Procrastinators Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from chronic procrastination.

Last resort

Hi,

I just joined the site. I’ve never been in any kind of help
group like this, so I want to apologise in advance if I say or act
inappropriately in some way which I have a habit of doing.

I’m 40 this year and I’ve been a procrastinator for as long
as I can remember. I under-achieved at school, at work and in my personal life,
all because of it. I only ever held down a job by finding ways to cover-up my
lack of work, which caused a lot of stress and guilt. I broke promises to
others and myself. Life was far from ideal, but I always used to cope. I even
used to joke about it with friends and work colleagues who claimed to feel
similar.

That was until a few years ago when a few traumatic events
occurred in a short timeframe and things went downhill rapidly until I reached
where I am now – jobless, broke, relationship in trouble and now under genuine
threat of homelessness. I don’t know anybody else who could be in such a poor
state and yet continue to lack the drive to repair the damage, and yet that’s
where I am. My mail goes unopened, phone unanswered, and rather than spend even
so much as 5 minutes applying for jobs, I will waste time doing anything at all
that’s of no consequence. Even with my landlord giving me notice to quit my home,
I did nothing to find an alternative until far too late. I’m under psychiatric care
and on medication, or at least supposed to be, because of it.

What I can’t communicate to anyone is, that it’s not straightforward
laziness or even apathy – I desperately want to fix things, I want to get a job
– even at the exact moment I skip past the job websites and go to surf
something meaningless, hating myself as I do it. I’ve never felt so imprisoned
and alone. I don’t even believe myself anymore when I say I’ll do it later, not
that it stops me from telling myself exactly that. I don’t believe the excuses
I make as to why it really isn’t the right time to do whatever I need to do,
although I still make the excuses.

I hope that I find an answer here…

Thanks to anyone who bothered to read this far, and I’ll try
to sound more cheerful next time, I promise ! 

Now I just need to dig properly into this site, without switching on the tv. 

Welcome!

Hi

Sorry to hear about your troubles, and welcome to PA! I hope everything will be getting better soon. Day by day, week by week. (I just want to note that I have been living without a TV for years, and it helps me a lot to be away from it. I would recommend getting rid of it, if possible of course.)

Solidarity,

Karasu

re: last resort

Hi DavidHendry,

Well you've met your twin :) I am in the process of an eviction lawsuit, for which I just submitted my response to the courthouse. I have never let myself get this far in debt, broke, etc. Not to the point of threatening homelessness. 

I was also completely unable to apply for jobs for months prior, simply out of a feeling of paralysis. I just couldn't do it. For me it has to do with just hating working, hating the drudgery of being in an office, so taking an underearning job that pays little but lets me work from home away from people. But the isolation is getting me crazy too. 

Before this happened, I actually had a very high-paying contract job for several months. But instead of keeping it going, I feared I couldn't get something else and didn't even try. I used up all I saved and here I am. I started off in another 12 step group that I need to get back to also.

I am not on meds but I came close several times in my life. My debt is getting so bad that I'm thinking of joining DA soon. I already have tried UA which I want to pursue but i just haven't had the guts to get a sponsor yet and do all they say. PA is helping me deal with  facing daily tasks and getting out of the avoidance.

I also had a few traumatic events in the past several years which led to my downward spiral.

Anyway, just going on about myself so that you know you're not alone and have someone here to relate to. 

Keep coming back!

Lavida

Thanks for welcome

Thanks to all for their words of support.

Lavida - I can truly empathise with your eviction proceedings, and I too used to hold down some very well paid contract jobs, which I spent my time hating rather than appreciating. I tell myself now that if I ever got back there, my attitude would be different and I'd feel more grateful, but I currently have little faith that the feeling would last very long before I was again fighting to cover-up my lack of output.

I've also changed usernames as DavidHendry (a well-worn pseudonym) just sounded kind of clunky

Again - thanks everyone - seeing some stories of other people pulling themselves up, does give some much needed hope.

don't leave out your recovery, lavida!

lavida, don't leave out that you are in the chatbox every day working, and accomplishing a lot. When you share your story, you want to share your "experience, strength, and hope" (as they say in AA), so you share "what it was like, what happened, and what it's like now". It's not bragging to talk about how much better you're doing - it's giving hope!

Re: don't leave out your recovery, lavida!

Thanks, pro! That's a very good point, since things have been bad for me lately, I'm really down on myself and forgot any positive things I've been doing. That's right, I use the chatbox and check-in threads. I realize I have a problem and I'm trying to improve. I guess for me right now I have "relapsed" in a way, so I basically feel like a newbie who is starting all over. Coming to this site is keeping me sane and feeling not alone, so that is the hope that I can offer right now, that WE ARE NOT ALONE!

welcome DavidHendry!

I hope you find an answer here as well...this site has helped a lot of us.

I know what you mean, procrastination is *not* laziness. Reasons are different for each person, but for a lot of us I think it has more to do with fear and resistance to what I'm "supposed" to be doing.

I hope to see you on this site and in the chatbox, working through your tasks and taking small steps to look at jobs etc.  (And if medication/therapy helps, go for that too!) I've found it wonderful to have people here who understand some of my issues.