My heart goes out to you. I hope you have a few supports and resources nearby. Be safe.

Oh, and great eye for the photo. The composition is striking. Well done, beautiful.

Qne thing I learned is that peoples idea of a homeless person is way off base. After a few years as a supervisor at a homeless shelter non profit, I'd seen every demographic come through.

What do you do during the day at your spot?

5 years in art school definitely didn't go to waste.

Revel in the fact that I've somehow landed a rich friend's richer dad's empty affair penthouse, build model kits friends buy me, take lots of nudes, fuck my friends a lot, play with toys, read, watch shit, get stoned, stay stoned, write, work on getting my metal vocals voice back in shape, have panic attacks, existential crisises and paranoid delusions, and play dumb mobile games.

Trans lesbian former sex worker religious incestual CSA survivor with BPD, Bipolar I, and C-PTSD.

Lots of boxes ticked.

I mean… i believe that’s the end-goal of most peoples lives… 😉

It's not so good when you have zero money, no permanent living situation, a shelter where your life is constantly in danger because of who and what you are, constant dissociative episodes where sometimes you wake up in someone's bed that you don't remember meeting, coming down from hard drugs you don't remember taking, and frequent flier status with the psych ward.

Read anything good lately?

Just reread Rendezvous with Rama. I completely forgot about Simps and Simp Masters. Got an actual spit take out of me.

Sounds rough!

this is a pretty good daily to do list.

Sounds like you’re having the time of your life.

It's pretty hollow tbh. I am on a fuck ton of meds, I dissociate a lot, and most days I'm just barely holding on. These are distractions at best.

Sure. If your idea of a good time is being raped and surviving a few murder attempts.

Also, I'm a lesbian. When you're manic, you're almost someone else, you do things you'd never do. It's literally psychosis. And when you wake up next to a man, and pretty sure you just did meth again, it feels so fucking vile.

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Is online school or a daytime online job an option? Having that kind of structure might help. You have a good setup during the day to get some things done too.

Glad you're still around!

Not really. I'm in appeals for SSI precisely because I can't work. I'm far too unreliable and reactively sensitive.

I'm also buried in student debt for an incomplete art degree from years ago before I was diagnosed and fully understood just how unwell I was. Dropped out like every third semester.

The amount of people in this thread asserting I have it good is too damned high.

I have some comforts right now. It's been nice. It's recent, and a reprieve from the hellstorm that's been the last 32 years.

But even with those nice things, my world is still pretty miserable and dangerous. To even sleep in the shelter I have to be on titanic amounts of benzos to counteract the incessant panic attacks.

So like, fuck off?

You'll need a second bingo card.

Why do you go to the shelter if you have access to the penthouse?

I'm not allowed to be here overnight more than a few times a month, owners rules. Besides, it just puts off a problem - I need to stay in the shelter to qualify for housing support, which I absolutely will need. This isn't a "I just need to get back on my feet" kind of situation. It will take me years of intensive therapy before I could hold any kind of real income unless I get very lucky and manage to write a book or three that sell ok. Which is hard when you're super mentally ill. And the truth of it is, I am a pretty severe case. I've had to come to terms with the fact that I may never get better. The frontline modality didn't work, and others I'm trying now are having limited success managing symptoms a little, but my outlook is pretty bleak.

“I can’t work”

Haha… I’m sorry, but that’s the biggest load of Bs I’ve ever seen …just be honest with us ..you choose not to work.

Being unreliable and sensitive is not a disability and I truly hope you lose your appeal.

Wow read the wikipedia article for it (yeah I’m one of those people) and it looks really good

Ok bud. I mean those are the effective results of what I deal with but I mean, psychosis, mania, and wild and sometimes violent episodes are what I live with. But I mean you do you.

Yeah, Clarke ain't considered classic for no reason.

So am I. It's been close more than a few times, by my own hand and by others.

Definitely want to stay. That's always one of the weirdest things. I really don't want to die. But when I'm in an episode it seems like it's the only thing you can do.

It certainly did if you're in a homeless shelter.

Sarcasm my dude. It's a shame, cuz its failure has nothing to do with the degree itself and everything to do with my brain exploding.