I just want to slip away from who I am

[SeekingAfrica]

I keep trying, I keep seeking change and it happens and then life crumbles under my feet again.
I am exhausted.
I need drastic change, in fact the change is coming towards me like a freight train and I am just... closing my eyes.

I want to go back. I want to not allow my emotions to eat away at me so now having to deal with so many health issues.
I want to go back to the first time moving out of my boyfriends place to my first apartment alone and have more faith. Do more. I spend so much time depressed then, so much time adapting to living alone, without knowing everything that it meant. I lived the way I was used to living or I took it day by day when I was too depressed.
I wish I had known that a breakup is a 2-way street and I didn't spend so much time torturing myself over it. I wish I had realised that with my circumstance changed I no longer have a safety net. I wish I had realised that is the moment to rise. To learn cooking cheaply before I had 3$ per week for food. To learn to take care of my home before the state of it made me depressed. To have realised that who I was wasn't the core of my relationship breaking up so I deserved making income, building a new life, creating change. I wish I had eaten simple but nutricious meanls before I got to a point of being addicted to junk food.
And all that was just the beginning of so much pain. I'm not sure I would constitute being desolate and poor in another country as trauma, but whatever it was it sticks with me like a bad cold.

And that was just the start, 6 years ago, or 7. Feels like an eternity. Feels like 1. There were some blessings. SO MANY mistakes.
And here I am. Last year I had 2 serious breakdowns. One of them was in November. Didn't really think there is getting out of it, and yet here we are.
I worked hard, I took mental health break, I was active... and then it all crashed. Something between my long-distance partner needing some time to cope with personal loss (not a break up but so little communication) and then my computer breaking down just like it had in those first months alone, and I broke again.
Few weeks and it undid months.

I want to want to try.
I just feel like I keep trying and getting broken and one day there will be nothing left.
I don't know how much there is left in me to fight.
I use apps and ai to set goals. I'm inventing cheap food options. I am trying to reinstall computer on my own. I have 20kg to lose again. I need to apply for jobs and I have no clothing or confidence. I feel crushed. I didn't die, I didn't end up on the street and I have to be using any moment to seek work.
What is wrong with me?
Last time wasn't my fault but if I let this happen again it will be.
Yet I have health issues I have to ignore and my energy is demolished.
I have a computer holding on will that I am using to write this, which is so broken that it's holding on pure will, so I guess that is something.
I have knowledge. Some knowledge of what having a degree in media and lots of online research has helped me figure out about freelance work.
I know I have had determined times in hard times in the past. Some of those I completely separated myself though, had like an alter ego I was imagining. Imagining someone better I can be.

6 years. Or 7. So much learned and somehow I am a crumbled mess on the floor again.
I want to have the energy to give 150% to this change.
I don't know where to find 5%.

 

[arfie]

life is as life is, not as i would have it. ~american proverb

i still wish i could wake up tomorrow as anything other than what i am, but here i am, still me and still a crumbly mess.

i find my relief in studying ways to accept and love myself, just as i am, crumble spots and all.

be gentle with yourself and patient with the process. seeki.

 

[SeekingAfrica]

be gentle with yourself and patient with the process. seeki.

I don't even know what the process is.
I don't know what I'm doing.
How many times can you try for redemption? Cause I thought that ship sailed last year.

I don't know how am I back to this state.
It's killing me.
At what point do you no longer have a right to be gentle with yourself, or a chance to keep trying?
Everything hurts.
For a second I had faith and now I am so lost.

 

[Friday]

I don't even know what the process is.

七転び八起き

Fall down 7 times, get up 8.

Improvise, Adapt, Overcome.

 

[SeekingAfrica]

I'm just tired, I am so tired today and I can't stop crying,
I am exhausted.
I know there is no quick fix but it hurts so much right now and I wish I had answer to at least something.

 

[Ecdysis]

I honestly think that many countries/ societies are under a lot of additional stress atm... The pandemic had a huge effect on all of us, inflation has been shocking and is making life unlivable and unaffordable for many, workplace changes, housing crisis and lots of additional societal stressors that are all coming on top of our own mental health issues.

Where I live, I'm seeing a ton of people simply not being able to keep living the life they have been accustomed to. So many people are having to find workarounds like moving into shared accomodation, just to be able to afford any kind of housing, even if they don't want to live in shared accomodation. Or having to downsize radically. Sell their cars. People are making some huge changes because what was previously the status quo just isn't working anymore. People are having to choose between "heating or eating" because they can't afford to pay both their heating bills and buy groceries.

I think it's important to realise this isn't an "individual" failing... This is a lot of people being pushed from "just scraping by" to "no longer getting by".

And I think we have to start "thinking outside of the box" and making choices that we previously would've said are "unacceptable" for us.

I've even thought about going to live in a Buddhist monastery or a nunnery, to be honest... I opted against both of these, because I have pets so that kind of rules those two options out. But I'm mentioning them to encourage you to truly think radically outside the box and consider things like moving into a charity project for people who are poor/ homeless, or whatever...

Because it sounds like you are breaking under the strain of trying to keep going and trying to uphold the previous status quo...

 

[SeekingAfrica]

I honestly think that many countries/ societies are under a lot of additional stress atm... The pandemic had a huge effect on all of us, inflation has been shocking and is making life unlivable and unaffordable for many, workplace changes, housing crisis and lots of additional societal stressors that are all coming on top of our own mental health issues.

Where I live, I'm seeing a ton of people simply not being able to keep living the life they have been accustomed to. So many people are having to find workarounds like moving into shared accomodation, just to be able to afford any kind of housing, even if they don't want to live in shared accomodation. Or having to downsize radically. Sell their cars. People are making some huge changes because what was previously the status quo just isn't working anymore. People are having to choose between "heating or eating" because they can't afford to pay both their heating bills and buy groceries.

I think it's important to realise this isn't an "individual" failing... This is a lot of people being pushed from "just scraping by" to "no longer getting by".

And I think we have to start "thinking outside of the box" and making choices that we previously would've said are "unacceptable" for us.

I've even thought about going to live in a Buddhist monastery or a nunnery, to be honest... I opted against both of these, because I have pets so that kind of rules those two options out. But I'm mentioning them to encourage you to truly think radically outside the box and consider things like moving into a charity project for people who are poor/ homeless, or whatever...

Because it sounds like you are breaking under the strain of trying to keep going and trying to uphold the previous status quo...

All of what you said is true. There is nothing much set up here for poor or homeless people and as a foreigner I wouldn't qualify. Home is not much better. And as you remember I gave myself a month off in January by staying with family and except for the literal ability to see my partner, it was exhausting. It wasn't a refuge, it was more rules and 2-3 buses to get anywhere. I was happy being in a new relationship, but I had burnout several times.

You're right. I have to make choices I wouldn't before. I am not sure what those are yet. Tonight is just lots of crying.
But that is the feeling too. The noticable shift in how things were and how they are now. I know I'll have to change.
But I can't put all this on current world- if I was better, I would have savings and be more prepared for this world.
I did briefly consider jobs that fall out of my compass ever so slightly, but I don't think that's the answer.

Probably the answer will be being healthy enough to work 2 jobs, which, if I manage I'll be proud.
But at this very moment? I am struggling to get out of the feeling that it's all my fault. I was holding on for a while, but this week I'm taking break from socialising and a break from ballet even because all this is getting to me. I need to sort myself out. I created 3 simple recipes with pre-made things in the last weeks because I had limited funds and that was kind of cool.
But beyond that? I need to be proud of myself. I need to be able to look myself in a mirror and know that if I am at the poverty line, I have tried everything in my power to change it. I don't know why but there are people that love me and I need to be strong for them somehow. I hate my space too, but it's so hard to organize it without adding anything budget wise and .... I don't know. I found local fb group for people getting rid of furniture for no price, just you have to get it to you... maybe I can ask a friend to drive me, that can be creative solution if that group is for real.

I feel the root of finding a solution is figuring out how to separate my feelings from what are the actual problems and break those down too.
Crying is just so exhausting.

I think I'm going to bed and will reevaluate all in the morning. Not that I sleep that much or that well lately, but still. Thank you for writing. It forced me to evaluate a piece of all going on, which is something. What solution did you find for your moving situation at the end, how did you cope?

 

[OM_™]

Thirty+ years ago I had money in the bank; then I lost $300K and the ownership of my home; then the CSA that began as a boy came back to haunt me; my father's violence haunted me too.

Today, I have a credit card debt of $25K that I never seem to pay off; the tax office is threatening legal action because my paperwork hasn't been completed since 2006; I haven't invoiced my clients since 2011; my child of 7 days had a massive brain bleed; he survived and then at 19yo died and was revived in front of me in hospital; he had 11 brain operations amongst another 8 operations and I have just dropped my psychiatry because I can't afford it and the only thing that's helping me is my SSNRI which costs me 30¢ per day.

I prayed to every God you can imagine...and I lost my Catholic faith a long time ago because my local priest wanted to f*ck me. He's now dead but probably murdered a bookshop owner, who I'm guessing was going to report his request for child pornography.

THE BRIGHT LIGHT is that I'm still alive and so are you, NEVER EVER GIVE UP. Life's not fun, but for some of us it's all we got.

 

[SeekingAfrica]

THE BRIGHT LIGHT is that I'm still alive and so are you, NEVER EVER GIVE UP. Life's not fun, but for some of us it's all we got.

Thank you! And thank you for sharing your story, it is indeed a lot to go through in a lifetime. I guess we are all going through a lot right now.

After I woke today something happened. Instead of having yelling phonecalls with some of the people I would have paid to if my computer didn't break down- I was honest and we made an extension and a fair deal of interest if I go over the extension.
For goodness sakes, I even made an extension agreement with a pawn shop(I know those are bad to use but I had to).
I got extensions for most of the things I owe.
I asked for small mini loan to have food and bus.
It was a LOT of brutally hard conversatons.

And today I'll be attempting to reinstall my computer myself and making a long-term income plan, not obsessing over the closest deadline.
I'm still overweight but I will try to accept my starting point.
I still don't have clothes for interviews, but I'll try to find something second hand possibly.
And obviously I'll need to spend some time working on my mental health, that's clear.

It's not an easy path, though who really has an easy path these days?
But I'm no longer avoiding everything. I'm trying to face some of it.
Radical honesty.

Thank you @Friday , @Ecdysis , @Movingforward10 , @arfie , @OM_™ and all of you wonderful people here.
I am not saying I'm okay. But I'm trying not to avoid any longer.