Please help

[JellyfishOnStilts]

I feel tired and unmotivated all the time. I keep thinking that I'm worthless and I'll never amount to anything. I spend a lot of time idly wishing that I was dead, or that I'd never been born. I've been trying to keep up with university and chores and a social life, but all I want to do is sleep or watch TV or surf the internet. Even though I'm tired all the time, I keep going to bed later than I should, because I hate the thought of lying awake in bed with nothing to distract me. Every time I even think about all of my responsibilities, I start panicking because it all seems so huge and impossible. Every little step along the way turns into a three-hour hike.

It got worse after I broke up with my boyfriend a couple of months ago - he was the only person I could really talk to about this sort of thing. The break-up has been really messy - every time I feel like I'm getting used to it, something else complicates it and I'm taken back to square one. I feel really lonely now that I've lost that relationship, but every time someone tries to reach out to me, I feel like I say the wrong thing.

I can't talk to any of my friends or family about all of this. I know they care, but I don't think they'd really understand, and I'd just be bringing them down with me. My parents have their jobs and lives back in my hometown. I have a few friends from high school who go to university in the same city as me - I live in a share house with a couple of them - but I'm not really close enough to any of them to feel comfortable burdening them. I don't want to be a downer, and I don't think they want to be around a downer, so I try to act happy when I'm around them. I usually do feel a bit better after I've been with my friends, but I'm kind of introverted and I always feel too nervous to initiate any contact, so I don't talk to them much, with the exception of my roommates. I haven't really made any new friends at university. I know it's selfish, but I keep thinking that I'm never going to get another boyfriend at this rate, and then I keep thinking that I'm going to have to keep being lonely for the rest of my life, and I can see it stretching out ahead of me and it just seems so pointless. Especially after having really, genuinely loved someone, who I honestly believed I was going to spend the rest of my life with. I feel like I've lost that, and my future really doesn't make any sense to me any more. I've given up on having a career that I care about, my parents will die long before I do, and my brother and my friends will all develop their own lives and leave me behind. What will I have left when that happens?

I was seeing a therapist in my hometown over the Christmas holidays, and it helped a bit. I decided to use the counselling services at my university, but they're swamped with people. I had one appointment about three weeks ago, and I was due to have another one today, but the lady I was supposed to see is sick, and they had to reschedule it for another two weeks time. I understand why they had to do that, and I'm not upset that they did, but at the same time, I feel like I can't handle this on my own. Two weeks seems like such a long time.

Sorry for the long, whiny post. I guess I kind of don't know what to do, and I don't really have anyone I can reach out to in real life any more, so I decided to throw it into the internet in the hope that it might help. I've been trying to convince both myself and other people that I'm fine, but truth be told, I've been feeling kind of desperate lately. This is something of a last resort.

[Neil_1]

Hi there JellyfishOnStilts  

Welcome to Beyond Blue and well done to you for coming here and providing your first post.  That’s a very good and positive step that you’ve done and your post is full of good detail as well which will help the wonderful people who post here and respond to posts a lot more – kind of the more information the better (within reason, of course).   I really love your name … would love to know the origin of it??  I may have to abbreviate it though as tis a bit long to keep typing out, hmmmm, Jfos ??  I guess that’s not too bad!?  🙂 

Oh and please, there’s no need to ever apologise on this site – you can feel absolutely free to write whatever you wish and it won’t be considered anything BUT a very important post.  

With all that you’ve been through and how things are panning out for you at the moment, I really think that you should continue to follow the course of help you chose over the Christmas holidays.  But to take it up where you currently live. 

Jfos, I’m not sure if you have a GP where you currently are, but if no, then on this website, Beyond Blue have provided a large list of GP’s and if you do a search, hopefully you’ll find one or more to choose from in your local area.  The thing with these GP’s are that they are all trained in dealing with mental health issues so they’ll be able to listen and understand  and then take things from there – whether you need a referral to a psych or therapist, they’ll be able to give you the best guidance and advice for you.  

Jfos it does sound like you’re still quite young and in that regard, when we break up from someone, it does feel like one of the worst things in the world and it does take a while to get over – but please believe me, you will move on in time. 

Now crops up a new issue that I’ve found from you – that you’re thinking at this point in time that you ‘need’ to have a partner to progress onwards in life.  But can I just say that for all the people who are together and in relationships, there’s also a hell of a lot of people who aren’t and there’s a theory going that the people who are in relationships sometimes wish they were single and the ones who are single, wish they were in relationships. 

Theories are interesting – hey, so are analogies, but I can’t come up with any analogies at this point in time.  Sorry, slight digression there.  

Jfos my main advice to you is to continue on with your uni … and potentially take one of your good friends aside and talk to them about how you are feeling – maybe do this AFTER you arrange and have your GP appointment – as they may have appropriate advice on how to approach your friend.  And IF they are a genuine friend they will stick by you and support you. 

And with regard to the relationship situation, just keep on going along – to uni, to visit your GP, etc … because you will absolutely NEVER know when someone special might just happen into your life.  

Jfos, I hope that my post has provided something beneficial to you and please it’d be great to hear back from you as well.  

Kind regards  

Neil