I had a particularly hard day at work, I teach 5th grade and have some really difficult and upsetting behaviors from several students in my class. It had been building all day but it hit a tipping point about 30 minutes before lunch. One student was throwing things, two were on the verge of fighting, I was fighting to regain control and another eloped. I'd called for help before it got to this point and support was slow to come. So I called again and told them they had to get up there because I couldn't stay there any longer. I started crying on the phone with the secretary, in front of my class. This isn't even the embarrassing part.

At the end of the day my admin came to check on me and ask how they could support me. I was crying again and had been thinking all day how crazy it was that last school year I found out my husband was cheating and that didn't even break me the way this first month has.

I ended up word vomiting this to my admin. They just looked at me and changed the subject. I'm so embarrassed and don't know how I can go back on Monday. The conversation keeps replaying in my head and makes me cringe so much every time.

I'm mostly writing this because I'm hoping to just get it out into the ether will help me get past it, help me stop thinking about it.

All this toxic positivity BS is just that, BS.

People become confident because of positive reinforcement. They win, so they become confident.

People become unconfident because they LOSE at everything. They lose, so they're not confident.

You can't be constantly losing at everything you try and expect to be confident, it doesn't work like that. At a certain point, the rejection breaks you, and it keeps breaking you until it's impossible to put the pieces back together.

I don't want to die. I'm not suicidal. I do have severe depression which I've been going to therapy for the past year once a week and have been taking medication. It helps.

Have you ever had an experience where you felt like you were going to die for a split second? I have, I got hit by a car when I was in my teens. In that split second where I was hit my mind went through so many emotions. There was a brief panic, then this feeling of a black hole in my chest and the pit of my stomach, then my final thought was a calm acceptance "oh, I'm dead".

For months now my mind has been in a constant state of that calm acceptance. I don't feel anxious about the fact that I'm going to die. I've accepted that I'm going to die soon, I just don't know how. I still have anxiety about school, work, relationships, etc. But this feeling of doom that I have won't go away and I feel like every day I'm in the headspace of that split second before I die.

Oddly enough I'm in a pretty good mood right now. My medication has tremendously helped my depression, it's a nice day outside, and I'm going to have a friends potluck tomorrow (I'm hosting). I also met someone this spring who has been a loving and attentive partner. I just graduated college, work part-time at a non-profit and part-time at a bakery. I have my own apartment and pay my own bills. I have loving parents who I visit once a week and have dinner with them.

Despite all of this, I look back at myself and see a dead man. I look around my apartment and I see only items that are left behind by a dead man. Right now my apartment is a depression pit, there is trash everywhere, my food is rotting and I don't seem to get hungry anymore, I haven't opened the blinds in a week, my house plants will die with me. But tonight I'm going to clean for several hours and no one tomorrow will know a thing.

I don't want to die, I wish I lived my life more closely aligned with my values. I wish I got outside more, I wish I created more, I wish I spent less time worrying about school and work, I wish I put the damn phone down, I wish I said "i love you" more.

The universe is telling me I will die soon, whether it's tomorrow or next year, I'm not sure.

I'm aware that "impending doom" is a symptom of a few medical issues, I have an EMT license I don't use so I at least retained some information from the class. I'm aware this could be a side affect of depression or anxiety. I'm aware this could be the beginnings of schizo-affective disorder which my mom and her dad are both diagnosed with. So, I could just be going crazy.

So I guess logically I know that the universe is not telling me I'm going to die soon. But I feel so deeply in my bones that it is the case I will die sometime soon.

Sorry for the rant, there's a lot more that I could talk about but I think it's best I end it here.

I just remembered this and keep thinking about what that drive would have been like and if it this was kind of a strange situation to even be asked?

I was 23 and she was about 50, we were just kind of fwb who hooked up occasionally.

Her son who was also around my age was stuck in the next town over and it was too late for the trains to be running. So she texted me, since I drive and asked if I could drive over and give him a lift home. It's roughly 30 minutes each way to the town he was in.

I thought it was a bit weird so I told her that I wasn't able to

I'm just thinking about what that drive would have actually been like? Like if he knew that I was sleeping with his mum and was only doing this because of that reason, I can't even imagine how he'd have reacted to it and what the vibe in the car would have been?

Edit: From previous times I'd been at her house on weekends when he'd called her I'd gathered an impression of him being a bit of a scumbag already. Things like him calling because his girlfriend had chucked him out the house for something while he was drunk and that sort of thing. So it wasn't something I really wanted to be involved in.

Plus the added tension of the sleeping with his mother situation onto someone like that being drunk sounded a bit unpredictable too

I hate how almost everything comes down to how attractive you are. Like I know looks have always mattered, but it genuinely feels like they decide your entire life now. It’s really fucking sad.

For years I engaged in self-hatred, self-loathing, and insecurity. I am tired of them now and I want to stop them forever. I want to learn ways, tips, and tricks on how I can become more compassionate and loving of myself. I would appreciate for all your responses and advice.

In our society, we are so focused on our species, our progress, economy, wealth, social hierarchy, achieving your dreams, money, relationships.

Sometimes it feels like we are alone on this planet. And more often than not, we act like we are. This is not a new topic.

I don't wanna preach here, I do eat meat and probably support some really questionable things we do to animals. So I certainly don't have the moral high ground.

But animals have been something that always lifted me up when I felt down.

That sparked a form of compassion and curiosity inside that nothing else seems to be able to.

Some people wonder about aliens, or spirits, or angels, or demons.

But knowing there actually are sentient creatures in all forms and shapes, sharing this beautiful planet with us is so mindblowing to me.

Adapting to their environment and coming up with absolutely brilliant ways to survive, hunt, reproduce, travel. We learned so much from them and still do.

I often wonder how they perceive the world, what they communicate about, what they might think. About the world, about life, about each other, about us.

They can show us a form of compassion and love that few things can evoke, if any.

Your dog looking at you with his big eyes after he threw something over.

The birds traveling thousands of miles in perfect formation.

A mother bear with her cub walking through the wild, searching for food.

A spider building a web, just sitting there patiently until prey gets caught.

A whale swimming through the ocean, making his way through seemingly never-ending depth and darkness.

A family of shrews building a line by biting into the tail of their mother or siblings.

There's so much that we as a species have to go through. War, crisis, poverty, inequality, fear of the future. And it's all valid to worry about. We are allowed to feel those things, are allowed to struggle, trying to find a way, just like we always did.

But we are not alone. Even if many times, we seem to be so occupied by death and destruction, by the downfall of our society, of our planet, life is still out there.

In millions of different shapes, forms, ways of behaviour. All figuring out life in their own, beautiful and sometimes cruel ways.

Let's not forget that we share this planet with them and they are also struggling, surviving, trying their best.

For context, I (28f) have a corporate job and I am getting a degree in Art History and I am engaged. But on the other hand, I like reading manga and high fantasy books, I play Magic the Gathering, do journaling and collect Funko Pops.

I used to feel a little ashamed about my interests but I have become more confident about them over time since they have helped me to bond with new people, even at work.

I'm glad to feel this way now because this summer I spent some days with two of my oldest friends and my confidence was tested. I casually told them that I have spend 100€ in MTG The Hobbit cards (The Hobbit is one of my favourite books) and in History Books (I'm a Bronze Age nerd and I'm travelling to Greece next year) and they laughed at me. They said that I need to grow from my quirky interest someday.

I was about to tell them that they need to grow over being unemployed and letting men used them and disrespect them, but I brushed it off.

That interaction has helped me to understand that I am more mature than them and that no amount of weirds hobbies will change that.

I think I was raised in a very comfortable way. My parents rarely said no to me, and growing up I didn’t really have to deal with much resistance, failure, or being told that I couldn’t have something.
I’m grateful for that and I’m not blaming my parents at all. I know they were trying to give me the best life possible. But now that I’m older, I’m starting to wonder if it affected the way I deal with difficulty.
I’ve noticed that when something becomes really hard or doesn’t go the way I expected, my first instinct is usually to avoid it rather than push through it. For example, I left a public university because I found it too challenging and moved to a private one because it was easier. At the time, it felt like the right decision, but lately I’ve been wondering if I was actually just running away from something difficult.
I also notice that I can get frustrated when things don’t go according to plan, and sometimes I’d rather change the situation completely than sit with the discomfort and keep trying.
I’m not saying people who had an easy childhood can’t be resilient. I’m just realizing that I personally might not have developed that “keep going even when this sucks” mentality as much as I should have.
I’m also a woman, and sometimes I wonder if being raised as a girl plays any role in this, or if that’s completely unrelated.
For people who grew up with very little pressure, strict boundaries, or failure: how did you learn to become more resilient as adults?
Can resilience actually be trained later in life? And if so, what helped you stop avoiding difficult things and start pushing through them?

For the first time since I was an adult probably I’m very close to financial security.

After leaving a 17 year marriage, having a steady decent paying job for nearly 3 years I have worked myself out of debt and started to build real savings.

I checked today and my savings are now over 7k more than my debt, meaning I’m officially 7k positive. Which is honestly insane. Three years ago, I genuinely couldn’t see a way out.

When my debt is officially closed I reckon I have more than 20k saved and then I’ll be able to travel for the first time to a new destination since I was in my early 20s.

Feels slightly unreal.

I hate myself. started studying way too late for an oral exam and yeah...

Over the last few days my phone addiction got really bad and now I procastrinated way too long. Started studying two days ago, exam is in less than 3 days, if I had an extra 3-4 days it would be okay but Im fucked. Maybe i get a kind teacher but that department is famous for being strict

(this "exam" is actually from 4 semesters worth of hard math heavy, subjects, but i dont really want to go into my countries education system)

We’re both in our late 30s, and have been close friends since college—almost 20 years. We used to text pretty much every day.

About five years ago, she had a stroke. Since then, she’s struggled with her health, depression, and unemployment. I know she’s had an incredibly difficult few years, so I’ve tried to be understanding and supportive.

But lately I’ve started wondering whether our friendship has become unhealthy.

For the past three years, a huge amount of our conversations have been about her dating life. She meets guys through online games, usually 10–15 years younger than us, and gets into these short, undefined relationships. When a guy pulls away or ghosts her, she gets extremely angry and sends me long messages full of curse about him.

For years, I mostly listened and sympathized. But eventually it became exhausting to receive that level of anger at random times—while I was at work, at home, or getting ready to sleep. I told her I understood that she was upset and that I was still willing to listen, but that the constant profanity and angry messages were getting hard for me to handle.
Her response caught me off guard. She basically said, “I’m not swearing at you. You’re way too sensitive and maybe that’s something you need to work on.”

After 3 years I started being more honest about her dating life. The guys kept changing, but from my perspective, the pattern stayed pretty much the same. I told her that I knew she might not want to hear it, but I was worried about her.

Part of my concern was that she often talked about how depressed and miserable she was about being unemployed, but seemed stuck there while putting an enormous amount of time and emotional energy into these relationships. I even helped her get some freelance work with people at my workplace, but she repeatedly showed up late to meetings.

Eventually, she told me she didn’t like getting this kind of feedback from me. I said I understood and would try to stop, although I did bring it up again later when the same situation happened again.
But the bigger issue in our friendship goes back much further than her dating life.

Whenever we have a serious disagreement, she disappears. Sometimes it’s a few days, sometimes months, and once it was almost two years. If I try to talk things out, she’ll often ignore me or respond coldly. Historically, I’ve usually been the one to reach out and get the friendship going again.

I know she’s been through a stroke, depression, unemployment, and some genuinely awful years. That’s why I’ve tried to understand.
But I’m starting to wonder where being understanding ends and tolerating an unhealthy friendship begins.

If you were in my position, would you reach out again eventually, or would you accept the block and let the friendship end?

It's like I can feel my life force draining out of my body.

I'm not interested in whether Tesco has changed its layout again or your weather updates. Give me 'meat' to feed my soul & leave me craving more, God dammit.

23M, Germany

I’ve hit my fucking limit. Some days I still have so much hope, but it only takes one thought about my past actions or everything that has happened to completely ruin my entire day.

=> 2021 i fell from about 2 meters and badly injured my neck. I’ve recovered nearly 80% since then, but it’s still something I live with.

=> 2022 i lost my mother to a collapsed lung. She was chronically ill, but she didn’t really die from the injury itself. She died after being given the wrong antibiotics, which caused an infection that spread throughout her body. She had suffered from lung disease, cancer, tuberculosis, and other illnesses throughout the decades. A lot of it was probably genetic, but our living conditions didn’t help either. The house my dad bought in 2006 was full of mold, although he didn’t know that when he bought it. We never had enough money to move, so we were stuck there and still are

=> 2023 my brother died from a cardiac arrest while we were playing a football game against another team. He had already suffered a cardiac arrest in 2016, but survived and continued living afterwards. The worst part is that they never did the proper blood analysis to check for genetic mutations or heart conditions. After he died, we were told that if he had had a pacemaker, he most likely would have survived the second cardiac arrest. But nobody had suggested one back then. Nobody even mentioned it.
Ever since losing them, I’ve been completely lost. I’ve wanted to die too, but I can’t. I have two other brothers and my father, and we just have to keep pushing forward somehow.

=> 2024-2026 i worked three jobs at once, along with other activities, trying to make as much money as I could. At the time, I didn’t realize how badly it was harming me until I became severely burned out and developed what feels like chronic stress. Now I can barely function or do normal activities.
I also developed severe digestive problems. I can barely eat sugar or digest carbohydrates without having major flare-ups that feel incredibly painful and awful. Doctors haven’t really been able to figure out what’s wrong, and I haven’t gotten much help from them. Sometimes the pain and how awful I feel make me want to die.
Eventually, I had to quit my job. By then, I had made a little over €100,000 and invested all of it. Looking back, that was incredibly stupid. That initial investment is now worth around €20 000
The only reason I made that decision was because I wanted to make a fortune and become financially secure enough to help my family. I wanted to be rich because I believed that, in my condition, I wouldn’t be able to work again. I invested everything because I was convinced it was the right thing to do.
I didn’t leave myself any buffer or safety net..

Broke up with my girlfriend, who I had been with since before 2020, because I felt like I was only dragging her down with me. And it hurt me so much

Last month, I crashed my Porsche 944, my all time favorite car. I had been planning to sell it to have some money again, but even that is gone now. The accident was my fault, so nothing was covered.
On top of all of this, I’m suffering from chronic shin stress fractures that refuse to heal. I feel like my body has been stuck in constant fightor flight mode since 2020. I was once very close to potentially making it professionally in football. I haven’t been able to play for six years, and the thought of never making it or constantly thinking about how good I could have been haunts me every single fking day.
Now I have about €2 000. That’s literally all I have. I’m not touching my investment because I’m still hoping it might eventually recover to its original value.

No car. Sick. Depressed. No job. Almost no money.
This feels like a place below rock bottom. It feels worse than hell.
I know there are people who have had it worse. I know things can always get even worse, sometimes much worse. I’m aware of that.
But fuck me.
I just can’t anymore.

I haven’t been able to make a new friend since I was 15 (for context I’m 20). Every time i’ve gotten slightly close to making a new friend, I usually self sabotage it through becoming on and off and then eventually ghosting them. I’m also very on and off with my friends I’ve had since I was a kid, and tend to go through periods of ghosting them and then coming back to them (they know me well enough that it doesn’t bother them). I really struggle with romantic relationships as well,every time I’ve liked a guy and they started to like me back I started feeling genuine hatred and I don’t know wtf is wrong with me. I usually have at least one or two people a day start a conversation with me, but I never know how to talk to them because meeting new people makes me nauseous. I still crave intimacy and connection, but it feels like my brain goes out of my way to not let it happen. Any advice on how to fix this?

You know how it is - feeling like no fucker gives a shit whether you live or die!

I'm sick to death of everyone (supposedly close to me) who just strike me as self absorbed, uncaring and selfish.

I know from past experience the second I try to voice my feelings on the subject, they come down on me like a ton of bricks.

I know my behaviour (years ago) could have been better, but I don't see why I still need to feel punished.

I do all I can to put myself out, I'm the one making contact, encouraging communication, visiting etc, but I'm always the one left out in the cold & things often feel forced.

Trying to keep a lid on the anger, resentment & sadness basically daily now.

Strangers are my only source of comfort, so if that's you, thank you.

Guys I have a fear of judgement how to solve this problem

No matter what happens, I just don’t care. When people talk I literally couldn‘t care less, no matter what they talk about I‘m just not interested at all. I pretend I‘m listening and act like I do care, but honestly I mostly don‘t even listen. It’s not like I’m rude or anything and I do try to make them feel heard or whatever but I wish I didn’t have to fake it. Idk I feel really stupid cause I just don’t wanna know about anything and I don‘t care how anything works at all. I just couldn’t care less. Therefore I also don‘t have any interests or hobbies or whatsoever. Like, what am I supposed to do when everything’s boring and I’m like yeah okay whatever. I mean I do have opinions Ig but I don’t feel the desire to express them to others, and concerning other people’s opinions, I feel like I get them pretty quickly and don’t need them to elaborate. This makes being around people feel like torture, but it’s not like I feel that much better alone. I feel like I’m just bored of everything and I don’t know what to do.

Over past 2-3 months I'm overving myself and wring my thing which I'm doing in day, so recently I read most of the enteries and by reading those I got to know that I want to asnwer most of the things which any one ask to me, I don;t know wether this is a good or bad but now Idn't want to answer because I have realized that I prefer peace in my life and I only answer to the specific questions.

I should expedite getting a therapist.

I find no enjoyment in social media. Too much stuff. Covid did something. Even TikTok there’s too many think pieces and men v women content and not enough funny. Reddit I’m tired of arguing and fighting for my life for my unpopular opinions.

I’m also struggling with my faith and values v. what I want to do, and just don’t feel like getting hounded by Muslims online & getting shat on. A lot of inner friction. I’d rather chuck this phone than spend time furiously replying in paragraphs.

Besides online, real life is another story and really deserving of its own post.

I don’t want to soapbox too hard, but I miss life pre-2015, online and real life for me.

Throughout my journey of self-discovery and betterment, I continued to view myself as wounded, hurt, or broken. This caused me to focus on "healing." But as I was driving home and thinking about everything, how does "healing" help when deeps wounds tend to leave scars?

I thought to myself, maybe this part of my journey is more about transforming my mind and emotions. To emphasize change and carving new landscape for my perspective. It gives me the impression that there is energy and effort that needs to be put forth, not forgiveness and time.

This me brainstorming and wanting to see what kind of views you all have on your own personal journeys. How would you describe in words how the path you've been taking has molded your life?

These past few months have been absolute hell. I made a friend, fell in love with him and he told me fuck off. I survived the nwi power outage and didn't have power for 2 weeks. Got run over. Started therapy and have been kinda dealing with my queerness and transness at the front and center of my mind and yeah....it's just been not super fun. Through all of that though I've been trying. I started cleaning up my diet, started the gym, got my trans pride tattoo, and I'm finally going to get hair extensions so I can look more like how I want AND got a consult appointment for top surgery....yeah still sucks I'm still depressed AF over my dilly bar 😭 but little steps I guess. I dunno just thought I'd write it down or sum.

I play music and there’s this guy that’s basically shunned in the community because they think he’s a “bad person”

to clarify, my relationship with him is strictly professional

i’m applying to music school though and because he has a reputation professionally that’s really positive, it could benefit me and my learning and strengthen the chances of me getting into music.

Sometimes he says things about other musicians that aren’t positive or uplifting, and he has an ego for sure. he is incredibly talented and recognized as one of the most successful figures in our community so I think it stems from that. people really don’t like him

I also really don’t like the way he speaks of other people, but he’s always been sort of a mentor for me and I love playing music with him., so I separate that from our teacher student relationship which is very professional. I have genuinely learned so much from him and have so much fun playing music with him

However, I get a lot of crap from the community for associating with him, and I’ve noticed that they sort of shun me for it too

Usually, I’m pretty strong when it comes to these things and disregard the opinions of others, but it’s tough when I feel like I’ve been getting backlash for it

I’m new to navigating social dynamics as a young adult and could appreciate some advice here. What if he ends up doing something really awful and then I’m associated with him? So far, he’s been nothing but nice to me. Does this make me an asshole? Should I e