you don't work you don't eat, you don't grind you don't shine

Have you been really unhappy at work. or do you think your walking away like this is more as a result of some (perhaps untreated) depressive phase? If so, your first port of call ought to be to make an appointment to see your doctor.

Write to your bank and explain that you are not working, and see if they can freezer bank charges and give you a bit more time to pay everyting off.

The landlord situation is more serious, as not paying your rent will mean you end up homeless. Do you have somewhere else you can go and stay? Can you go home?

i don't know, the bank seems pretty serious too. i told my mum and she wasn't very supportive. "where's your stamina".

i'm not sure if i'm depressed. dissatisfied maybe. i smiled lots today. alot of things have gone wrong for me in the past year or so.

i want to cry, but nothing is really coming out. i am making a crying face, the crying actions, but nothing.

Best of luck to you ... Is there any possibility of getting your job back? Do you have employer-sponsored counseling? If you quit due to depression, they may be willing to work it out. Of course, if you can't see yourself ever going back ....

argh what have i done.

i walked out of my job and started an "i'm depressed..." thread on ile. you lot don't even know who i am!

"where's your stamina"

Was it that particular job you were unhappy with, or don't you feel you have enough "stamina" (as your Mum puts it) to work at all at the moment? Do you feel willing and able to go and find yourself another job?

I still feel that if you have reached some sort of "crisis point" which has culminated in you walking away from a job at a time when it wasn't very wise to do that because of money problems, that you need some kind of support from somewhere, and your doctor might be the place to start looking for that. Maybe he can refer you on to a counsellor or something, to get to the root of what has made all this happen?

my job involved wandering round a big warehouse with a pump-up/pallet, picking tools and loading them onto vans. trolley jacks, bottle jacks, magnetic pick-ups, compressors, space heaters, supermigs. door 5 or 7.

it shouldn't be that serious. but it is.

scg the first thing you have to realize is that everything's going to be all right, or at least has the potential to be all right. but it will be shitty for awhile. the thing is, you have to start makin good decisions. walkin away from your job might have even been a good one! but maybe, on balance, it was a bad one. i don't know.

i only met my college advidor like twice the entire time i was in college (on balance, i think that was one of millions of bad decisions i've made). he told me something i've never forgotten though and i'm going to share it with you. i doubt it will make you feel better right now but here goes anyway. everybody has two lives: the paper life and the real one. the paper life is paper, it's not real, but if you don't take care of it, it starts messing up your real life in very real ways. so take care of the paper you, just take care of it, or the real you's gonna suffer.

I've been thinking about doing this every freaking day of the past 4 months. Part of me is cheering you on and the other part is like "oh shit, I'd probably feel just as fucked as he does!" I'd say the first step is to make a plan and hit the pavement and find a way not to make this the worst mistake ever. Think of your life as starting new from this point. Good luck!

You haven't answered the questions, scg.

Did you dislike your job? Can you ask for it back? Can you get another job (similar, or different)? Do you want to work, or do you need time out for wallowing in some sadness/self-pity?

maybe i am depressed. and frustrated.

i think my ma was right re: stamina.

xpost.

i like that tracer, thanks. i think i left because i wanted to make a good decision. maybe i've been looking after my paper life too much? (is that possible?). i don't want to get too melodramatic. i'm 21 and i just want ____.

if you owe as much as you say you do, you have not been paying to your paper life at ALL, scg!!

"paying attention to"

hi cj, sorry for not answering. your tone on this thread has been really helpful, thanks. i could probably get it back. my point was that i'm easily replaceable. the job involves no training. i was fairly indifferent to the job. i feel like i've been wallowing for a while now and i just want it to stop. seeing all the faces and hearing all the voices at work made me sick tonight. the smell of the warehouse, and the black dust and itchy eyes. i do tend to make rash decisions but this is a new low.

haha. what an idiot. that's what i seem to do lots. tell myself that i'm sorting everything out when in reality i'm neglecting the things that normal people have to do all the time without making a fuss.

it is almost funny, in some sense yse it is, but everyone i know, who is around that age, including myself, feels really fcked right now. yesterday a friend of mine broke down and cried, another one a couple months ago, another one, i don't even know what's up anymore, me, all the time. and these are not [exception - self] ppl one would see this stuff coming from.

so, you, me, we, are not alone, here.

i don't know why no one seems to think these are typically rough years [oh high school sure but then yr out of it till midlife right?], but they are, they most definitely are!

my teenage years were great. i wish i could cry with my friends. there's too much pressure on me to be a man, i'm not ready to be a man yet.

The thing is, scg, you can turn your back on all this and just do a runner - walk away from all your financial problems, your life as it is now. Forget about the money you owe the bank and your landlord. You can take off someplace else, and start all over again. But the chances are that the people you owe money to will hunt you down relentlessly (or start bothering your family about it) to try and get back what is rightfully theirs. It'll bugger up your credit rating, your chance of being able to open another bank account, your chance of getting any references (which might be needed later if you wanted another job or to rent somewhere else to live). If they pursue it far enough, bailliffs will start looking for you, knocking on your door when you least expect it, causing trouble, stressing you out.

Honouring your debts might not bother you much now, if you are only 21. But somewhere down the line, in a year or two, it's probably going to mess things up for you. It's much better to face up to things and get them sorted out, and not run away from it. Once you have made some positive steps by contacting the people you owe money to, and explained your situation, and attempted to negotiate some kind of workable settlement plan, you'll probably feel much better in yourself. Make an appointment to go to see a debt counsellor at the Citizens Advice Bureau (if you're in the UK). They'll be very understanding and helpful, and might even write the letters to the bank etc for you. Banks etc do tend to be a little better about things if you come clean with them, and don't just ignore their letters. They know they can't get blood out of a stone, and if you don't have the money to pay them back, they'll realise they will have to wait longer for it and just get very small repayments until your finances are sorted out.

Obviously you can only sort out these things if you have some income, so one of yout main priorities is to minimise your outgoings (i.e. give up your rented accommodation, move back home where you will have no overheads), and increase your incomings by getting yourself a job of some description. If you are truly miserable, go and seek medical help. But feeling sorry for yourself won't make all this go away, only some positive action on your behalf will do that. I don't mean to sound harsh, but this is just the reality of it.

Being 21 isn't easy. You're caught in that limbo between still being a kid who can hope to get bailed out by parents (if you're lucky), and being a responsible adult. Lots of people have a "crisis" of sorts at this time, faced with the endless years of mundane working drudgery ahead of them and wondering if this is really what they want out of life.

I took off and went travelling for a few years when I was that age. I had scarcely any money, and just picked up work as and when I could in each country I landed in. It was huge fun, and gave me a new perspective on life. Maybe clearing your debts and planning ahead to do something similar might give you something to focus on and work towards? Just a suggestion :)

i did this about a year ago because my boss pushed me (like, physically pushed me) during a tense disagreement. i could have brushed it off, but i was like, nah, fuck it.

anyway i can tell you that nobody will judge your stamina based on how quickly you walked off the job, but rather on what you do next.

and "i hated the stench of the place" is a perfectly good reason to quit a job. otherwise "help wanted" ads wouldn't list "nice environment" as a perk.

also rid yourself of the illusion that you're "easily replaceable"!! it's not true!! a shitty job is easily replaceable, if you want, which you probably don't. more power to you.

one other thing: the advice about moving back home is good advice.

maybe i can just get another shitty dead end job and start again. i don't know. i'll sort it out tomorrow.

well, i really appreciate your posts. it's made me feel better. i'm drinking cider and playing with fruityloops. it's an amerie remix. it started to rain.

on saturday night i had the most amazing conversation with a girl. she had glasses. she said i shouldn't hide my face with my hair. she had a boyfriend, but i wish i could see her again.

aw.

she said it looked like a flock of seagulls. it took me a while to work out what the fuck she was going on about.

i did start tieing it up like scratchy, but it looked too much like david beckham.

tracer's advice is good advice.

basically, i hate to say "i know how you feel," but, uh, i know how you feel (i know i know it sounds fake). i've had a rough past couple of years. lost one job, was despondent and couldn't find one for a long time, then last year got a new one that sucked, i couldn't live with myself. then i had some family trouble (basically had to deal with other people in my fam doing some really really bad/dumb/horrible things, which was difficult for me to deal with), then i got fired. went thru days upon days of not leaving my house, not talking to anyone, not feeling much ambition to live life at all.

started getting some help, that's going okay. started working again, if only to have some money (tho very heavy in debt). ended up getting a job that basically is my dream job in many ways. things were starting to get better, i thought.

then last week i don't have enough to make rent. the girl i've liked for 10+ years treats me badly. i spend the nicest day of the entire year inside, because i feel like such shit.

but you know what? you gotta go on, somehow. borrowed money from friends, so i'll make rent (will be able to pay them back in the middle of the month when i get my first real paycheck from my new good job). couple days after girl i like was rude, another girl i like gave me her number. and i'm getting out more now, despite weather being shitty (who cares about just a little rain?).

you gotta give yourself some space/time to be you. sometimes that includes moping, feeling like shit, wanting to die. that's okay. i go through that, but then somehow i pull through. i don't fucking know why, my life has been mega-weird. but though the good parts are few and far between, getting to them seems worth it.

i dunno if that helps.

If any ILxor besides Calum goes homeless, they are welcome to stay at my house.

If you'd also gimme a paid job, roxydear, I'd be right at yous doorstep inna nanosecond!

it really helps. just helps to know that it's not only me. maybe everyone feels like this, but why aren't we telling each other?

i have a bad family situation too. it seems like now it's only just becoming apparant to me. how much of a dick i was to my mum when i was younger, and how much hard work she put in to bring us up, and now i'm failing her. that's the hardest thing for me. i could care less about money. i can't really go home. i'm going to speak to my landlord tomorrow and move out i guess. thanks again for your helpful remarks.

part of me is happy that i don't have to do that stupid job anymore. but i know tomorrow i'll wake up and it will be really hard. if only i had stuck it out. "where's your stamina". i just want it to be summer.

i know what you mean about going home. i just recently got a reprieve in the form of this great job, but it's temporary. but that's way better than like, two or three months ago, when i thought i'd have to break lease and move back home (if parents would allow that).

i know this sounds lame too but sometimes a change in environment helps, so maybe quitting your job will work after all. the fam members that were having the problems moved to a new city and state, and they're like 100% better. i felt really good to be part of the move, too - i think it helped me psychologically as well.

i feel dumb for doing this, because i know alot of people will be reading and thinking i'm some ______ or whatever, but thanks.

who gives a fuck what these douchebags think? that's my attitude (if it wasn't obvious). you gotta do what ya gotta do, and if just writing about it helps, well, fuck the haters.