Good morning, True Believers!

Despite many setbacks, the year is off to a good start, overall!

Currently, life is really insistent on creating unexpected, large expenses. Luckily, cool under pressure as I am, everything is still in place for us to be in a safe, secure position once I'm between jobs.

Unfortunately, bae's income took a hit of about 200 dollars a month! Not insignificant. However, we're making it work.. I began driving for Uber! It should be miserable, and some riders are pigs, but l u c k i l y I'm a fiery ball of don't fuck with me, right now. So there's that.

Besides that, I think we've finally cut off the mother-in-law completely (her side.) The last connection was, apparently, her cell phone. We have our own plan, but the phone was still being paid by her mother. It's being mailed back, and she'll never get our phone numbers again. Hooray!

Now, many people may be horrified at this. "Family is everything! You're going to regret this later!" If that's you, you're likely one of two people: you have never dealt with a family member that truly had horrible personality disorders or addictions, or you have convinced yourself to allow them to drag you down because they've leeched and corrupted you for your entire life.

Really, if the negatives outweigh the positives at much as they do in my situation, don't be afraid to cut the cord. You're an adult, nobody has any right to control you, or use you to make themselves feel better about their horrible lives.

And with that hopefully behind us, our next topic shall be me! I've started therapy for myself. Long overdue, believe me. Every aspect of my personal life, I now realize, has been affected because of the horrible things I've seen and the sexual trauma I've experienced.

No matter how strong you are, a thousand papercuts could take down Hercules, especially if they're nicking arteries.

So there's that! Even though we've just begun, it feels good to really just lay out everything to someone with no preconceptions.

And then there's you. Why would I tell you all this? It's because it's who I am. The good, the bad, everyone is a melting pot of fuck, and denying any part of you will only lead to pain and misery.

Take it from someone who was too ashamed/scared to to talk to their spouse about their kinks. Yup! That's me. Rope bunny extraordinaire, scared all of their horrible turn-ons and experimentations would scare away their everything.

It sounds silly, but not sharing who you are with those close to you is lying. Lying leads to more lying, and without truth there can be no trust.

Which leads me back to therapy- for the love of fuck, if you have experienced trauma, or people tell you you're acting differently, or you know something is wrong with the way you feel in certain situations... Don't wait. Find a mental health team that'll heal you. If you can't afford it, there are free options to help, you'll just have to look.

But enough about that- here's the positives! We found some really nice furniture for an absolute steal, so our apartment is looking 300% nicer! It's unbelievably reassuring after a bad day to come back to a home that looks like a responsible middle class adult lives there.

The sex is also 100x better, again! Turns out, that sexual trauma I mentioned? Ya, it was crippling our relationship. We've addressed the things I were avoiding/reacting negatively to and focused on them, and holy crap, I don't know how we've survived the passed 3 years.

Speaking of, we're exploring polyamory. Go ahead, bring on the haters- it's lovely.

And of course, my writing is still going well! I've slowed down on projects, a maximum of one at a time, plus the for-fun stuff. Part of it is to keep me off the computer and phone when the two of us actually have time off together, the other part is to keep less on my mind. Burnout is real!

That being said, I'm always available for comissions. Hit me up!

S'all I have for you, Newgrounds. Until next time!