Cultural Piss and Pleasantries

Hola! 

I am back after a rather harsh pneumonia virus, and NOW I am reminded why I did not enjoy the health care system here in Odda much in the first place. It is actually much worse than I remember!  I mean sure we do not pay the health insurance additional to government taxes but furthermore, the care for patients is definitely not a priority. The budget is first priority next to earning money on sick people. At least in my hometown the health care is being cut back and what is left is a slightly but barely functioning surgery. The hospital is about to loose their E.R surgery and honestly after loosing the delivery room a few years back it comes as no surprise that our lives do not matter much to the government. Now consider that our city is one of the most growing tourist attractions because of Trolltunga. We have a lot of industry and it is far to the next hospital that has an E.R! Only last year we had over 80.000 tourists visiting us in summer and this year the prognosis is around 100.000 if not more. These are often people with no climbing experience nor great fitness! No E.R.??!  Shocking ....just utterly shocking!

It has been a long time since I have met with a doctor when real sick and actually felt like they did want to help me out. I understand they are under a lot of pressures and maybe that is the problem. I feel bad for the very people that should be there as a support system and help for when I am sick. They actually get paid for me telling them to check my vitals and blood when my temperature is around 40+ Celsius ! Again, baffles me...

So life in Odda is to no surprise getting on my nerves even-though I am mostly happy and content. I have a lot of great people around me. However, I keep wondering when I will loose them, and by no means do I want to seem negative here. Still the facts remain that I have lost a lot friends and loved ones the past years. It seems to be a consequence of the course of time. I keep getting pulled back to moments when I was this happy with the people around me just to be reminded that I lost them soon after. 

It is strange to have so many memories flowing through my mind like a river and feeling like I have lived several fragmented lives in my past. Knowing I have lived lives beyond these borders that few people around me seem to understand just to land back in my hometown and starting the cycle over again. It is like some kind of entrapment of sorts. Maybe it does not make fully sense, because is hard to explain but to make it short it feels like I am old... I am old and it is like I died several times. I am constantly reminded of moments and memories both good and bad ones and I sometimes do feel regret in that I cannot go back in time to fix things.

I, now more than ever feel impatient with cultural piss linked to narrow-mindedness and mean people. What is pleasant with in this tornado of memories and feelings linked to that you ask? Or rather, what makes me happy and content these days here and now?

Well a sense of calm that comes when you enter a low-paste life. People around me are finally not in a hurry, I do not feel guilty when I sit down and relax and I am not considered lazy. This time I am the one in a hurry and I am the impatient newcomer that likes to get things done swiftly. I have been lucky to meet someone who is showing me everyday I am worthy of being loved and that feels like everything I ever missed even if it is also a bit scary as well.

No I am not lost, just very aware of the bridges I have crossed and the repetitive course life has. I feel blessed to have had such an eventful life and even more happy knowing it will probably be eventful until the actual end of it. I know I am prone to meet interesting personalities and jump into new adventures in a flash. On the inside it feels like someone has lit fireworks and I am on the road I was meant to be on all along. My prints in the soil are lit up by the spontaneous colours of the fireworks in the sky.

Still not even close to perfect and fully aware of the piss and pleasantries surrounding me at all times ;) Have a nice day sweethearts! 

xx Viking

How I sort out trauma

Hola,

So as many of you may know I did not always enjoy my childhood. Sure there were good moments and journeys that were made. But in many ways I was not allowed to feel like a child and I was in some ways more expected to act like an adult from a  really young age. Now, maybe I was also in part a very independent personality from the getgo but I would like to emphasise I was a child and I did need to feel like one just like everyone else. There are many grown ups like me out there that were robbed of their childhood due to different sorts of trauma or neglect. I remember that as I moved away from my hometown the first time struggling with the memories and anxiety from trauma. I had NO self-esteem yet tried to fake that I did. After all I was an adult and expected to have my shit together.

The fear you do feel when pushed to the edge of what is bearable is beyond my words. But I can tell you that day inn and day out felt like I was being chased, criticised and that if I lost my way I would end up back in hell. Little did I know that these emotional states would come back to haunt me every-time I would fail at something or have a setback. I wished so hard for a pill or a magic button to appear that would wipe my memories clean or re-set my feelings to neutral. It was that bad that my life did feel like torture as a teenager. I turned my frustration inwards and needless to say I suffered a lot because of that. Now, there are many people that go through this and all I can share are some of my stories and how I got through some of my tough times on this blog.

So one of the things that helped me use my feelings constructively was a therapist. A good one and to focus at one thing at the time. To exhaust my excess energy that often comes with restlessness and frustration.

Every-time I was chased by nightmares and poor self-esteem I would work out more intensively and it removed stress in the most liberating way. There is almost no use for people to join me when I do sports because I am so intensely working on what is within that I zone out and run until I almost collapse. I focus and I calm down thereafter but for me this works. To regulate this immediate fix has been an issue previously because with my very independent and high achieving personality it can become an addiction or a way of self-medicating. I think I have come to the point when I know what works and what does not work for me. But it does not hurt to be careful even so. 

The traumas I experienced growing up will always be with me in a way. But I found that when I accepted what they made me or who they made me into and how I ended up dealing with situations and people they made some sense. Nightmares are way less and I work through frustrations in a healthy way mostly these days.

Bullet points for people who struggle with similar things that I did.

- speak to a professional and get emotional tools from them

- move your body, get out the negative energy

- meet people and learn from those who inspire you

- shut out people who give you negative shit, it is hard but worth it and it is perfectly OK!

These days I am doing ok though I like anyone have my D-days. When they pop by these days must be a reminder of how far I have come the last 10 years. Only I know what I have really had to go through and only I have the ability to fight my own issues. That is why I choose who I share certain things with, with the most care. I would advice anyone who go through similar things to do the same.

Xo Viking

Snow and Old Photos

Hi there,

The winter and spring are having a fight about who shall be present this march in Odda. Time passed by faster then I could ever imagine. The air feels fresh and I enjoy the little things as best I can whilst still longing for the city of Stavanger and travelling. I have had to look inwards for many months and really stand in a lot of my own mess yet still deal with those of others. I pushed away the things and people who were hurting me, I had to because in the end it was hard to survive the winter with that on my shoulders. Yet I also tried to repair certain sides of myself and relationships as well as my health. Mostly I think I am doing and have been doing ok in this, but as you all probably noticed I did not feel like sharing much of it.

A lot is changing for me now, things have happened that I did not foresee at all and though they were mostly good things it has taken me a lot dives inside my own head and heart to deal with them. For a long time now I have felt like I do not deserve love, because emotionally I am a mess of course and my life is far from what anyone would like to lead. I also lost the ability to fall in love I think...or at least I thought. Though my trust issues persist I am starting to grant myself some love allowance. Yeah, let us call it that! :) The fear of jinxing something good is keeping me from saying more about the whole ordeal, but I am happy and working on myself. 

Not too long ago someone claimed I share too many of my feelings online. She was probably right, but then again most people do these days so I do not consider myself special in this and for the people who do not like what I write, simply STOP reading my blog. I would never force anyone to read what I write, nor would I wish them to. Certainly, I can question myself and what I am writing sometimes. Yet I am a writer and it is in my blood to do so and to share is just a by-product of this blog. I would never want to hurt someone else with my writings nor make someone else feel less than what they are. I just want to write and by that work through my thoughts and maybe share with people who find help in my scribbles or go through similar emotional states. This blog is also about travelling and different cultural impressions that left their footprints on my soul.

Since my last post in summer a whole lot has happened. I went to the Netherlands a few times, I moved my stuff to Norway and I travelled to Bergen, Haugesund, Florø and Stavanger a fair amount. Stavanger reminds me of Haarlem and I know people there so that is why I go there as often as I can and then Haugesund houses some of my friends which I tend to miss rather lots. So yes I have managed to travel and get away from Odda now and then. Though I feel rather ok living here , I do get restless and things are not always easy so I do try to find a job in Rogaland and to move to a city ASAP. 

I am hopeful that after summer or autumn I will have found something in the city and can update my blog more often with news and emotional ups and downs ;)

My cat is loving Norway by the way, she might be Dutch and all but her own space suits her just fine and the birds that come close to the window tempt my little puma to make leaps I did not realise she had in her. In May I need to get her vaccinated again, it will be bloody expensive but gotta be done for us to be able to travel. Right now the little gremlin is sleeping at the foot of my bed. 

Today I went to see my dad and grandparents. We found granddad´s old photos and would you look at that there were photos of me in all shapes and and sizes! We laughed a lot and it was really nice to sit and joke around about these things. I have not been an easy child, I know that but they were there for me anyway.  In the good spirit of taking photographs I took one of the snow that settled outside on the second official spring day of the year hahaahah.

                                                                                     Odda in the Snow 2.3.2017

                                        One of the photos my granddad took of me as a child by the lake at the Seljestad Cottage. #90s

xo
The Viking