Despite the hole I mentioned in my last post, I have still been trying to find little lights in the hole. Things that help me, even down here. Things that remind me to keep clambering at the walls despite how scared I am, and remind me not to give up on myself entirely.

I dislike calling it “self care” and prefer “Little Lights in the Dark,” because people often weaponise self care into something it was never meant to be – as if a bath with candles should magically cure a mentally ill, sleep deprived, anxiety riddled brain.

Some of these things didn’t work the way I wanted them to. Some didn’t “fix” anything at all. But they still helped. And I think when we flatten everything into cure alls, we miss the quieter ways things can support us because we’re too busy feeling disappointed and more depressed that they “didn’t work as advertised.”

So, here are some of the little lights I’ve been gathering in the hole lately.

---

The Lonely Pigeon

My son and I were both not feeling great, and we needed to go get more food, which I was dreading given my current hole with recovery. Before we went, I suggested Starbucks in an attempt to cheer ourselves up a bit.

On the way there, we stopped at Pigeon Point. Our city centre is full of hostile architecture and fake birds of prey squawks blasted through megaphones, so the pigeons gather by the river instead. My son lovingly named it Pigeon Point.

The hostile environment doesn’t stop them raiding Greggs though. Later, we watched a woman open the door and two pigeons casually stroll out like they were heading back to work after their lunch break.

I love standing near Pigeon Point because there always seems to be someone feeding them. The pigeons there are also so brave. They walk right up to your feet, looking at you hopefully, wondering if you’re one of the good ones.

I stood taking pictures of them and inventing lore for each pigeon. One of them gave me lonely vibes. I was probably projecting how I felt onto him, but I put him in the bottom left corner of the photo grid anyway.

My son and I have been obsessively watching Better Call Saul hidden details videos, and the YouTuber Better Watch TV*** mentioned how placing a character in the bottom left of the frame can amplify loneliness. It really worked. It ended up becoming one of my favourite pigeon pictures.

Which is saying something, because I have an alarming amount of pigeon photos on my phone.

---

Project Hail Mary AVAILABLE TO STREAM

I was having an absolutely RUBBISH day. It was rubbish from the moment I woke up. I was sat crying silently with my headphones on, staring into space while obsessing over numbers, when my son interrupted my spiralling by tapping me with my bear.

“LOOK AT THIS.”

He shoved his iPhone screen in front of me. Project Hail Mary was suddenly available to rent or buy on Amazon Prime.

My immediate response was:

“IS THAT REAL THOUGH?”

because I have been betrayed by region locked sci-fi before approximately one THOUSAND times.

It was hard to find at first because it must have literally just been added, but eventually we found it. My son was upset it cost £20 because that’s expensive for a movie, but I bought it IMMEDIATELY. I was worried it was some mistake that would disappear if I didn’t act quickly enough.

He looked genuinely shocked and kept saying I must really love him to buy Project Hail Mary for him. Honestly, I couldn’t wait to watch it again either.

We watched it that evening while eating dinner. I’d previously seen it at the cinema, but I was dealing with a lot of anxiety at the time and realised during this watch that I’d missed loads of it because my brain had been elsewhere.

Watching it at home felt completely different. Safe. Comfortable. I kept looking over at my son, whose face was basically the physical embodiment of the 😀 emoji the entire movie again. That was honestly the best part of watching it.

I almost cried multiple times. I love Rocky and Grace’s relationship so much.

Afterwards I crashed a bit again mentally, but I was grateful for the little break in actual space it gave both of us. He keeps saying it feels even more special because I love it too.

He always warms even the unhappiest of brain states.

---

The Project Hail Mary Poster of Love

My son had been really stressed with his end of year Uni assignments. He was trying to complete them while dealing with migraines and really bad anxiety. I am so unbelievably proud of him because despite all of that, he always does amazingly well and has never handed anything in late.

I see the struggle though. I think because his grades are so high, people probably assume it comes easily to him, but I see how hard he works for those marks. They aren’t a reflection of ease, they’re a monument to his dedication and determination to always do the best he possibly can.

He always says, “That’s the best I could do.” and thankfully his marks usually reflect that effort despite the difficulty behind the scenes.

Because of all this, I wanted to get him something before any marks had even come back. To me, the achievement isn’t just the grades I know he’ll probably get – it’s the fact that despite all that stress and overwhelm, he still worked incredibly hard and handed everything in.

I knew exactly what to get him, a giant Project Hail Mary poster and a frame.

To say he was delighted is an understatement. He kept thanking me and immediately put it on his Instagram story with the caption:

“Does your mum really love you unless she buys you an A2 Project Hail Mary poster (with frame).”

He has accumulated quite a few Project Hail Mary related items at this point. The collection seems to expand daily, to the extent an Evri delivery driver once had to make two separate trips in one day. We both found that HILARIOUS.

He sometimes worries he’s being frivolous or spending too much money, but honestly this is fairly expected behaviour for a new special interest. So I decided the poster was also my way of telling him I fully support him turning our flat into a shrine dedicated to Ryland Grace and Rocky.

Buying my son presents and watching him light up always helps me so much. I’ve enjoyed SO MUCH watching him completely absorb into his new special interest.

---

I Read Listen to Books Now.

I watched a WheezyWaiter video, as I have been doing for the last 17 years (which is genuinely horrifying to realise). I love Craig. I feel like we have a lot in common personality wise, including our shared passion for loving when the coffee is done.

In one of his newest videos, he went to a library and randomly picked books without looking into them first in an attempt to read more. He referred to this process as, “Raw dogging the library.” Which honestly made me laugh more than I’d care to admit.

I’ve struggled with reading books for years. I’ve tried physical books, audiobooks, audiobooks alongside physical books – basically everything except changing the actual type of books I was trying to read.

For the last 20 years, I’ve mostly read Non Fiction. I used books to learn more about quantum physics, philosophy, science, black hole information paradoxes, Schrödinger’s Cat, and even actual UAPs.

But over time, I think the internet has slowly replaced my need for Non Fiction books specifically. When I finished White Holes by Carlo Rovelli, one of my favourite physics books ever, I immediately disappeared into months of internet rabbit holes about Loop Quantum Gravity and watched lectures from Carlo Rovelli himself on YouTube.

So channeling WheezyWaiter I decided to try something different.

I started with Project Hail Mary because I felt like the movie was missing all the juicy science bits I love. Everything felt compressed. I wanted to know how in the universe we went from Apollo moon landers to near light speed travel in such a ridiculously short time frame.

I bought the audiobook and absolutely devoured it in 3 days.

It was brilliant. The narrator was amazing, Rocky’s dialogue worked so well in audio form, and I got completely absorbed in all the science and how Rocky’s intelligence is so VERY interesting.

Audiobooks are definitely better for my brain. While listening, I’ve made macramé bows, cleaned my kitchen, played The Long Dark, and even done strength training. Weirdly, I focus better while doing something else at the same time. It helps me “go into” the book instead of drifting away from it.

Since then, I’ve listened to four more books. Recursion by Blake Crouch became my favourite so far and now feels difficult to beat, another of his, Dark Matter was really good, and two from other authors I completely abandoned because they annoyed me.

They’ve all been standalone sci-fi so far. I really love the harder science focused ones.

I still find starting a new book difficult though. It feels like a huge commitment, and I’ve felt strangely guilty abandoning books I don’t enjoy. But with my mood being where it currently is, I can’t force myself through books that feel like chores just because I’m “supposed” to finish them.

Reading is supposed to help me right now, not become another obligation.

I think the books I’ve loved probably deserve their own posts because I have SO many thoughts about them. I’m still thinking about them daily, and they’ve genuinely reignited a lot of creativity in me. They’ve helped me so much in my hole.

---

Little Lights in the Hole

None of these things have magically pulled me out of the hole. I’m still deep in it. Still vibrating with anxiety, still dealing with my mood, and still obsessing over numbers and all sorts of things.

That doesn’t make these moments any less important or meaningful though. If anything, it makes them more meaningful to me – that you can be having the absolute worst day mentally, and then your son taps you with your plushie bear and says:

“PROJECT HAIL MARY IS ON STREAMING.”

and suddenly you get a two hour pocket of peace while watching the person you love most sitting there looking like :D.

That you can bond with a pigeon that looks lonely and take a picture of him to keep forever.

Or that thanks to a YouTuber you’ve been watching for YEARS, you end up reading Project Hail Mary and Recursion and reigniting your love of books again.

Even while in the hole.

That’s why I don’t particularly like flattening everything into self care “cures”, because none of these things cured me. But they still helped in their own ways, and reminded me that what’s outside of the hole isn’t just more things to fear.

Here’s a song I’ve been listening to lately :-

*** Highly recommend Better Watch TV YouTube channel if you love Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul and El Camino. I’m obsessed with the episode breakdowns!