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Unemployed
Technically I am not yet fully unemployed, but I have been on a leave of absence for a month now, and it is probable (although I do not know how probable) that I am not returning. I feel unemployed even if I am not.
I always resented how much of my life energy my work consumed. I daydreamed about leaving work so that I could have my life back. But I don't have my life back. My world has gotten much smaller. I leave the house less, and spend more time in my room. For the most part I have cut off social connections with others, and others have mostly forgotten that I exist.
Mostly, I mope and worry and sleep. When I was working I dealt with anxiety by eating. Now I deal with it by sleeping.
I do not need money immediately. I have a financial buffer I can live on for a while. But I am grieving my job and I am emotionally fragile. More structured activity would probably be good for me but I am reluctant to get caught up in anything any more.
The world has been getting by just fine without me. Event after event, deadline after deadline has whooshed past and nothing much is different. There have been lectures I have not attended and meetings I have not organized and social events I have not participated in and activism I have neglected and none of it has made a difference at all. Sometimes I feel anxiety about missing an event (or a workday) just before the opportunity to attend closes, but then it does not matter. This hurts my ego because it (correctly) implies that I do not matter, but so it goes.
I am becoming more and more convinced that I will never be able to work again. I am brainwashed by the values of my old organization, but more importantly I am a terrible employee. I am not prompt. I don't handle mornings well. I am opinionated. I have deep anxiety and depression issues. I use work resources for non-work things. I procrastinate and procrastinate. I rarely put in a full day's work. And I don't want to put 110% into anything.
On the other hand I am resentful because I feel I have skills to contribute, and I feel that I could help some organization do good work. What organization? Who knows. I have seen some job postings, but in addition to job postings being ineffective I am underqualified for most of what I have seen. The job postings that I might be qualified for feel a lot like my old job, which does not spark enthusiasm either.
I spend a lot of time paralysed by the thought that I become less employable day by day. My experience is becoming less relevant, and it was not particularly relevant to begin with.
Another delusion I had was that I would get a lot done after I had left my job. This never happens. Instead I get nearly nothing done. It is a big deal when I can focus for two hours on something. There is a long list of "ought to dos" that is getting longer and longer, and I just don't care.
It feels bad that I am so lazy.
Some of this is depression, maybe. Some of this is grieving. A lot of this is fear and anxiety. Maybe some of it will pass. Maybe I will go crawling back to my old job just so I have some income and structure. Maybe I will find something interesting to do. Maybe I will spend the next year asleep in my room. Nothing makes sense right now.