My children are living without me 3 days a week, now. They miss me, they really do, and in some ways, they are marginally less well-looked-after than if I looked after them. But they won’t die of it. Even my daughter can speak, now (she doesn’t do it often, but she does) and they are both much better at asserting themselves than they were, in 2011.

My sister will have her second baby soon. I wish I could be there for that–they’re going to name her after me, kinda. (Same middle name.) I like my middle name. I like my sister and her husband and kids.

My eldest younger brother will graduate soon, ish. He wants to be my favourite male character from literature when he grows up (Atticus Finch). I wish I could come see that. I wish I felt like I really know my youngest siblings, but I don’t. They grew up without me. I left home and never really came back, and they’re teens and adults and they haven’t regularly seen me since they were babies/toddlers.

I’m supposed to be doing a psychology degree, now. 3 days a week–the 3 days I’m away from my kids, essentially by myself, trying to study and mostly failing–I sit in lectures and tell myself that in 2 more years, I’ll have a degree and it will be worth it and I’ll look back on this time fondly, with a sense of accomplishment, and I’ll be so glad I did it.

9 days in a row, now. 9 days, where I’ve sat in front of my pc and tried to listen to cheerful songs and read webcomics and make myself do my uni work, as tears run down my face for, oh, no particular reason.

It’s my birthday, soon. I’ve already had a lovely celebration–I met Weird Al, and told him I’ve got my own parody group (I don’t, really, I thought I did, but it turns out I don’t) and he was one of the nicest people you could imagine. It was great. I met someone I absolutely idolize, and it was *better* than expected. Who gets to say that? Not many people, I bet.

I suppose I’m just ungrateful. If I loved more, or worried less, or tried harder, or had upped my meds sooner, or had never left home, or had gone to uni when I was younger… *sigh* Bad decision follows bad decision follows bad decision, and I don’t even remember what the good decisions would have been.

Falling in love. There’s a slippery slope. You can actually love people *too* much, you can frighten them away with the intensity of your feelings, you can force them to admit that they’d actually be happier without you… and *then* what do you do? When you love everyone and no one wants you to…. ?

I’m too much even for the people who love me. That’s not hyperbole, it’s demonstrable fact. No one can put up with me, at the levels I need, to feel secure/loved/happy/stimulated/valued.

I understand that starting university is a big change. I get that sometimes, people let you down (I was meant to be a little less isolated, I have friends in my uni town, but… well, shit happens, I guess). But when you have to go on psych meds just to be able to handle speaking in front of your classmates, and you’re spending all your time waiting around for people who are meant to be your friends to have time for you (not their fault that they made better decisions than I did, and they have jobs and uni of their own, by the way) and you miss your partner and kids (but not that much, you actually miss the people you’ve turned your life upside down to be near even more than you miss your partner and kids) and every second of every day is spent waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the uni to figure out you’re not that clever, for your partner to realize he’s doing too much of the work, for the person you’re actually in love with to seal the deal with the girl he’s chasing, for your parents to die and your nieces and nephews to be born and your siblings to graduate and you know you’ll never make it back home before any of it happens….

How long are you meant to leave it? How long, until you give in and accept that it’s *never* going to get better?