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This is a tough, very personal entry. It's the anniversary of my move to the capital and I've had a bad day. I discuss self harm, suicide and acts of emotional abuse.
The past decade, from 2013 to 2023, has been the most prominent time period of my life, and it has passed in two halves: The first, full of growth and changes to myself that I did not realized were happening at the time. The second, full of grief and inaction, every skill and desire covered in dust.
I moved from my small rural town to the capital in 2013, for my last two years of high school. It was my first experience meeting other queer people my age, and the friends I made felt monumental, as did the sense of freedom I gained as I learned to navigate public transit on my own, tried to tear down some of my emotional walls and began to be physically affectionate. I felt brave, and new, and my classes were fun and the future was so bright I had to wear safety boots. My first two years of University were just about the same, where I met the people that I thought would shape and remain in my life forever, though only the first of those was true -- I was studying Philosophy, surrounded by people I loved deeply, every week full of countless enriching conversations and world changing lectures. I was so enamored with this reality that when my mental health started to take a turn for the worse, my first thought was that I should hold on to that feeling no matter the cost. I was so desperate to keep things in that lovely haze that I kept my friends trapped in what soon became a self-destructive loop where I, despite my growing desperation, would tell myself that if they still cared about me everything would be okay and I would force them to sit through daily public suicide attempts and constant texting for comfort. I can now look back and understand that what I needed was to be assertive, acknowledge my own suffering, ask for comfort explicitly instead of trying to trick anyone into giving it. But it has taken me almost 8 years to understand that.
The gap that grew between me and all the friends I had made in the first half of the decade was enormous and all-encompassing. I was deeply depressed and what was once self harm to garner attention had become my default response to any distress. I dropped out of University, told myself I would focus on healing, so that I could come back to the world more emotionally regulated, capable of seeing hope in things again. I started talking to a friend from my hometown that ended up becoming my girlfriend for a few years, and through her I made new friends in a tabletop gaming club at her own college. I was so excited for this friendship that I neglected any endeavors that did not involve nurturing it, again leaving my classes by the wayside.
When I started feeling myself slipping into the same kind of depression that tore my University friendships apart, I decided to "be kind" and isolate myself from this group of friends entirely the moment my self-harm habits reared their head. I have been avoiding them for 3 years now.
I am immensely lonely. I did not go back to college. I did not learn how to be a better friend, only how to abandon people due to my own lack of self control. I am unemployed. I have been homeless several times because my lack of financial independence puts too much of a strain on my parents' conscience. I barely sleep an hour at night and then either sleep through the day or enter a dissociative insomnia state for several weeks. Every time I spend my few savings on classes, I stop attending a few weeks in because that exhaustion barely lets me have a routine. I try to quench my anxiety with impulse purchases with money I don't have. I don't know how to get out of this state, if even small attempts to build a routine for basic hygiene and schedules fail. I am desperate and suicidal.
I don't know how to fix my life.