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dominickb , 13 Jun 2013

Stuck in a creative rut, getting yelled at, and picking

Hi folks, My name's Dominick and I've been picking since I was young. I have anxiety and depression problems that I try to get over every day. The past few months have been getting brighter and brighter in terms of depression but now that I'm feeling decent and human again I've started getting stressed and anxious. I want to create something: a short story, poems, a novel, a program, a programming language -- but every time I am confronted with the blank screen or page I am unable to begin. A creative block is going on. The last time I wrote a whole story I was traveling as a teenager from one state to another half way across the country. I'm considering taking long rides on the bus to see if that doesn't improve things - something about the constantly changing scenery makes it easier to write a moving story that doesn't sit still. I get yelled at for simple things from my fiancee because she's getting close to her particular monthly time for women - she's frustrated waiting and yelling at me over silly stuff. I try to keep calm and other times I yell back to tell her to chill out. But when I keep calm I find myself at a strained point. The strain involves the unsatisfactory feel of not being able to create anything, my fiancee's yelling, and the frustration of not responding in kind to that frustration by yelling back. [possible triggers ahead] I'm picking at my face in three places and both of my hands... and I get yelled at for it: I try to explain that focusing on the picking and trying to force me out of it only exacerbates the problem... The more I think on stopping picking, the more I think 'oh how frustrating to have this odd feeling piece of skin and not tear at it.' Before this I had months of time where there were no feelings of pickiness -- but here I am again, with five places to pick at. I think I'll get a rubber band bracelet and snap that when I feel an urge to pick. I hate and love the situation, just as I hate and love myself... right now I'm getting more hate than love though, Dominick
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