How's your head?

I have many complaints.

I've always considered myself to be a high functioning depressive, but when I'm honest with myself I don't really know what that actually means. I certainly do function a lot more highly than many other people with depression but it's only recently that I've come to realise the extent to which I actually rely on the structure in order to maintain a positive and stable mental state.

Just over a month ago now I finished my degree and became wonderfully, brilliantly, unemployed. It was my fear, one which has now come into fruition, that I would struggle a huge amount with not having anything to do. Despite having achieved a first class psychology degree, and being an extremely passionate person, none of the many jobs I have applied for yet want me. And whilst that's fine, they all want people with experience etc. the lack of structure is becoming increasingly hard to deal with. I can't function without reason to function, I don't know if that makes sense, and I sure as heck have no clue if that is 'typical' of a person with mental health issues. But that is how I am.

Despite having so much more time which I could be pouring into my hobbies, I am doing nothing. I have barely uploaded to my blog, I've barely read, I tried and failed (although I still have a little time left) to write a story for Camp NaNoWriMo, and I feel like I have lost my interest in absolutely everything. Not helped by the fact I have moved home from Liverpool to a place with very little to do and where I only have one friend. I also no longer have the clinical psychologist support I was receiving at uni, and I'm sure that has a little bit of an impact despite me not particularly enjoying the experience of having a psychologist (but that's for a different post).

I am terrified that I'm going to slip backwards, I don't often give myself the credit for it but I have made a huge amount of progress in the last couple of years, but I can feel myself getting back into old mindsets and stuff and I just can't see a way out?

I'm not trying to say that a job is going to cure my depression, that would be silly. But I guess what I'm saying is I feel so much worse when I don't have a) a structure b) a reason to leave the house c) regular social interaction with people my age (even though it has to be social interaction of a certain kind because, social anxiety - wow doesn't mental illness make so much sense??). I don't know what I'm supposed to do at this point, I need to find something to do with myself on a daily basis as this seems to help me allow myself time to engage with the things that I love, but I'm scared that the more time until I get something to do, the harder it will be for me to continue applying for stuff, not only because I may be disheartened but also because my condition is on a slow but steady downward spiral.

There's a lot of stuff to look forward to, I mean YALC is only a couple of weeks away? But I'm mostly worried right now that I'm not going to be able to enjoy it and I'm going to be downer on everyone else because I'm not feeling good. I know there's a lot of power in the stuff you speak over yourself and perhaps I shouldn't say these things but continually going to bed at night knowing you've achieved pretty much nothing is super hard and I don't know how one shifts out of that.

So yes, that's where I'm at currently and I wanted to offer some explanation for my lack of... everything really. Sorry that this post isn't an interesting, or a book related one, but I'm reminding myself that the reason I started this blog was to help my progress and thus it's okay for me to use it to document this kind of thing.

I don't know how to round this off really, but if anyone understands where I'm coming from and/or can offer some advice on the stuff I've mentioned please let me know either in comment or DM me on Twitter, because tbh any thoughts right now are much appreciated! Hopefully something in my circumstance will change and I'll start to move towards being better again, but right now it's a little scary and by writing, what has turned out longer than I meant - sorry! I feel like I'm a little less alone, so thanks.