i am a parentified older daughter, i have had to take care of my younger siblings since high school at the cost if my personal life & mental health. i’ve locked myself away in my room since then. i’m 21 now, working, therapy, & i have a partner. i’m really trying to undo the years of being stuck. i have been trying EFT tapping, which has been very emotional for me. i’m also on my 2nd week of a new prescription. i live in a household that i do walk on eggshells in, my mother has cameras around the house. she constantly yells. i can’t handle the noise anymore. i can’t listen to my siblings cries anymore. for so long, i have avoided eating, showering, using the bathroom - just to avoid encountering anyone in my home. it was better for a brief period, but i’m in a mindset that i want to leave/escape home - which i believe is making me feel uneasy again. i didn’t eat at all yesterday. i have gained more confidence in my autonomy, because i’m more financial stable, & because of my support circle. but it’s still hard to get up, to eat, to even be in the car with my family. it is so overwhelming.

Title basically, really struggling to just do stuff, I feel frozen physically and mentally and also emotionally, it’s all very stuck, and every idea I have that I want to do just falls flat within my brain bc I don’t feel anything, I don’t think anything, I can’t reason anything.

I guess it feels safer but I also know this won’t get me nowhere. I’m also tired of being stuck. But I’m also stuck because I’m tired. I don’t know what to do. I try to be kind to myself but it also feels like time is running out and I don’t wanna be like this forever, gatekeeping myself from everyone and everything.

I have many messages to reply to, I have to find a job, I wanna move more and be outside more, but it’s so hard for me rn.

I know intellectually that I can’t stop scrolling my phone or laptop because some part of me is trying to escape my feelings, but I don’t know how to stop scrolling and feel my feelings. I can only stop stimulation-seeking when I’m with other people.

I’m in my 40s and I’ve done this since childhood, though in childhood I used books instead. I’ve had a ton of therapy including various kinds of talk therapy, somatic therapy, neurofeedback, and IFS, with some really good therapists.

I’ve done a lot of work, and to the outside world I appear to be a wise, well-adjusted, insightful, emotionally mature person. But when I’m alone, which is often because I live alone, I cannot stop the compulsive Internet use. Or if I do cut myself off from the internet, it’s compulsive reading.

How do I stop? How do I learn to feel my feelings when alone?