My Mental Space

Hello there! I decided to make a blog on WordPress today because I find I have a lot to say and never have enough time with my therapist to say it all, and talking about things never works out unless you’re making a podcast, and I realized I don’t have time for that.

So what is this all about? First and foremost, it’s about my brain and what I’m working to organize in it, and sharing the misadventures there as well. It’s also about my daily life, my viewpoints, my experiences with life and how it shapes me and who I am.

So let’s start that introduction shall we? My name’s Matt, I’m also known as RJ in fandom circles, I’m 44 going on 45, I’m gay and in a long-term relationship with my partner of 6 years. I am a furry as well, primarily a wolf with some side forays into being a buck or snow leopard(snep) as my online avatar. You’ll probably experience things of that nature here, among other things that make me who I am.

My hobbies involve collecting and displaying memorabilia and things like media(books, video games, movies, vinyl), I love various types of music, from rock and hard rock and metal to Chillhop, EDM and trance, ambient… the list goes on. I drive German cars, mainly Audi, because they seem to be the ones that end up falling into my lap. I like reading manga and sci-fi/fantasy such as Jujutsu Kaisen and a re-reading of Initial D, also TJ Klune, because gay werewolves. I have gained a love for coffee shops and eating things that aren’t the typical fare as well. Heck, I’m writing this post from a place called Apothecary. They make amazing drinks and have a partnership with Zingerman’s, a state institution, especially in Ann Arbor.

Currently I’m in the process of prepping my house for sale and making a more permanent move to the Detroit suburbs(God I have a lot of stuff), re-establishing myself in the workforce, and paying off a mountain of debt because of bad mental health practices(retail therapy is a bad idea, yo). I’m also working to read through my backlog of overdue library books. I’m on The Great Money Reset by Jill Schlesinger, with my next targets being Swordheart by T. Kingfisher, Furiously Happy, and others I can’t recall off the top of my head.

Like I said before, my purpose for this blog is to talk about mental health and the things I’ve struggled with and learned about myself for the past year and a half or so. For example, did you know that in 2023, people were calling into the National Passport Information Center, or NPIC, by the thousands, daily, during Peak Season in the summer? I was working that job that year, and it had a profoundly negative effect on my outlook and my working habits that I’m still trying to overcome. I tend to say it gave me PTSD because of how it was every day. I started calling into work and skipping shifts, my productivity plummeted, and for all of 2024 I struggled to bring myself back to consistency in that job when, thank you hindsight, I should have quit that job and started fresh. I didn’t because I thought I could work past it eventually, and because I didn’t want people in my family to react negatively for leaving a job they viewed as perfect for me. I was stubborn with a side of avoidant, and by the end, I was damaged goods. I’ve been trying to find a job that fit my needs and my skills, but most times they’ve said “we’re going with other candidates”, which does a number on the mental health itself, I tell you.

2025 hasn’t been easy, but I’ve learned a lot about myself in the time it’s taken me to get to mid-October. I’m here and I’m still fighting, and I will make it to the other side, or as my partner likes to say, he’s building a dragon bridge to help me get to the other side, and honestly, I wouldn’t be where I am today without him. And I will definitely get to the other side.

So this is my first post. I hope that by this time next year, things will be deeper on the side of positive.