This is still me ❤️

Brianna Maitland disappeared within weeks after just 90 miles from where Maura Murray vanished. Who is Brianna Maitland Brianna was fun, spontaneous and very independent. She lived on a rural farm with her family until she moved out at age 17, and she also dropped out of high school. After some failed living arrangements, she eventually moved in with her friend Gillian and was continuing her education whilst working 2 jobs, one morning job and another evening job in the Black Lantern Inn. The disappearance On March 19th 2004, Brianna had breakfast and went shopping with her mum. During the time they were together, Brianna's mum noticed that she became distracted by something or someone outside the shop they were in. Brianna left, saying she would be right back and her mum eventually found her in the car park. Brianna's mum said she seemed tense, shaken & agitated and had to get home as she had work that evening. Her mum, knowing how fiercely private Brianna was,

Who is Maura Murray Maura Murray was a 21-year-old nursing student at the time of her disappearance. She had previously attended the prestigious West Point with her sister Julie and boyfriend Billy, before transferring to UMAS What Happened On February 9th 2004, Maura emailed her professors to say there had been a death in her family. This was a lie. Maura then packed up her things, enough for a few days away, withdrew almost all her cash from an ATM, went to a shop, bought a lot of alcohol and drove off in her car. She hadn’t told anyone, including her family, where she was going. 4 hours later, she crashed her car and was never seen again. Her phone, credit cards & backpack were also missing. The Accident According to the police report, at 7.27 pm on 09/02/04, a woman reported a car accident outside her house. A car was stuck in a snowbank, she called the police, adding that she could see a man smoking a cigarette outside the car. Around 3 minutes later a bus driver s

I first heard about this case on the Going West podcast Who is Rachel Cooke Rachel Cooke, a 19 Year Old from Georgetown Texas, attended Mesa Junior College in San Diego, California. In December 2001, she went home to Georgetown with her boyfriend Greg to visit her family for the holidays. What Happened After the holidays, Greg returned to San Diego and Rachel stayed to attend a family wedding. On the morning of 10th January 2002, Rachel’s sister went off to school, her parents went to work and Rachel prepared to go for a run, a 6 mile route she had run regularly for many years. Before her run, she spoke to Greg and said she would call him when she got back. Later that day, Rachel's father returned home early from work as they had planned to go shopping, so he was confused to find that Rachel was not at home, although her belongings, including her mobile phone and purse, were still there. He decided she must be at work, as she was going to do some shifts at a local restaurant wh

I heard about this case on the Trace Evidence podcast and it is so baffling that someone can just apparently vanish without a trace. Who is Brandon Swanson Brandon Swanson was a 19-year-old from Marshall, Minnesota who lived at home with his parents and sister, they were a close family. He was an avid reader, with a keen interest in science. He was also blind in his left eye. The disappearance On 13th May 2008, Brandon was coming to the end of his first year in college and made plans to celebrate with friends. He attended a small gathering at a house, where it is said that there was alcohol, however, Brandon did not appear to be drunk Around 10:30 pm, he left the gathering to drive to Canby, which is 30 miles away from Marshall, to visit a friend from school to say goodbye. It was said that there was a party at the house he went to and that he was seen to have a shot of whisky, but he didn't stay long, leaving around midnight. Again, it was reported that he did not appear drun

My week in a rather large nutshell Friday brings PMS. Joy. A recent symptom it has decided to bestow upon me is sore, swollen gums as well as all the usual delightful things. I also had a dream that I went back to my old job it was more of a nightmare, I woke up in a cold sweat. I was a bit rattled by the uncharacteristic negativity I was feeling, but I was determined to push through. I got up, made myself a cup of tea, did some meditation, did my morning reflection, read my daily stoic & set my intentions for the day, but I wasn't feeling my usual sense of satisfaction. It was annoying me. The ring doorbell jangled to let me know someone was approaching our front door, the annoyance that hadn't yet subsided, racing back to the surface, when I realised who it was. Charity Bag Man. After lockdown, when clearly I didn't have enough to moan about, I decided to order a no junk mail sticker for my letterbox. Junk mail never bothered me before, but I developed a passion

And some of the many questions I still have. Like many people, I find true crime intriguing. I watch documentaries, I listen to podcasts and I read about it. So I thought to myself, why not write about it too? I particularly find the unsolved cases interesting, so I thought that would be the best place to start. I first learned of the Somerton Man after listening to an episode of Casefile podcast . What happened? On December 1st 1948, the body of a man was discovered on Somerton Park Beach in Australia. He had no identification in his pockets, no wallet or money, there was an unused train ticket from Adelaide to Henley Beach, a bus ticket stub from Adelaide to Somerton Beach and a packet of cigarettes, however, the cigarettes inside differed from the brand of the packet 18 of his teeth were missing and all the labels had been cut from his clothes. A trouser pocket had been restitched, using tan thread, which was later found to be made in the UK. Cause of death It is thought

Up, down and loop the loop. Last Friday, after keeping a few things to myself and letting them bubble under the surface, I got them off my chest. As usual, I felt so much better and wondered why I didn’t just let it all out in the first place. The problem I have is that I am much better with my words when they are written, I have time to go over them, think about what I have said and reword where necessary, this is why I don’t send voice notes, although I do like to receive them. I had been anxious about going out that evening, alcohol and anxiety do not mix. Thankfully, the air was now clear, and I could go out and enjoy my evening. The husband and I went out with some friends and danced the night away in a local Irish bar. On Saturday, I felt like a new woman, albeit a groggier new woman. I didn’t feel the need to eat all the food like I had the past few days and the husband and I enjoyed a chilled day indoors. I was woken up by Toby on Sunday morning, who decided he wanted to c

You can’t live a positive life with a negative mind. Today, I wasn’t feeling my best. Despite having good boundaries in place, the negative thoughts can still creep in. When this happens I have a list of go-to self-care activities and I thought I would share these with you. Meditation I always thought meditation was sitting crossed-legged on the floor and clearing your mind completely, which, quite frankly, feels impossible for me. I gave up trying to meditate for ages until it was explained to me that is not the case. The actual definition of meditation, according to Merriam-Webster, is: 1: to engage in contemplation or reflection. 2: to engage in mental exercise (such as concentration on one’s breathing or repetition of a mantra) for the purpose of reaching a heightened level of spiritual awareness Each morning, I make myself a cup of tea, set a timer for 10 minutes and sit in silence, letting my brain do what it wants to, which is usually worry, roll off my list of things

It is not your job to make others happy. I had never heard of the term “setting boundaries” until I started therapy, I certainly didn’t know what it meant. Yet I have found it a key part of my healing process. Why hadn’t I heard about this sooner? I will admit, that I can sometimes find setting boundaries difficult. I am a people pleaser, I want to keep everyone happy, unfortunately, this can cost me my happiness. Your peace should be your priority. This isn’t always going to sit well with others, but if someone is ok with you putting their happiness first at the expense of your own, maybe it’s time to question that relationship. We also need to be respectful of the boundaries others put in place. We all want different things and we all have different priorities in life, so whilst we may not understand the thoughts and feelings of others, we should still be respectful of them. Since I started setting boundaries in my life, I have experienced a dramatic improvement in my overall

My productivity has skyrocketed since setting clear, concise goals. After spending some time last week reviewing my current goals and setting some new ones, I'm feeling quite excited about the future. For the first time that I can remember, I am very clear about what I want in life and it feels pretty damn good. Sometimes when I set my weekly intentions, I struggle to think of some, which is where I will usually chuck in something vague like "drink 2 litres of water each day" and then inevitably, don't follow through with it. Now I have some crystal clear goals, it's so much easier and I could list several intentions I have for this week (don't worry, I won't) I'll just give you the usual three. Finish my article One of last week's intentions was to write an article, I started writing one but as I mentioned in last week's post , it was bringing back some pretty painful thoughts and feelings. I will go back to that article, but only whe

There is always something to be grateful for I often find that when one area of life is going well, another area isn't going as well. Maybe sometimes when something is going my way, I look at other areas to improve, so that everything can be just how I want it. This is why I like doing my weekly posts on what has gone well so that when my brain is chewing over all that I perceive as negative, I can remind myself of all the positive things that have happened. This week, I will admit, that I struggled. I had to look in my 6-minute diary and look at my daily gratitude, just to give myself a little oomph as I was in a bit of a negative mindset. Needless to say, I felt a lot better afterwards. My creativity is through the roof. I have a list of over 30 ideas for posts and articles and it's growing daily. I love not having a 9-5 and working to my schedule, I am up earlier, get more done and in general, feel happier. I have the time and space to think clearly and it works well f

There’s no stopping me I am so thankful that I don't have a 9–5 job at the moment. I can’t say I’m not working, as writing has taken over my life and I love it. I am constantly brainstorming new content ideas and I spend most of my days, writing, planning what to write and researching. It’s my dream career. I was quite sad to have a busy weekend to take me away from it. We had a family bbq at my brothers on Thursday, my parents, my other brother and his family were staying at the same hotel as us, so we had a few drinks in the pub next door when we got back. One of the members of staff was so rude! Berating us because we hadn’t booked a table, despite only two tables being occupied. We weren’t expecting to be going and were just going in on the off chance if there hadn’t been tables available, we would have gone elsewhere. He continued to be rude and snippy to us throughout the evening and in the end, my dad told him about himself. He was fine after that. Incidentally, the

A personal time capsule Last week, I wrote a post about the importance of self reflection . I hadn’t realised how much self reflection I have been doing, it is now as much a part of my day as brushing my teeth. One important thing to remember when self reflecting, is that you must guve yourself time and space to do this, writing daily reflections mindlessly and never actually thinking about them again, serves no purpose. I was excited to see that my first weekly challenge in my 6 Minute Diary, was to write an email to my future self for 6 months time, describing where I see my life at that point in time. There were two websites given where I could use to do this. I decided to go with Future Me, which I had heard already heard of, I thought I may have even wrote a letter to myself in the past. The idea is, that you write a letter to your future self, it can say whatever you want it to, you can even get ideas from the website. You then decide when would like to receive the letter

Will it be as bad as I think? Today, the husband and I celebrate our 4th Wedding Anniversary & things finally feel like they are settling back down again, after a hectic few weeks. Last Friday, I was sent into a bit of a panic. Toby was a bit sick in the morning, not usually a cause for concern as I have read that cats can be sick if they eat too quickly, but he seemed fine. A couple of hours later, he was sick again and by midday, he was barely lifting his head and was completely listless. I was quite worried now as there are lots of things that are toxic to cats and I didn't know if he had eaten anything he shouldn't have during the night. I decided to call the vet, who asked me to bring him in straight away. Toby got into his carrier without a struggle, which is unusual and he didn't make a sound on the journey, which is also unusual. He usually likes to loudly complain. The vet sees us straight away and he just sits there whilst she examines him, still quiet as a

As I am making some little changes to my page, I thought this would be the perfect time to ask for some feedback. I would be so grateful if you would complete a quick, anonymous survey and let me know how I can improve using the below link ❤️ https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/JGJFX2Z

As of yet no miracle has been invented to prevent me ageing so I am finally going to have to accept that I actually have to start looking after my body. I want and need to get myself back in shape. I’d like to have more energy and just generally feel less sluggish. I’ve read in many articles that strength training is better for women in their 40’s, so I am going to include some of this in my weekly routine. I also want to try and get a hold of my water intake, my skin is clearly feeling the effects of my lack of water so I just need to make more of an effort to not only incorporate this into my daily habits but stick to it. I have a really busy week this week and after (another) weekend away, I need to not only plan, but schedule my blog posts and newsletter. I’ve got myself into a really good rhythm with this and things are going well so I don‘t want to let things slide. I only plan to move forward from now on.

I didn't do particularly well with last weeks intentions. I started off well, getting up at the same time each and taking a nice morning walk, but I found that as the week drew to a close and the long long Easter weekend arrived, I got lost in all the plans and let these slide. As I mentioned in last weeks blog post, food tracking became a complete ball ache and it took over a bit, so for the sake of my sanity (and waistline) I dropped it. I do still want to be conscious of my eating habits, I just need to experiment and find out what works best for me. I am always open to suggestions🙂 This week, is another short week for me. The husband and I are away for the remainder of Easter weekend and next weekend I am going away with my friend Rachel, so it doesn't give me much time at home, but I have tried to set intentions that will work with this. Send out my substack newsletter. My substack newsletter usually goes out on a Tuesday. I like to keep the content different from the

I’ve been on a pretty high vibe this week and with this, some pretty positive things are happening. As I mentioned in this weeks blog post, I had myself a little mini spa session on Wednesday and I’m pleased to report that as of Saturday morning, the nails are still look fabulous. Home spa sessions will absolutely become a regular thing now. The bestie came over for a catch up on Thursday night, we talked non stop for hours and as soon as she left I realised that there were loads of things I still needed to tell her, that are of course too long for a text message or phone call, so we will have to schedule another catch up in. At the end of the week, I joined the Medium Partnership Program. For me this is a huge step in the right direction for my writing career and I am looking forward to learning from other writers and hopefully having a bit more exposure to the world of writing. I have been blogging for over 5 years and I still enjoy it so much and I happily spend hours shut away in t

Last night, I finally got 100 followers on medium 🎉 124 in fact. I was excited to wake up this morning and apply to join the partnership program. Imagine my surprise when I logged on to my profile to see I only had 56 followers 😭. Why had so many people unfollowed me? Had that many people looked at my page and though wtf is she on about? Then I saw that I was only following 64 people, which was definitely wrong. I went to the partnership program application page and thankfully noticed a pop up saying there was a technical error. Phew. There was no mass exodus of people unfollowing me. Typical that this would happen as soon as I get enough followers, but it was resolved very quickly. I used this time I read through how it all works and set up a stripe account so that hopefully, one day, I will get paid to write. It’s strange really, even though I have read that it’s not particularly easy to get paid on the platform, the fact that I can now be part of it has given me a bit of a c