What's up, everyone! It's me, the biggest nerd in Bakersfield. Every time I clock into work, I can feel an underlying hostility directed towards me. I don’t understand why. I try to be a good coworker and fun to work with, but it seems like people just don’t want me around. It's sad because I genuinely enjoy being around others. My own family has turned against me because they think I'm “annoying.” I don’t know why they feel this way. I’ve been excommunicated from my family and am now fending for myself, all because, according to my mother, I’m “ANNOYING!” I just want to be a dignified person and make my parents proud, but instead, it feels like they hate me to the point where they want me locked up in a psych ward. My mother has even recruited the whole family to be against me. I now live a life of total isolation, and it’s mentally draining. I suspect I’m cut out of the will, and that thought scares me! I’ve been especially careful not to have children because I fear my mother would use them against me, or even leverage her position as a doctor to take them away. I just don’t understand why my parents treat me this way, and it hurts. I used to think I just had crazy parents, but I also sense this underlying animosity toward me at work, at the gym, and everywhere I go. Even my neighbor, a young guy, gives off an impression that he doesn’t like me, and I can pick up on it. I need to figure out how I appear to others. If I truly am “ANNOYING!” as my mother says, then it's no wonder people seem to dislike me. I’ve made a list of things I need to change about myself to avoid annoying others. In general, I try to limit my conversation and interactions to keep from bothering people with my presence. The only times I go outside are to get to the gym or Starbucks, and even then, I feel like people are watching me or keeping track of my movements as if they’re stalking me. I used to leave my blinds open in the living room to watch the homeless searching for food in the dumpster, but I stopped that. I started feeling like people were watching me through the window, which is unsettling. On a more depressing note, I’ve been reviewing my budget and it looks like I will be $330 in the negative every month. This means I’ll have to dip into my savings by that amount each month. Fortunately, I have about $5,000 in savings, but I’m still anxious about it. I need to find a second job soon, or else I might end up homeless, and I would have to sell all my belongings because my family has shown they don’t care about me. Again, it comes back to my mother saying, “YOU ARE ANNOYING!”