>>5497
>she said it sounds like I might have an anxiety issue but before dealing with it she wanted to rule out some sort of cancer of the adrenal system
This sentence didn't so much give me whiplash as it attempted my explosive decapitation. Disordered sleep, onset of depressive behavior sprinkled with executive dysfunction? Yeah sure, here's a ticket clipped for an adrenal workup and if it comes back within the requisite number of standard deviations then let's say it's, uh, anxiety. Whatever - both we and her insurer will have to give her the benefit of the doubt since she's the one in the chair.
Alright so let's see: When you were motivated by shame, a need to escape, or some other extrinsic factor you were fine. Sounds like you've turned into a lump because you can't find any reason to care or the mechanism that permitted you to care has burned out.
There are two dimensions to this, one physical and the other of meaning. The obvious physical stuff aside, could be you've got some kind of executive disorder or other neurochemical issue that you were getting around by jamming outside shame where intrinsic motivation should be, not to mention the general guide-rail stimulus that comes with working your way through the regimented goals of a university course. (Sounds like it wasn't all the way smooth after that, especially since you mention that your friend would catch you burning midnight oil regularly enough that it was something she'd worry about on your behalf.) Brain glitches aren't something to immediately blame, but it can be helpful to remember that it takes way more work to look after yourself when there's a slab of malfunctioning meat fizzing betwixt your ears.
As for that side of things, the usual advice applies. Exercise, preferably progressive resistance training (no you won't get muscly like a guy would, you already know that very well) will absolutely help. Good nutrition will help. Sleep will especially, especially help, and even though getting away from a fucked sleep schedule when the caffeine cycle's got you in its grip is super hard, doing the other two things will help a lot.
But the main question that you're asking here is the most important one: "Why should I care?" It isn't enough to flop your meatsack around the world, you've gotta have a reason for keeping that thing running. You've probably already figured out that the usual Instagram bio shit is a scam, so where's that leave you in a world that's figured out it's way easier to just show JPEGs (WEBPs? That cancer kind of fits the metaphor better) of goods meant to temporarily substitute for satisfying things instead of ponying up the things themselves?
Physical factors aside, all the things you describe yourself doing might not seem to have much of a payoff - that's why you want to stop doing them - but in actual fact they produce that sweetest and most addictive of poisons: Incapability.
>oh fuck please no motivational speech
No speech. You're smart enough to know the thrust by now anyway. Find that thing that you need to do. Not immediate goals or self-care or whatever, but the thing that makes all that necessary as a means to an end. It'll probably scare the hell out of you, whatever it is, but you'll be constantly pulled toward it even as you try to run away.
>so what gives you the right to flap your fingers about this Anon
'cause it happened to me too. Miserable work, fucked/interrupted sleep, bad diet, no exercise, practically zero motivation to fix any of the above because I was really just sneakily running myself down any way I could find so that I had an excuse to not be capable of anything.
There was no sexy amazing autobiographical story to the turnaround, just me getting explosively angry and disgusted at myself. After that it was things anyone can learn: Seven Habits stuff, a diet overhaul, proper exercise that made me sore afterwards, and so on. I didn't like it very much but I liked the consequences of doing it even less. Take it a little at a time, but don't stop - it's the stopping that kills.
The more I do, the sneakier and more cunning those backsliding demons get. The only way to overcome them is to fight them methodically and sensibly each and every day.
There's something like that for you too, Anon, something more than "I can't let people I care about see me like this". Finding it is the most important thing you can do, at least next to the lifelong journey that finding it will put you on.
In the meantime, do what you can to get the physical side of life under control, however many tries it takes. Even if it seems pointless now. It'll all turn out to have helped a lot in retrospect, trust me.
Shotgun of a post that this is, I hope at least some of it helps.