2025 review / 2026 plans

[DeskJockey]

Congrats!

[mik]

Well done Zed - still bike-commutable (fall-off-able) distance from home?

[Delphi]

Congrats, Zed!

Last year was pretty good with a totally shit ending - found out I was being made redundant and my mother-in-law died (she was only 58).

This year is starting in a bit of a holding pattern - looking after a grieving wife (she and her mum were very close) and there are rumours that I might be kept on after all, so I'm just waiting and seeing until probably the end of February. If I don't get kept on, I'll be leaving at the end of April so I'll take May off and hopefully snag another role in the summer but the job market isn't great at the moment.

I've got a trip to Ireland in May with some of my Porsche mates which should be good and a couple of family holidays too.

Need to get a few last jobs sorted on the 928, but it's all minor stuff and after it handled a 1200 mile Scottish Highlands trip without missing a beat, I'm pretty confident it's all sorted.

[ZedLeg]

Cheers guys

It’s right by Ibrox mik, so it’s in bandit country but distance wise it’s about the same. Just head around bellahouston rather than going towards town at strathbungo.

[dinny_g]

I've got a trip to Ireland in May with some of my Porsche mates which should be good and a couple of family holidays too.

Sorry to hear if your tribulations Delphi - hope things get better.

Whereabouts are you going in Ireland ??

[speedingfine]

Congrats Zed, nice one

[DeskJockey]

@Delphi sorry to hear that.

[KiwiDave]

Like last year, I've had this thread open for ages dreading engaging with it - way too much like looking in a mirror when I don't want to see what's there. However... You all engaging with it, sharing your ups and downs is a good thing, it does make this thing we're doing all seem more relatable and like we're all in it together somehow.

So last year I said:

I've been looking at this thread every year with a deep seated desire to write something, but each year so far I've been broken to the point where writing it would have me curled up in a ball in the corner. Same goes for the bucket list thread, open in a tab for over a year now... From that I'd say the fact I'm making this post at all is progress.

24 was a year where I've struggled to still be here. Largely driven by the loss of Dad at the very end of 23 and all the bullshit that went along with that. When I added it to some of the other weight I'm carrying in my head, I only just held on. That said, there were some positives - 2 and a bit glorious months in a friend's gorgeous lake house, riding my bike every weekend in Rotorua, was especially awesome. I know she doesn't frequent here any more, but I know some of you know her, so a particular hat tip to Caroline of the former EVO shire who was (and is) quite frankly a gift of a human being. Doing the grief thing side by side with her was a genuine life changing experience and she is fucking awesome. My job continues to be awesome too. It's not extending me any, but it's safe, a good vibe, pays pretty well and is great to have that as a solid constant.

25 - ride the bike a bit more, be less fat. Probably try and start to ease off my love of craft beers. I have a massive shipment of drums coming in 2025 which will probably be the biggest spend I ever make on them which is exciting. I wanna continue to do the odd driving thing, it was awesome to do the odd trackday last year. I'm wanting to finally get into doing some home recording. I hope the year is kind to the three friends I have fighting cancer right now, I don't wanna be doing any more funerals any time soon. The big stuff - I think I'm finally ready to admit I'm gonna seek some professional help for my head again this year - I've been reluctant for so long as I've been there and got the t-shirt, the past few times I've sought some help I felt very little benefit, just an emptying of the wallet. Something has got to change though, it's that or say time is up. The big one I've been chewing on for a while is whether my relationship is finally over, or if it's OK and I'm the problem - I've been in a 'if you're not sure, you're not ready to do anything state' for a while. Maybe I'll still be there this time next year.

I can't believe I've actually written that down. Let's see how much I regret it.

Looking back at that, the overwhelming light bulb going on, is that when I wrote it I was obviously in a worse mental health place than I am now. Dad dying mattered much more then than it does now. That to me is real progress. In saying that, I definitely had wobbles, including one weekend back in July last year where I actually lost my ability to control my brain completely and frankly, rolled the dice and only just woke up the following morning. I know some of you saw the post I made on Facebook that evening, removed a few hours later out of embarrassment at myself, for that I can only say sorry. So not all roses by any means. I had surgery last year for an umbilical hernia and while the healing has gone fine, the returning to the measly fitness I had before has been hard. A little more weight and a little less mobility to finish the year. I am also still stuck in the relationship which I'm 95% sure is fucked. Good news - still loving my job, some tiny murmurs that maybe I'll take over running the place as my boss heads towards retirement, not counting my chickens there but nice to know that's the light I'm seen in. The friends fighting cancer - some won, some are ongoing. My sister (reunited after 15yrs of silence during Dad's passing) is still in contact which is great, but her partner has been diagnosed with a huge brain tumour and a case of when, not if. Shitty few years for her looking backwards and forwards...

I did try and actively tackle the mental health stuff last year, which seems obvious but is a big deal. Unfortunately the process proved my earlier point of being a waste of time and money. I got several months in, to that stage where meaningful progress was beginning, then the practice which contained the therapist I was seeing closed and relocated nearly 2hrs away. That process of investing time, energy, effort and so on, is a major investment as I'm sure many of you know. I'd been reluctant to do it again for fear of it being worthless, and it was pretty shitty to have that proven true.

Oh, and the drums did arrive and they're fucking awesome.

For 26 - really the main focus is health improvement and seeing if I can actually sort out this mess with the relationship. I only really have two bits of hesitancy which are money, and then not knowing if I'm the problem and walking away means not actually fixing much but giving myself a whole heap of extra headaches to deal with. I'm about 95% that isn't the case, but that last 5% sure does carry some weight and questions.

I'd really like to do more car stuff this year. It would be great to do some more photography again, and I'm hoping that this year is the year I manage to start doing some recording and music making.

[Nefarious]

I did try and actively tackle the mental health stuff last year, which seems obvious but is a big deal. Unfortunately the process proved my earlier point of being a waste of time and money. I got several months in, to that stage where meaningful progress was beginning, then the practice which contained the therapist I was seeing closed and relocated nearly 2hrs away. That process of investing time, energy, effort and so on, is a major investment as I'm sure many of you know. I'd been reluctant to do it again for fear of it being worthless, and it was pretty shitty to have that proven true.

One possible suggestion: write.

When I started with a therapist, we were still in hokky-kokky lockdown, so most meets had to be phone or zoom, which I found kinda unsatisfying and inefficient. So we struck upon an arrangement whereby I wrote, he read and sent back a lightly annotated version, and then we had a phone conversation about it afterwards. I found it *massively* more productive that even the face-to-face sessions. Of an hour's typical face-to-face, we would typically spend at least 10 minutes on chit chat, another 10 getting back up to speed with where we were last time and probably an average of another 10 heading down false avenues where I hadn't expressed myself properly. Of the remaining 30, it was so much more efficient to pick out the important/salient bits from a couple of pages of my previously written ramblings than do that process live. And all of it felt much easier to do remotely than trying to express my thoughts for the first time into a computer monitor (or over speakerphone sat in the back corner of a random carpark).

But more than making the process more cost/time efficient, I found that the writing itself became the effective therapy, because ultimately, the therapist is only there as a guide and it is *you* doing the work to create an honest, internally consistent narrative that *you* can live with. What I wrote evolved from some sporadic diary-entry type things and cod-philosophy musings tangential to my issues into something more like a bluffers guide to how my brain works. In the end, I dropped the therapist and carried on with the writing. The added bonus is that I now have all those little pieces to look back on to remind myself of the ways I can slip into circular thinking, the things I am likely to unconsciously lie to myself about, and the patterns of behaviour that *do* ultimately make me happier.

Keep on keeping on, man. It's trite, but - it'll be alright in the end, because if it's not alright, it's not the end.

[Nefarious]

Similarly, the situation with my dad's health has continued to decline, although without any dramatic collapse. His grip on reality grows increasingly tenuous, and his mobility is teetering on becoming non-existent. Again, I suspect things will move to the next phase in 2026.

My reflection on this with my mum is that you expect some big crisis to come along and change the situation but it never does. It's a gradual, inexorable decline. At some stage a minor change upsets the delicate status quo.

I hope you're right, but it does feel like its a precarious house of cards ready to come crashing down. If he gets any kind of infection, doesn't eat properly, or gets his drugs wrong, he slips into full delirium. He's already been sectioned twice due to it. If he perceives *any* deterioration in his situation (his ability to go out, his ability to stay in his flat, his current group of carers), he slips into deep depression, which in turn leads to refusing to eat and drink, or take his meds, and, ultimately, the above delirium. And his mobility is so poor (he can just about shuffle between bed, toilet, sofa and, critically, wheelchair). *Any* deterioration, given his mental state, will effectively see him bed bound, with all the above consequences. If we get to this time next year with him living outside residential care, I will be amazed.

[dinny_g]

Another vote for writing - I've found it to be very therapeutic. I started during my lowest point where writing down "What I felt happy about today", "What I can look forward to tomorrow! was necessary but as I've got slowly better, that sort of thing come more naturally (thankfully) so now it's just a stream of my thoughts. some days, I write a sentence, others, "War and Peace" but it all helps me keep focused on not slip into the old ways

And as an aside Dave, it's great you have Caroline to rely on. Never knew she had moved to New Zealand. She seemed like a good person, albeit only based on her postings here etc. I never met her in real life

Edit - that's Caroline, Photographer and occasional soap maker with the 3.0 Z4 and the ridiculously photogenic parents, right ??

[Explosive Newt]

I hope you're right, but it does feel like its a precarious house of cards ready to come crashing down.

I would agree with that. It's sensible to scope out what is around you - we were totally unprepared when we had to arrange respite care for mum at short notice when the wheels came off her care arrangement. However having done that it meant that a year later when she was admitted to hospital and it was clear she couldn't go home, we had a nice nursing home that was close by and happy to have her.
The other thing is the finances. Residential care is expensive. The state will want to see all of your father's assets run down before it steps in to help financially, and even then they will only comp about 50% of the fees.

Sorry a bit of a downer I know but happy to share experience over DM if you like.

[KiwiDave]

And as an aside Dave, it's great you have Caroline to rely on. Never knew she had moved to New Zealand. She seemed like a good person, albeit only based on her postings here etc. I never met her in real life

Edit - that's Caroline, Photographer and occasional soap maker with the 3.0 Z4 and the ridiculously photogenic parents, right ??

Right Caroline, wrong country - she's still in the UK, just done a lot for me via Messenger and been a good friend.

The writing suggestion is interesting and I'm not ruling it out, I just find writing to be one of those things which has a wall in front of it unless the planets align. I'm not sure why, partially dyslexia (I actually spelled that wrong, the irony!) and partially attention span of a gnat maybe... I've had people tell me I should write full stop, the same things prevents me. There's a brick wall there until something just clicks, and that's pretty rare.

[Nefarious]

I hope you're right, but it does feel like its a precarious house of cards ready to come crashing down.

I would agree with that. It's sensible to scope out what is around you - we were totally unprepared when we had to arrange respite care for mum at short notice when the wheels came off her care arrangement. However having done that it meant that a year later when she was admitted to hospital and it was clear she couldn't go home, we had a nice nursing home that was close by and happy to have her.
The other thing is the finances. Residential care is expensive. The state will want to see all of your father's assets run down before it steps in to help financially, and even then they will only comp about 50% of the fees.

Sorry a bit of a downer I know but happy to share experience over DM if you like.

Thanks man. Plans are in place - this has been a long time coming. Estate planning/assent management was done over 10 years ago, my brother has LPA, the flat he is in was set up for this purpose (and could be further converted for accessibility), and there are two residential places lined up if things move in that direction. And everyone is suitably braced for the wallet raping of either full time home care or residential care.

I'll drop you a PM

[Nefarious]

The writing suggestion is interesting and I'm not ruling it out, I just find writing to be one of those things which has a wall in front of it unless the planets align. I'm not sure why, partially dyslexia (I actually spelled that wrong, the irony!) and partially attention span of a gnat maybe... I've had people tell me I should write full stop, the same things prevents me. There's a brick wall there until something just clicks, and that's pretty rare.

Right. Totally understandable. It feels weird at first. And that's coming from someone who actively likes writing.
It felt self-indulgent and like it really missed point or direction. I would occasionally cringe at myself literally as I was writing some stuff. In the effort to be really honest with myself, I frequently found myself paralysed by questioning what really were my *true* feelings.

An absolute game changer was - WhatApp messages to myself. I didn't even know you could do that previously. Oh. And WhatsApp set up on my PC too.

Rather than sitting down with a blank sheet of paper trying to compose the most erudite perfect encapsulation of all my feelings and the mechanisms by which they came about, I just started firing myself messages as thoughts/ideas occurred to me. Then later when I was sat at my computer, C&P the messages into a word file and give them some kind of order/structure.

Somehow, the familiar messaging format made it easier to both shoot from the hip (just single lines sometimes) and take a more conversational style (literally as if I was chatting to a trusted friend).

I will also add that it was a lot easier to get started because it was specifically set up to replace the unsatisfactory remote therapy sessions - firstly because I knew that ultimately there was a third party helping to guide, and secondly because it gave the whole endeavour purpose and a more focused aim. It was maybe 9 months before I dropped the therapist (primarily due to his ill health).

PMs are very very much open if I can help.

I spent way too much time developing strategies for tolerating being miserable, instead of expending that effort trying to make things better

[dinny_g]

Right Caroline, wrong country - she's still in the UK, just done a lot for me via Messenger and been a good friend.

Ah right, gotcha

Edit - I was going to suggest Voice Notes too...

[Delphi]

I've got a trip to Ireland in May with some of my Porsche mates which should be good and a couple of family holidays too.

Sorry to hear if your tribulations Delphi - hope things get better.

Whereabouts are you going in Ireland ??

Thanks mate. We're doing the Great Atlantic Way, so down the west coast.

[dinny_g]

Excellent - Two must visits, if you can is Gus O'Connor's pub in Doolin, Co. Clare (Near the Cliffs of Moher) - Unofficially, the best pint of Guinness in the world. (and the Mussels and Trad Music can't be beaten). The other is Dingle (to stay a night if you can) and but you must do the Slea Head drive to Dun Chaoin and then, if it's clear, back over the the Connor Pass.

Have fun, it'll be a blast I'm sure