u/imrootless

I’ve been an EMT basic at a pretty busy 911 agency for around a year now. We only have ALS trucks and I’ve been on night shift as of a couple months ago. Since working this job it has been exhausting and difficult to balance any other part of my life, so I promised myself that I wouldn’t get sucked into the vortex and get my medic. Well… I feel myself getting sucked into the vortex.

There’s a lot of issues at my agency and a lot of people are leaving so I wonder if I would enjoy it more working somewhere else. The schedule is exhausting, but it is also largely due to being night shift and I can swap at some point. I love to learn and I feel like I’ve gotten to a point where I want to do more on high acuity calls. And I want to call the shots instead of all the idiots I have to work with all the time! It’s exhausting seeing people handle situations incorrectly while also not being qualified or knowing exactly how to handle it yourself… just that you can tell they’re fucking it up. You know what I mean?

The place I work pays you to get your medic. I’ve been looking for other jobs because I really want to make more money, but if I can’t find a job fast enough I might just join the next medic class that starts. I really enjoy the job itself, it’s just the long shifts and tough 2-2-3 schedule that is pretty grueling. I miss having weekends off every week.

Let me know your thoughts. Should I just say fuck it and do it or should I not. Please be honest!

Hey y’all. I sometimes don’t have very good insight into my own mental health and I wanted to get some takes from this sub.

I struggled very significantly with my mental health my whole life (I’m 24) up until about a year ago when it finally got better. I’ve been to treatment facilities twice, in therapy for years, several groups and therapy programs. Diagnosed with a whole laundry list of things, mainly struggling with bipolar 2, eating disorders and OCD, and BPD which I believe is basically in remission. I just wanted to include this context because part of why it is hard for me to conceptualize how well I’m doing is because I don’t really know what it’s like to function as a normal person. I never really have. This is my first experience feeling relatively sane and not at risk to myself.

I’m a little bit worried that I’m slipping. I think about suicide daily. Not necessarily that I want to kms, but I think about it all the time. It almost feels like an OCD theme for me because of how much I ruminate on it, but I know what it feels like to be suicidal and this isn’t it. I am in a relationship for the first time and am very happy. I’m excited for where my life is headed and I feel grateful for things every day. I know I am able to experience joy now when I wasn’t before. But I also daydream about hurting myself all the time. I drink a lot, whenever I can. I’ve been crying more about random things. I’ve been more irritable and quick to anger. I honestly think I feel like garbage emotionally unless I’m having fun with my girlfriend which luckily happens pretty often.

I think what confuses me is that I’ve struggled so much in the past that I never really felt happy about ANYTHING during those times, just constant torture despair and misery. Now I’m not on the brink all day every day and actually have things to live for. But I still feel… bad… a lot… and I don’t know if it’s normal people bad feelings or if I’m like mildly depressed? I’ve never been mildly anything. It’s hard to figure out and if I should be concerned at all. Let me know what you guys think. I can give more info. Thanks!