Whatever it Takes

Dear Diary:

I am feeling very depressed and cynical today. I am not looking forward to my plans and I am viewing the world and life and others negatively.

I don't think people like me as much as I thought they did, and I don't think people care about me as much as I thought they did.

So, I am withdrawing my affection from them, and withdrawing my care. It's not healthy for me to invest more into them, than they are investing into me.

I guess I ought to find new people, to start investing little bits into, to see if they return my investment? Is that the way, to keep moving on?

I feel empty inside.

- Singer

Dear Diary:

I'm leaning on you a lot lately. I need the support.

I just want to update you that the person I am staying with is a fucking ASSHOLE. I am through trying to find gratitude for my place to stay and trying to look at it positively. It is a toxic environment for me, and I am going to call it for what it is. If I look for gratitude from here on out, I will be grateful for the opportunity to overcome this challenge. I have been looking at it all wrong. I have been turning myself into a doormat, trying to be grateful "for a place to stay" all the while this guy has been treating me like shit. I knew I was wrong to try and bend it that way. The proper thing to be grateful for is the challenge of recognizing what IS and IS NOT RIGHT for me.

Just to remind you, this is the way I was greeted upon arriving back in LA: He had said he would pick me up from the airport. I messaged him two days in advance, a day in advance, and the day of my flight to confirm. NO RESPONSE FROM HIM. I landed in LA, unsure whether he was picking me up or whether I ought to get an Uber. Moreover, I was unsure where to even go from the airport -- whether he would be expecting me at his apartment, or whether I ought to try and find a hotel (which on my budget, would be very stressful and signify I needed another plan of where to go immediately). I heard from him the last minute that he was leaving to come get me. As I was at the baggage claim. Upon his arrival, did he ask me how my month-long trip was? NOT ONCE. Did he even speak to me? BARELY. Did he give me any inclination that anything was wrong, that I had upset him, that he was stressed, anything? NOTHING. It was a very awkward car ride back and I felt myself panicking. It stayed similar to that the first several days I was back. That was my welcome back.

Just reminding you, self, that that happened. And it was never addressed. He never apologized, nothing. No words were said. I said nothing, because.... I was afraid. I have nowhere else to go in this city.

Fast forward to today.

Latest example: I got home just now to find out he had just run the dishwasher. Halfway full. He had taken all of the dishes that were his out of the sink and loaded them in... and intentionally picked around the dishes that were mine and left them in the sink. And ran the dishwasher halfway full. Did he text me to ask if I wanted him to wait? No. Was there any reason he needed to run it immediately? No. Did he reasonably simply WAIT until I got home later and loaded my dishes in since there was still PLENTY of space? No. He intentionally and deliberately for whatever god knows manipulative passive aggressive reason ran only his dishes through the washer.

Example before that: I was napping on the couch. (Since that is my bed / I have no room). He and a friend came home for lunch. They saw me sleeping (I heard them remark). They continued about their business in normal voices. That was inconsiderate enough...... however, there's more. I got up, said hello. I relocated outside to the patio. My "friend" popped his head out and told me "You can still sleep -- it's okay. We aren't going to be using the couch."

W O W.

Can you BELIEVE his point of view and how selfish and egotistical he is? He clearly, so crystal clearly is viewing and intentionally choosing to treat me as being an OBJECT taking up HIS SPACE. And may I remind you, one more time, that HE SAID IT WAS OKAY FOR ME TO STAY HERE? WE ARRANGED IT AHEAD OF TIME. AS FRIENDS. AND HE HAS NOT AT ANY TIME SAID ONE WORD ABOUT IT NO LONGER BEING OKAY FOR ME TO STAY HERE. He simply continues to behave in manners like this.

I did not even bother to reply and tell him something along the lines of "Actually, no, I can't sleep -- you and your friend coming in and talking disrupted my nap. But that's fine, you didn't know I was sleeping, I'll just nap later." Which would have been a more than generous response given his lack of consideration in talking even a bit more quietly. No, I did not even dignify him with that response.

I am not grateful for that. Nor has he been a friend to me for the past month, so I am ceasing calling him a friend like I started to nearly a month ago.

Now, the question is... it's 10 days until I'm supposed to move out. What do I do? I am not asking for advice here to any readers of my diary; I am asking myself.

I could leave now. I could go one of two places. I could go across the country to my parents', where I was planning on going in 10 days. I could leave early. It would involve forfeiting at least four days' worth of work and pay, and up to eight days' worth of work and pay (the other four days I might get work if I stay, but it's not guaranteed). It would also involve cancelling three commitments (three different jobs with three different people) I've already made. One of those commitments is with someone I never liked the way she treated me working for her. The second of those commitments is with someone who I have often seriously questioned and often seriously disliked the way she treated me working for her. The third of those commitments is with an administration that has treated me well, but the job itself treats me in a way I often seriously dislike and is rarely necessarily rewarding.

The question is, am I going to stick to my commitments and be the "good girl" I was raised to be, the "good girl" who lets herself get turned into a doormat and walked all over? Or am I going to do what I have been told I need to do out here -- I was told this by my property manager when I had to wait for the roommate who assaulted me to be evicted -- that I need to "do what's best for me." ?

It is not best for me to be in the living situation I am in right now.

It is not best for me to be treated any of the three ways I have been treated in any of those three work environments.

It is not best for me to be in this city. And even though I am already planning to leave, each additional day I spend here in this environment is adding who knows how much time's worth of recovery to my depression and anxiety, because it is sinking me lower. Plus it is hurting me every moment that I know I am acting against what is in my best interest.

I do not know if I will ever forgive myself if I continue to stay.

Plus, I am continuing to reinforce the longer I stay that this behavior is acceptable to me to tolerate for a given amount of time. I am not being IMPRISONED here. I am not BEHIND BARS. I am not going to be shot if I get in my car and drive away. I am not preserving my life by staying here. I am not in imminent danger if I leave. The only danger if I leave, the ONLY danger, the ONE AND ONLY danger, is that I might not find another source of income.

That's it.

Of course, I can snowball that into a whole lot of other dangers, like what if I can't find another source of income and then I don't have money and then I don't have the things that I need and then an accident happens and I can't pay for it and then and then and then.

To be continued. I want to post this separately.

Dear Diary,

I'm posting again.

I'm literally feeling trapped. There's not anything I can go do. It's night out, I hate this city, I don't want to spend money, I don't have anyone here to do anything with, there isn't a thing in the world I want to do here. This place is dead. This place is death. There is nothing here. What am I to do with my time after dinner?

I could go on a walk. I didn't go earlier, while it was still light out... it's dark now. It's getting dark so early, already. But I can go in the dark. Not as pleasant as the beach during the light, but, it's a walk nevertheless.

I feel trapped, like an animal. It doesn't make sense. I have a car. There's gas in it. It runs. My legs work. Yet I feel trapped. It doesn't make sense. Why?

I just smudged myself with a sage-cedar-lavendar blend. I can't even clear and cleanse the space I'm in, for gods sake, because the space isn't mine. What the hell am I going to do at my parents'?

I need to be at my own space. I need my own space.

For that... I need a job... an income...

Dear god, why is life so challenging?

Why am I a 30-year-old adult who doesn't have a place of her own?

Calm... calm. I've been changing careers... I have been supporting myself in Los Angeles..... Now might not be a good time to think, and to be in my head. My thoughts are negative of late. I might be better suited to take care of myself some other way, rather than writing...

Dear Diary:

I am tired. T minus 9 days until I leave LA. I want to feel myself rise. I feel stronger now. I saw my doctor today. He told me I've made it this far, not to increase my medication dosage. He said wait it out. I'm almost out of here. He said it seems like an outlier; see if my depression score goes back down once I'm out of this town. If it does, he said I'm clear to taper off.

I spoke to my therapist today. I told her I'm tired. She told me most people with anxiety don't make it this far, and that I am not disabled, rather, I have a gift. An incredible mind. She said she thinks not a lot of people can even come close to me.

At the bottom of my heart I know she's right. My critical thoughts argue against it all day long. Can I learn to let them go? It's so hard to separate out unnecessary and ill-informed critical thoughts from helpful critical thoughts.

I have been eating chocolate every day. I don't even want it anymore at this point, but it symbolizes and represents comfort to me, I suppose, so I continue to nibble munch and chomp away at it. Don't worry... it's the healthy kind. I mean, all of that fat isn't great for me (hard for the body to process), but, it at least doesn't have any milk/dairy or white sugar in it. It's dairy-free and only has natural sugars like maple and coconut. So, at least it's free of proven inherent evils.

I am tired.

- Singer

Dear Diary:

I kind of didn't want to post, because the diary portion of the trauma community had 1234 entries. Lol. Now it'll be 1235.

I feel weird. Change is in the air. Today is the first day of fall, I know. And I'm moving, I know. But I mean more. I feel like my... I was going to say personality, but that's not correct. I feel like my mindset is changing. In a pretty radical way. (radical: "fundamental nature of something; far-reaching or thorough")

I hope it's in the right direction... I suppose baby steps are key?

.....

Why do people have to be adults? Why do we have to have responsibilities? Why can't we all just.... sit around doing what we want, all the time?

I've been avoiding life. For a long time. Because I didn't like it.

It's just sort of hitting me that life is not going to be very fun... childhood is over.... there's a big myth going around that if you are successful, you have fun all the time and enjoy everything and don't have any responsibilities........ but that's called being a child.

I bought in.

Romance just.... doesn't exist. It isn't real. That's why adults read novels and fantasies....... to escape, to have fun. That's why people go on vacations.... because real life is.... well........ it's mundane. It's boring. It's monotonous. And you gotta learn to love it. You can't just go on wild adventures all the time....

I really, really had bought in that all of my life was going to be a wild, fun, awesome and amazing adventure.

#trauma #traumasupport #traumarecovery Do more people see my post if I hashtag it? Lol.

Dear Diary,

I am feeling so many emotions. I cried a lot today. I just arrived in South Carolina. It's 1:30am, and it's my birthday.

I want to be in a position in life where I can pursue things I'm passionate about. I am so sick and tired of being in a position of survival due to money.

I feel hopeless that life will change. I feel bitter and panicked over what I do not have that I wish that I did. I don't want to be grateful for what I do have, because what I do have is not what I want to have.

- Singer

Dear Diary.

I saw a post by @SaltyDog from over the weekend, and I realized I've been wallowing. For quite a long time. It's not my fault - I believe I did my best to find positive influences in my life, and just kept getting knocked down over and over again by people who I thought were positive but who didn't end up helping, or etc. I got discouraged when I couldn't find the type of friends I wanted and when the things I wanted to do with my life, I couldn't find a way to do them. It's not my fault. And I have done something about it -- I picked up and moved across the entire country last week. To be in, not my home state, but nearly my home state, where all three of my siblings live, and the rest of my extended family and parents are a state or two away.

I have no idea if I made the "right" decision. But I believe I did. I took a big risk moving to Los Angeles in the first place, and it didn't work out. I tried extremely hard. It's not my fault. I was unhappy. It wasn't what I wanted; it wasn't the dreamland I thought it would be. Rather, it was sort of the opposite... competitive.

I have thoughts going through my head this morning of panic. That I'm a failure. I'm torn. Do I want to pick back up my old dream? My dream of making movies, being involved in production, acting, theatre, writing, etc? Or is that dream now gone? I had convinced myself I no longer wanted that dream because I'd seen where it led (to Los Angeles). But... do I still want that dream, only, to do something different with that dream? (Not Los Angeles).

Or do I want to pursue a different dream? Such as going back to school for physics? Letting everything I went through go, and be a wash, and learn from those experiences, and be grateful for the fun?

I legitimately feel torn. I had so much fun in college working as part of a team, being in productions... but am I romanticizing it? Because in the real world, to do that for a career, the hours are often out of control. But would I care? If I was passionate about it? Am I just scared? I honestly don't know right now. Am I feeling swayed because I met up with an old friend from college who I haven't seen in five years, and he is pursuing a master's in our college field of production, and I have had feelings of... regret? Mild jealousy? Longing? Yearning?

I could do anything I wanted, and I ought to be grateful. Why is it that I can never fully decide and commit to what I want? I wish I had more confidence in my self. I wish I better understood my emotions, and what they mean, and what they're telling me. Rather than fearing them, letting myself say I am "confused" by them, letting them scramble up my life. At the end of the day, I am simply afraid.

I wonder if when I was in Los Angeles, the "I don't know how" of making my dreams happen turned into "I don't want it bad enough" and I wonder if that was my way out. It's easier to be in control, to say you don't want it anymore instead of being stuck in the overwhelm of thinking it won't happen and not seeing a way how. And it's easy to justify when your dream is something unrealistic like being in story production, when there's lots of practical reasons not to pursue that particular dream. It's easy to start pursuing whatever sounds the most practical, and naming that the thing you most want to do.

I've reframed things, but I don't know for sure whether I like the way I've reframed them. I don't entirely, that's for sure.

I miss college... seven years ago this December I graduated. I had hard times, but there were some bright times. Is what has been going on all of these years really simply a deep depression, where I selectively remembered all of the traumas, made those my entire history, attached them to my dreams, and decided that my dreams were what were traumatic? That my dreams were what put me at risk for trauma?

I had a friend suggest something similar to me last New Years.... I thought he didn't understand me, but I wonder if he saw this truth. Ironically, he stopped speaking to me after that... I have no idea why. I haven't addressed it with him.

I have been fortunate to have some good and positive people around me, who like to see me succeed. The problem for me has been that they are ready and willing to encourage me, but I am the one who has got to decide the direction in which I want to go. It's hard to find support for yourself when you aren't committed to a particular direction or end.

How do I get to the place where I am committed? To where I know what I want for my life, and I am pursuing it? It breaks my heart, and it has always broken my heart, for as long as I can remember, that I have not been in that place. I translated it into "I am not good enough" and then I fought really hard to get out of it. I fought to get out of it by deciding that it's okay to not know what I want yet, and by staying away from the people who I felt badly around. My brain is a mess of confusion sometimes.

I know I am on the right path right now. I fear finding out that I made a colossal mistake somewhere along the way. I do not want to believe that that is true. It sounds like the old religion that I grew up with.

Anyway, here I am.

- Singer

More thoughts @wizeakre

You have a good point. I have been comparing myself to my friend who is in higher education in the field/industry I left. I am second guessing myself since being with him, left and right. To the point where I am thinking I AM on track to still pursue that after all. I feel so confused. I keep thinking -- why did the Universe have me run into him? Was he a test? A test of my ability to cease comparing myself with others, and to stop second-guessing myself and my decision to quit my field? Or was he an inspiration, reminding me of the passion and love I used to have for my field (and maybe still do?), and a push as an opportunity to start again, in a different location, with different support? I don't know 😩 And I don't know how I know.

I am still thinking of physics. And I am still drawn, passionately, and with despair, toward making art, film, production, acting, singing, music, lyrics, writing....

Physics feels exciting for me sometimes, satisfying sometimes. I mean, this is in theory, and while talking to others about it, not in practice -- I haven't completed a physics course since high school.

I think about art and I think about pain, and toil, and torture.... and ideals, and release, and expression, and emotion, and catharsis just out of reach (because I won't reach for it)....

Mythology interests me, stories interest me, energy interests me, femininity interests me. I don't know which way is the right path to take. And I know I'm the only one who can decide for myself. I need to rely on my Angels / Spirit Guides / Universe to help me and show me the way and bring me the support I need, even while I feel guilty and ashamed for not doing it all myself.

I CAN make this move into whatever I want. Wow. I really have got to take this bit by bit, baby step by baby step, so that I can be sure of each and every step of what I'm doing.

Being kind to myself is so very hard for me. Lately I am re-visiting the past, over and over, beating myself up for not pursuing certain things more. I don't know which way is the way I should go, or how to stop beating myself up.

All I can do is all I can do I suppose. And stop worrying (to the best of my ability) what other people think. And stop comparing. And be proud of myself and how far I have come. Taking it slow feels hard, but I can't see another healthy way.

Dear Diary,

Argh why is it a problem in life that people who are supposed to support you drag you down instead?

Whether it is your parents, or someone here on 7 cups, or a partner or a friend....

I have been trying to get my mood up since I woke up. I finally got it up, and then someone said something that brought it ballooning back down. I am actually really angry at the person who said something. Nothing makes me more furious than someone telling me who I am, especially when they are wrong and think they are right.

I guess I can't put my day off any longer. I've got to get going. Imperfect as I am, as my mood is, and as my thoughts are.

- Singer

I'm taking a break from 7 cups. Again.

This is why:

I do not feel like it is a reciprocal give-and-take community for me. I feel I am getting lots of notifications on my little bell up top, and I don't know how to "opt out" of so many of them. I'm always going through and x-ing them out. I'm getting on this site as a coping mechanism when I'm upset, whether it's to vent or ask for support or what have you. But I'm not giving back lately, and I don't like that. There are SO many options and self-help things available on 7 cups, and I feel like all of them would help me, and I don't know what truly would. I don't know how to turn off the notifications to things that don't pertain to me.

I'm also really angry today. Someone commented on something I posted and it really upset me. And I'm sitting here stewing about it, and I have no way of getting them to answer me. They might later, or they might never. It's not like it's a stranger giving me criticism (although it is a stranger -- it's someone who I've never talked to before) and I can just brush it off as them being "a critic". It's someone who is supposed to be in a supportive community, so, I was expecting support. They didn't even introduce themselves. They just felt free to tell me who I was and what they thought I should do. And they happened to say something super triggering that's a big fear I have about myself. Who cares if they did it on purpose at this point. It happened. And there is nothing in the world wrong with me for being upset about it.

If that was the only thing that had happened, I probably would be staying on 7 cups. But there are other things, too, such as I mentioned above, and so this is serving as sort of a last straw for me. Some people have been really, really, REALLY helpful and encouraging to me on here. But I just don't feel like it's healthy for me. It doesn't feel right. I don't want to be on a "mental health" website. I want to get well. I don't want to stay on here forever. I'm sick of it, frankly. It's been over two years. I haven't swapped over to being a listener, or to "giving back" on this site. And I don't want to. I don't like engaging with people online in front of a computer screen. I like real life.

I'm mad at myself, furious really, for being on 7 cups for as long as I have. For not seeking out and finding community in my real, daily life. I'm not physically disabled. I don't have agoraphobia. I can leave my house. My throat works; I can speak. My eyes work; I can see. I have no excuse and I'm pissed.

I'm scared, too, because I've relied on 7 cups for so long as a coping mechanism and a "thing to do" that I don't know what the hell I'm going to DO with myself now. And I'm so, incredibly, pissed at myself.

I'm sick and tired of there being something "wrong" with me. I want to be a normal god damn human being again. And I'm the whole one who decided there was something "wrong" in the first place. I have wants and needs. THOSE AREN'T WRONG. OF COURSE I AM UPSET IF THEY AREN'T BEING MET. THERE ISN'T SOMETHING WRONG WITH ME FOR HAVING WANTS AND NEEDS. THERE ISN'T SOMETHING WRONG WITH ME FOR HAVING WANTS AND NEEDS. THERE ISN'T SOMETHING WRONG WITH ME FOR HAVING WANTS AND NEEDS. (TBC)