It should come as no surprise that my mental health isn’t doing great. I have no idea if it’s a combination of the Main Purpose of the drugs I’m on or if it’s simply a long-lasting side effect of simply being in pain All The Time, but I’ve never been this type of anxious for this long in my life before.

Well, maybe during football season. I was anxious all the time then too. I hated football. It was hard, everyone else was so effortlessly good at it, and I struggled. Everything I was doing somehow revolved around football practice.

Spanish class was boring and the room too hot, but I couldn’t get sleepy because I had to be wide awake for football practice.

It was meatloaf and cornbread day at the cafeteria, with apple crumble for dessert, but I couldn’t get seconds because then I’d be too full for football practice.

I couldn’t run around having Adventures on a Sunday because then I’d be tired or sore the next day at football practice.

The only time I felt free, when I was truly unencumbered by the thoughts, was immediately after a game on Friday night. The energy, the lights, the crowd, all I could hope for would be to not embarrass myself. To be a good teammate, a good cheer squad from the sidelines, be a good player when I was allowed on the field. We’d win, of course, and we’d all be… happy. Friends. It was the only time I felt good.

Saturday would be fine, but I’d stress the entire time about having The Most Fun I could during the only time I was free. If I didn’t pack everything I could in during that time, then I’d wasted the weekend, and I had an even more horrible week waiting for me. That I’d have to suffer through it after not living My Best Life and that would be even harder.

The only respite, the only rest, the only time it ever let up, was when the season was over and my responsibilities waned. Then I was just bored. Not as anxious. Until I thought about next season anyway.

When I look back at it now, I can see that’s no way to live. I can see that I had many issues beyond just my feelings toward football practice. It was just the only time I was visibly pushed to failure, worked so hard that I dropped, and I was terrified I’d never Be Enough in this life.

That, more than anything, is likely the prevailing fear that I have always possessed. Deep in my chest, hiding somewhere between my heart and my lungs, making my pulse louder and breathing harder. It’s always been there.
**
And it’s here now. It’s here pretty much all the time. Unless I’m completely losing myself in something like a wonderful game on the Playstation (or even my phone) then I’m feeling anxious. The garbage stacks up, the floor gets dirtier, the rabbit’s cage needs changed, I need to shower, the dishes stack up, the kids need taken places and then brought back and everyone needs fed almost all the damn time.

It’s making it hard to fall asleep in the mornings, when I feel like I need it most. I lay there and feel the tightness in my chest. Wondering what will go wrong, what will wake Jo up, what will break that day, what will bring The Authorities to our door for some new violation, some fresh way to punish us and keep us flattened on the pavement with their knee on our neck.

I don’t know what to do about all this, but I know that I need to do something. Instead, I eat. And escape into things. And sit around getting fatter and be in pain.

Oof. I really need to work on fantasising about when this is over, I know that. But now that there’s been some mix-up with the referral, I still don’t have a date yet. Fucking shitfuck, I’m not even on the waitlist.

I suppose if I put my Psychology Hat on, I’d see that I’ve started to decline mentally since I found out that they fucked my referral and I’m not even waitlisted at either hospital. Fuck.

How Am I Doing – 30/04/2023

[EDIT: 3.35pm 01/05/2023 – Originally a text file on my desktop, I have put it here.]
Not doing great, if I’m being honest. Still get sad, but now am feeling more and more removed and cynical and untrusting of others. Email from Cathie didn’t help. She makes me FEEL like I want to care, like I want to get closer to her. But then I remember all the times she’s made me feel like I did something wrong, like I am/was somehow wrong.

She just never missed a chance to remind me of that. The whole time Jo was there in her house, it would be Jo saying “Wasn’t he just wonderful!” or “Oh, what a cute little guy!” and Cathie would always, ALWAYS follow with “Oh, he was no angel!” in her firm voice.

Man, fuck that. I was a good fucking kid. And what the fuck did she know about it anyway? Did she ever pick me up from school for being naughty? Did my dad? Did either of them sit in a Parent-Teacher Conference and have to hear about anything awful I’d done?

What did I ever do to HER? I was stuck at her place for hours, days sometimes, with no other kids to play with and nothing to fucking do. I was stoked when I got to play on the computer, but the “Emergency Teleport” button was the space bar, and it was quite far away from the arrow pad that moved the little space ship. So when an asteroid was about to smash me, I had to quickly reach across and try and hit that space bar to teleport. It sounded hard, because space bars make slightly more noise than any other key.

Did she come in and politely ask me not to bang on the keyboard because computers are expensive? Did she come in and ask me why I’d banged on the keyboard? Nope, just a medium roar from the next room, “DON’T BANG ON THE KEYBOARD.”

I got one warning. One. If it happened again, in any manner, I was kicked off the computer for the rest of that visit and the entirety of the next one. For hitting the space key too hard. Because I was trying to emergency teleport.

But she never knew that, because she never cared. She never showed any interest in anything I did, ever. She never came to a concert, nor a football game (not even the ones in her town). I was shoved in the corner of her house and expected to play quietly. The toys there never got better as the years went by and I was absolutely, categorically NOT allowed in Jamel’s room in the converted attic. I was one told I could play with her brand-new Rubik’s cube and I got so close to solving one side but I just couldn’t figure it out. When I saw that the stickers were basically layers of plastic laying on the squares, I got my fingernail under one and it came off clean. Then the other one did too, so I swapped ’em. I felt guilty and stupid, but then forgot about it.

Jamel, being brilliant, came home and took one look at it.
“Did you swap the stickers?”
I wanted to lie. “Yes.” I hung my head.
“K, don’t… do that again.” She was pissed and went all quiet.

I wasn’t allowed to play with her stuff ever again. Not even shit she’d outgrown that sat in bags or boxes in the spare room. That stuff was for other people, promised to other kids. Not me.

Fuck I hated going to Cathie’s. And she never came to ours. Stepped foot in our house once in 1988 when we bought Denny’s truck and gave him a Going Away Party before he left for Perth. Other than that, I think she was there briefly when I graduated, but I don’t really remember that either.

So yeah, I’m a bit… sensitive these days. And I’m feeling quite bitter at anyone in my family. I still can’t believe Becky’s post. That was such shit and made me feel like complete shit. They’re all such shit, my family. Why are so many people such shit? *I* don’t think *we* are shit. I fucking love my little family. They’re wonderful people and I think they’re the best around.

Anyway. I’m not doing great. Pretty sensitive to things. Pretty sad sometimes, melancholic, then overly-sensitive. Trying so hard not to be too bitter, to be to reactive or sad or grumpy or shitty.

Kind of feel like shit today. Hate Mondays like Garfield, but hate bad sleep and bad wakings worse.

And all I’m doing is fucking whinging about it now. Just too… nostalgic isn’t the right word. Thinking about the past, I guess. Fuck that shit, and fuck all of them.

I came in with love for the sport and passion for the community.

Straightaway saw Kiron being a cunt and Gilbert Grant being a crazy cunt.  I too, wondered what Nhat did.  It would be nearly a year before he told me the story, start to finish.  All up, he did nothing to GG, nothing at all.

Bounced along happily, banning the crazy cunts, but Zach was always hard to control.

Then it all blew up.  He’s crazy, and after all we did for him.  He’s an actual sociopath.  Just like Gilbert.

Now this ban.  The Ausgel Podcast was the last straw.  Putting some wankstain like Tyler Lynch on there like he’s important.  Dan, Peter, Chris, these Titans of Industry, all talking about how they’re going to initiate legalities against the ban.

We’ve never heard from ANY of them.  NONE of them have ever engaged me in conversation, social media or otherwise, though I’ve reached out to each and every one of them.

This industry, this community, deserves what it gets.

Me, Nhat… Dan.  My wife.  We’ve all put in WAY MORE than we’ve ever gotten out.  What we’ve gotten out instead is abused.  Slandered.  Shit on.  Dan’s gotten it less because he’s been around less, but he’s gotten way more abuse than he’s ever deserved.

I’m sick of it.  Sick of it all.  After all I’ve done, the good energy that I’ve brought and the good I tried to do.

This “community” can go fuck itself.