Young people

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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.

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I need advice pls (TW: Eating Disorder)

replies: 2

Hi, I am currently a year 10. Ever since the year 7 I had the "perfect" life. I had good grades, and had many skills. I also participated in many extracurricular school sports and I had got selected into the gifted and talented program for the high school I am currently in. However, ever since the end of pandemic I think my life had started to go down. I first quite the sport I did for 6 years, I was very promising first however I slowly couldn't carry on anymore. After that I think I went through of a phase of social anxiety and embarrassment of my own culture as I was a migrant. I think I felt embarrassed a lot of the times when my family and I went out in the public. So my mum decided t seek me a psychologist, however I think after 6 months of it I couldn't bring myself to say most of what I had felt and so they thought I had no more problems left. I think after that I got into a phase of depression, which may have been caused due to puberty. However I didn't seek help from my parents or anyone. Then everything became worse last year. Due to my background as a migrant who went to school that was mostly all "white", I had often been discriminated as well feeling different. I think a sort of image stuck to me. I had bad body image issues, which I think was quite common in kids these days. However, the end of last year I was diagnosed with Eating Disorder. Everything went down hill, because of my worsening relationship with my parents and me being unable to focus in school. During the past 2 years my parents' relationship and I became bad. I also slowly started to find school work draining, ever since the start of year 9. Now it's getting worse. I am often stuck feeling helpless, all the school work seems like an effort, I don't have any goals for what I want to do in the future and I am constantly struggling to accept my body after gaining fat due to re-feeding. I also currently have a psychologist but I still can't tell them how I really feel. My parents, recently, had given up their high expectations of me. My mum said she feel quite disappointed and has given up on me. I am currently thinking of quitting guitar that I have been learning for years. I've been getting into a lot of arguments with my parents and I hate my current self. I'm always trying to seeking change. I don't know what to do. I don't know why I am making my own life difficult. I don't want to ruin my own life.

Parents fighting. Again.

replies: 4

My parents have gotten into another argument, I feel no one is right, both are wrong. This has gone on all my life, but I feel like I've had enough. It will never ever stop. All I want is a family that functions well and sorts out disagreements in a civil way. Nope, I have two parents who think they're doing better than the other, and that they're more important. Im stuck with for my entire life, and I feel like whenever these two are in a spat or are not talking to each other, I can't be productive at all. I simply feel helpless. Neither of them are thinking of me at all in this. Im just stuck. I feel my life could be perfect if only these two got along with each other without these insane arguments in which they yell at the top of their lungs and doing give a single stuff about their children.

Uni, Friends & Poverty.

replies: 6

My friends are all 18-25, university age and all of them are in uni or planning to be. I am happy that they have this opportunity but all they ever talk about is school as if it's the most normal thing in the world-- I can't afford university, I couldn't even finish year 12 because of my home life falling apart. I can't add anything to the conversation because if I do, I'll just bring down the mood and make it sad. But it makes me feel like shit that I can't pursue I what I want, that I'm always denied work even when I have experience because I don't have a bloody level 2 certificate or I wasn't able to finish year 12. Then to see my friends who are privileged enough to get into good schools skipping classes all the time and doing nothing but complaining...it makes me really upset. But again, I can't say shit.

Best friend

replies: 3

Hey everyone, I'm not sure if I'm overreacting to these situations but I just wanted to know what I should do. When I started high school last year I was always stressed and my friends all suddenly dropped me so I started hiding out in the bathrooms just to avoid people and cry. Its been a year since I stopped doing that and my best friend just transferred to my school this year. I thought things would be easier to manage now that I had my best friend as well as a few other friends I made. She was normal the first few weeks but then she started telling me I was ignoring her. I knew how bad that feels so I started hanging out more with her, but as soon as I do this she starts hanging out with my other friends and ignoring me. I thought it was probably fine even though I was getting left out by everyone again, atleast I had my best friend. I also vent to my best friend to help me get things off my chest, and she used to be quite understanding, but now if I vent about something like my insecurities she counteracts them by saying she never had any such issues and I need to just "deal with it." She also doesn't respect my personal boundaries as much as she used to. I have told her that I'm not comfortable with too much physical contact (hugs or holding hands) and she used to respect that but now she doesn't. It makes me very uncomfortable and I don't know how to tell her. Despite her ignoring me a lot and leaving me randomly to go to her other friends, she gets mad at me for "leaving her out." I know the things my best friend has gone through and they are quite similar to mine, but she keeps using the way her family raised her as an excuse to get mad at me. She even ignored me for a complete week and then said she felt left out even though I tried to talk to her multiple times. She also is very social and pretty so she uses those things against me when I am venting to her. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about this honestly. She always makes me feel like I'm a toxic friend, and lately I've been starting to think I am. I'm scared I'm going to suddenly lose all those friends I made because its only been a year since I stopped hiding to avoid people, and I dont want that to happen again.

Uni and just life in general

replies: 3

So im currently in my final year of uni, ive never had good grades and more recently have been only just passing my assignments. I know that passing is the main thing but it has really been getting me down recently and has been making me feel like im not even understanding any of the content, and leading me to procrastinate my assignments, which then leads me to being more stressed and not wanting to even bother doing any of them and just dropping out. I really cant afford to fail and at the same time i cant really drop out since ill be a failure to everyone around me, considering this is the second degree ive started (dropped out of the first one) and stuck for options. My job also requires me to be studying this degree so i cant really defer for a semester either. It also doesnt help that my friend is studying the same degree with me and always talks about getting high distinctions for all her assignments which leads me to have even more doubt in myself and feel like a dumb ass. Im really at the point of just being like stuff this, and wanting to just run away. Speaking of friends, i literally only have 1 friend and my partner. I feel like having so little friends also effects me and my mental health. Ive also moved regionally, away from my 1 friend and my family therefore feeling even more isolated. Im not a super outgoing person so making new friends can be really difficult for me. I just dont know what to do, i have no motivation or care to do any uni assignments and i have like 4 due in the next two weeks. Just feeling really overwhelmed and lost.

are really emotional periods normal?

replies: 5

Hey just a quick question Ive had suicidal problems in the past and it’s been difficult to get over however now i only really get them when i’m on my period. I know being emotional comes with the period and stuff but i don’t know if this is normal. I have a lot of suicidal/self harm thoughts while on my period and every time it happens i feel like i’m going into a depressive episode or something. I'm really happy when I'm not on my period, but when I am i feel completely terrible. Is this normal? is there any way to help with this?

Crying for no reason

replies: 9

Hi im V and im new here im 12 and in year 7 i have been crying a lot recently and not sure why, a day ago i was crying before school without a reason then today i started crying before school because my jackets wrist wasn’t straight then cried again cause my brother was staring at me. I don’t want to cry but i cant help it, i feel like im not apart of my body because it wont tell me why its sad. I feel like im not normal and something is wrong with me I need support but i don't feel like i can get it from my parents because they don’t understand me.

I hate my "friends" at school

replies: 19

Today I cried like hell. Multiple times. I'm the "extra" of my friend group. I'm the one that's not very close with anyone and that's just there. My friends leave me out of everything. Nothing I do is worthwhile to them. I'm essentially just a downer to them. Today, at some point during the final session of the school day, my teacher made the stupid decision to have our class outside, since I had hayfever I had to stay inside. My best friend promised he would be there with me. He wasn't. He then said he would talk to me nearby. He obviously didn't. I was so upset I couldn't even muster the motivation to work. I cried, but thankfully nobody noticed. Yesterday, we had sport. Our teacher is ignorant of groups and told us to form our own. Sadly, I'm the worst in sport and I'm not usually chosen, but even so, my class can be compassionate about it. My friend group formed a team with everyone but me. At this point I had enough of their shit and held strong resentment for them. I know these examples may seem pretty normal, but they are totally not just forgetting me. They do stuff like play games together and go out outside of school without me and openly talk to me about it. All I do is just pretend I'm okay with it. My best friend tells me not to get Discord where they all hang out. They also leave me behind in group work, recess and such. My best friend has started to avoid me. At one point we grew apart because he hung out with a girl in the group and left me behind. He stopped talking to everyone at one point, then talked to me, like some form of replacement, and now things are back to normal for them. The girl was also a close friend of mine too, then we grew apart, and then we were getting close again, but it seems she's actively avoiding me now. I decided to take a day off tomorrow because I felt so shitty. I needed the time for myself to be away from all the trouble, but I still can't feel any desire to go back to that. I can't see any spark in any of those "friendships" but I can't even make new friends or leave behind these guys. I have no fucking idea what to do. I'm tired of caring for these people. I'm tired of enduring their constant shit. I'm tired of trying to get close to them. It has had almost no value to me and yet I can't get rid of it or change it. It feels like my fault, and I tried to back out from being annoying, etc. but what's even the point? How does one even approach something like this? I don't know, man. I just don't know.

Struggling to cope with a culmination of physical and mental health issues

replies: 4

Hi there, a bit about my self. I am 22 years old and have a beautiful parter and a perfect 8 month old baby boy who light up my world like nothing else. I would quite literally be nothing without either of them. I have struggled with mental health issues for nearly half my life now with the earliest bout of depression starting at only 12 years old. For a couple of months I could not even get in the car to go to school and felt crippled emotionally to the point of uncontrollable crying with absolutely no idea why. Life was getting better again until I started high school. Long story short I found it very hard to fit in to the groups of friends that had all separated when primary school ended. I ended up trying incredibly hard to fit in with people who physically and mentally tormented me almost every day. From the start of the day being refused handshakes from my so called mates, continuously making jokes about me to having my bag stolen and ransacked and thrown onto school buildings and getting physically tormented all in the name of fun and banter. I have been through all the bullying. I then experimented with marijuana in an attempt to fit in with the crowd which resulted in a massive flip out of which I suffered with DP/DR for quite a number of years from a bad reaction to smoking bud. My senior years of high school got better, a lot of the people contributing to the bullying had now left and I had a pretty tight circle of mates who would all do anything for each other and we all shared some pretty fun times. Leaving school I persued an apprenticeship FIFO which I followed through to the end and this pushed me both mentally and physically to the point of break down many times. I am currently struggling with my current role as a tradesman taking on an incredibly high workload for not a lot of money since I have decided to come back home and work to support the family. This has pushed me to the point of resignation. I am in an incredibly bad state of mind at the moment and cannot cope with even basic tasks and feel sleep deprived with little to no energy every single day. This has been like this since leaving high school and starting full time work feeling completely burnt out 24/7. I am as far from suicidal as it gets quite the opposite I have an extreme fear of death and leaving my loved ones behind with a stressful financial situation that they could not possibly bear alone. TIA

What has been most surprising about becoming an adult?

replies: 23

I'm only recently into adulthood, and I've already learnt so much. It's quite enjoyable getting to experience a greater level of independence, and even watching all my friends from school/childhood adapt to adulthood as well. I have to say, I wasn't at all prepared to see such a change in my social life. Some of my friends are already making steps towards forming their careers - they're doing really well in university, or forming small businesses, or taking external courses to help them build their resumes. Some of my friends are exploring their identities - they're experimenting with their style, dedicating lots of time to their fitness, or have come out as LGBTQIA+ and are working on their self-expression. Some of my friends are working full-time, making money to invest in things like housing or other lifestyle purchases. Some have chosen to take some time off to enjoy life - partying, socialising, making the most of their youth in a sense. It's really interesting seeing how different people are reacting to adulthood. And there's no right or wrong way to do it, either. People will experience different things at different times, and it's up to individual interpretation how we respond to these experiences. So I'm asking all the young adults on this forum, what's been the most surprising or shocking thing you've experienced coming into adulthood? What was something that you didn't expect, or weren't necessarily prepared for? I also extend that question to people who have been an adult for quite some time, what's something you wish you had known about adulthood before coming into it? And for all the people who aren't quite 18 yet, what's something that you're nervous or excited for once you become an adult? Any concerns, questions, or reservations? I'm interested to see people's responses.

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

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

I need advice pls (TW: Eating Disorder) replies: 2

Parents fighting. Again. replies: 4

Uni, Friends & Poverty. replies: 6

Best friend replies: 3

Uni and just life in general replies: 3

are really emotional periods normal? replies: 5

Crying for no reason replies: 9

I hate my "friends" at school replies: 19

Struggling to cope with a culmination of physical and mental health issues replies: 4

What has been most surprising about becoming an adult? replies: 23