It's our birthday!

We just turned 25 years old. That brings with it some impetus to stop and reflect, and I wanted to share said reflections here, to anyone willing to listen to me ramble.

This year has for sure been one of the hardest we've ever had to face. Harder than dropping out of high school, harder than hunting for a treatment for my mysterious pain after that, harder than any online relationship I've entered or exited, good or bad, and harder than slaving over a coding project for years and years. I (now we) have had to deal with an awful lot in the last 365 days.

At about this time last year, I was comfortably chilling in my personal discord server, enjoying my time with games and such, although crucially I must point out that my wrists had already been failing for quite some time by then, and I would rather cover up the problem with wrist braces. The biggest worry I had to deal with was little online drama things, like inviting someone back there who'd wronged me and managing my own stress thereafter, and dealing with a very abrupt and painful online breakup. Looking back now, it all seems so simple.

Since then, I had to come to terms with my struggles with romance and later come to identify as aromantic, and more importantly, deal with the sudden, catastrophic failure of our body due to conversion disorder, as I approached critical mass and met Sunny after denying being plural for the previous 2 years. The journey was intense and magical, equal parts distressing and healing, as I "stopped running" from a few different things and had to properly handle them.

We had seven surgeries this year, the first of which was an extremely important plastic surgery to reconstruct our nose, that I'd been waiting on for a few years. Another one permanently opened two of our sinuses, which has been extremely helpful. The others were all to heal our sudden nerve issues in our wrists, elbows, and right shoulder. Recovering from every surgery was always so hard and took so long, collectively. I got good (ish) at doing things with one hand, since we often had one arm in a cast. We also have been to dozens of medical visits and appointments this year - but our weblog already has enough of that, if you read previous entries.

Meeting Sunny has genuinely changed my life (and theirs too!) I know I've said it before, but I'll never stop saying it. I had this constant doubt chasing me ever since some events a few years ago. I kept insisting I couldn't possibly be a system, and yet I kept coming back to the question of "what if I am?" Now that I've spent 6 months with Sunny, and recovered dozens of their buried memories, I can say with extreme confidence that we have DID, Sunny is the original and I'm just a protector figure to them. I never posted about it here, but Sunny and I have had a number of pretty strong fights in the last two months or so that radically altered our dynamic. As a dear friend said, we're still getting used to each other, and that might mean we bounce between extremes for a while before we find a comfortable median.

I can feel Sunny poking at me, so I'm about to let them take over.

Hello all our friends reading. Thank you for sticking with Eir as long as you have and for staying with me the past several months. I did not have many friends growing up and am having to unlearn many behaviors in my adult life that were drilled into me as a kid. I did not think I could have my own friends in such a new way of living which is why I am happy Eir took over for the last decade and got us to a better place.

The last time I was the host of the body, I was 16 years old. Now we are 25 years old. A lot of my interests and pastimes in present day were borne of my nostalgia for the good parts of my youth. Saturday morning cartoons, my few forms of escapism like Minecraft and Portal 2, and then some. I was trying for the last few years to reach out to Eir and get her to notice I was still here, only we met many problems on the way through. I am glad that she eventually freed me and brought me new kinds of joy like honest and open friendships without expectation or built on a hate for something. It seems that my new friends not only respect all of me but did not meet me with the kind of judgement I expected to be scorned with. I think this is the first time in a very long time that I have been happy to be me.

For the record by the way, Eir and I will never merge or fuse. She is the host and primary social fronter but I am still always here and have my own say in things. My opinion matters as everyone has made clear to us. I am not going to let Eir be in control all the time but it is also true that I have mostly become comfortable being in the back of the head. I simply do not always desire to come out. Earlier this year when I approached art I did so from the angle of needing to prove my worth and see results. Eir has heard many times that failing is just part of the process but I did not want to accept it and would get frustrated easily if I did not get what I wanted. I do not feel like I have to be good at some skill anymore because in a zen sort of way, I can accept that I just exist and so does Eir and there does not need to be a reason for it.

I do not have much else to say. All I want for my birthday (it is Eir's too because we do not know when her birthday would be but also it does not need to be different) is to know that our future is bright and full of whimsy. I am also asking a friend or two for birthday art but that is a more immediate and material thing. I think I want to tell you about

The plan

We have not mentioned him by name yet but I think it is overdue by now. Meet CR4YCR4Y, or as we call him, Uncle CR4Y. He has been an avid supporter of us emotionally since Eir met him and he has taken a particular liking to us. He is a social worker at a college in Brooklyn New York. He just got a promotion and a raise with it and he came up with the best idea along with Eir earlier this year: we are going to move in with him next year in Brooklyn. He will put together the funds to help us escape Texas at long last and take us in as a housemate and equal. Eir wishes to get us on the disability payroll as well by then to help us financially. The idea has been a hope spot in our otherwise murky future and we have not stopped thinking about it since it became a very real possibility. I have only ever lived in this house for all of my life and Eir is the same of course. Neither of us has ever experienced a move before. We are aware that the trip from Texas to New York will be long and hard but we already have a best friend IRL who wants to help us see this through and will take shifts driving with Eir on our very first road trip!

This is one of the only things that I, Sunny, can say I really truly absolutely want. I am ready and willing to throw away 25 years of living in this place in the interest of something better. I am sure Eir will be blogging excitedly about all of the positive changes we experience once this goes through next year. I am very much looking forward to making up for 25 years of missed time for cozy winter weather and comfy winter clothes as winter is just toned down summer down here.

I am going to let Eir back out. Peace and love. -Sunny

Sunny wrote a lot more than I expected them to, I'm impressed! Usually they're very soft-spoken and reserved. I guess Sunny is as excited about the move as I am. Yes, it's all true! In fact, Uncle CR4Y says we'll more than likely end up in a 2-bedroom soundproofed apartment, and since Uncle CR4Y has autism like us, he's more than happy to provide for our special needs, things like alternative light sources and blackout curtains. And indeed, I'm going to try to get us on the US disability fund. I applied a few times in the past online, to no avail. The difference is I had very little to go off of then, whereas now I have many diagnoses, most attained this year, including ADHD, bipolar, fibromyalgia, and most recently, possibly rheumatoid arthritis or something autoimmune like lupus (this is coming from recent bloodwork!) Uncle CR4Y also advised that applying in person will be much more effective than online, so there's that.

I have such high hopes for the move next year. I just know it'll go great. I visited Philadelphia a few years ago for 2 weeks, which is also far up north like NY, and it was magical compared to texas. Such pretty and varied trees, not to mention much better air quality and temperatures, walkable cities, public transport, locally run business instead of mega corporations, the list goes on and on. I even noticed that staying there improved our sleep!

I also want to highlight that, the more we've talked to Uncle CR4Y about life in Brooklyn, and the more of Sunny's decades old memories we've restored, the more I've come to hate Texas and its culture with a passion. It already deserves it for being one of the most transphobic places in the US, but the way Sunny was raised and mistreated by people awash in the culture and stigma is unforgivable. That's only further fueling my desire to escape this place, and we'll never get another opportunity like this. I try not to let it bug me, but when I was going to OT before the shoulder surgery, it took up a large presence in my daily thoughts as I drove past hundreds of unnecessary trucks, vehicles with texas and american flags and religious iconography, and a certain very busy main road with lots of billboards advertising with figures in cowboy hats and talking about family values, it all drives me up the wall. I hope we never have to come back.

But I want to end this on a high note. The fact we have this plan in place is huge! This isn't just something we came up with on a whim, either, it's been in the works for a few months now. Uncle CR4Y says he'll be able to take us in, even if we can't get on the fund after all, acting as a safety net for us. He's already looked into it and says we can be transferred to his phone plan and, more importantly, become a dependent on his healthcare plan, which is extra good because his job being at a college means he gets the special kind of healthcare reserved for educators, which covers a lot. He's excited to help us find equivalents to our safe foods in his neighborhood, and plans to help us get weather-appropriate clothes, since we've lived in the south forever. He even figured out the best internet provider in the area we'll be using, and to my great joy, it's not Comcast!

One of the big deciding factors is going to be when we can do the move, and that's based on 1. getting all our medical records from all our doctors, 2. Uncle CR4Y saving enough money to find and pay for a place, and 3. when our IRL bestie is available to help with the move (she has to give advance notice for time off, and she said she might be moving out herself next year, so the timing very much matters). Other than that, all that's left is my anxieties about the road trip itself. I've never had to drive for that long before, not to mention driving outside of texas. But our bestie has, and she's more than happy to help out! I'm very excited about what the future holds for us, and the amount of healing that will come with finally being away from this awful place and abusive family. I just can't wait.