A passing blue cloud?

I am neither a doctor nor a psychiatrist, but today I diagnosed myself with mild dysthymia. Differential diagnosis is a "passing blue mood", I'm not sure yet. Or perhaps it's a touch of cyclothymia. I've got enough self-insight (I think) to know it's not that bad. It feels bad nonetheless. "Not just bad, but weird and sad", as one of my favorite bands sing on their new album. Couple this with a light paranoia and a fair amount of anxiety, and we're getting closer to the core. Then there's the psychotherapists wet dream (pun intended): my parents. The vegetables.

This time the releasing cause was a conversation with my mother on the phone. She's the uncrowned queen of making you feel guilty, of giving you a bad conscience, feeling worthless, scared and stupid. The worst is that she's most likely not aware of it herself. In any case I have been a bad boy myself. My mother got diagnosed with malignant breast cancer, has gone through surgery and is right now about to start chemo therapy. Myself, I've been trying to not think about it, push it away, don't care. The prognosis for full recovery is good, and I don't want to think about the possibility that everything goes to hell. I've been trying to do something nice for my mother, but I fear that no matter what I do it's not good enough anyway, and in any case it's easier to not think about it. It's just a passing black cloud, right?

Stupid me. A phone call now and then would make a huge difference. So why can't I do it? I'm fucking scared to death, and most of the time I'm a nervous wreck for days after talking to my mom. When I've been home and visited them, the nervousness lasts longer.

On top of it I'm desperately searching for the meaning of life, or rather how to find meaning in a meaningless world. I'm an absurd mind. All my life I've wanted to do creative stuff. I wanna be a writer, a musician on the side, visual artist on my spare time. Bohemian. Free. My parents would never understand that. And that's a quite egosentric occupation, isn't it?

I recently found myself facing two choices: 1) The egosentric, fuck-the-world road. 2) The non-egosentric, help-people-in-need road.

I'm 99% positive I'll head down road #2.

It's too late for me to start med. school or become a psychiatrist, unless someone decides to pay for my life the next 10 years or so. 5 years, at least.

So, I'm heading into Child Care. I want to help children and youths, help them not become fucked-up, make a difference, be good. 3 years in school and I'm done, with the possibility of taking a Master's degree later on.

I mentioned this to my mother last night, and was like "Well, good, it's about time you get a real job, you useless crap [well, that was not her actual words, but my interpretation of them]. You can't study forever, because you can't afford it." Screw the money! It's not important! At best it's convenient, and of course necessary. But not important.

Enough for now.

Tentative diagnosis: F34.0 Cyclothymia? F34.1 Dysthymia?