Dear Girija:

“I need to be significantly less chaotic and detached. Maybe I am in the process of developing it” -. I would like to think that you are indeed in the process of becoming more and more mentally calm, organized, balanced, levelheaded.

“Most people don’t need a break, but I am just weird, not normal” -it is not true that most people don’t need a break, everyone needs a break. You are not weird or abnormal for needing a break!

“I don’t have… a shelter to rest and refresh” – I like how you defined a break: a shelter to rest and refresh. Without a shelter to rest and refresh, no wonder you feel chaotic.

The following is what you shared in this most recent post, mostly your words:

My parents didn’t support me, and so, I was born into a situation with no support. The pattern repeats as I keep finding myself in situations with no support. In these situations, I carry the weight of the world on my shoulders, it’s me against the world.  I don’t want to be the daughter who has to earn and factor my family’s retirement fund for me to retire. I hate being the developer who has to do things way above her experience. I want to have at least one situation where it’s ok to fall.

For the first time, I think of you as a slave, a slave to your family.

Global slavery index. org/ India, reads: “The Global Slavery Index estimates that on any given day in 2016 there were nearly 8 million people living in modern slavery in India... In the 2016 Global Slavery Index, we reported there were 18.3 million people in modern slavery in India. The difference between these two figures reflects changes to counting rules and estimation methods” –

– the 18.3 million number would be much greater if adult children enslaved by their families, without the threat of physical violence, were counted in, according to a different estimation method. Slavery exacts a heavy mental and emotional toll on those enslaved, like low self-esteem and elevated stress. What do you think?

anita