I frequently feel empty and have little sense of self

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05/28/2023 23:02

Subject: I frequently feel empty and have little sense of self

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Anonymous

Hi all,

I’m the OP of this post:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1105572.page

and I was wondering if anyone in a similar situation has struggled with feeling empty and having no sense of self (or even having Borderline Personality Disorder).

I was born in an East Asian country and immigrated to the US with my parents when I was 5. My entire extended family still lives in our home country, and I'm not close to them at all since I only saw them once every few years growing up. I'm also an only child, so my loneliness was amplified throughout my childhood.

Ever since my parents and I moved to the US, we've moved to a different state once every few years. I lived in California, Texas, Illinois, New Jersey, and Georgia. This "military brat" style childhood (even though neither of my parents are in the military) made it really hard for me to have good friends growing up. As a result, I have no friends from my childhood who I still keep in touch with. I guess that's what happens when you go to three different high schools.

Making long-lasting friendships was also very difficult for me growing up since my parents really restricted any socializing I did outside of school (as is common for many Asian immigrant parents). My parents did not let me go to playdates or sleepovers as a kid since in their eyes, an hour spent with friends could be an hour spent studying or practicing my instrument or sport. My childhood was a relentless sequence of them tiger parenting me to get into an elite school. My parents frequently beat me for anything less than an A, and I was expected to always be a top student (despite not being that innately intelligent). For example, the first time I took the SAT at the beginning of my junior year of high school, I scored a respectable 1530. My parents screamed at me that this was a horrible score and that I’d need to retake it. I refused and told them that my score was in the 99th percentile. They told me that I was an ungrateful daughter for not wanting to score higher and subsequently shoved a bookshelf onto me to “knock some motivation into you.”

When I was a senior in high school, I was deciding between an Ivy League college known for being very competitive and cutthroat while having little sense of community, my state flagship, and a nurturing liberal arts college. My parents forced me to attend the Ivy, and I was miserable during every minute of college. Of course, the fact that my entire junior year was over Zoom while I was living with my parents wasn’t helpful, but I hated being at a cutthroat, careerist, competitive school where students were disinterested in their fellow classmates. I’ve lost touch with everyone from college after only one year post-grad.

My parents told me that they would only pay for my college tuition if I majored in an “approved” subject. The summer before I entered college, my parents wrote down every single major offered at my school and sorted them into “approved” and “unapproved” majors. I wanted to major in English or Creative Writing, which unsurprisingly, were unapproved majors. I took a look at the list of approved majors and selected Economics since it was the easiest one; I had no interest in Engineering/CS, and I hated the idea of majoring in Bio/Chem and going to med school.

I still took a good number of Creative Writing classes on the side in college; the summer after my freshman year of college, I received a fellowship from my school to live in Brooklyn for the summer while working an underpaid internship in the publishing industry. I realized that everyone else in the publishing world came from generational wealth, and that there was no way that I’d be able to pay off my student loans on a publishing salary. I spent the other two summers in college interning at a tech company and a hedge fund. I managed to snag a full-time offer at a Big 3 consulting firm in DC during my senior year of college.

I graduated exactly a year ago and moved to DC in August to start my career. I hate everything about it — the terrible work/life balance, the office culture, my “fratty” coworkers, the actual work itself, the feeling that my job solely exists to make the wealthy even wealthier…

But the problem is, I don’t know what else I’d be doing if I quit my current job. I normally work like crazy during the week and sleep in on the weekends, waking up late on Saturdays and Sundays as if I were waking up from a catatonic daze. Recently, I’ve spent my weekends running errands, spending time on Wall Street Oasis trying to figure out less demanding exit opps, and going on underwhelming Hinge dates. Finding lifelong friends in DC is hard; it’s such a transient place. And besides, by the time you’re 23, no one is looking for a life-long group of friends. Most people consider their childhood friends or their college friends their “forever group.”

My roommate from freshman year of college is someone I’m still weirdly resentful of. She was a sweet, sensitive, and artistic soul. She hated our competitive and pre-professional Ivy League school and begged her parents to let her transfer. After our freshman year, she transferred to the same nurturing, artistic liberal arts college that I had considered going to as a senior in high school. I was shocked that her parents let her “transfer down” in college prestige that much, and also weirdly jealous and envious of her. She lives in a small, artsy town out West as a film producer now. It’s hard not to be resentful of her, as unhealthy as it is.

So here I am at 23 — my life looks fantastic on paper. But I have no close relationships to anyone. I don’t talk to anyone from the three high schools I attended or any of my childhood friends (not that I had many). I am not close to my extended family at all, and I have no siblings while having a distanced relationship with my parents.

The other day, I realized that my parents and coworkers were the only people who had texted me in the past four months. This was a terrible realization to come to. To recognize that I have no positive long-term relationships with anyone was really unpleasant. I walked down to the Connecticut Ave bridge and stared at it for a long time, willing myself to try to jump off.

I ended up leaving (obviously), but I still feel a tumultuous sense of terror and loneliness every day. I’m technically 23, but I don’t really feel my age. I still feel like a teenager. Or a middle schooler.

I perpetually feel empty inside and have little sense of self. Even my therapist dropped me, saying that I have Borderline Personality Disorder and she doesn’t work with BPD clients. This was surprising, as she specializes in DBT (which is the recommended treatment for BPD).

I frequently fantasize about moving to New Hampshire to, like, work at the Macdowell Colony or something. But that’s obviously a pipe dream. I wonder if anyone else on DCUM ever feels this way.