I just really don't know what to think anymore. I have been depressed for as long as I can remember. I've had some pretty bad down times, some of them lasting for months or years, and this one in particular seems to have started around 2008. I thought I would be happier when I got out of grad school, but I ended up having a complete meltdown and had to leave grad school. I tried to find a job in my field and couldn't, so I took what I could get. I moved back in with my parents because I could no longer afford to live on my own. That meant packing up my apartment and moving 8 hours away. I wrecked my precious little car that I loved. It took me over 7 months to get over the loss of my car.

Both my grandparents passed away within three months of each other when I moved back. I had a part time job at a good company, and proceeded to fall for a guy I can't have. It seems like the guys I end up getting feelings for are almost always taken. Also, he's in his late forties, I'm just shy of 30. I finally found a great job in my field this month. And I had always thought that it would make me happier. It didn't. Something is missing. I feel so empty inside. It makes me feel like someone punched me in the stomach. And I can't stop thinking about that guy. I have no interest in anything that used to interest me. On the weekends I can't stop sleeping. I don't want to get up because I'm happier when I'm dreaming, although that's not even totally the case anymore. This stuff in my life has leached its way into my dreams. Thoughts of him, sexual abuse I suffered when I was 2 in a daycare center, my dysfunctional relationship with my dad, everything just keeps leaking into my subconscious.

My dad was never there for me when I was growing up, he lived 3 states away, and the road goes both ways, but we were the only ones that made that move to come up and visit him. Now he's trying to be the father that he wasn't then. And I told him that I would like that, but in reality I am still so angry and he inevitably ends up making me mad. You're daddy's beautiful baby girl, daddy's so proud of his little girl. WHY don't you just SHUT UP, I'm not you're LITTLE GIRL, talking like that makes me want to VOMIT! But I never say that, I'm always like I luv u 2 dad. But in reality it makes me want to punch him in the face. My aunt, who is my other parent, my mom's sister, is such a downer, and can be a really mean, nasty person to be around. Oh joy, I get to come home to more unhappiness.

Sometimes, I just want to start driving and never stop. I see birds fly and I'm envious of them because I can't escape my life and the way I feel, and they can just fly away. I wish I could just escape to my own little fantasy world and not have to come back into this one. I want to be thankful for what I have, and I feel so guilty for being like I am. I know there are others out there that are a lot worse than I am, and I'm sorry for feeling like I do. I don't want to come across as ungrateful or thankless, because I'm not. I'm just so unhappy. I do not want to keep feeling like this.

I live in NC in the mountains and it is such a beautiful area, where I was born, and I can't even appreciate that anymore, it's lost its meaning. Everything has lost its meaning. I pray to God, but I don't think my heart is open enough yet. I go to church, it does nothing for me. I feel like an outsider. There aren't many places I've been where I felt like I truly belong. This used to be one of them. Now I'm not even sure about that anymore. Everybody's got there little cliques and I just stand on the outside watching.