thehusk

I don’t want to be this anymore.  Being inside my mind is not a fun place to be. I’m tired, sad, lonely, and full of regret, all the time. My life sucks. And I’m not blaming anyone else for that, But it feels so past the point of repair that the urge to give up is overwhelming.

There are certain kinds of videos games (I’m thinking mainly of strategy/tactics games) where it becomes clear you’ve messed it up, long before you hit a game over. Where the mistakes you made early on are now sabotaging your every move, making just keeping your head above water hugely […]

There’s something extremely destabilising about not having a clear idea what you’re living for. If I examine the narratives I tell myself about what’s keeping me here, none of them are sufficient to help me to live a functional life.

I’m not killing myself because of a strong attachment to an unrealistic and idealised fantasy of a possible life (romantic love, inner peace, freedom from pain.) But if it’s obvious that it’s highly unrealistic, then what good does that do me? What does it give me to work towards, to motivate me to get out of bed in the morning, to get my life in better […]

I never thought I’d be this alone when I was young. I encountered plenty of people who lived on their own, who relied on occasional visits from relatives to provide them with social contact, but it never occurred to me that that would be me. I suppose I lived in a pretty sheltered bubble for most of my childhood. I never learned that you had to work in order to get people in your life, in order to build worthwhile relationships. I was able to live with the delusion that things like that would just come to me. I never had to struggle or work […]

I’m tired of trying to distract myself from my loneliness. I’ve been more or less alone for the majority of my life, and it’s only getting worse as I get older. No one knows me. No one cares except my family, and they don’t really know me. I’ve given no one a reason to care about me. There is no good reason to care about me. I’m not someone worthy of being cared for. But it doesn’t stop me wanting it. I want to be known. I want at least one other person to really understand what goes on in my head, without wanting to […]

Trying is scary to me. If I do everything within my power, and it’s still not close to enough to get me anywhere worthwhile, but I still don’t have it in me to end it, then I’m just… stuck. Stuck in complete misery and despair. No more false hope or fantasies to tell myself, to get me through the day. Just the unrelenting awareness of my failure and inferiority. That’s terrifying.

But at the moment the story I’m telling myself is that I will try. That I am trying. Tentatively and gradually at first. But  that I will eventually do all that’s reasonably possible to find […]

Something I think about a lot is unavoidable suffering, what you might call “existentially necessary suffering”. There’s the suffering that’s caused by our own minds, or inflicted on us by other people, which we can imagine might easily by relieved by a change in fortunes. But then there’s the suffering that’s “built-in” to the fabric of reality. The children born with agonizing degenerative illnesses. The animals doomed to be slowly torn to pieces in a competition for survival. The suffering that was in some senses required for this world, with all it’s beauty and wonder, to exist. You can think of it as “natural evil” […]

I want not to feel this anymore. What is this? An insanely messy and conflicting mesh of things. In no particular order…

Fear: I’m afraid that I am completely unacceptable to other people, and will never be acceptable, no matter what I do in future. I have done unforgivable things, and want to do even more unforgivable things, and if anyone ever finds out, I will face violence & rejection. And if no one ever finds out, I’ll just be alone. Even if I’m with someone. Alone with the knowledge of what I’ve done, and what I still want to do.
Longing/Craving: Sometimes for healthy/good things. Sometimes for […]

I should be working. Instead I’m lying in bed, wallowing in my despair. I need to work because…? I remember, I need money to survive. And I need to survive because…? The answer to that one is fucking complicated.

Why would killing myself not be the reasonable choice? I’m alone. I spend each day and each night alone. And I’m likely to always be alone, to some extent. Even if I somehow made a lot of money, and sorted out all the material issues in my life, I’d still be left with the chronic inability to connect to other people. Even if I’m with someone, I’ll […]

I think I have a massively distorted sense of what might make a life meaningful (romantic love, beauty.) Possibly because I’ve never had those things in my own life, it’s allowed my mind to magnify their significance over the years. Perhaps those who do experience them are more able to view them through an appropriate perspective. But to attach so much meaning to something so trivial/inconsequential definitely seems like evidence of delusional thinking. I think a sheltered upbringing and susceptibility to modern cultural narratives has also played a part.

It might also be that I’ve clung on to the significance of those things for so long […]

To not be as miserable, I think I need people in my life. Some are fine on their own, but I don’t think I’m one of them. I’m extremely introverted, but I still need people. I need to feel seen, to be known. I need some form of meaningful interaction with at least one other person on a daily basis. Otherwise, it’s like I don’t exist. I drift through life like a ghost. I don’t think it’s something I can think my way out of. I’ve spent decades trying to deny it, but I think it’s a fundamental psychological need.

This is a problem. Needing people […]

I feel so far from a meaningful life. And it’s so hard to take even a tiny step in the right direction. Because I know that once I’ve exerted the effort, and put myself through the ordeal, I will still be effectively in exactly the same place. I will still go to bed tonight tormented by all of the things I missed out on in life. And I will still wake up tomorrow exhausted, not wanting to face the world.

It would take so much consistent effort to get myself even close to something different. And I just can’t bring myself to do it. Every tiny […]

“Accept what you cannot change.”

I definitely can’t change the past. So I have to accept that I’ve done so many unacceptable things.

And pretty much no matter what I do from this point on, I won’t be able to change people’s perceptions of me for doing those unacceptable things. I will always be a terrible person, and I have to accept that. I have to accept that I will always be alone, psychologically isolated from other people. That I will always have to hide the truth about myself in order to just keep existing in the world.

I obviously can’t change how old I am, or all […]

It’s so hard to force yourself to do things to improve your life, when a large part of you doesn’t want to be alive. It’s a constant “what the fuck am I doing this for?” And the only answer you can tell yourself is: “so things might be marginally less shitty at some unspecified point in the future.” Cool. Or I could just curl up in a ball and try to forget the world exists for a few hours. The end result will be be more or less the same.

I have no motivation, no drive to do anything, no energy.

When I weigh up suicide, two factors generally seem to carry equal importance:

I cannot stand feeling like this anymore. I hate being me, being in my head. It’s just this endless loop of regret, longing, despair, fear, self-hatred and shame. It’s not a life worth living, and I can only see it getting worse over the years ahead.
. It seems unacceptable to put my family in the position of having to mourn my loss. They’re far too invested in my wellbeing, and they’ve done so much to try and help me over the years. I don’t think they’d get over it, and I can see […]

I never figured out how to be ok with how much of life is full of death and decay. From your mid 20s, it’s like your body is slowly falling apart. All that effort to grow into adulthood, and then so quickly it’s all going downhill, like it was all for nothing.

Now in my mid 30s, I’m officially over the hill. My back hurts, my teeth are worn down, I have huge bags under my eyes from decades without sleep, and most of my hair is gone. My parents are now pensioners. It always strikes me whenever I see them: when did they turn into […]

I can be miserable all day, but it’s only at night that I’m really forced to stew in my unhappiness. I don’t have any energy left to avoid or deflect or distract myself. I need to sleep. I can’t sleep. So I’m stuck with this lingering ache, this longing to not be alone anymore. It’s at the core of all my unhappiness, but I can’t connect. I can’t trust other people. I don’t like other people. Being around others forces me to confront how much I hate myself.

It’s insane how much a simple thing can come to dominate your experience of life. Things are fundamentally […]

I will never experience any of the things that I feel to be meaningful in life. So why bother trying? Why put all that effort into improving my health, to earning more money, to improving my social skills. If it’s all going to amount to nothing I really care about, why force myself through all that? Why get out of bed every morning?

The answer is that if I don’t, things will get worse more quickly. I’ll end up even more isolated, in more physical pain, with worse money worries.

It all makes logical sense. If I’m not going to kill myself, and it seems I’m not, […]

I’ve wasted my life. And I’m too old to fix it. I’m sure there’s plenty I can do to improve things, but I’m never going to catch up on all those years of relationships and formative life experiences. And I see that more clearly on the rare occasions I’m actually around people. Which makes me not want to be around people. But I need to be around people in order to improve my life. And so the cycle continues.

It’s so hard to accept – being socially non-existent. Having nothing to say for yourself. I just sit there and wait for the ground to swallow me. […]

This world is fucked up. And I’m probably one of the most fucked up parts of it. And I hate that. I hate that when I see people doing messed up shit to others, I understand where the impulse is coming from. I hate that I want to do such messed up shit myself. I wish I’d been a good person. Or even a half decent person. I wish I wasn’t this.

It’s all just so tragically fucked. And it feels like it didn’t need to be this way. But maybe this was the only way to run a universe – survival of the fittest, an […]

Fear has been the defining experience of my life. Mostly fear of other people. Of what they’ll think of me. Because if they judge me negatively, who knows what they’ll do…

Maybe they’ll hit me, kick me, spit on me. Less likely, now I’m old. Maybe they’ll insult me. And I’ll take it to heart, because I hate myself. Maybe they’ll isolate, avoid, or reject me. And I’ll feel despair, because I know I’m not worthy of love or friendship.

I fear being seen, being accurately perceived. Because there’s such rottenness in me now. No one could see what goes through my head and not feel disgust.

I […]