I'm sad

I listen to "Better Things" by The Kinks when I am drunk and sad. I don't know if it helps.

I've been playing doodleordie for the last several days, and I think the above posts sum it up.

I just put on my best cute red polkadot 50s dress and my sunglasses and went for a walk round the block in the sun, grabbing some cider on the way back. If I cant feel great at least I can look good dammit.

NOICE

Yay Tracy!

All the sads are welcome to come to my house where I will feed you soup and give you a nice warm kitty to pet.

Hmm not sure that came out exactly right.

quick, say "video games", then it'll be OK

well, fuck it, i managed to finally attempt to contact someone for therapy. This website was very useful because it lets you search by location, insurance, speciality, issue, and so on: http://therapists.psychologytoday.com/rms/

up and down and up and down and down and down and up and down and down and down and down and up and down and down and down

i just want to have a normal day. then again, last weekend i drank tequila all night and danced my ass off at a house party with a bunch of semi-strangers until 4am, had an absolute blast. the day after that i was still feeling the glowing residue happiness of the night (or maybe i was still a bit drunk) and i thought maybe i had figured out how to live for a minute. but then it's back to work, feeling like i will die in a cuberhood in 30 years and no one will give a shit. and seemingly unable to find any way out of my position, no prospects anywhere. all i do is animate shit in my spare time and even that turns into a millstone because it attaches me to a computer for an extra hour or two a day and it's pretty much all anyone knows me for here. then again, it's one of the few "hobbies" that i can still push myself to do these days. i'm unable to read anything, learn anything. i can't even be lazy and play videogames or watch tv or a movie. can't do anything, really.

anyway, i managed to send an email to a therapist so yay, i will probably be on antidepressants in a month and never feel anything good or bad again.

trust me, with antidepressants you still feel good and bad things.

oh, and on top of that i must be a raging alcoholic because a) uh i drink every night, alone or with people, doesn't matter, b) the rare nights that i don't drink, like tonight, i get incredibly bummed out and irritated, bored. but c) apparently it's not affecting my day-to-day functionality because i do fine at work, i manage to get stuff done and people call me whippersnapper.

had an absolute blast

this is cool

are you bipolar?

no, i don't think so. i used to be pretty steady, emotionally, up until the great debacle of oct 2011. ever since then things have been all over the place. sometimes good, more often bad, sometimes just...in a weird place. i've tried to explain something to several people over the past few days but i can't seem to figure out how to say it without sounding really stoned (which i am not/wasn't at the time): i went to the natural history museum the other day, in post-tequila night afterglow, and viscerally experienced the exhibits, particularly the fish and bird skeletons, in a way that i haven't felt things in years and years. i mean, i would look at the bones and they would make my OWN bones tingle, and crackle, almost painfully, like i was becoming the animal. it gave me goosebumps repeatedly for about an hour, and i would just sit there and stare at shark teeth for a really long time, or ponder the hindleg bone structure of 4-legged animals in a prolonged way that's very unusual for me. very strange, and hard to explain. i don't know why i'm telling this stupid story, it's just...shit's been weird.

that's one of the (only) good parts of the post-breakup emotional rollercoaster ime. I definitely had periods of intense sensory and intellectual activity during my "great debacle of oct 2009" that were sorta epiphany-like? i think? i'm not sure why that happens, though there's probably some scientific explanation.

you'd been with someone basically all your adulthood. and now you are not. it is not unreasonable for shit to be weird for some time to come.

it's also not unreasonable to talk to someone about it, whether it be ilx or a professional.

at any rate, i'm pretty sure everyone here likes you and would like you to be well, so you needn't worry about being weird or whatever.

oh, i don't worry about being weird. i was definitely a very odd child, and if anything life has just been an exercise of sanding off the rough weird edges in an attempt to fit into society a little better. but deep down i kind of like being weird.

just realized that yesterday i was criticizing someone for self-defining as "quirky", and here i am self-defining as "weird". i don't have the heart to go to thesaurus.com and confirm, but...yeah.

the difference I think is that quirkiness is currently socially-acceptable whilst weirdness usually isn't

"quirky" is for people that aren't weird that wish they were "weird" because they've heard that it's cool

I think that's it

as for me: I'm just sick of being fucking broke and being surrounded by idiots

z s, I'm glad you're going to talk to someone. and yeah, if they do it right, the meds won't shut you down. you'll still be you.

fyi if I only knew you for animated ilx stuff I wouldn't be here telling you you're a valuable poster on all kinds of things, warm and funny and thoughtful, always. maybe you feel weird in yr head but you're not as weird as you think you are to the world, I promise.

natural history museum experience sounds cool as hell. Smithsonian hall of mammals blew my everloving mind a few years back, turned me into a 5 year old for a whole afternoon, I'm envious of the level of feeling you had with your visit!

ha, hall of mammals reminds me that actual footage was captured of the animal/human mindmeld that afternoon

http://a5.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/409453_10150548186000959_638030958_8992566_291306799_n.jpg

it really was neat. then i left and had a terrible egg sandwich at au bon pain and things returned to normal very, very quickly

never eat @ abp

ugh, normal ruins everything

I love that photo!

Z S that happens to me at museums too; in fact, I actively seek out that experience. I really enjoy it. I biked to the plant conservatory every Saturday over the summer and sometimes I would sit in the fern room (ie monopolize the bench in the fern room) for at least an hour just sitting there smelling plants and thinking about how ancient they were and feeling intense. It may have looked like I was just sitting there, though. I took a lot of pictures of plants too. Since then I haven't gone and I feel like the plants and I have broken up.

^^ This is what I do in order to cope with feeling nuts. Fortunately you have the Smithsonian! Anyway, I seriously wish you the best of luck with the therapist and know that people can see that you are a real person, not just a one dimensional gif machine.

See COrtazar's "Axolotl"!
This part of museums is
REAL

ZS I wish I could make you some tea.
You are so much beyond a cube or a gif or a gif of a cube.
All best on therapy, pushing beyond inertia is huge.

thanks...although I haven't received any response to the email I sent (the website I referenced above has a "email therapist to describe your terrible sadness and set up an appointment" link), so I'm guessing I'll wait until mid-next week without hearing anything and then give the non-therapy life another chance.

I'm gently envious of this talent some of you have for seeing the flip side of reality. I would see...plants. And then wonder what time lunch was. I like your way.

Z S are you eating ok? are you eating enough? sometimes tired + hungry + vaguely hung over is the worst emotional combo on earth and it feels real but it's (usually) not. easy to forget that those things really make a huge difference.

i'm generally eating ok, but not enough. but i've always been like that, that's not a new thing. i eat as much as i can, but i don't like stuffing myself, and i also have an absurd rate of metabolism.

I am holding a knot of sick, angry sad in my belly like a large stone, have been for about 2 days now. Its partly due to work - they've been slowly loading me up with this weird shit that never was part of my job and I dont know how to do (financial stuff... christ no) but I dont know how to protest it without sounding whiny and risking my (never payrise rewarded) job, so I sit and stew myself sick instead.

Partly its also because veganboy finally dumped me, insisted he wanted to stay close friends, but immediatrly stopped talking to me. Said this was spurred by meetng someone else, but had the KINDNESS to tell me only a week later that he was "crushed and heartbroken and not going into any further detail" which I assume means whoever this person was that he chased after blew him off. But no detail, no explanation what happened with all this or why, me with no idea what the hell I did wrong, and I feel like Im full of bile.

It sounds like not talking to him is probably best for you. You didn't do anything wrong; there is no explanation he could give you that would make sense of the pain. He is coming across as indifferent to your feelings. You do not need a friend like that.

This is a lesson I'm trying to teach myself more than anything tbh.

As for work, is there someone around who does know how to do these things? Can you sidle up to anyone and say "This is new to me, could you possibly take me through the best way to do x?" - you're not saying you have no idea, you are seeking their expertise.

Failing that start an accounting advices thread, someone round here will know that shit.

:( :( sorry to hear that Trayce

yeah, I've tried asking the boss, whos the one who should know the prices im meant to be checking -he negotiates them with our suppliers! - and he says shit like "you can work that out". Grrr. He makes a lot of asssumptions about shit going on and flies off the handle without facts. It is very very frustrating. I also havent had a payrise (not even a CPI increase, or a bonus) in almost 3 years and I'm feeling really unappreciated right now.

Money talks and I'm about to walk.

Looking for another job sounds worthwhile.

hey duane, cheer up

me with no idea what the hell I did wrong

Try "I did nothing wrong" on for size. I'm pretty damn sure it will fit this situation perfectly. Maybe get a tattoo of it, because it will come in handy many more times.

I've been like hardcore sad/depressed for three straight months and I just wanted to post to say that I'm starting to feel better :).

Trayce, without risking meta-TMI, I'll just say I feel/empathize with your breakup situation. Fuckin' sucks.

sorry to hear all of that trayce. the job thing maybe i could help with (for once):

tell them that the financial shit/extra stuff you're doing is not part of your job description. depending on how you feel about taking on extra stuff and how they respond to you raising the issue, here are the possible results:

a) you continue doing the extra stuff in exchange for a pay raise (i did this a few years ago at a shitty data entry temp job in chicago and got a 20% raise)
b) you go back to doing what you were doing and don't get a pay raise
c) for some reason neither a) or b) happens, and so you either threaten to quit (and get a pay raise as a result) or just quit (you successfully leave a shitty situation and move on with your life)

a) and b) are way more likely, i think, depending on your preference. sorry to analyze the shit out of this but when people get screwed at work i always want to help them fight back against the man. you don't have to take that shit.

OTM. If you haven't gotten a pay raise in three years and they feel they can get you to do more work in spite of that fact, don't be at all surprised when they try to pile even more work on your plate down the road...again, with no pay raise. If they can take advantage of you, they will. Do not go gently etc. etc. I speak from experience here.

also, speaking from experience (although i've only done it twice), it feels REALLY GOOD to ask for a raise and get it. you deserve it.

What Z_S said is real talk, but to back it up you have to be willing to leave the job. It doesn't have to be part of an explicit threat of "give me a raise, or give me less work, or I quit", because that will commit you to a timetable, but if you make it clear to your supervisor that the present situation is unacceptable and why, and nothing is done about it, then you'll know exactly what to expect from your employer: more shit and no compensation for it.

Just hoping someone will step in and make it better never works. If you want any improvement, you'll have to act. The important thing is clarity. Be clear to yourself and to your supervisor. As for "sounding whiny", that's not a function of the facts of the matter, nor of pointing out the facts, so it is entirely up to you whether you want to be whiney or just factual.

there's the wage that people actually deserve, and then there's what these terrible people pay you, and what they pay you is almost always less than you deserve. they get away with it because they know it's difficult for people to ask for a raise because they're not in a position of power.

that's right, managers all over the world, uniformly, are terrible people!

I actually worked for a good one, once. Long ago. It was like living on another planet.

Thanks guys, those are all good suggestions and I agree with em.

shoot up the place imo

lolol.

aw Trayce that sucks so much. work shit and boy shit is just ugh yahtzee of shit. But dudes are kinda otm here: the work thing is something you can actually tackle, in your own way. I know Orstraylian she'll be right is kind of the default mode, but asking for a bit of compensation to match your new workload doesn't have to mean being bolshy about it.

And as for veganboy...well, just poo to him. You are too cool of a chick to let an annoying albatross like that keep dragging you down. I know it's easy to say but don't let his failings make you sad. New chapter, off we go :)