Definitely ups and downs this weekend/week. Tonight was my acting class, which I go to partly because I'm eligible to be in the Screen Actors Guild from when I was younger and may start to go for auditions soon, and partly because I find it really cathartic emotionally. There are some teenagers in the class and I really enjoy hearing their perspectives on things, listening to their monologues, getting a sense of what life was like for 'normal kids' when I was sick and in my personal hell in high school.

If it sounds like I'm a little obsessed with the subject of high school in my posts, it's because I am. I've gotten over a lot of the really bad OCD symptoms (tics, counting) that plagued me when I was younger, but my new obsession is worrying about the impact that that period had on my personal life, social life, love life, etc. I kind of came to view myself as a twisted, stupid person who didn't know anything about living in the real world. I think to myself that I don't have what it takes to "make it,", I obsess on what I should have done differently, I yearn to go back to high school to make up for my failures. Most of all I want to go back and feel normal, to have normal experiences and friends and conversations, instead of the godawful time I actually had.

Sometimes the people around me make me feel a lot worse about myself. I live in New York and had to move home about a year ago, partly because I got fired from a job. I'm lucky enough to have had a really great job offer from the Government since then, but it hasn't started because of the budget situation, and the temp job that I'm working now doesn't pay enough for me to move out. My parents are good enough to let me live here, but they are frustrated about me and let me know it sometimes. This weekend I went to the Berkshire Mountains with some friends and had a great time; I actually felt some of the stress of life melt away, and felt myself able to focus and relax and have fun, and even stop obsessing on things for awhile.

That all changed when I came home and realized that I'd left my keys up there. I have a problem with losing things and keeping track of things, partly because I'm in my head a lot with OCD and thoughts. I had to tell my parents because it was my only set, and they basically threw a shit fit, bringing my stress levels right back to where they were. My mom in particular let me know that they are worried about my ability to live independently and lead a normal life, and to let me know that I disappointed them in the way I "turned out.". I really hate myself at times like this; it may have just been in anger, but it hurt. It's especially painful because my brother is, in pretty much all aspects, an awesome person. He'll be going to med school, has a girlfriend, is generally liked and thought well of. I'm the fuck up who spent my adolesence twitching and loses stuff. I think that they are prouder of him than me, and trust him more than me; I love and admire my brother so much, but on the other hand I'm jealous, and wonder if I could have been that functional if only I'd gone to the right school and not developed OCD.

On a brighter note, I am feeling better after my acting class, and I think I made an important breakthrough on one level. I have been trying to suppress my emotions, I think, to make things less painful, to make myself feel like less of an idiot for having OCD and some of the bad or stupid things that I have done over the years. I convinced myself that making an effort to be social was stupid, that I was just being delusional, generally not wanting to invest emotional energy into anything for fear of it not coming back to me. I think I realized tonight that the investment is worth it, and that trying to be my best self is its own reward. I'll try to work on that for now, hopefully it will pay off.