I don’t always know what I’m thinking. Actually… no. It’s more like I never know what I’m thinking. My head feels full — packed, overflowing — but none of it lines up into anything I can use. It’s just noise. Constant, humming noise.

There are a thousand things I need to do, but only the loudest ones get my attention. The urgent ones. The ones that fall apart if I ignore them. So I drag myself through the basics — the dishes, the laundry, the meals, the morning routine — the small acts that keep life from unravelling. They’re ordinary things, but they feel like the daily maintenance of a world that would collapse without me. If I don’t do them, everything tilts into chaos: the house becomes a storm‑wrecked cabin, the fridge empties like a forgotten campsite, the dog goes unfed, and suddenly I’m the villain in my own life.

And some days… some days I can do it. Not happily, not gracefully, but I can do it.

Other days, it feels like I’m fighting myself just to stand up. Just to move. Just to care. I don’t want to get up at 7am. I don’t want to walk. I don’t want to think about groceries or meals or the endless cycle of chores that regenerate like cursed quests in a game I never asked to play. I don’t want to be the one who keeps everything stitched together.

But I do it anyway. Because someone has to.

And everyone says the same thing, don’t they? “You do what you have to.” “You keep going.” “You make sure the people you love are okay.”

Fine. I do that. I make sure they’re okay.

But where do I come in?

There’s the future I’m supposed to be building — the plans, the dreams, the safety net I’m trying to weave so we never have to worry about money or stability or survival again. And then there’s me. The person underneath all of it. The one who thought they were strong enough to carry everything life threw at them. The one who thought they could do the work of three people and still have time left over to be… themselves.

Turns out reality doesn’t care about that version of me.

Even when I have time, I don’t have energy. My mind keeps calculating, sorting, prioritising, whispering reminders at me every second of the day. Even when I sit down — even when I try to relax — the thoughts don’t stop. They just dim, like someone turned the volume down but left the radio on.

And in the quiet, I start asking myself questions I don’t like.

What do I want to do now? What do I even like anymore? Who am I when I’m not doing things for everyone else? Where did the person I used to be go? Am I still happy? When do I get to live the life I want?

And the worst one — the one that hits me in the chest — Am I the problem?