Moving House and Moving On

It has been a very long time since I last wrote on here. I am in a very different place from when I last wrote here as well. Frankly, it’s a good different.

I am in a good place at the moment. There are ups and downs, there always will be and I will always struggle with the downs and how deep they can go. However, the ups are making the downs feel shorter, smaller, less significant entirely. For this reason, this blog post may be longer and, hopefully, followed in the next two days by a little girl and the mouse instalment.

As the title suggests, there has been some moving going on recently, I will start with the physical move. I recently moved into a house with my boyfriend. It is a wonderful place, I love being able to come home to it every weekend. That is the only problem with it though, I only get to stay there on the weekends. It is based in the town in which my boyfriend works, and it is a hugely convenient place to live. I still work in a small town half an hour away and spend the week in my live-in accommodation there, and go home when I’m off on the weekends. The house is lovely, and I love knowing that he and I have a place together, but the place does not feel like home. Not when he is the person in it during the week and when I arrive on Friday, I feel like a guest in his home.

We have discussed ways to fix this, and I know it will be fixed soon, but right now it is the one thing leaving me feeling despondent about our home. I hope that one day it will actually feel like “ours” to me.

There are two things that I know will help me with this feeling of not being home. The first is a driver’s license and the second is a part-time job.

I am now officially 21 years old, last week, and I still don’t have a driver’s license. I know I am not the only over-20-something to not have this, but I have reached a point in my life where I need it. If I finish work slightly earlier, I could drive home and then come back early in the morning before my shift starts. This is difficult, I am not a confident driver, am terrified of accidents and refuse to find the time to take lessons. I have used the excuse of “not having time” which is half true because of my job, but also an excuse that has expired and I need to stop using.

My job, I have mentioned before, it’s not something I want to do with my life and is something I have become caught in after planning to only spend a few months to earn some money and help out until I could be replaced. This is supposed to become a part-time position soon, unfortunately, there are things still in the way, but this is the closest I have come to being properly part-time since receiving my management position.

Besides this, things are okay. My relationship is wonderful at the moment. We recently went on an incredible trip up to Johannesburg for my birthday, stayed at Montecasino and watches the stage production of The Sound of Music. I am happier with where we are currently than I have ever been and, though I am a person prone to doubts, mistrust and insecurities, I feel this will not affect us. This leads me to the second moving: Moving On.

There have been things that I have worried about our relationship in the past. There have been things that have always niggled at the back of my head and while most have now been quashed, there will always be one or two, unfortunately. I am trying to move on from these. Accept that no relationship is perfect, no two people are perfect, separately or together. This is my first ever relationship, but from my limited experience, what I understand a good/healthy/happy relationship is a partnership of two people who are no perfect, two people who may even be broken, damaged and beyond full repair, but who make each other better people and will always support one another through those broken, damaged and beyond repair moments.

I know I am a person who will never be entirely “fixed”, this used to be something that haunted me, bothered me, worried me and made me feel unlovable and hopeless. This is something I have accepted and moved on from though. I know that I can be difficult to deal with, but I also know that my boyfriend will never falter in supporting me through those broken moments. All I can do is try to do the same for him and keep trusting that he will be there when I drop, ready to pick me up and dust me off, or even just to be ready to hold my hand again once I have picked myself up – whichever we think I need at the time. Learning to think this way has not been easy for me, and in the past when I began to experience these broken moments, I would push him away and try to fix the moment myself, in the hopes that one day I will permanently fix myself.

I do not believe it is up to a person to fix themselves alone, without assistance or even support. I also do not believe that every person needs a football team of people, but also believe that it is not up to me to judge or decide if one person does. I personally currently need two people only, the first is my partner and the second is myself. I cannot guarantee that it will always be this way, there is a high chance that I may need to expand my group of supporters in the future, I have people whom I trust to do so, and if none of them feel suitable, I will find the person who is.

I know that life is a series of ups and downs, jumps and dives, swimming and drowning. Today was a day where I smiled at people who were bein rude to me on a personal level (not professional which I have to handle anyway). Tomorrow may be a day where I tell them to f*** off. Today was a day I out together a schedule of things I needed to do, and got most of them done. Tomorrow may be a day where I get home from work, collapse into bed and don’t move until the next day for work. Today was a day where I danced in the shower, humming to my new playlist. Tomorrow may be a day I consider drowning myself in my bath tub.

I have accepted that this is something that I will always experience, something that I will learn to live with and I will push through the drowning to be able to sing in the shower again.

I hope all two of my readers have a lovely morning/afternoon/evening or night’s sleep.

Goodnight x

 

{Song recommendations of the post (seriously): Follow Your Fire, Kodaline; Something, Monark; Better with You, Jesse McCartney. 

They are all some happy songs, for singing in the shower. }

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shut down

I’ve been doing really well. Things are going great. I’ve managed to stop bad habits that were harming me. I should be happy.

Why aren’t I?

Things have actually been going well for me recently. My boyfriend and I officially have a flat to live together in. It is half an hour away from my work, which means I’ll have to stay at my live-in home for now, which is fine, and then only go home on the weekends, which is also fine. I went to boarding school for five years, stayed at school all week and went home every weekend. This shouldn’t be a problem. It is.

The flat is gorgeous and in a really nice and convenient area. We have a bath tub and a shower, we can even get a pet. It suits us perfectly and allows for two cars to park. The flat is wonderful. So why am I suddenly filled with dread?

One of my co-workers, who has taken almost twice as many sick days as it legally allocated to employees and often skips work early or leaves me to work double shifts, handed in her resignation this last weekend. I am ecstatic that I won’t be dealing with anymore, absolutely! I’m glad no one will be covering shifts or working longer hours or having to work two departments at once. The only thing I can think though, is that we’re understaffed again and I’m never going to be able to leave my job that I hate.

I had planned to move to England this year, last year, the year before really. I had plans to go there and study, to see my family over there, to experience the world a little bit more. But now I can’t even see myself going to a real university, I can’t actually even see myself leaving this job anymore if I’m honest. I hadn’t thought or dwelled on the England plan in almost a year until yesterday morning.

My relationship is something that is going well. We actually put down the deposit on our flat on our one year anniversary (gross) and everything seems to be going well. Yes, I am struggling with doubts about such a serious relationship at such a young age, but I’m also trying to remind myself that not everyone experiences their lives and relationships the same way. Both of us are struggling individually at the moment though, I can feel our separate battles, and I don’t know how to broach the subject to try and win them together. I am currently drowning, and I know that he is right there with a rubber dingy but I feel like there’s a leak in there, and he’s going down soon as well.

Today, I’m sitting at work, and I’m struggling to find it in myself to do anything but stare at my screen. I’ve been trying to write a blog post for about two weeks, and the only thing that finally drove me to do it,was the terror and exhaustion that being at work instills in me.

There was more I wanted to write, but my limbs are feeling heavy and my mind is feeling thick. So, have some fiction instead.

x

There was a little girl lost at sea. Her small rowing boat was being tossed about by the waves and her oars had been lost to the depth days ago. She had lost all will. She lay for hours, just staring up at the cloudless sky, not a thing to distract from the endless blue. It was a calming colour, the boat was slowly rocking in the finally gentle waters and her clothes had finally started to dry. The soft sounds of the waves lapping against the sides of her boat, coffin, was almost peaceful and she could almost ignore the hopelessness. Hours passed and her skin started to heat, her organs beginning to feel like they were being slow cooked. Her limbs felt heavy, and her head felt thick, even moving her eyes was a task. The sound of seagulls did not excite her, or even interest her, she only half heard them in her empty head. Slowly her eyes drifted shut, sleeping into a vague sort of sleep, hoping she would not open her eyes again.

lies and negativity

It’s been a tough few weeks. I don’t know if this will end up being published, who even knows at this point, but basically – I’m done.

So, we’ll start with the negativity part of the title, as you can see, it’s beginning to overwhelm me. I know I have always been a negative person, and I have far too many people in my life who like to remind me of this…..often. This actually makes it worse (a hint to all the positive people in the world telling their more pessimistic friends to be more positive). It also just pisses us off … a lot.

About a week ago I made a very late “New Year’s Resolution” – not that I would ever actually call it that, to try and be more positive about myself and my life. It was right after I flipped back a couple of pages in m journal, back to where I said some really horrible things about myself last year. I know that I may be too hard on myself, but to me, that’s how I see myself. Recently though, I have been slightly more accepting. After seeing how much I used to insult myself and call myself on every little downfall, I thought it would be easy to stay away from this habit (I have already for a fair few months without even really trying), however, since reading those pages, it almost seems to have come back. I’m officially negative about my negativity at this point. Every little thing I do is not quite right. Every issue I encounter and solve, I realise could have been solved by someone else, someone better. And that’s all I am seeing: someone better.

There’s someone better for my job, a better daughter for my mum, a better girlfriend for my mouse, a better general fit for my life. I feel disjointed and out of place and no matter how many times someone assures me that I shouldn’t worry about being replaced as a girlfriend, or not being missed as a daughter when I leave, I still feel the horrible sense that I should just disappear and let someone else in to take my place.

Today at work was incredibly difficult. I work an 8-5 job as a hotel reservationist, today, I had no booking system for almost six hours and no computer at all for four of those – it was a long, difficult and exhausting day. At the end of it, the receptionist on duty with me through the afternoon complimented me on how well I had handled the day. She said she was so impressed and “blown away” by how amazingly I did. I didn’t feel it. It was very sweet of her to say, and I did appreciate it, but the only reason I didn’t go straight home and cry in my bathtub and make myself bleed was because my boyfriend was there. I waited until he left to do that.

I came very close to just bursting into tears four times today and actually burst into tears finally, at ten pm as I got into the shower. It was a painful sort of crying, the sort that hurts your throat and ears and makes your eyes sting. I thought about the negativity, my hopes of avoiding it this year and felt like an absolute failure. Unfortunately, there was something else I had to face for the evening after even all that. It is something I know is stupid and ridiculous and absolutely pathetic when you look at it. But my boyfriend got the number of my ‘best friend’ (very long complicated story, we’ve been friends for nineteen years – at the age of 20 – and it’s not an easy relationship anymore, and we definitely aren’t best friends nowadays) a few months ago when I needed to message her from his phone. Today, I regret it immensely. I don’t have a problem with him talking to girls, not at all. I am fully aware that men can have female friends and vice versa, I know he still speaks to some of his exes and can handle this as well. I trust him implicitly. Unfortunately, I struggle with him speaking to what I would probably consider my sister. There has always been an extreme level of competition between us, always a “she has one, I want one too” (on her side more than mine, she is from a rich family and I am not, I had the discount one as a ‘big deal’ and she would demand one as well and immediately brag with her smartphone or expensive laptop or new bedspreads or jewellery or hair etc).  The issue is one I cannot identify, all I know is that the very idea of them talking, makes me ill. It isn’t even about the potential of her taking him away from me anymore, it’s just the discomfort and dismissal of knowing that they are talking – especially considering that he knows how I feel about her and this. I am completely aware that asking them to not speak is wrong and ridiculous and not something I would ever do, but after a day like today, it was enough to push me over the edge.

That is what led to this blog post. I needed an honest outlet, a real one where I’m not going to filter or omit things. I needed to vent, so I am venting in the only way I know how, to a bunch of strangers on the internet who probably won’t even read this whole post.

My negativity, unfortunately, is even more difficult to avoid when there are a lot of similarly negative people around me. There are several others in the management team or pessimistic and negative about almost everything they can find. There are never enough rooms booked, never enough phone calls and emails coming in, never enough umbrellas (not even kidding). I have had to deal with a lot of this negativity myself, and it is becoming harder and harder to overcome. The negativity already surrounding my job makes it hard to deal with any of it.

I have mentioned before that I am a little bit trapped in my job. I’m not going to harp on about it, I do too much of that already, but basically, I hate it and it’s hard. So, that’s that.

A lot of people don’t understand this and keep demanding why I am still there and why I haven’t left. One of my closest friends went so far as to say: “I’ve given up on you at this point” and then just shook her head and said goodbye. Others are insistent that the moment I finally leave, I will magically be better and everything will be okay again. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite work this way, and after twenty years (almost 21) of knowing the sort of person I am, I know it definitely doesn’t work that way for me. Once I finish work, I’ll have to tackle entering university and finding a new job, maybe living with my boyfriend. I know that I very much live in the future, but it’s the only way I can live, it’s the only way I can survive it. I have to be prepared for the worst-case scenario because if that does happen and I didn’t prepare for it, I wouldn’t make it.

The negativity leads to the lies component quite well. There is a direct segue. Essentially, I’ve started lying to everyone about how far the negativity has gone.

I work in a profession in which lying is essential and far too common. I also took drama all through school and ended up with the drama award at the end of high school. I excelled at it because I have been lying most of my life. In one way or another, I found a way to lie about something. I lied to my family about my depression and self-harm, I still lie to my mother about it even now. I lie to my friends to get out of plans and avoid conversation, because I’m too overwhelmed, exhausted and anti-social to handle any of it. I lie to myself when I say that I am doing okay, or feeling happy, or doing the right thing by lying to someone. I have recently lied to my boyfriend, in order to avoid a fight. And it wasn’t the first time I had done it. The last one is the one I am most ashamed for, and the one I wish I could erase the most. I looked at it, and over the last two weeks, I have lied to him repeatedly – they are small lies: “Yeah, that’s fine.”, “I understand, it was my fault” and “It’s too late” but they hurt my throat and make my eyes tear up.

The main issue is that I often don’t even feel myself lying until I have already said the words, and don’t know how to take them back or if I even want to take them back once they are out. Like I said at the beginning, the lies about my negativity have become a problem. I have repeated to my mum, my best friend and someone I will soon be working with (he starts tomorrow) that I am trying to be more positive this year. I told my best friend that if she ever caught me being negative she could point it out and tell me to stop – she knows how much I hate it usually. Unfortunately, as the week has gone on, it is getting harder and harder to even try and tell myself that I’m trying to be positive anymore. I’ve given up, as my boyfriend and best friend and mum and school friend and ex-best friend (aforementioned) will tell you I always do.

I don’t quite know what to do with that though. I don’t really think I care anymore. I don’t know if that’s a lie.

– Kitten x

sunlight and honesty

I have several tattoos, to the chagrin of most of my family and some of my friends, and some were quite impulsive. One of these is a long one down my back reading “All I ever wanted was sunlight and honesty”. I had booked a session for a tattoo and had not yet decided on one, I heard this song by Eden (End Credits) two days before the session and it was decided.

I have been in a relationship for a little over ten months and we keep repeating the importance of honesty in that relationship, however after a post I read recently dealing with a similar topic to me, I realised that I’m no longer 100% honest in these posts. Knowing that there is a person who I know reading them, has made me filter what I say and often even skip over things I would usually have written about. So, today is an honest update on everything, it may be a long one unfortunately.

So, Christmas. I recently took three days off work (against my will) to go and stay with my family for Christmas. This is holiday is a tricky one for several reasons and unfortunately this one wasn’t much easier. It was okay, but long and I am now beyond exhausted and spent most of the following day crying over everything because I was so tired. Besides this though, it was nice to see the family, including ones I haven’t seen in about three years because they live overseas. There are now several repercussions due to this visit and my mother has asked to handle them, namely: the family from overseas wanting to come and see us before they go home next week. She is going to tell them to not come. And I am unhappy about this because, before leaving, I promised I would find them a date. I can’t argue with her though, and at this point can’t even be bothered. She has chosen to isolate herself from the family (and most people in general) and I have given up on trying to stop her from doing so.

Next, is the aforementioned relationship. I have been struggling a lot recently with this particular aspect of my life. We live about half an hour apart, which really isn’t a big deal, but it affects me terribly. I can feel how little I get to see him and when he has plans with other couples, as ridiculous as it is, it upsets me. They are the sort of plans to which maybe I could go, and with the ever increasing depression into which I have been tumbling for the last month, every time he chooses one of these functions over me, it hurts a lot. Yesterday was a breaking point, I was exhausted from the trip and he found out last-minute about another such event that he had been invited to. After having spent most of the evening before and half of the morning in tears, seeing him, yet again, preparing to leave me, shattered me. I was left in pieces and sent him away. Moments after he left I lost it. I return to a terrible self-harming habit after trying to phone him repeatedly and couldn’t get through. I sent about eight messages in a row and, with no response, ended up in my bathroom, hysterical and hurting myself. This was the scene he had to walk in on minutes later when he quickly came back. I honestly worry that if he hadn’t, something much worse would have happened.

This occurrence, and the repeating of it over the last few weeks, has scared me. The distance has affected me and I constantly feel abandoned. I feel like the most pathetic of attention seekers with him, demanding attention and ending up further depressed if I don’t get it. I am starting to feel like it isn’t healthy, to either of us. When I explained this yesterday, he didn’t agree and, as with the every time I try to end our relationship while like this, he refuses and fights me on it. While I appreciate this at the end of each episode, because I realised it was not necessary, this time was harder. At the end of this one we nearly took a break of sorts. I came close to agreeing to not seeing each other until it was closer to the time we could move in together. That time is still at least three months away (if not more) and I, even now, don’t know if I’ll actually make it to then. I’m inclined to believe I’m not.

This is most probably something I am being petty about, and today I am sick and beyond exhausted. My boss (my mother) has tried to send me home twice already. Our booking system has also been down for most of today and I haven’t heard from mentioned boyfriend in about three hours. In the middle of doing my fourth system reboot of the day, I couldn’t decide if I wanted to ignore him and never speak to him again or walk all the way to his house and hide there for a few hours after work.

Work is the other component currently pulling me down to the depths. I’ve mentioned before that it’s something I am a bit trapped in, and at the moment I feel more so than ever. While most of my friends are currently on holiday from university, I am the one still dragging my feet to work each morning. And as each morning passes, it gets more difficult and more draining to do so. This morning was particularly difficult, after three days off and an afternoon and evening of tears as well as a night of night terrors and restless sleep, I very nearly rolled over and ignored the world. Even now, I wish I could. There is a small piece of me telling me to listen to my mum and go home, but a larger, guiltier part of me is refusing. The people I work with are draining and the people with whom I have to deal with are demanding, but the thought of making someone have to cover my job makes me physically ill.

At the moment, there is a chance of my replacement coming for an interview soon, however I have reached the point where my potential ‘replacement’ has come so many times for interviews, started working here and then not been suitable or left. I dread the concept of my replacement now, because I feel like the disappointment is just an interview and a rejection away. I’m coming close to resigning myself to being here for another year, which will likely lead to the end of my relationship and, once I finish with my job permanently, possibly the end of my life.

I recently brought up with my mum  that I was beginning to feel depressed again (she knows of the history but does not know that it never ended) but I told her that it wasn’t as bad as three years ago when it first got bad. At that moment, I believed that, however I don’t think I do anymore. And that thought it beginning to scare me.

I should probably head back to my emails again, they’re slow today which is good, and hopefully I’ll remember to update again before another two months has passed.

Lovely days to everyone, have a great 2018 if I don’t chat again soon.

Kitten x

the little girl alone

The little girl and the mouse is a series I’ve been continuing in my head, and for some reason, the mouse has been absent from most wanderings of thought for the past few days.

This shouldn’t be happening, the mouse (the positive and more important things in my life) has been present in my real life. My job, though still sprinkled with difficult and exhausting days, is okay at the moment. My relationship, although still not quite what I want it to be all the time, is sort of healthy now. My mum and I are getting along slightly more, though we do still have difficult moments and I do still feel hurt often.

For some reason though, I keep seeing the little girl wandering around alone, she’s losing her way a bit though, so I thought I may expand on that a bit. I’m no writer and, realistically, never will be, but I thought I’d go with the feeling for a bit.

She couldn’t remember where she started. Or when really. The flowers had drawn her, all the bright reds and shocking yellows, like blood splattered on sunflowers. A detour down a small garden path had become a trek through forest and rocks, her small wandering had somehow developed into a journey to nowhere. The sun was setting, the sky dripping with pinks and oranges, as though a painter was pouring his paints from the sky. She stopped to watch it. The very colour from the world around her was leaking and pouring with the paint. She almost felt it pulling the colour from her own being as well, she looked down at herself, fearing she would see her body slowly fading away as well. She was intact for now, but something seemed indistinct, as though not quite finished.

She sighed as she wandered on. She had come too far to turn back and wouldn’t know which way to turn anyway, the night would bring colder weather, but she did not fear it. As she walked and the flowers, the rocks, the trees all faded into nothing, the painter angrily swiping the darkest paint on his palette over the world around her, she stopped fearing everything. She felt the cold creep inside of her and protect her from the fear, the darkness wrapped itself around her legs and hid her from the anxiety, the eerie whistling of the wind wound around her neck like a scarf, ensuring to guard her against the dangers of this dark world. She did not remember falling asleep.

When she awoke, the cold and darkness and wind had left her. She saw the footprints of where the wolves had circled her, she saw the marks on the trees from the terrors slinking from above while she was asleep, but she had been protected, she had been concealed from the night by those that the night loved. The day had brought colour and warmth and life back to the world around her and she felt herself longing for the cold to fill her again instead, but she walked on, wondering if she would ever get home, ever find herself in familiar lands, ever see her mouse again.

The flowers around her, while beautiful and shocking, were only a reminder of being in a foreign land. She missed the pale pinks and purples and the dark greens of home. The pathway under her feet changed to grass and then to stone and then to dust. On and on she walked, hoping to find some direction. The sun has risen in seemingly the same place it had set the night before, so she did not trust it, she did not look to it. Her constants had dissolved into uncertainties and without the night, she felt alone for the first time since walking from home.

The soft sounds of the wind seemed to be carrying her now, the very feeling of walking had turned her body numb to it, she was simply a moving shape now and moved as the wind and flowers and path dictated. The sun above her was growing warm and she felt her clothes stick to her, she felt her hair wet against the back of her neck and around her temples. She searched for trees and shade and water, but in the strange rhythm, she had lost interest in her surroundings and had not seen the change in terrain. Every way she looked was long and sandy and flat. The path underfoot looked as uncertain as she felt and she wished for some sign, some strange inkling of her way home, her way to something, her way to life. 

She felt, in that moment, as aimless and lost as ever in her life. With no direction, no signs, no guide, she lost herself further. In those hours in the desert and the following days in this strange endless world, she felt that she lost all of herself. She had wandered away from all of the good things she had ignored, all of the things she found familiar and she wandered away from her mouse and their happiness.

Indeed, the little girl lost herself, alone.

hold on

Hold on to me, cause I’m a little unsteady.

This week, month, year has been hard. Somehow over the last month, something new had started though. There’s a new level of “hard”, it turns out. This is the fourth blog post I’ve tried to start this month, and there are a list of drafts building up on here. Today, I hope to get this one out.

Therea isn’t loads to say, this is the overflow. This is the point where I’ve realised that I have nowhere more to go, I have nowhere else to look, and I’ve found my breaking point. I’ve surpassed the anxiety and depression that has overwhelmed me for the last few months, and reached a level of numbness and indifference.

I’m struggling to care about things, and simultaneously care about too much. The hotel at which I work is being graded today, we’re a five star, and my managers are all nervous. I can’t find it in myself to care, but also feel their nerves and panic every time they remember. When she arrived today, I was calm and also entirely terrified. 

My second job, transcription with Rev.com, has become difficult because I can’t find the perseverance to search for a job, and if I do manage to find one, give up after finding stupid excuses to unclaim it. Just opening the website makes my heart drop and my hands shake.

My interests have dissipated. They no longer exist and if they’re still there, they don’t last longer than half an hour. My boyfriend has been sweet enough, to try and help me find interests and each time, there is a temporary distraction, but it too disappears once the smallest hitch appears.

I’m struggling with interest in the people around me as well. The girls who I work with try to tell me stories and I find myself glazing and spacing in the middle of the news. I have a pile of messages to reply to most of time, and have to build up the bravery and positivity to try and reply to them. Even now, there are six waiting for me, and I’ve been ignoring some for days. 

Every song I listen to isn’t quite right and all three books I’ve tried reading seem bland. Movies are either mind numbingly boring or anxiety-inducing to panic attack levels. Pitch Perfect left me short of breath and sitting on my bathroom floor because of the lights, an episode of The Middle sent me spiralling existentially and all of my favourite YouTubers grate me.

Even the people closest to me terrify me at the moment. Three of the people closest to me told me that I need to see someone within a week of each other, and all three of them are too rational for me to handle. Normal conversation is even making me nervous. I feel I don’t know where I stand with anyone, what anyone thinks of me or how they really are. I’m missing sadness or nervousness, I missed my best friend’s almost breakdown in the middle of a conversation and can’t tell what people are feeling. 

My head is a pool of anxiety, overthinking and terror and I fear she’s wandering off to escape this without me. I’m on the brink of tumbling off a cliff, and I don’t think I want anyone to steady me anymore.

everything and nothing

My head is one of those ones that likes to make a huge deal out of nothing.

Through school, this meant a lot of stress and procrastination and panic. At work it means a lot of nervous energy and quiet panic attacks. In my relationship it means that my head tells me to end it every five minutes.

Today was a day where, somehow, I had all three.

I’m currently in the middle of a short university course and am struggling to find motivation and interest. This has led to my absolute terror and imminent panic at the assignment looming next month when I have nothing prepared for it yet. I wish I could say I fixed it and I feel better now, I don’t.

At work today, I lacked the support of my general manager and managing director as neither were available and this led to several things going wrong which I had to deal with alone, guest complaints that got heated that I had to assist with and many moments where I wanted to run away screaming. Several trips to the bathroom were simply to sit on the floor and try and keep myself from crying. The only bright side is that I’m off tomorrow, so I am coping with this.

The final is what tipped my day into the disaster zone. I overreacted repeatedly to some of my boyfriend’s messages and a small argument developed. I had already been fighting the doubt that my head likes to throw at me several times an hour. Today those doubts has increased and I sat for half an hour staring at my wall ready to end the whole thing because I was “going to screw it up anyway”. When I finally got over it, the school and work pressure overwhelmed me and I had a brief panic attack. Seeking help from my partner, I sent him a message and this is where the catty jokes turned an attempt at lightening the mood into a dismissal, on both sides. And I crashed hard.

I had relapsed and then relapsed further. I felt myself slowly losing my mind and I didn’t know what to do about it. It was like I had no control of myself anymore in that moment. I tried to share the doubts and something came up that delayed his response and, again, I panicked. My head has now spent the last hour and a half listing every reason that this relationship is not worth it and that I’m wasting his time while my tear ducts enjoy the turmoil and won’t stop burning my skin with salt.

I’m exhausted and finished and keep staring at my scarred thighs – I want to go to sleep forever now.