this year i learned that caring for other people makes me feel good but i still don't know how to take care of myself, despite seemingly being the laziest most self-indulgent bitch on the planet

i'm not lazy so much as self-defeating. my inactivity is actually self sabotage, because i'm such a perfectionist that i'd rather not even try than make an effort & fail. what seems like me being "lazy" is actually me being so anxious that i'm paralyzed into inactivity.

i'm the only child of a single parent & my mom..... isn't great at empathy. she's the one who dictated my view of myself. i'm still learning that just because she says something doesn't make it the objective truth, & that my brain doesn't work like hers.

all of the "jobs" i've had have been super physically demanding - i put "jobs" in quotes because many of them were unpaid. much of what she called "laziness" turned out to be due to chronic exhaustion because my thyroid is literally eating itself. THAT'S objective.

then when i was STILL tired doctors & everybody else told me it was just because i was fat & if i'd only do more physical activity i wouldn't be so exhausted - as if that's possible! "the cure for being tired is to simply be less tired" wow thanks!! so helpful!!

well no, turns out i was tired because i had a giant fucking ovarian cyst the size of a literal baby growing inside me for years that was sucking up all my blood & pressing on my lungs so i couldn't get enough oxygen. & i only found out because i conveniently got kidney stones!

i couldn't breathe with my mouth closed while lying down & even short flights of stairs left me panting. but i thought it was my fault. i thought it was normal & acceptable for fat people to suffer. so i just didn't say anything - they would've just told me to lose weight anyway.

& when they took the scan to see the kidney stones & saw this HUGE growth half the size of a basketball on my ovary, the biggest one the ER doc had ever seen - who got blamed? who got laughed at for being too fat to notice? hint: it wasn't everyone who'd shamed me into silence!

anyway. i didn't start this thread with the intention of pissing myself off. the point is, it doesn't make me lazy that my house isn't unpacked enough for my mother's liking - it's MY house. getting a job right now would make me an essential worker, & that risk is unnecessary.

i shouldn't work during a pandemic if i can afford not to. what's the point of being a trust fund baby if not to sustain me during a damn pandemic? it's my own money that i earned in exchange for my entire family dying. i give it away, i don't need more.