How can I be happy and confident?

Thank you for reaching out and asking your question. From what you have said it sounds like you have been through a lot and experienced some trauma in your life up until now. Your main question is 'how can I be happy and confident?' and from that it would seem that these are areas in your life where you would like to make changes and see improvements. 

Trauma can come from adverse events both in childhood and adulthood and leave us with unwanted patterns of behavior, disturbing thoughts and generally feeling unhappy and lacking in confidence. Trauma can also make us hypervigilant for threat which can be exhausting and take us further away from the feelings of happiness and confidence that we seek. 

Evidence tells us that one of the first steps to healing past trauma is being able identify, locate and name that trauma. From what you have said this year has been really challenging for you and I sense an awareness already where this trauma has come from and the events surrounding it. This awareness is the beginning of healing and you may benefit from speaking to an experienced and qualified therapist to begin working this through and making sense of it. It is not evident from your question whether you have also experienced other trauma, perhaps in childhood in the form of adverse childhood experiences that may be being reactivated as you sit with this current trauma that has occurred over the past year. If this is the case, this too can be addressed through having specialist support. 

I hear you when you describe the trauma making you 'get in my head' and this sounds like you are describing it going around and around in your mind without you being able to get away from it. You go on to describe how this then prevents you from living the positive lifestyle that you seek. This may be something that a therapist could also work through with you as well. It is not uncommon for those dealing with trauma to experience it as intrusive or unwanted thoughts and this then gets in the way of living the life you want. 

You have made a really positive first step reaching out and asking your question here. It may now be helpful for you to take this momentum and explore this more in video, phone or text sessions as it sounds as though you are ready to make a change in your life. Well done for making that first step and good luck with your exploration going forward.