Young people

Pinned discussions

Eeep! When study is overwhelming! - Tips, ideas and coping strategies

replies: 51

Hi! Just thought I’d make a post with some tips for study. I know this is something we can all struggle with. These are all suggestions so feel free to take them or leave them! Hope they help! If you only remember one thing, let it be this: You are important. Your grades don’t define you. (support) Studying can feel isolating but know you’re not alone! Reach out – and find or make friends that can support you along the way. If you’re having trouble finding some friends, join some local communities or clubs! They have lots at Uni’s and even stuff like open days are great ways to meet new people and find out what’s happening. Study groups can also be a great way to meet people and stay motivated. Also remind yourself why you’re doing this; inspirational wallpapers or quotes can be super inspiring. Remember the saying about the oxygen mask? If you can’t take care of yourself first studying will be harder. You are important. You know the drill - water, food, exercise, sleep. Try to stay calm. Stuff that might be able to help include mindfulness, breathing exercises, colouring in, going for walks, journaling, listening to music… If you’re struggling – reach out. See a therapist. Talk to your student counsellor. If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask for it. Also lots of Universities and TAFE offer disability services – which includes conditions like Depression and Anxiety. (study) Find the right study space for you. Maybe that’s in your room, or a coffee shop, or the library. Some people find that noise helps; other people not so much. If you like particular kinds of noise, you can find ‘coffee shop’ noise or ‘rain sounds’ to help concentrate. Make a plan. It helps to do it often so it becomes a habit. Anytime you get a due date, write it down. Maybe you could use a diary, planner, bullet journal or an app. I find the 30/30 App helpful - study for a bit and then break for a bit. You can also get add-on’s for your computer to block sites like Facebook if you find them too distracting. Find out what study technique works for you. Do you like cue cards? Mind maps? Colour coding? Does highlighting stuff help you remember? Charts, maps, diagrams? Recorded lectures? Goals! These are so important – not just writing down deadlines but rewarding yourself for meeting them. Even making smaller goals like ‘read two pages from a textbook’ can help. Break it down into bite size pieces, and don’t forget to reward yourself after!

NEW TO THIS FORUM? Please read this first

replies: 0

The Young People space is a sub-forum within the wider Beyond Blue forum community. 1. Its purpose is to provide members aged 25 and under a space to discuss anxiety, depression and other related life issues. If you are aged over 25, please be mindful that this forum is a space for younger people to connect and provide peer support for each other. 2. Content from this sub-forum is displayed on both the beyondblue and youthbeyondblue websites. 3. Please bear in mind that some members find content relating to suicide and/or self-harm distressing or triggering. If you would like to post on these topics, please do so in our Suicidal Thoughts and Self Harm section. Please see also our guidelines for making posts on this topic. Posts made here in the Young People sub-forum containing content relating to suicide and/or self-harm will be moved. 4. These forums are moderated, so your posts may not appear straightaway. Information on how our system works can be found here. Being familiar with our community rules can help ensure that your posts appear online as quickly as possible. 5. This is a peer support community, and to get the best out of being here we recommend that you 'give support to receive support'. More on how that works here.

All discussions

Sorted by:

Start a discussion

Sometimes, I hate myself.

replies: 11

I am filth. I am dirt. I am disgusting and lazy. I hate myself. For the better part of my life I have half-arsed my way through absolutely everything I could. I can’t even do the things I enjoy because of the amount of effort that I need to apply to complete these tasks. I never finish anything. Every project I’ve started is simply deserted sooner or later. I’ll never amount to anything in life, not with the way I half-arse everything and put off decision making. I can’t even decide on what to eat for dinner let alone make important life decisions. And forget ever having children. I can’t even discipline myself. I’m a twenty two year old child with no direction in life and no drive to find direction. I started a new job recently and I suck at it. I mean, not the work itself, but just communicating with my co-workers. I’m pretty certain the manager hates me and the rest of the staff think I’m weird. Why would they think I’m anything but? I say awkward stuff all the time because I’m not even sure how to hold a proper conversation. I’m so tired of everything – university especially. I’ve been there for five years now because I keep failing classes and need to repeat. It’s only a matter of time before the university finally kicks me out. Then that’ll be another thing on my list that I’ve started but never finished. I’m so pathetic. Concentrating in lectures is impossible. I don’t know how you’re supposed to do it. After five minutes my brain just wanders. I mean, I can’t even pay attention to a conversation. My brain just doesn’t take in information. Outside of class I never get work done. Inside of class I never get work done. I just never get anything done. At the moment it’s especially bad. I just can’t prioritize things. And work takes up all of my attention span at the moment, there’s just no room for me to worry about university or anything else. I never used to be like this. Once upon a time I was classified as a ‘gifted’ child, always aced every test, always got my homework in, etc. But now I’m a whole other person and this person is a failure who does and says stupid, brainless things all the time. I’ve become a lazy idiot. My mind feels like it’s constantly in a haze. It’s just all over the place. And even just trying to do like a simple assignment feels like agony. All this is why I hate myself. I’ve tried to change, I really have, but it’s just like everything else I’ve started: a project that I’ll never finish. How do I change?

Scared and confused

replies: 2

Hi everyone! This is my first time ever posting well actually my first time visiting this site. Basically throughout my entire life I've always thought seeking help from others was the easy way out and I think because of that a lot of my life keeps crashing down around me. I'm 20 and at Uni which is one of the main issues here I'd like to address. I've been at Uni for almost 3 years but recently changed my degree, I'm currently loving what I'm doing and I was under the impression I was doing so well but got my grades back and I'm currently failing 2 of my subjects. None of my family has attended Uni so trying to speak to them about it is pointless and to be quite honest trying to speak to my friends about it just makes me feel stupid. I'm usually the person people come to for help not the person people help which is why I'm so stuck, scared and confused with my life right now. The thought of telling people I'm failing is more stressful to me than the thought of actually failing...now that is surely a call for concern right? I keep saying to myself if I fail I'll just pick myself back up again and try again. But then in the back of my head I'm constantly thinking I can't tell people I failed they will think so little off me and I hate the thought of that. I think what also makes me really scared and upset about this entire situation is the fact I'm failing has nothing to do with me not trying I'm trying so hard but I'm clearly not smart enough and it makes me feel so worthless more than 90% of the time but I also try keep that too myself. Which leads me back to my point about asking for help, regardless of the situation I can't and I won't do it and I really want to change that I want to stop being so scared of what people will think of me and just start doing things but I'm so scared like words can't describe. I don't know what to do anymore. I cry and cry all the time but no one knows, not a single person and I don't know what to do about it. Uni is only one impact towards this but currently the most weight berring. I'm honestly so afraid and I don't know where to turn too. Please help me.

Where to go now?

replies: 4

I don't know where to start...The last few years have been riddled with mistakes and heart ache for me. But the last month has been absolute chaos.I was living in Sydney with my girlfriend, and things were good, however;I do weird shit behind her back, not to cheat, but just to talk to other girls, I get some kind of satisfaction from it. Its shit. I know.We probably fight too much.I have anger issues and can't control myself or calm down once I'm angry.I have adult separation anxiety and have had trouble cutting ties completely with my previous ex girlfriend.I have alot of debt and was working in a pretty low paying job, so my girlfriend would basically have to pay for all food etc.So things were good for a few months, until I got a call from a previous employer offering me more money, but the job was in Canberra.After taking a few days to think it over I decided it would be good to make the money, pay out my loans, and then move back to Sydney.It kind of worked at first, I guess it put a spark back in our relationship at first only getting to see each other on the weekends, but that quickly changed, I got a call from Carlie saying that she couldnt do it anymore and that she wanted to beak up. This is where everything falls apart.Almost every single day since that call I have been an anxious wreck. I feel like my life started to completely fall apart at that point.Trying to balance work with this weighing over me has been so difficult. I've been driving to a from sydney every couple of days for the last 3 weeks trying to sort things out. Everytime I feel like I make a bit of progress something holds me back.I started putting a plan in motion, I was going to see a psychologist once a week, go to meditation classes, and Carlie and I were going to figure this out and get back together.But last night, after Anzac day 2 up, I made the poor decision to drive home to canberra from wollongong. My reasoning was that I hadn't had a beer in about 5 hours, I felt pretty good, I thought I was okay. But I wasn't. I stuffed up and I looked down at my phone for a second and when I looked back up I was headed straight for the railing. I wrote off the company car I was driving and I got charged with Mid range drunk driving.Work wasn't happy, but they've decided not to sack me, but I don't really want the job anyway. The thought of being back in Canberra makes me feel physically sick. I can't go back there. I can't do it.

Recently diagnosed

replies: 6

Iv been recently diagnosed with depression and I have been diagnosed anxiety for about 2 years now. I'm not sure how to deal with it, I feel like some people around me don't understand and I don't know how to get them too. i also haven't told many people because I'm scared too, I also don't want to get attention from people because i myself don't know how to deal with this. How to I get other people to understand if I don't even understand?!!

Trust Issues

replies: 4

Hey Everyone, i was doing some thinking today. I discovered that I honestly have the hardest time getting close to people. My friends, family & the idea of a relationship scares me to my inner core. I don't trust anybody. I like & care about people a lot & tend to become the therapist (trying to stop this) but my main thing is, I have deep trust issues. If someone I knew who was very close to me asked me if I trusted them, my answer would be no. my trust issues stem from my childhood, where I wasn't accepted for who I was, I was guilted a lot and everything I did was never good enough. Along with many other things that stem from childhood. but my question is, how do I practice trusting people & letting them in? Without being afraid of being vulnerable or 'emotionally naked' because at this point, when someone hugs me I literally stand there and don't reciprocate. It's pretty bad, and I no longer want to keep people at arms length.

Am I Depressed?

replies: 3

Hi everyone I don't really know what to say but here goes I've always been the type of person who closes off their emotions and I hardly ever tell anyone how I'm feeling and sometimes I don't even know how to express what I'm feeling at all Im irritable and I always feel tired and I have a terrible immune system. My mum and my boyfriend both think that I'm depressed (on and off for a couple of years) and I've done a bunch of tests and they all say there's a chance and I should see a doctor but the thing is I don't know what I'd say Like if they asked me how I was feeling I wouldn't know what to say because I feel like nothing that bad has ever happened in my life and I have nothing to be sad about If anyone has been in this kind of situation it would be great to hear your experience because I don't know what to do

Alone and confused

replies: 4

So this is my first time on here and I've never done anything like this before. I've had depression for a while but I have managed it until certain events occur in my life. One of those events are happening right now but this time I feel like I have nobody to talk to about anything. I feel completely alone. It seems like every time I start to become happy something has to push me down again. At the moment, I have friends who have turned against me and my boyfriend is overseas and isn't talking with me. I feel so lonely, I cry myself to sleep everynight and question everything. It is a new relationship and he is away for a month. I don't feel like he cares at all, I feel like he's too busy to wonder what I'm doing. As for my friends, they have stabbed me in the back and it always seems to happen when I get into a new relationship. I have so many thoughts running through my head that I just don't know how to get everything out while making sense. Maybe I'm just overreacting, maybe I'm just confused. It's gotten so bad over the last few days that I don't even want to be at work, I just always want to sleep. I sleep through alarms. I always used to exercise - every day without a doubt, now I just can't be bothered. I don't know how to make myself feel better or even where to begin. There's so much more that is going on, mainly minor things that contribute to the big thing but everything is all muddled up in my head. I don't know if anybody will be able to respond to this because if its confusing for me, its confusing for everyone. I get that.

a Teen with words to say to YOU

replies: 1

"Anxiety can look very different from person to person. One individual may suffer from intense anxiety attacks that strike without warning, while another gets panicky at the thought of mingling at a party. Someone else may struggle with a disabling fear of driving, or uncontrollable, intrusive thoughts. Yet another may live in a constant state of tension, worrying about anything and everything. Despite their different forms, all anxiety disorders share one major symptom: fear or worry in situations where most people wouldn’t feel threatened." I'm 16 and I have anxiety, unfortunately it makes me who I am as a person and it explains clearly how I live my life, how I treat situations, how I meet new people and how I learn, literally everything! Few weeks before my first attack, I would always be on the verge of tears about everything, like if someone asked me if I was okay, I would say that I am happy because I was too afraid of telling them I don't know. I would immediately assume that everyone is trying to be against me for no particular reason, I would think of the worst and people would tell me to stop thinking bad. How could I? with this THIS shadow looming over me consuming every fragment of my body and mind. Waves of sadness, depression, negative comments that was said to me years back I would remember would wash over me, tear over tear, all of the bad things BIG or little would keep washing over me reminding me how much of a bad person I was. I would cry and wouldn't know when to stop, I wouldn't know when to take a break from crying, wipe my tears, even eliminate the thoughts of every negative thing that happened to me. Mentally drained and full of taking in the bad monsters under my wing. I had my attack. The worst, most excruciating pain that could happen to you, loneliness, sadness, everything. Gone, eaten savagely by me so no one can suffer the pain that I suffer. But. I'm not the only one? what? Is it true that I don't suffer alone. There's help? The second help found me.... I took a long deep breath of fresh air. Help/verb: Make it easier or possible for (someone) to do something by offering them one's services or resources. In other words. Someone is somebody's everything... Do not give in the pain, you are so much stronger than you think, there is help.. Just let them in and give you that assurance that you will be okay, loved ones, friends who adore you, family. You are loved, No one is against you. You are loved.

work anxiety

replies: 1

just over a month ago i got my first part time job at a small but popular pizza delivery and pickup place, and i currently only have 1-2 shifts a week, but before every shift i work myself up and get really nervous to the point where i feel sick. I have never had actual anxiety in the past but i have always been a shy person who worries a lot, and its starting to effect me because i get really stressed about working days before my shift. never got one on one training with the job and it is usually really busy so there also isn't much time to even ask many questions. My main job is taking orders over the phone, as well as other small things but I feel as though I am always making mistakes. I hate asking my boss for help as i do it so often and he is always busy. I also didn't get an interview for the job he just gave it to me and my friend (who is doing a lot better than me) so i feel as though I'm not right for it. I really want to quit but I feel bad because I just finished getting trained and am starting to get actual shifts so I would feel as though I'm letting people down. I also need the money (even though the pay is horrible). I just don't know what to do and its really getting to me.

Parents not letting me get help...

replies: 3

Hi, This is my first post here so here we go. I am in year 12 and I am experiencing some pretty severe anxiety so I went to speak to the school counselor about it because I figured it would be a good place to start. I have since told my mum about what i am experiencing and she seems to think that for me to continue to see the counselor will be enough to help me which is just not true. I am aware that the next step for me is either to see a GP or a psychologist and I have expressed this to my mum on multiple occasions but she simply dismisses me. I was wondering if anyone has a way that I could approach this that would lead to me getting some proper treatment and a diagnosis so that I can get through year 12 because I am seriously struggling at the moment Murphybovo

Eeep! When study is overwhelming! - Tips, ideas and coping strategies replies: 51

NEW TO THIS FORUM? Please read this first replies: 0

Sometimes, I hate myself. replies: 11

Scared and confused replies: 2

Where to go now? replies: 4

Recently diagnosed replies: 6

Trust Issues replies: 4

Am I Depressed? replies: 3

Alone and confused replies: 4

a Teen with words to say to YOU replies: 1

work anxiety replies: 1

Parents not letting me get help... replies: 3