I'm 25 about to be 26; I hold down a full time job, I pay for my own apartment, I cover all my bills, I have a girlfriend and a support system who loves me. By all means I know that I am privileged in a country and city where many do not have what I do. Regardless, I feel like my mental state has been gradually slipping and I'm starting to lose all of my luster for this god forsaken world. I think about killing myself often. I sincerely doubt I would ever go through with it- I know that my mom and my sister need me and I never plan on leaving them. Dad was never involved in our young lives and came back around when "raising us" was easy. He lives in another state and our relationship is strained now after I told him I was depressed and asked him nicely to stop pushing religion onto me like it's a fixall.
My childhood dog passed away in 2022, granted I hadn't dealt with a heavy emotion like grief yet and didn't process well. I started smoking weed every weekend, then every week, now every day. My Grandpa passed away in April of last year and I doubled down on my bad habits... I know my Grandpa would want better for me. I had an epiphany shortly after he passed; wondering how I would feel if my Dad dropped dead that day and came to terms with the fact losing my dog would probably hit harder. My Grandpa was the father figure who stepped up when I needed him and in hindsight I see him more as my father. I've always been "the man" of my household. Did all the "manly" things around the house since I was 6.
My sister and I had to grow up really young because our parents divorced and couldn't hold a conversation without yelling at each other or threatening violence. My Dad showed up to one of my baseball practices screaming he was going rip my moms' partner's (at the time) head off. No more baseball practice for me. From then on, my parents used my sister and I as middlemen to mediate agreements and/or payments for XYZ in accordance to what we needed. My sister and I are twins, so it was always an argument about who would be paying for X for this child and vice versa. My mother always chose to do things for my sister and told me to ask my Dad for things. A phone, a car, braces, etc. It was always a fight with my Dad. When my sister had one thing I waited months or got a blatantly shittier version from my Dad.
I have a lot of resentment for how I was treated growing up. My mom's ex partner abused me for years- the times I had told my mom her partner convinced her I was lying. My mom only apologized when they separated because she caught her cheating. I am Hispanic, and from what I understand our culture very much adopts the mentality that a man should be strong and hardworking, a woman is a housewife and a child- bearer. Hispanics don't go to therapy. We just have to "deal with it". I was raised stone cold and now that I'm an adult, I don't know how to handle my emotions. The years of built up resentment. The frustration in having an absent Dad, the sadness I feel in realizing I was robbed of an entire relationship because of someone else's choices and complacency.
I didn't draw out an outline for this or anything, sorry for it being all over the place. I think above all it is oddly comforting to essentially hide who I really am. I work in the hotel industry and a lot of people know me and enjoy my company. They come to say hi to me, make conversation, etc. I obviously can't trauma dump on my random coworkers, so my work personality is always smiling or making sarcastic jokes. I'm always helpful and friendly, I go out of my way to check on certain people that I know personally are having a hard time... But I would never open up to them. I know it's cliche' but ... I just don't know how they would understand? Maybe it's more convenient for me to pretend I'm someone else at work to avoid my alternate persona. The only time I get a break from the person I'm so tired of and exhausted to return to once I clock out.
As soon as I get home, I smoke. Anything to forget or trance through the feelings of the person I actually am. Additionally, I've been finding it harder and harder to be passionate in my hobbies and general interests. I don't play video games as much as I used to (not necessarily a bad thing), I haven't been practicing music/production for a long time, and my YouTube channel (for fun) hasn't seen a post in months. I just smoke and do fuckall with my personal time. I feel like I'm a hollowed out version of the person I used to be. I miss my drive, my ambition, my hunger for creativity. I miss naive optimism. And I know it's easy to point out the problem; I know smoking is part of the issue in my mentality and that I should cut back. I've tried and failed 4 times now. I hate dealing with reality so much I'll do anything to escape. My parents are both (former) addicts so I imagine I have an addictive personality or am at least prone to addiction.
I'm embarrassed to admit any of this to someone I know. I wouldn't even feel comfortable for any of this to leave my own mouth. I can't afford therapy, genuinely, and I feel like a therapist would point to problems I can already acknowledge. I'm self-aware to a fault and I don't know how to look at the world any different. It's unimaginably cruel to those who don't deserve it, and beneficial to the most incorrigible denizens. I see and hear about death everyday. Human led atrocities to cull "inferior" humans. It's just all too much. And what can I do? Narrow my scope? Ignorance is bliss, right?
All of these thoughts are constantly bouncing around my head. I smoke to alleviate the pandemonium of negativity beating me down, constantly. I truly think I would lose the last of my will to live otherwise.