I think I’m probably upsetting everyone, being blunt and unimpressed with everything, telling everyone what I think of them and the stupid things they say. I know this makes me quite a bad person, and I feel guilty (I know I’m no better than the people I’m being a bitch to, I just can’t help correcting them).

I’m also sleeping a bit less…alternating between wide-eyed, twitchy-limbed hyperactivity and slow, painful lethargy. It doesn’t seem to matter how much sleep I get, although lying awake can be annoying because my brain keeps whirring around, like an appliance that’s been left on.

My boss has been mentioning again that I should apply for a managerial position. I don’t really know what to say. I’m torn between the feeling of itchy feet and wanting a new adventure and the feeling that at least the job I have now doesn’t throw up any nasty surprises. I’m not the cool, calm, collected, reliable, adaptable person that everyone seems to think I am. I know my boss is just being good at his job, encouraging me to progress, and there’s a part of my heart that just sinks at the thought of doing the same thing forever. I’m just not sure it’s a good idea to set myself for failure (and, in the even of success, much more stress than I have now) when I feel a little vulnerable lately.

I’m spitting out opinions and making suicide jokes without any hint of a smile. I’m being such an arsehole and I hate myself for it but I can’t shut up, can’t stop my reactions forcing themselves out of my mouth. And I keep trying to give away my money. It’s burning a hole in my pocket. Sometimes I think I should just die so I can have a will and share it all out between the people I know. I don’t want money, it makes me uncomfortable. Sometimes I want to grab a bag, run away, live day-to-day, take my chances out in the real world, own nothing, never be tied down.

There’s a woman at work. She keeps sighing. It is driving me MAD. It sets my teeth on edge. It makes me grip the arms of my chair with my nails. It makes me want to say cruel and unnecessary things. I don’t know where the anger’s coming from.

It reminds me of a few years ago, being at a music festival, pacing round and round a field, dragging my friend along, ranting all the while, never shutting up, hardly stopping for breath, tearing my hair out, shouting and stamping my feet over some habit of someone’s – so small I can’t even remember the details now.

I want to be calm and sensible, but I just feel like throwing things. I know I can’t. I know I have to calm down. I’m not a fucking child. I need to learn to control myself.

I’ve never felt this way so strongly before. The only times I can really remember feeling it at all were while I was taking antipsychotics, or after self-harming. Maybe a little bit, now and then, after unhappiness or weeks or months of sleep deprivation or too much vodka.

I feel not-real. Completely blank. My glasses are the camera through which I watch the world. The hands in front of me, typing…I know they’re mine, they must be, but they don’t feel it. They feel separate. Someone else’s hands typing words passing faintly across my mind, so faint I’m getting writing and reading mixed up.

Hands, arms, legs, not mine. Not my movements. I’m watching on a screen. A screen on a screen (not quite infinite regress; not enough screens). One hand bending back the finger on another and I can’t feel it, we’re not attached, I could break the bone and it’s just graphic TV, not real, not me.

I don’t really know what I am.

Emotionally I am mostly blank. Just a little curious. Like a dream or out-of-body experience.

If I’m not in the body I can see, then where am I?

Pacing around my room like a caged animal. Realising that’s stupid and getting into bed, only to lie, eyes wide open, tapping tuneless rhythms on the wall with shaking hands. Tingling skin, almost goosebumps, but not cold, lit by an unknowable heat, an almost-fever, coursing through my veins.

I can’t switch off my brain, and my thoughts are full of hanging. I’m not suicidal. Just preoccupied and agitated and I can’t find rest anywhere.

I have to get up for work in a few hours.

Come on, Laura. Sort your life out. Get a fucking grip.

I feel trapped here. I feel like I’m in suspended animation. Day after day, week after week, month after month, nothing happens. The routine that’s helping to keep me sane is stifling. I’m so scared that this is my life now, forever, and that nothing will ever change. I’m terrified that I’ll never get out of this house, will always be here, will never escape my perpetual adolescence.

I’m bored, and I’m restless, and on days when I don’t have work, I lie on my bed all day and do nothing, or nothing of any worth, at any rate. I try to read, but have difficulty concentrating after a few pages. I switch my computer on, but have nobody to speak to, and nothing to do. I vaguely research charities, think about doing some volunteering, or giving away some of the money that’s like an albatross around my neck (most of my wages are untouched, just sitting in a bank account doing nothing, and this money feels like a burden, like a flashing sign above my head, alerting everyone to the fact that I have nothing and no-one to spend it on, nothing of any importance in my life, and I’m just trudging along, accumulating money I’ll never spend because having a job but having no life is easier to explain than curling up in bed forever, doing nothing and speaking to no-one and never moving until I die, which is what I feel like doing at the moment) – but I’m embarrassed. It’s so stupid, I know, but I’m incapable of admitting when I want something. I’d like to have something meaningful in my life, some slight feeling that anything I do actually means something to anyone else, but that seems particularly selfish, and anyway, what could I do? All the things I’m good at – planning, organising, talking, explaining – aren’t really very practical, and they’re things I’m only good at some of the time, anyway. Even if I managed to shake myself out of this torpor and offer to help someone, they probably wouldn’t want my help because I’m useless. And…I don’t really know how to explain it, but I feel like it would reveal too much of me. I’m increasingly secretive, and finding it impossible to reveal even the most mundane facts about myself (always saying, “that’s a personal question”, even when it’s “what kind of music do you like?” or “what did you have for dinner?”), and I feel like if I volunteered to do something, everyone would be looking at what I was doing and trying to deduce things about me from it.

The only thing that scares me more than the thought of being frozen in time here for all of my life is the thought of change. Because I’m alright, here. It’s not the life I used to dream I’d have. I know it’s nothing notable or special, and that I’m a person who’ll never be remembered, but I have some sort of stability, and that’s not nothing.

I used to think I could be dynamic and successful, that I could make some sort of difference to something, but whatever drive and ambition I used to have drained out of me a long time ago.

I’m bored, and trapped, and I feel like this is the end point…that this is where the narrative stops. I feel like this is what happens after ‘and they all lived happily ever after’. All that can ever happen once the plot is over is stagnation.

I went to my friend’s house on New Year’s Eve, and it was nice, but awkward. Nice to see people I haven’t seen for a while, but awkward because I’m not the person I was when I knew them well. Or, maybe, the problem is that I am still that person, and they’ve all changed. They’ve all grown up. All the people in my life who are around my age are doing stuff. They’re having adventures. They’re going travelling and starting businesses and doing doctorates and getting married and having kids and getting promoted and buying houses and looking to the future.

And I’m just me. Living in my parents’ house. Getting up, going to work, coming home, watching TV, going to bed. I feel like I have nothing to say to anyone.

I know that it should be enough. Roof over my head and food on the table and things aren’t as mad as they used to be.

I just feel like, whether I die today or in 50 years’ time, there’d be very little difference in my life story. Everybody else always seems to have hopes and dreams, and for so long my only aim has been staying alive, and now that I’ve mostly got that sorted, it’s dawned on me that just breathing isn’t, in itself, an achievement.

I feel flat, deflated and purposeless. I don’t really know what to do.

When I was at uni, I used to feel that my life was fine but my brain was fucked. Everything was going well except I couldn’t control my emotions or my thoughts or any aspect of my life.

Now, I feel more or less the opposite. My mood’s alright. Still having occasional, alarming peaks and troughs, but they happen less, and are less often really bad. I feel like a proper person, capable of being an adult.

But life is terrifying and certain stresses are overwhelming. It’s family, really. I can cope with work stresses without much worry. Even the occasional existential panics about how painfully short and unbearably long life is can be overcome after a while.

But every time my mum accuses someone of trying to sabotage her, or threatens to kill someone, or spends all day crying because getting her own way 99% of the time is so unfair on her and she can’t possibly bear that 1% of someone else having priority, I sort of shut down. I don’t really cry much, because I’m scared of turning into her (an age-old problem, and perhaps something to do with my complete inability to express my emotions). I just sort of sit in my room, very quiet, breathing deeply, covering my ears until her shouting and anger start rattling painfully around my head and I go downstairs and try to reason with her, try to show her what a complete and utter dick she’s being, but then it turns on me and I don’t really have any defences, not when it comes to her, so I go upstairs again and fantasise about hanging myself, not because life is pointless or not worth living but because I feel so fucking trapped and the least I can do for me is get out of here in the least confrontational way I can imagine (you have no idea how fucking hostile everything becomes when I suggest moving out, although she’s happy to threaten me with being made homeless when it suits her). And maybe if I killed myself it’d shock her into actually caring about her family.

It’s bullshit, I know. If I killed myself, she’d probably find a way to blame it on my brother.

I feel trapped, invisible and powerless, and I feel like a weak, whining hypocrite for feeling that, because I’m not trapped, not in any material sense of the world. I have a job, money, health and a smattering of people who call me ‘friend’ and could be relied on to help me in an emergency. The only thing keeping me here is fear.

Fear that the only way to leave this house is by cutting off contact with my family forever.

Fear that, if I leave, I’m abandoning my family to bitching and fighting and never compromising, because I’m the only person here who ever tries to resolve a dispute.

Fear that I don’t have the necessary skills to live alone, and would have to come grovelling back, and they’d never let me forget it.

Fear that, without rules and routine and the way my mother keeps me on my toes, finding myself alone and free, I’d only fall apart again.

Fear that, if I leave, I’m abandoning my family to bitching and fighting and ever compromising, because I’m the only person here who ever tries to resolve a dispute.

He was asking what my ambitions are, where I see myself in six months. I find questions like that impossible to answer at the best of times. It’s not that I’m unambitous, as such – I would like to succeed, I’d like something to show for my life, I’d like a challenge – but my ambitions are without direction. And sometimes, I don’t really see myself being alive in six months.

So I sort of joked and muttered and threw my hands up and admitted to not knowing what on Earth my plans for the future are.

He laughed at me, and said I’m a natural manager. He said I could do his job with my eyes closed, and that if I’m interested in applying for a managerial role, he’ll back me. He said that I’m the only person on the team he’d say that to.

I’m flattered, obviously. And there’s a part of me that thinks he’s right. Maybe it’s the part of me with the over-inflated self-esteem, but I think I could do it. I’m getting restless in my current job, and I’d like to have something to work towards.

But the whole reason I was so nervous about applying for any job, back before I bit the bullet and got this one, is that I don’t deal particularly well with the stresses of applications and interviews. I’m not so bad with the pressure to perform – now I have my job, I’m fine working hard and proving myself and trying to be the best I can be – but the pressure of applying (of having to talk about myself – of having to talk about myself in a positive way -, and of knowing that just by applying for something, I’m saying I BELIEVE I’M GOOD ENOUGH, which feels like setting myself up for a massive fall) is probably too much for me to handle.

And, I mean, let’s be serious for a moment. Whenever a job arises, there’ll be loads of applicants. And I’m…me. I’m a good ten years younger than most (if not all) of the current managers. I have just over a year’s experience in the company, and that’s all my experience in this industry. In fact, it’s all of my experience in full-time work, full-stop. I’ve got a degree, but I did really badly at it, and it’s nothing to do with my job. I don’t really, fully believe that I have any skills whatsoever.

So there’d be all that stress of applying, of jumping through hoops, of pretending to be the best person for the job, and I wouldn’t get it. And if I failed, I wouldn’t have the strength to try again next time. And I’d be humiliated, because I’d have indicated to everyone – by applying for the job in the first place – that I was that kind of person, and in not getting it I’d have proved I’m not the right kind of person. It feels like the most ridiculous arrogance to even consider applying.

I feel sure that I could do the job. I just don’t believe I have any chance of getting it.

I can’t really explain that to my boss, though. I have a carefully-cultivated aura of confidence, and I can’t shatter that by admitting to my endless, soul-destroying self-doubt.

It’s my work’s Christmas party tonight. To be honest, with all the stuff that’s been going on, I forgot. I didn’t realise until I got a phone call from a friend, asking where I was. I told her I wasn’t going. I used feeling ill as an excuse…it’s not a lie, I’m still feeling awful, and there’s no way my headache could survive all the noise and lights.

But also, I just feel…deflated. I don’t feel like going out, or spending time with people, or making myself seem cheerful. I don’t know how much of that is just being ill and how much of it is the fact that I’m sort of…not depressed, as such. Down.

I feel guilty for not going, for letting people down. I feel like a bad person and a disappointment and an idiot. I feel like crying, to be honest.

I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to go about it. I’m 23 years old but I have no idea about moving house or what I can afford or what I’d have to do or anything. I feel trapped.

I can’t keep living here. It’s driving me mad.

Today, my mum said that, when my brother was 3, he’d knocked something over in anger, and that was when she knew he was evil.

Fucking three.

He’s a dickhead sometimes, but wouldn’t you be? If, for as long as you could remember, your own mother was telling you what a bad person you were?

She never stops telling him all the ways in which he’s a disappointment. Even when he’s not there, she practices, telling us all the awful things he’s said and done and thought. My dad sticks up for him then, but when he’s in and she’s saying it to his face, my dad joins in. I don’t think he can separate the fact that my brother isn’t perfect, and sometimes does things wrong, and the fact that my mum is persecuting him.

I try to be supportive, I try to help my brother (someone has to), but I’m no good at it, not good enough anyway.

I just keep thinking that I want to kill myself, because this isn’t how the world is supposed to be. I have so much anger building up inside me but I’m not allowed to express it…even annoyance, even cold, unfeeling logic is called silly in this house. I feel like the only way to express how fucking angry I am is to tear myself to shreds. I know it’s stupid. I’m probably not going to do it. It’s just anger and frustration building inside me.

I’m so fucking sick and tired of being the only person who ever tries to get on with people.

But things are crazy in a different way, now.

I’ll say ‘family problems’, but you’ll know what I mean.

Things with my mum are just…awful.

She’s obviously miserable, but it’s hard to feel sorry for her when she uses it to make everyone else miserable too. She keeps accusing my brother of beating her up (he doesn’t, she only mentions it when she’s angry, and there’s never a mark on her). She says me and my dad are cruel and heartless every time we make any kind of joke whatsoever.

She keeps saying “I’d be better off dead” and threatening to kill herself. She says it’ll be “a nice treat” for us on Christmas morning.

I don’t know what to do. I find it hard to be sympathetic because I always find it hard to sympathise with people who complain about something but aren’t actually looking for solutions (I know that’s hypocritical because I do that a lot here, but in my defence I just write stuff and if anyone stumbles across it, they can choose to stop reading. I don’t scream “I’M GOING TO KILL MYSELF” in the faces of people who I allegedly love).

I’m sort of scared, but don’t know how to change things.