Eat. Pray. Panic.

It's weird. I've been having these rather severe panic attack-like symptoms for the last several hours. My heart is racing, palms are sweaty, wrists are half-numb with tension, breaths are short and quick in an attempt to calm my body down.

Part of it is that I've been stressed with money problems lately. It's something that's been consistently consuming my thoughts. It's nothing Earth-shattering, I guess. I just have not been saving up as much as I wanted to. Living amongst the richest of the rich on an island that has the greatest concentration of millionaires in the world has not exactly made me feel particularly wealthy either.

It's funny how money concerns can become a part of your daily existence. Even when, by all standards, you can call yourself comfortably middle-class, it is keeping up with the ever rising life style expectations and comparing yourselves to the Joneses next door that can make you feel like you've been sinking deeper and deeper into debt.

I didn't think I wanted to be rich when I was younger. But you know what? Being rich just makes things so much easier. So hell yes, I want a million or two to go buy that nice dress that I saw in the Miu Miu store window or to get that nice hot stone massage I keep hearing about or to get my bills paid on time in the US and not worry about the exchange rate going up and down like a roller coaster every couple of days. (Thanks for that crisis, Europe!)

I want to be able to get my family a nice Christmas gift without scouting discount web sites for bargain deals on second-grade stuff that will sort of look like the real deal that I wanted to give them in the first place. I want to be able to fly to Hong Kong or Hanoi for the weekend without checking my bank account to make sure that I have enough money for my ever-sky-rocketing rent for the month. Or, hell, I want to go to the dentist to get that pricy root canal taken care of without worrying that one more unexpected expense will drive me to the poor house.

More so, however, I think that I am currently pissed over the fact that I bought my boyfriend a $300 dollar painting as a birthday present. And while that may not seem like much money to some people, this is actually the most that I had ever spent on any gifts for any boyfriends/friends/pals/family members. This is a testament that I actually want to impress this dude by buying something thoughtful that is, at the same time, on the pricier side, by my standards.

And no, I am not pissed that I spent that money. I wanted to spend it. And I found the perfect painting that I hope he will love as much as I think he will. It's just the fact that I know that he's been to that stupid dating web site again and it's bothering the crap out of me. Makes me feel a bit foolish knowing that he went to the site again, while I am sitting here and buying presents for him.

When I asked him about the site a couple of weeks ago (actually, the conversation about it was sort of brought up by him because he mentioned how someone sent him a weird message recently), he said that he goes on there once in a while when people send him random stuff that he can laugh at. He made it sound so innocent and straight-forward that I immediately felt relieved. I could see that he was being honest and that there was nothing going on behind the closed doors.

However, the question still remains. Why is he on the site? Why does he go on it, about once a week? Is it really because the "hilarious" messages from socially-awkward singles amuse him that much?

Or is it because deep down he is hoping for something different than what he has right now.

I don't wanna waste my hard-earned money on a guy who is not fully there and who will dash at the first sign of a better thing. I can be a damn good girlfriend when I put some effort into it. And now that I am putting effort into this, I want to see the same amount of reciprocation.

And I don't wanna have any more panic attacks over money/love matters. I think I deserve better than that.