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 like it will just be my parents and I forever

replies: 4

Growing up I really struggled to keep positive friendships and be part of teams because of self esteem issues . If I wasn’t perfect at something I would talk my way out of it and feel it is hard to get any passions because I am so consumed by wanting to impress others. I am extremely close with my parents and spend all my time with them because of my inability to form strong friendships . I find it hard to socialise because I talk to my parents about everything instead of talking to others my own age and our relationship has gotten really toxic because I project my anger of not being able to make friends onto them. I want to build myself as a person but hate joining groups as I feel I will be rejected and made fun of, this means I have no where to build connections outside of school. I am lost and have no idea who I am. I am so self absorbed I find it hard to concentrate on other things such as school work and my friends issues and am constantly comparing my lack of friendships and relationships to others. Should I move out of home and go to boarding school to not rely on my parents? How can I stop being so sensitive and just start forming lasting friendships I feel as though I have tried so many different groups and sports but none stick.

I'm feeling horribly isolated because of who and where I am.

replies: 2

Hey all. I'm sorry if this post isn't great or formatted correctly or something like that. I've never been very good at forums. After proofreading I've noticed it's a poorly paragraphed and inconsistent ramble and stream of thoughts more than anything but I haven't slept and I'm too lazy to correct things and gather my thoughts. I don't even know what I want out of this post. I'm a 17 year old bi transgender girl and I've had low functioning depression and anxiety for roughly half of my life. I feel so isolated and trapped in my town. The closest transgender support group to me has not only disbanded, but they were transmasculine exclusively. All of my friends are cisgendered and straight, and while I trust them and love them so much, I can't properly tell them how my situation is making me feel, despite me being out to all of them and them all being supportive. They also all live more than two hours away from me, since my mum and I have had to move constantly because of landlords selling houses. I've tried to find other gender-diverse Australians, and when I do, they're all in other states (QLD and VIC are the main two I've noticed) or the ones who are in NSW are all from Sydney or much older than me, moreso than what I'm comfortable with, or both. I missed my last psychiatrist appointment because I slept through it and couldn't get out of bed. Now we don't have enough money for me to have another one. I didn't really have a "teenagehood". Despite being friends with most of my schoolmates when I was in school, I felt like I wasn't much more than a classtime joke-slinger. None of my school friends invited me to the nights out they had, and when I made plans outside of school, everyone ghosted me or cancelled at the last second (except for one of my best friends). And while I know that high-school relationships are mostly superficial and almost never go anywhere - I hate that I never had one because of who I am. idk what exactly I want out of this post - maybe to know that someone like me exists near me? For just once in my life I want someone to hold me and actually care for me.

New to this please excuse the length

replies: 3

I have recently been involved in a unhealthy household amongst other young people where things escalated beyond reason so I moved from that environment back to my other accommodation and we recently had some visitors who I use to live with and they were nasty to me then so I kept my distance this time around. On of the girls that I live with was seeing this person and did things in which I do not condone in and I found it disrespectful for them to being doing those things within a living environment where others had not been exposed to it. I spoke to this girl about the issue and she addressed that she didn't like to hear I didn't like this person and was quite defensive about the issue and we didn't see eye to eye, I also discussed other issues with her about other people and where things stood, this has since been turned around and twisted and I have been accused of lying. Thursday whilst I was at work I was informed if I come into contact with anyone traveling to Sydney or coming from Sydney I can be asked to remain away from work for 3-5 days to prevent the passing of the COVID-19. I emailed the head resident and spoke to him about my concerns with certain people traveling to and from the area of Sydney, he responded and they are in the process of getting a form out to protect everyone. Friday evening this same girl came and went off at me accusing me of ratting her out because she was planning on traveling to Sydney and I simply said my job is in the line and she then used other information of which was disclosed to her in private against me and tried to belittle me and bully me out if the dorm living. J have since had two panic attacks and am feeling quite fearful for my wellbeing

Feeling Stressed

replies: 2

I have been feeling recently really anxious with no reason. I can't really relax, or go to sleep without music and meditation. If I don't go without music, meditation or drawing for more than a few hours then i start to have panic attacks where I feel really stressed and something bad is about to happen. It feels like something is heavy on my chest and I can't breathe properly. Also some intense types of music trigger these attacks too. I am coping okay with everything in quarantine so I don't know what I am stressed about. The stress is making me break out too. I am just getting really tired of being on edge all the time and I don't know what to do. Does anyone have similar problems like this? -Cassie

Emotional detachment?

replies: 3

hi, so I'm not sure what to call it but for majority of my life I have struggled to feel love. I know instinctively that my family and friends love me. but I don't feel anything. When I think about the words and their meaning I feel empty like I'm missing something. This ultimately causes me to feel quite different when I hear about my friends talking about people they are attracted too or how much they love their family. I believe this is what caused me to feel disconnected and distant from the world, I dont feel like I belong, if I stay with a group of people for too long I begin to feel emotional pain. throughout my life I have especially struggled with knowing the value of myself as a person, I dont feel I have any self worth. thus I naturally hate myself. every time someone acknowledges me, every time I receive complements or even when the people closest to me say they care for me, I can't help but feel as though they only say so out of pity. like its their obligation to say so. every time I just hate myself more and feel ever so more disconnected from people. its hard to open up to my family because I've tried 3 times now and each time they claim they understand and yet they still treat me the same, they belittle my issues whilst complaining about how hard their life is. it makes me angry because having my value ignored hurts even more than accepting my own irrelevance. is it possible to have emotional numbness for a specific emotion? or do I have something else entirely? do I even have a problem? am I just making something out of nothing? thanks for listening

Born a Sadist?

replies: 2

Troy here. Since Kindergarten, I have seemingly derived pleasure out of other's physical pain. I had a female friend then, and she always seemed to get hurt. I remember feeling some guilt in these instances, which makes me wonder if I was inflicting the pain covertly; my memorys are hazy. When we were to draw ourselves in the career of our choice, I strangely drew my self as a creepy doctor with a circular saw standing over a busty woman on a surgery table. I was not abused as a child, and my parents/teachers didn't seem to notice. I would go on my slap my older brother across the face with a plastic frog and laugh hysterically for no reason shortly thereafter. From anecdotes relayed to me in my teens, I was adored by my older sister's female friends ad nauseum; I was the envy of mothers--a cute kid. But wouldn't this just make me a narcissist? Nowadays, at 19, I have seemingly dropped the intense sadism I have felt towards teenage girls when I was ages 16-18, but occasional and breif episodes will occur when I am intensly attracted to a particilar female. I hope that I will cease to experience intense surges of aggression when coming into contact with teenage females. However, I am bewhildered as to how I became a sadist in the first place. Are my genetics to blame? Does being adored by females in childhood constitute an environment condusive to the development of sadism?

Venting problems

replies: 3

Hi, - I want to be an animator. However the animation industry in Australia is minuscule and I’m sure that I can’t get a job even if I complete a degree. I could get a job in the filming industry, however the filming industry in Australia is not doing well, either. - I want to get a part time job so that I can support myself financially and don’t have to ask my parents for cash— however I can’t even study well and my parents say that I am not responsible enough for one because I don’t even wash the dishes at home. - Getting a part time job is just giving me the stigma that art majors are homeless and live in poverty or whatever. My parents joke about how after I finish an animation degree I’ll be forced to wash dishes to pay bills anyway. - I don’t wash the dishes at home because I want to focus all my time on studying since I am in year 12. The only problem is that I procrastinate too much because I am too daunted to actually do schoolwork. - I’m failing schoolwork anyway, especially since a lot of my assignments are now just half-finished crap because O procrastinate. - I hate sharing my problems with real people because I’m scared that I’ll use them like a therapist or they’ll throw me away after they get sick of me. It’s what happened to my best friend. - I spend most of my time online and roleplay characters since I find it a good way of escapism. I primarily spend my free time watching video essays about media on YouTube. - I’m skeptical of people who say that I should pursue my career choice, because my parents judge me for being too lazy and never even drawing. I do draw, I just complete hastily finished sketches. - I’ve been trying to practise violin for my 8th grade violin test— however, because of my above choices I don’t have the motivation to. And I don’t have the motivation to especially since AMEB grades does not contribute to ATAR grades at all. So I end up not practising violin for several weeks. - Real life is exhausting, and I get discouraged by my choices and my inability to make a good decision. Which forces me to get addicted to online media even more. I know it’s my fault for getting addicted to social media and that I lack discipline or whatever, but I‘m scared about how I’d rather live online than in real life, and that’s not good for me. Help? Advice?

I feel weird?

replies: 3

So as of the past maybe 10 months I don’t feel the same, I get stressed more and isolate from friends. I’ve been feeling super insecure which isn’t usually like me. I don’t feel normal. Sometimes I just sit in the dark and cry. I often leave class because I get random shakes and short breath, sometimes it makes me cry. No one knows this. I’m not comfortable talking to my parents but feel I may need to see a professional. I have been doing research and a lot of the stuff I feel sounds like anxiety. How do I stop feeling this way? I can’t describe to entirety how I feel but I just don’t feel right? I feel kinda numb. - at 17yrs old is this normal?

Failing in life

replies: 7

This year I'm 25, and I feel like I have failed in every area of life as a young person. Many people around my age already have the basics together- finished school, got an entry level job at least, have some savings, have a social circle already, are getting into relationships, moving out and moving forward in life. However I'm stuck. I started uni when I was 18 but dropped out when I was 20, was a bit lost until I was 23 and started picking back up my life again. My only completed qualification I have is a TAFE course, I only have about 1 year working experience in my field, I'm still studying online at uni and only barely over half way there. Just went to 4 job interviews in the past 2 weeks but got rejected by 2 of them cause of a lack of experience compared to other candidates. Since the whole virus thing is going on, I just want to find some stable work and financially stablise a little bit but finding no success so far. I still live with my parents, don't have much of a relationship with my family due to them being abusive to me in the past, still can't drive and not financially stable enough to move out. I'm hopeless when it comes to my social life too, I currently have no friends, nor do I have acquaintances that I keep in contact with, I've never been in any romantic relationship. I spend all my days stuck at home, looking for work online- sending in resumes, making cover letters and filling out long lists of addressment criterias. But my failures are burning me out in this area. Other than that I try to focus on my online studies, but its really hard to when I feel so down and alone. Only time I go out of my house is to go to job interviews. Really wished I could hold down a stable job, have some friends and relationships by my age but I'm still like a lost kid. My low self esteem keeps weighing me down emotionally and sometimes I just end up in tears all by myself, crying into my pillows at home.

Social Media incident from years back

replies: 3

Hello everyone, In 2016, I did something that I was and am not proud of. I sent an image that I wasn't proud of- kind of got manipulated into sending it. Anyway, I really struggled following this incident and felt really shitty and disgusted at myself. Anyway, the first year was tough real tough as a lot of people at school were asking me about it. I kept trying to avoid it at every instance I could and it find of went away. It doesn't come up all the time but when things that have anything to do with that or something similar even if it isn't me, my mind casts back to that moment and I cannot seem to move on or get it out of my mind what happened. I just want to be able to forget about it. I am usually really really busy so it gets my mind off it but when I have alone time, you can imagine what I am thinking about. I just don't know what to do. As it is quite a private, sensitive incident that happened and me wanting to keep it under wraps, it kind of is hard to deal with it. Does anyone have any advice. I just really want to be able to move on with my life even though the majority of people I interact with and talk to have no idea. As it was really my worst mistake in my life, you can probably imagine how bad I feel about it and in reality, it probably isn't that big at all. I must also add, the people involved I have tried to avoid since the incident and that particular person, I haven't spoken to them and blocked them out of my life since 2016.

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

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

I feel like it will just be my parents and I forever replies: 4

I'm feeling horribly isolated because of who and where I am. replies: 2

New to this please excuse the length replies: 3

Feeling Stressed replies: 2

Emotional detachment? replies: 3

Born a Sadist? replies: 2

Venting problems replies: 3

I feel weird? replies: 3

Failing in life replies: 7

Social Media incident from years back replies: 3