My story...just because I don't have anyone in real life to tell it to

Wanted to say that these same winds of depression power my sails in similar fashion. I started in business for myself last year and as of late I can hardly get up off the couch and do anything. I do not feel capable... Its like someone tied a 50 lb weight to my soul. I want to sleep, watch TV and I Eat maybe one meal a day. I don't want to answer phone calls or talk to people....I'm convinced I am all washed up and the end with be approaching....That I'll lose everything...I have accumulated some great stuff over the years but it is all meaningless to me....

Think I'll go on a facebook diet too....

Hi,
Question: are you a perfectionist? If so, you will struggle with self-esteem. Perhaps it's a professional hazard. ANyway, if you could get a job in Music in Canada, you'd get free healthcare.
I still think it's important you level with your parents. You never know, give them a chance to surprise you.
And with regards to girlfriend, why not go online and be frank about who you are and what you want?

So, I'm 30 years old. Live with my parents. Have no money. Borrow their car because I don't have my own. Have pretty much no income. I have a college degree from an extremely prestigious east coast music school that I attended on partial scholarship that doesn't really mean anything because it's just a piece of paper sitting on the wall next to me in my parents' basement mocking me.

I have no self-esteem. Realize deep down that I'm good at what I do or have potential or whatever considering the heaps of praise that have been given to me by other musicians, teachers, friends, audiences, etc. But, even getting constant praise, support, and reassurance from some of the musicians I admire most in the world doesn't help me because I find some way to convince myself I either don't deserve the praise or that I'm worthless because everybody says I have all this talent and I'm wasting it sitting in my parents' basement doing nothing.

I don't like teaching because I feel like I don't have the ability to do it well or maybe that I'm just too lazy to do it well. Yet, I've had students who love me and I know that I have much more to offer than most, but I just end up sending them away to somebody else instead (ironically, usually they end up with somebody with 1/10th my talent, but the belief that they are worthy).

I gave up years ago on relationships. Haven't had a girlfriend in at least 8 years...been on 5 or 6 dates in that time. At this point, don't even know if my lack of desire to ever be with anybody again is because I really don't care or because I assume I'll never be good enough to find somebody. I somehow manage to watch porn and masturbate 4x a day on average but I don't think it's out of actual sexual desire to be with somebody. I assume I'm just looking for the 30 seconds of feeling good, relaxed, and carefree that comes from orgasm. Sometimes I realize that I'm watching porn and the actress isn't even somebody I would want to touch in real life. The need to watch porn seems to be simply that it's part of the necessary process that leads towards the release of dopamine. I started having trouble with getting enough of an erection for satisfying intercourse with my girlfriend back when I was 21 or so which I'm sure was a mental, not physical issue as I was skinny as a post back in those days. It hasn't gotten any better ever since then, but I guess I just got used to it and now it doesn't even seem like a problem since I don't date anyway. But, it was a source of fear for me back in the days when I still had interest in finding a partner.

I gained quite a bit of weight around the time of a breakup around age 22 or so and went from 5'8" 140lbs to 5'8" 180lbs in a very short time which caused me to get stretch marks all over my stomach...yet another reason to avoid intimate contact...here I am at age 30 and they're still all visible and more appeared as I'm now pretty overweight at 5'8" 205-210lbs. So, even if I desired to be with a partner, it's hard to imagine any female being thrilled with an overweight guy with stretch marks all over his stomach and a weak erection. Not to mention the whole living with his parents way past the acceptable age thing.

I tried talk therapy for a while about 4 years ago during a time when I was becoming a borderline alcoholic supporting myself by playing music, but hating it all the while because I didn't have respect for the music I was needing to play to pay the rent. The therapy was every week for about 4 months and helped a little, but not much. I'm a very guarded person and I was comfortable telling her about my drinking, work troubles, depression, anxiety, etc, but couldn't bring myself to tell her about how I was afraid to be with a girl in case they would laugh at my stretch marks or weak erection. I guess I hoped that if my depression could be cured, the sexual problems might be cured as well, and I might have enough self esteem to not be so worried about my appearance. But, no luck.

I tried some antidepressants for a short time and it seemed like they were beginning to help my depression lessen a little bit, but they also seemed to make me even more tired than usual, and make it almost impossible to orgasm. So, I stopped. I've been trying St John's Wort instead, but after a month of 600mg a day, I'm not noticing any obvious improvement in depression...I might be feeling slightly more stable, but certainly not enough to make me feel like I can cope with day to day life. A day that I make it to the shower feels like a success at this point.

Somehow, I've managed to get a college degree, play music for thousands of people over the years, teach students, hide my depression so well that nobody is aware of it (aside from people thinking I'm a negative person), but it's all been through this horrible mask I where when I have to deal with people. I go do what I need to do and then come back home exhausted from even the smallest contact with the outside world...and then eventually sabotage any little success that I am having by disappearing, not returning phone calls, disappointing people, etc because I'd rather just sit at home and be worthless.

I can't afford antidepressants or therapy because I'm not working enough, and the reason I can't work enough is that this stupid depression makes me afraid to go into public, feel like I'm not good enough to play the gigs or teach the students that musicians with half my talent are out there doing instead of me. I've created this internal sense of what is and isn't good enough, and because I'm not 100% perfect and the best in the world, I feel like I'm not even good enough to leave the house and teach a 10 year old. It's a strange place to be in to realize that I'm a better musician now than I'd ever dreamed I could've become, have had more success than I'd ever dreamed I could've had, and to look around and realize that musicians who aren't half as good as me are getting the work that I want because I can't live up to this impossible standard I've set for myself. If I can't be one of the 10 best in the world at what I do then I feel like a complete failure...despite the fact that some of those who I *do* consider to be the best in the world have time and time again tried to tell me that the only thing holding me back from reaching their level is my belief that I never will.

So, now I'm at a point where I should realistically be able to do anything I want with my life, but I'm sitting in my parents' basement wishing I could summon the energy to shower. I don't dare ask my parents or family for help to see a therapist or get on antidepressants. They absolutely do not understand...it's actually less painful for me to sit in their basement having them think I'm lazy than it would be to admit to them that I need help.

I'm beginning to think that the only way I can help myself is to give up on music and get a job working the register at Walgreens 40 hours a week so that I can afford to get a little studio apartment and a therapist and antidepressants. However, I'm not even sure I could do that since I always end up sabotaging myself eventually. I'm worried that even pushing buttons on a cash register is more than I can handle and that it wouldn't be long before I was fired for calling in sick every time I woke up feeling like I couldn't face the world outside.

So, I just sit in my parents' basement at age 30 writing this note and wondering how I'm ever going to have a life. I don't even want a life...I just want to sit in a room watching Netflix and getting fatter and fatter until I eventually don't have to be alive anymore. There are people all around me living with horrible diseases...losing their children...homeless...being abused...being beaten...starving to death...all these horrible things that people less fortunate than I have been are dealing with. I feel like I should be able to pick myself up and not be worthless because so many others don't have the chance...but that just makes me feel even more worthless and pathetic because I'm sitting here feeling sorry for myself and whining about my life. I just wish I could give my life to somebody else who is struggling and let them have it and do something great with it while I just disappear completely.

Anyway, thanks for reading this. I just needed to write this and have somebody hear it because there's nobody in my life I can tell it to.

Hello again,
I see from your reply that you are on your way to figure things out and make things happen.
One book I would recommend before you can afford to go into therapy is Feeling Good by David Burns, cognitive psychologist. It is a self-help written by a true professional, well researched. There are exercises, too, if my memorery serves me well.
One thing that striktes me when I read your posts is that you are critical of your parents. However, they too, are only human and have done as THEY thought best; they didn't know any different and neither you or they can change the past. You can, on the other hand, take a firm hold of the future.
Going home to mull things over has served you well, you are getting some perspective, just don't get stuck. I wish you all the best in your pursuit of a good life.

That's not true. Don't deny your own pain and suffering. Those with external scars are in as much pain as those with internal scars. You're denying yourself of what you really want. Listen to yourself. Have you read what you wrote? How would you feel if another person said this to you, said that they feel like they're worthless. That's not true! Stop it! You know you don't really want to get fatter and fatter just watching Netflix all day. And you're not feeling sorry for yourself and whining, you're reaching out for the compassion and support that you need. And that is normal. That is a human thing. So is masterbating, wanting to feel good. Everyone wants to feel good. But that's not the only thing that will make you feel good. Inspire yourself again. Find the inspiration once more. You won't find it in the basement. I think you'll find it where the sun is shining. Try taking a walk outside and just feel the wind, breathe in the air, look around, what do you notice? Just simply observe. And you can do it. Don't think about it, just do it. Go in your PJ's if you have to. Bite yourself if you have to, slap yourself if you have to, just don't think, just walk. Even now, whatever time of day it is, just go outside.

Because if you've lived 30 years, that means you could live another 30 years. And that means, you do have willpower. When there's a will, there's a way. You can do it. Don't think, just do. Don't think, just do.

Hello,
Just like to say that it doesn't really matter who did what to whom, but rather how you deal with it. The blame game, irrespective of where you place blame, is futile and will not improve your situation.
Please understand that I do not wish to make you upset, rather stress the now and the future, which are the only places where you can feel good. What is done is done. If you can find it in you to like yourself enough to want more from life, you can move on. A walk on a lovely autumn day?

I actually just began reading Feeling Good. Thanks for the tip. If my posts seem overly critical of my parents, please realize it is because this is the first time in my adult life that I've been willing to place blame on anybody but myself. I am tired of hating myself on a daily basis and it's easy to see that all the issues I'm dealing with stem from things that I began experiencing well before I was an adult or teen.

I think our parents are a lot alike. Growing up in my house there could be a raging wall of silent rage between my parents but the moment anyone called everyone was all smiles and friendly. Any feelings other than fine were not validated and not allowed.

I hid my depression behind a mask of social politeness and smiles and after I married an abusive guy I hid that too....until one day I could not hide behind the smiles any more and tried suicide. Of course my mom wanted to know how I could do such a thing to her! For a while after everything broke loose I too was extremely critical of my folks, and everything else around me. Part of that was the years of depression that turned everything into a negative, part of it was learning to feel my emotions, name them, and get used to acknowledging that I had feelings other than happy & fine.

This is just part of your growing awareness that "fine" doesn't work. I loved my parents and still do, we became closer and more comfortable after I went though therapy although there were a few very rocky years when my father felt I had let the family name down. Dad died years ago but my mother and I are now closer than ever before, I've learned that she went though a lot of depression too and wishes now that she had, had the strength to go to therapy years earlier. Your parents might just surprise you.