It’s currently 2:30am.
I don’t want to fall asleep. I know it would be better for me to do something about my sleeping habits – to go to bed at a reasonable time and to wake up at a reasonable time, but I find myself desperately putting off going to bed. Even when I finally go to bed, I clutch at my smartphone, finding things to do. I can never ever fall asleep and I dislike just lying there, staring at the ceiling, at the walls, at my alarm clock where every minute lingers and its always too early or too late, still awake, always awake, trapped in my thoughts. I’ve started going to bed at 5am some nights, which is just crazy. I stay awake, wanting to exhaust myself. I feel so tired all the time, but that relaxed, sleepy state is always out of reach. Needless to say, Things still aren’t great. I really tried to have a better week though, and I sort of succeeded. I’m finally starting to get stuck into revision – I don’t think I’m doing enough, but then I never think I can do enough. I try and comfort myself that at least I’m doing something now.
The formal thesis draft was submitted last week and somehow my group members and I managed to pull it together into something much better than it was – although I’m still worried about it. We’ve not heard back from anyone. To be honest, I’m not sure how or when we will. And the days are ticking towards the final draft deadline and I think – surely its not ready to be submitted once and for all? Its just crazy, that somehow we’ve managed to put together a 60 page essay. Its my first time putting together such a long essay and it was certainly an experience – its hard, putting together something so long. Its so easy to derail, to go off on tangents. Its hard to make it cohesive and with a clear argument. I really wonder what the moderators think. My thesis is 30 credits, it could be the difference between a 2.2 and a 2.1. Needless to say, I want the 2.1.
I cannot believe I have to write a whole thesis myself next year. I’m not sure there’s anything I’m passionate enough to write 60 pages on it, which is probably the most distressing thing. Trying not think of that one.
My exams are also creeping closer. I’m trying not to think about that, too. Only two exams, yet it takes tremendous willpower to get any revision done. How on earth did I manage with 6 exams last semester? I feel terribly lazy. It feels terribly pointless. I think, well I have a 2.1 and I couldn’t even get a job so what’s the point of keeping up that standard? I feel utterly defeated by my failure. I know I’m supposed to learn from it and move the hell on, but I’m fairly tired. And I’m bored. Studying is really boring. My mind just wanders off, I can’t focus. Its the same as the sleep situation – its impossible me to really immerse myself in any one task. Its hard to get my thought to shut down, so that I can focus, or relax.
At the end of the day, the downside is that there’s just over a month left of everything. But that is the upside too. Just a month or so, and then I’ve got the rest of the summer stretching before me. So I’m not working, or got any plans beside. I’ll take the opportunity to enjoy the time off – it is after all my last free summer. The last summer I have to cling to being a child without any responsibilities. The next summer I’ll be a graduate and who knows what will be awaiting me then – I doubt its going to be pleasant, at the rate that some graduates get jobs. (This year, I let myself hope I wouldn’t be one of them, next year I’m not going to be so reckless.) For now, I’ve got this time to look forward to. A whole summer in my own space, a whole summer to relax and hopefully heal.
I’m struggling with my eating disorder right now. For a while it was going really well, but I crashed recently, slipping back into bad habits and its been hard trying to get myself back on track. I guess its linked to my low mood, this feeling of what’s the point? that tinges everything.
The other thing is: I’ve gained weight. I’ve gained a lot of weight in fact- for the first time since I was a child you could probably use the word chubby to describe me. Its unfair, I think. I’m eating better and doing more exercise and yet, I’ve gained weight. I’m struggling to accept it. I do not want to accept it. Yet the only way I can ever get myself to where I was is to starve myself. Why do I have to have the sort of body that only looks the way I want when I mistreat it? Why can’t I exercise, eat properly and be skinny? I want to fit into a a size 8, a size 10 at the max like I used to. Now I have to squeeze myself into a size 12 and I hate myself. I’m doing thing properly, for the most part. I’m trying to treat my body better. So why? I really hate it. I run my hands over my body and where there used to be the outlines of bone, there’s only the softness of fat. You can pinch my skin now, hold on. Its fascinating, in a grotesque way. My CBT modules tells me to love my body. I’m not quite sure how to go about doing that, when all my clothes don’t fit, and I feel all squishy, and I have all these curves in all the wrong places. I used to have the ideal figure – tall, skinny, no curves. Sure, I got that way because I was depressed and barely eating, but it felt good. It felt like the one thing I had – I was unhappy, I hated my personality, my skin was terrible, but I was thin. That really meant something to me. The fact that I’ve gained weight now just feels like another thing out of control, another thing that isn’t the way I want it to be. Why, I think. Why. I’m wrestling with myself – with the part of me that wants to better, to sort out my weird, distorted relationship with food (and all the things that come with it) and the part of me that just wants to give up – to just go back to the ways things were. I was thin then, at least.
I have my last therapy appointment on Wednesday. I’m fairly dreading it. I really liked my first therapy sessions, but now it feels like I’ve not made enough progress, that I’ve failed at getting better. I feel embarrassed by this, ashamed at facing my therapist like this. I don’t even know. I just feel like a bit of a failure right now. Its hard not to look at other people your age and wonder how they are so well put together. Oh, you know beyond the selfishness of your own sadness that they are probably struggling too in their own ways, they are just as insecure perhaps, that they basically have their own private demons to deal with most likely, but its so easy to slip into this feeling of being somewhat inadequate. Of being 21, and failing at it miserably. This summer I turn 22. I’ll have finished up my third year of university. The future comes ever closer, adulthood looms, and I do not feel ready for it at all.