Before I even start this post, I want to say one thing. I really don't intend for it to come across as shaming anyone. Everyone has things in life they struggle with, however it is our responsibility as adults to do our best to not let our issues affect others.
I moved out of my apartment this weekend. It was very stressful considering the choice was made on an incredible time crunch, but ultimately as I sat in bed last night I felt a small amount of relief for the first time since September of 2021. I can't say I regret the experience entirely, but it was not a good choice. Karma definetely took its time making its point these last 18 months. I've learned a lot of lessons. Now time to call myself out.
I grew up severely depressed, for many reasons that aren't relevant right now, along with other factors I had a terrible time with executive function. Combing my hair, showering, picking up trash, just maintaining basic human normalcy was a huge struggle. I improved in my hygiene at 19 (some skills I gained between 12 and 19, but for ease sake will say it all came together then), what I still couldn't figure out was out to manage keeping a clean room/home. Dishes and laundry, and even more basic things eluded me. It wasn't really for lack of want to maintain a well kept home, but I lacked motivation, energy (spoons), and the skill to figure it out. Even twenty years of therapy left me unprepared for how to truly take care of my space. I know what it's like to live in some pretty bad filth, at almost 25, I'm pretty ashamed to admit that. When I moved out, my bedroom was a wreck, and saints that they are my family managed to pack and clean the room for me. I was determined that I was going to do better. Here's the thing, I put probably a little too much pressure on myself to try to be perfect. When inevitably things weren't spotless I had massive anxiety. The reality is, it was going to take time and hard work to fix both my mindset about cleaning and the skills I lacked to properly maintain a home. I'll say I won't be getting my security deposit back (I figured that out after some previous roommates let a rabbit eat their carpet and left huge holes in the wall. Though thankfully with a lot of help we left it as good as we could). As many of you may know from my previous post about roommates (and the above comment) I had just terrible luck. I won't say this was entirely someone else's fault, I am not the easiest person to live with, neither is my partner. Some of the blame in the situations we were in sits with us. We can only grow and learn from those experiences and I like to think that we have.
Yesterday did not go to plan, after moving our essentials out of the apartment on Saturday (and packing the majority of the place in a week) I insisted on taking Easter off. I wanted to relax and finish unpacking before taking on the stuff going into storage. This was a mistake, because our apartment called yesterday afternoon, and we ended up having to go finish the place in a day. Which was incredibly stressful, but considering I knew what was left to do I felt confident it could be done. Then disaster struck. Our roommate hadn't moved out (we had given him as much notice as possible and considering he was not on the lease I assumed incorrectly he would vacate shortly after us), he was asleep when they arrived, and my partner asked him to finish cleaning as we had to turn in keys and be done by the end of the day. He had two hours before he had to go into work. I was in the middle of my work day, anxious enough that I couldn't be there to help, but when Tyler called to let me know that the roommates room was a disaster and way more work than three people could do, I could do nothing more than drop everything and rush over to help. What I found shocked and disgusted even me.
I want to clarify before I continue that while my apartment was nowhere near perfectly clean, everything was functional and mostly taken care of. Especially the bathroom. The full bottles of pee coating half the room and a bag of human waste in the floor led me to have to sit down and debate every life choice I've ever made. There's a lot that I tend to let people get away with in my life, that's not really something I'm especially proud of, but it is true. I may be a huge asshole, but I tend to have a pretty big heart. I knew months ago we needed to probably remove our roommate from the apartment, between not helping around the house, random disappearances, and not paying rent (or paying less than expected) there was no real excuse to put up with him. Other than friendship. Friendship is really something I value, I desire intimate relationships with people, communication, vulnerability, board games and D&D. I like to have a little tribe. I can't say I've ever had many friends, in fact at this exact moment I have two good friends and my partner outside of my family. In reality I am not upset about that. If I've learned anything lately, quality is far superior to quantity. I am unwilling to continue keeping people in my life who don't meet reasonable standards. There is a place where no excuse or explanation is enough. I think everything that happens to us is just another lesson we needed to learn. Though I'm not entirely sure what the lesson about human waste was. Maybe it wasn't my lesson to learn.
All's well that ends well. I have many things to look forward to, the space I need to grow even more, and some really amazing people in my life. I'm thankful for all of what I've been blessed with. The bad stuff comes with the good so even it is something to thank the universe for.
Taila Out.
