I Think That The Gift For a First Anniversary is Paper - Fitting I Think

Today it has been one year since I posted my first blog.  An entire year of blogging.  When I started this blog it was because I wanted something to take up my time while I wasn't going to school.  I am amazed at how therapeutic blogging ended up being.  I was able to work through a lot of crap throughout this past year.  I have always known that I understand better when I read what I think.  In order to read what I think, I have to write what I think.  The best thing about writing down your feelings or what you think about something is that you can read it the first time know what is where you are really at.  Then you can edit until you are comfortable with other people reading it.

I have posted 118 blogs in the last 12 months, had 8,318 total page views and people in over 10 different countries have read my blog.  Obviously the U.S has the most reads, but then comes Germany and Canada.  The oddest countries that my blog has been read in are South Korea, Turkey and Singapore.  Not surprisingly the #1 read blog is My New Tattoo, my second highest read blog is A Little Late on this #yesallwomen Bandwagon, Then Drama, Drama, Drama. Why? Why? Why?, and finally A Sweet Story About Puke rounds out the top four.  I'm sure that the blog about my tattoo is viewed the most because of Pinterest and the pictures in the blog.  The #yesallwomen blog taught me the power of the hashtag.  The drama blog was a surprise.  It's amazing to me the number of times that blog is read per week.  And it always does my heart good when I see that the Puke blog has been read since it is one of my favorites for a lot of reasons.

I haven't been blogging a whole lot in the past few months.  When I first started blogging I didn't care if people were reading my business.  After all it was my business and whether or not people were reading it was something that effected only me.  Now it's a little different.  I know a lot of my friends read my blog and a lot of Josh's friends.  He has a hard time with that and in return I have a hard time blogging.  He's never asked me not to blog, or told me directly that it bothers him for other people to know what's happening in our lives.  But I can tell it does. I sometimes wish I had the foresight to keep our identities secret at the beginning. I'm pretty sure everyone still would have figured out that I was the one writing and that Josh was the one I was writing about and who my ex-husbands and kid are and who my parents are.  For those people that know me all of that information is obvious and for those that don't it isn't.  But it is certainly hard to maintain a blog and not write about the things going on in your life.  Thus, telling other people your business.

I also experienced someone taking information out of my blog a using it against me a couple of months ago.  It wasn't a happy experience, it's what the Drama blog stemmed from.  I never really gave two seconds of thought to whether or not people who didn't like me were reading my blog.  It just didn't matter.  If I matter enough to someone that they are going to read my blog just to find out information about my life, that's their problem.  Or so I thought.  I had no idea that someone would take general information that they knew about my life, add it to information that they learned reading my blog and then use it to play on every insecurity that I have in this world.  Let me tell you it was an eye opener.  And it made me just as hesitant to write about my life as "telling other people my business".  I even dreamed last night that I was mad and upset about something different and I yelled "she's the reason I can't blog!"  I guess my subconscious was trying to tell me something.  This makes me mad and embarrassed especially since I have spent the past year of blogging trying to be positive, change my life for the better, and not care what other people think about me.

This blog started as a 30 day challenge and has now managed to make it 366 days.  In the past year a lot of things have changed and my life is completely different today than it was last September. School starts in a week.  I'm not sure that I am going to have time to blog and combined with the fact I'm not sure what I have to blog about this may have only lasted a year.  But let me tell you.  I am proud of what I have written. What I have learned about myself. What I have worked through with my relationships. And I'm not sure I could have done it without the help of this blog.

So, thank you, to everyone who read this is the past year and helped me reach 8,318 pageviews, who supported me with great comments in the early days.  Who encouraged me to keep writing when I was finished with my challenge.  I hope that I have kept you all entertained and made you think a little bit.  I hope more than anything that my journey inspired you a little bit. It's been a good year.