A couple of things ...

First of all, I volunteered for a Befriending project in my area, where you befriend local seniors and sit and chat with them, that sort of thing. I did it because it always makes me feel good to help others, I have always adored being around seniors -- they always have the best stories!! -- and because I'm hoping volunteering my time to something special like this will not only boost my self-esteem but will give me something to do other than worry about school. I was contacted by the lady who runs it and she wants to meet with me on Monday. I was SUPER excited about this but now I'm really, really nervous for some reason. I don't even know what I'm nervous about, exactly, since I've been wanting to do this for a long time. Maybe I'm afraid I'll be a disappointment to them somehow, or that for some reason I'm not going to like it. I can't see why, it's exactly my kind of project, I'm just letting my thoughts run in directions they shouldn't, I guess.

Second, today I did a presentation for French ... and it completely bombed. It was AWFUL. I stayed up until 4 o'clock this morning working on it. I don't get nervous making presentations, so it wasn't nerves that messed me up. I'm not sure what it was, but all of a sudden I just lost my train of thought and couldn't remember what I'd already said and my carefully crafted notes made no sense and when class was over I just BOLTED out of there as fast as I possibly could. It was humiliating. The worst part is, I'm not going to get a do-over. That presentation is basically 50% of my oral mark in French and there I was stuttering and mumbling and forgetting even the simplest words like a total idiot. Normally I speak French pretty well, I've been doing it for sixteen years, so I have no idea how my brain managed to just switch off like that. And then, as I was walking back from class, of course all the words I SHOULD have said came flowing back. The entire presentation as I'd rehearsed it was right there in my head and it just made things worse because I KNOW I could have done better and I made a complete idiot of myself instead. I'm really angry and disappointed with myself. I can't believe I screwed up like that!!!

I'm going to make an appointment to go back to see my counsellor. I haven't been to see her yet this school year. I didn't think I needed to because I was feeling all right. I still am generally feeling okay, in terms of symptoms of depression. I'm eating, sleeping, exercising, getting my work done and for the most part feeling pretty good. But something feels off, too. I've put off going to see my counsellor in part because I have no idea what to say to her. I can't pinpoint how I'm feeling at all. On the surface, I feel fine, but it's like there's something nagging at me and I don't know what. My relationship with my family is better than it's ever been; this is the first year of university I haven't spent the majority of my time worrying about a particular relationship that was pretty much the last straw in terms of my falling into a depression -- it feels like such a weight off my chest. But I still feel like now that I've come out the other side, I have no idea where to go. During the worst of my depression my life consisted solely of weathering the storm -- some days even breathing felt like a huge effort -- and now that the storm has passed I guess I'm starting to see which parts of my life have survived and which parts are now just debris. My best friend has been after me to go see my counsellor for weeks -- I think she can tell when I'm lost before I can, a lot of the time. It's not that I think going back is any kind of failure or form of personal weakness -- I think it requires a huge amount of strength to ask for help. I just don't know how to ask for help when I'm not entirely sure what the problem is. Sorry if that doesn't make sense, I'm not really sure what I'm getting at ...