u/SeveralExcuses

I am half Black and half Mexican. My Mexican family on my grandfather’s side has roots in Southern California since the 1920s. On my grandmother’s side, she came to the US in the mid 50s. It’s sad but though my mother grew up in a very Mexican household and speaks Spanish she very much assimilated into American culture in her adult life. I do not speak Spanish despite her being bilingual and I have realized this isn’t uncommon for chicanos. The assimilation being pushed my grandparents from my grandparents’ generation for the hope of a better life also isn’t uncommon. That being said I was raised primarily by my mother and my grandparents, around Mexican culture through them, so I definitely feel a connection. I feel anger towards my mom having assimilated almost fully and raising me without much regard for her roots outside of the proximity I spent with my grandparents (who are deceased now). But growing up in Southern California, I interacted with many who are Chicano and I would like to engage and learn from this culture further. It’s difficult because Chicano culture is largely intertwined with California and I am now on the east coast but I want to engage in the ways I can. For the record, I am also embracing my Black side as well and have worked through my dual identity but due to my upbringing primarily being around my Mom and maternal grandparents I feel a more intimate connection to that side of my heritage.

Here is what I like:
Philosykos EDP - when I smelled this it felt cold, it felt like walking into the produce section of a grocery store, a green banana. I loved it.
Tom Ford Vanilla sex - I would never wear this but this smelled so much like sensual body fluids that I loved smelling it.
Tom Ford Bitter Peach - green, photorealistic peach it felt so edible and slightly spiced
Victor and Rolfe Bon Bon Cola - this smelled so much much cola that my mouth started watering. It was a hot day when I smelled it and it is by far the most crisp, refreshing cola scent I’ve smelled
Mugler Angel - I love the top note combo of a piney patchouli mixed with a delicious edible melon and the fact that it evolves into a chocolatey patchouli. This fragrance takes on so many different forms in its evolution and depending on when and where I’ve wearing it. It evolves, it’s interesting.

I’ve realized recently through therapy that I’m very lonely and always have been and I deeply desire to connect with others. That being said, have you ever had a work environment where everyone is friends with everyone, they all hang out outside of work, but you’re the only one part of the out group? They don’t appear to dislike you but have no interest in engaging with you at work or outside of work? It hurts. How do you cope with being in a workplace like this? I just wish I could be included.

I have a friend who used to get back to my messages. Not immediately but she would at least respond. We’ve been friends for about a year and a half now and she was the first one to reach out to me because she wanted to get me a present. I hung out with her by herself like once outside of work by ourselves a few months back. Since then I went over to her house once and hung out with her, her finance, and other friends. I didn’t really vibe with the other friends so I was really quiet. I’ve messaged her a couple times recently and she just never responds anymore. She seemed liked she genuinely liked me at one point but has lost interest in being my friend now. I don’t know what to do, if I should confront her or just let it slide. I’m also friends with her fiancé (we were friends for a couple years before my friend and I became friends) who will actually get back to my messages so I find this weird. I would feel weird asking her fiancé if she’s doing okay because that seems like it would highlight my concern over her not getting back to my messages which if she has stopped liking me would just make everything more awkward. I have autism and I’m trying to learn how to respond to gray areas in relationships and addressing conflict better.

Whats wrong with me? I think I just feel very overwhelmed for various reasons such as the vibes not matching, not having much to say, having to mask. This has happened to me ever since I was a kid.

I’m chasing simple pleasures over long term investment in anything, that’s not making me happy. But sometimes I find a simple pleasure that makes me feel like I’m alive but it burns out quickly. Then I chase it again. Long term investment in anything is fulfilling but so hard. The crash from simple pleasures makes life feel meaningless and makes me wonder what I’m doing any of this for. I’m lonely and I want a partner but I honestly think that’s only to just bring a spark into my life, that doesn’t stop me from day dreaming about having a partner constantly. I am looking for pleasures now in romantic media where I can escape into another world and watch two people actually live life and fall in love. I neglect my actual life in the process of this escapism. I am working towards long term goals but the lack of immediate pleasure I’m getting in this process still pushes me towards escapism. I can’t stop life from feeling meaningless at times. I don’t want to seek out religion because I’ve never been a religious person and it generally doesn’t appeal to me.

The level of intimacy and sexual chemistry between Haesoo and Taeha is one of the reasons I keep reading. Lol

Does it have any of the Angel DNA in it?

He’s racist towards one of my races but claims he isn’t because he has me as a step daughter. I can’t afford to move out now but I’m working towards this and I want to go no contact after I do. However, he’s the only reason my family has been financially stable and he claims me 100% as his daughter, which leaves me angry and conflicted, because I’m tokenized. I’ve had many friends tell me I don’t owe him anything and I feel like going no contact is the right decision for me but I can’t help my feel underlying guilt behind this and am overall lack of gratitude if I do go through with this. This has fucked with my mental health for years now, my thoughts are always going in a spiral with this. You guys are the only ones who will understand this.

SpongeBob in season 1 felt more like an actual person rather than a caricature of a person to me. He didn’t suddenly lose these characteristics in seasons 2,3, and 4. But something about him felt the most human in season 1. He seemed less like a character that’s mentally and emotionally stunted in elementary school and more like someone who had some degree of emotional maturity who was just very naive and optimistic.

I feel kind of pathetic but he’s become the object of my fantasies since I began reading this manhwa a few months back.

I try to distract myself from it but when I get time to myself the anger I hold deep down rises to the surface. I want to leave but I can’t. I wish I had left years ago but I didn’t even have the option.

It’s so good in a show that isn’t normally musical.

It’s a weight I feel. It feels like if we don’t advocate for ourselves nobody else will but we can also only do so much. I’m proud of what our community has done beforehand for me to even be able to get the solid education I had and the ability to move up but it’s not equality across the country and even across neighborhoods. This has only become more apparent as I’ve moved from the West Coast to the Deep South, gotten older, and traveled more. It feels like the only way to cope is to only focus on moving forward yourself but that level of individualism feels wrong at times because if everyone felt that way then I wouldn’t have had the privileges I have today. It hurts seeing people lacking the ability and resources to move forward then having people with no empathy or understanding of other’s situations laugh at them and look at them with pitiful disgust and a superiority complex. It hurts having that be how our community is viewed as a whole globally.

I loved Henry Rose Windows Down for so long then recently when I wear it, it turns savory to my nose. This happens about 30 minutes in and it doesn’t matter if I wear it in my skin or clothing. It gets this smell like smells like a combo of vinegar and soup, it’s not objectively bad but I don’t want to smell like this. This tends to happen whenever I wear a perfume with prominent citrus notes, it happened with Montblanc signature. I really like citrus but it tends to turn savory and almost vinegar like to my nose after awhile. I never know when it’s going to happen either. I got off hormonal birth control in the last year and I think that may have contributed. I loved both Montblanc signature and Henry Rose Windows Down when I was on the pill. Off the pill, I can only smell them in small doses before the citrus notes just turn weird.

I can’t explain why. I’m not sad because I feel I’ll be alone forever. I’m mourning the obvious signs that were there before the relationship that I chose to ignore and go against my better judgement. I’m mourning the person I was before the relationship who felt okay with the prospect of not being in a relationship. It’s not the lack of a relationship or the loneliness or even being single that hurts. It’s the way everything ended, it’s talking through things together and them reassuring you only to have them rip the rug out from under you. It’s the mind game that’s traumatizing and still hurts. I don’t want to hear that I’ll find someone better, it’s the mind game that hurt and that’s traumatic.