I was supposed to be someone, and do something with my life. I slaved to make the best grades I could and earned a Master’s degree in Education working on my PhD. I taught for 4 years. I established a life for myself (albeit a little late)… I’m supposed to have it together. I gave my town and everyone around me a chance to see a spectacle of a breakdown.
I’m not stable enough to hold my job – I am more unstable emotionally sometimes than the kids I teach I feel.
I had to drop out of my PhD program because of the stress
I totaled my car in a moment off my meds.
I got suspended from work for a month
..
There is so much more. My therapist keeps telling me how much I can handle, and this is something I can get through. I don’t want to get through it. I just want to accept that I wasn’t meant to be someone in life. I want to go live back in the hole I grew up in, the pain and agony and all … but where the stresses are at least less than they are now, and I’m not responsible for anyone else.

Go ahead – call me selfish and stupid. You’re only contributing to how I see myself. I don’t mind. I just wanted to let out my rant. I am Brent, 26 years old and so far broken beyond repair.

[Skeezyks]

Hi Brent: I'm pushing 70 years old! I was an only child. I was supposed to be someone too. I turned out to be a nobody. Worse than that I turned out to be a destructive nobody! Looking back over the course of my life takes my breath way... life among the ruins... I know how you feel.

I don't know you but doubt you're selfish or stupid. The good thing here, from my perspective at least is that you're still young & you have insight as well as time to figure out what to do. I wish I had had that. Perhaps I wouldn't have done the kind of wholesale damage I did along the way.

You mentioned going back to live where the stresses are at least less than they are now. I would be the last to suggest you go back to the "hole" you grew up in... whatever that was, if that's the way you feel about it. But it is true, I believe, we all have different levels of ability to deal with pain, agony & stress. And there comes a point where one simply has to accept that one is who one is & figure out how to live within those parameters rather than to continue battering one's head against the wall trying to be something else one is simply not equipped to handle. So I'd like to suggest perhaps you're not so much "broken beyond repair" as you just need to veer off into a new & different direction. As I once heard it said... "no matter how far you've travelled down the wrong road... TURN BACK!" I wish you well...

[LaraR4444]

Hi Brent, everyone is going to discover their limitations and personal struggles in their early adulthood and have the potential to get pretty depressed by it. I'm also pretty positive there's always potential to learn new things we "can't" do no matter how old we get. Thankfully, there isn't a real standard on what we have to be to be "good enough." We just have to be ourselves, and we have to try from where we are if we are to find peace with ourselves.

I like to think of people as having paths in life. Sometimes one person will be "ahead" while another is struggling and sometimes we're going all around in circles, but if we could try to imagine what the path looks like in a longer form, rather than where we are "standing" right now, we're all windy and twisted.

And we all have different gifts. Sometimes our gifts come from our weaknesses or struggles we have. That very thing may be what makes you look you're "ahead" at one point of the road in comparison to someone else's path.

[Sunflower123]

Bless your heart. Why would anyone call you stupid or selfish? I’m sorry you are having such a tough time and don’t feel good enough. Compared to what? Society’s rather rigid standards of success? It’s not easy being MI. You are being way too hard on yourself. It sounds like you hold a lot of should statements firmly and that will make you miserable.

I don’t have any advice. I just wanted to reach out and offer support and big hugs.

[Teddy Bear]

Sometimes I feel as though I have failed. MI may cause you to do less than you hoped for but keep trying

[MickeyCheeky]

You're trying your best to cope. That alone doesn't make you a failure I'm sorry you're having a tough time, though.

You are amazing from what I've read. You are so young with so much wonder to look forward to. Good things will happen for you, I can feel it.

[sky457]

Hi Brent, as someone who suffers from depression, I get your thought process.

I am a couple years older than and I had to go through a major shift in who I was over the span of about 6 years. It was the toughest process I've had to endure, especially suffering from depression. I went from working in media, to working with at risk youth, to now attempting to become a specialized doctor (not a MD).

To this day, I still have thoughts of crawling into a hole and never coming back. I have made an armada of mistakes in my life, seen so much pain and suffering from myself and others, and my community has also seen me go off the deep end.

But, I take each day as it is and tell myself that if I have made it this far, I can make it one day more. Day after day.

You already have a masters, which is far more education than anyone else has, and you were in a PhD program. The sheer ability to achieve what you have is unmatched by the vast majority of individuals.

I also see the beauty in making yourself better after failing. In cases of wildfires, the landscape grows back better & more beautiful than it had been before. It takes some time, but the results are breathtaking.

People in my community have also accepted me back because people realize that stress & distress are very real things. Things heal and the pieces will positively fall where they may.