Sick and tired of everything
Im depressed but cant really express it to my family so venting here. Probably nobody is going to read this but whatever.
My dad died when I was 9, so my mother has worked and raised us alone (me and my 8 year younger sister). Since I'm the male the family responsibility will ultimately fall on me only.
I was not really sure of what i wanted to do, so i took maths in 11th because i least disliked it. Then took jee mains and advanced, got 95 percentile in mains and didn't clear advance. Didnt get fuck all since I'm a general category male. So was forced to take a drop year.
The drop year was going well and for the first time in my life i was actually dedicated towards a goal. When my syllabus was 60% completed in coaching I scored 98.6 percentile in December mains attempt which was a good confidence boost.
But then, corona happened. Exam kept getting delayed indefinitely. I was sick of studying the same shit again and again since 3 years. Was also unable to go outside or meet anyone else. The confinement and the repetitiveness was killing me from inside. Then i stopped studying. Then the guilt/regret started and everything went downhill from there. I was stuck in the cycle of being unable to study/focus for more than 5 minutes -> regret that why am I not studying -> worse mental state -> unable to study/focus.
At that point i was having sucdal thoughts because i felt like an asshole for not studying and felt like i was doing a disservice to my mother's hard work. I opened up about this to my mother eventually and then quit studying. So based on my December attempt percentile i took admission in the best nit i could get, and since I couldnt get cs with that rank i took mechanical (as I liked physics somewhat)
Then the corona continued. The supposed two best years of college life were spent being stuck in my house doing online classes/assignments and playing games all day. I got obese as well during this time. Where other people open up and develop long lasting memories in the initial years of college, all I have is a blank space in my memory for that period because literally fucking nothing happened in that time in my life.
When college finally started we had no connection with seniors, and then we were in third year (hardest time in college) and directly in the internship/placement race. I never truly got to explore anything without fear of consequences/guilt. I made some great friends at least, fortunately. I also tried coding but the job market situation and lack of genuine interest made me decide to go for core engineering. Also being fat and introverted I never tried any extra curricular activities because of insecurity
Then i somehow got placed in a PSU (BPCL) in 7th sem, after failing every interview in previous core companies. I was happy because it was a semi secure job with the best pay a mechanical engineer can get (16 lpa). But it didn't last too long. Because the reality of the PSU job was something else entirely. The work culture was appalling, the boss was sadistic, leaves were never approved, sometimes even on weekly offs I had to work (once i had to work 21 days straight), the LPG work environment was straight up life threatening and also harmful for physical health. The shift rotation was erratic as fuck, and we were understaffed as hell. Most of the time I was in shifts by myself even though i was just a "probationary" officer (naam ka officer hai waise, feel pura labourer wala aata hai). This was the reality of most of the mechanical core jobs in India. It literally was killing me mentally and ruining my physical health too. I have also developed insomnia because of those senseless shift changes(2pm - 12am and then six hours later back to office at 6am) and crazy overtimes (10-12 hrs almost every other day).
One day a senior official visited us and when we expressed our concerns regarding overtime and work load, he literally said "tum logo ki to dukan hai. Jab tak demand hai dukan khol ke rakho" (by dukan he referred to our LPG plant, basically hes saying work overtime if you have to as long as there is demand, he doesn't give a shit). I decided on that day to call it quits. I resigned despite my family suggesting not to.
After the JEE disaster I was sick of government exams but I had no other choice. So i started grinding for GATE in hopes of getting a better job via M.Tech (and also simultaneously prepare for barc/isro). But still i was scared of it because of the jee trauma and was worried the same thing will happen again.
I had six months which is good enough time to prepare. I was again studying with dedication after a 14 month gap from college studies. But the same shit happened in january (a month before exam). I couldn't focus to save my life. For me revising same things over and over again is physically painfully. Then again the guilt loop started. Basically the thing i feared the most happened again. So of course I scored shit marks in gate (585 score in general category, around 1300 rank). This score will not get me anything worthwhile. I also fumbled BARC exam because I didnt study after gate (and it was my first and last BARC attempt because the age limit for general is 26).
Now I dont even know what i wanna do. I know I wont get any top IIT in a branch I want. The placement scenario in lower IITs and top NITs is laughable in mechanical. I dont have the courage to prepare for next year.
I have no direction man. i have no passion for anything, no courage to do anything because of fear of failure having failed thrice in these exams. i dont even wanna have kids or a family because i dont want them to born in this country and face similar hardships with worse climate, pollution and water scarcity that will be there in the future. i am fat but dont wanna go to gym. my family is still very supportive but that will only last for so long. afterall i need to take responsibility for both my sister and my mother. if i was born in any other western country I think I would have gotten at least SOMETHING with the amounts of effort that I have done. but here the population is so large that even being in top 2% of aspirants in gate gets me fucking nothing.
I wish I was never born. At this point I am just hoping I just dont wake up tomorrow. so sick of this shit. and if you think these are smaller issues compared to other people and im just being a pussy, then you are probably right