Drift gently into oblivion

when your friend never texts you first and misses your birthday and never makes an effort; you don't mind. you know she's struggling, and you want her to get the help that she deserves. you give her every excuse and every chance.

it shouldn't matter to you so much that people are always coming through for her. you want her to be happy, you love it for her. you love that her community rises up to the occasion. why does it bother you that when she snaps at someone, says horrible mean things - but two hours later, everyone is comforting her while she's crying. you know she's stressed. why do you kind of hate that she is welcomed back to her job, that her parents are endlessly wiring her money.

and you're - fuck, are you envious?

but when you don't text back, someone sits you down and says i know you're struggling, but you're being a bad friend. when you're too numb to show up for work, your boss just shakes his head. i'm sorry. i can't approve more time off. we have the company to protect. when you finally snap back at your family for making that shitty comment again, you're forced to apologize for being too sensitive.

god forbid you need something. people aren't used to you being the one asking. you're the giver like the book you hated; your pages all open and rumpled. you always have the answer, always have the solution. you are reliable, trustworthy. people like you don't struggle with things. you're supposed to be lifted by tragedy. you are given a maximum of 24 hours to grieve, and then you need to just behave at the party.

you can't read the giving tree without feeling like crying, and even that feels like it's too much emotion. like, nobody looks at you and assumes you're the tree; they'd name five other people before even considering you in the running. you're just there, never-asking.

your friend gets to say mean shit, that's just her personality. when you make a snide comment, you're just being petty. people laugh when your friend stands you up for another event; they say she's just like that. you were 5 minutes late to a meeting with friends and they were mad about it for the rest of the evening. your friend sets everything on fire; everyone applauds her through the ashes. you so much as light a candle: and suddenly now you're an arsonist.

you don't want your friend to suffer, though. the thing is that you just wish that the empathy and kindness your friend gets - you wish you had that option, that everyone offered you grace and money and a gentle reception.

the other day you were fighting down the bad urge; the void call, the end note. you tried-anyway. you went to the family event, tried laughing at the right moments. nodded and smiled and all of it. one of your siblings threw a fit, but she's allowed to, so everyone just rolled their eyes about it. you took 3 whole minutes to stand outside when you got overwhelmed. you literally set a timer about it.

I feel like so much of my life has been spent trying to find this effortless sort of middle ground everyone else seems to automatically already know, and I'm always swinging too far one way or the other. I'm lucky to have neurodivergent friends who grok me, but goddamn I wish that I could just like, exist without the constant background script in my brain that's like "you're being too loud. You're not talking enough. you're being self-centered. you're being boring. you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong." I feel like I'm back in high school trying to make friends but stuck as the eternal "weird kid"

i want things to change

i want a different life

today was a shitty day/week

i don’t want to live like this

i want to be somewhere else in life

i’m not where i want to be yet

loss of autonomy.

not knowing how to do anything without explicit permission or instruction.

feeling like you’ll get in trouble if you do anything on your own will.

waiting until you’re given permission to do so much as eat.

not feeling like your body is your own.

Me: Ok. Cool. *stops masking neurodivergence*

1. I get fucking payed to do this? Like kids work and don’t get payed at all

2. I get a 40hr work week and again get payed to do those 40hrs because if I wasn’t it would be considered inhumane for a person to do 40hrs of really stressful work and not get payed anything. Except kids work even more then I do and get payed literally nothing. Like kids go to school from 7am-3pm at least where I’m from. That’s 8hrs for 5 days aka 40hrs except they also get homework, the average kid gets around 3hrs of homework a day (sometimes more.) So that’s no longer 8hrs a day which an adult is expected to work but 11hrs a day, making for 55hr work weeks!!

3. I’m an adult! Like why do people not understand this. “Oh well as an adult I have to go through stresses and and responsibilities and shit too!” Well yea you are a full grown fucking adult. Don’t compare what you have to go through to a literal child of like 12!! Why does the 12 year old need to be as stressed out as you?? They’re 12!

4. Children have to wake up at fucking 5 in the morning every day. At least I did. My classes started at 7:00 but the buses would pick us up at around 6:30 and I would have to wake up at 5:30 to get ready. That’s insane! I still sometimes have to wake up at 5am for work but I get payed for it, it’s not every single day, like some days I’ll close or open or work midshifts, I’m a fucking adult not a growing developing child, and I don’t get home to do homework and study which keeps me up for hours.

5. I get home and I’m done. That’s it. Time to do what I want. Kids get home and fucking do more work?? Bullshit.

6. Adults are allowed to be tired and frustrated but kids aren’t for some reason. I’ve seen so many time kids will be visibly tired or frustrated or upset probably because they’ve got a shit ton of responsibility, deal with assholes for 8hrs a day, wake up hella early and stayed up all night doing homework or studying, and then everyone gets mad at them. Like fuck you guys. Let the child take a nap. I was always so angry all the time as a kid and that immidetely went away when I graduated. Because I was no longer a sleep deprived kid who was yelled at 24/7 and feeling like a moron all the time.

Like, my high school routine was waking up at 5 AM to catch the bus at 6 - I lived in a small town with no high school, so my bus route picked us up then had to spend awhile collecting all the farm kids before bringing us to school, so I’d get there at about 8. School would be done at about 3:15, and I’d be back on the bus for 3:30, to get home at about 5:30 PM. Let’s take an hour or so to eat dinner, shower, and just generally take care of any chores that need doing (laundry, cleaning litterboxes, ect), and then I could start on homework at 6:30. Three hours of that brings us to 9:30 PM, but uh oh! We’ve got a problem here! Let’s say I finish my homework exactly at 9:30 go straight to bed, and fall asleep immediately. That means I wake up at 5 AM the next day with only six and a half hours of sleep. Three and a half less than what I need.

But that’s not too bad, that’s survivable, right? And I’d always fall aslepe on the bus, so let’s be generous and call the naps an extra hour and a half of sleep, pushing us up to eight hours. Except I’ve got ADHD, and one of the effects of that is extreme difficulty falling asleep - unless I’m passing out from exhaustion, it takes me at least an hour to fall asleep, dropping us back down to 7 hours. And nowhere in here is there room for personal time! I’m not a social animal; I need time alone with my own head, or I start to really lose my shit. Let’s call it at least three hours of that every day, which was the bare fucking minimum needed to convince myself that suicide was probably a bad idea, and jesus fucking christ we’re down to four hours of sleep, and a solid hour of that is just a fucking nap on the bus.

That was my schedule. Every. Single. Day. Four hours of sleep, if I was lucky and my insomnia didn’t act up, and I had nothing else going on. On a really good day I might get five or six hours. That’s difficult for an adult. For a teenager, it’s torture. But it’s okay! Yeah, I had a massive sleep deficit, but that’s what weekends are for! Fourteen hours of sleep may be a bit extreme, but dear fucking lord did I ever need it. But oh wait, everyone knows teenagers are super lazy and that definitely included me. Just look at how I’d sleep past noon if left to my own devices! Thank god I had my loving and understanding parents to forcibly drag me out of bed at a reasonable hour in the morning on weekends to ‘save’ my sleep schedule. After all, I had a really hard time getting up in the mornings, and I’d sleep through my alarms sometimes, so that obviously meant I needed to sleep less on my days off, to make sure I didn’t get too used to it. Oh, and remember, not only did I have to go through all my classes with like 4 hours of sleep, I also had to do it with an untreated learning disability and no accommodations. And I was going hungry more often than not on top of it all, because the mountain of stress and exhaustion I was under meant that I rarely had the energy or executive function to make myself breakfast, and packing a lunch for myself hasn’t been possible since junior high. I’m pretty sure four hours of sleep and one meal a day is all a growing teenager needs to function; I mean I didn’t fucking die, so I was probably fine. I only dissociated hard enough to accidentally wander out into traffic a few times, it wasn’t so bad.

Adults get done with their jobs, go home, and barely feel like cooking dinner. They drop everything to socialize and do hobbies. A HANDFUL of people push themselves past eight hours a day, but that’s NOT the majority, and the majority neither want to nor could keep up that pace indefinitely.

i think we all know this feeling of being stuck inside your routine. you’re not really sad but it just feels like something is missing. so i’m here to give you ideas on how to spice things up™️ (or just make life more enjoyable).

paint your nails in an exciting color. paint them in several colors idc. now every time you see your hands (which is very often) you see your super cool nails

listen to a new music genre. like something completely different. if you like rap you will listen to country music now. jam your heart out i know u want to (here & here are some playlists if u need any ideas)

on that note revisit songs you liked when you were younger. we gettin nostalgic

sometimes you just need to watch a good old vine compilation 

food!!! this can be such a huge factor. something as simple as switching your breakfast from toast to cereals, just smth new, can make a huge difference. try new things out, have fun (recipes here, here, here and here)

same thing with the things you drink! add lemon to your water, drink some tea, try iced coffee out, buy water from a diff company, …

a cute cup for your morning drink can really lighten up your mood too

get some magazines and cut things out you like. now get an a3 (a4 is okay too) paper and make a big collage

ikea trip? ikea trip!! don’t forget to eat smth there too yum

after showering put on some good smelling lotion and just enjoy the feeling

now put on your favorite underwear and an oversized shirt. maybe take some cute pics just for yourself. trust me you will feel better

rip a paper into little pieces

cuddle with your stuffed animal idc if you feel stupid, you will feel better

maybe spice things up with the way you look? try out a new hairstyle or invest in a new accessory you like (jewelry, hair ties / clips, belts, scarfs, etc.). it doesn’t have to be expensive, there’re lots of cute things in second-hand stores for example!

start a challenge in whatever you’re interested in. maybe for a hobby you always wanted to try out or pick up again. there’re tons of challenges on pinterest. i think i will try this one out though

write a love letter to yourself. you deserve one. fold it into a very small piece and put it into your pocket. this is now your lucky charm because trusting in yourself is all you need sometimes

buy groceries but this time with a friend or family member. catch up, have fun, buy some cookie dough and eat some cookies

picnics!!!!!!!! i love picnics!!!!! they’re so cute and actually super easy to organize. you can go alone or with someone else. just grab the food you have at home and a blanket and go to the nearest spot you find. even your garden or balcony. you can easily incorporate this into your day if you don’t have much time. instead of eating your dinner at your kitchen table you will go on a picnic now

if you have more time, you can bring a book with you or some art supplies and enjoy time outside

taking a walk listening to your fav album can help so much

change your bedding. you don’t even need to buy a new one, just wash it and get that feeling of freshness

open one of these sites (1, 2, 3): and read an article that seems interesting

buy flowers for yourself and put them in your room

change the color your laptop highlights things in

declutter your phone and laptop in general. set up some new backgrounds that make you happy

vary your commute. take the bus instead of the subway, get off a station earlier, or if you can, take the bike 

change the places you do things. try studying in the library or a café, scroll through your phone not in your bed but at the kitchen table, read on the floor, every small change adds into spicing things up

take a bath when you shower normally or the other way around

light candles in the evening

search for your old nintendo and play some games

stretch in the morning. even for 2 mins is good

download some new apps

try a no social media day

instead of a black / blue pen write in a different color (for example your groceries lists, on post-its, in your journal, …)