Day 29 – Dressing for a different direction
When I started the 365 dresses section of the blog it was without too much thought about the content of each post. I knew it would contain a few images of the dress I chose for each day and information about the hows, wheres and when’s it had been acquired; but originally I had no plans to merge various life experiences into each day. When talking with some friends at dinner the other day we got on to the subject of the various posts and the two who have followed mentioned their favorite days had been the one’s not focused on fashion but the more personal. 
To their mind, a blogger who was open about a health condition which many people know little of or who some people are perhaps a little wary of was still a relatively rare thing. Fear not, I have no plans to suddenly make the entire focus of each and every blog a detailed account of my current mental health. There are far better blogs that cover this very well for there to be any need and besides I enjoy tippity tap typing about giants, musicians and technological assault to stop.
What I have considered however is the charity aspect of this feature. Aware of having been a little vague so far on how the dresses will be sold or for whom any money raised will go to I have now decided to give any money raised from the blog to a mental health charity. I am looking into who this will be but will hopefully announce details within the next couple of weeks. In the meantime any suggestions of mental health charities people hold in high regard would be much appreciated. I will start selling the dresses directly through the site and all the money will go directly to the charity or I will start-up an eBay shop from which they will be available to buy.
I have also come to this decision because I really would like this project to last the distance. I for one really enjoy writing every day and I know when I am going through my own bad patches it is really helpful to be able to read other peoples experiences to know you are not the only one going through it or who has been through it. One thing which struck me as I trawled through a number of blogs about bipolar and mental illness was how suddenly a lot of them ended and how infrequent posts were. As much as I at times don’t feel able to write a post especially if I am having a gray day I try to force myself because some people have been kind enough to tell me they read the blog every day and there is a large part of me which doesn’t like letting people down. 
Yesterday on the way out the door to see my best friend on her birthday at her home where we were due to play Monopoly I had a very foolish but a very real raging argument with my parents.
I am so lucky I have been able to return home over the years in times of financial struggle or when I just need a bit of extra support and it pains me to argue because I find it hard to check my temper especially when the subject is of my illness. The giant struggles at times to understand the ins and outs of the condition and to be fair to him I am not far in front of him myself. We all ended up having a silly tiff over my driving and whether I was ready to get back behind the wheel following my rather dramatic VW cartwheels back in December. The whole run in left me so upset more than anything because I felt as though I was behaving like a teenager, all over emotional and misunderstood. The difficulty is however that a lot of the time I do feel it can be near impossible to explain to people how it feels to be stuck in a mood, how awful it is when you can’t just shake something off, when you wake one morning and just don’t feel as though you will ever want to get out of bed again. 
I feel misunderstood because I don’t understand myself and if this blog ever even makes one person feel a bit more normal, or helps a parent, lover or friend understand what someone close to them is going through or just as importantly makes people giggle and gives them a pretty picture to look at then it will be worth doing every day of 2010.
Today’s dress was another eBay buy and this one was 0.99p. It looked amazing on the floor but I am not really overly keen on the shape on me as I think I look a bit boxy and perhaps as a result of the new tablets I have taken a bit too chunky round the waist. As I did not wish to disappoint you too much with the pictures, which were taken by my best friend Katharine after perhaps a little more rose than professional photographs would drink prior to a shoot I decided to upload a special picture taken by myself of one of the most fashion forward four-year olds I know. Ladies and gentlemen please see below for the début of my best friend’s boy, in his own personal creation of pyjymas and post christmas inspired tinsel pashmina. He is a genius.
M L Durham said,
November 14, 2011 at 7:38 pm
If there are far better blogs than yours, I have yet to see them.
lostinnotation said,
November 28, 2011 at 6:47 pm
How nice. How did you come across it?
I’m planning a new project for 2011. If you leave your email or join my Facebook group I’ll give you a heads up but is going to be quite fun and will hopefully work better than the dresses and involve less stress for me at least. Well that’s the idea anyway. 
emeldee said,
November 28, 2011 at 7:05 pm
I have no idea how I came across your blog, just surfing the net, I guess. So much of what I see is not of interest to me. Your blog is.