yeah, this is getting old
1/31/2024
It's safe to say I'm getting bored of being a NEET, but I probably won't immediately get a new job until next month. See, this was the part I was scared of! What kept me working there so long was I was worried it was the best I could get. But I'm just tired of having nothing going on. I wasn't even going to post anything today, until I realized tomorrow is February... OOPS!
I was pretty productive this weekend though. I slept late on Saturday, but I finally cleaned half of my fucking room all day which was a great start to rewiring my brain when I don't have anything else to do. My current huge bedside drawer needs to be removed from my room at one point, but I just haven't emptied that out yet. I also ended up calling Kotte in the evening afterward, which is something I'd like to do more often when our schedules allow it.
Yesterday, I started going through my various unsorted paperwork to find my stuff from the workforce solutions before the pandemic. I found that, but I also found other things... One, the psychological assessment done of me 4 years ago, and then some psychiatry papers about the medications I was on and diagnosis when I was a teenager. They're were fucking depressing to say the least. The assessment was just...so infantilizing even though I was late 20s when it was done. It kind of #Triggert me because I'm so used to having personal things or struggles be only something you can talk about in a pathologizing clinical setting. The same settings that always dehumanizing me every time.
A horrifying thing I learned was also that, I wasn't medicated for "just" 7 years after dropping out, it was for a decade! Yeah, no fucking wonder I was so useless and nonfunctioning for nearly all of my 20s. The longer I was on this shit, the less it worked. When I talked to psychiatrists about it, they just changed the dose or wanted me to take more medications. I literally tried to talk to my ever-changing rotation of assigned psychiatrists in the last decade to maybe take me off this shit, but none ever let me because I "needed it". One of my final straws was when one raised my dose when I wanted to slowly taper off. I was on a fuckton of meds when I was 16, notably antipsychotics despite not experiencing psychosis... It's fun how I was diagnosed with "useless idiot disorders" after dropping out and couldn't function in school anymore, so that was just a free pass to ruin my health with prescriptions. (Look up "Risperdal boys" if you want to see a particularly heinous pharma scandal.)
When I became medication-free several years ago, it something I had to do by myself. I would lose contact with the psychiatrist that ruined my life for months at a time, so I couldn't ask her to just gradually lower my doses. I had to just get a pill cutter and do it myself for weeks. I tried talking to other psychiatrists about my health problems and declining mental health from this, but all of them refused to help me. They refused to let me try anything that wasn't an SSRI/SNRI or Wellbutrin (which I developed a tolerance to), the alternative was "talking about it in therapy" when I left therapy for traumatizing me more and not knowing what to do with me.None of these professionals ever had solutions besides shoving pills in your face and silencing you if you question it. I can't talk about it to other people, because I just get told "but they helped ME!" or "just try a different medication + go to therapy" like some kind of brainwashed wellness cult. I've given up losing the weight I gained from all this.
When I was going through hell in 2019, I almost gave up on ever living a functional life and tried to apply for SSI. Well, you know how that works, even people who actually need that get rejected. But one thing I wrote about my general lifestyle was interesting... I had probblems sleeping back then. I still do. Even when I worked, I basically took a homemade cocktail of OTC stuff to make me sleep every night except days off. My problems sleeping have come back similarly, and it worries me how even when I'm unemployed I have to take that. Even if I'm taking less things, I'll always be on something I guess...
lol
1/25/2024
It's... been awhile! Oops! Because if I'm not working there's not much going on in my life. Haven't been to the state's workforce solutions but I'm thinking about trying for retail closer to my house because there's two locations and they pay more than my last job. I have experience, so as long as I'm not SPS or forced to be a cashier I should be fine. I really do want to be employed by next month or March though... this gets kind of boring. My itabag was going to be my project for when I'm unemployed, but I decided the bag isn't good enough so now I have to wait until I can buy a better one... Also ummm... some upcoming merch I want to preorder and import too.
I got my real last paycheck weeks ago, by the way. I'm glad my hours were tweaked to be less pathetic the very last week (Christmas week's hours were nonexistent even if I liked the break...), but damn. I was hoping I could keep the entire paycheck, but the rest went to other bills besides the cut my bills next month. So my limit of staying unemployed is by the end of February unless something happens (I hope not!). I did my taxes days ago, and I made slightly more in 2023... because I was put through the wringer so much. But it's not even enough to move or get decent insurance. LOL!!! And my return is slightly more this year because I never went to the doctor last year... Sigh... I'm not even excited about my return because it'll probably go to bills, even though I'd like to use it to pay off my debt.
I was also very unproductive the first two weeks of this vacation... because I was glued to talking to my girlfriend during the hours we were both awake. D'OH!!! I know... That's why so many things went untouched until a week ago. But I had to talk about it, for obvious reasons I've been "easy dopamine" driven for the last 20 or so years. I'm also just so used to being alone, so the new experience is a form of "easy dopamine" to get hooked on above anything else... but then I feel like the dork who is sleeping in at home while she's at work when we both were working last month. It's okay to "take a break" or not talk constantly for hours and have time to do things alone as long as I say something beforehand. I still need my personal free time and space. I feel like I'm too lucky and undeserving that I have someone similar to me and understands me.
temp NEET arc begins
1/9/2024
I've been unemployed for three days. And it's been pretty great.
Now, this is only going to be temporary. Being a NEET for so long after getting my GED was one of my biggest mistakes and I ruined my own life. But it feels so good to just relax. Just do what I want at home. Turn my phone off, just do whatever without having to plan ahead for the next week. (Did I mention my schedule at work varied by week?!) After 3 years of working and the last year being unforgiving, I need this. I have enough money left over on my paycheck to cover my bills until March, and I might not mind it if it takes that long until I get a new job. I'm still scared... but I don't think it's that bad right now.
I'm not completely directionless, either. I allowed myself a last bit of "fun money" with this paycheck, and I bought some stuff to fill my itabag I started. Kotte is also a motivation to stay on a decent schedule, our timezones are 7 hours apart so I want to be online to talk to her... The thing about when I was a NEET in my early-to-mid 20s, it was too fucking long, and I basically did nothing for years straight. Now I have hobbies and people to talk to.
What do I want to do during this break?
Write again. My previous rune isn't so bad, but I used to be able to do much better. Unfortunately, I'm having a hard time with that because I have ideas, but executing it is the hard part! Maybe I can attempt humorous filler again... Edit some existing shrines and maybe publish a new one. (Did you know the "next shrine" that the mouse hints at was technically started but hasn't been written? Sigh...) Play some games??? When I was a friendless NEET, I felt more inclined to just sit and play games. Now I've become kind of needy and have to talk to people... Not sure how I can get back on the ball of playing games when I don't work anymore and can't just play my Switch on breaks. (Not just Switch, I have a PS2, 3DS, and PC games...) Yet something stops me. As much as I hate psych meds I wish I could be prescribed stimulants as a quick cheat to do stuff, lol. Make some layouts!!! I was actually in process of one, but then I switched to drawing and looking at old Neopets premades for inspiration... Sigh. I do want to get into anchoring, it's such a clever code trick to have everything on one page.
I don't even remember if I had a resolution last year, but the closest thing I have for this year is to be in more communities that aren't social media (which I'm slowly phasing out - not active on Twitter and I've given up on Tumblr's community, it's just a shitpost/bitching zone or to see what Kotte pings me in). Wonder where to go from there? I know there's possible potential with Neopets and Moderneo (I never got into guilds...), I have a Mastodon account I don't know what to do with, and I pop on Side7 and Melonland sometimes.
The internet doesn't have to be as small as it looks, and I wish I realized that I can just leave the Twitter/Tumblr/Reddit sphere if I don't find it worth salvaging. Social media is ideally the "station square" of the internet to find new spaces, not the internet itself. I've had a better time using those sites as a springboard to find different off-site spaces (I'm pretty sure I found out about Mastodon from Twitter, and Neocities from one of three sites). Hell, I literally initially met my girlfriend because someone on Tumblr DMed me a Discord server invite, and someone in that server invited me to another one (and so on)... It's fun to see how far that's gone, but it feels like it was so much easier trying to find communities online over a decade ago. Instead of just searching for an XYZ forum, or just posting artwork of something on DeviantART/Furaffinity and finding other people who like it, it's like I have to go door-to-door and ask for someone to invite me or where a server is... I hate that so much. I wish I was old enough to have experience the Livejournal era, but if I did I'd probably be angrier about the state of things, lol.
it's over
1/6/2024
Today was my last day of work. Earlier this week I was stressed out over how I saw next week's schedule and...I was on it. But I was told by a manager (an actual manager, not the closing manager who doesn't do shit...) that it's a placeholder and to not worry about it. So I won't. I'm not coming in tomorrow, because it's over. What are they gonna do if they call me in tomrrow and I don't go, fire me? HAHAHA! Weirdly, my paycheck this week was really good. Then I realized... that might be for the two weeks before my last? Not that I'm complaining, I'm going to put money aside to cover my bills for February and March just in case. I wonder if I'll get a deposit for the measely last two weeks later this month... I would kind of need it, but I didn't ask about it. I can check the website that shows my paychecks or just call, I guess? It's apparently tax season so my return could buffer me if anything happens.
The guy who clocks in after me was late, so I was willing to stay longer until he was there. Then I bought two things while I still had my discount, a Hello Kitty boba kit and a bluetooth speaker since my mom didn't know what kind to get me for Christmas. Went to the nearby stores I usually go to after work, didn't see anything good. Then I went to the plaza mall. One of my other favorite shops besides the Hot Wheels store was finally opened again, and he was selling pins. I bought two, and when I was talking to the guy I was saying I was kind of sad, because this is my last day of work and I really liked going to this mall after clocking out... I'll probably go back sometimes when I can.
After that I Ubered home near the evening and had an interesting conversation with the driver. Apparently kids nowadays have more vacations than I did in school - they have a week off for the state fair instead of a day (I don't remember getting a day for that when I was in school), and this is a month after summer vacation. Winter vacation is apparently longer too. This is a shock to me, I've heard nothing but bad things about how school is for gen alpha and this piles onto it... I mentioned that I haven't been to school since 2008, and he mentioned he was out by then. He said something about 2000, and I said "You graduated high school in 2000?" Apparently I caught him in a lie, and he graduated in 1989 and was doing college and trade school before I was born! I rarely tip because I tend to Uber with scraps of my paycheck, but I had a ton of money left over and gave one after I was dropped off home.
Before bed last night I just kept crying the same way I kept crying around Christmas. I get so overwhelmed with how I feel lately, I don't have any other way to let it out besides crying. I really, really didn't think my life would come to this point. There were moments in the last 5 (soon to be 6) years where I really wished I went ahead and killed myself in summer 2018, or I wish I went through with the method I thought of a year later. But now I'm glad I didn't because it wouldn't get to this point. The psychiatric shit I went through years back literally traumatized me so bad, but it was also the one thing that pushed me out of this cycle... I'm still alone in real life but I never thought I would go out into the world, I never thought I would allow myself to think again, to post things in the open again. I never thought I'd find out that I am worthy of something after all. One of the last few things I told my therapist was that I would've killed myself by now, but it really did get better. Maybe it's not a complete cliche that you'll be at rock bottom before it gets better. I'm still scared of what will happen next but it doesn't seem as bleak anymore. I wasted so much of my life not acting because I was too scared of what will potentially happen.