Documenting my journey through the mental health system

Finally, it is done. The room is completely revamped. I knocked down the wall that made a sort of “closet” because it was just in the way. Took it out entirely to expand the tiny room. New LVP flooring and redone walls – mud, sanding, etc. – before the paint. Now I’m fighting with my mother to get her shit back in there. The shed is a 3rd detached bedroom of the house, built to house standards. Like a mother-in-law suite, only it’s…my mom. She seems to want to move most stuff out there but I don’t know and not much is moving. My dining room is full and half the living room. I hate a mess.

I got rid of the bed frame, the old box spring. If I get a new bed in there, it will be a bunk bed. I like the idea of expanded guest space. My mother insists the room isn’t possible to sleep in because of the vent – due to my small house and that tiny room, the air pushes through it hard. This is true throughout the house. I think it’s a simple problem with an easy solution – vent covers. They redirect air flow. But she will catastrophize and exaggerate everything. It’s very hard to live with. I know she has a lot of borderline issues like me. I know she feels miserable in my house for some reason. I’ve done a lot to make it nice but she hates it. That final frontier – what I called the Eggbert piss shrine, is finally tackled and done. Eggbert is a cat with a picky disposition. She didn’t scoop the cat boxes each day like he requires while I was away. So he systematically peed all over the room. I knew months ago I’d have to deal with it, yet another expensive restoration from the neglect. Now my house feels restored with that room usable again. It was a fixation for me, driving me crazy, and now I feel relieved.

And Eggbert uses the litterbox just fine because I scoop them properly and every day. There are 7 cats total, 3 litterboxes. It’s not that hard when it’s done every day. And Eggbert will piss on carpet if he doesn’t have a clean one.

I regret leaving her sometimes. I couldn’t take it. I had a severe depressive episode, was in the VA psych ward a couple weeks, and left home the day I got out. I stayed away for a year and a half and didn’t move back till June – there was so much I had to do to the house. And I did it.

So maybe it was necessary. She clearly couldn’t handle it all herself, but by being away, I could completely remodel my room and paint and install new light fixtures and all kinds of things. Replaced furniture, got a couple new pieces, threw out a lot of old. It’s a nice house again.

Home seems to be an important thing for me. I don’t like living with my mother, but I can at least make my home as comfortable for me as possible. I need a lot of solitude, so completely revamping my room was the first thing I did. That spread to the living room and dining room and bathroom – I even had my bathroom floor’s grout redone and sealed. It looks SO good. I bought a new stove and dishwasher last year. I got my tankless water heater flushed and cleaned out. I’ve done so much and I’m not done, I have other plans when it’s not winter.