Failing at recovery

[Circles]

This is just me mainly venting so but anyway I'm just tired of trying so hard with recovery and feeling like no matter what I'm not really meant to recover. Like my mind has been set on suicide and death for so long that I feel so lost without it. I just a fucking failure okay. I failed at life. I'm a 27 year old loser who really fucked up his life beyond repair and I see no way out besides death. If we get graded for how we did in life I'd get a big fat fucking F. I know I only started recently and I should take things slow and take things day by day, blah blah blah, but at the end of the day I'm still me and I can't live with myself.

I truly wish my mother could understand that I really can't live being me anymore. I feel so claustrophobic inside my own self as though I could collapse or sink inside myself wandering aimlessly and wondering how did things happen to be like this? How did my life become such a fucked up mess? It's all just so overwhelming I can't fathom how I'm going to keep this recovery facade up any longer. Was this just a reminder of how pathetic I've become? Is recovery just another way of pretending to be something I'm not? I don't know anymore. I just want to cry without end. I am tired of being like this. I'm tired of being me. What can I do? What the fuck can I do? I feel so lost and broken.

You see maybe some people just never were meant for life no matter what. I feel stuck cause I know this realization is pointless cause I'm too coward to kill myself at this time. But death is all that matters to me and once death becomes your everything it's hard to turn back. I don't know what to do.

 

[whatevs]

For now all you need is to let it out in a meaningful way, do you have anyone to be this raw with IRL?

 

[UpandDownPrincess]

This is just me mainly venting so but anyway I'm just tired of trying so hard with recovery and feeling like no matter what I'm not really meant to recover. Like my mind has been set on suicide and death for so long that I feel so lost without it. I just a fucking failure okay. I failed at life. I'm a 27 year old loser who really fucked up his life beyond repair and I see no way out besides death. If we get graded for how we did in life I'd get a big fat fucking F. I know I only started recently and I should take things slow and take things day by day, blah blah blah, but at the end of the day I'm still me and I can't live with myself.

I truly wish my mother could understand that I really can't live being me anymore. I feel so claustrophobic inside my own self as though I could collapse or sink inside myself wandering aimlessly and wondering how did things happen to be like this? How did my life become such a fucked up mess? It's all just so overwhelming I can't fathom how I'm going to keep this recovery facade up any longer. Was this just a reminder of how pathetic I've become? Is recovery just another way of pretending to be something I'm not? I don't know anymore. I just want to cry without end. I am tired of being like this. I'm tired of being me. What can I do? What the fuck can I do? I feel so lost and broken.

You see maybe some people just never were meant for life no matter what. I feel stuck cause I know this realization is pointless cause I'm too coward to kill myself at this time. But death is all that matters to me and once death becomes your everything it's hard to turn back. I don't know what to do.

If I could do anything for you, I'd change the way you're thinking about recovery.

Recovery is NOT pass/fail, black or white, recovered or unwell.

It's a series of small steps on a winding path. Some steps go forward, some back, some are just a lateral move, not making any progress but not backtracking either. It's a long - perhaps lifelong - process.

Recovery is also a bit of a wonderland. One day you're doing great and the next you've fallen back down the rabbit hole. You make one small move and everything changes or you make a million big steps and remain in the same place. It's not a straight line by any means and the rules always changing. For sure, you can't compare your journey to anyone else's.

Maybe most important is that every step forward, no matter how small, or no matter how many times you've tried it before, is something to celebrate. They are hard-won victories, deserving of self-respect.

Please be gentle with yourself. How you got here really isn't the point. What you do today is what's most important. To borrow a trite phrase from another recovery program: One Day At A Time.

 

[Pluto]

Without the right people around you, and some sense of purpose, it might be virtually impossible to overcome that state of mind.

As an older person, I can particularly agree with @UpandDownPrincess' comment about comparing your journey to others. When we are young, we are constantly hammered with the idea that we should 'succeed' in this or that way - finances, beauty, possessions, relationships, career, etc.

As we age, we observe some people who tick all of those boxes but are only faking happiness. We may also open up to other cultures which place emphases on completely different priorities. We see that everyone is mortal so there is nothing permanently meaningful about success or failure anyway. It is an opportunity to stop beating ourselves up by internalising society's judgements and more deeply strive to find ourselves.

 

[Toxic Positivity]

You raise a striking existential question. When one has been building up most of their life to reach the point of suicide--when, compulsively, habitually, instinctively, one has chosen to live with the goal of ending their own life--what is left when the moment of drama does not come? What then? When all of the patterns, thoughts, behaviors have been had with that end in mind?

It is a tremendous opportunity for us to learn how to aspire to and achieve something else entirely. And half the adventure is figuring out what. In deciding to avert the calamity of suicide, you are already succeeding.