Hello, and welcome. I offer you a 5000+ word info dump.
So yeah. Imma get hella wordy up in the bitch, just an FYI. I'm a chatty Cathy when it comes to these things.
I'm Erin, 33 and currently living in Alberta, Canada. I grew up on the east cost, in New Brunswick, but moved out here 10 years ago this coming September.
I grew up an only child in a single-parent household because my dad died before I was born. I lived immediately next door to my grandparents and they helped out a lot while I was growing up, much to the displeasure of my mother because she's stubborn as hell, just like her father and my grandfather. She had no choice but to let them help out but my grampy liked to do, then tell because he figured he knew better. It didn't help that they're both alcoholics, of course.
My mom got sober around Christmas of 1999 and has been since. She still deals with it every day but I'm super proud of her. We wouldn't be as close as we are if she hadn't quit. My grandfather, on the other hand, drank up until he passed away on NY day 2001. My nana passed in 2003 and she was mostly a guilt addict. As in, guilting everyone else to get what she wanted.
Ahhh, functionality. I hardly knew ye!
Despite my weird upbringing, out of my family (my mom and her two sisters; my uncle [their brother] is dead and it's a good thing) my mom and I have the best relationship out of all of them with their kids. Aunt J is close with her son but her daughter is pretty ungrateful and lives in Ontario. Aunt G is also an alcoholic who is currently going through a contentious divorce that should have happened YEARS ago. She lives outside Toronto and had one of those "keeping up with the Joneses" marriages. Lots of hidden credit cards, bitterness between spouses, giving their two kids whatever they wanted and not knowing how to reign them in when they went wild.
I don't have much contact with G and that's for the best on my part because I have felt some animosity on my part toward her because, as the kid of an alcoholic, I know what her kids felt growing up and have all these, admittedly irrational, feelings about her situation, especially after seeing my mom get dry and how hard she has and continues to work to be sober. So instead of letting any of that seep into a conversation with her I just don't talk to her.
Not that it's a big deal, to be very honest. I'm not one who keeps in touch with lots of people. I talk to exactly one person I went to high school with and he's my best friend since we were 6/7. We haven't even spoken on the phone in years, but we email and tweet each other. His name is Adam and he lives on the east coast still.
Since moving out west it's been an interesting ride finding friends. I'm happy on my own, for the most part, and enjoy hermitting during weekends and my evenings. I've made a small circle of friends through my work places because I honestly don't know how people meet other people in this day and age. I've never been into bars and am awkward as hell at parties where I don't know more than one or two people.
I ended up out here because I finished school and didn't know what I wanted to do once I was done.
Let me re-phrase that a bit. I did six years of university, getting my B.A. (AKA: a fancy, embossed piece of paper) in history with honours, human rights and psychology, then applied for one law school and to a human rights program at Columbia University in NYC and didn't get into either. Which is TOTALLY for the best, believe me.
I ended up with $60,000+ in debt with student loans and an over-qualification for retail work. My aunt J and her hubs D moved out here the year before because he was in the military and my mom suggested I come out here "for a year" until I figured out what I wanted to do. So off I went! For "a year".
While here I contacted a flooring place I wanted to kind of shadow to see if installing flooring and tiles was my bag (LAWL, it was not) and instead got hired on for temp office work, updating their inventory system. While there I did some promotional material for them, info sheets and press release-type things because they were going through a re-branding and the owner asked why I wasn't in public relations.
WHY WASN'T I IN PUBLIC RELATIONS?! So I looked at a couple local-ish schools and found one in the next city over. Applied and got accepted for a SEVENTH YEAR of school, in an accelerated program I'd do in one year instead of two because I already had education out my ass. While waiting for fall of 2007 to roll around my job was coming to an end so I needed something to fill the summer months. The flooring store was working with a sales rep from the newspaper to help with their rebranding so I slipped her my resume to see if they did any summer student programs.
A few weeks later I got a call from C, the supervisor of the classified department of the paper, and we had a whirlwind interview. I was hired! A highlight from that interview:
C: You have a great personality.
Me: I have a personality?
I didn't really know who I was at that time and was fumbling along, trying to find my place so it was a weird thing to be told.
Leaving was hard at the end of the summer but I went off to my course, figuring things would get better with this certificate program that would enable me to work for firms and ... stuff. I don't know.
While in this city and during my time at school I hit my first major depressive episode. It hit me like a ton of bricks and I had to ask a couple instructors to grade me based on my work to that point in the semester, while another one recommended I see a counsellor on campus because she was worried about me.
I got through it, got through the program and went back to my aunt and uncle's, although at that point all I wanted was to leave Alberta. This province, for those who may not know, is considered the Texas of Canada. Incredibly conservative (or was up until this past year) and all the "ists" as hell. SO different from the east coast, not very established in terms of history and longevity and, in my eyes, not much culture.
But that's neither here nor there.
I took one week off between my coure and looking for a job to get me by until I figured out where to go and what to do. The day I had an interview with a hotel to change bed sheets and be a maid I stopped into the paper to say hi to everyone.
It was meant to be because C immediately pounced. Turned out that the creative supervisor had been fired the day before so someone moved into his place and they were down a creative person. By a fluke I happened to take a one hour crash course on Quark (which is what creative used then) and I was told to come in the next day "as a trial".
Four months after I started in creative C snagged me back into classifieds and I've never left since. In the past couple of years I've moved into more of a sales person position but inside and for our specialty projects like magazines and features and currently I'm sliding into home plate on a wedding show the company bought three years ago. This is my third year involved and my first year running it from start to finish, with the planner who sold it to us doing most of the show planning and prep and whatnot. Because the advertising I KNOW. Pipe and drape and planograms I do NOT.
Things have been relatively same old, same old except for the past few months. I'm sure most of you have at least heard of how the print industry and newspapers and "traditional" media are on a downslide. We fought that for years and battled against that because in Canada for the most part, but especially this city, newspapers have been strong. But we've steadily been laying people off and amalgamating positions and departments and losing subscribers and advertisers and money and ... yeah.
C has gone from being a simple telemarketer who faced a wall, to a classified girl, to supervisor, to managing the classified departments for both our paper and our sister paper where I went to school last, to overseeing newspapers we own in the neighbouring province. She recently took on the official title of ad director, which she was already basically doing but hadn't wanted.
She's doing six people's jobs because they've cut so many people, and she hasn't been offered any compensation in return. Finally, the final shoe dropped, she saw red and made a call. She has a new job and her last day with us is next Friday.
C has been my biggest supporter and ally and cheerleader for years. We're friends and I am loyal to her, not the company. After some rockiness with the company in 2010-ish a few of us in the department at the time were of the mindset of, "you quit, we quit" and I'm the last one left. In my mind it's like that line from the Notebook: "If you're a bird, I'm a bird." And so I've started on the job hunt. It's something I've been considering for about 10 months now but because C was still there and I was loath to rock the boat, I stayed and didn't bother even looking for other jobs.
Last week I applied for a student recruiter position at the local college because I think it's something I'd be really good at. I'm a sales person who liked school so much I went for seven years! So now I wait and look for other jobs in the meantime.
As I mentioned, I had a depressive episode in 2008 while at school. Part of it was homesickness, part of it was exhaustion from being in school for so long, part of it was that I still had no idea what I was doing and the program wasn't really what I was hoping/thinking it would be and a large part of it was my damn brain.
But once I got out of there and returned to live with my aunt and uncle things got better. I started working and was in fandom and went to movies and hung out with my friends. Things seemed okay. But then 2010 happened.
I'd been feeling off for a few months but in the summer shit hit the fan and I started having crying jags and feeling fucking awful. I saw a psychologist for a few sessions but I had to pay her out of pocket because my benefits were used up from going to physio.
Oh yeah, I was in two car accidents in 2009! I was rear ended twice within two months, the second being by a loaded dumptruck, carrying a pup in the back which was also loaded. I was driving a Toyota Yaris that exploded in a hail of styrofoam when he smashed into me. I didn't stand a chance.
As a result of that accident (the first one was a basic rear-ending by a Dodge Neon so it wasn't as bad, just fucked up my neck a bit) I have some bulged discs and will likely be in chronic pain for the rest of my life. Woo! Got a nice settlement out of it, but I'll get into that, later.
So in 2010 I was dealing with ~emotions~ and pain and feeling like I was being left out by my two closest girlfriends (seriously, three girls are an awful group). It was an awful time. I also decided that fall was the time to move into my own apartment. I got my cat, Gracie (I'll show her off later), and lived in a basement suite that had an issue with maple bugs, leaked in the spring and had noisy people upstairs. But it was mine and I thought it would work out.
I'd been afloat, fandom-wise, for about a year at that point because Supernatural wasn't my bag anymore and I didn't have anything new to hold my interest. As someone who joined LJ in 2003 at the tail end of Buffy airing and has been in a fandom basically all this time, NOT being in one was WEIRD. I didn't know how to use LJ, didn't know who to talk to (I was SO over SPN to the point of hating everything about it), and it made me feel even worse because I couldn't be creative. I was lost.
My sleep suffered, I cried ALL the time. Like, ALL the time. I felt everything but that "everything" was only awful things. I tried to walk and keep my energy up and I was still functional at work--until I wasn't. It was then that I knew something had to be done because I was starting to cry at work and not be able to keep a lid on my emotional shit. I didn't say a thing to anyone at work for ages about it because I was always "on" at work and I wasn't sure it would seem valid or true if I said I was "depressed".
My general doctor is a GREAT guy. I am so happy to have gotten on with him because it was a bit of a fluke that I did. I was seeing another doc, one I got into through my aunt since we're family, but she was female and the only times I went she was on mat leave. 9.5 years later I STILL have yet to meet her. But I saw my doc, Dr. N, and he listened to me.
He tried me on a low dose of a med right away and it ... helped. In the sense that I went from feeling everything to nothing at all. And I went like that for a few months. I just stopped crying and basically everything else. What's worse? Feeling everyting or nothing? So he upped the dose and things evened out. I was stable, finally.
Sleep is, to this day, an issue but it was mildly better. I went through a host of sleeping pills, too, until I settled on using melatonin because it's so mild and it makes me drowsy enough I can slip off without feeling like complete ass the next day. Although I need to start using it again because getting 4-5 hours of sleep a night isn't working for me anymore. I'm goddamn old now! I can't do that like I used to!
During this time I also started with a bariatric clinic with the end goal, if I chose it, being gastric bypass surgery. I went to all the classes and appointments and worked with the nurses and doctors and specialists and, in the end, realized the program wasn't THAT great and I LOVE FOOD. Honestly, the biggest reason why I didn't go through with it was because I wouldn't be able to go to all you can eat sushi with my friends! It was one of those things I felt I'd truly miss out on and would be a detriment to my life because it's FUN and it's SUSHI.
The other, more reasonable, answer is because the type I was leaning most toward was one the doc who would have performed the procedure didn't do and wasn't as tested as the other two. The one he wanted to do was bowel removal. I was super not into that one because I already have digestive issues (IBS) and the LAST thing I need is for food to run through me even more quickly. Quicker? Whatever.
ANYWAY. Through this program I saw a psychiatrist, as well, who upped my anti-depressants to the max dose. Holy fucking shit, you guys. It was like that moment when The Wizard of Oz melts into colour from boring black and white. Rainbows and puppies and kittens and explosions and this AMAZING shift in everything about me.
I'd been "stable" before on the mid-dose and on the max I was super!Erin. I felt so good. SO good. I became a whole different person; someone happy and chipper and wacky and I really came into my own and I feel like I discovered myself. I honestly can't say that in the years before I had even that first depressive episode in 2008 that I wasn't depressed. I'd never really felt like a "person" or valid before that, I think. See above: the "I have a personality?" quote.
I hadn't cried in almost a year when a friend and I went to see Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. I really enjoyed it but at the end it hit me and I cried and it was this amazing thing. I had a full range of emotions again!
Things were good for a few years. I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes (or Diabeetus, as my mom says *facepalm*) and I'm "dealing" with it (as in trying to exercise and making the effort to eat better but, in reality, I eat whatever I want, as much as I want and it's ridiculous but I can't seem to make myself understand what awful things could happen. I'm a smart stupid person) but it's still a thing in my life, obvs.
Anyway. During the depression dealing I was still working on the pain issue and, unfortunately, being on the max dose of my antidepressants was causing me to shake more than I should (at all?) so my doc brought me down to the mid-dose again. Badness ensued so I went back up but the meds didn't have the same effectiveness so I had to try a couple new meds. It's led to some ups and downs in the past year and a half. Last year about this time I was also put on an anti-anxiety med because I was having panic attacks like mad.
Which brings me to the next health issue that's been a thorn in my side: birth control. I've been on the pill for years, since I was 16. I'm on seasonelle so I only have four periods a year. Great! But I also have persistent anemia. CAN NOTHING IN MY BODY NOT BE A JERK?! So with my doc we looked at IUDs and I got one put in last January-ish. I thought, great! Three years without a period!
NOPE. I bled for basically six months until the damn thing was removed. He even added extra progesterone in hopes that it would help the IUD take but that just made the bleeding worse and gave me hellacious acne that took until about Christmas to clear up.
I was wearing pads AND tampons while on the IUD and extra hormones. It was BRUTAL, as were the cramps And I was physically sick to my stomach for the first time in years. Every month or so my stomach would get all fucked up from this thing. Since taking it out I haven't been sick once. What kind of black magic bullshit?
But since being back on Seasonelle things haven't gotten better to the place they were before the IUD. I asked about an ablation, where they basically boil your uterus so the lining can't grow every month, but the obstetrician I saw nixed that because he can't guarantee I won't still bleed for the next EIGHTEEN OR NINETEEN YEARS.
Later this month I have a follow up with him to talk hysterectomy. I was hesitant when he brought it up in November or whenever I last saw him, but then I bled from November to just before Christmas, then had my actual period that lasted about two weeks so I'm SO on board with this! I've been wanting this since I was 27 or so, actually.
Which brings me to
I don't like kids. When I was 11 I wanted to start my own Babysitter's Club because the books were just SO cool (those 13 year-olds STILL seem so much older than me). But once that fad passed I realized I don't like kids.
But beyond that I've also realized I don't want to take care of someone else. Someone who would depend on me not to get them dead or starve them or forget them at the zoo or something. I have a cat and even she's too demanding for me at times.
And even more recently I've been considering the world we live in right now. When I read the news, or go to the grocery store, or hear about how unstable markets and economies and industries are-it terrifies me to think about trying to raise a kid today. That doesn't even take into consideration what a shitshow it seems like it is to send the kids to SCHOOL. Like, do kids actually LEARN anything anymore or are they just constantly under threat of being bombed or shot at or having the kid next to them bully them to suicide or be shamed by the administration and staff for something stupidly innocuous?
People who have kids: you rock out with your cocks out because you took that on for your reasons and that's great. But for me, it terrifies me at the thought of it. And I've ALWAYS thought that it would be better for me to adopt instead of having my own. There are so many kids out there that need homes and to give them a home instead of my own would feel like the right thing.
Oh, and another reason why I have some feelings about adoption is because my mom gave a baby up for adoption when she was 18. They reconnected when I was in university but I didn't deal well, to put it mildly. I've never met her, don't know her name, don't know anything about her. I'm an old child and very insistent on that. I guess she was going to have her own kids and contacted mom through the finder service, or whatever, to find out the family history. From what I know they're no longer in touch because of the daughter's choice, although I THINK mom might be in touch with her SO instead. *shrugs*
But I'm MUCH happier without a kid. Even my mom has come out and said she didn't think I'd ever have a kid, not just because of the whole not liking them thing, but considering my body and health she isn't sure I'd have an easy time carrying. Soon enough it's moot, anyway!
I also don't have a partner, not that it's needed to have/raise a kid, obvs, since I wasn't raised like that. My "love life" is non-existent. I haven't dated or even been truly interested in anyone since I moved. That's a long-ass time. It's hard enough making friends here, I don't even know how to go about meeting guys! I've tried Plenty of Fish and met one guy who lived about 40 minutes away but all we did was text because neither of us worked up any gumption to do more. Plus he was super boring and a pushover. I need someone to challenge me and who won't let me get my way.
Last Valentine's Day I went to a speed dating thing that failed miserably and hasn't been held again since. I didn't meet anyone there, either. I did chat with a gentleman who was bitter as fuck about being laid off by some newspaper and was going to be driving a bus the following week, and another guy with one front tooth who was a performer named Pirate Jack. So... it was interesting, at least.
At this point I honestly wonder if I have it in me to compromise to be with anyone, and I've felt like this for a while. Obviously if I met someone I would likely feel differently, but I'm pretty set in my ways so who knows?
Basically I'm not overly concerned with a love life. If it's going to happen, it will. And if it doesn't then I'll have cats n' stuff.
Which brings me to:
My mom was laid off from the job she worked for over 26 years and made the move across the country to come live here in Alberta, too. At the time I was living in the apartment and enjoying being on my own for the first time ever. But I'd tried to get her to come out here for years after I moved because she was the only one of us left out there, on her own. I wanted her to be here with her sister so I could move to Vancouver or somewhere else and feel comfortable being even FURTHER away.
But now we live together, which sounds ~SO cool~ at 33. If I did meet someone I'd have to be like, "Yeah, let's go back to your place. Mine has a mom at it. More specifically: mine."
We live together in a rental (another thing I don't want to be an adult about: owning anything. I lease my car, rent our house, own nothing except for my bed, computer and cat. I don't want the responsibility) house with my three-legged rescue Persian Gracie and mom's rescue mutt Coconut.
We just adopted Coconut a couple years ago this summer. My mom's got a soft spot for the literal underdogs so we did a trial with this one dog called Dannie who was timid as fuck and wouldn't let anyone but her foster mom touch her. Mom thought she could win her over. We brought her home on a Friday and she didn't leave the house once in the five days we had her. Not even to use the bathroom. She wouldn't let either of near her, didn't like the cat and "didn't do stairs". :| Mom took her back on the following Wednesday. Two days later we had Coconut, who I wanted from our initial visit with Dannie. It was meant to be.
I'm a big animal fan. I've had cats my whole life, probably 16 or 17 in total, and four dogs now. If I ever win the BIG lottery one of my dreams is to have an acreage or farm where I take on animals no one wants. Like those one-eyed ones and cats with feline AIDs and stuff.
TL;DR: I'm on the hunt for a new job after being in my current one for eight years. I deal with depression and some other health things. My mom and I live with each other in western Canada after living our whole lives in the east. I'm VERY wordy.
Fannish stuff: I'm no longer into Buffy, so if you're looking for someone who is and disappointed I'm not, obviously feel free to defriend. I was a Buffy fan from the movie and discovered the world of fandom through it in the final season, when I found a random forum and chat, then LJ (when it was invite-only!). After Buffy I jumped into Queer as Folk until it ended. I wrote both Brian/Justin and Gale/Randy in that fandom. Then I dabbled with Prison Break and Lost for brief stints, then into SPN that lasted until season 5 when I peaced out of that one. I even went to a couple conventions for SPN!
After that I drifted until I found Teen Wolf and now that has my heart. I watch SO MUCH TV but I can't say I'm 100% fannish about any of it. I'll make icons for just about anything but if I write fic for it I'm IN IT TO WIN IT.
• I have done caps for a bunch of shows. TW caps can be found in this tag.
• An out of date fic list is here including the big bangs and all my SPN fics & J2 ones. I did some writing for that fandom I'm still proud of!
• My A03 is here, mostly TW stuff.
• I make icons and post them to rockstar_pink.
• I'm in a couple general landcomms to stay active and involved in fandom, any fandom. If this is your bag, too, check out gameofcards and tv_universe!
Fave shows at the moment: Teen Wolf (obvs), Dateline (LAWL, date deterrent), 2 Broke Girls, Bob's Burgers, The Flash, iZombie, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Scorpion, How to Get Away with Murder, Shannara Chronicles (although I'm 2-3 eps behind), Shadowhunters (against everything I have in me), Agents of Shield, and so many more.
I don't know what else I could possibly say to best introduce myself. I'm sure if you made it this far and read everything some of you are wishing I'd just shut up so... sure.
I'm Erin, 33 and currently living in Alberta, Canada. I grew up on the east cost, in New Brunswick, but moved out here 10 years ago this coming September.
I grew up an only child in a single-parent household because my dad died before I was born. I lived immediately next door to my grandparents and they helped out a lot while I was growing up, much to the displeasure of my mother because she's stubborn as hell, just like her father and my grandfather. She had no choice but to let them help out but my grampy liked to do, then tell because he figured he knew better. It didn't help that they're both alcoholics, of course.
My mom got sober around Christmas of 1999 and has been since. She still deals with it every day but I'm super proud of her. We wouldn't be as close as we are if she hadn't quit. My grandfather, on the other hand, drank up until he passed away on NY day 2001. My nana passed in 2003 and she was mostly a guilt addict. As in, guilting everyone else to get what she wanted.
Ahhh, functionality. I hardly knew ye!
Despite my weird upbringing, out of my family (my mom and her two sisters; my uncle [their brother] is dead and it's a good thing) my mom and I have the best relationship out of all of them with their kids. Aunt J is close with her son but her daughter is pretty ungrateful and lives in Ontario. Aunt G is also an alcoholic who is currently going through a contentious divorce that should have happened YEARS ago. She lives outside Toronto and had one of those "keeping up with the Joneses" marriages. Lots of hidden credit cards, bitterness between spouses, giving their two kids whatever they wanted and not knowing how to reign them in when they went wild.
I don't have much contact with G and that's for the best on my part because I have felt some animosity on my part toward her because, as the kid of an alcoholic, I know what her kids felt growing up and have all these, admittedly irrational, feelings about her situation, especially after seeing my mom get dry and how hard she has and continues to work to be sober. So instead of letting any of that seep into a conversation with her I just don't talk to her.
Not that it's a big deal, to be very honest. I'm not one who keeps in touch with lots of people. I talk to exactly one person I went to high school with and he's my best friend since we were 6/7. We haven't even spoken on the phone in years, but we email and tweet each other. His name is Adam and he lives on the east coast still.
Since moving out west it's been an interesting ride finding friends. I'm happy on my own, for the most part, and enjoy hermitting during weekends and my evenings. I've made a small circle of friends through my work places because I honestly don't know how people meet other people in this day and age. I've never been into bars and am awkward as hell at parties where I don't know more than one or two people.
I ended up out here because I finished school and didn't know what I wanted to do once I was done.
Let me re-phrase that a bit. I did six years of university, getting my B.A. (AKA: a fancy, embossed piece of paper) in history with honours, human rights and psychology, then applied for one law school and to a human rights program at Columbia University in NYC and didn't get into either. Which is TOTALLY for the best, believe me.
I ended up with $60,000+ in debt with student loans and an over-qualification for retail work. My aunt J and her hubs D moved out here the year before because he was in the military and my mom suggested I come out here "for a year" until I figured out what I wanted to do. So off I went! For "a year".
While here I contacted a flooring place I wanted to kind of shadow to see if installing flooring and tiles was my bag (LAWL, it was not) and instead got hired on for temp office work, updating their inventory system. While there I did some promotional material for them, info sheets and press release-type things because they were going through a re-branding and the owner asked why I wasn't in public relations.
WHY WASN'T I IN PUBLIC RELATIONS?! So I looked at a couple local-ish schools and found one in the next city over. Applied and got accepted for a SEVENTH YEAR of school, in an accelerated program I'd do in one year instead of two because I already had education out my ass. While waiting for fall of 2007 to roll around my job was coming to an end so I needed something to fill the summer months. The flooring store was working with a sales rep from the newspaper to help with their rebranding so I slipped her my resume to see if they did any summer student programs.
A few weeks later I got a call from C, the supervisor of the classified department of the paper, and we had a whirlwind interview. I was hired! A highlight from that interview:
C: You have a great personality.
Me: I have a personality?
I didn't really know who I was at that time and was fumbling along, trying to find my place so it was a weird thing to be told.
Leaving was hard at the end of the summer but I went off to my course, figuring things would get better with this certificate program that would enable me to work for firms and ... stuff. I don't know.
While in this city and during my time at school I hit my first major depressive episode. It hit me like a ton of bricks and I had to ask a couple instructors to grade me based on my work to that point in the semester, while another one recommended I see a counsellor on campus because she was worried about me.
I got through it, got through the program and went back to my aunt and uncle's, although at that point all I wanted was to leave Alberta. This province, for those who may not know, is considered the Texas of Canada. Incredibly conservative (or was up until this past year) and all the "ists" as hell. SO different from the east coast, not very established in terms of history and longevity and, in my eyes, not much culture.
But that's neither here nor there.
I took one week off between my coure and looking for a job to get me by until I figured out where to go and what to do. The day I had an interview with a hotel to change bed sheets and be a maid I stopped into the paper to say hi to everyone.
It was meant to be because C immediately pounced. Turned out that the creative supervisor had been fired the day before so someone moved into his place and they were down a creative person. By a fluke I happened to take a one hour crash course on Quark (which is what creative used then) and I was told to come in the next day "as a trial".
Four months after I started in creative C snagged me back into classifieds and I've never left since. In the past couple of years I've moved into more of a sales person position but inside and for our specialty projects like magazines and features and currently I'm sliding into home plate on a wedding show the company bought three years ago. This is my third year involved and my first year running it from start to finish, with the planner who sold it to us doing most of the show planning and prep and whatnot. Because the advertising I KNOW. Pipe and drape and planograms I do NOT.
Things have been relatively same old, same old except for the past few months. I'm sure most of you have at least heard of how the print industry and newspapers and "traditional" media are on a downslide. We fought that for years and battled against that because in Canada for the most part, but especially this city, newspapers have been strong. But we've steadily been laying people off and amalgamating positions and departments and losing subscribers and advertisers and money and ... yeah.
C has gone from being a simple telemarketer who faced a wall, to a classified girl, to supervisor, to managing the classified departments for both our paper and our sister paper where I went to school last, to overseeing newspapers we own in the neighbouring province. She recently took on the official title of ad director, which she was already basically doing but hadn't wanted.
She's doing six people's jobs because they've cut so many people, and she hasn't been offered any compensation in return. Finally, the final shoe dropped, she saw red and made a call. She has a new job and her last day with us is next Friday.
C has been my biggest supporter and ally and cheerleader for years. We're friends and I am loyal to her, not the company. After some rockiness with the company in 2010-ish a few of us in the department at the time were of the mindset of, "you quit, we quit" and I'm the last one left. In my mind it's like that line from the Notebook: "If you're a bird, I'm a bird." And so I've started on the job hunt. It's something I've been considering for about 10 months now but because C was still there and I was loath to rock the boat, I stayed and didn't bother even looking for other jobs.
Last week I applied for a student recruiter position at the local college because I think it's something I'd be really good at. I'm a sales person who liked school so much I went for seven years! So now I wait and look for other jobs in the meantime.
As I mentioned, I had a depressive episode in 2008 while at school. Part of it was homesickness, part of it was exhaustion from being in school for so long, part of it was that I still had no idea what I was doing and the program wasn't really what I was hoping/thinking it would be and a large part of it was my damn brain.
But once I got out of there and returned to live with my aunt and uncle things got better. I started working and was in fandom and went to movies and hung out with my friends. Things seemed okay. But then 2010 happened.
I'd been feeling off for a few months but in the summer shit hit the fan and I started having crying jags and feeling fucking awful. I saw a psychologist for a few sessions but I had to pay her out of pocket because my benefits were used up from going to physio.
Oh yeah, I was in two car accidents in 2009! I was rear ended twice within two months, the second being by a loaded dumptruck, carrying a pup in the back which was also loaded. I was driving a Toyota Yaris that exploded in a hail of styrofoam when he smashed into me. I didn't stand a chance.
As a result of that accident (the first one was a basic rear-ending by a Dodge Neon so it wasn't as bad, just fucked up my neck a bit) I have some bulged discs and will likely be in chronic pain for the rest of my life. Woo! Got a nice settlement out of it, but I'll get into that, later.
So in 2010 I was dealing with ~emotions~ and pain and feeling like I was being left out by my two closest girlfriends (seriously, three girls are an awful group). It was an awful time. I also decided that fall was the time to move into my own apartment. I got my cat, Gracie (I'll show her off later), and lived in a basement suite that had an issue with maple bugs, leaked in the spring and had noisy people upstairs. But it was mine and I thought it would work out.
I'd been afloat, fandom-wise, for about a year at that point because Supernatural wasn't my bag anymore and I didn't have anything new to hold my interest. As someone who joined LJ in 2003 at the tail end of Buffy airing and has been in a fandom basically all this time, NOT being in one was WEIRD. I didn't know how to use LJ, didn't know who to talk to (I was SO over SPN to the point of hating everything about it), and it made me feel even worse because I couldn't be creative. I was lost.
My sleep suffered, I cried ALL the time. Like, ALL the time. I felt everything but that "everything" was only awful things. I tried to walk and keep my energy up and I was still functional at work--until I wasn't. It was then that I knew something had to be done because I was starting to cry at work and not be able to keep a lid on my emotional shit. I didn't say a thing to anyone at work for ages about it because I was always "on" at work and I wasn't sure it would seem valid or true if I said I was "depressed".
My general doctor is a GREAT guy. I am so happy to have gotten on with him because it was a bit of a fluke that I did. I was seeing another doc, one I got into through my aunt since we're family, but she was female and the only times I went she was on mat leave. 9.5 years later I STILL have yet to meet her. But I saw my doc, Dr. N, and he listened to me.
He tried me on a low dose of a med right away and it ... helped. In the sense that I went from feeling everything to nothing at all. And I went like that for a few months. I just stopped crying and basically everything else. What's worse? Feeling everyting or nothing? So he upped the dose and things evened out. I was stable, finally.
Sleep is, to this day, an issue but it was mildly better. I went through a host of sleeping pills, too, until I settled on using melatonin because it's so mild and it makes me drowsy enough I can slip off without feeling like complete ass the next day. Although I need to start using it again because getting 4-5 hours of sleep a night isn't working for me anymore. I'm goddamn old now! I can't do that like I used to!
During this time I also started with a bariatric clinic with the end goal, if I chose it, being gastric bypass surgery. I went to all the classes and appointments and worked with the nurses and doctors and specialists and, in the end, realized the program wasn't THAT great and I LOVE FOOD. Honestly, the biggest reason why I didn't go through with it was because I wouldn't be able to go to all you can eat sushi with my friends! It was one of those things I felt I'd truly miss out on and would be a detriment to my life because it's FUN and it's SUSHI.
The other, more reasonable, answer is because the type I was leaning most toward was one the doc who would have performed the procedure didn't do and wasn't as tested as the other two. The one he wanted to do was bowel removal. I was super not into that one because I already have digestive issues (IBS) and the LAST thing I need is for food to run through me even more quickly. Quicker? Whatever.
ANYWAY. Through this program I saw a psychiatrist, as well, who upped my anti-depressants to the max dose. Holy fucking shit, you guys. It was like that moment when The Wizard of Oz melts into colour from boring black and white. Rainbows and puppies and kittens and explosions and this AMAZING shift in everything about me.
I'd been "stable" before on the mid-dose and on the max I was super!Erin. I felt so good. SO good. I became a whole different person; someone happy and chipper and wacky and I really came into my own and I feel like I discovered myself. I honestly can't say that in the years before I had even that first depressive episode in 2008 that I wasn't depressed. I'd never really felt like a "person" or valid before that, I think. See above: the "I have a personality?" quote.
I hadn't cried in almost a year when a friend and I went to see Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. I really enjoyed it but at the end it hit me and I cried and it was this amazing thing. I had a full range of emotions again!
Things were good for a few years. I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes (or Diabeetus, as my mom says *facepalm*) and I'm "dealing" with it (as in trying to exercise and making the effort to eat better but, in reality, I eat whatever I want, as much as I want and it's ridiculous but I can't seem to make myself understand what awful things could happen. I'm a smart stupid person) but it's still a thing in my life, obvs.
Anyway. During the depression dealing I was still working on the pain issue and, unfortunately, being on the max dose of my antidepressants was causing me to shake more than I should (at all?) so my doc brought me down to the mid-dose again. Badness ensued so I went back up but the meds didn't have the same effectiveness so I had to try a couple new meds. It's led to some ups and downs in the past year and a half. Last year about this time I was also put on an anti-anxiety med because I was having panic attacks like mad.
Which brings me to the next health issue that's been a thorn in my side: birth control. I've been on the pill for years, since I was 16. I'm on seasonelle so I only have four periods a year. Great! But I also have persistent anemia. CAN NOTHING IN MY BODY NOT BE A JERK?! So with my doc we looked at IUDs and I got one put in last January-ish. I thought, great! Three years without a period!
NOPE. I bled for basically six months until the damn thing was removed. He even added extra progesterone in hopes that it would help the IUD take but that just made the bleeding worse and gave me hellacious acne that took until about Christmas to clear up.
I was wearing pads AND tampons while on the IUD and extra hormones. It was BRUTAL, as were the cramps And I was physically sick to my stomach for the first time in years. Every month or so my stomach would get all fucked up from this thing. Since taking it out I haven't been sick once. What kind of black magic bullshit?
But since being back on Seasonelle things haven't gotten better to the place they were before the IUD. I asked about an ablation, where they basically boil your uterus so the lining can't grow every month, but the obstetrician I saw nixed that because he can't guarantee I won't still bleed for the next EIGHTEEN OR NINETEEN YEARS.
Later this month I have a follow up with him to talk hysterectomy. I was hesitant when he brought it up in November or whenever I last saw him, but then I bled from November to just before Christmas, then had my actual period that lasted about two weeks so I'm SO on board with this! I've been wanting this since I was 27 or so, actually.
Which brings me to
I don't like kids. When I was 11 I wanted to start my own Babysitter's Club because the books were just SO cool (those 13 year-olds STILL seem so much older than me). But once that fad passed I realized I don't like kids.
But beyond that I've also realized I don't want to take care of someone else. Someone who would depend on me not to get them dead or starve them or forget them at the zoo or something. I have a cat and even she's too demanding for me at times.
And even more recently I've been considering the world we live in right now. When I read the news, or go to the grocery store, or hear about how unstable markets and economies and industries are-it terrifies me to think about trying to raise a kid today. That doesn't even take into consideration what a shitshow it seems like it is to send the kids to SCHOOL. Like, do kids actually LEARN anything anymore or are they just constantly under threat of being bombed or shot at or having the kid next to them bully them to suicide or be shamed by the administration and staff for something stupidly innocuous?
People who have kids: you rock out with your cocks out because you took that on for your reasons and that's great. But for me, it terrifies me at the thought of it. And I've ALWAYS thought that it would be better for me to adopt instead of having my own. There are so many kids out there that need homes and to give them a home instead of my own would feel like the right thing.
Oh, and another reason why I have some feelings about adoption is because my mom gave a baby up for adoption when she was 18. They reconnected when I was in university but I didn't deal well, to put it mildly. I've never met her, don't know her name, don't know anything about her. I'm an old child and very insistent on that. I guess she was going to have her own kids and contacted mom through the finder service, or whatever, to find out the family history. From what I know they're no longer in touch because of the daughter's choice, although I THINK mom might be in touch with her SO instead. *shrugs*
But I'm MUCH happier without a kid. Even my mom has come out and said she didn't think I'd ever have a kid, not just because of the whole not liking them thing, but considering my body and health she isn't sure I'd have an easy time carrying. Soon enough it's moot, anyway!
I also don't have a partner, not that it's needed to have/raise a kid, obvs, since I wasn't raised like that. My "love life" is non-existent. I haven't dated or even been truly interested in anyone since I moved. That's a long-ass time. It's hard enough making friends here, I don't even know how to go about meeting guys! I've tried Plenty of Fish and met one guy who lived about 40 minutes away but all we did was text because neither of us worked up any gumption to do more. Plus he was super boring and a pushover. I need someone to challenge me and who won't let me get my way.
Last Valentine's Day I went to a speed dating thing that failed miserably and hasn't been held again since. I didn't meet anyone there, either. I did chat with a gentleman who was bitter as fuck about being laid off by some newspaper and was going to be driving a bus the following week, and another guy with one front tooth who was a performer named Pirate Jack. So... it was interesting, at least.
At this point I honestly wonder if I have it in me to compromise to be with anyone, and I've felt like this for a while. Obviously if I met someone I would likely feel differently, but I'm pretty set in my ways so who knows?
Basically I'm not overly concerned with a love life. If it's going to happen, it will. And if it doesn't then I'll have cats n' stuff.
Which brings me to:
My mom was laid off from the job she worked for over 26 years and made the move across the country to come live here in Alberta, too. At the time I was living in the apartment and enjoying being on my own for the first time ever. But I'd tried to get her to come out here for years after I moved because she was the only one of us left out there, on her own. I wanted her to be here with her sister so I could move to Vancouver or somewhere else and feel comfortable being even FURTHER away.
But now we live together, which sounds ~SO cool~ at 33. If I did meet someone I'd have to be like, "Yeah, let's go back to your place. Mine has a mom at it. More specifically: mine."
We live together in a rental (another thing I don't want to be an adult about: owning anything. I lease my car, rent our house, own nothing except for my bed, computer and cat. I don't want the responsibility) house with my three-legged rescue Persian Gracie and mom's rescue mutt Coconut.
We just adopted Coconut a couple years ago this summer. My mom's got a soft spot for the literal underdogs so we did a trial with this one dog called Dannie who was timid as fuck and wouldn't let anyone but her foster mom touch her. Mom thought she could win her over. We brought her home on a Friday and she didn't leave the house once in the five days we had her. Not even to use the bathroom. She wouldn't let either of near her, didn't like the cat and "didn't do stairs". :| Mom took her back on the following Wednesday. Two days later we had Coconut, who I wanted from our initial visit with Dannie. It was meant to be.
I'm a big animal fan. I've had cats my whole life, probably 16 or 17 in total, and four dogs now. If I ever win the BIG lottery one of my dreams is to have an acreage or farm where I take on animals no one wants. Like those one-eyed ones and cats with feline AIDs and stuff.
TL;DR: I'm on the hunt for a new job after being in my current one for eight years. I deal with depression and some other health things. My mom and I live with each other in western Canada after living our whole lives in the east. I'm VERY wordy.
Fannish stuff: I'm no longer into Buffy, so if you're looking for someone who is and disappointed I'm not, obviously feel free to defriend. I was a Buffy fan from the movie and discovered the world of fandom through it in the final season, when I found a random forum and chat, then LJ (when it was invite-only!). After Buffy I jumped into Queer as Folk until it ended. I wrote both Brian/Justin and Gale/Randy in that fandom. Then I dabbled with Prison Break and Lost for brief stints, then into SPN that lasted until season 5 when I peaced out of that one. I even went to a couple conventions for SPN!
After that I drifted until I found Teen Wolf and now that has my heart. I watch SO MUCH TV but I can't say I'm 100% fannish about any of it. I'll make icons for just about anything but if I write fic for it I'm IN IT TO WIN IT.
• I have done caps for a bunch of shows. TW caps can be found in this tag.
• An out of date fic list is here including the big bangs and all my SPN fics & J2 ones. I did some writing for that fandom I'm still proud of!
• My A03 is here, mostly TW stuff.
• I make icons and post them to rockstar_pink.
• I'm in a couple general landcomms to stay active and involved in fandom, any fandom. If this is your bag, too, check out gameofcards and tv_universe!
Fave shows at the moment: Teen Wolf (obvs), Dateline (LAWL, date deterrent), 2 Broke Girls, Bob's Burgers, The Flash, iZombie, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Scorpion, How to Get Away with Murder, Shannara Chronicles (although I'm 2-3 eps behind), Shadowhunters (against everything I have in me), Agents of Shield, and so many more.
I don't know what else I could possibly say to best introduce myself. I'm sure if you made it this far and read everything some of you are wishing I'd just shut up so... sure.