My first thought was to ring my mum. But I'm 28 and trying to be more grown up so I'm writing this instead.

This is my day.

H woke me just before half past seven and I felt awful. I couldn't believe it was time to get up. I went back to sleep until my alarm went off. My eyes were heavy and achy. If I'd been going to college, I wouldn't have got up (which is interesting in itself). Anyway, I dragged myself out of bed and started doing my old nebs as my Ineb broke yesterday. I know, I know electronic things don't just break and the condensation on the inside of the display tells me that I may have had something to do with it. Something like immersing it in too much water. So being extremely tired having not slept that well and having to do nebs which took much longer that the time I'd allowed for them, I was running late. (Come back Ineb I won't get you wet again or leave you on the floor, instead I will treat you like the King you are.)

I just missed the first bus thanks to the bus driver shutting the doors in my face. And as I was waiting at the freezing cold bus stop, I realised that I'd left my phone and lots of fruit at home (banana power was the only way I could see myself getting through the day), and felt like giving up and going home. I know I was going to be late for work now and was so exhausted that I didn't know how I was going to do anything anyway.

But bus arrived. I got on it and made it to work. I sat at my desk and wondered how I was going to function; when my log-in details appeared on the screen, I just stared at them as if my brain had never seen a computer or log-in details before. Finally, (I'm finding it difficult here to convey the problem I had with this but it really was like my brain was frozen) I remembered my password and managed to log-in, phone a few people and do a bit of work.

The only other person in this morning was the other 'super' volunteer. I tried to converse with him about vaguely intellectual things and managed to get his 'quiz' right about when the UN was set up. (1945, if you're wondering.) He went to Oxford (obviously), has just set up a new online magazine about global politics, volunteers for an MP and has got an internship at the Oxfam head office in January. I will be looking out for him as a director of Oxfam in a few years' or as the government's head of policy for international development or the foreign secretary's speech writer. Yes, he's that good.

So when he asked me what my career goals were, I just had to laugh to myself. I'd had the worst morning by far since I'd started at Oxfam. I was feeling that I would probably have to quit volunteering and that any ideas I might have about a career were purely delusional.

I escaped for an early lunch knowing that my staying in the office was pointless and headed straight to a coffee bar for a cappuccino. Yep, I had to resort to caffeine to stop my eyes from aching. It was my last chance and I prayed for it to work. And miraculously it did. Or was it the placebo thing again, or my lunch, or maybe all the water I was drinking (which has worked in the past)?

So I felt better this afternoon and set about writing a press release. I really enjoyed writing it and thought it was pretty good and so was feeling a million times better than I had done this morning. Until that is, I asked my manager-type person if he'd read it and it was very clear that he didn't think it was good. At all.

This was my reaction.

My heart sunk. I felt awful. I felt like the most useless piece of rubbish in the world. I wanted to cry. I felt as if someone had cut me open and taken a piece out of me. I didn't want to be alive. I wanted to evaporate. I hated my job. I hated me. I thought, I'm so rubbish, I can't even be a good volunteer. They'll regret having me. I'm a mistake. All their other volunteers are amazing. I'm not. If I can't even be good when I'm feeling OK, I've got no chance. No chance.

It might seem extreme. OK, I know it's extreme but when all you've got is a job (or not even a job), it becomes a big deal. I don't know how I'm going to do this anymore. If I give up I'll get depressed and if I fail, I'll be depressed. It all seems a lot of effort, and for what? I've hated pretty much all of my jobs and suddenly they seem great. They can't all be that bad. So it must be something about me.