There's a shed-load of stuff going on at the minute. I really didn't think that life could get much more complicated than it has been in recent years, but, as has become the standard, I was wrong.
I find life pretty confounding at the best of times, and these are most certainly not the best of times. What with University work, health (or lack thereof) issues and all the other things that the majority of people seem to think are par-for-the-course in daily life, I am utterly bemused and not entirely at ease.
University
I recently discovered that my skill set and unit choices have me headed (if I survive the year) towards a career involving programming - in no way did this scenario ever present itself in any previously considered 'game-plan' of my life. Thus I am having, whilst still attempting to do the relevant coursework, to completely reassess my plans and adjust to the thought of becoming a code-monkey.
Now, I had just decided that I actually did enjoy programming, particularly Java, and then I went and failed my Autonomous Systems Coursework. Don't get me wrong, I think I have established the problem, and there is a chance that I could fix it, but I'm somewhat broken myself at the minute. I got myself worked up into such a state that my parents were willing to come and pick me up, take me back to Hounslow, and let me forget University altogether. I ended up handing in the broken code, and I now can't look at the program without verging on the catatonic. Weirdly, this does not suggest 'programmer' to me.
Oh, yes, and I have a number of other units and my thesis which are suffering similar fates, partly (although I suspect not entirely) due to the extreme, over-arching reaction generated by the catastrophe of Autonomous Systems.
Health
This is currently a substantial area of concern for me. There's a lot going on which is complicated and may or may not have a bearing on the majority of my future decisions. I will, I hope, have a few more answers on the health front in the next couple of weeks, but I'm very much in limbo until then. This limbic sensation is also bleeding over into my academic work and being very disruptive to my thought patterns and motivations. It is very distracting.
Daily Life
From getting out of bed in the mornings, through to diving under the duvet at bed-time, people seem to do an astonishing number of 'things'. For a start, while they may not do it willingly, I have noticed that most people don't seem to feel that getting out of bed in the morning is the sort of event which is tremendously momentous or requires much careful planning, weighing-up of variables, and overcoming the gut-wrenching disappointment over the fact that death did not make a delivery during the night. This is how my day starts, and it tends to continue in a similar vein. The level of difficulty seems to be increasing, and trying to explain, and even justify, this way of existing is almost impossible. I think it likely that a lot of the stigma I feel is self-imposed, but when I hear how other people are 'getting by', it really does seem like I have gone substantially wrong somewhere.
Every day is a struggle against the desire to end it all. When you live like this, to scare, no, petrify, even yourself with the intensity of your own suicidal urges, that's a situation to take note of. To make matters worse, we were told today that the new project for Autonomous Systems had been posted on the unit web page. I opened the page, but before I could get any further I was struck with the same feelings I had at the end of the last project. Not only did I wish more than anything that my head would burst into flames and burn my brains away, it felt like I was experiencing something about as painful, but unfortunately not as fatal.
The general consensus is that you should tell someone when you feel that bad. God knows why, but my pride won't let me say it out loud, although it will let me post it here - perhaps it's a stepping stone. Anyway, here's me telling 'someone': I'm on the edge and the cliff is crumbling.