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

Lost

replies: 7

Hi. This is the first time I've ever come to a place like this.And I truly don't know what to say. Maybe just an introduction to my life.I'm a male, 22 years of age. I'm at University for a degree in Primary school teaching.For the longest time that I can recall I have been depressed. One of the most vivid things I remember about my childhood was the day I had an argument of some kind with my mother. I ran into the backyard and prayed for God to take my life because my family would be better off and happier without me. I have a loving family that would support me to the end of the world and yet I'm still crippled by an emptiness, I don't care about anything, I barely care if I pass or fail at Uni. I can't drive a car, I had to quit or lose my job at the end of the year. I decided not to get a new job and concentrate on my studies but even that is a joke. I can be happy, when I'm with friends or playing games but its temporary. As soon as I'm alone with my thoughts I'm overpowered by self-loathing, emptiness and anxiety. My mind plays tricks on me, I know what its doing but its logic is strong. Unlike so many, I have a home, parents who care for me, friends who like me, a loving upbringing, food, internet. I see myself empty and depressed, crying and my mind just tells me how worthless I am, tells me that I should dare complain about my life when compared to most I have it good. No matter what, my mind makes me hate myself. The happiest I've ever been is when I had girlfriends, But I'm a 22 year old with no job, no car and for everything that I can see before me no future. But most relationships I've ever been in have been horrible and ended horribly. I used to accuse them. But how is that possible, the only constant is me. I need another person in my life to make me feel whole, but any person that I find, I know the best and most loving thing I can do for them is not enter their lives. There is nothing I can provide, I can't expect them to love me when even I don't. I've nevertried to commit suicide. Not for real anyway. Every day I went to Tafe I thought of ending my life, but I couldn't do that to my family, I love them too much to imagine the pain they would have to go through. I' m so afraid of failing I can't even start. Every day that goes further I feel like I'm failing those who love me most just a little more. Its paralytic.beyondblue’s clinically-trained moderators often work offline (invisible to you) on issues relating to suicide or self-harm. At the same time, general supportive comments from the community are encouraged. If you have concerns around suicide or self-harm, please phone our support service on 1300 22 4636.

Finding it really hard

replies: 1

I don't know who I am anymore. I could look into the mirror and just see a face. A stranger. The face may look familiar, but the person staring back at me is someone I would not have seen before. i cannot see the positives around me. They have blurred out. Sometimes I can see a glimpse of them, but they're a bit fuzzy. Is this selfish of me? I don't go out anymore, don't spontaneously see my friends like I used to, nor make any kind of plans. I am home bound. Am I a loner? I am full. From the second I wake up, to the seconds where I start to fall asleep. I wish mornings were later, and evenings sooner. The thought of getting out of bed drains me. I feel tired. What used to excite me is gone. My energy has run out. My overall view on life is distorted. I can breathe. I can smell, think, and see. But I feel nothing. I look for my old self, hoping one day she can be found. I used to enjoy feeling like this. I obviously didn't take it seriously because now I am miserable.

My story of depression

replies: 2

My name is Serena, I am 17 years old and was diagnosed with depression 2 years ago. It was a hard struggle for me, not having anyone to turn to that understood exactly how I was feeling. My parents tried their best to help me through the depression. I had always felt a huge sense of unwantedness where I was; at school I was bullied, at home I was fighting with my parents. All I wanted was to be dead because I thought that it would be easier if I was gone. I had few friends to turn to that I could talk too about things. People think that depression is a sign of weakness but in reality it's not. Depression affects so many people in so many different ways and a lot of people don't have help and support from friends or family and people don't realise how much something that they say can affect a person. I've been bullied all through my school-life and it used to affect me a lot because people would say all these negative things about me and it hurt because I already had low-self esteem and the bullying only made it worse for me. Not only I was getting bullied but my parents and siblings were always putting me down and I didn't have many friends at the time which left me with no-one to talk too about my problems. This was when I feel into depression with suicidal thoughts, but I thankfully got help and have since recovered from the depression, although at times I do still feel unwanted and down, I know that I am a stronger person now and I don't let people who say negative things about me bring me down. I want depression to something that everyone is aware of and don't think that it's a sign of weakness because I know that it is not. And my heart goes out to all them people who have struggled with depression for years with no-one to talk too that understands you and to the people who still struggle with depression today, you're a stronger person then you think you are!

Do I have OCD?

replies: 2

(Numbers represent my age at the time) 6: When angry, I would think of doing intense acts of violence towards family members. 9: Organisation of pencil case and books in school tub, (sections and symmetry). I had a very good concentration at doing just one thing e.g. Math. I would ‘wake up’ from my thinking to find the rest of the class had gone to do something else. I would look up gore on the internet. 10: Counting habits including: (power lines, cars, footsteps, chewing, cracks). I built a weird scoring system around this that I couldn't be kept track of as things were scored far too often. I had intense frustration and feeling of wasted time from this. I got over it before high school, but I still have counting habits, they just don’t consequently cause such stress as they did in primary school). 13: Placement of possessions in my room with symmetrical manner. Weekly cleaning of room, (dusting, window cleaning, de-cluttering) 17-18: Necessity of having my own desk at school. My friend took my spot once and I couldn't learn properly at all. Before class starts I take my pencil case from my bag and arrange it accordingly. I then open to the current page in my 4 ring partitioned binder, and get out the appropriate pen and calculator and ruler for the lesson. There are plenty of more things I could list, but I think I've addressed the main concerns along the timeline. When things are going well for me, I am really quite happy and relaxed and I feel good about life. But when things are out of order, I get quite stressed and edgy. I have always considered that I might have OCD, but then dismissed it because I don’t seem to build up as much stress as extreme cases I have seen on TV. But just recently I have considered that it might actually have it. I have never really spoken to anyone about this, especially the violent thoughts as a 6 year old, I still have those intense motives of rage that randomly spark, usually when I’m by myself and I think of someone annoying me, or an unorganized inanimate object annoys me, or having following an argument with family members. Do I have OCD? What do I do next?

Disgust

replies: 18

Has anyone ever repressed traumatic memories, and then suddenly just remembered what happened? I was going through a website about sexual abuse, and although I had already known I was sexually abused, I had forgotten the other time, honestly I had shoved it to the back of my mind and then all of a sudden the memories flooded back in. I feel so disgusted, and lost. I feel unclean, because at the age of 7 I was already being abused, and I just feel.. i dont know. Lost, disgusted and sad. I've been losing hope a lot lately, that im never going to be able to feel happiness again since its been so long and this has made me just withdraw, and lose even more hope for life. Im just rambling now, sorry

Sad, tired, alone and depressed

replies: 1

I'm just so sick of the abuse people give me at school. My family is worse than broken. I'm so sick of everything and I just want to crawl into a hole and never come back out. I am always sad, even for no reasonable reason. I am always tired because ... View more

Scared to sleep. Recurring dreams

replies: 4

So lately I've been having two recurring dreams. The first where I can't see a thing but feel like the walls are closing in on me, I can barely breathe and wake up gasping for air . The second is me walking alone through a dark deserted hallway that never seems to end, before realizing that my teeth have fallen out and I can clearly feel where they used to be so I suddenly wake up and make sure they're still there. These are starting to really scare me and I delay sleep as much as possible just to avoid these dreams but I can't seem to escape them. Can anyone tell me what they would mean??

Anxious. Lost. Numb.

replies: 3

I've always been an anxious person and i go in and out of thinking i need help and thinking i am ok. On the outside nobody would guess that i am an anxious person, in fact i appear quite calm and collected but on the inside there is an underlying sense of anxiety that clouds each day. It's been particularly hard lately as i am no longer a student for the first time in my life and i am in the transitional phase of student to developing my career. There are plenty of things that i continue to feel anxious about eg. the future, things i need to do to achieve my goals etc. which is normal. However, i amplify these things in my mind to epic proportions and i am left in a state of feeling hopeless. i have always done it regardless of the situation or challenge i am faced with. I have a friend from that has never experienced anxiety and appears to breeze through life even though i work twice as hard as her. I convince myself that the only reason i feel anxious is because i am not conquering my fears and taking risks as much as i should be but am i so hard on myself? I seem to neglect every positive thing about myself and very rarely congratulate myself, always believing i am in some way inadequate or undeserving of something. It holds me back so much but it's like a disease, i know it's happening and i hate it but i don't have the skills to change it. The same friend who never feels anxious can go for weeks without exercise and eat terribly. If i did this i wouldn't be able to cope. (I feel horrible if i don't go for a run for two days and eat badly) My exercise and healthy eating is something i do to feel in control...however sometimes i'll go for a run and feel even more anxious (meanwhile my friend who never feels anxious has not been for a run and is watching a movie eating a piece of pizza and still seems to get ahead with work.) Basically i feel like i have to work so so hard and always have to stay in control and even then i'm on the verge of collapsing. For the last few weeks i have cried for no particular reason at least 2-3 times a day and felt generally miserable and depressed even though when i put things into perspective i am in a good place in my life. I want to appreciate these years (I'm 23) and not let my insecurity, negativity and anxiety hold me back which it has for so long. What should i do? my mum recently saw her GP and was told to go on anti-depressants for her own anxiety but is opposed to going on medication.

Diary Entry

replies: 10

Hi all, Just did the old drive-to-uni turn around come home trick because I was feeling anxious about walking into a lecture room full of people (I was 5 mins late). I was/am anxious about my appearance, with usual culprits like red eyes, pasty skin, unshaven, thinning head of hair all chiming in. It's really unfair that we are constantly bombarded with unobtainable images of perfection (models in advertising, on TV, in movies, etc) and are expected to conform to stereotypes of how we are supposed to look like and how we are supposed to act. It feels confirmed everywhere I go. I'm writing this at a park that I used to play at when I was younger and I don't really want to go home (it's cold, dark and a bit lonely) but I don't really want to go to uni either. I feel very unimportant there, like I'm part of a production line designed to shovel out employees. Having said all that the rational part of me says that 1. No one is perfect (image wise) 2. I have spent a weekend drinking and not sleeping a lot, so these feelings really should have been expected 3. Getting a degree is like learning to read or write, it takes a while, but it's worth it in the end. Making the way I feel catch up with the way I'm can rationally think is the part I'm having trouble with. Thanks for listening. Rant over, Ben

20C

replies: 12

Hello group of friendly or problem facing people So, i have been here a few times and although I have changed since my first post I feel this is largely due to the fact that I stopped caring about anything and I started to not give about what people thought. I am in high school and am constantly feeling depressed. I have also begun to stop trusting anyone and am always extremely cynical. furthermore I realized that I don't care if I have friends because whether some one is my friend or not they still seem to treat me the same way. the real reason i have come here is to ask for some advice about a problem. THE PROBLEM: every time i meet someone who has a quality which i dislike or does something i think is either rude or stupid or mean or annoying or just undesirable I consciously avoid doing that thing. for example when someone you know starts talking to you about something really simple as if they are talking about a complex issue and they assume you have no knowledge about it even though it's just something really obvious and then they act like their the best because they told you about this idea. or when people always agree with you even when you start the conversation with a debatable idea and people just don't want to argue so they just agree. or when people don't accept a compliment or fish for compliments. there are more. now i have become a void of nothing because I realised that i actually hate every quality about every person and I can't possibly do something which I hate in other people, but instead i have become this boring nothingness and I hate this more than anything else in the world. the other thing which makes me angry and feel isolated and then depressed is that no one seems to share the same opinions as me on anything, or when I do something differently to everyone else (which happens often) rather than people supporting me they are just condescending and gossipy. what's worse i have a really bad anger problem and am always so angry at things which other people don't seem to give a damn about. what i'm really trying to ask is how do you become an interesting person who who doesn't hate themselves and how do you make friends who aren't phony and furthermore how do you keep them? thanks

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

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

Lost replies: 7

Finding it really hard replies: 1

My story of depression replies: 2

Do I have OCD? replies: 2

Disgust replies: 18

Sad, tired, alone and depressed replies: 1

Scared to sleep. Recurring dreams replies: 4

Anxious. Lost. Numb. replies: 3

Diary Entry replies: 10

20C replies: 12