Debt makes tenderness toward myself feel like bad arithmetic

Dear Delyara, A small comfort becomes a calculation. A gentler option becomes suspicious. The easier route home, the helpful purchase, the harmless pleasure, the rest that costs anything at all — all of it gets dragged under the shadow of “should I really?” Debt does not only affect spending. It affects permission. And I am tired of how often the answer to softness feels like it must first pass through financial guilt before it can reach me.