You always ask me how I am doing, and what is going on, and for me to be honest with you. You always want to know, and I never am truly open or honest with you, but I figure since you always ask, I should finally tell you the truth.
I am not happy, I have never really been happy, and I don't see any time in the future how I can be truly happy. The rest of this letter will explain most of it, so don't just read it over very quickly, actually pay attention to it.
From whenever I can remember, I have always led different lives. I would just do stuff or say stuff to be friends or to make someone happy, but more times than not, it was not really how I was feeling, but I did it anyway. Looking back now and talking to doctors it was pretty obvious that I had ADD for most of my life, and that I was also very depressed. I never dealt with it when I was younger, so I had to just deal with it. I feel like I have been leading 3 or 4 lives my whole life. I know I am a very nice and caring person, and inside I am a very good person, but for some reason I don't always act that way. I have always acted in a way, so that other people will like me. That has caused me over the years, to have many different groups of friends, but also have separate lives.
As I have gotten older, I have learned to stop doing that, even though I still do it every once in a while. I am working on trying to be happier and just be myself and do things for me, but I feel like I have dug myself in such a whole (not really a financial hole, just an overall life hole). When I go to talk to these doctors and people that I have talked to in the past, I am not 100% honest with them, so I realize I am not getting the most out of it that I could be getting. The problem is, I have a feeling if I went back and talked to someone, I would still not be 100% honest with them. There is always so much going on with me, and so many things that are upsetting and bothering me, yet I have never told anyone about them. In different ways, I have told all my problems to different people, but I pick and choose what I tell them and how I tell them, so it doesn't seem so bad. I don't think anyone I know, knows how truly depressed I am all the time. I wish there was a specific reason that I could pinpoint, and then take care of it, but that is not the case. I have been taking the adderal and xanex, and they help, but they more help mask things and do not really help the overall problem.
On the money side of it, you know how I am. I have had times where I have had tons of money and was making a ton, and I have had times where I have no money. I have never changed my personality with that. I have never let money either a lot or a little affect the way I think and act. Obviously, right now I do not have as much money as I used to have, but that is not really affecting me that is just something else that is always on my mind. I guess part of my depression, is that bc of my ADD there are always numerous things on my mind, and most of them just bring me down. The other problem, is I live a very care-free, worry-free life. I got a lot of that from all the time I spent with mom in New Mexico. I learned that there is so much more to life, and not to worry about little things, and to just try to be happy over all.
I know that the lack of caring about certain things is another reason I am always not happy. Over the years, I have somehow convinced myself, to just be happy and not worry about things to much, and that things will always work out. The problem is I have convinced myself so much of that, that I lead my life like that, but yet all those scared and nervous thoughts are still in my head, and I just try to push them away. When those thoughts pile up, that is where I become depressed. Like right now, I have some serious issues going on in my life, and yet I act like everything is fine, and I am not sure why I do that.
As you probably know, I am always asking you how I look when you see me. Honestly, I don't really care that much, it is more about how low my self esteem is, and how much I seek approval from people. I am not sure why I do this, but I know that I am never happy with myself or my life, and I think that is why I do what I do with my jobs and my girlfriends( Ill get to both of those later). All I want is to be happy in my life, and for some reason I cant do it. I feel like I always have so much going on, and then when things finally are good and worked out with me, I find a way to mess it up. By mess it up, I mean I am purposely doing things to make my life more difficult, almost like I am trying to ruin my own life. I am not going this on purpose; it just seems to be the cycle, that I am constantly doing things to make my life more difficult and in turn it makes me more depressed.
Every once in a while, I think it still has something to do with Amie, but then I convince myself that it doesn't. I know my first mistake with all of that, is that I never talked to anyone about what happened, it just happened, and I went on with my life. I think I just convince myself to try to forget what happened, and to act like everything was fine, that now I am paying the consequences for it. I did the same thing when Mom died, I just moved on, and never talked to anyone about it, and I still think about it, and wonder things about it, and I know I probably wouldn't if I had talked to someone about it. After I kicked Amie out of the house, I stopped caring about everything, money, job, friends, etc.. I just went out and did what I wanted, and didn't care about my life at all. I was very irresponsible and did very stupid things, but just kept telling myself it was ok, because of what she did to me. I now see how bad that was, but I can not go back in the past and change things, so now I just have to deal with it.
The way I treat the girls I date is something that I have no idea why I do it, but all I want to do is stop, and I can't. From the first girl I dated after Amie up to Emily, they have all ended the same way. Things would be going great, and we would hit a point, where she really started to like me, and would want to make things a little more serious, and I would get scared, push her away, and go to someone else. Never once, did I truly want to do that, and I still wanted to date the person, but for some reason I got scared, pushed them away, and made myself unhappy. I sit around and all I want it to be in a relationship with someone I care about, and someone that cares about me, yet when I get that, I find a way to ruin it and push the girl away and make myself depressed. I have no idea why I do this to all the girls in my life. Some people ( books, doctors, etc.) will say I have a serious trust issues with women due to what Mom did to you, and then she lied to me about the cancer at the beginning, and then everything that Amie did to me. I can understand if I have some trust issues, but that does not explain why I keep doing things to purposely make my life awful and miserable. I tell girls that I am not ready for a relationship and that I need to be single and enjoy my life, but then I sit around just wanting to be in a relationship, and when the girl is ready, I push them away. I truly think that if I wasn't so depressed and if I was actually happy with my life that I would not do this to women, and I would be able to hold down a steady relationship.
The other thing that makes me feel awful all the time, and the main reason I never tell you anything is because when I tell you stuff I feel very guilty and awful and embarrassed. I know some of what you have been through in your life( I probably don't know it all) and I know that you have always done the right thing, and you have always done what you had to do, and you were always able to make things work for you.
For some reason, I can not make things work out for me. You raised me as a single father, because your wife left you, you grew up with a step mom that you didn't even love and didn't have a great relationship with her, , etc.. I just know you have been through so many tough things in your life, and never once have you complained to me, and even if you were sad or upset, you never let me know, and you never showed it. It makes me feel so bad when things are wrong with me bc I feel stupid bc I know you dealt with it on your own with no help from anyone, and somehow I cant. How can I talk to you about the pain of what happened with me and Amie, bc you will just let me know that I need to stop being a pussy because you went through it also, and I just have to grow up and move on. I can't talk to you about having money problems, because you never had a lot of money, and you always got bye fine. I can't talk to you about my self depression or lack of self esteem, because then I just feel stupid for having all these problems and issues and putting them on you. I can't talk to my friends about most of this stuff, because this is just stuff you do not talk to them about. You have your own life with Patty. Patty comes from a very nice, normal family and upbringing. You guys have your happy life and I feel like I am the only thing bringing you guys down, and I am the only reason that you guys would not be 100% happy in your life. You guys have your friends, and her family and everything. Yes, I love patty and I know she loves and cares for me, but I also know how she must feel about me. She met me when I was 14, and for the last 14 years has seen me do things to slowly destroy my life. I cant imagine how either one of you still have any respect for me. I figure if I wasn't so sad, and if I had my life more together, you two would moved away to Florida or the beach, or any of the other places you talk about. When I got into college, sean was already in college, so mom and rich decided they could move away, bc we were growing up, and the moved to New Mexico. I feel that if I wasn't such a screw up, you and Patty would be way happier with your life, and I just feel like I am giant burden on both of you. All of that may not be true, but I am a depressed person( doctors say I am bi-polar, another one said I am a manic depressant person) and that is how I fell sometimes, and because of that, I can never truly be honest and open with you, because I am so embarrassed, and I know that any issue or problem that I have, you have dealt with 10 times worse, and you always got through it, so what is wrong with me, that I cant get through these things.
I do not know what do to that can make my life better. As I have learned over the years, no girl, no amount of money, no job, can truly make me happy. I have never been truly happy with myself, and I just wish that would go away. Every time I am out with my friends, or any time someone asks me how I am doing, and say fine or good, that may be true for that exact moment in time, but overall, I really am not, and its slowly killing me and just making me more and more depressed every day.
