Stress Post

[weirdlet]

So my forbearances are coming to an end, I still have no job, few prospects, and nobody's buying what I have to sell (ie art, although if I could whore meself out the old-fashioned way in order to avoid being forsworn, I would). I'm stressed and frightened and angry, but I've chewed those all over again and again so often the last year or two that it's just kind of a well-worn tread in my head. I'm almost zen at this moment, because I just don't want to make the *effort* to get all riled up and panic-attacky right now.

Sallie Mae probably won't have my legs broke, but it's right there in the friendly little warnings and sidebars all around their site that they will ruin your credit if you don't pay them or have some compelling reason on file with them. I thought by now I'd have a job doing something. I did have a job, but they tossed me out for learning too slow (on- 12 hours average a week? Really, honey.) although to be fair, I'm beginning to realize that mom is right, I do have a learning disability focused on how my ears work and how I retain information that I hear rather than read. I just hate using such things as an excuse for my failings. So face-to-face listening-and-speaking-and-remembering-orders customer service isn't for me.

I'm pissed off at how many different screw-overs have been directed my way by the various establishments I've tried to be a part of. I mean- even the Financial Aid department at my university let me think I had paid for the previous semester, told me 'the paperwork's gone through' which I took as and nobody bothered to correct me on that everything was paid for and the loans were all disbursed and everything. No one said a word to me about having run up against the limit of 'student' rather than private loan- all it would have taken was a simple 'no, I'm sorry, that won't work, why are you filling that one out, it's not for you', and a redirection to some of my other options. Instead, they let me do the wrong thing, and I ended up having to quit the next semester when I went to pay and found I still owed a huge balance. It may be laughable to some people, four thousand, but when you've got literally no income, are trying to stretch the familial food budget to last an extra week when mom's payperiod is superlong, and don't even have the reassurance that your home is going to be there to go home to in a few months- it's a big fucking deal. And they're just the people I owe immediate balance to- everyone else I owe graduated payments that add up to a staggering amount, far more than I would actually be earning a month if I were still at Panera, much less trying to live somewhere independantly and eat off it, too.

Annnnd we're chewing over the same paths again. Let's redirect this, shall we?

Nobody's died yet, I refuse to take the destructive paths of stress-relief that seem to be the narrative norm these days for broken characters, it's only money, only reputation, not honor (although it feels like it's encroaching on my honor, a lot), and something's gotta give one way or another on the house, so... I'm really tired of dangling on the string of 'will we or won't we' keep or sell, but there's nothing else for it. Mom's pretty determined we sell, dad's pretty determined we stay (he's deluded), and I'm just in the middle waiting for the fallout.

Still. I'm still here.

I'm just really wishing I could produce something that would help.

I need to stop being afraid of trying- but I'm so afraid of failing at this point. I need to stop that.

Comments

[neldluva.livejournal.com]

I need to stop being afraid of trying- but I'm so afraid of failing at this point.

I know exactly how you feel ... that was me, all summer. It was pretty miserable. I'd probably still be at that point if the job I have hadn't basically fallen into my lap. I don't think I even have advice, apart from don't give up! One thing you can always count on is that life will have its downs, but it will also have its ups.

Also, my mom has been talking to me a lot about positive thinking. One of her methods is whenever she feels bad/depressed/angry/negative, she tries to think of one positive thought, even if it's just a little thing. "Oh, those leaves are so pretty today." In theory, switching your negative thinking to positive brings positive things to you. At least it helps you direct your thoughts from the bad depressing things to something positive.

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

*nod* My mom's been on me to try some meditation, and that stressing myself out over these things is only going to make me sick and less able to deal with them. I can agree with that, it's just- sometimes it feels like it's cheating, like I'm looking away instead of staring head on into my problems *before* I've come up with a real way to deal with them.

I'm rather stubborn that way.

But yes, there are things to enjoy in life, and I'm going to make the effort to enjoy them, here and now and in the future.

...I just noticed your icon. Am now giggling hysterically.

[neldluva.livejournal.com]

Hehe, it is my generic "things seem to be going poorly!" icon. It is useful. <3

I can understand the cheating feeling. Still, I feel like it's a good idea to let things percolate, sometimes, before dealing with them. Sometimes you can't tackle everything head-on ... in fact, that sounds like a bad idea. And my brain just went off on a tangent about the Lion King.

LOL, I suppose the point of this comment is "hakuna matata."

[weirdlet.livejournal.com]

Hehheh^^ I think I need to find an icon of the Great God Om (holy horns).

*nod* I know it's not cheating- it just sometimes gets this paranoid 'if I don't watch it I'll slip and miss the opportunity to fix things, and that'll be even *worse*' feeling. It's the difference between percolation, and letting something fester until it bursts open and all your problems are unavoidable and you *still* don't have anything to show for the deadline extension you were given.

So- a little watching, a little more effort, but not so much crazy holding-grimly-on.