Ok, so here it goes… I have done some thinking today, been at some difficult places today honestly, but I think that I am feeling better now and definitely stronger.

I have been on LiveJournal for four years now, a little more than actually. I began journaling occasionally, and soon I learned how therapeutic it was/is. I began to journal more and more. In the beginning, I was not very careful about filtering and not making things public so that anyone could read them. Within a short period of time though, I became a little more wary of who might be watching and reading. After Joel and I stopped talking, I chose to post some things public, but many things I kept friends-only. I got burned by a nasty comment that someone made and I stuck to friends-only for a long time. Once I began dating Jeremy, I was a little more careless because I wanted him to read, but once he got a journal too, I was backing to being on guard. A year later, I got another smack in the face with one of my only public picture posts, me in my wedding gown of all things. Anyway, since then, I have definitely been careful that most posts are friends-only, the ones that have any meaning behind them and I don’t care if they are used against me. Lately especially I have been loose with my entries because I was getting a friend from work to read. Now she has a journal too so it makes it easy for me to make this decision.

I have decided once again to go friends-only, but I am making this decision for everything; general posts, updates, pictures, memes, polls, anything and everything. The people in my life who care about me keep in contact with me in some fashion and if there is anyone else who is reading, then I guess they shouldn’t know what is going on with me.

I am a strong person, with a lot of hopes and goals. I hate that at times my journal has become a weapon to use against me. I don’t want to ever hear someone say “I read this in your journal, so what is the deal?” or hear people complain that I have time to blog but not to speak to them. This is my thoughts, feelings, sweat, blood and tears that are poured into here. This is as this entry, 1,021 entries of mine over the past four years. This is sacred to me and the people here are sacred to me too. So I am just going to take my journal out of the equation. If I am friends-only from here on out, I know that at least this will be safe.

I know the people in my life who love me, who appreciate me, and who think I am a pretty cool person. I know the people in my life who make me feel bad and who make me sad. I am trying to work on those aspects. I am currently working at a job that I am falling in love with more and more, and for the first time I have seen hope in my educational/career future. I got told today by my boss that I am doing a great job. I am looking into a certification program to receive a counseling degree in working with the chemically dependent. This is not as far out of my reach as I had previously thought. Jeremy is going to be getting a job really soon and we love our house. Brooke is going into gymnastics and Girl Scouts in the fall. I have finally reached a healthy weight and my vision has stabilized. I would say that for the most part life is good. So I will leave it right there for the people who are not in my life for one reason or another. For the rest of you, I look forward to seeing you in my life or inside my gated fortress of Friends-Only.