My name is Katrina, I’m 34 years old and I’ve been struggling with depression, anxiety, chronic pain, and PTSD most of my life.
I have very little family, I have a few close friends and a boyfriend I want to marry soon. I have three cats, I love Neon Genesis Evangelion and horror movies. I’m pretty goofy but also very serious and I am forever a dreamer.
Five years ago I started painting with watercolors and I’ve gotten to a place where I can say I am talented and have potential but because of my many challenges, both personal and financial, I haven’t been able to advance very far. I’ve done some local shows and been in small art collections in downtown galleries but I live in an area where there isn’t a lot of foot traffic or interest in my type of surrealist artworks.
I’m currently waiting on to see if I qualify for disability because after 10 years of working full time I am too burnt out and too mentally fried, and in too much pain, to keep working. My abusive mother died when I was 24 after 7 years of me caring for her (she had cancer), and after that I was thrown into the real world. She had kept me isolated for my whole life, I barely went to school and had no work experience. It’s been an uphill battle ever since to just survive and be able to eat.
This is part of what I wrote in my disability claim, I’m putting it here so you get an idea of what my life is like and how hard it is to work. And even when I am working, I can never get a job that lets me afford to live and be happy.
I cannot sit for longer than a few hours before I need to take a break and lay down because of my back pain/fibromyalgia that can become debilitating if I don’t rest well.
I cannot stand for longer than an hour without having to take a break and sit down for at least half an hour because of the pain in my lower back/knees/feet. After just a half an hour on my feet I begin to feel pain in my heels and no matter what shoes/insoles I wear, my feet will ache.
I can’t type/use a mouse for longer than a few hours before my back pain/fibromyalgia starts to get aggravated. The pain will radiate through my upper body and down into my arms, making it so even typing and moving the mouse is a painful experience. I need a break after at least 2 hours and need to lay down for at least an hour before I can get back up and work.
I have anxiety which makes it so that being out in public/interacting with people is too overwhelming and I get anxiety attacks that cause me to sometimes break down into tears and need to run to privacy to cry. I tend to not be able to stop crying once I start so I need at least 20 minutes before I can go back out into the situation. I also become very irritable and rude when I’m feeling anxious.
And lastly my depression makes it so that literally everything I do feels so pointless at times that I don’t want to get out of bed. I don’t want to do anything, I don’t want to do fun things, or play video games, or read, I lose interest in everything and everyone. Working feels too overwhelming, and I don’t groom myself or feed myself properly which makes it so that going anywhere or getting anything accomplished is even harder because I feel awful and I’m tired/hungry from not eating.
I also have issues with PTSD from my mother abusing me in childhood. These issues have become harder to deal with in the past 2 years because I finally admitted to myself that my mother abused me. So before, I just felt like I had been neglected and could bottle up all the horrible situations and things that happened to me as a child. Now that I’ve realized my mother was emotionally/verbally/sometimes physically abusive to me, I have felt an increase in my overall depressive mood and anxiety so that these events tend to haunt me. Even just during an average day, I might have a flashback that makes it so I can’t focus on anything but the trauma.
I also believe I have undiagnosed ADHD and possibly am on the Autism spectrum, which makes my daily life and mental stability even more rocky.
I just want to be happy, and make my art. I know that making my art and being able to live comfortably without worrying about where my next meal is coming from will change my life. I’m waiting on disability which could take 6 months or longer, and I am also waiting on assistance to pay my rent or else I might have to vacate soon and I’ll be displaced along with my three cats.
I’m not asking for much, just enough to make my next year survivable and maybe even be able to save money for the future. I want to marry my current boyfriend, paint, not have to worry about if I can manage to work that day because of my pain/mental health. I don’t even have a car so I take the bus when I do have to go anywhere, which makes life 100% more difficult. I can only see my boyfriend on weekends when he can manage to come up to see me. I want to have an easier life, just for once.
I also believe I have talent that I want to share with the world, I have something to say and create but it’s so very difficult to continue when the world doesn’t seem to want to help. I just want to breathe.
I think if you’re feeling extremely generous, really $50,000 would completely change my life. But even $5,000 would be immensely appreciated.
https://paypal.me/KStautihar?country.x=US&locale.x=en_US
Thank you.
