strixalba

I emailed my boss at my shitty job (as opposed to the one I mostly like) to say I will not be at work tomorrow because frankly, I am not in a great place mentally. I haven’t been in a great place for weeks, and it’s been a struggle since August. I am trying to be more open while simultaneously fighting the urge to bundle everything away like a spider so that no one will know what’s going on and I won’t be a needy person because I have some hangups about that. I take pride in not oversharing. I want to be strong and stoic and someone who helps, not someone who needs help.

Which … the end result has been that I am lonely and terrified of reaching out to anyone verbally or physically even though I am desperate for both company and affection. I am working on it, I’m working on it, but also I’m applying to grad school and dealing with the logistics of that (they suck! a lot! my previous grad school has a pain-in-the-ass computer system and they will not mail me my transcripts, so I need to have a friend pick it up and FedEx it to me so I can get it translated! my undergraduate advisor has not answered an email in over a year and I desperately need her recommendation! the GOP’s shitty tax plan might make it even more difficult to pay for grad school, which, fuck you Paul Ryan!) and I have medications to maintain, and meanwhile, I can’t be alone for more than a few hours before I start spiraling which is fucking lovely; and my babci died which is partially a relief (she’d been slowly succumbing to dementia for 15 years and it was hard on my dad, a lot) and partially an unmooring (she was my last living grandparent) and also meant that I drove for 3.5 hours each way to get to her memorial service yesterday and I am exhausted emotionally and physically from that. I’m tired of telling people. I’m tired of calling her my grandmother because that’s not the right word.

Talking to anyone about anything remotely personal - including writing, my opinions about anything, making plans - makes me so anxious, it’s like having strings from my shoulders and neck and hips drawn back and pulled tight into a knot in my back. I have been having weird back spasms the entire time I’ve been writing this post. But I feel invisible and muted and I don’t know what else to do besides yammer about it, even if it’s only on the internet.