FEBRUARY 14 | HAPPY SELF LOVE DAY

Hello my lovelies, the day of love is approaching and for those of us who are single (another year for me) it can be a day with a feeling of what's the point in caring. However there's a false sense of what love means around Valentine's Day. If you're in a relationship, yes you love your partner (at least I hope you do!), but you also love your family, your friends, your pets, and of course yourself. 

And if you don't, I think it's time you did. 

Each type of love you have is different for different people, but 2019 is the official year of loving ourselves each and every day. No doubt life gets busy and sometimes we end up sacrificing time for ourselves to benefit other people. So this year on February 14th don't be disheartened if you haven't got someone to take you on a date - take yourself on a date!

Over the course of 2018 I perfected the state of spending time on my own and enjoying it. It's so unhealthy to constantly depend on other people for your love and happiness. I'm not saying that you should completely desensitise yourself from your feelings of longing for other people. For example, I crave touch and affection from others when I haven't had it for a while. But what I'm expressing is we should all have the power to say, I'm fine being on my own. Which I'm hoping this post will resonate with a few of you so you can feel comfortable in yourself to go out and do these things or spend time with yourself etc. 

So aside from just saying those things, I'm gonna give you all some ideas of how you can put that state of being into practice. And how you can spend this Valentine's Day loving yourself. When I say self love I don't mean you have to love every single inch of you every single day. We're all human and we all have days where we might dislike our skin or our legs for example. But if you're at a point in your life where you're mostly comfortable in yourself within your own bubble, then those negative feelings don't last for more than a short period of time. But I do think when it comes to doing things on your own the way you're feeling about yourself can sometimes affect that more than we realise.

Let's be honest, a lot of the things you do with others regularly you can do by yourself anyway. E.g. going for a coffee (we know I do that every damn day) or going shopping (again, do that 6/7 days a week). On this blog I have mentioned too many times to count how important it is to go out and do things by yourself. Take yourself out to lunch or to dinner. Take yourself shopping, give yourself a pamper day/night. The possibilities are endless of what you can do so let's discuss a few of my favourites. 

GO FOR A COFFEE

One of the easiest things you can do on your own. If you're like me and go for coffee a lot it might not feel like a treat when you do it so often. But you could go to a coffee shop you love but you don't go to very often. Or you could go and try out a new one that's opened that you've been meaning to try. For example I go to Costa basically all the time just because I like too. However in my town there's a coffee shop called The Rustic Bean, which again I love but I don't go there all the time. So when I do it feels more like a treat. 

BUY YOURSELF A PRESENT 

Whether you're in a relationship or not, on a day like Valentine's Day it's nice to get a little present to know you're appreciated and thought about. So why not go out and treat yourself to that ring you've been eyeing up in that window display at Pandora or those brand new heels at New Look even though you don't know when you're gonna wear them but you like the idea of them. Let's be honest we all buy things just because we can, but they're normally little things here and there. But actually treating yourself to something you wouldn't necessarily buy in general feels so nice and and like a real treat.

For V-Day this year I'm gonna treat myself to a ring in Pandora that is one band but it meets in the middle with two hearts, one slightly bigger than the other. It's quite simple but I think it's a really lovely ring to wear on my ring finger, I'm very excited to purchase it. It's only £45 which is pretty good for the quality of the jewellery, I've also got a voucher and some money saved especially to treat myself so it really will feel like a treat just for me. Make sure you all treat yourself to something special this Valentine's Day! 

LINGERIE 

The power of nice lingerie that you feel good in is crazy. Only a few years ago I hated all my bras. I hate wired bras - I've tried to wear them but they're not comfy, I don't like them. But trying to find non-wired bras that also have padding to support my boobs, that actually fit but are also pretty is one of the hardest tasks that has ever graced my life. The only place on the high street I can rely on is M&S. Marks and Spencer's is great for bras and under wear. I've had white, nude, and black bras from M&S for years but I'm so bored of wearing those colours. Yes you always need a bra in a neutral colour, they're handy. But for years and years that was all that was on offer to me, white, nude, and black. It made me feel like I didn't care about lingerie because there was nothing on offer to me in the types of styles I wanted to wear but couldn't because of my personal level of comfort over fashion/ sexiness etc. But within the last year I've managed to buy some dusky pink ones and a dark purple one which I absolutely love. I love how soft they are, how comfy they are, and how good they make me feel for me. I wanna buy a set I've seen recently that's got a white and a red one included as they look really lovely. So that's my next investment.

When it comes to pants, my preferred style is Brazilian and I love anything with lace and silk and pretty patterns. Buying pants has never been as big of an issue for me. I normally get them from Primark but over 2018 I had a bit of an issue finding my size. I'm an XL in Primark's underwear and for some reason they sort of just stopped doing their underwear in that size in every store I went in to yet they still made their clothes in XL? Sorry but what? You can't have certain sizes in certain styles of clothes and not the others. God brands and their sizing annoy me to the max but anyway, that's a topic of conversation for another post. So when I was having trouble finding them in Primark, I decided to try out M&S' underwear which is honestly probably one of the best things I ever did. They're so comfortable and extremely flattering, they're true to size, and they have so many styles. I bought loads of new ones that were in the sale recently and my god do they make me feel good and feel sexy. If you're struggling at the moment for bras and pants then I'd recommend having a look in M&S. 

*WARNING*

ADULT CONTENT AHEAD... 

Right, what I'm gonna talk about now I made hints to it in a post I did last year for Valentine's but I never directly said it. But I'm in my twenties now, I'm sure quite a few of you are as well, so I feel like we're in a safe zone. If you're not in your twenties or you're just not interested in this topic I'm about to mention then I understand if you wanna skip to the end or just leave the post here. 

SEX AND MASTURBATION 

I feel like as you transition from teenager to young adult this is a topic that a lot of us between the ages of 16-24 don't really know how to mention or discuss with friends etc. Even though I'm pretty sure we all know we do one of them at least because we're all human and we have needs. 

I started masturbating technically at 15/16 but that was before I really understood what it was and what it meant and why I felt the need to do it etc. But even though I started then I never felt good after I'd done it each time. But I think it's because all throughout my teens it was made known that it was normal for guys to have a wank, but in terms of female masturbation it was almost like it was embarrassing to admit that you touched yourself in that way. Looking back I don't know why we all made it such a big issue. Did anyone else go through this? 

It's so normal to masturbate for both men and women, it is one of the most natural things that we do as human beings. And for a lot of people, it's the first experience with pleasure and feeling good in a sexual way. I think as I've got older masturbating has become less of something I shy away from. Obviously I don't shout it from the roof top of my house or chat about it over Christmas dinner, but talking about masturbation and sex with friends has become a regular chat every so often as we've all got older. 

Up until kind of the end of last year I never really felt confident going into places like Ann Summers just because it's whole new barrier to cross from being a teenager to going into adulthood. So in January I finally went to Ann Summers and bought a sex toy. I got a rose gold vibrator and it's honestly one of the best things I've ever invested in. When starting out with sex toys they do say to start with a vibrator or just something small as obviously it's all new and you're just experiencing using them for the first time etc. But it has made masturbating easier and so much more enjoyable. And I hear sex toys are great for couples too, according to Ann Summers 69% of couples said their sex life is more enjoyable with sex toys. 

And if there's gonna be any day when you make love to yourself or have love made to you, surely the day of celebrating love is one of the best days to do it. 

Plus, at the moment Ann Summers currently have a Valentine's promotion going on. I bought a really sexy red velvet two piece pyjama set that was originally £25.00 and it had 30% off, so it would've been £17.50 which I thought was a pretty good deal anyway. But I got to the till it was only £12.00! Honestly what a steal. I'm not sure how long the promotion is going on for or if it's on everything in their stores but if you've got a chance to go to Ann Summers before the fourteenth then I would recommend! Whether you're single or in a relationship, treat yourself to something sexy this year to please yourself or benefit you and your partner. 

Personally at the moment in my life these categories have been been quite prominent over the Valentine's period. But there are many other things you could go out and do either on Valentine's Day or in celebration of Valentine's Day. Obviously having a pamper session is always a great idea. Face mask, eye mask, paint your nails, a really nice bath, moisturise your skin etc. I really do love a pamper night and I do them at least once a week these days. 

Take yourself out for dinner. I know this is quite a big deal for some people; when you imagine a dinner date the average number of required guests is usually at least two. So I totally get if it feels a bit too out of your comfort zone to go out somewhere like a restaurant because they're places associated with being social and meeting people. But I took myself to dinner once because I really fancied a Nando's and none of my friends were free to go and I'd had a really shitty day so I just decided to go out by myself and it was honestly really nice. It was a very therapeutic experience in a weird way, I would recommend. 

 One thing I really want to do in general is go and watch a film by myself. There's always so many things I say I want to watch and then I never go and see them. Partly because I can never find the time but I'm gonna make a date for next time I have a day off and if there is anything on at the cinema I want to watch I'm just gonna go.  

Well my lovelies I think I'm gonna wrap up this post here. Thank you all very much for reading, I hope this post gave you a little inspiration and confidence about feeling good in this season of love. And reminds you that the greatest love you can ever have, whether you're single or in a relationship, is the love you give to yourself. 

Happy Valentine's/ Self Love Day. How ever you're spending your day I hope you are filled with nothing but love and laughter and I will speak to you all again soon. I promise. 

Love,

Katie