I’m a 29 year old woman and I have found myself back in a life situation that I feared returning to and I now feel utterly hopeless and confused.

I had a stressful childhood with a mentally disturbed father who is now completely estranged from the family and I have not had contact with in ten years. I feel that holding in this stress led to my becoming sick when I was seventeen and developing Fibromyalgia. I was utterly blindsided and incapacitated by the illness, I left school and ended up being cared for by my mother, for many years I almost returned to infancy ; having no job,no money, no relationship and needing assistance. I was desperately unhappy and deeply lonely. Finally at 23 I went into Psycho Analysis, which I attended two days a week for two years. After two years of this intensive therapy I hit a break through. I had always adored creative writing and wrote a lot of poetry and short stories, I realised that I wanted to study Creative Writing full time, So at 25 I left my home country (Ireland) and moved to London where I did a Creative Writing degree- It was the greatest time of my life, I grew as a person finally making friendships and blossoming in all areas of my life, My fibromyalgia all but disappeared, as though I had removed it’s power by focusing on all that was positive in my life. I fell in love and met the man who is now my partner of four years, he too was a student in my course and in our final year we moved in together.

Then this May we graduated and suddenly I felt like I lost everything, We tried to live together in London but we both struggled to find work, bills piled up and we realised that we could no longer afford to live in London or together. Seemingly out of options we decided to remain a couple but return to our respective family homes, his in the Uk and mine in Ireland. His plan was for him to find work in the Uk and as soon as he had I would come and join him there, that was four months ago and he has yet to secure work and I have returned to my family home and it feels like – my old unhappy life. While I was in Uni in London, I was terrified of one day ending up back where I was and now I feel I have.

I feel so devastated, like I have completely lost my life plan, it doesn’t seem right to have to wait for my partner to have work before I really start my life again, but I want to be with him and I do not want to stay in Ireland. I feel totally hopeless, heartbroken and depressed and these feelings have made my Fibromyalgia flare up again and now I feel that there is no place or purpose for me because I’m sick. I miss my partner desperately and my old life in London just as much. I have become so devastated about feeling stuck in this situation, that I have no idea what to do or where to start to help myself, I feel helpless, lost and empty.

Any advice on how to restart my life again and stop history from repeating itself would be greatly appreciated, Many thanks!