Life is not going the way I was told it was going to. Sigh. Plight of the optimist? From when we are young, we are told to keep trying, keep hoping, keep attempting to get the things we want. We are told that if we want badly enough, and try hard enough, eventually something will happen. It may not be what we initially set out to get, but we'll probably end up with something, and be happy anyway.
But I call BS! Life: 2,000, me: 50? Life is definitely winning. When I say Life, I mean all the things that can go wrong, like rejection and plans.
I'm definitely depressed, and definitely Going Through Something. Don't get me wrong, I know I have been lucky to have had the life that I have had, but my future isn't looking so great. Lately I can't seem to get any wins. If I were a stock in the stock market, I would be performing below market, with a bleak forecast. Dump all of your stock in me, I'm crashing.
I had a serious talk with my boss about a week ago about my future. It turns out that the reason I am getting my PhD--to be qualified to lead the project that I've been managing for 11 years in the job that I adore--doesn't exist. There
is no path forward post-PhD in my job. Why? Because they would have to pay me too much, and my project can't afford to pay a post-doc salary, and because I am actually NOT ALLOWED to lead the project unless I get hired by the University as an academic (note: this is impossible, and my boss flat out told me that it was impossible and that there are no positions anticipated to open for the next 5 years; also, I don't
want to be an academic). So I have essentially been in a dead-end job for 11 years without really knowing it. I thought (and was told) that if I obtained my PhD, that future was a possibility. I've been used.
Anyway, there's more. All I can think about is how I'm 40 and:
--don't have a boyfriend/husband
--ALL of my friends are either far away and/or getting married/having babies/leveling up in their careers and don't have much time for me anymore. I spend 99% of my time alone now. The only people around that actually have time to hang out are about 25. Nothing against 25 year olds, but a) I can't keep up anymore, and b) I--understandably, I think--don't have the same interests and am not super interested in becoming best friends with 25 year olds as a 40 year old.
--My body is achy and tired
all of the time. I feel old. My body truly feels worn out in a very permanent way, for the first time ever. I've suddenly gained a ton of weight even though I haven't changed how I eat or exercise in several years. I look like I'm pregnant! None of my pants fit anymore--I wear sweats 80% of the time when I used to only ever wear them in the house. The doctor says it's just age.
--I apparently have no career prospects.
--I
still don't have a dog.
--My house down payment fund needs to be 4 x its size, and my salary needs to be at least 3x bigger for me to afford a house. Buying a house in Auckland by myself is an impossible goal. But again, I don't have a husband/partner and there's no one I would trust to buy a house with here.
--I don't really have anyone reliably in my life except my mom and dad, and my dad has cancer and my mom is 70 and having her own health issues. Pretty soon I'll be all alone in the world.
I am not sure what to do. Mostly because I feel like there is nothing
to do
. I feel like I am just going through the motions and dragging my body from chore to chore, and this will be my life for decades upon decades until I blissfully enter a nursing home and get someone else to do all the hard stuff for me.
I'm on a loop: weekdays are wake up, get ready, work, eat, work, go home, eat dinner, bathe, get ready for tomorrow, meditate, sleep. Weekends are plan next week's meals, laundry, clean house, change sheets, grocery shop, get a massage, cook for the week, take care of plants, plan doctor's appointments and life stuff, plan my work week, talk to family for an hour. I'm exhausted and any down time I do have is spent in bed watching TV, because that is the only thing I have the energy leftover for. All I am doing is keeping the fraying edges from unraveling my life altogether. I go from thread to thread, plugging holes like my life is a leaking dam about to flood the plains. I can do that forever, I think, sure, but it's just treading water...it's not
getting me anywhere. I want to
BE HEADED SOMEWHERE. I have a million goals, but they exist on some far away island. I can't even see the goal islands anymore! The career one sank right into the ocean. Meanwhile, all around me are people driving by in boats, or paddling or swimming away, headed to their islands with their spouses. I'm not drowning, so no one cares.
I keep telling my therapist my concerns, and she just keeps telling me to go to bed an hour earlier, like that will magically fix everything. ??? I am doing that and I just don't see how that helps at all. I just get an extra hour of sleep (9.5 instead of 8.5) in that case.
I don't know. I used to just pick myself back up and get back in the game when life knocked me back. Now, I'm
TRYING to see light and hope and do all the things my optimist self used to do, but I'm burnt out and tired of always getting shut down and put back in square one again. It's
too hard to get back up this time. There are only so many times you can start over again, and I've hit my limit. I give up--I don't think it is going to happen, what I need from life. What do people do in that situation? How do you maintain focus on basic things like keeping your life from falling apart further when you know it won't ever get any better?
