Terror and pain

I'm woken up at 1:30 am by the profound belief that something is wrong. I had some kind of dream about associates being able to upload art to the Victoria's Secret company website and I basically woke up having a panic attack about whether or not to upload my art. It takes me half an hour of floating in confusion to realize that this online art gallery probably doesn't exist at all. And then, even if it did, I calm down and slowly believe that it doesn't really matter either way. 

So, I'm obviously stressed about work. Waking up in the middle of the night from an anxiety dream makes that obvious. It's 2am. I tried to drink water and was immediately overwhelmingly nauseous and my head actually just clouded over. I forgot who I was for a second, and it was scary. I still don't entirely remember. I've been dissociating so badly today, I'm just floating in the void. I'm so stressed out and terrified of just about everything, I just feel worn out and afraid and like a cornered animal, like that's all I am and ever was. 

The depression and anxiety I could handle if it weren't for the constant dissociation. I can't remember the past, can't remember myself, can't remember anything. It is so scary to realize how many things I've forgotten, even when I write them down I simply lose connection to the words on the page and it's like they're written by someone else. Who am I but a being who exists in constant fear? Fleeting moments of happiness just break up the pain of existence. 

How can I ever be happy when I feel so bad all the time, when I don't know my own identity or trust in my own purpose, when the mere thought of saving money to use for therapy scares me so much. Just working such a simple job gives me so much anxiety it makes me want to puke. And yet I can't give in, I'm going to keep doing it, but maybe at the cost of my mental health. I WANTED this. Why does everything I want inevitably get consumed by this awful stress? 

Maybe some of it is founded. But, I don't know how much. I hate this anxiety and what it does to me, and the way it just makes me lose myself. The constant battles I fight in my life, I fight on autopilot now. I don't know how to go without the autopilot, I can't imagine continuing to fight as the actual, vulnerable me. I feel that she hid a long time ago and I feel so, so alone. 

I don't feel like I know who I am or am assured in who I am at all. I often go through profound periods of feeling ashamed and unstable in my identity, constantly, and I really don't know how to react to it. Things like this make it seemingly impossible to date, because I'm not sure how I'd have the courage to in the first place plus I know from experience that dating brings on extra anxiety and the mood swings I experience are not conducive to a healthy relationship. I've been thinking about it lately and I just don't know how it'll ever happen or if I want it at all anytime soon. When I fall into this hole of anxiety and dissociation, reality becomes so warped and I come out the other side to a burning track in my life, an era where I can hardly remember who I was or what I did. That was my time with Alex, my time with Khalid. Entire years of my life owned by something else, and it's so much of my life it scares me... 

I need help. I need help so bad. 

Heather, sometimes you tell me you feel for me in that I feel physically bad and don't know what it is. I don't know if it's that. The most prominent issues I face on the daily are the awful anxiety and dissociation. I probably have physical problems but I've lost touch with what's a real physical problem at this point because I've just lived with it for so long. Because honestly I spent years denying it and denying myself any kind of treatment or empathy and to this day I still don't know how much is fact and how much is fiction. I will admit I have some chronic pain, but I am so used to it that I ignore it 99% of the time. I don't know. I'm so confused right now. 

Taking a broader perspective, everything should be okay right now. I'm working like I wanted to, I'm taking my engineering class like I said I would, and I'm drawing like I wanted to. Just, daily life is mired in anxiety and it feels so painful and hopeless. This is a familiar situation. It seems like  my brain takes average situations and twists it into something awful. It's like some kind of chemical deficiency, or maybe I just know something is very wrong, and I'm deeply unhappy about something. I am deeply unhappy. About my choice of major, about my direction in life. I don't like what I'm doing. I don't like how much my parents influence me. I don't like how used to it I am. I'm deeply unhappy with myself and my social anxiety. Am I deeply unhappy because I'm used to being deeply unhappy with myself, or because there is a profound issue after all? It's both.

I think it'd help a lot if I had a kind listening ear here with me, physically, in this room, and a hug. 

Lately, it's been hard to eat. It's been hard to remember because I'm hyperfixating on things a lot (for me this is a way of avoiding bad thoughts and anxieties) and forgetting to eat. But also, food just makes me feel nauseous, and every time I have to stand in front of the fridge and decide what to do it fills me with dread. Like, I don't like "wasting" time making food. Every second of the day feels overly precious, like I must do something, and I always feel like I have not done enough. It's a toxic mentality that doesn't afford me time to just be, it turns me into a machine that does things. But it also offers me security and something to do to take my mind off of... this. But this brings me back to food, I've literally been seeing food as a waste of time, cooking food as a chore. I hate that I devalue my own health that way.

I can't completely change myself to a more healthy mindset. But I hate being stuck on this autopilot of feelings and tendencies. I don't hate myself, but I hate what I've become, and I hate the fear. Talking to people helps me feel more normal and functional and keeps the fear at bay, and I've been talking to people more lately. But it's something deeper that I must confront eventually. It's just... this quarantine. Has been so awful for my mental health. Beyond the depression and anxiety and profound lonliness I feel like I've lost a part of myself, my executive function, in fact I'm terrified that I've lost a part of myself and that I will continue to throughout my life until there's none of me left and I'm a senile old lady. All the paranoia, the false ideas, the detachment from reality, the social anxiety, floating in the void void void void

Positive things? I know I'm going to school soon. I'll see friends soon. Going to work means I have to interact with people, which keeps me grounded. And going to school means being away from my parents, and being able to find who I am away from them, and getting therapy without them hovering over me. It all sounds good just, anxiety hovers over all of these ideas, anticipatory anxiety. Smaller things, I bought a new flavor of potato chips I like. They're some kind of hawaiian themed brand. My blankets are very soft and warm. My friend and I are getting into the habit of calling and talking every day. I'm in the habit of drawing almost every day now, though this is affected by my problems of hyperfixation; I either hyperfixate on drawing all day for one day or hyperfixate on something else and don't draw for a couple days. I want to draw over the next couple days, at least a little bit. 

Edit: I'm feeling better now. Dumping my thoughts helps me feel lighter mentally and assures me that I'm still conscious, aware, and myself. I'm realizing things aren't as bad currently as they seem, and I may just be going through another dip in my overall boom and bust cycle of emotions and habits. I wish I didn't have a boom and bust cycle at all and that I could feel okay.

I'm noticing trends in my thoughts and pointing them out to myself, and it makes me feel more reassured in my own validity and my own "expertise" in the scientific field of me. I've been through these things a million times. A lot of the times I use that thought to beat myself up for not knowing better. But I also have a lot of knowledge inside me on how to deal with it. I dunno, I don't want to overreach my positivity. I've been better at avoiding that recently, I try to curb the "boom" where I'm overly positive, almost manic, an set expectations for the test of the time that I can't reach (during the "bust"). 

What expectations do I want for myself this week? I just want to follow my schedule and get everything decently done and on time. I also want to make sure I'm taking care of myself and getting properly hydrated, fed and keeping up with my hygeine. I've been better at showering at regular times lately! Another thing I wanted to do this week was draw a little bit every day. Maybe that's too many things. 

I do want to do daily journalling too. Just for, memory and checking in with myself purposes. Because I'm so forgetful and out of it, it could be good for grounding. But I can see building that habit becoming a target of anxiety as well. I shouldn't let it stop me but god, the daily anxiety is so painful. I have no real way to cope with it beyond loafing and being lazy, playing games and the like for hours. 

Wait, that's the normal day to deal with stress. Why did I think that was abnormal and wrong? Yikes. This is the kind of stuff I want to journal for. Putting things down in writing takes them out of my head and into a place where I can judge more accurately. Plus having a record for my memory would be nice, though I wish I would remember to go back and read the old ones too. A lot of the times I don't want to because so many of them are painful, and I don't want to relive it.