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 feel lonely

replies: 3

Hi i’m 19 and i’m not really good at opening up when it comes to mental health. My experiences when reaching out have never gone very well. i think I just need a space to share because I feel isolated and alone. Most of my friends struggle with a mental illness making it hard for me to work through mine and reach out to them, when i’m trying to be there for them. It makes me feel exhausted and I just feel tired, it makes me feel like a bad friend. Some days I don’t eat and and I really struggle with my image as when I was 13 I was diagnosed with severe scoliosis. Romantic relationships don’t last very long, so some days I just feel unwanted and over a month ago I got in to argument with two of my closest friends and we haven’t talked since. Making me feel unwanted and unloved. I feel like something is wrong with me since I can’t keep people around. It feels incredible lonely and i’m Terrified to reach out to my family as they see me as their happy daughter i just needed a place to talk and I don’t want to feel alone anymore

Seeking help with an unaccepting family

replies: 3

Hi everyone, So I guess to start off just with just a bit of a background on me- I'm 16 in Year 12 (finishing school in 3 weeks yay!) and I'm actually going pretty great at the moment! The last few months for me have been pretty good as far as my mental health goes. But I have had a bad few years recently, I've struggled with an eating disorder, self harmed and ive had a lot of suicidal thoughts. And at the moment I do feel good but I don't think I'm 'healed' (I can't think of a better word but you get where im going?). Like at times I do feel myself slipping back into the headspace I've had in the past and I think id like to see professional help- just to be able to discuss my issues, and feel a bit more secure in my ability to stay on this functioning level I'm at now? (Wording things is -clearly- not my skill but hopefully you get my gist). I guess my main issue in the past while I was in the thick of my mental health struggle (beyond my mindset that I didn't deserve help) was that my mum doesn't 'believe' in mental health. I think she has a fairly toxic mindset r.e. mental health- at one point I tried to see my school counselor and she told me that depression is a mindset, I just needed to grow up and suck it up- things along that sort of line. Unfortunately I wasn't able to just 'suck it up' and there was genuinely a point last year where I was just a minute or two away from taking my life and I'm scared to sink back into that place. So yes I'd like to seek professional help because although I'm on a roll just now I don't actually have any coping strategies for when I am in a bad patch. But I don't really know how to go about that without my mum's consent? I'm still 16 so I cant drive or get myself to a GP, etc and I really don't feel safe or comfortable trying to approach her about this- anytime I've tried has honestly been more damaging than benefitical. I've had friends who have gotten help for themselves over the years so I think I get the basic- see a GP, get a mental health plan- there's a questionnaire involved? But yeah I'm not really sure how to get there without parental aid? So if anyone has any advice on how to go about this/has similar experiences please let me know? Thank you all in advance and hope you're having a great day Cam

i dont know whats my purpose

replies: 3

hello, this is my first post. Recently i have been feeling very depressed. I have this mindset in my head telling me 'im a fat, no life, pathetic loser'. I dont have any friends in school and no girls like me. I have no one to talk to but myself and on the weekends i always find myself sitting alone in my room, i look at my phone and see that everyone is having so much fun with their friends. I have no purpose and a waste of space

the emptiness never seems to leave/ i wish i could love myself fully

replies: 8

Hi everyone so I just wanted to get some feelings off my chest. So I am in high school right now and lead a pretty average life. I have a good portion of friends that I enjoy spending time with and am a good student and yet, I get this weird kinda emptiness that just surrounds my life. The intensity changes with how my day is going but sometimes I wonder if it's actually always there but it is only when I am distracted that I don't notice. It's like everything just feels so meh. I feel unfilled in my life, and super lonely sometimes despite having friends. Apart of me feels like I don't completely belong/ fit-in and I keep thinking people don't actually like me even though I know its probably just my overthinking and insecure mind. Sometimes it all just feels like such an appearance where everyone just pretends to be perfectly content with their lives. Like I'm just doing things because I have to and I know that if I want to be a happier person I need to start actively looking for happiness / find it in myself but I never seem to able to because honestly, I don't know-how and often stop myself from doing things I want to because I care too much about what other people think of me. It just sucks having 1 good day in two/ three weeks because even if its a really great day, the time in between can sometimes be so mind-numbingly empty. To be honest, although I love the girls in my friend group, I don't feel that strong sense of closeness I desire. I have it with one other person outside my group but I am constantly double-guessing if she feels the same (my fault not hers). Sometimes I just wonder how many things in my life I have convinced myself I'm content with. I know there are better ways to lead my life than this, especially because I feel a lot of my issues come from myself because of my insecurities, the fact I don't really know myself and because I struggle with putting my happiness first ( I am quite a nurturing person, the care-taker and the emotional support so I not used to that role). I just spend so much of time overthinking this stuff, my actions and life in general. Lowkey this is just word vomit but I wonder if anyone has any suggestions about anything I mentioned. I want to stop feeling so empty all the time and just be able to be happier. I wish I could just learn to love and trust myself. Thanks for reading and I hope you all stay safe during covid!!

Struggling this year (like many others)

replies: 5

At the start of this year I was super motivated and happy to be able to start uni and put my high school days behind me. Although now, in the 10th month of the year I have never felt worse. I cannot get out of my bed, I cannot attend my lectures online, my sleep schedule is all over the place, I can barely make it to the shower, I can't keep up with assessments, I have gained so much weight in such a short amount of time and eat at strange hours, I have isolated myself from friends and family out of pure embarrassment. My grandmother messaged me the other day to say she had noticed I gained a lot of weight and she was worried about my health. I realise that I have but the problem is I have absolutely no motivation left in me to possibly change even if I want to so badly. I beat myself up because I cannot even do daily simple tasks to look after myself and I feel like I am wasting people's time and my money by being at uni and not being able to keep up with everything. I feel like I have completely lost myself this year. I loved going out, seeing people, meeting new people, I am super extroverted, I was passionate about my course at uni and now all I do is nothing but sit around like a numb blob, wasting space. I moved to Australia 3 years ago from South Africa and for a while I was doing great but once it set in that I had left such important family behind it has broken me. I have a constant debate with myself that I am just being lazy and need to get my shit together but then think about how I can't even make it to the shower and realise there is a much bigger issue going on. I recently missed an assessment and this was the point where I messaged the uni counselor to ask to speak to her. We have scheduled a time to speak but until then I don't even k ow if I can get through the week and do assessments and attend lectures. I feel like such a lost cause and would really like to hear from others

overachiever who doesn't know how to seek help

replies: 2

Hi, I'm very new to seeking help because I've been denying that I need it and am still in doubt. Honestly I don't know where to start but let's start with not being able to sleep at night. I'm not sure if that's a symptom of something but the reason I can't sleep is because of my tendency to overthink things and doubting myself and the future that lies ahead of me. On the surface I seem perfectly fine to everyone around me, a typical overachiever. I have a purpose in life but I have failed once before in trying to pursue my dream career. I know I'm still young and by no means have I given up hope on my ability to reach my dreams but maybe being on a gap year and having nothing to do has allowed this feeling of being useless to creep in. My family are all very hard working and I wish I could be as well but nowadays my lack of sleep has made me very unproductive and it feels like a vicious neverending cycle of crying myself to sleep because I feel useless and being unproductive during the day. I'm still very much dependent on my Asian parents. During this gap year they think that I am always sleeping in and have nothing to do. They're not wrong but I really don't want to be like this, that's why I need help. What they don't know is how I can't sleep at night, how my pillow is often wet and how my dried tears sting when I wake up. I don't know how to tell them, they are all super busy. Don't get me wrong, they are very understanding and will probably listen to me when they're free but I'd feel extremely guilty and out of place. Unlike me my twin sister has succeeded where I failed before so I have lost my no.1 and only confidante, although I expected that would happen at the start of this year. The problem is that I don't know how to tell them I need help. My parents are always supportive of me and are always encouraging me to do things like volunteering and tutoring to fill my free time. Perhaps it would cure this feeling of uselessness but I need to address the fact that I lack energy and motivation everyday before being able to do those things. I don't like doing things unless I'm fully engaged and enthusiastic in doing it otherwise I feel guilty towards others I'm working with hence why I still feel absolutely useless. This is just one thing I struggle with. A lot of the other things have been discussed by others, such as my inability to be myself around people outside of my family. For now I don't want to lose that ability completely. What should I do?

why can't i make friends

replies: 3

i don't even know why i am posting this, i guess it's just easier when i can write everything down and not try to explain it to someone. Every year i try to make friends and it goes okay and then it's like i slowly start to pull away and all my friends go in one direction and i'm left all alone. Ever since i can remember i would try my best to make friends and fit in but i still ended up feeling lonely towards the end of the year. I like being on my own and i think that is part of the problem. I want to just have space to relax and do my own thing and in doing so i think people just end up leaving me alone. I have extreme social awkwardness and anxiety. I struggle to make a conversation with people outside my immediate family like cousins and family friends who i have known all my life. So making friends is absolutely terrifying and difficult. I think one of the things i struggle with is my sister who is two years older than me. She goes out with her friends almost every day and comes home late every night. She is always making fun of me and saying i don't have any friends. I have one friend but she's not very nice and picks on me all the time. Last year she told the whole school that i punched her. lots of people came up to me and were being really rude. We eventually made up after a few weeks but I lost most of my friends because of that. She makes fun of me and tells really mean jokes about me but she's been my friend for 5 years and if i stop being friends with her i will have no one to sit with. School starts back on Monday and i am terrified. We have been at home in quarantine for almost three months and my social skills have declined even further. My homeroom teacher started making me see the school psychologist a few months ago but i don't know how i'm meant to talk about everything. I just feel all alone all the time and even when i hang with other people it just makes me want to go sit alone because i don't know how to connect and fit in to their conversations. I keep asking my mum to let me move schools which might be terrifying to some people but i just want a fresh start where no one knows me and i can just be myself. I had one friend who i felt like actually knew me and i could talk to and open up to but she moved back to England at the end of last year. i have tried everything i play lot's of sports, i join school clubs but i always feel like im in this bubble and i don't know how to get out. Please i need help i don't know what to do.

Constant jealousy and possessiveness over boyfriend.

replies: 7

Hello to whoever has clicked onto this thread. I’m an 19 year old female who has been with her boyfriend since February 2019. I don’t know where to start. These things are hard to put into words. We have a good relationship. He treats me well and respects me at all times. Just at the beginning of our relationship we did have some ups and downs. We had people trying to get between us and it caused some arguments. Fast forward a couple months and we are happy and in a healthy relationship. We love each other so much and all is well. This year before COVID came along, he went out one night with friends and decided to flirt with another girl. All they did was flirt but it ruined everything. I haven’t been able to trust him the same. We have spoken about it a million times and yes he regrets it so much and swears black and blue he would never do it again. Technically he didn’t physically cheat but I see it as him emotionally cheating on me. He seeked the attention of another woman and I just can’t understand why. If you knew the two of us you would never think we would hurt each other because we truly are in love and seem like the happiest and strongest couple ever. It’s just since then, I’ve become possessive and I hate it. I’m continuously jealous. I try to avoid watching movies with decent looking girls in it because I don’t want him to “check them out”, I get super jealous when I see him liking photos of other girls on Instagram (I’ve spoken to him about this and he has stopped it but I know he still does it here and there), I feel sick at the thought of him thinking someone else is better than me, I continuously try to change myself so he will always want me, and there’s so much more. I’ve had to delete social media because I always go on his account and see him following all these new girls full of Botox and it just makes me feel so sh*tty and makes me feel like I need to change myself all the time. I continuously cry over this because I hate feeling and being like this. Ive even started to have dreams of him physically cheating on me and it kills me!!!! I’ve become a toxic person and it’s gotten to the point where the way I’m feeling is absolutely ridiculous and I feel stupid for even telling him half the things I’m feeling. I just want to get better. I hate being like this. I hate constantly being jealous and possessive. I just love him so much and I don’t want to lose him to someone else.

New here and just want to let out some thoughts

replies: 24

Hi, As I’ve mentioned this is my first time posting on a forum. Um, so I just wanted to talk about mood swings and how it’s affecting my life so far. I’m at uni currently and just switched courses because my previous one made me so miserable, mostly because of my fluctuating mood. I couldn’t bring myself to do much work on most days because my mind was filled with thoughts about how I don’t deserve to be there and how I’m not capable enough. I should probably mention that I have experienced these thoughts for many years and have had mood swings for the same amount. I initially chalked it down to hormones seeing how it coincided with my teenage years but later on I began to think that maybe that’s not it. At one point in the last few years, I found myself attending therapy where I was diagnosed with mild depression. My main concern is with my studies, because I’ve become avoidant of my responsibilities towards my degree because well... it scares me. I want to go on to study educational psychology myself in the future (hopefully) but my mental health may become an issue as it’s stood in the way of my passion before. I really would like to get better but I just don’t know how. If anyone could share strategies that have worked for them or someone they know I’d greatly appreciate it.

Body dysmorphic disorder

replies: 3

I need help. If anyone here has suffered from body dysmorphia, please tell me things you did to get better. I can’t even look at myself without crying.

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

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

I feel lonely replies: 3

Seeking help with an unaccepting family replies: 3

i dont know whats my purpose replies: 3

the emptiness never seems to leave/ i wish i could love myself fully replies: 8

Struggling this year (like many others) replies: 5

overachiever who doesn't know how to seek help replies: 2

why can't i make friends replies: 3

Constant jealousy and possessiveness over boyfriend. replies: 7

New here and just want to let out some thoughts replies: 24

Body dysmorphic disorder replies: 3