I can never live with my partner

 I haven’t stopped crying since Tuesday evening. I can never live with my partner. The one thing that I wanted more than anything. It hurts so much. He is buying his own home miles away. I don’t want a long distance relationship. Six miles is a long distance relationship to me. Living in separate homes two miles away is a long distance relationship. Now we can never have day trips or go on holiday or get married. We can’t cuddle. Everything hurts so much. I’ve always been told, “No one’s ever gonna want to live with you.” I honestly believed that this relationship was different. That I could actually have what I have always wanted, to live together with my partner. If I knew this was going to be long distance when we met, I never would have tried. I hate my life so much. Everything, for my entire life, is always what the other person wants and what is best for them. You have to watch the TV programme your brother wants. You have to play the game your cousin wants. You have to do the presentation idea your friend wants. I am sick of it. Why isn’t it ever, let’s find out what Josette wants. Right now, I don’t want anyone! I do a whole lot better on my own. No family. No friends. No partner. Just me.

I want to write, but I don't know what to write

I finally have a moment, where I feel I have time to myself, time to actually do something, but my brain cannot do anything. I had an overwhelming moment, earlier today, and now my brain is going to struggle until I go back to sleep. To cut a long story short, I began noticing that my medication for my B12 deficiency wasn’t working. I spent the first few weeks of the year so drained and with such a heavy head that I was worried that I might end up permanently bed bound. I changed the medication and my head has been feeling a thousand times better. I had no idea that I had been dealing with such intense brain fog for, probably, my entire life. I have never experienced my head feeling so clear and free. However, it has come with its negative parts. I think the intense, heavy brain fog was partially protecting my autism from getting so overwhelmed with things, because now sounds are a lot worse than they used to be. A lot worse. And just for clarification, sound is the sense that I struggle with the most. I always have, ever since I was little. When sounds are too loud, I get routed to the spot, unable to move, or open my eyes. The residual sound and effect is very intense and leaves me shaken up for a long time. As someone who is the production coordinator for the UK’s biggest siren factory, I have been having to wear noise can celling headphones just to get through the day. Noise cancelling headphones do not do an awful lot, but they help me from being completely rooted to the spot and almost unable to move.
          Part of me wants to work on one of my many stories, but I know that if I try to, it won’t be as good as it should be.
          Another reason why I have been struggling so much this year, is that work has become so incredibly toxic. It is as though everyone decided, over the nine day Christmas break, that they were going to become selfish, spiteful, gossiping toads. I think I have figured out that people who like to watch soaps, like drama. The people whose lives are perfect, need drama, to make their lives entertaining. So, rather than cause drama in their perfect life, they cause drama in the workplace. I really, really, really cannot tolerate it. So many colleagues (despite there only being 28 people, including me) have really wore out my patience. Someone who I trusted so much, they were my emotional support person, has completely stabbed me in the back, and is trying to get me sacked. He cannot admit that he has ever made a mistake and done something wrong, so instead he has filed a complaint against me and wants the company to chose between us both. He knows that I financially struggle to make ends meet. He is close to being a millionaire. He used to be the vacuum guy, Mr Dyson’s, right hand man. He owns three homes in the UK and one in Australia. Oh and he drives a Range Rover. He doesn’t need the job. He can retire in Australia any time he wants to. But for some reason, I am his next target. I was supposed to discover my fate yesterday, but my useless excuse of a manager didn’t discuss anything with the production director until six minutes before I finished work. I wish he had spoken to the sale director, because one, he likes me more than the production director does (as the production director is just as two faced), and two, my step-nan worked for the sales director’s dad, so we kind of have a trusted bond. The sales director knows that I would never sabotage the company. He, also, wouldn’t get rid of me because of some stupid petty squabble on the manufacturing shopfloor. The sales director invited me to a ball. The production director didn’t invite me.
          To add to all of that stress, my partner has decided that he wants to purchase a property almost fifteen miles away. He cannot drive. I cannot drive. I know why he wants to buy his own property and why he wants to live in the specific area. I fully understand and support him. But it doesn’t make it hurt any less. Yes, he says that he will still want to see me and nothing will change, but he is thinking with his heart, not his head. Of course it will change. Right now, we see each other two to three times a week. If either of us are having a bad day, I can just go and see him. He only lives 2.5 miles away. I am struggling, with it being dark, so we don’t get to see each other, in the weekday evenings, for as long as we both would like, but we still get to see each other. Then he stays over at mine on most weekends. My home already feels empty without him here this weekend – he is at a gig with his dad today. He just doesn’t seem to see that things will be very different once he moves away. It is going to be so much harder once he moves away. Usually, the closer couples get, the closer they live together, not the other way around. There will be no seeing each other after a long, hard day. There will be no coffee shop meet ups. There won’t even be him staying over at mine almost every weekend. We will be going from seeing each other two to three times a week, to once every four to six weeks. He keeps saying that nothing will change, because he loves me so much and he will miss me, but that is him thinking with his heart. We won’t physically be able to see each other and spend the time together, like we do now. When close relationships essentially become long distance (whether there really is distance or not) you have to think with your head. I don’t want a long distance relationship. That’s the whole point of telling Bumble what distance to look for a match. Robert lived 33 miles away, and he drove, and that was still hard. I know this isn’t as far away, but when neither of you drive, it might as well be. I will have to walk three miles to the train station, get a twenty minute train, then walk a further one to three miles, depending on the location of the house that he purchases. And for someone who really struggles with public transport and had a horrifying incident one morning on the way to work that mentally scarred me to the point that a colleague now has to drive me to work, I am going to struggle. It is going to be hard for me. I am not going to be able to be the same person that he is used to being around on the weekends, when I see him. I am going to be more like the person that he sees after work, who is stressed and emotionally drained, who struggles to place an order at the café that we go to all the time. I don’t like that version of me and I don’t want that me to be the only me that I can be around the person who makes me feel so calm and happy. I don’t need him to cope. I do need a clear and safe connection to cope. That isn’t being needy or clingy or codependent, that is just the basic human needs for a relationship to work, especially when one has sensory autism.
          I have been working hard to try to help myself. I have recently reached out to several old managers, so I now have my backup career options. My partner did explain to me that you always have to have a backup job at the ready, even when you are successful in your job. He is incredible and I really admire him, and am proud of him. I wish that I could be more like him. But, yes, I have found three managers, who I have previously worked with, on LinkedIn and I have reconnected with them, just in case. If worst comes to worst, my mum can get me 20 hours, where she works, but that won’t be enough to pay my mortgage, council tax and bills. I do hope that I can remain in a proper job, and not have to go back to a retail job. There is something very demeaning about not having a proper job.
          Okay, I have had a bit of a break, watched a few videos, spoke to my mum for almost an hour and now it is bedtime. At least I am being good and sticking to my bedtime. With any luck, I can get between nine and ten hours sleep again tonight, so that my heavy fuzzy head will recover. I guess at least, if my partner isn’t staying over tonight, I can have the duvet (he is a duvet stealer) and he won’t wake me up snoring. It does mean that I don’t get cuddles every time he rolls over in his sleep though, or if I am having a bad dream, he won’t hold me until I calm down. Goodnight blog. Hopefully I will be able to finish tidying tomorrow, do some more beginners yoga, cook lots of meals for the week and maybe have a bath. That sounds nice.

- Josie -

A Little Life Rant

 Why is there one rule for Josette, but another rule for everyone else? Not just in relationships, but basic life. Why am I not allowed to have that job without a degree in it, but someone else can, with less experience that me who also doesn’t have a degree in that field? Why is everyone else allowed to live wit their partner, but it’s wrong for me to?

          My whole world came crashing down in one simple, positive phone call. Thinking positively doesn’t work. I have been thinking positively and living in my little positive bubble that everything was working out really well and that everything was going to be okay, but now that my little safety, positive thinking bubble has been popped, I really don’t feel able to cope with the reality of the situation. If I wasn’t thinking positively, and I was planning for this, it wouldn’t hurt so much, nor would the transition feel quite so impossible. I know it still won’t work out. I know my limits and I know that I can’t do it, but I’m not being believed. So, rather than say goodbye now, and it be incredibly hard and hurt, but he will recover from it eventually and be able to be happy, we have to wait for ten months, for me to prove that it won’t work, and then it will end very badly an =d with hurtful, negative feelings towards each other, rather than ending things now, without the resentment. I feel guilty and selfish in continuing, because he deserves to find someone who will make him happy, someone who doesn’t own their own home, so that they can up their life and move thirteen miles away, or maybe they already live there. I can’t be in a relationship with one person because I don’t own my own place, now I can’t be in a relationship with another because I do own my own place. The person who I couldn’t be with because I didn’t own my own place married someone else who didn’t own their own place. Owning my own place has mean that I could see and spend time with my current partner, but now it is also part of the reason why I can’t be with them anymore.
          Why is everyone else allowed to live with their partner, but I’m not? Why is everyone else allowed to see their partner every day, but I’m not? Why is everyone else allowed to have their own happily ever after, but I’m not. Why is there one rule for Josette, and one rule for everyone else?

Jas Hook – Prologue

(Josie Sayz: I feel really excited about this piece. I do miss having someone to bounce creative ideas off. I really am not too sure where this piece is going yet, aside from the vague end goal. This piece came to me, during my walk to work, at 5:45am.)

 

Illuminated from the glow of the gentle amber radiance of the streetlamps, a silhouette of a hook swung from her right arm. The aglets of her charcoal leather boots clattered in rhythm with her swift steps. Stopping beneath the glow of a streetlight, she hooked the handle of her umbrella over her right wrist, as she slipped her hand inside her double-breasted swing coat. A glimmer of gold twinkled against the soft glow lighting, as she pressed the crown of her pocket watch, stealing a glance at the time. Returning her watch to an inner pocket, she arched her neck around, scanning the streets surrounding her. The curls of her long copper locks brushed over her shoulders, cascading down her coat’s raven-coloured felted wool. With a twitch, she adjusted her petite tan satchel and returned her umbrella to her right hand, as she strode on.

 

- Josie -

End of 2025

I have been loving having ai edited mine and my partner’s photos into a Disney-esque image. I think I want to end 2025 with our first photo and the most recent photo of us together, edited in the Disney style.

 These pictures make me so happy.

 Never mind, I can’t help it. I want to add all of them!

 

- Josie -

Eggshells

(Josie Sayz: There is a difference between connection, consistency, and emotional presence, not constant attention. I’m not after attention. Sometimes I don't understand why people are in relationships, because they make you feel more lonely than being alone. Is there such thing as a relationship where one doesn’t feel more lonely than being alone?) 

You ask how my day went,
I’ll reply straight away,
But I know you won’t read it,
Until the end of the day.
You won’t reply
To anything I say.
You’ll just say, “Goodnight,”
Won’t even meet me halfway.

When I respond to your question,
I’ve learnt not to expect a reply,
Or for you to read my response.
I have no idea why
You message at all.
If to hear from me is a chore.
To be ghosted or left on read
I don’t know which one hurts more?

The double standards you write,
Causes me so much pain.
You expect a response in three minutes,
That you won’t read for hours; that’s okay.
You were warm and inviting.
Six months have flown by.
How long can I hurt for,
Bottle it up and then lie?

I’m not being controlling,
Asking for a, “Good morning,” text.
When you can’t manage that,
It makes me miss my ex.
I just need routine,
And a connection that’s stable.
I’m not dictating your life,
Nor without you am I unable.

I hate feeling punished,
If I’m a few minutes too late.
You withdraw your affection
And leave me in wait.
It's like a test,
And if I am good.
You’ll say, “I love you.”
Although you already should.

It's gaslighting by omission,
To put me in my place.
It makes me feel anxious,
And a complete disgrace.
Though I’ll never confess,
I’ll hide it inside.
You won’t see that you hurt me,
Or the times that I cried.

It's not just by text,
Or our phone calls too,
It hurts when I’m midsentence,
You blurt out, “I love you.”
Maybe you’re done listening,
Our you just zoned out.
It's little things, like this,
That leave me with doubts.

I love you so much.
I wish we could be together forever,
But can I withhold my feelings,
On our lifelong endeavour?
I’m not being controlling or I needy,
I wish you could see.
I’ve adjusted so much for you.
Could you try for me?

- Josie -

Discovering A Secret

(Josie Sayz: I didn’t want my 300^th post to be of raw pain and heartache. I wanted to celebrate and it be something happy, but I discovered a secret that I was never supposed to know, and now I can’t unsee it.)

Discovering a secret
You know you oughtn’t know,
Is filling up my heart, with such sorrow.
What began as something innocent,
A curiosity.
It has now, possibly, become the death of me.

Who’s that girl? What’s that scene?
Is feels like something from a movie screen.
Cocktails, jazz and dancing,
With her is so risqué.
How could I be so stupid?
You never look at me that way.

I have replayed the scene
In my head a million times.
Makes me feel like these past six months have been nothing but lies.
I don’t know the truth,
I did not have a clue.
The partying, nightclubs and dancing, they don’t feel like you.

Who’s that girl? What’s that scene?
Is feels like something from a movie screen.
Cocktails, jazz and dancing,
With her is so risqué.
How could I be so stupid?
I know I’ve overdue my stay.

I care about you so much,
This message comes from the heart.
This isn’t jealousy,
Or a cry of insecurity.
I do not want to be an obstacle
For who you truly want to be.

Who’s that girl? What’s that scene?
Is feels like something from a movie screen.
Cocktails, jazz and dancing,
With her is so risqué.
How could I be so stupid?
I think it’s time I go away.

- Josie -