Blog it out. Part 1.
Alright, time to vent. And time for a little self-honesty. It may not be pretty, but it’s necessary. Let’s do it.
On a side note, this blog is and will remain PG-13 (maybe R for language), and I’m fully aware that everything I write can be read by anyone. You wanna make fun of me for it, you go right ahead. I’ve got nothing to hide.
End side note.
Today is the second day in a row and the (at least) sixth day this semester that I didn’t go to any classes. My roommate has stopped asking questions when she enters the room and finds me still in bed at 3 in the afternoon. Obviously, this is a problem. I can’t keep missing classes like this.
It’s become a vicious cycle. For the longest time I thought that perhaps I was simply nocturnal. But as I delve a little deeper inside myself I think I can pinpoint the cause of the problem.
But the problem with the problem is that I’m not supposed to blame my mental disorders for the bad things that happen in my life. So… in order to identify the problem, I have to… blame my mental disorders. It makes no sense. But then again, nothing in my life ever makes sense.
It boils down to this.
Problem #1: My anxiety disorder is kicking, hard. Part of this is my fault. I’m feeding the fire by remaining disorganized, not writing everything down, procrastinating, and basically keeping the same habits I’ve held for the past four years. So then, surprise surprise, I become overwhelmed by the volume of stuff I have to do, all the things I can’t seem to remember, etc., and my body and brain, in order to combat the impending major panic attack, go into “sleep mode”, literally. I have sudden feelings of exhaustion, and I can’t focus on anything. Basically, I end up having to take a nap before I can think about trying to get anything accomplished. This leads to
Problem #2: Because I nap for several hours in the day, I can’t sleep at night. At least, that’s one of the reasons I can’t sleep at night. I’ll get to the other one momentarily. But yeah, this one’s pretty self-explanatory. I’m fucking up my sleep schedule.
Problem #3: Even if I’m completely and totally exhausted at night, I can’t shut my brain off. I lay there in bed and the thoughts keep coming a mile a minute and no matter what I try, I can’t get my brain to shut off. Music (for once) doesn’t help, keeping the TV on has the exact opposite effect of what I need it to, I’ve tried counting both down from and up to 100, counting sheep, focusing on a one-word mantra, and a slew of other sleep-inducing techniques. I haven’t tried sleeping pills. The last time I had this problem whatever doctor I was seeing at the time had me try Melatonin, which is basically an herbal sleeping supplement-type thing. It worked for getting me to sleep, but, as with most sleeping pills, left me extremely groggy the next morning. And obviously I’m having enough trouble getting up in the morning as it is. So that’s out. Thus, what ends up happening is that I give up on trying to sleep and screw around on the computer until about 3 am, and then my head finally gives in to my exhaustion and I knock out. This leads to
Problem #4: I’m too damn tired in the mornings to get out of bed. Why? See Problems 2 and 3.
Problem #5: The other, more important reason I can’t get out of bed (cause even if I’m tired, I should still be able to force myself up): I’m depressed. Have been all summer, and most of the second semester of my senior year. I’ve been ignoring it, mostly cause I’m sick and tired of dealing with it, but I know now that I have to, or I’m going to keep fucking myself over, which will lead to further depression, and I’ve been down that road too many times. I have the scars and the hospital bills to prove it.
So now that I’ve established that I’m still suffering from depression, I need to establish why. So, I think it’s list time. See you in Part 2.
