Vent

TL;DR:
Overly-personal venting about health frustrations, mental health, and [TRIGGER WARNING] ideation of escapism.

It's not important or anything anyone must know—so although I appreciate that you've cared enough to click into here, please feel free to close the page and don't worry. <3 Ultimately things are fine!

For the first time, I've turned off replies because I don't want to burden anyone's kindhearted soul with having to comfort me or talk about such draining things. ; ; Thank you so much though if the thought crossed your mind.

This one truly is a raw diary entry that I'm not sure if should be posted (albeit not my first time broaching such topics here) but I'm hoping it's a turning point and something to be looked back on when things improve. Emphasis on when!

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Simply put, there's been another downturn in the state of my mental health in the past few weeks. Frustration with my health kept piling higher and higher, energy depleting, motivation and enjoyment of anything down, anxiety and all of the bad feelings up, and that nasty Voice of the Void (whom I randomly nicknamed Fred starting today but open to new names) coming back at annoying frequency... louder and louder.... So loud that it's what I think about often, the source of much regretted tearshed...

It is not hard to figure out where this voice is coming from though. Of course there'll be a dip in mental health following that of physical health and lack of exercise.

Very frustrated that getting bitten by some unknown bug to which I'm apparently allergic has managed to fuck up my ankle for over three weeks. How is this possible!? Pain is gone now, but there's still discomfort that gets easily triggered. Because of this and the stiffness of ankle joint, I've been driving using my left foot—and gotten pretty darn good at it! Part of the lengthy injury is my fault though, as it had started feeling better enough that I overdid it while working onsite at con two weeks ago, walked too much, too fast, too many stairs, didn't want to admit my pain at first, and also wore leggings not knowing that I shouldn't have been wearing anything constricting... 😔 New blisters formed next to my healing ones which is freaking insane?! After the perceived recovery, I plan to take it easy for a bit afterwards to prevent yet another renewal.

But ugh, not that long ago I wrote about how I started taking frequent walks and occasionally jogging to improve my health and work towards my body goals—complete wrench thrown in the momentum I had. Could barely even walk around the house, stopped exercising, can't go to my friend's kpop dance classes that I'd meant to start attending... Honestly should have been doing upper body workouts but no energy.

Getting even more trivially personal now (venting post!) but I'm also anemic, been taking iron since mid last year, and decided to try putting a pause on it after reading that iron can cause various digestive issues that I have: including acid reflux. Evidently I was overly confident/hasty because my blood pressure and energy levels dropped extremely low and still haven't improved yet. 😭 Everything is a cycle of evilness.

I'm so tired and sleepy all the time even when not doing anything, been spending more time in bed than usual, then when I do have obligations I'm absolutely exhausted. So I anxiously dread those times knowing how it's going to make me feel. Stress rises. Stress causes all the things. Stress also worsens acid reflux :D which consequently irritates my throat!

Frustrated that it feels like I'm not allowed to do things without compromising my health. Throat not in great condition, so I haven't really sang or done voicework in over a month. I love food but gotta watch what and how much I eat due to acid reflux. Constantly dealing with dry eyes and eye strain, which puts a damper on all my hobbies, work, playing games—and unfortunately my job requires intense eye usage so it's hard to manage. :c Actually recently started a new dry eye treatment since my previous one failed, this one involving a nasal spray... and that's also causing throat irritation, sigh, so wondering if I should drop it. Again my ankle has limited activities and the amount that I go outside, which I've already struggled with since working from home... There's just been a lot of wallowing in my room feeling physically crappy surrounded by self pity and deprecating thoughts at a time when I needed to be touching grass and seeking fresh perspectives.

Admittedly dramatic but it really just felt like, what the hell is left for me to do? There's nothing I enjoy or can look forward to?? I can handle having a lot of obligations if allowed to break up the pacing with rewards—whether gratifying feelings, food, enjoyable activities, comfort—but when there's nothing with which to reward yourself... it just feels like ... forcing oneself to exert effort amongst bleakness and dread. It's hard to find motivation in this state.

Been thinking I wish I had goals to burn for with that spark of passion or ambition or desire. It's true that I've accomplished some stuff but self deprecating thoughts keep finding reasons to feel guilt and anxiety that overwhelm all other feelings.

Trying to fix one health issue keeps causing other issues and when you're in that perfect festering ground for negative thoughts, you start wondering whether your body even wants you to be functional or not. Also hard for me to relax or make progress in meditation when taking deep breaths causes discomfort in my post-surgery lung; that always ruins my mood. Though it may sometimes feel like everything crashing down, I would like to be more grateful though that my health isn't worse than it is..... My rather petty ailments are nothing compared to more serious matters and I am truly lucky that recovery is possible. ;;

I hate that the Voice of the Void came back in such a way that was deeply intrusive, and that it had the power of making me cry so many times. For reference this is what I wrote at the end of 2019:

If there's a learning I'd want to tell my past self regarding mental health, it'd be to not fear or embrace The Voice of The Void. Especially when I'm driving, I often encounter extremely negative disruptions in my thoughts—the "demon in my head" I used to call it, who always gives the worst fucking advice ever. Why is it so obsessed with wanting to see a car drive into a railing for no reason? Why is it so obsessed with me?? It's been many years, I don't carry suicidal ideologies anymore, my life is developing brilliantly, I have things to live for, I have a great support network, I'm a lot more in tune with myself than before, I usually want to make it to my destination.

But although it stops being as loud and obnoxious, the Voice doesn't go away. It made the world of difference when I finally started recognizing that it was not my true voice; it may be in my head but it's not me. Since the disowning, I've learned to drown it out and it's even become this sort of Mental Boy Who Cried Wolf like, "oh you're back! haha you say that but I know you don't mean it lololol nice try but I can't be tricked anymore, silly!"

 

This breach in my mental strength has me seriously considering this time whether I should try to see a therapist, and honestly part of my motive for writing this post is for my own reference. I know that the Voice is not me. Yet sometimes in the moment it didn't sound...entirely disagreeable. Sometimes I rolled my eyes and thought, you know what, maybe I'd be okay with not arriving at my destination. There's so many things I'd love to escape from dealing with; the future and course of life terrify me. It even presented an almost convincing argument that...well, everyone around me is at such an independent situation in their lives right now that they would probably live on perfectly fine without me. It is true that now is perhaps the time this is closest to the truth than it'd ever been, a scary line of reasoning. Maybe they'd even be relieved to not have to be burdened with my flaws or poor company. I think me telling myself these things was what hurt the most. I know though, I always try to remember in the end, that I'm beloved and cared for and very fortunate and have countless wonderful things ahead of me and lovely people rooting for me. ❤️ ;;; After a lot of reluctance I finally opened up to someone about these thoughts yesterday and they also assured me that I enrich the lives of others and how much I mean to them, so don't worry—I'm hearing the reminders both internally and externally.

I am louder than the ideation! Fred you idiot, you don't know anything!!!!

Then there's the question: is this possibly caused by a chemical or hormone imbalance? Part of the reason I've never sought therapy is because my lapses are typically just that—part of a fluctuation or very easily linked to lack of exercise, stress, or some sort of medication. This post was written over two days and today I'm emotionally already feeling more stable thankfully. ;u; Opening up, letting it all out, receiving comfort, being able to sort out my thoughts, and come up with solutions and have hope was pretty cathartic. And I finally don't have anything too big coming up to stress me out anymore; been taking on many challenges that've worn me out.

Once my ankle heals, I plan to push myself to exercise, frequently walk, and dance again and praying it helps solve some of my ailments and improves my low energy! I want to pursue more freedom. I want to put myself in places at which I can have joy-sparking experiences whether big or small.

Tomorrow I'll make an appointment for a physical check-up and hope that helps too, though I can already predict they'll attribute everything to exercise, heh.

I've been thinking that I might need a new hobby that I can find relaxing or fun, that won't contribute to eye strain... Don't know what yet; every idea so far I've had some opposition against, but I definitely ought to become more open-minded. This may even involve forcing myself to try things despite currently "not enjoying" them and seeing if after taking the first step, I have a change of heart. Honestly this'll probably be harder than it sounds because I'm going to feel guilty spending time with new activities when I still have things that I owe or want to eventually finish... But at the same time since I feel so constrained from doing anything without compromising my health or sanity, finding a stress-free hobby is probably important?

With some other things I'm not happy with... I really just need to manage my mentality. Learn to let go, be okay with how those things are and just do my part. Stop feeling guilty about taking up space or not delivering/achieving ideal results. Care less about being judged. Worry less at times when nothing can be done. Live more in the moment.

Let's do this~