Just the thing

To be perfectly honest, I'm not doing very well right now. I simply have no time to process "all of the shit" that is raised in doing my current course. All of the other factors (poor nutrition, poor self-care and now poor sleep) have joined together in another pre-psychotic chorus. Did I mention I'm treading water with my relationship? And my parents still haven't called since I told them Drew and I separated?

It could be worse. I at least recognise the early warning signs now, and I know how to manage it on an emergency basis. But this isn't a fire. This is my life, and I cannot keep this up. God forbid something truly catastrophic happens. I nearly broke down in Tesco when I couldn't find the vegetable oil.

I've already taken a hiatus from a few life ambitions and now I'm weighing up more long-term options for how to cope:

(1) Decrease hours at work (again) but also this time decrease responsibilities. Major con: loss of income (that we desperately need).

(2) Change jobs to working with CYP so that I can quit volunteering and get my weekends back. Major con: loss of income (again), but also stress of managing change.

(3) Quit my masters course. Major con: losing a life ambitions.

(4) Death. I wish I were being funny, but sometimes it does feel like I'm stressing myself to death: the poor physical health, the obesity. Other times it feels like I'm already dead. Major con: losing all life ambitions.

How do I ask for help when asking for help is more traumatic than going it alone? ...when being seen, being held, being loved... these are the very things that hurt me most?

I'm trying to make sense of myself. I have a deep empathy but no experience of caring. They aren't the same thing. They are not the same thing at all.

Can I change my stripes?

Can any of us change our stripes? This is the question that hangs on every discussion: that passes between our eyes, that our fingers rub into the papers on our laps. All of this knowledge. All of this therapy. All of this unpinning of our human condition.

Is it too late for me?

Will I, stripped of my defences, always find pain underneath? Will it always be grief behind the next door? Do I lack the reserves, lack the desire, lack the ability to sustain a connection to you?

These are unanswerable questions. But in our minds, how we feel about them matters. It makes the difference between hope and despair.

I feel like a monster.

I feel like a monster, because I am, in part, a monster. Inside me, part of me, defining me, is a reflection of the face that the world turned to me. And for me, that face was either silent, prescriptive or abusive.

Even in my silence (especially in my silence), I feel like a monster. I am a monster and I am becoming more chimeric every day, as I hacksaw these unacceptable pieces of me and stitch on new ones.

I don't know how to do this. Be me. I just know that part of that means being uncomfortable. Part of that means being anxious. Being afraid and alone, and with everyone against me. Or maybe not everyone. Except sometimes it might very well mean everyone. Today, it feels like everyone.

I need help.

But that's just the thing. What exactly does 'help' mean?