(The following is (mostly) a copy-paste from our weekly public update post on Patreon! If you like what you see, you can try a free demo of the game on our itch.io by clicking here! If you enjoy the game, please consider supporting us on Patreon! We couldn't make this game without our supporters!)

Hi guys. Sorry for skipping last week's update, I didn't have a whole lot to talk about. I still don't have too much to say, at least not about work. Work and life have still been an immense struggle the past two weeks. The medication change has helped me sleep better at least, but it's nowhere near solving things. My depression is still hanging around again, I'm not sure if it's caused by any medication or what, but my mental state has been really shaky. Things have just been really overwhelming lately, and it feels like I haven't had a break from major responsibilities in months, even though that's not really accurate. I've never been good at dealing with life when it feels like a lot of stuff is going on, and these past few months have been the busiest it's ever been, with the constant doctors appointments, crunching to put out v0.45, gearing up for taxes, guilt about not only the lack of progress but also this relapse into depression when it seemed like everything was finally getting back to normal.. it's just been a lot to deal with. I'm really sorry that it's affected development of CPE to such a degree, and I wish I had a more concrete answer on when things would improve, but all I can really tell you right now is that I'm working as hard as I can on trying to make it better.

Even though I don't have anything to share in terms of work updates, I'll continue to be as transparent as I can about what's happening right now in life, and what steps I'm taking to improve. You guys deserve that much at least, since you're the entire reason I'm able to seek help in the first place. So, if you're just here for the CPE development update, then first off I apologize for not having anything to show you; none of you have ever pressured me for progress, and I appreciate that more than you know, but it still eats me up inside every time the weekend is approaching and I still have nothing to show. In any case, you can stop reading this post here - it's just going to be personal updates til the end.

Since my last update, I had my first appointment with the cardiologist to try and figure out my heart problems. They took a quick EKG and set me up with a heart monitor, which I'm going to be wearing for two weeks, to get a more accurate picture of my heartrate and to find out if I have something like arrhythmia. The monitoring period will end at the beginning of March, and I'm also scheduled to get an echocardiogram on the same day, so hopefully by early/mid March I should start having a clearer picture on why my heartrate is so high. I'll keep you posted as soon as I know more.

It took a little longer than I would've liked to get stuff moving with therapy, thanks to some technical issues making me fill out their application multiple times, but that step is done, and I have a short phone call scheduled in a few days to talk about my application and make further plans. I don't know if I'll be getting a therapist assigned and scheduled on that day or not; it sounds like the place I'm going to is overwhelmed with applications right now, and they're even having to turn some people away and refer them to other counselors. Luckily, puffernutter is already seeing someone for therapy at this place, and she talked to her therapist about my application, so she was able to give us some tips that should make me more likely to be higher priority.

I'll keep you all updated on what's happening with therapy as soon as I know more, right now I think it's going to be the most important step towards me getting better. I've been doing a lot of thinking lately, and I'm wondering if I might be focusing too much on my ADHD instead of my other symptoms. I've dealt with ADHD since I was a child, so the entirety of CPE's development was done with unmanaged ADHD symptoms, and I still managed to get the game this far. I think the depression, burnout, and just constant feeling of being overwhelmed is what's holding me back right now more than anything, though it's really hard to know for sure. This is a subject I obviously plan on talking to my eventual therapist about, and I'm also going to be bringing it up with my medicine doctor when I have another appointment with her in mid/late March. I don't really understand my own brain, never have, and it's really hard to figure out the best direction to tackle all of this from because of that. Fingers crossed that I can get a therapist sooner rather than later.

I think that's about it for the stuff I want to share. There's more going on, but it's stuff I'm either not comfortable talking about, or that doesn't really have any bearing on CPE and my health. I have at least one appointment scheduled for every single week through mid-March, so things aren't going to be slowing down any time soon. I'm just glad that I have so many people around to help, in addition to all of the support you guys give me. I don't know what I'd do if Puffernutter and Orexius weren't around to help try and lighten my burden a bit. If I'm struggling this hard even with their help, and with the support of all of you, I don't want to know what it would be like alone.

Anyway, thank you so very much for reading. I wish I had a happier update to give you guys, but I'll get there someday. Have a good weekend, everyone, and hopefully there will be some good news to share next update.