Stifled Tears

I feel emotionally all blocked up, like a stuffy nose. For a while I've been feeling like I want to cry, but I fight it every time. The only times I've come close was while watching Avengers: Infinity War (oh, I'd talk about this, but spoilers), and a clip for a uni assignment that followed the story of a young girl in foster care. And of course, that feels like fake crying anyway.

I turned 21 four days ago, not that that has had an impact on anything. I had been looking forward to my 21st for about a year, but when it finally came, I was so sick of hearing about it that I was glad for it to be over. Actually, I don't know why I brought that up. That has pretty much nothing to do with anything.

But no matter. I feel like eventually it'll get the better of me. I won't be able to stifle the tears further, and they'll just force themselves out. And, I mean, it's not entirely me holding them back. Many times I've wanted to cry, but just couldn't. It's a frustrating cycle. When I can cry, it's not an appropriate time or place. When it is acceptable to cry, I can't.

I don't know what's going to happen. For now, I guess I'll just continue on in this numb state.

~SA

The Persistent Dark

I had quite a good day today. I got the filming done for my next assignment, which means that the hard part is done. I spent the day with two of my good friends. All-in-all, it wasn't a bad day.

But it just lurks in the background, waiting for any opportunity to rear its ugly head. As soon as I'm alone for a few moments, that feeling starts coming back. It doesn't even need to voice itself anymore. I recognise the feeling before it speaks its words.

No matter, I'm not going to focus on that. I'm not even going to focus on the long list of assignments that are decorating my whiteboard. I'm going to focus on what I have done, and the very next step. If I look at everything, I'll be overwhelmed and give up. But in this way, I can see that I've made a little step, and that I can make another little step. If I can break down assignments like this, I no longer have a pile of assignments staring at me, but rather, a series of small, easy-to-manage tasks that don't take up too much time.

***

My friend bought an electric piano this week, and she has been using it as a reward, since I am so in love with music. We've set up a schedule when I'm over: work and study for half an hour, then music break for five minutes. It seems to be quite effective, so I'm thankful for that. Perhaps I should do all of my assignments there. No, that won't work. She doesn't have internet, which will pose a problem. But as for typing and drafting, that doesn't tend to require research (and thankfully so - research is always my least favourite part of assignmenting. I have no idea where to start!).

Hmm, this feeling deep inside me doesn't look like it will let up any time soon. Perhaps I should just take an early night, and start again tomorrow.

One Step at a Time

"Be gone, you filth!" ~Revellers, Diary of a Muse

That line comes from a musical my teacher wrote for us in school. At the time we thought it just a funny line, but now it has meaning for me. Perhaps not the intended meaning, but meaning nonetheless.

I should be in bed, since I'm working all day tomorrow. I'm procrastinating. And I'll complain later that I don't have enough time for anything, but in reality, I'm here, typing away on my pointless blog when I should be asleep.

Here's the thing: I have an assignment due on Monday next week. It's a video and involves a "student". I'm not even going to try to explain it here, since I frankly don't understand what I'm doing as it is. Oh, and it's the same course that I failed the assignment in the other day, so I'm already playing catch-up.

But it's due Monday next week, so I have a week tomorrow. Tomorrow I'm working all day, though I may be able to get some done tomorrow night. Tuesday I have uni all day. Wednesday morning I'm working, but since it's ANZAC Day, I don't have uni, so I'll have most of the day free then. Thursday I'm busy with uni and an appointment until mid afternoon, at which point I'll have to film, since that is when my "student" is free. Friday I'm working all day again. Saturday is my stupid birthday (yay, happy 21st to me (note the sarcasm)), and though I might have the morning free, the afternoon is booked. And Sunday I'll have a few hours in the middle of the day.

The thing is, it's more than just filming. I think have to critique it, have someone else critique it, and critique someone else's video. So I cannot leave it until the last minute!

Oh, but that is completely irrelevant for me right now. Right now, I should be asleep. Right now, I shouldn't be focusing on anything other than being ready for work tomorrow. As a good friend of mine said, I need to take this one step at a time.

A Trigger of a Course

This course is just stressing me out. It's the same course that I failed an assignment for. This course should be easy. All the content in it is so incredibly basic. None of this is new to me, and it all makes sense.

But for some reason, every time I even see the course code on my whiteboard, I freak out and start to feel that familiar feeling drift over me.

Maybe it's because I failed. Or maybe there's another reason. I mean, it is written in orange, which is one of my least favourite colours. But that seems too superficial to be creating an anxiety trigger. Perhaps I'm over-worked and just need a break. But the thought of taking a break from uni is even more stressful - after all, if I take a break now with my many assignments already starting to pile up, when I am finished my break, it'll be an even bigger problem with even less time to fix it.

I honestly can't wait for uni break, but that's in June. Oh, only two months away, sure, but that just emphasises my lack of time.

I should probably be working on it now instead of typing here, but my brain is refusing to take in any more information. I can't focus on my assignments, and I certainly can't focus on that course. Unfortunately, the next assignment that I have due is for that course. And that is in less than a week and a half away.

Certainly, I'm going to have to get it done. I can't afford to not do it, because I don't think I'll be able to pass the course without it! But part of me is just wanting to give up. Part of me feels like it's all too much, like I am never going to be any good at it. Oh, I was amazingly brilliant at everything in school, especially primary school, but university is a completely different game, and one that I cannot seem to work out the rules for.

No matter. For now, I need to pack up anyway. It's all too much for me, and I need to be awake again in just over seven hours so I can get to work.

~SA

Please Stop

I don't want to be here. Please, just go away. Please. Stop making me shake. Stop waking me in the night into another attack. Stop making my heart pound so hard that my body rocks with each beat. Stop making me feel like I'm going to throw up. Stop making even the slightest pain so intense for me. Stop making me cry! I don't want to cry. I haven't yet, despite the countless times you've filled my eyes with tears. I haven't given in, and I won't.

I won't give in. I'm strong. I can stay independent. I can fight this. I don't need help.

Except I do. I do need help. I need help. I can't keep pretending to everyone that I'm okay. Because I'm not. I'm not okay.

But I can't tell anyone.

I have no one to tell. Or I do, but they're busy. And I don't want to talk to anyone else. Certainly not my family. Certainly not my dad. He doesn't understand. Maybe I'm not as close to him as I used to be. I don't know. I really don't know. Or maybe we never were as close as I thought we were. Well, I'm not as close with one of my best friends as I thought I was. Because she doesn't see me as one of her best friends. Perhaps my fears about people only tolerating me are true. Maybe I'm too quick to trust people, to let people in, let them close. Maybe I'm too dependent upon everyone.

I know I am. Oh, but I cannot stop being dependent. I am needy, too needy. I need people. But they're all busy. Busy with their lives. They have enough to deal with without having to deal with me, with my issues.

With me. Me. That's the biggest issue of all. Me.

I can't let anyone in. It'll just scare them away. They already see me as a burden. I'm a burden. I'm someone to have pity on, and be nice to because you're a polite person. No one actually likes me. I'm just tolerated. That's all I can be. No one can like, let alone love, me. Because I'm nothing. I'm a mess. An absolute mess.

***

I failed an assignment. I worked really hard on it, and even handing it in four days early. Many other assignments I've handed in weeks late and part finished, and pass, but this assignment was easy. I finished it early and did it well. But I got 45% on it. Maybe I wasn't trying hard enough. No. I wasn't. I didn't try hard enough. I didn't try at all. I'm no good at uni. I was amazing in school, but I can't get through university. I'm wasting my time and my money. I'm wasting my lecturers' time. I'm wasting my life. No, my life is a waste. I don't know why I thought I could do this. I can't.

I handed in another assignment last night, and instead of feeling that sense of relief, I just felt more anxious.

I've been having super vivid dreams lately, so vivid that they wake me up and trigger an anxiety attack.

Normally the anxiety goes away overnight, and I wake in the morning, still tired, but no longer anxious. But now the anxiety is just mounting, even as I sleep. I'm not getting a break from it.

That's the other thing. I can't sleep. Or I can sleep, but I don't feel refreshed when I wake. My sleep pattern is completely ruined, and I range from four to ten hours of sleep at night. But no matter how much sleep I get or don't get, I am still tired when I wake, to the point where my eyes sting.

I've become incredibly sensitive to pain and heat, and I'm easily jump-scared because I'm always tense and on edge. I've noticed that my heartbeat is so intense that it makes my entire body rock.

I'm not well. It's not quite nausea, more that unsettled feeling again. But it's almost nausea, almost like I'm going to throw up.

I don't know what to do anymore. I'm at my end. I just want it all to stop. I just want it to stop.

~SA

Pushing the Boundaries

I'm pushing it. I know I am. I have an assignment due on Tuesday. It's Saturday night, and I have wasted today completely. Oh, not completely. I completed a quiz this morning. But aside from those twenty minutes, I've done nothing except play games and create audio mixes on Ambient Mixer (another plug: ambient-mixer.com is incredible, and perfect for creating that perfect background study sound).

But that's beside the point. The point is, I've spent all day doing nothing. I'm heading to bed now, since our church service is early tomorrow morning, which means I have a few hours tomorrow, a few hours Monday (because I'm working all day), and a few hours Tuesday (because I'm at uni all day). I still need to get all my research together for this! Oh, that was so silly of me. And the whole time I knew this would come back to bite me. I have no one to blame but myself.

I'm not worried, though. This part of the assignment is 400 words, so research really is the only thing I have to tackle. For me, writing the words is super easy. The pain in the neck is finding the literature to back it up.

I think I was procrastinating today because I've found some authors that I would like to reference, but I need to actually read their stuff. And I haven't read for a long while. I used to be a bookworm, but one day I finished a book, put it down, and never bothered to pick another up. I think it ruined books for me. Yes, I'm looking at you, The Lord of the Rings... Anyway, I'm getting off-topic again.

Well, I had better work out my plan for tackling the rest of this assignment. I should have enough time between the morning and evening services to get most of the hideous reading done. After all, it's early service tomorrow morning, so I gain another two hours afterwards. And then it shouldn't be too much of a deal to write it up on Monday night after work, finalising everything on Tuesday. My goal this semester was to not hand anything in late, and so far I am making that goal! That is, four assessment pieces submitted so far with a success rate of 100% for being on time or early! Last year I I only submitted two things on time, and one of those had an extension anyway, so it doesn't count. So I am so excited to be meeting my goal so far! I can't let this assignment break this streak!

Anyway, I should be getting to bed. No good sitting up all night writing out plans, if I'm not rested enough to carry them out!

~SA

Music

It's been quite a while since I last wrote, so I think there may be a lot to catch up on. That said, I can't think of anything specific.

This past week has been pretty low for me, with yesterday and today being the peak of my emotional mess. I've been struggling with insecurities and social anxiety, and it's been getting in the way of my relationships.

The past month, in fact, has been terrible as far as sleep is concerned. A good friend of mine suggested playing music on a timer until I fall asleep. I tried it the past four nights. The first and third times it worked quite well, and I felt refreshed when I awoke, though I still got really tired quite quickly throughout the day. The second night it didn't work at all, though that may have been because I was distracted by something. And last night I had to turn it off because it was actually making me anxious. So it seems to be quite hit-and-miss.

I am currently listening to one song on repeat through my headphones, and it is putting me in a state of absolute bliss. The song is called Zen Mode (YouTube link here), and is from the soundtrack of a game called Alto's Adventure (web link here). And yes, this game gets a plug. It is actually quite helpful for me to de-stress, though it doesn't have 100% success rate. Nothing does. But for now, the music has lifted the anxiety, and I feel a little freer.

I have an assignment due in just under a week. It's not a big assignment - the first section is essentially note-taking, and the second is only 400 words - but I have no idea how to tackle it. I probably need a good night's sleep, and to sit down in front of it again tomorrow with a clear head and a cup of Earl Grey tea. It shouldn't take more than a day or two at most to get it knocked over.

I also have a quiz for another course that opens over the weekend. I find quizzes and exams and the like to be relatively easy and stress-free. You sit down, answer the questions, and are done. There isn't a long and drawn-out process of finalising each section, of planning and drafting, and all the other things that go along with essays. There's one right answer and a bunch of wrong answers. That is all. No grey areas. No "Well maybe in this scenario, but you could do this better." None of that. Just straight, black-and-white, right or wrong answers. It appeals to my strangely analytical mind.

I say strange because I tend to be quite creative. I don't even pretend to understand for a moment why I absolutely adore maths so much when my brain works in music and literature. Keeps things interesting, I guess. And it makes me just that little bit more unique.

~SA