Christmas Season and live update

Hello everybody,

we are currently one week into the fifth season, aka Christmas season. I love Christmas, but I had a bit of a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit this year. Without Christmas Markets and shopping for presents online instead of in store, well it makes things harder. I now have recovered from my blues and started to feel very Christmassy. Wearing Christmas jumpers, ordering presents and baking cookies are the things I enjoyed most last week. Also, Arthur Christmas, which is my favourite Christmas film is on Netflix!🎉 On the weekend I went to Dresden where they had a little Christmas Market, gosh it felt so good to see people having a good time.

Since getting my degree I started working at my mums' hotel, I have been working here before as a student, but now it is full time. I love working with people and in the tourism field, also my job is to do the marketing for the hotel. What I love most is that not one day is the same as the last. Obviously there are routines like the check-in process, but every guest is different and that's why it's never the same. I attended some business trips which were fun, and we started with our big renovation project. Unfortunately, we had to close our hotel and restaurant in November as Covid-Restrictions were intensified. Live was still busy tho as the renovation project needed all of our attention. It's all coming together now, and I'm so excited to see the finished project. 

I haven't been well mentally in the past month or two. I really struggled with all the restrictions, as I'm not vaccinated there's not much I can do. This led into me being very anxious and also depressed, and the fact that we have less and less daylight everyday just made it worse. In order to conquer this, I made a big decision and got vaccinated last Thursday. I still won't be able to do much until January, but this perspective really gave me some hope. Getting the vaccine was easy, and it didn't hurt. After the 15-min wait I had a very slight headache and my arm felt a bit heavy but nothing major. The rest of my day was quite hectic, but I could just go on. The next day I was very tired and couldn't focus, I could not lay on my left arm or lift it too high. I had a bit of a fever in the evening. I just took things slow that day and rested a lot. On Saturday I was feeling much better and only had a bit of pain in my arm. Over the weekend, this issue resolved and there were no other side effects for me. Now I'm just waiting to get my second shot. 

Another thing that really messed up with my mental health was my emetophobia and anxiety and panic attacks. In October my boyfriend caught a stomach bug and had to throw up at night in bed, luckily there was a bucket close so nothing got dirty, but I ran away crying and screaming for my dear life. I ran away in the middle of the night and have not been back to his place for that week. I was so scared to also have caught it that week, but luckily I didn't. Not only that, but I was so nervous going back, but I managed to do that. But ever since then, I sometimes struggle to fall asleep or stay asleep when I'm with him. This sounds so bad, and I feel kinda guilty for it, as obviously didn't get ill on purpose. I mostly struggle in the nights from Sunday to Monday, as this was the timing of him throwing up. I will either not be able to fall asleep or sleep for like 1-2 hours and then wake up. After 5 am, I'll start to calm down enough to fall asleep (again). I'm guessing the 5 am mark is like a save spot for me because he threw up at like 4.45 am on that night in October. Last weekend it was so bad that I actually left his flat at 3.30 am to go home and get some sleep. He was fast asleep and didn't realize what was happening. In the end I did not get a lot of sleep as I got up at 7 am again and went back to his to say goodbye for the week because he starts work at 8 am and I drive to my mums hotel and stay there during the week. 

I really don't know what to do about this. I feel so guilty because this is all my fault as this whole thing is really just in my head, and he did nothing wrong. 

Are you also struggling with your mental health or have emetophobia? What is something that helps you?

Love, Steff xxx