To my readers I have a confession to make. I have schizophrenia, but I don’t think that is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I think my experience of schizophrenia has made me a better person, because I am an empath and I often feel other people’s pain, which is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because I have compassion and can listen to other people’s sad stories of being victimised and stigmatised and really relate, but being an empath I can feel the emotional pain of these people and want them to know there are people who care when they are suffering and if you have a little faith, there will always be someone who will listen and say I HEAR YOU.

I have a strong faith in God and this has guided me throughout my darkest hours, when it feels like no one cares or understands, and when the negative thoughts become agonising I force my mind to feel better, by doing something caring and positive for a loved one ❤️. I believe goodwill generates goodwill and doing something nice for someone helps my own healing. There is way too much negativity surrounding a diagnosis of schizophrenia, the stigma is awful to bear from cruel small minded people who believe that people with schizophrenia are evil and inferior. My experience of it is that this judgement of us, contributes to and compounds the more negative symptoms and leads to people self harming, comfort eating and feeling suicidal. Just how many people have committed suicide because the emotional pain caused by stigma is to hard to bear.

Honestly battling schizophrenia feels like a war in your mind between good and evil. I am a highly functioning person and I am determined when I am unwell that evil is not going to claim me. I make myself think positive and go put of my way to think kindly of myself and my loved ones. I am truly grateful for the good people in my life, who have some compassion for the impact on me of this spiritual 🙏 battle. I will always advocate for the basic human rights of those who suffer like I do, and I will always listen to and make time to treat people well and empower them to have faith and be positive in their life. When you are feeling disempowered, you need to find whatever works to empower you. What empowers me is my belief in angels. That God sends us angels, as his employees to heal the damage caused by people who stigmatise mental illness. I truly have met some wonderful people working in mental health, my psychiatrist in particular. My psychiatrist is a very wise man and we often talk about faith and people having a life purpose. My purpose is to bring a little empathy, compassion and care to those having such a spiritual battle. I’m not an angel, just a human brought up to be loving and caring.

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Twelve months on Susanna remains as important to me as ever and I sense her spirit is omnipresent in my life.

I find myself reflecting on the impact of her life and passing. No single person had ever had the impact of Susanna, not even my dads passing impacted on me in quite the same way as Susanna

She was an angelic presence and a ray of sunshine to everyone of her loved one’s . I totally wish to follow the example she set with my own loved ones. If I can be half as good as Susanna I will have achieved the example she set, by the bucket loads.

Susanna was the most giving person I ever met, and I mean not that she gave a lot of gifts, I mean that she was the gift and freely gave all of her generosity of spirit, in so many ways. She was the best social worker, that I had the pleasure 🙏 of working alongside. Her understanding of the human condition and her empathy and compassion was the most immense that I had ever seen. She was no bodies fool and would stand up if someone tried to take advantage of her, or put one over her. She was my confidante and she probably knows more about me than anyone else in my life

Twelve months on I know have the opportunity to look back and reflect upon her and just feel grateful 🙏 for what she brought into my life. She definitely was an angel and I know that with every challenge that I have encountered in life since her passing that she has still been sharing the journey with me.

I can still visualise her in her gold sparkling ✨️ halo and her silky white robes. I hope I am still reflecting on her in the years to come and still have her own a big part of my heart

Susanna I will always love and miss you and know we are friends for eternity. Although it feels like forever to we meet again, I know that when we meet again in heaven we will never be parted again. Our Souls are eternal after all.

REMEMBERING THE ANGEL LADY

I’m writing ✍️ this blog post to my unattached readers who a looking for a true partner or prince in their life. My words of advice come from experience and a good place.

My first word of advice is to trust your gut, and if your gut is telling you to be wary of a person to trust that instinct. If things seem too good to be true, trust that feeling and hold off getting too attached to that person. If things seem to be too good to be true, often it is that way. Take time getting to know a person, and don’t get involved too quickly with someone you don’t know. Truly good relationships start out as friends, because you take the time to get to know soneone, before you jump in and take the step of starting a relationship. I had a relationship with someone who chased me for a good two years before we got involved. This person was obsessed with me and kept pursuing me to eventually I gave in. This person promised me the 🌎 world, yet when they had me, started to treat me terribly and treated me like I was inferior and crap. So if things with this person seem wonderful, in the lead up to a relationship, then change overnight once you get involved, then be strong and prepared to walk away. We all desrve better, so walk away before having your sense of self worth damaged.

Another thing high on my list of priorities, is to watch how this person treats your pets . If this person doesn’t instantly treat your pet with love and kindness beware. This goes even more strongly if you have children from a past relationship. I know from painful experience that if someone doesn’t love 💔 love your pet as much as you do and in fact acts jealous of the love ❤️ you have for your pet, be very wary indeed. As I don’t have kids of my own I can only guess that if your new partner doesn’t like the fact that your kids are number one in your life, walk away and choose your children’s welfare as your priority.

Always look for people who are honest, and particularly if people have baggage from a past relationship, look for people who are honest about their baggage and issues from day one.

I guess my main advice in relationship’s is to trust your gut instincts and look for people who are honest and decent. Don’t settle for second best and don’t be pressured into getting involved with anyone before you are ready. Tread softly and lightly where your heart is concerned and don’t rush into anything in the heat of the moment. Let yourself enjoy the courtship, and romance. Far better to enjoy being flirted with, and enjoy that special time, than run the into a relationship with some stranger who treats you terribly once you are involved. If seen one too many friends rush into relationship only to find out that their prince, turned into a cane toad overnight.

Most of all if you practice healthy self esteem and treat yourself with respect 🙏, sorting out the princes from the cane toads becomes easier as we tend to reap what we sow. Enjoy the courtship rituals and don’t be in a hurry. Far better to be with a prince, who offers to walk 🚶‍♂️ your dog with you, than someone who feels the dog 🐕 is their competition. Choose someone who strives to be a good part in your life, not someone who is looking for another name in their black book.

As many of my readers know I recently have been watching clips of The Mentalist. I have been enjoying this immensely and it has made me wonder if there is such a thing as “real psychics “.

I do definitely believe that there are people who have a very good skill set in observing people and can read a person by their body language, gestures etc and that these people also have a great intuition and know what questions to ask to get a person to express themselves. So obviously I agree that highly skilled mentalists do exist. Whether they are true psychics and can do things like communicate with those who have passed over I remain sceptical about.

I think a lot of us have highly developed communication skills, and observation skills and can feel compassion and empathy for those around us. And yes I do believe in women’s intuition . There has been too much happen in my life, that it can’t be coincidence. Maybe as women we have some skills that a Mentalist actually have and maybe if we can concentrate and observe more around us, those skills can be enhanced and we can become like Mentalists.

I am going to give this a try and work on my powers of observation, to improve my relationships with those around me. Who knows, my women’s intuition may grow. Just don’t ask me to communicate with passed over loved one’s. That is not a skill I would particularly want to have.

Cathy Kelly would have to be my favourite author of modern day “chick lit” as it is known, that being literature for modern day women.

Her stories are always based around Ireland 🇮🇪 and makes me dream of one day visiting the emerald isle, because the villages where her stories are set all sound so charming, lovely friendly and community minded.

Her stories always feature a few female protagonists who are dealing with something in their lives and always end up in a better position by the end of the book than when we first meet them at the beginning. I love her message of growth and positivity and the fact that we as women don’t always need a relationship in our life to define us. Sometimes her storyline are romantic and other times the characters are dealing with allsorts of issues, from adoption, illness infidelity etc. She writes these characters in such a way that you really believe in them and want a good outcome for them. She never disappoints and she writes with such warmth that you genuinely believe her characters.

Cathy Kelly also does work for UNICEF and uses her role as a best selling author to highlight what UNICEF do around the 🌎 world.

If you are looking for good fiction to read I highly recommend 📚 reading Cathy Kelly. I have many of her books and read them over and over again

As I get older I realise how very important a sense of privacy is to me. It is something I as an adult haven’t always had and as part and parcel of my independence, it is something that I have had to fight hard for to achieve in my life

Right from when I was a small child I dreamed of having a place to call my own. I saw myself as a adult having a small home 🏡 of my own. This dream didn’t always include a husband, and sometimes it did include having children. The women I idolised were always independent strong women, who succeeded despite the odds, ie Helen Keller, Laura Ingalls and later on Janet Frame. I can remember as a young adult applying to the Ministry of Housing for a scheme to help people buy their first home. Surely this should have been a wake up call to some members of my family that I was seeking an independent life.

I moved out of home in my early twenties, like so many of my generation. Initially I moved out with friends, who had the same desire as me, to have some independence . I really benefited from this independence as it showed me the real 🌎 world of having to budget to pay bills, and have a sense of autonomy and privacy regarding my life. Little did I know that the onset of my mental health issues would result in certain people trying to take away and control my independence and my sense of privacy. Had I had a 🔮 crystal ball that looked into my future I would have fought hard to remain living the way I wanted to. To say that fighting at that particular time was way too hard and the judgement and stigma surrounding my mental health was overwhelming so it was impossible to stand up and reclaim the sense of peace that having true privacy gives you.

I can recall being treated with a total disrepect of my privacy and it wasn’t until I gained meaningful employment in mental health that I fought against such control of my independence and moved out to live on my own. It has only been recently as I reflect on my life that I realise that I had to ultimately regain my independence or I wouldnt be where I am today. Had I not regained my independence I shudder to think of where I would be today.

As I reflect I am really grateful 🙏 for the privacy I now have . Living with Lily is very peaceful, quiet and fulfilling. I may only be renting and probably because of life circumstances beyond my control I will probably never own a place of my own. Having good people around me who love me and understand how much I have had to fight for what I have certainly helps. I have learned to be both grateful and gracious for this support. There still remains in my life an element of some people who seek to control or restrict my privacy and my independence but ultimately they have minimal impact on me. I have fought so hard for the basic human rights in my life and those I have assisted in my career in mental health. I am strong because I have a faith that has led to some pretty amazing people sharing my journey. With a sense of privacy in my life, cones a sense of peace and happiness.

As Christmas time and the end of this year draws to a close I find myself reflecting upon this year and the many changes and challenges it brought to my life.

Possibly the most drastic change was the passing of Susanna and everything that went along with that. You never stop grieving for that loved 😍 one but the grief gets easier to live with as time passes. I know I will never forget and never stop loving her and her passing brought other blessings into my life. The friendships I have made with both Kathryn and Susannas daughter Rebekah have been lovely and both fill a gap and fill me with joy. I feel Susannas presence in my life to this day, gently guiding me in all I do.

My writing ✍️ has also provided me with such joy and inspiration. Collecting and writing the stories for God Bless Our Dogs was wonderful and the goodwill generated from that little 📖 book has been pleasantly overwhelming.

If there has been anything I now realise, even more so now, it is that goodwill generates goodwill. My friends and family have been supportive of my writing . Writing gives me a sense of fulfilment, peace and contentment beyond compare. I plan to regularly continue my blog and put together my second book which will be about Susanna and her legacy for her family and many friends.

I feel this year I have gained more than I have lost and hope to continue to be a becan of positivity for my readers. I wish peace and happiness for those I love and those who regularly read my blog. Better tines are ahead for us all, I can feel that in my bones. Love and peace, Kaye.

I must admit there is something that I consider to be my guilty pleasure. I am only human, so I am as fallible as anyone

My guitly pleasure is that I love watching Simon Baker on screen, particularly in The Mentalist. When I was married I was a little too honest with my exhusband and made the mistake of telling him, that Simon Baker is a piece of eye candy 🍬. My husband was very insecure about that and would throw a tantrum when I would try to watch The Mentalist. I tried explaining to my husband that just about ninety-nine percent of the female population in Australia would consider Simon Baker eye candy 🍬. This didn’t seem to work, so I gave up watching The Mentalist as my husband was just so irrational about it. I couldn’t tell you what The Mentalist was about because I was forbidden to watch it.

Lately though I have found clips of The Mentalist on YouTube and have been indulging myself watching it. God it was a good series that worked on so many levels. It was witty, intelligent, funny and charming and God does Simon Baker look good in that suit. It is a guilty pleasure 🙏, like eating chocolate 🍫 in bed. I feel now that I missed put in the past because of my ex husband’s insecurities. I love watching these clips and I think if any man pulled the antics of my exhusband I would stand up for what I want to do. There is nothing wrong in indulging in a few guitly pleasures that makes us feel good, it is all just innocent fun after all.

Women of Australia let us unite 🙏 and enjoy watching Simon Baker to our hearts content. He certainly is eye candy 🍬.

As,I write this post I am watching a repeat of The Pacific In The Wake Of Captain Cook. It is hosted by one of my favourite people on this 🌎 earth Sam Neill.

Why do I call Sam Neill my Guru? Thriughout lockdown he just spread so much love, laughter, goodwill and humanity both online and on social media. He was deeply concerned for humanity whilst the whole world 🌎 was in lockdown and spent his time very productively trying to make humankind smile. And boy did he achieve that big time. From playing ukulele, reading 📚 kids stories and supposedly “cooking” all online he gave us all a reason to smile, laugh and enjoy being a human. My favourite is Sam attempting to cook duck, actually ending up having cheese and crackers with his own Two Paddocks Pinot Noir. It is comedy gold.

Also I very much envy Sam’s lifestyle, part time spent acting in roles all over the world and part time on his vineyard in central Otago New Zealand. What an idyllic lifestyle. What a beautiful part of the 🌎 world to return to, after a busy hectic time spent on his acting craft.

Sam just gets more attractive and enviable as he ages. He always was an attractive man, but now he has the attractiveness of wisdom, and a life well lived. I would love to share a meal, a cuppa or a bottle of wine 🍷 with Sam to just hear his opinions and knowledge and generally just chew the fat about life.

Sam you are my guru. A gentleman, who is just so talented and wise. Kia Kaha Sam, you are one of the lucky Kiwis who bring a breath of fresh air to a worn out weary world. A true Guru.

Last week I lost a friend. Yes it is really sad and unfortunate, but as I said in a previous post, everyone comes into our life for a reason, and for some it is only for a season.

I am sad and mourn the loss of that friendship, but I think that it was a friendship with a use by date, because recently that person had showed me that they were becoming more and more possessive of me, and not taking it well when I occasionally had to say no to this person, because of other commitments and relationships in my life.

If life has taught me anything it is that no one gets to “own” me. I am a bit of a free spirit who walked away from a controlling, possessive husband, who ended up cheating on me. It took alot of time and effort, to move on from that, but I did. The friendships I have now, with males included are on a whole different level, we ❤️ love and trust one another and there is no ownership of one another. We respect boundaries and are there for each other. The whole pandemic made me value my friends even more, because of the extensive lockdowns we had here in Melbourne, so I value my long term relationships even more, because absence mskes the heart grow fonder. Lockdown did make me aware of that

There is only one person in my life that gets to be possessive of me, and she has fur, four legs and a tail. Lily can be as possessive of me as she likes, because the sort of way she is possessive is just soo cute, in a dog. Yes she is actively possessive of me and I just love ❤️ how much she loves me. She owns me and is my little best friend.

Wanting to own someone is cute in a dog 🐕, but wanting to own another human being can be a bit too needy or uncomfortable to live with in the long term.

The season of that particular friendship may have come to a sad end, but it has also made me realise I maintain several wonderful friendships that bring me great love and joy, and I value that lost friendship of having been beautiful whilst it lasted. As spring moves into summer, so does my life progress and change.