got moved from 9PM till 10PM.

Speaking of the lockdown, my husband predicts from what he’s read that most of the restrictions will remain until mid-June. I really hope he’s wrong, but at least we can still see each other (provided neither of us is under the weather).

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I’ve been loving reading other blogs as well as writing my own blog posts. I’m not yet preparing for the #AtoZChallenge. Maybe I should, as it’s in less than a week.

I’ve also been in contact with WP support again. The reason is the news that the classic editor might be disappearing after all. I’m not sure WP support itself knows what it’s doing, as I get mixed messages. I’m trying to let it go for now though, as so far at least I can still blog.

If we were having coffee, lastly I’d share that we might get new staff here in my care home soon. I think I mentioned last week that a male staff was having a look around our home last week Saturday to see if he wanted to work here. Turns out he does. He’s been orienting here a few more times. He used to work in a home for people with intellectual disability who also have complex care needs due to behavior. I got the impression he didn’t like that anymore, so I feared I’d scare him away from wanting to work here. Turns out he’s going to work in both homes.

Then on Thursday, another prospective staff, also male, toured my care home. The manager informed me in advance that he was coming, which I liked. I’ll be curious to know if he decides to work here.

What’s been going on in your life?

Gratitude List (January 17, 2021)

Posted on by Astrid

It’s nearly 2AM and I can’t sleep. I woke up about two hours ago after only an hour or two of sleep. I’m kind of worried. To calm my mind, I decided to do a gratitude list. I can’t find the Ten Things of Thankful link-up, but that doesn’t keep me from being grateful.

1. I am grateful for my one-on-one support. I’ve been a bit stressed lately and thankfully, they help me manage it.

2. I am grateful for a financial positive. I won’t believe it till the money is actually in my bank account, but if I’m correct, I won’t have to pay a higher long-term care copay this year. This means my net paycheck will be higher than it was last year.

3. I am grateful that I felt comfortable ordering some new soaping supplies. I ordered almond oil, coconut oil, cocoa butter, shea butter, beeswax, Dead Sea salt and some water-soluble colorants for my soap and other bath and body products. I am hoping, once they arrive, to be able to make bath melts with the oils, butters and beeswax and bath salt with the Dead Sea salt.

4. I am grateful for heart-shaped candies. Last Monday, my staff had a team meeting and one of them brought these, then put the leftover candies in a box with my name on it. The other clients, after all, can’t eat hard candy.

5. I am grateful for cookies. Like I said yesterday, my one-on-one helped me bake those. They were really good.

6. I am grateful for Mexican bean wraps. My day activities staff and I made those for lunch on Wednesday and they were good.

7. I am grateful my bath bomb turned out pretty good. I will have to check whether I placed the image correctly in my last post, but oh well. I didn’t end up taking a bath last evening, but I might today or sometime next week.

8. I am grateful for a lot of Christian self-help books. I’m still struggling with my faith, but they definitely help me realize that I can’t and don’t need to be alone.

9. I am grateful for a nice phone conversation with my father. I was a little stressed about it at first, as I hadn’t spoken to him in a few months. However, it went really well.

10. I am grateful that I have the right to vote. I am not yet sure whom I’ll vote for, but I’m so glad I live in a democracy.

What are you grateful for?

#WeekendCoffeeShare (January 16, 2021)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi all on this grey Saturday. Today I’m joining in with #WeekendCoffeeShare. I just had my afternoon coffee about half an hour ago. If you want a Senseo though, I can make one for you. Let’s have coffee and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, first I’d ask you how your weather is. Ours is pretty cold, but the newspaper said it isn’t even really freezing. I guess I don’t really like winter if I consider this cold. Snow is forecasted for tonight, but I doubt it’ll even create a dusting of white. That’s fine by me as I don’t like snow.

If we were having coffee, I’d share that I guess I shouldn’t have said on Thursday that I am glad to live in a stable democracy. After all, the Dutch government collapsed on Friday. It’s totally justified though and no, it’s not about COVID. It’s about parents pretty much randomly being labeled as fraudulent childcare payment recipients and made to repay sometimes tens of thousands of euros that they didn’t have.

If we were having coffee, I would share that my father had his birthday yesterday. He considered the government collapse to be a welcome present, as he doesn’t support the rather conservative parties making up the government.

I phoned my father yesterday and he told me he’d also gotten some type of signal converter, so that he can read the status of his heating on his computer. I sent him a Kate Rusby CD, but it isn’t due to arrive until like the 25th.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I have been quite creative lately. I made a bath bomb on Thursday. I might take it with me into the bathtub later this evening.

My one-on-one staff also helped me bake cookies yesterday. Well, she did most of the prep, as the dough was too sticky for me to handle. That was a bit frustrating. The cookies were delicious though.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I had a long phone call with my husband yesterday. I am not going to go to our house this week-end, but I loved to hear his voice instead.

If we were having coffee, lastly I’d tell you that I’m hoping to get an AFO (ankle foot orthosis) for my left foot soon. The physical therapist already E-mailed the orthopedic equipment maker, but we haven’t heard back from him. Walking is still doable without the AFO, but when I go for long’ish (like twenty minute) walks, my foot drags. This is a little painful. It also causes my shoe to get damaged quite easily. In fact, even though the orthopedic shoemaker had already put some type of buffer thing on it, the shoe was almost beyond repair after three weeks. Anyway, I’m hoping the AFO gets here soon and will be helpful.

If not, my father mentioned that, back when I was little, the doctors had mentioned surgery to lengthen my calf muscle. That probably comes with its own risks though. Besides, as long as the pain and discomfort are manageable, I don’t think any doctor would want to operate on me just to save me buying a new pair of shoes every month.

What’s been going on in your life lately?

Sunday Poser: Changes for 2021

Posted on by Astrid

Today’s post is going to be a relatively quick one. I hardly slept at all last night and really need to rest, but I’d also like to write something to wind down for the night. I’m joining Sadje’s Sunday Poser. The question is about the changes you wish to see in 2021. I traditionally write a post of personal hopes for the new year in early January, so I won’t make this too personal.

Like Sadje, I agree that I totally wish this COVID-19 crisis will end. I really hope the vaccine will be distributed fast. I’ve already heard that the staff of care facilities may get the vaccine in late January here. That being said, I doubt things will move as quickly as it looks now, because we have a rather slow-thinking health minister.

We’re due to have a national election here in the Netherlands in March. I really hope the right won’t win more seats in the Lower House than they have now, but I must say I don’t hope for a huge move to the left either. In this sense, I don’t hope much will change, although my leftist conscience does tell me I need to object to Mark Rutte getting yet another term as prime minister. My centrist intellect says he isn’t so bad after all.

Honestly, of course, I do think a lot needs to change on a larger scale. We need to truly show our stewardship towards the planet and we need to distribute wealth and health more evenly. That does make me worried for my own sake though, as I know I’m relatively healthy and wealthy considering the world at large. I shouldn’t be so selfish though.

Lastly, like Sadje, I definitely hope people become less divisive and extremist in their encounters with others. If COVID taught the world one thing, it should’ve been that it can affect us all.

#IWSG: Reasons for Writing

Posted on by Astrid

IWSG

It’s the first Wednesday of the month again and this means it’s time for the Insecure Writer’s Support Group (#IWSG) to meet. I did pretty well in the writing department over the past month, although not as well as I’d hoped. I mean, I didn’t write a blog post for #Blogtober20, or at all for that matter, everyday. Particularly towards the end of the month, I was less and less motivated to write. Let’s hope for a good writing month for November then.

This month’s optional question is why you write what you write. Albert Camus is quoted as saying that the purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself. Such a fitting quote on the day after the fiasco that is U.S. election day. I don’t usually share my political views on here, but let me be very clear that I don’t support Trump. Now I must say that Biden is pretty far from my ideal president too, but at least he isn’t as much of an idiot as Trump. But I digress.

Flannery O’Conner, an author I’ve never heard of, is quoted as saying: “I write to discover what I know.” This resonates more with me than Camus’s reason. I mean, like I said, I don’t share my political views on here much. In case Camus means that the written word is everlasting, I doubt mine is. Though I’ve been able to conserve most of my writings from the early days of my online journal and before, I’m not sure they’ll last forever or even close to it. The Internet evolves faster than we know, after all. WordPress may not be here for the rest of my life, or even the rest of this decade. With its stupid decision to enforce the block editor, who knows how long it will be able to survive?

I can, in a way, relate to O’Conner’s idea of writing for discovery. Or self-discovery, in my case.

However, I don’t just write for myself. In fact, I cannot keep myself from writing with an audience in mind, even when I write in my own private diary. It’s been this way even years before I knew about the Internet. In a sense, I write to discover what I know, but also to share what I know. Maybe that’s a bit snobbish, but oh well.

When This Is All Over: A Letter From My Future Self

Posted on by Astrid

I am feeling rather low right now. I am in fact struggling somewhat with suicidal thoughts. To motivate myself to keep going, I’m writing a letter as if it were say 2021 (because in 2021, everything will be okay) and I am writing to myself right now. In other words, I am writing a letter from my future self to my current self. Of course, in this letter, I’m assuming that by 2021, I’ll be in long-term care. I really hope and pray I’ll be in long-term care much sooner, but I know that at least they won’t be able to deny me funding by 2021.

Dear you,

I see you. I feel your pain. I understand 2021 seems like far away and I know you hope to be granted long-term care funding earlier. I know you need it. I know you’re struggling right now, seeing that your application is likely to be turned down. I know your support staff are fighting like lions to get you funding. Please appreciate that.

Please don’t end your life now. Things will get better. I am here, in a suitable supported housing facility, looking at you. Look at me and please give me a chance. I don’t want to be dead.

Please, for the sake of me, keep going. You’ve been through so much already. I know that isn’t particularly motivating to keep going, as each disappointment drags you further down the rabbit hole of depression. However, I am here to guide you through.

Please, for your husband, keep going. He loves you. He supported you through the twelve years up to this point and he’ll support you through the rest of the time needed to finish this thing.

Please, for your parents, keep going. They may see you as manipulative. They may have felt in 2007 that the main reason not to kill yourself is that they’d have to pay for your funeral. They no longer do, but they don’t deserve to be proven right about the manipulativeness. Please keep on fighting and show them you can be a happy, positive person.

Please, for your support staff, keep going. You have the best support coordinator you could wish for. She fights like a lioness for what you need. She believes you. Please don’t let her down.

I know you want to be included on the Autistic Memorial Blog if your suicide is successful. Fine by me but I’d rather you be a living person rather than a statistic on a blog. I know you say that your suicide might wake up the politicians and policy-makers involved in healthcare, but they’re already working on changing the law. They can’t speed up things just because you’re gone.

And what if you attempt suicide but fail? Then you’ll be exactly where you are now, except that you’ll be there to remember your parents being proven right about your manipulativeness. Because quite frankly, killing yourself for political reasons is manipulative. I know that, if you ultimately decide to attempt suicide, you’ll not be thinking about this, as you’ll most likely act in an impulse. However, I am here on your blog to remind you that, as shit as this may be, suicidality won’t get you what you want, or even what you need. Look back at yourself in 2007 for that. You might get temporary relief from the current situation, but it won’t last and you won’t be relieved from yourself, except if you truly die. Which I know isn’t what you want or need either. Please, stay safe.

Me