I got a stupid gift card and now I’m spiralling

I don’t know how to say this without feeling guilty or selfish.

Human emotions but I hate feeling them yet I feel them pretty much all of the time. Kinda ironic. I think, I’m not 100% sure what ironic means.

Anyways uh there’s backstory to this, obviously I’m not just yk sat in bed staring at my ceiling. (I am but I’m just overthinking it’s fine, completely normal)

I get my boss a Christmas gift every year. I don’t really know why, it just feels right to do? We’re close, not close close. Like I haven’t hung out with him outside of work, he doesn’t know a lot about me. But we get along pretty well.

I know shocking, he’s my boss and I should hate him. I do sometimes, when I let myself slip. When I realise that at the end of the day I’m just an overworked, underpaid employee me and the only reason why I’m still there is because I’m good at what I do.

Really freakin’ good.

But idk? He’s a good guy. Nice guy. So yeah I buy him and his wife a gift, a couple tbh. It always causes me stress and anxiety but I don’t get them birthday gifts so I splurge a little at Christmas. It’s a me thing, a weird thing. I started it four years ago and I’ve continued it.

He’s given me money, gift cards. They did a whole thing for my 18th and it was really sweet. Embarrassing and for someone who’s incredibly socially awkward, it wasn’t fun. But the thought behind it was really sweet, even if it’s not my thing.

So I got him a Christmas gift. Wrapped it with my friend. Gave it to him. All good. I never expect anything return, I never do. Gifts are just that, a gift.

Mf came up to me two days ago and was like ‘btw me and my wife have got you a gift voucher. I was going to get you shoes but I don’t know which one’s you already have’ (I collect converse).

He even apologised that it was late.

I stumbled so hard man. What do you even say to that?? I just said ‘dude no, you didn’t have to get me anything. I didn’t get you something to get something in return’. Dude turned around and said he wanted to.

I thanked him multiple times, apologised for the fact that I’m SUCH AN AWKWARD PERSON.

Now I have this £60 freaking gift card (CRAZY) and I feel guilt.

I feel sick with pure unadulterated guilt and I have no clue what to do with it.

Gifts growing up always came with a catch. Christmas and birthdays were a performance. My mum didn’t know me so she never knew what to get me, just got what she wanted me to be. I was always grateful, smiled, said thank you. I never let on that I didn’t like anything.

Or a gift when she messed up, a gift to shut me up.

I don’t do gifts. They make me anxious, gifts come with expectations, with hidden meanings.

I know that isn’t logical. I’m aware that I’ve overthought this to death.

I give gifts because I want people to know I care. Or because it reminded me of someone. I’ve always been reckless with money when it comes to spending it on someone else.

But now there’s a £60 gift card sitting on my bed and idk if I can use it. Which makes me feel just as guilty as using it. Isn’t that crazy? I feel crazy.

It’s helpful honestly. I’ve been needing new trainers for about a year, my docs are too heavy for work and my crocs are quite literally falling apart. I need new joggers because mine are all ruined because of work.

I’d spend the gift card on things for work, kinda ironic right?

It feels too much? Like I’m not worthy of it, deserving of it. Which is dumb because I do so much for that job. Constant volunteered unpaid hours, always offering to cover shifts, doing jobs outside of my job description. My boss calls me a manager and I am but my pay 100% doesn’t show that.

It’s fine, I’m okay with that because I love the job.

I just don’t feel worthy. I don’t feel like I’m deserving of this. I don’t feel like I’m enough.

That’s all it amounts to at the end of the day.

I work too much, too hard because I’m trying to prove a point. That I can be useful, that i’m a fully functioning person. That my life isn’t completely meaningless.

I buy gifts because it makes people smile. I buy gifts because if I myself can’t be enough at least what I buy can be. As long as I can just give and give they’ll ignore every reason they don’t like me, every reason as to why I don’t belong.

So maybe I do deserve it on the surface. Alex, the happy, energetic guy who smiles and works hard and is good.

But deep down I don’t, not really. Alexander, the depressed, demotivated guy who’s just clinging onto a job that mistreats him because he’s too scared to let go. To scared of change. To scared of drowning.

That job is my life jacket, my boat in the ocean. I can’t loose it, even if I know I need to.

Sorry this spiralled