Been going through some depression/anxiety for some time now

Hi all,

I’m new to spaces like this, I apologise for the length of this but there’s alot to unpack. But for the last few years I’ve been going through some very hard times with regards to mental health. Probably started in one of the covid lockdown years but I found myself really reclusive and alone quite a lot. During this time I picked up bad habits which seemingly have gotten worst the last 12 months. During my childhood I was never diagnosed but I am fully aware that I had gone through spells of high anxiety and depression. I actually got out of this funk when I went to do a course at University, I think that was just a great time where I didn’t have things happen that would impact my mental health. Anyways after I graduated from my course I seemingly had spells of depression and anxiety etc.. and ended up just falling flat out fatigued from my University line of work. Combine the with the lockdowns a few years back and not really interacting with alot of my friends in person I would lose out on alot of social interaction I would be craving. The last few years as well I have picked up a really bad sports betting/horse betting habit, to the fact I’ve wasted tons of money and had months I’ve been really struggling for cash. I flat out love sport, but my god the amount of sports betting promotion you see is so hard to avoid not having a go on the punt. And obviously as I’ve dealt with depression and these low spells I’m not exactly thinking in a positive mindset and so if I lose on these activities I just become more and more isolated. I do my best to try and flat out take breaks from gambling but it’s so hard. I can get to 7 or 14 days then bang I’ll see some fancy promotion 3 weeks into my time away and I’m hooked again. I tend to get very anxiety heavy during a lot of times I’m in public with lots of people and lots of things are happening. I’ve had anxiety attacks occasionally. I’m a very quiet person in real life, and I really struggle to interact with most people, other than just casual chats so a lot of my friends have no idea of the troubles I’ve dealt with and it’s really hard for me to say reach out and open up, as I don’t generally feel all the time welcome in that sense. There’s also a lot of fear as well with that. So many times I want to open up to people I know but then I just get cold feet completely with the fear of judgement. I have times I wake up and automatically in a terrible mood for the day and I just feel so worthless and so undersupported. I find myself at times when I’m in a depressive state or dealing with bouts of anxiety I am really hard to speak to like coworkers I work with I might just seem uninterested and not happy, and I don’t mean to be like that. It’s just hard to remain positive in a facade. I’m just looking for some feedback or help.

Even if nobody replies to this. I am happy to post something like this on an anonymous forum. Thank you for taking the time to read this reply.