my thoughts don't make sense sometimes

I haven't been this depressed in a long time. Or maybe I'm not depressed. I feel more defeated than sad. Like I should just give up on trying because nothing I do is ever going to be good enough.

I can't get myself together. I have no motivation to do anything that I need to do. I have a to-do list. Some things stay on that list for a month before I finally force myself to do them. Not because they're hard. But because they require energy. Or thought. Or me to get up off the couch. I feel so bad about myself because I never get anything accomplished. It's a vicious cycle. The less I do, the worse I feel about myself, so the less motivated I am to get up and do anything.

Jessie is always gone. If she's not at work, she is out partying. I am unbelievably lonely a lot of the time. She and I used to spend many nights a week together, watching our shows or just hanging out and talking. And now she goes out literally every night. And I can't go, because just the thought of being around all those people in a bar or a house party makes my head spin. So I sit here alone, scared to say anything to her because I know it's not going to matter and it's just going to make things awkward between us. Why doesn't she want to hang out at home with me? Probably the same reason David doesn't -- because it's boring. I'm boring. I feel like life is passing me by because all I want to do is sit in my bed. Or on the couch. But mostly my bed.

I had so much more I was going to write. But my incredible anxiety is keeping me from having focused thoughts... So I guess I will have to write more later.

Day 29: 3 wishes

Where to start...

(1) First and foremost, I wish I didn't have POTS. Seriously, for an illness that's not life-threatening or majorly debilitating, it's really freaking irritating. I hate that I never feel GOOD. I have better days than others, but I never feel good. And it sucks.

(2) Second, I wish that I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I wish I could decide now how I want to spend the rest of my life. I know I COULD make that decision right now, but I want it to be the right one. I just want to be happy with my choice.

(3) Third, I wish that I could eat anything I wanted with no repercussions. No weight gain, no health issues.

Day 28: Something that stresses me out

Oh my. This one will be easy. Because there are tons of things that stress me out.

(1) Having POTS. Aside from the fact that anxiety-like symptoms are part of the syndrome, the fear that I will pass out or vomit in public due to this illness is sometimes overwhelming. Waiting in line can be difficult, because I'm always scared I will need to leave the situation but can't. Of course, aside from that first time at Cedar Point, I've never had to do that. But it still stresses me out, a lot.

(2) Worrying about hail on my new car. I have never worried so much about the weather before, and this storm season we're having is making it even more worrisome. It hailed on my car last weekend for about fifteen minutes, and I was stuck on the highway and couldn't do anything about it. I was hysterical, and I was SURE my car was ruined. It turned out that, as far as David and I can tell, there was no damage caused by the hail, but it was still scary.

(3) Money issues. I'm sure lots of people (if not most people) are stressed out about money. My stresses come from the fact that I really just want to be independent. I want to be able to pay for everything I need to and be self-sufficient. But making minimum wage and working twenty hours a week isn't cutting it. I just received a lot of money for graduation, but all of that will be going toward bills. I need to find a new job, but I'm very scared. Which leads to...

(4) My job. I hate my job. I hate wasting my time working for minimum wage for a man I despise. I would like to get a 9 to 5 job, maybe doing receptionist work or something, while I try to decide what I would like to do next (as far as deciding between grad school and a job...). But I'm scared... I'm afraid it's going to be hard. Or that my POTS will get worse and I will have to miss work and then I'll get fired. I'm just having trouble pulling the trigger because I don't want to leave my comfort zone when I'm not completely confident in my abilities because of my illness. It's a combination of laziness, comfort, and fear, I think.

It is nice to not have the added stress of school mixed in with all this, even though I do miss it. Hopefully within the next few months I will decide how I want to move forward, and then I can go back to school. Or something...

Day 27: original photo of my city

This one was kind of hard for me at first. I take lots of pictures, but most of them are indoors, and none of them really show what Columbia is actually like. So I had to borrow a picture from one of my friends, Monique. This picture is of the Magic Tree, this tree that is decorated with a ton of Christmas lights in December. There are supposedly lights on every branch of the tree!

I would have liked to post a picture of the columns on MU's campus, but oh well. This is pretty unique to Columbia, too!

Day 26: my dream wedding

This one will be easy. Because I haven't thought that much about it. I really want my wedding to be simple. I want to be so in love with the person I marry that my wedding won't matter. I watched wayyy too many love stories as a kid, and I really do believe in true love... not necessarily soul mates, but true love. So that's all I really want at my dream wedding. True love.

Day 25: Put my iPod on shuffle, first 10 songs

1. Chop Suey - System of a Down
2. Goodbye To You - Michelle Branch
3. Shake Ya Ass - Mystikal
4. Fancy - Reba McEntire
5. If You're Gone - Matchbox 20
6. The World's Greatest - R. Kelly
7. You Were Meant For Me - Jewel
8. U Don't Know My Name - Alicia Keys
9. Family Portrait - Pink
10. My Way - Usher

This is a terrrrrible example of what I like to listen to. I really only like the first song. Jeez, I really need to clean up my iPod...

Day 24: something I've learned

"Youth is wasted on the young." That is what I have learned. I wish I could go back to high school and have no responsibilities. More than that, I wish I had known how good I had it back then. But that's the nature of life. Young people are inexperienced, so they don't realize just how good they have it... Life's funny.

Day 23: favorite movies

Ok, 30 day challenge. You really dropped the ball here. I already answered this question.

Day 22: What's in my purse?

This should be therapeutic. I need to clean it out anyway! Let's see:

• bottle of Ibuprofen
• bandana (I have to wear it for work)
• checkbook
• 4 ink pens
• mechanical pencil
• wallet
• 3 chapsticks
• face powder
• Extra polar ice gum
• hair brush
• hand lotion
• sunglasses
• concealer
• piece of paper with last week's work schedule on it
• car keys
• non-mechanical pencil (it's glittery and pink, and I never use, but I love it)
• Bandana'a nametag
• mascara
• flashlight
• deodorant
• loyalty card to Tiger Express Carwash
• eye liner
• visor clip-on that says "Never drive faster than your guardian angel can fly"
• spare car key
• packet of Ibuprofen
• bottle of naproxen
• a dime
• 5 bobby pins
• prescription I never filled
• receipt for the car battery I bought for my old car
• receipt for David's mom's Christmas gift
• 3 ponytail holders
• 6 tampons
• two gum wrappers
• two Andes mint wrappers
• a lifesaver mint wrapper
• spare keys to David's car

Well that was fun. I realized that I'm prepared for kind of a lot. I guess that's good to know!

Day 21: Favorite picture of myself ALL TIME. Why?

I love this picture of myself, but I'm not really sure how to answer why. Maybe it's because I look so happy. Or maybe it's because it's a silly picture. I think most of it is that I think my hair looks good in it. And you can't see my double chin. Plus my boobs look big.

I had a hard time choosing between this picture and two other pictures from that night. I must have been overly photogenic that night, because usually not very many good pictures turn out of me during one event...

Day 20: Nicknames

When I was in junior high and high school, I had lots of nicknames, and none of them were very nice... My 8th grade science teacher started calling me Skara, and I legit STILL get called that from time to time. I was also called Shwhitey (because I'm loud, and pale... it started out as "shh, Whitey", but I guess that was too long...), and then my junior year this boy Josh started calling me Seabiscuit and literally everyone started calling me that. He said he gave me that nickname because my teeth jut out in the front, like a horse's... High school's fun...

Once I got out of high school, all those nicknames (minus Skara...) have pretty much gone away, although Jenn's husband Corey calls me Whitey. He came up with that one his own though.

The one nickname I've had my whole life is Nick. My middle name is Nicole, and my whole family calls me Nick. I still think a little part of it is because my dad wanted a boy and if I were a boy my name would have been Nick... but that's neither here nor there. My whole family calls me that, and I always respond when I hear the word Nick at my parents'. When I was dating a guy named Nick, things got sort of confusing at my parents' house...

Day 19: something I miss

I miss a lot of things. I'm a pretty nostalgic person, and I think a lot about how things used to be. But the thing I miss the most is my life before I had POTS.

When I first got POTS, it made my life a living nightmare. I didn't know what was wrong with me, and my family and friends thought I was bat-shit crazy because no one could see my symptoms. In January, when I was diagnosed, I thought I finally had the answer -- I thought I was going to start taking this medicine and I would be fine. And eventually, by about March, I was feeling lots better.

But this past few weeks have been rough, culminating with tonight, where I almost passed out at work. I feel like I'm not even on medication. It feels just like it did when I first started having symptoms. I don't know if it's the heat, or stress from finals/birthday/graduation, or what, but it's killing me. And my mom told me tonight that I just need to learn how to control it. Well if I knew how to do that, I obviously would already be doing it. No one in my life understands. My family thinks I'm crazy -- yesterday, for the 30 day challenge I'm doing on facebook, I posted a picture of POTS for something that has impacted my life recently... and my grandma commented that there are people with worse things than that. No one has ANY FUCKING CLUE what it's like to be inside my body, miserable all the time. In pain, dizzy, completely confused all the time. It makes my life a living nightmare, and, contrary to popular belief, I think I'm being pretty DAMN positive about having a chronic, incurable, possibly lifelong disease... But no one agrees.

And then there are the people who tell me they think it's all in my head. I think my mom thinks that. I KNOW she thinks that about the anxiety I've been having for the last ten years. She tells me to just "stop". Like I hadn't thought of that brilliant idea yet. Like I could do that if I wanted to... Other people think that too, and it's really upsetting because it ISN'T all in my head. But to prove that, I'd have to faint in public, or drink alcohol and then have a heart attack or something. NO ONE BELIEVES ME, and it is SO FUCKING FRUSTRATING.

... But I've strayed from the point. I miss my life before POTS. I miss being able to go out until 3 in the morning and not have to worry about getting enough sleep so I'm not sick the next day. I miss being able to have a drink with my friends. I miss being invited out. I miss spontaneity. I miss not taking 8000 pills a day, even though they don't make me feel that much better. I miss being happy...

Day 18: favorite place to eat

Sadly, one of my favorite places to eat is Chili's. I know, I know... I worked there for over a year and ate there at the very least once a week... I still eat there all the time even though I don't work there anymore. It is pathetic, really.

Another place I love is Red Lobster. I love seafood, and when I get to eat there it makes me so happy... mmm, Cheddar Bay biscuits...

I also really love El Maguey. Best. Queso. Ever. I never liked Mexican food until about a year and a half ago when Jessie forced me to go there. Then I decided I love it. A lot.

Obviously, I'm really big on chain restaurants. I don't venture much past them. I would like to, but I'm scared of the unknown, so I don't. I'm a baby.

Day 17: Something you're looking forward to

There are lots of things I am looking forward to this month. I am looking forward to my birthday on the 10th, graduation weekend the 14th through 16th, and my graduation party on the 21st. I am just really excited to be done stressing out about school. I'm also looking forward to having more free time this summer to just hang out.

Day 16: Dream house

This one is kind of hard. I am not a very creative person, so designing my own house is going to be kind of out of the question. So I will just list some of the features I would like my dream house to have.

I would really like to have a two story house. We never had that as a kid, and while in college I lived in a duplex with two stories and I like that. Sam likes stairs.

I would also probably want a patio or porch on the second story. So no burglars can come in, but I could sit out there and feel safe. (I mean, I guess if they had a ladder they could get in, but most aren't that crafty... right??)

I would want my house located in the suburbs I think. I lived in a fairly rural area until I moved to Columbia, and once I moved here I realized how much I like living close to the places I want to go. Like work. When I was 16 I had to drive 30 minutes one way to work, and I basically spent all the money I made on gas. So I would like to live in the suburbs, but not in a city.

A garage is a must. And lots of storage space. And a basement for when there are tornadoes. And a big kitchen. And an appropriate amount of bathrooms for the number of people who live there.

I obviously don't care much about these things. I'm not big on flashy or elaborate things, and my dream house will be no different, I'm sure... Or, I'm so poor now that any nice house that's not in a ghetto will do and I can't think beyond that...

Day 15: Bible verse

I am not even remotely a religious person. I don't know Bible verses, and I don't go to church. I don't judge other people for what they DO believe in, so don't judge me for what I DON'T believe in.

That is all.

Day 14: A picture of me last year - how have I changed?

This picture was taken almost exactly one year ago, on my birthday. Lots of things have changed in my life since then.

The biggest difference between myself then and myself now is that I could never drink alcohol now like I did the night this picture was taken. Since being diagnosed with POTS I have reduced my alcohol consumption to zero because drinking alcohol makes me feel dramatically worse. Most of the time I'm okay with this, because I was kind of tapering off my drinking before I got sick anyway, but sometimes it's a little sad. I don't get invited out to bars or parties really anymore, because everyone knows I won't have fun being the sober girl watching everyone else get wasted and act like jackasses. When I do go out, I have to drink water, and I have to deal with the million questions that go along with that. Sometimes I just want to lie and say I'm drinking vodka straight, but I don't... POTS has really changed my life, in more ways than just this one, and I can only really come up with negative ways it has done so...

But enough with that. Since this picture was taken, I re-enrolled in college; I will have finished my degree by this time two weeks from now. David and I moved apart, and now I live with Jessie. Even though I'm lonelier than I was when we lived together, as far as sleeping alone most nights, I think it was the right move for our relationship. It, along with not going out partying every night, has made me realize all the good things about him and our relationship without having to deal with the stress of trying to pay bills together and keep a house clean together (which we NEVER EVER did).

When that picture was taken I still worked at Chili's. In fact, that picture was taken at Chili's. But in December, Tracie (my old boss) and I disagreed about my holiday schedule, and, long story short, I don't work there anymore. I work at Bandana's now, and I hate it. It isn't the company. It isn't even the people I work with for the most part. It's mainly two things: (1) first and foremost, it isn't Chili's. I miss working with people I know, people I have known for the last (almost) two years. I miss working with Jessie. And (2) working for minimum wage really really sucks. Especially considering I was serving and making almost triple that an hour before I left Chili's. It's frustrating, and it's not paying the bills, which makes it even worse. But I'm finally starting to bond with some of the people I work with, so it's getting harder to think about quitting there, even though I think about it a lot...

This is going to sound ridiculous, but I miss the hairstyle I had in that picture. About a month and a half ago I made the horrific mistake of getting an $11 haircut, and I'm still paying for it in the stress that it's caused. I told the girl who cut it that I wanted about three inches cut off, and instead she cut off like seven. She also gave me little boy bangs that aren't remotely close to being even, and I'm not sure how I'm ever going get that fixed. I am going to have to wait five years until they have grown the length of the rest of my hair I guess. I miss my long, pretty, non-little-boy-like hair from last year. It's sad.

Day 13: Goals

Oh goals. I have never been very good at accomplishing big goals in my life. When I graduated high school I thought I would be two years into law school by now. Oops. Instead I am struggling to graduate with a 3.0 GPA with my undergrad in biology.

Actually, the lack of accomplishing my goals in life has been one factor leading to my low self-esteem, I think. I never really do what I set out to do, and it frustrates and embarrasses me. I read an article today about procrastination, and about how, if I just did the tasks I need to get done in a timely manner, I would realize that they aren't as bad as they seem, and I would get them finished before the dead line makes me crazy... But I don't do that. And that is part of the reason I rarely accomplish my goals. I am kind of an unmotivated person, in general, mainly because I don't really know what I want out of life. And that's hard. It's a vicious cycle; I am unmotivated because I don't know what I want to do, but because I don't accomplish anything it lowers my self-esteem and depresses me, which leads to a further lack of motivation.

Having said all that, I do have things I would like to accomplish in my life. I want to have a job where I help people. That's really important to me, but aside from being a doctor I'm not sure how I could use my biology degree to do that. I think I would like to go to a career counselor to see what my options are, but I keep putting it off. Because that's what I do.

Another goal I have is to earn enough money to support myself comfortably some time in the (extremely) near future. Minimum wage at a job I hate just isn't cutting it, but I'm not sure where to go from here. I need something for now that will more than pay the bills (or pay them at all...), but I don't want to go out and get a "big kid job" because I don't know what I want to do as a career. "Big kid jobs" aren't as disposable as restaurant or retail jobs, and I'm scared that if I got a "big kid job" I would hate it, or I would figure out what I really wanted to do but then I couldn't leave that job because it would look bad on a resume that I quit a "big kid job" after a month. It's a lot to wrap my brain around, and no one seems to understand the feelings that I have about it. It's sort of frustrating...

A goal that many women have, which is having babies and getting married, seems very distant to me. I suppose one day I might like those things (might being the key word), but they are both very big commitments that scare me right now. Maybe in the future those two things will be closer to the top of my list of goals, but for right now they are pretty low priorities.

Right now my biggest goal is to finish college with as close to a 3.0 GPA as I can get, and celebrate with my friends and family. I am having a hard time looking past the next two weeks because I'm so busy, so if I accomplish this task I will be happy.

Day 12: something I can't leave the house without

Sad but true: I can't leave the house without my iPhone.

This isn't a picture of my actual phone, but I have this case on it. I love this case, even though it's huge, because I love the phone so much I want to keep it safe!

I never thought I would jump on the iPhone bandwagon, but I have and I don't ever want to jump off. I use it for everything: checking the weather, checking my facebook, reading emails, reading the news, and most importantly playing Angry Birds! And now, my new car has Bluetooth in it, so the songs on my iPhone play on the car stereo without having to plug it in, and I can also talk on the phone through my car.

My phone is awesome.