Sunny Sunday (December 17, 2023): A Good Day!

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Today I was writing another post, which I’ve since scheduled for tomorrow, but instead of sharing that decided to join in on Sunny Sunday. Today was a good day. Let me share what made today good.

First off, the weather. As I opened my phone this morning, I saw a weather report, which I didn’t read, but the headline said it was “ideal walking weather”. It was a little cold in the morning, but that’s only to be expected in December (I guess there’s a reason I was born in the summer, ha). However, later in the day, the sun peeked through the clouds and the daytime temperature rose to 10°C.

I decided to follow the headline’s advice and go for an hour-long walk. In the morning, I was supported by the most familiar to me staff member, which was awesome. I am so grateful she supported me rather than leaving me to be supported by the temp worker or very young and inexperienced new male staff.

In the afternoon, my spouse came by for a visit. I said that I was thinking of buying another case for my phone, since the one I’d gotten was too rigid. I am grateful to share my spouse showed me how to properly fold the back of the case.

In the evening, I had lots of fun crafting with clay. I created a butterfly pendant.

Overall, today was a pretty joy-filled day. It was also a productive day. After all, I had a shower in the morning and washed my hair, rearranged my Day One journals’ content, and have been spending the evening online reading and writing blog posts.

I of course could think of reasons why today wasn’t perfect, but no-one needs a perfect day. All we need is a little joy and sunshine in our life.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (December 16, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It’s been a while since I last joined in with Natalie’s #WeekendCoffeeShare, so here goes. I already had my last coffee for the day and had my weekend soft drink (yay, we still got Dubbelfrisss!) too. I bet you could still get a cup of tea though. That is, I’ve had some later in the evening here. Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, I’d share that I bought a new iPhone last week. I bought the SE 3rd gen. I had originally intended on buying the 15, but that costs like €1000 and I would probably get annoyed with the lack of touchID and a home button. Besides, it’d be a greater risk of being stolen. Still, to be honest, I am slightly disappointed with the battery life of the one I got and had wanted the 15 for its great camera features. Of course, I myself can’t take good pictures at all, but I would’ve loved to have a device that can make them. All that being said, I’m pretty sure the pros of the one I got outweigh the cons.

My spouse bought me a lilac case for it. It’s a little on the thick and rigid side, honestly, so I might want to replace it eventually. I still have my old phone’s case, which the new one fits into too, but I don’t feel like I could in my right mind switch them up. That would be unfair to my spouse.

If we were having coffee, I’d ttell you that I joined the Christmas lights tour in my town yesterday. Originally, the staff hadn’t thought of inviting me and, since it wouldn’t end till 8PM and my one-on-one leaves at 7:30, they were saying I could walk an alternative route with my one-on-one. I was disappointed and tried to say I could walk independently alongside the others just fine and didn’t need my one-on-one. The way I had imagined it the staff would be pushing a wheelchair that I’d hold onto too. As it turned out, the wheelchair users were pushed by volunteers and one staff would need to watch the entire group of ambulatory clients, including me, if I didn’t get my one-on-one. Thankfully though, my assigned staff, who did my one-on-one till 7:30, offered to stay half an hour longer to be able to allow me to participate too. Normally, I’d have to pay like €30 for those 30 minutes of extra one-on-one – not that staff actually earn €60/hour, so don’t ask me why -, but he said he’d find another way.

Along the tour, there were various points where people had decorated their houses or front yards with Christmas lights and some had left Christmas lights along the pavement. We also came by my former support coordinator’s house. You know, the one from the intensive support home, the woman one who was my original support coordinator there. She no longer works for my care agency. Anyway, we were actually instructed to come into her garden, where she was toasting marshmallows and handing out hot cocoa. I initially didn’t recognize her even though I knew she lives in this town and the instructions mentioned her first name. She said, “think [intensive support home],” and then I realized who she was. She asked me how I was doing at my current home (she knew where I’d moved). I said very cheerily that I was doing well and liked it here. I also told her that I found out about the move through my current assigned staff E-mailing my mother-in-law wanting to know my preference for the paint on my wall. “Oh, that wasn’t fun,” she said. “In fact, that was fun,” I replied.

At the end of the tour, we got fries. That was so cool!

If we were having coffee, lastly I’d report that I finally disclosed about my possible dissociative symptoms to one of my staff yesterday. She said she’d seen some of my alters, contrary to what my assigned staff says. Maybe what he’s looking for is me calling myself by different names, which I don’t do unless I really trust someone. I’m trying to maintain the status quo as to whether I/we actually have DID or not, in the sense that it’d be much easier for treatment purposes if we didn’t but then again the parts, whatever you’d call them, are there whether I want it or not.

The Wednesday HodgePodge (November 29, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It’s been four weeks since I last participated in the Wednesday HodgePodge, so I thought I’d join in again. For those who don’t know what it is, the Wednesday HodgePodge is an opportunity for bloggers to answer a diverse selection of questions. Here goes.

1. Does anybody really know what day it is? Last week we skipped the Hodgepodge and I just assumed this week would find us in December, but nope. Still November. Do you wear a watch? Use a paper calendar or strictly electronic? What’s your favorite hour of the day? Why?
Well, usually I know what day it is without looking it up, but I was confused yesterday too. I told my staff, when she was looking up who would be working today, to look at the 28th. Nope though, it’s the 29th already.

I do wear a watch, ie. my Apple Watch. I bought it primarily for its activity tracking purposes, but honestly now I find myself using it as a timekeeping device too. In fact, my assigned staff at my former home said I’d keep track of staff’s whereabouts by the second. That wasn’t true, but oh well.

My favorite hour of the day is probably 8PM, as that’s when I’m most energetic. I am currently writing this blog post around that time.

2. Tell us something about how you celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday.
I didn’t. It’s not a thing here in the Netherlands. I did want to benefit from Black Friday, which is a thing (of course, since companies benefit from it ultimately), but when ordering something online that day, had forgotten to check the store’s newsletter whether they had any coupon codes.

3. What’s a sound you hate to hear?
Where to even get started? The vacuum cleaner and lawn mower come to mind now as most common sounds I hate, but I am generally very sound sensitive. Oh wait, a particularly annoying sound is people whistling.

4. Where do you not mind waiting?
Uhm, nowhere. I’m not very patient and can’t handle long periods of nothingness.

5. I really wish____________________________________.
That my one-on-one gets approved real soon.

6. Insert your own random thought here.
I’m having a nasty cold. Or maybe it’s COVID, since I didn’t get tested. I doubt it though, since I’m still at roughly the same fitness level I was last week. That is, my cardio fitness level according to my Apple Watch has decreased, but it isn’t like I can no longer go for 45-minute walks.

October 2023 Reflections #WBOYC

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It’s the last day of the month and this means I’m reflecting on the past month’s happenings. As usual, I’m joining in with What’s Been On Your Calendar? (#WBOYC).

First, I’m finally going to share the polymer clay unicorn I crafted on September 30. Okay, that’s not technically the past month, but I didn’t fully finish it and take a picture till October 5.

My spouse joked that, judging by its colors – fuchsia, yellow and blue (the blue is called Peppermint, don’t ask me why) -, it’s typical of a specific music scene from the nineties. The staff who helped me craft this unicorn, is only slightly older than me, so she understood.

I haven’t really been crafting with clay much over the month of October. I did though help cook dinner twice. I also made a few smoothies.

I also did a good amount of walking, although I didn’t meet my movement goal every single day this month. I blame the rain, because the one day I didn’t meet the goal, it was raining almost constantly. Besides walking, I went swimming once.

My mother-in-law visited me three times this month and my spouse came by each week. My sister had originally wanted to come by this Sunday, but I prefer not to see her or my parents in the institution. Instead, my spouse and I are going to see them and my parents at Christmas.

Mental health-wise, the month has been quite good, truthfully. I mean, I’m still adjusting to my new care home and it’s October, which is a hard month for me each year. Taking this into consideration, however, I can’t complain. I am intensely grateful for the fact that most staff go out of their way to accommodate me. Initially, I was told by some that I’d be assigned the temp worker almost by default, which set me off because that was exactly what happened at my old care home and, given my attachment issues, I struggle with this. I spiraled into a bad crisis for this reason last week. Thankfully though, the staff now try their best to assign at least a somewhat familiar staff to me if they have to be a temp worker after all.

With respect to my physical health, I am happy to report I didn’t lose any more weight. In fact, I gained a few pounds. It wasn’t like I definitely couldn’t lose any more weight for my health, but I would’ve felt concerned had I lost more weight, given how much I ate over the past month. I am now within the weight range I agreed upon with my dietitian rather than slightly below it, so I’ve decided I can no longer afford as many treats as I used to consume. Yesterday, I convinced my assigned staff to add my food plan to the manila folder of important information that’s on my table in my room. After all, staff would often hand me a cookie (or two) without even thinking about it with each coffee break, despite the fact that my food plan has one only with my evening coffee break. I am due for weigh-in tomorrow morning again. Fingers crossed I won’t have gained significantly.

Walking and Making Smoothies

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I have been struggling a bit lately, but today was a good day. I went on three walks, one over an hour and 4.5km long. It rained for most of the day, but I’m not made of sugar, as they say in Dutch. I honestly have no idea where that saying comes from and what sugar has to do with not being water-resistant. I mean, there are many other substances that will melt or otherwise dissolve in water. As a side note, we only had a slight drizzle on some of our walks, so it wasn’t like I got soaked in the rain.

When the rain did come pouring down, I decided to make a smoothie. I had ordered some supplies online yesterday. Like I’ve explained before, my care home does have its own postal code but officially you need to address things to the main building, adding the home in an additional address line. Most stores though don’t allow for two address lines. So, in an attempt to bypass the need to have stuff sent to my in-laws and wait a week for my spouse to bring it here, I decided to say “screw it!” and address my order to the home with its own postal code. And guess what? It got delivered right to our doorstep. This is not how I should be handling things if I can avoid it, but it’s quite tempting, honestly. Waiting a week for my stuff rather than having it delivered within 24 hours of my placing my order, isn’t very appealing.

I had ordered carrot juice, mango nectar, agave syrup and hemp seeds. The hemp seeds are in a lot of smoothie recipes and I’d kind of impulsively ordered them to get to the minimum order amount. The person with whom I unpacked my package, didn’t ask anything about the hemp seeds, but the next staff did make a bit of a weirded out sound. I had looked it up online and found out that usually only the shells (which mine have been removed from) contain trace amounts of THC. Nonetheless, I decided not to add them to my first smoothie, which I was going to share with my fellow residents.

I did add carrot juice. I also added frozen mango chunks, which we’d ordered from the online grocery store that delivers to care homes. We added one banana and a pinch of cinnamon.

Honestly, the smoothie turned out a bit thin for my liking, but it was definitely delicious. My spouse later said that ginger and orange make for a better addition to carrot juice, which I think may be true. I’m going to try this with my remaining carrot juice.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (September 23, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare. I’ve long had my last cup of coffee for the day, as it’s 9PM. In fact, most people here at my new care home are in bed already. I guess I’ll have just water to offer you now, sorry. Let’s catch up anyway.

If we were having coffee, I’d start out by moaning about the weather. Fall has well and truly set in here. The temperature hardly got above 20°C at all this week and most days it didn’t get above like 17°C. Moreover, unlike the heating in my old care home apartment, which was set to an uncomfortably warm setting all year round, this room’s heating seems to be stuck on the cold side.

If we were having coffee, then I’d post another petting zoo picture. This one is of the birds once again. Did I mention that my new care home is like a two-minute walk from the petting zoo?

If we were having coffee, then I’d share that I’m adjusting better to living in this care home than I was to living in my previous one. Like I mentioned on Thursday, I started working with polymer clay, in fact. I haven’t put anything into the oven yet, as I first need to test the oven temperature before subjecting my precious projects to it. However, I’m happy to report I already finished two simple pieces: the planet charm I mentioned on Thursday and a flower.

In addition to working with polymer clay, I have created a shower gel (from just a base and essential oils) and made a bracelet. I did play card and dice games too. I didn’t walk as much as I used to at my old care home, but that’s okay.

I am still struggling with mornings and early afternoons, but I’m giving it a chance to work out. For example, yesterday I came up with the idea of watching children’s stories on YouTube when I have my group activity time. I normally watch those in English, which of course the other clients can’t make sense of, but I could definitely find Dutch children’s stories on YouTube too.

If we were having coffee, lastly I’d share that I bought another collection of journaling prompts that I’d really been looking forward to on Tuesday, only to find out that the actual prompts are probably handwritten or something inside the Kindle book and I can’t access them using my screen reader. This is a relatively common occurrence with Kindle books and I honestly feel that Amazon shouldn’t claim screen readers are supported in that case. Oh well, I have tons of other prompts to choose from.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (September 16, 2023)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare today. I just had my afternoon coffee, but will probably not finish this post in one go, as I have an activity moment again in half an hour. Let’s have a drink and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, first I’d talk about the weather. We’ve had pretty nice late summer weather here with temps rising to between 20°C and 25°C during the day. Next week, we’re supposed to get rain and then I’m pretty sure it’s over with the warm weather, although October can occasionally bring days when the temperature reaches 20°C too. I love telling tales of the day, about five or six years ago, when we had a daytime high of 27°C here in mid-October.

If we were having coffee, then I’d talk about my walking and other exercise. I went swimming on Wednesday. It’ll probably have been the last time for now, as I’m moving to the new care home on Monday, although the swimming instructor did say my new home’s clients go swimming too.

I went on the stationary bike yesterday. Other than that, my physical activity has been hit and miss. Some days, I got in over 10K steps, while on other days, I hardly walked at all.

If we were having coffee, I would however share that, on one of my walks, last Tuesday, I visited the institution petting zoo and took some lovely pictures. The first picture shows the petting zoo’s cat, Macho, on a stack of hay.

There also is a large aviary with parakeets in it. Here are two photos of the birds in their cage.


If we were having coffee, finally I’d tell you all about my visit to my new care home. I went there with a staff and my mother-in-law. Since this staff has been pushing me towards independence more than I can handle lately and since she’ll be doing handover too, I was disappointed that she’d be attending the visit too. After all, that’d mean I wouldn’t be able to talk to my new staff about my needs without her overhearing.

When we got to the home, we were greeted by the man who will be my new assigned staff, same one who’d been talking to my mother-in-law about the color paint on my wall. I had thought he’d be my support coordinator but apparently not. I don’t know who my support coordinator will be yet. Not a problem, since in general you have more day-to-day contact with your assigned staff than your support coordinator. When still outside, I heard a loud singing of “Happy Birthday!”. This turned out to come from the neighboring home though, as no-one had a birthday this day.

We were led into the living room, where a number of residents and another staff were having coffee. I initially thought there were two staff, since one of the residents talked in an almost identical voice and said almost the same things as the staff. This turned out to be echolalia though.

The residents in this home are more significantly intellectually disabled than those at my current home. Most can speak a little though. Like, one told me I had a pretty golden ring. When I told my spouse about this, I was reminded of my preference last year for a home with people with mild intellectual disability. Yeah, I replied, but I didn’t know back then what I had to give up to live with people with whom I can have a conversation.

Overall, the staff seemed much nicer than those at my current care home. For one thing, both staff introduced themselves, while back when I went to look around here last year only the staff who would be giving me the tour told me their name.

I was led to my room, which is the closest to the living room. This has disadvantages, in that I may be able to hear living room sounds more, but it has a huge advantage in that I will be able to find it much more easily than my current room. The wall is a nice baby pink according to my mother-in-law. I wasn’t able to get a real impression of my room without my furniture in it yet, but that’s not a problem.

When shown around, I did make it clear what my needs are re help with my activities of daily living and that I’m not ready to grow yet, since that will take me being stable first. The staff who was with me didn’t comment, thankfully. Overall, I feel less stressed about moving to the new home now that I’ve met my new fellow residents and staff.

I have yet to pack my clothes. Other than that, everything is in boxes now and ready to be moved. I’m ready for a new chapter in my life!

Gratitude List (September 8, 2023) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It was a rather eventful week. Time for me to focus on the positives in a gratitude post. I’m joining Ten Things of Thankful, which is back after a hiatus over the summer. Here are my thankfuls.

1. I am grateful I have a moving date! This obviously tops my list. Like I mentioned on Wednesday, I’ll be moving to the new care home on the 18th.

2. I am grateful my mother-in-law is taking time off from her volunteer job to come to the visit to look at my room and have a coffee at the new care home on the 15th. Hers may be a volunteer job, but it’s responsible work, as she works for an animal rescue shelter and they’re required to maintain 24/7 availability.

3. I am grateful for quality time spent chatting and playing dice games with a fellow resident. Today, she won, which was good, as I had spilled the beans about my leaving this home a little earlier than I’d originally planned and she was quite upset. For the record, I didn’t let her win.

4. I am grateful for the nice card this resident gave me, even though I told her I wouldn’t be leaving today.

5. I am grateful for sunny and warm (well, hot) weather. It’s a little too hot for my liking, but I love the fact that I can wear my summer clothes a little longer than usual.

6. I am grateful my Braille display and computer both behave. Both gave me a scare this week. I bought new headphones on Sunday. Not because I needed them but because they’re fluffy and pink. Then when I plugged them into my computer, somehow my PC decided to install TikTok. This was a coincidence, as a 3.5mm audio cable can’t transfer data like that. However, I had no clue so started messing with my computer like crazy, uninstalling everything I didn’t recognize. This thankfully didn’t cause any long-term problems, but for a while I thought my Braille display wasn’t working so I must’ve somehow uninstalled its driver (even though I recognize that manufacturer). In the end, rebooting my Braille display solved the problem.

7. I am grateful for a delicious blueberry smoothie I made on Monday with a temp worker. I used frozen blueberries, yoghurt, vanilla extract, cinnamon and sweetener. It was absolutely amazing!

8. I am grateful for some long walks when it still wasn’t too hot outside.

9. I am grateful for a great essential oil blend in my diffuser. Yesterday, a fellow resident was out of control a lot and it was causing me anxiety. I eventually decided to ask the staff to help me create a blend so that I could calm down. I put patchouli, white fir and lavender essential oils in the diffuser.

10. I am grateful for the will to write. I may not always know what to write about, but at least I want to write. I currently have a seven-day writing streak going (although I still need to write today, which will make it eight days) in Day One, which is rather cool. Sometimes, all I write is a quick gratitude list (which I drew inspiration from for this post) or a “My Day” template post, but that’s okay too.

What are you grateful for?

August 2023 Reflections #WBOYC

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It’s the last day of the month, so it’s time for my monthly reflections. Overall, August was slightly better than July, but it’s still been quite a tough month. Honestly, it’s been quite a tough year so far.

My spouse’s car broke down a few weeks ago, so we weren’t able to see each other each week this past month. Last Sunday, though my spouse did visit me, it was in my mother-in-law’s car. Thankfully, the car has been fixed for now.

My mother-in-law also only visited me once this past month despite there being five Tuesdays in August and her normally visiting me every other Tuesday. On the 1st, she had to work and on the 29th, a new horse was delivered. The story behind her having gotten a new horse is a bit sad, in that one of her horses, Remco, passed away suddenly last month. I mean, he was already crippled, so could only step around a bit, but still his death was unexpected. The new horse is a young mare called Marrit.

Now on to my own life. It’s been boring. I’ve been mostly waiting to find out more about the move. Last Sunday, my support coordinator told me that I’ll move within six weeks, probably sooner. I honestly have mixed feelings about the whole thing. Obviously, I try to remind myself it can’t be worse than here, but what if it isn’t any better either? Will I be expected to magically flourish there just because it’s not this home? I’m hoping, of course, that I will eventually flourish, but this isn’t going to happen magically. Indeed, this requires work, both on my part and on the part of the staff.

I also, like I mentioned yesterday, have had an increase in flashbacks to my childhood trauma. Of course, I could hope this will lessen when (if?) I’m in a calmer environment, but still I’m pretty sure they won’t disappear without support.

In the health department, I’m doing pretty well. I had a meeting with the dietitian yesterday and she asked me not to lose any more weight. I’m not sure how to do this, truthfully, as I’m eating well overall. There’s also this thought at the back of my mind telling me that I could still lose 10kg and be at a healthy BMI. Besides, I still have quite a lot of abdominal fat and watched some YouTube videos a while back that mentioned the dangers of internal obesity. Then again, the dietitian told me there’s very little I can do about this. The YouTube videos tell me otherwise, but then again my healthy voice is telling me (or at least I’m assuming it’s my healthy voice) that following those YouTubers will just lead to extreme restricting, which will probably just cause me to relapse into bulimia. I’m still struggling intensely with all the things diet culture tells me about what to eat and not to eat to preserve my health and, at the same time, my dietitian has one foot right inside diet culture as well. After all, my food plan was a classic weight loss plan up until I reached a healthy BMI. Heck, the very fact that I mention the BMI here shows how much I’m into diet culture. I want to unlearn this, but I’m not sure how.

With respect to other health factors, I’m doing okay. I walk more than I did in July, have been swimming again and went on the stationary bike occasionally. That being said, I do worry about a decline in my mobility. This could be the YouTube videos again, which told me a loss of arm swing could be a sign of overall decline. I have absolutely no idea whether my arm ever swung at all though. That being said, my drop foot seems to be getting worse too.

I did finally get the eczema on my legs treated. I also got a slight infection on the skin of my earlobes, where I had my ears pierced in early July. I’m currently on a course of an antibiotic ointment, so hoping that’ll work.

In the crafty department, I haven’t been very active. I did create a lot of unicorns out of polymer clay, but they were all done using cutters, not sculpted. I intend to paint them and use them as gifts for my fellow residents when leaving this home.

I’m linking up with What’s Been On Your Calendar? (#WBOYC).

Opening Up About My Trauma

Posted on by Astrid

Last Monday, I was going for a walk with my one-on-one for the moment when we saw a few clients and staff she knew (she’s a temp worker). She wanted to “say a quick hi”. That turned into a fifteen-minute conversation between her and one of the other staff, which eventually turned to clients with severe challenging behavior being taken on outings off grounds and then, when they act out, staff being filmed by bystanders when restraining the client. This discussion triggered me, because it led to flashbacks of the times I’ve been “guided” (as staff call it) to my room. More like physically moved by several staff at a time, and the fact that I wasn’t officially restrained (because that probably only counts when you’re pinned down to the ground), is solely due to my lack of physical strength.

I asked the staff, admittedly more curtly than I should have, to not have these discussions in my presence in the future, as it was triggering me. She told me I was making it all about me and if I wanted to offer an opinion I should’ve made sure I listened to the whole thing because now I was twisting the truth. I told her about the time I was shoved to my room and staff threatened to lock me up in there. “You probably deserved it,” was her response.

This led to a whole chain reaction of triggers, in which I started to doubt the validity of my trauma-related symptoms. Didn’t I deserve the harsh punishments my parents gave me? I know at least back in my day an “educational spanking” was legal. In some U.S. states, child abuse isn’t even child abuse if it’s used as punishment.

I can’t go into the details of the punishments I endured as a child, and I’m pretty sure they’re not necessarily illegal. Does that mean they can’t have caused me PTSD?

That evening though, I was having intense flashbacks and decided to open up to my staff for that moment. She happened to be one of the staff who’d shoved me to my room on Friday and threatened to lock me in there. I had to admit – even though I don’t believe it – that I deserved to be physically moved to my room. I mean, the reason was my dropping the F-bomb while in the communal room (and then refusing to go to my room on my own when told to), which, well, truthfully staff do all the time.

After I’d given examples of the way my parents treated me, my staff seemed quite shocked. I honestly don’t understand this, as she restrains clients everyday and never even cares about the impact this has on them. I mean, I know, staff restraining clients is legal, but then again does something have to be illegal to be traumatic? And if so, where’s the boundary between an “educational spanking” and child abuse? Or does it have to be unwarranted? In that case, I must say, my parents acted out of a need to show who’s boss because they’d felt powerless over my behavior. I did, indeed, try to excuse my parents’ actions by explaining about my own behavior. The staff didn’t seem impressed.

I know, in my heart, that the truth is that restraints can and do traumatize clients too. I know I experienced trauma while in the psychiatric hospital because of being locked up in seclusion against my will. I know I still experience emotional trauma. And, of course, I’m more sensitive to this due to the trauma I endured as a child. But it isn’t black-or-white. And this is confusing.