The eternal struggle to want to improve but also be vastly oversensitive to meaningless ranking points
Just go in with the intention that you will be making a new account as soon as you feel like you've improved enough but the ELO system isn't accurately reflecting that. ELO is not flawless but it's pretty accurate for the most part, however that number is always temporary. If you feel like you hit a slump or are stuck in the wrong bracket, just make a new account. If you end up in the same ELO, you should analyze your games and note your mistakes, with much less focus on what your opponent setup but more so what you think you were planning.
As long as you aren't completely lost in the opening, regularly doing a tactics trainer will see your Elo increase. The small +/- of strategic play are essentially meaningless if you're at the level where +/- swings of 5 are common. Everyone's different though, so do whatever learning style is sustainable, but you aren't going to get better by just playing chess.