Okay so I really always post these types of blogs late where no one will see them but lemme go into this!
I have spoken out about mental health on this site before. I am fairly open with my struggles, although I struggle with talking about them until after they pass. It is super hard for me to talk about what I am feeling as I go through it. Those who interact with me often on Skype and Zoom know that a little bit ago I went very MIA for about a month. During this "time in the wilderness", I was maybe at one of the lowest points I had ever been. I have had 3 major emotional "crashes."
The first one happened in February 2019 when my college decision was not what I wanted. Me, as an impoverished prospective student, could not handle that setback. It shook me so profoundly. I allowed myself to determine my worth based on what schools accepted or rejected me. My TTM got really bad at this time.
For those of you unaware, TTM has been a struggle of mine for awhile. I have mentioned it in other blogs like this but essentially TTM or trichotillomania is a disorder characterized by hair plucking. It can be connected to anxiety or OCD but exact cause is something that is contested among experts.
My second major crash came shortly after 2020 New Year's (and the rest of the world seemed to crash shortly after!). It was for very little reason. I just sort of shut down.
This most recent crash was likely the longest and the darkest. Without a strict school schedule to adhere to, I lost track of my sleep schedule and began coming on Zooms less and less. I spent most of my time absolutely alone and with no one awake to talk to since my sleep schedule was very much inverted. The online friends that helped me a lot at the beginning of quarantine slipped away because I just sort of shut them out. During this time, I struggled a lot with appreciating myself and understanding my accomplishments and I just got so low that I did not know how to get out. I convinced myself that I didn't deserve happiness and was not capable of being a consistent partner so I mutually broke things off with my longtime girlfriend.
"Impostor syndrome (also known as impostor phenomenon, impostorism, fraud syndrome or the impostor experience) is a psychological pattern in which one doubts one's accomplishments and has a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as a 'fraud'."
Above is something that I think describes my feelings and where I was at and, unfortunately, where I am still at. I feel as if no matter what I do, I am trapped in the same place. It feels as if nothing I do matters and none of my accomplishments matter. Part of me knows that I am appreciated. Hell, I had multiple close friends from this community reach out to me during my month of shutting everyone out. Yet, it feels like I learned nothing from that. I have this constant, deep-seated urge to revert back to that state. And I don't want to do that. I REALLY don't want to do that but for the past week or two I feel like all I have to do is drop off of the face of the planet again and it is whatever.
I do not really have some great ending thesis to this blog all except that I wanted to type this out and get these thoughts out there so that perhaps I can work through them and get better at talking about them while I am going through them. And also, I am around to talk if anyone is dealing with these type of feelings. And be kind to each other. Because there is a lot weighing on people, especially this year, and you aren't just interacting with some ugly TG avi, you are interacting with a person.
Hopefully I get out of this ditch eventually but for now, I think this is it.
+ also I have been dealing with bad headaches lately so that does not help
Comments
and if there are any typos in this thing - I tried to get these thoughts out as quickly as possible so I am sure even if I made a silly mistake, I am sure you can infer what I meant.
