Category: Personal

Read about my battles with Pre-Menstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD), my mental health, surviving both childhood sexual abuse and a 12 year relationship plagued with emotional abuse, as well personal projects / challenges, and anything vaguely Jem-related.

Deja vu part two

In my previous post, in which I announced the separation from my husband and likely impending doom of trying to buy him out of the mortgage, I joked that I might have to do Project £20k again. I probably shouldn’t have tempted fate, because as it turns out that this is the number that Gaz […]

Deja vu, here we go again, etc

Long term readers (are there any other type now? pretty sure I don’t get any new ones these days 😂) may recall that in 2014 after splitting from my ex – the children’s father – I launched “project £20k” to raise funds to buy my ex out of our joint mortgage. Well, as it turns […]

Aeroplanes, autism, and Fern Brady

It’s 14:17 GMT. I’m sat in the front row of an aeroplane, once again en route to Athens in business class. Albeit a cheeky last minute upgrade bid this time rather than a full priced ticket. I’m traveling alone, off to support my partner as he runs his first marathon in the Greek capital. He […]

A dirty secret

About this time last year I blogged about the chaos that was life at the time (nothing has changed, for the record) and one of the things I mentioned in passing was that I had nearly broke my marriage after fundamentally changing the very foundations of our commitment For the astute amongst you, you may […]

Keeping it in the family

My brother should have been 42 today, and I’m finding his birthday and the upcoming anniversary of his death to be particularly hard this year. Since my autism diagnosis, and the advice to seek an ADHD assessment, I’ve been somewhat obsessively looking at family on both sides to see where “it” came from. I have […]

An Imposter and the Mountains

I’m currently sat in business class on a flight heading to Athens where I’ll be attending WordCamp Europe in a couple of days. We’re directly above the Swiss Alps and while I eat my complimentary breakfast and sip my fancy coffee I’m struck by the raw beauty of the landscape below; seemingly perfect undisturbed snow […]

Because I’m only getting older

Long term readers might recall that in the years before my 30th birthday, I set myself a list of “30 things to do before I’m thirty“; challenges and personal milestones I wanted to hit before I reached 30 years old. Within months of turning 30, I started writing a similar set of goals and monster […]

A change is as good as a rest

I have successfully rendered myself a liar this week. After calling myself “basically unemployable” back in 2018, I started a new part-time position with Source Design this week. Super stressed Jem who couldn’t possibly contemplate a 9-5 way back in 2018 is now super chilled out handling a senior dev position for one firm, managing […]

Back on the Sobriety Train

One of my fitness goals for 2023 basically entails me getting my shit together and nailing a consistent gym routine, and as such I’ve given up alcohol for the year (again). My journey to (and from) sobriety is a funny one, with a balance more or less found over the last couple of years, but […]

Is this adulthood?

I realised today that it’s been nearly a year since my last blog post of note. Teenage Jem would be ashamed, adult Jem is wondering how the fuck a year passed in the blink of an eye. Get up, walk the dog, breakfast, school run, work work work, school run, cook, clean, walk the dog, […]