To summarize, I am...

- Taking a rpol break. Again.
- Bought Sims 3: Ambitions (love it, except that one save game crash) and Dragon Age (playing Human Mage path).
- Taking herbal supplements and vitamins while I still lack health care.
- Unsure what's going on with the money I'm owed. I'm STILL waiting indefinitely.
- Still doing Order recruiting duties in DR.
- Really feeling hermit-y right now. :(

I really wish I could work my troubles out and get my priorities straight. Like, I need to exercise more, I need to prepare for college, and generally just take care of myself better. But I feel bad about rpol games suffering, and my time in DR dwindling. I feel bad every time I feel compelled to take time off, so I never truly rest, and it means I have to take small breaks more often.

I feel like people complicate my life, sometimes. When I have to worry about what others think it drives me to distraction. I feel I can't rest, even when I need to. I always feel the need to compare myself to others. I hate that feeling, that I constantly have to prove myself, or feel guilty for not trying or inferior for not being good enough.

The reason I often decide to disappear when stressed is not because I don't want friends. It's because if I don't completely isolate myself, my brain can't rest long enough to just give me the time I desperately need to recharge. I don't think that's healthy, but I don't really know how to change it. I don't have some sort of off switch that will just stop caring about what others want or think of me, or all the myriad things be doing other than paying attention to my own needs.

Eventually it creates frustration and bitterness in me, because I wish sometimes that people would give me the excuse to rest. Please don't tell me what's going on with x or y when I'm trying to distance myself from it. Don't tell me how much you're getting done while I'm trying to "relax", leading me to regret allowing myself the chance. Let me just not think about my obligations, real or imagined. Let me not be reminded of stressful things, and feel refreshed for once.

I wish these things, but two things prevent it from happening. One, I feel self conscious to ask. Two, if I DO ask then it may prevent people from telling me things that are truly emergencies and I NEED to know. I can't even be sure whether people will know the difference between genuine emergency and "you know what, you could really have saved that for another time."

It's like I said. People are complicated. I always feel in these moments like I'd rather be playing the Sims, where I can control all but a few select variables, and even those I could probably control with a cheat. No having to guess what people will do and determine my response to it, or react to things they say that trigger me. No worrying about whether I've offended or disappointed or someone. No thinking I'm useless or forgettable to anyone. Can I ever live in a world where I'm not feeling those things constantly, as long as that world involves other people? I'm really starting to doubt it.

I don't even know whether my problems lately are depression related, anxiety related or are just a sign of how socially maladjusted I am. Or all three. I try to hide the consequences, and most people who meet me think I'm a friendly and great person. But I feel like I've been running on empty for months and I just don't know how else to get that strength back except by disappearing for a while.

Right now I still have too much of a sense of obligation to disappear as long as I need. Unfortunately, all these short hiatuses will never amount to enough to re-energize me, either. I feel like I'm facing a conundrum where I either have to give a great deal of things up, or continue on the path and end up having some sort of major breakdown that decides it for me anyway. All that's left in the matter is whether I decide to choose what I lose, or let my limitations choose for me.

At this point, though, I'll probably have to lose everything in order to gain what I really need: the time and effort needed to improve the quality of my I'm sad to think my rpol games will disappear, or that my DR activities will dwindle, or that my friends (online as they may be) will drift further from me. But all the time I spend paying attention to others, means I am sitting here suffering. I'm continually gaining weight, thus worsening my self image; I'm not going out, thus worsening my social anxiety; I'm not adopting regular, healthy habits like exercising and tidying up more regularly.

I'm just in this stand-still because I'm afraid to lose everything and everyone else I love just to save myself. But why does it have to be a choice so drastic? I know part of the answer--because I never learned how to balance my life between others and self in the first place. I give too much, and left so little for me that when I finally notice I need some "me" time, I need it so critically I have to shut everyone out.

But how I learn that sort of balance is beyond me. All I know is that to learn it, I have to start at zero again. I have to let everything go and pick up only what I can, when I can manage it. No matter if people will be upset or disappointed at me. No matter if I lose opportunities that I otherwise would have wanted. I have to trust that some people will still remember me and stay my friend when it's done. That there will be some place left for me to return to when I've fixed myself up. And if not, that I will have the strength to find, or create new communities to be a part of.

I just can't bring myself to start. Am I being too hasty? Is there another way I haven't found yet? Or am I condemning myself to a life of wishful thinking while my health and sanity dwindles?

I wish there was something to look forward to, too. Like I said, I'm still waiting for the money I'm promised, for my IDs and my health care. All the endless waiting is definitely not helping. As long as those things I've been promised don't come, and I have enough money to subsist on, I feel like there's no point in doing anything of significance. My focus is on survival, not on progress. Progress is this muddy thing, this myth I cling to because I'm too stubborn to believe my life is a dead end at this age.

So the biggest achievements in my life are things like running rpol games or helping out in DR. At least those things involve people, even if it's fictional. Lately, though, all I've been doing is playing Sims 3, and while I enjoy it short term, it makes me feel even MORE worthless in the long run, because it's something I only play with myself. :/

I could write about this for hours, but I'll just be going in circles. So I'll cut it off now and head to bed. (Hey, at least I posted. It's been a while.)